Thursday, June 23, 2005

In Which Our Heroine Gets a New Hat
Right. Bit sleepy of late, which is what comes of not getting to bed on time. And the actual concept of work means not lots of time to run around and cover the bits and bobs of what's been happening here in Britannia. But a bit of a recap.

When last we heard of our heroine (that would be me) she was headed to Ascot without a chapeau. This was causing her great consternation, as it seemed to be rude and just not the done thing, but in typical form she (still me, that is) would not be stopped.

End third person narrative, it is just plain pretentious.

Anyway.......first there was the back to work element, which was a most joyous occasion, and there was much rejoicing. I had one day at work before heading up to York for Ascot, and everyone was very nice. I think it will be a good job until I get replaced (they're looking for someone permanent, and that isn't to be me). One of the perks of the job is that at the end of the week, the PAs (personal assistant) get to take the flowers home if they like. I wound up taking a massive bunch of expensive flowers up to York which were a hit for the following reasons:
1) Michaela loves flowers, and this provided four vases of them scattered around the house.
2) Gareth, in his Yorkshireness, likes the fact that I didn't have to pay for the expensive flowers.
3) They have a son with quite severe autism, who occasionally destroys things. Were he to destroy the flowers, no big deal as no out of pocket cost. All in all, a winner.

This actually worked out particularly well the next morning when I was trying to adopt a proper stiff upper lip attitude re lack of hat. Mic remembered that she had a couple hats up in the cupboard, and suddenly she had her old hat from her wedding/going away outfit which matched her new dress, and she had a big straw black hat which was very plain "but maybe we can put a scarf on it or something."
\r\n \r\nI promptly pinned two whacking lilies to it and voila, it was perfect for Ascot. Matched the flowers on my dress and all. We were set.\r\n \r\nWe were actually more than set, as Lian had arrived nice and early and poached us a table, enough chairs and a blue parasol. This all came in handy, and as other people realized this they attempted to nick them off her. The force runs strong in her, though - more than we ever realized. In addition to successfully defending our chairs from the rabble, she also went from "so do all the horses have four legs then" type expertise to coming out substantially in profit on the day\'s betting, winning four out of six races. The rest of us were far from so lucky, although we mostly broke even apart from Kevin, who couldn\'t win a pence despite trying. Never mind, we oogled hats, we waved to Queenie (who waved back - very sociable that Queenie) we tried to pick the form, and we drank Pimms amidst an ever deepening coat of 30 proof sunblock.\r\n\r\n \r\nIt was great.\r\n \r\nIt was also exhausting, all that sitting out in the sun drinking gin based things. \r\n \r\nWe met up with Gareth for dins, but beat a relatively hasty retreat back to the house after that as collapse was iminent. And the next morning I had to head to Cambridge for loads of birthday type celebrations. Thankfully, these were understated as was truly warranted. Mostly sitting out in the back garden in the sun (not so hot as the day before though) sipping champagne with strawberries and then having afternoon tea with homemade fresh scones, jam and clotted cream as one should. Back to London at night, and back to work the next morning. It all went well, and tomorrow is payday, which is not to be sniffed at. Ah, the end of iminent poverty!\r\n\r\n \r\nAnd again, there was much rejoicing......\r\nLove\r\nAnne-- Anne Wolfe, Esq, LL.M.Mobile: ( 07890) 462-212",1]
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I promptly pinned two whacking lilies to it and voila, it was perfect for Ascot. Matched the flowers on my dress and all. We were set.

We were actually more than set, as Lian had arrived nice and early and poached us a table, enough chairs and a blue parasol. This all came in handy, and as other people realized this they attempted to nick them off her. The force runs strong in her, though - more than we ever realized. In addition to successfully defending our chairs from the rabble, she also went from "so do all the horses have four legs then" type expertise to coming out substantially in profit on the day's betting, winning four out of six races. The rest of us were far from so lucky, although we mostly broke even apart from Kevin, who couldn't win a pence despite trying. Never mind, we oogled hats, we waved to Queenie (who waved back - very sociable that Queenie) we tried to pick the form, and we drank Pimms amidst an ever deepening coat of 30 proof sunblock.

It was great.

It was also exhausting, all that sitting out in the sun drinking gin based things.

We met up with Gareth for dins, but beat a relatively hasty retreat back to the house after that as collapse was iminent. And the next morning I had to head to Cambridge for loads of birthday type celebrations. Thankfully, these were understated as was truly warranted. Mostly sitting out in the back garden in the sun (not so hot as the day before though) sipping champagne with strawberries and then having afternoon tea with homemade fresh scones, jam and clotted cream as one should. Back to London at night, and back to work the next morning. It all went well, and tomorrow is payday, which is not to be sniffed at. Ah, the end of iminent poverty!

And again, there was much rejoicing......
Love
Anne

Monday, June 06, 2005

In Which Our Heroine Lives the Life of the Shiftless Poor
I don't have a job yet. It isn't for lack of trying, although my friend Jim insists there are council estates just waiting for people like me, the shiftless layabout unemployed. Frankly, it is driving me mad not having anything to do - I can't take it.

So, apart from more applying for jobs and more appointments with temp agencies, today I got even more proactive. I was asked at a lunch after graduation if I would keep writing book reviews for the Bi-Monthly Review of Law Books. I confirmed this today by e-mail (me in the UK, the head of the BMRLR in Mexico, which he says is hot and polluted), and then set about looking for newly published books that would be interesting to me to read and then review. This serves a few purposes. It gives review and criticism to books, which is somethign publishers are looking for (and something doens't particularly happen a lot with legal tomes). It also gets them a bit of publicity - people may not know the books are out there, and bearing in mind the price of books (one I requested today is $300 or £165 in the UK) they may be a bit wary about forking it out if they don't know it is good. It also gives me a free copy of an expensive book in my field, and makes sure that I actually read it.

The downside is that I actually have to read it. Which when you're contemplating 1000 pages on International Domain Name Law and Practice, gets a bit daunting. Good for the practice, keeps me up to date, so on and so forth. But 1000 pages on one topic is more than enough for anyone I should think. Particularly when it is an international comparison, jurisdiction to jurisdiction on the same topic. Oooo, that's a lot. I bet it repeats a lot. Wow. I am destined to acheive even higher levels of dorkiness than before!

I also fired off an e-mail to a friend in Australia saying "Wanna write a paper on international privacy regs together?" Dork.

But I did get to do cool stuff. I was sent via e-mail a travel ticket. It is a surprise. Can't wait to find out what it is!
Love
Anne

Wednesday, June 01, 2005

In Which Our Heroine Goes Back to the Basics
I've always encouraged my coaching students/teammates/self to identify the best and worst things about an outing on the water. There are days where sometimes the best thing you can identify is "I didn't flip." There are also days where the best thing suddenly shifts to "I didn't drown." There is still something to be gained from those days, and at least this practice does to an extent short circuit completely beating yourself up for things.

I'm having one of those days generally today, and with no rowing outings currently in sight! (I love rowing. More than ponies!) I've contacted the local RC, but haven't heard back yet. Grrr.

I had to really reach around today to find a good thing and in the end came up with "organic raspberries are cheap, plentiful and in season" - they're incredible. That's all I could come up with today, but it still works. When compared with the joy of the fresh raspberry, life ain't so bad.
Love
Anne