Waterloo Sunrise

It's Monday, so it must be over-running engineering works.

Sure enough, we roll in to London a little over an hour late (actually "approximately fifty-eight minutes late" is how the announcer always puts it, as they have to pay compensation if it's an hour or more).
I don't mind. I'm having a Rosie Thomas morning on the iPod, so I'm nicely chilled out (Thanks, Robyn; it sure is a beautiful album).

It's actually a clear(ish) morning (we're between storms) so I amble my long walky route, figuring I'm late, so it won't matter if I'm a little later.
Watching the sun come up under Tower Bridge is always a treat, and seeing the sunlight light up the bridges ahead of me has me singing Waterloo Sunset, causing frightened looks on the faces of commuters walking the other way.

So here I am on another yummy monday. No more weekend chores to do; just a nice no-brainer day making stuff in 3D.

Walking across London, the thought comes to me that Ame and her hubby only need to learn one phrase when they come over here next month.
In fact all Americans should learn it as it will cause hostility to fade away in an instant and they will be greeted by helpful smiling Brits.
The phrase is: "Actually, we're Canadian."

I won't recommend lots of things for Ame to do or places to go as there are just too many and a lot of them wiill depend on the weather.
Besides which, Ame's tastes and mine (indeed everybody's tastes and mine) are unlikely to coincide.
For instance, one of my favourite places is the Hunterian Collection (part of the Royal College of Surgeons), a splendid, free and newly revamped cornucopia of medical curiosities, including a whole wall of diseased penises and the Bishop of Durham's anus in a jar (not the present Bishop, I hasten to add).

But two things I would recommend are:
- A go on the slides at the Tate Modern (Wheeee …);
- The London Eye (Spiffy).

Hints for Eye travellers: I'd usually recommend booking well in advance, but in February, the weather is likely to bugger this up.
What I normally do is book the combined Eye trip and river excursion. It's well cheap, and the trip down the Thames to Tower Bridge and back is great (I do love tooling up and down the Thames; it's a lovely way to see London).
The other hint is: The Eye officialy opens at 10:30. If you get there half an hour earlier, they are sometimes starting it up and they let people get on before the queues build up. If you're lucky, you can get a whole gondola to yourselves.
You can see my office from up there, so do wave.

The comments box welcomes suggestions for Ame's trip.
Real ones today, please. Any more silly suggestions can go in yesterday's comments box.

Tips For Ame

Ame and her hubby are visiting London in February and she has asked for some tips on language and culture to ease their path.

Here are a few simple "London" rules to start them off:

- Taxi drivers only accept large denomination notes (that box thing in the front is full of change; they get rid of it for the banks).

- Never tip a London taxi driver; they find it offensive.

- When alighting from a crowded bus or train, it is considered polite to stop just outside the doorway for a few seconds and admire the view.

- All ticket machines in London accept US coins.

- In restaurants, braying into a mobile phone is considered a sign of sophistication.

- Smoking is permitted in all museums and galleries.

- Prices given by taxi and bus drivers are open to friendly haggling (you should need to pay between half and two-thirds of the quoted price).

- Given our "special relationship" with the US, American tourists have preference in London. Always proceed to the head of any queue, simply waving your passport and stating clearly "We're Americans".

- In London's many food markets, browsing shoppers are encouraged to take a piece of fruit, free of charge, from any open-air stall or display.

- "No Smoking" signs refer solely to cigarettes. Cigars and pipes are permitted.

- Always stand on the left side of escalators, leaving the right side free for those in a hurry.

- To hail a cab, simply step into the road and raise your middle finger to the driver.

I hope these tips will be of some assistance, Ame.
Should anyone wish to add to this list, the comments box is open and waiting.

The Lynn Experiment

Okay, so it didn't work this time, but I've decided to give it a go.

For those who can't be arsed to read the comments (always the best bits of my blog … at least until I post a photo of my bottom), Lynn has been - I hesitate to say "nagging " - but I will anyway; Lynn has been nagging me to go out to our lovely Norfolk country pubs and look for a woman.

Today I finally cracked under the pressure of a particularly powerful nagging spell and headed off to Ranworth, to the Maltsters; one of the loveliest pubs on the broads and right opposite Ranworth broad. Beautiful views, good beer and food, picturesque village. Only about five or six miles away, so no real hassle.

So. Dive's "dating rating" for the Maltsters:
Contents: One barman. Two blokes playing darts.
Potential for Luurve: Er … Didn't really fancy any of 'em.
Outside, admiring the broad: A small bunch of ducks (Bunch? Herd? Flock? Quack? … I'll call them a "niggle" of ducks).
Dating rating: A big fat zilch.
The coffee wasn't that good, either.
I know for a fact the beer and food are excellent but it was the middle of the afternoon and I was driving, so coffee it was.

I suppose to save myself from more of the 'n' word, I shall have to continue this experiment.
If anyone knows of any pubs on the broads where single, attractive, bookish, academic, artsy women (with poor eyesight and low self-esteem) are likely to hang out, please let me know.
Oh … and "slim" … I forgot to mention "slim". Anybody remotely cuddly can breathe a big sigh of relief now.

Drive In Saturday

Sigh … Why do I go into Norwich every saturday morning?
It's always the same …

"The city is where the women are at!" I hear you cry.

Well, that's as maybe. But other than a smile from a lady in the coffee shop when I gave her my Guardian Review (she had been ogling it covetously, but hey, I've got a great ass; why wasn't she ogling that?), the place was pretty much a date-free zone.
As usual, I met Phil, caffeinated myself, soaked it up with a croissant and hit the bookshops. What a sad fucking excuse for a life.
Two hefty bags of books and a DVD later and I'm coming home, dateless as always, to start the weekend's housework.

I even tried a different coffee shop.
Coffee: Very good indeed.
Croissant: Middling and slightly greasy to the touch.
Free Paper: Today's Guardian already split into parts so I could nick the Review without scattering paper everywhere (Why do they always put that poxy "Family" section inside the Review? Literary Review readers don't have families. Is it just to rub that fact in our faces)?
Seats: Good selection; we chose "comfy" for our old arses.
Air con: too cold for Phil, just right for me.
Women: Mostly couples; one or two frumpy thirty-somethings (including the smiley one). No bookish looking literary/arty types for poor old Dive.
Overall: Probably go there again, but not regularly.

Unusually, the bookshops were totty-free. All the girls must still be frantically buying shoes in the New Year sales.

So … Coloureds in the washing machine; drag the hoover out of the understairs cupboard; here comes my drudgy old weekend.
I think I'll stop using the label: "Dating" and use "Not Dating instead".

Roll on monday.

Keep Fit With Dive

Righto.
Time for a photoblog.

This one's for Ame as she and hubby are coming over to London in February to experience all the rain and misery they can't get in beautiful, sunny California.
And because she used the word "neato" in a comment yesterday.

This is actually a little travelogue I put together for Mum last summer when she wanted to see all the things I see on my walk to work.
This is, of course, after the 4:40 alarm call, the drive from the Norfolk Broads into Norwich and the two and a half hour train drag into London Liverpool Street Station.
We join the journey when I'm at the station and continue it all the way to Westminster.
If it's tipping it down, I'll only walk to Mansion House, then dive onto the tube, but I do this walk at least three days a week (both ways); more in the spring and autumn.

Unfortunately, you'll have to click on the pictures to get the text big enough to read, but it's quite a nice walk so I think it's worth it.

You'll notice there's only one picture actually taken in rush hour. Mainly because stopping to take a picture in rush hour is a monumentally stupid thing to do, unless you wish to learn some colourful new words and possibly have your camera take a photo of the inside of your bottom …

And to keep fit, you must do this journey at breakneck speed, carrying a coat, a brolly, today's Guardian, a bag with all sorts of junk in it and another bag with a stupidly heavy Apple seventeen inch widescreen Powerbook in …
… in ALL weathers.

Enjoy:



























Another couple of hundred yards and I reach my office, some pictures of which are in this old post.

Then I put in a full day's work and go all the way back home again.

Every day …

And you wonder why I get tired sometimes.

A Short Break

Just to break things up so that my comment box doesn't get too long again:

If anybody misses the debauchery of the past few days and has not yet been over to her blog today, young Spinny has a splendid post up.

I for one, am determined to keep it clean(ish) for a bit as it's been so long since I indulged in any nudie prod games that even the thought of them may provoke an unfortunate injury.

Oh, and THIS turned up on the Engrish site today. Kinda reminds me of National Drunk Blogging Day … Eurgh … Never again.

The Circadian Rhythm Method

Let's update that pesky Brontë bird, shall we?

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in
possession of a bloody good job and a nice house (and who also irons), must be in want of a wife/partner/girlfriend/shag/good cuddle/whatever."

Thankfully, now that I'm back in the hectic routine of commuter hell, the lonelies seem to have receded a bit.

Before I expand on that, I feel I must apologise to my dear blogpals for my appalling mood swings over the past week or so.
While they've certainly brought in the old comments - 46 yesterday, 55 the day before - I don't really enjoy bouncing from euphoria to despair every few hours.
And then yesterday, exhaustion hit me … BAM!
I know some people pay good money to experience those effects. Well, they're welcome to 'em. They fuck me up big time.

After two lovely weeks of natural circadian rhythms (groovy), my poor old body is going through the transition shock of getting back into the old "4:40AM leap screaming out of bed/seven hour commute with a full working day in the middle/get home knackered, check my posts and tumble into bed" routine.

The first few days back after a break are always hard and my body gets its revenge by kicking my brain around my skull until I don't know which way is up. Hence the mood swings followed by exhaustion. It's like jet-lag, only nastier.

The one good side-effect of all this is that I now don't have time to get miserable and lonely. It seems that if I keep moving and keep busy, I can keep the lonelies at bay. Depression can't be arsed to catch up with me; it's too much like hard work.

The down side of course, is that loneliness lies in wait, ready to drag me down into despair whenever I so much as stop for a breather. Douglas Adams was right about Sunday afternoons: "The long, dark teatime of the soul" …
I've learned to do my ironing then; around tea time, in front of something funny like a Red Dwarf DVD.

So basically, I've not really got anything to say this morning other than I'm exhausted, but gradually getting back into my routine, and that even with all of your wonderful dating advice over the past week I still don't have a clue about how to find my "wife/partner/girlfriend/shag/good cuddle/whatever."

Hey ho … Same old same old Dive …

Enough, Already

My God. What have I done?

I've just got back from work and seen the comment total from my last post. I'm not even going to bother to open it as I have a good idea about what's in there and its not pretty.

As Sassy has pointed out, we children have got a little overexcited and need to calm down.
I admit I kind of asked for it and apologise for that, but I've had a knackering journey home and now I just want a nice sit down with a glass of wine before bed … and no more debauchery …

So I'm putting the toys back in the box. If you'd like to tiptoe quietly out and go play at Mister Knudsen's house, I'm sure he would be glad to accommodate you.

He has posted a lovely picture of some kittens.

Nighty-night …

Boswell On Puffin Frottage

So at last young Sassy's eyes have been uncovered and she becomes aware of that deliciously tactile French term for "rubbing" (we shall ignore the appalling "modern" usage of the term "dry hump").

The more observant among you will have noticed the occasional reference in this blog to "puffin frottage", an arcane Hebridean practice which, when introduced to Norfolk, with its singular lack of puffins, has led to the almost total extinction of the delightful bittern.

Digging through my second edition of Boswell's Travels With Doctor Johnson, I stumble upon the earliest known literary reference to the practice of puffin frottage.
This passage was mysteriously omitted from subsequent editions, much - in my view - to their detriment.

To further my young colonial correspondent's education on the subject (notwithstanding and acknowledging her Masters Degree in History), I shall now quote verbatim from Boswell's admittedly verbose chapters on Scotland:
(the following passage to be proclaimed slowly and in a pompous voice):

"Our second day upon these desolate Northern Isles sees the inestimable Doctor Johnson engaged in financial negotiations with one of their fiercely parsimonious inhabitants, that we may bear witness to an arcane practice of these shores, the viewing of which the Good Doctor, in his immeasurable wisdom has long since desired.

Presently, negotiations concluded, we are ushered in to a rude stone hut under a turf roof. Inside, peering through a stygian gloom, I behold a circle of thickly clad women, of varied yet indeterminate age, surrounding an open peat fire, the smoke from which tears mine eyes.

The women sit upon crude rocking chairs, excepting the youngest, who is seated by long custom upon a tussock of peat. Beside the hearth lays a rough sack, the contents of which appear in constant and agitated motion.
These are the "Puffins". For we are here to witness that most secretive of all winter practices in these barren Northlands; that of "Puffin Frottage", a traditional and communal afternoon's diversion for those of the Island's women who are unable - through injury or lack of wit - to knit.

The puffins have been brought here as every morning by the men of the broch; said birds being simple creatures to capture by the very method of placing netting over their burrows at night. They are a smallish seabird with a white breast, but are possessed of a fearsome beak disproportionate to their size.

At a given signal the eldest woman reaches into the sack and produces a puffin. We see that - to protect the participants' "delicacies", each bird's head and beak is encased in a decorative padded leathern hood, or "hoood" in the enchanting dialect of this outlandish folk. The puffin is apt for use, being easy to grasp in one hand, even for so delicate a creature as one of the fairer sex, and the bird appears soft and downy, yet with a firmness of body within.

The Good Doctor and myself are seated at either side of the hearth and watch, transfixed, as bird after bird is revealed from within the sack and passed around the circle until at length all but our good selves are possessed of the means to "frot".

By and by, using their free hand, the women lift their heavy skirts and - eldest to youngest and always in a clockwise direction as tradition dictates - the "frot" commences. The hooded puffins are at first rubbed vigorously to excite and agitate them to frenzied movement and then applied to the womens' delicate regions where a more gentle motion is subsequently pursued.

Propriety forbids me to elucidate further, yet I may inform you with some authority - for we witnessed this activity daily during our stay - that the "frot" continues for some hours, the womenfolk whiling the afternoon away in traditional song, or by turns chattering and gossiping among themselves in their soft brogue, only interrupted by the occasional strangled gasp or squeak from one or other "frotter".

Custom further dictates that if, during the "frot" a puffin should become asphyxiated by one of the younger and less experienced "frotters", this unfortunate woman shall be summoned forthwith to the hut of the "Puffin Catchers" where she shall bare her nethermost region and endure summary and severe chastisement with leathern strops, and after, be constrained to wear the deceased bird hung around her neck until two full moons have passed.

Doctor Johnson later became unduly distressed when, during our entire week's sojourn in the Isles not one bird was lost; as he had expressed a passionate interest in witnessing this quaint local custom.

Upon our return to the Metropolis, the Good Doctor attempted - with limited success - to introduce the practice to London Society, utilising the common pigeon as a device of "frot" due to the paucity of puffins hereabouts."

A bit of a pompous windbag, our Bozzer, but 'twas the spirit of the age (or something) …

Apparently - and I would ask our esteemed Mister Knudsen (the Doctor Johnson of our generation) to confirm this - the practice is still current in the nether reaches of Scotland and the Isles.
I would advise anyone wishing to try it at home, however, to Watch That Beak!

So it was a boring train journey last night.
I did what any sane man would do and wrote about frottage.

Normal blog service will be resumed if I ever get out of the seminar I'll be stuck in all day today.
Meanwhile, here is some light music …

Ironing

Okay, let's get away from this stupid dating business. It's not going to happen so why bother?

Let's talk about ironing.

Letting slip the fact that I iron (never mind the fact that I also cook, clean, dispose of spiders humanely and provide a warm body for cold feet in bed, ladies) has provoked almost as much of a reaction as when I pointed out that denim skirts are slightly less sexually attractive than unblocking drains with your tongue.

Do none of you have a partner who irons? … None? … NONE?

Okay. Let's do something about it.
First up, try not ironing their clothes for a couple of weeks and see how much of a stink they kick up. Then just hand 'em the iron and go sit in their favourite chair in front of the TV with a beer.
The reason I iron is not because it's as much fun as drugs and sex; I iron because I don't like to go out looking like a moose slept in my clothes. And if I don't do it, then who the hell will?

Listen up, girls. Men say they're crap at ironing and do it really badly for a reason. The same reason as claiming they can't cook (except at barbecues where they can wear a pinny openly).
It's because we like having you around to skivvy for us. The same as we like sitting in front of the TV with a beer, or surfing the net for porn.

So rise up, sisters! Make the lazy fuckers do their share.
Deprive them of your sexual favours (or at least ration them to when you are in the mood) until they can do a decent job of ironing their own shirts.
Sneak up on them when they are online, then click on their "history" button to see the kind of filth they look at. Then, while they're still in the room, surf for pictures of men with huge cocks, to see how they like it.
And remember, if your partner has a personal password for "his" computer, he is hiding something.

Hee hee …
I do like stirring things up …
If I can't have a relationship, at least I can mess up other peoples'.