In Which Our Heroine Is a Little Unsure About Her New Digs

The local free paper came through the letter box today. Front page, very large point text.

"100th Crack Den Is Shut Down"
(Latest closures seal borough's 'remarkable' record)

Um, I'm sure that's a good thing. Or at least a better thing than having 100 crack dens lying around where people can trip over them.

Help me! Help me!

Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Moves To London

Here I am, all tucked up in North London. It is like having flashbacks to 15 years ago, when I lived in Muswell Hill. That was next to Alexandra Palace, coming up on it from the back or the left hand side depending on which road you took. Here in Crouch End, I walk out the door, turn right and there it is - the best view of Alexandra Palace I've ever encountered. It is a slightly strange neighbourhood. The road we're on is miles long and just lined with identical houses as far as the eye can see. It seems the epitome of nameless suburbia, and gives a feel that there is nothing to recommend this area at all. But if you turn left down the first road, which is only meters away, there's wonderful little cul de sacs and within five minutes you're in Crouch End Broadway which is wonderful. Wonderful! There is no Cafe Nero, which often tends to be my immediate benchmark as to whether I can cope. There are, however, a couple nice little independent coffee shops and those will outdo Nero almost every time. There's also a Starbucks, but that's always a negative. But there's wonderful little shops, and bookstores, and a massive park, and everything you could want.

I've also acheived a new level of housewifery. This actually started before I left Exeter, when Sara texted me to beg me to make a quiche before I left. Jim then wanted to know if I could do the dishes when I arrived. But that's nothing. I have acheived a new pinnacle of success. As far as I can tell or anyone can remember I am the first straight woman ever commissioned to design, pick out and shop for a gay man's kitchen. And bathroom! Mostly Jim doens't have the time, and he's still in a panic about whether he did the right thing buying this flat. The story of how it got decorated so far is hysterical. His friend Paul took him shopping, as he was sick of hearing him kvetch. They got to the store, and Paul insisted "Just pick an accent colour. Just one colour. Do it!" Jim moped, and refused.

That's the point where Paul said "Right. The colour is red, because you're pissing me off."

The accent pieces are fabulous. I love Paul. Everyone does. Paul is now desperate for me to come shopping with him ever since we talked about my running interference for James on those Oliver Sweeny shoes in Selfridges in the New Year's Sale at Selfridges.

I've been re-organizing shelves and things all weekend. Turns out I also iron and do laundry!

Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Makes Her Resolutions for 2007

I always make New Year's Resolutions (by always, I mean about the last dozen years) and for the most part I take them pretty seriously. I tend to carry a list of them around and seriously check in on them round about my birthday, which is conveniently almost exactly half way through the entire year. But this year, I'm putting them here, mostly because it was a heck of a New Year's Eve (um, weekend?) and I may in fact be too hungover to operate a pen in such a way that will be readable later in the year.

There are rules to New Year's Resolutions, but they're pretty general. First, there should be a mix of those that are easy, hard and middling to keep. A bit like the three bears. Secondly, if it worked last year and still seems like a good idea, keep at it. Plus, if possible/appropriate you should up it a notch. You know, increase your discipline a bit. Thirdly, everything should be within your control. The classic example is: I'm going to date so and so. Totally out of your control - So and So may in fact loathe your very existence and refuse point blank to date you. You just don't know it yet. But a resolution to ask So and So on a date, that's within your control absolutely. So go for it. Resolutions should also be acheivable. Don't just give up something you currently do 93 times a week. Restrict yourself to a smaller amount, (74 or so?) and then keep tapering it off if you can (revising to taper it off fully next year if you can.) Unofficially, there should also be a rule that your resolutions should be useful to yourself, but that tends to be axiomatic.

And so....the list.

First, the traditional resolution list starter.
1. I will not date anyone from Bromborough, Wirral. Two was enough. For a lifetime. And then some. Particularly that last one dated. Like shingles after chickenpox, he came back and worse than ever. It should be noted that I have not had even a slight problem keeping this since the list began, but it may arguably be harder now that I live in the UK where people from or in Bromborough are statistically more common than back home. Still, I vow to remain strong.

2. I will obtain a better job. Odds are looking good on this, but hey, you never know. Gotta keep going on this one.

3. I will not torment Charles more than twice about the sports celebrities I met at the SPARKS ball. After all, I merely encountered these people for all of five minutes. I may never meet them again or they might become my bestest friends ever (though lets face it, odds are strongly against that) but either way it does not make me a superior human being. Even if Charles thinks makes me better than him..............

4. I will try to make coffee approaching something suitable for consumption by humans at least twice a month. No more moaning about how rubbish my coffee is without still trying to make it better.

5. I will knit (and complete) a jumper for myself. Finally. At last. I have the pattern all picked out, so I just need to buy the yarn and get going. I guess in doing that I need to pick a colour, but I think I already have it sorted. I say I have picked a pattern. More accurate is I saw a lovely £750 Pringle jumper and have adapted it slightly. The nice thing is even if I use pure cashmere (which I'm quite tempted to do - after all, for all the work that it takes to do this sort of thing, I've never skimped on yarn quality. Why spend 80 hours making a beautiful scarf that itches, pills and no one wants to wear?) it won't cost that, and what's more it will fit me, which it wouldn't do if I bought it from Pringle. You know, what with my arms being longer than everyone elses. (If you e-mail me, I'll send you a picture of the original.)

6. I will not eat fast food more than once a month. It doesn't have to be from a chain - I just need to continue to eat better and this is an easy way to make sure things start to stay in check. If there is one month I do not eat any fast food at all, that doesn't mean that I can eat it twice next month. Calendar months set the rules.

7. Less shutters down. That one is kind of personal. But I know what it means, and so does the other person it applies to, so we'll work on it.

8. I will finish my second hat.

9. I will make enough jam and jelly this year to sustain my own needs and give it away to those who have asked. I had enough requests at Christmas that I felt badly for not being able to hand away whatever I should!

10. I will get at least £1000 into an ISA by the end of the calendar year. Ideally, I'll have more, but that's the bare minimum. That's not even £100 a month overall. That's doable once number one is acheived!

11. I will not drink Diet Coke more than twice a week. I never used to think this was a big deal. Then I moved to England, where everyone seemed to flip that I drank it every day. So, now it is a minorly big deal. Cutting back is a good financial and health move, and I'll save the money to do something special with it. Heck, it might help with number 10!

Any further ideas?

Love,

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Starts Reading Her Christmas Mail.......

Oh my. It is that time of year. The Christmas circulars and cards start arriving. This year really took the cake. (Speaking of which, I think i should go grab some Christmas cake for while I type this. ) There was the circular that hit death by sentence three and from there went on to illness, rheumatoid arthritis, pulmonary embolism and all else, with no let up from the misery and clinical terms until the last paragraph which exhorted everyone to have a very happy Christmas in full caps. It is crying out for a competition for me to enter it into just to bring some joy into its miserable little life. The next contender arrived in my e-mail in-box a few days later. This one was at least positive, but contained the awe inspiring statement "I truly regret that incident at the border." Now, I've since found out about the actual incident, and frankly it is tragic and not to be teased about, but that line is pure literary genius. I just wish people would stop saying "sounds like something you'd say!"

Even the regular Christmas cards are hysterical. I've actually received one this year which includes the word "fucking" in it. Granted, it says "Bush is still fucking president and we still hate him", a sentiment I fully agree with, but it still cracks me up to read it in a Christmas card.

Apart from the joy of those, life's been good. Christmas was quiet, with more church than even my devout Catholic order friends deemed necessary but apart from that it was long walks with the faithful hound, and good food and good friends. Had a lovely Christmas Eve dinner with Mike, and tea on Boxing Day with Pete, Alice and the children. And the interim was spent nice, quiet and not having to deal with everyone bickering. Ah, now that is Christmas my friends!

Hope everyone else's was as nice.

Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Saves Sinterklaas!

Oh the things that wind up happening when we try to be nice. Oh dearie, dearie, dearie.

The other night, we were all getting together for a Group X meeting on the topic of "Science and Religion." The discussion was going to be led by my friend Jeff, an Episcopal priest and medical doctor, and professor of medical ethics at the local Medical School. But with everyone gathered together in the lounge at Pete and Alice's I arrived home to discover that Jeff couldn't come. His eldest daughter, aged nine, had fallen and gashed her head, and suturing was going to occur. Mom and Dad were in the ER with the two younger kids in tow. Since I didn't have to be up at any certain hour the next morning, I volunteered to fetch the two nippers from the hospital, and take them home and put them to bed.

I had a few reservations about this as the youngest (aged 3) is exceptionally shy and while saying to her Mom and Dad that she loved me and liked it when I came round, she'd never actually spoken a word to me. This struck me as not the best time to have to force that point, but it turned out to be ok. Once inside the house, she was a regular chatterbox, and happy as a clam. All good. Into jammies, up to bed, teeth cleaned, stories read, prayers said, and lights out. Ruthlessly efficient, but all very friendly. I was downstairs in the kitchen when the crisis started.

The kids had climbed out of bed, come downstairs with shoes in their hands, and "reminded" me that it was St. Nicholas day tomorrow so they had to put their shoes by the fireplace. This accomplished, they very happily went back to bed. They were fine.

I, on the other hand, was a wreck. I know what St. Nicholas day is about (or Sinterklaas, as the Dutch call it) from my Dutch and German friends. But I had no idea what went into the shoes, or for that matter where to find it! I called Jeff. Voice mail - no cell phones in most parts of the ER. So I called back to the group for help. General consensus was candy and an orange. I could find oranges, but not candy. I also didn't know how much candy. Text messages were sent to anyone religious I knew, and also to the Netherlands. It was pointed out to me that whatever I did, not to do it before midnight as if they did come home with the eldest daughter, she shouldn't see it before midnight or it would give the game away to her. The panic, the dread, the complications of overwhelming guilt at the thought of being responsible for a small child losing faith in St Nicholas. That's right. As much as I wanted the kids to be happy, I couldn't bear the weight of the guilt of being the one to shatter the illusion.

In a pinch, the group was prepared to send sweets home with someone heading home from the meeting and I could put those in the shoes. Contingency plans abounded. Thankfully, as things hit a crisis point approaching 11, home arrived Jeff, Mummy and the eldest (sporting five stitches in her head, and an exceptionally dazed expression, poor wee thing). The presents were revealed to be hidden in a particular drawer (and it turns out that sweeties in this instance weren't the way to go, since they use it to prepare the kids for Christmas, so they get things like books of Christmas stories and CDs of Christmas carols.

I'm just glad it is over. I can start to calm down now. Whew! Pressure's off.

Gelukkig Siinterklaas!
Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Starts Thinking About Christmas

Thanksgiving is this week, so it is time to start thinking about the shopping, the shipping, the making, and the whole deal. I've already completed one or two Christmas gifts (you knit, you start early), and I have some good ideas what to get most people. Assuming I have disposable income, which at this point is looking dicey, but hey, here's hoping!

And of course, people keep asking what to get me. I have two options for you. Amazon.co.uk gift list as ever, or I just found this: http://www.markhelprin.com/index.cfm?page=store. Ooooo, it made me shiver with tingles of goodness.

But first, Thanksgiving. I have to figure out how to enrobe the chocolates.

Love,
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Joins the Fray

Right, people. Tom Cruise. More specifically, Tom Cruise's wedding. For fifty points and a chance to win the boat, please discuss the following:

Why. Do. We. Care?????????????

I am, or was, as much of a Tom fan as anyone should be. I mean, he was cute, in a short guy all -American way. The movies weren't too bad on the whole. Some of them were really good. (Born on the Fourth of July, Magnolia, etc). But not being on the obsessive side, I saw them because I wanted to see the movies, not because Tom Cruise was in them. Most people I know feel the same. And now..... well, we all thought this last year was a bit out there for Tom and his publicist should rein him the hell in. Not because we actually cared about what he did or didn't do, until it became an annoyance in our lives. And he should not become an annoyance, as I/we/you haven't met the guy. And 99.9% of the world is not affected directly or indirectly by his actions. So what on earth is all this durm and strang about his wedding? It isn't even his first one. The guy's on his third, and the speculation is that it isn't going to last anyway. (I won't go into the reasons here.) There should have been a total of three news lines about this:
1) Tom Cruise is going to get married.
2) Tom Cruise is now married.
3) (If necessary:) Tom Cruise is no longer married.

So why is there all this kerfuffle? I just don't understand, and what's more, I'm totally sick of it. It isn't like they want me to send a present. Because if they do, they'll be sorely disappointed.

I'm not usually so bitter, and almost never so about weddings. But this celebrity culture thing is just insane.

Love,

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Keeps in the Poetry Vibe

By sheer coincidence, my friend Liz (the other half of Team Milhouse) sent me this poem today to give me a chuckle:


Short Love Poem
Judith Viorst

It's hard to love
The tallest girl
When you're the shortest guy,
For every time
You try to look
Your true love in the eye
You see
Her bellybutton.

I don't know Judith Viorst, but I'm suddenly a big fan.

Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Gets Various Feedback

That post on business-speak resonated with people, I'm glad to say. I can't take credit for prompting this story in the BBC
but that shows how much this is becoming an issue. In addition, I was sent to the lovely site for the humorous antidote to all this garbage: Despair.com. Keeps me going, knowing that there is still sanity in the world. Particularly as I am interviewing for jobs at the moment, and having to keep discussing my "core competencies." These seem for the most part to be basic lawyering skills such as drafting, negotiating, and the like, but have been taken over by business speak. I'm hoping that the Campaign for Plain English becomes involved at some point.

Thankfully, where business speak leaves off arts comes into its own. Specifically in this case, poetry. Now, I've read a bunch of poetry and in fact I quite like it. I owe a lot of my later understanding of the genre to my friend John Hildebidle, literature professor at MIT, poet and someone always eager to share his enthusiasm for this chosen topic. As much as I was (and continue to be) willing to learn, he is always willing to share, and is the embodiment of the philosophy that there is no such thing as a stupid question. Believe me, I have tested this philosophy to the limit with him.

But he's also a deeply funny guy that you can joke with very openly, and laugh very hard in his company. I have been winding him up of late with my statement and conviction that whatever poem he sent me that week was pretty good, but that all truly great poetry required cows. Needless to say, I chose cows as to the best of my knowledge, they only rarely turn up in poetry. This has been an on-going joke for a while, and now in my in-box there suddenly appears the following:

A friend (to meet her, you'd take her for genteel)
seems devout in her attachment
to beasts of bovine persuasions.
I'd thought the custom was to link
girls and women with horses (just as
men lean toward fast cars and Harleys).
But cows? I suppose, the kindest view
is to take her as unique, not generic.

made to order

He has also hastened to point out that "the greatest of cow verses (outdoing even the Irish proto-epic, "The Cattle Raid of Cooley") is Ogden Nash:

Cows are of the bovine ilk.
One end gives moo, the other milk."

I have had other poems written for me in my day. Most of them were, quite frankly, atrocious. One of them (the one before this) was very very good. But it just didn't have the cow factor. And as previously stated, the cow factor is what makes it all truly great.

Love,

Anne

Finally, more Hat Detail......

I'm very proud, you see.

In Which Our Heroine Has a Little Rant

Like most other people in the world (for example, my mate Gareth)
certain things in life really get so far up my nose, I can feel their boots on my chin. And for the longest time, one of those things has been empty minded business speak. You know the stuff I'm talking about. It is supposed to motivate you, but really it just illustrates how someone else just doesn't understand the problem. And usually, they don't understand the problem they're actually facing.

For example, here. All this stuff about "Wow, isn't this guy great, look at him practice, look at him go!" (for those of you who can't see or access the link, it is pit crew for NASCAR practicing putting on wheel nuts. Or maybe taking them off.) First off, this is actually pretty demeaning to the chap in the photo. Think about it. This photo was pretty much chosen because whoever decided to circulate it around as a "get with the plan" motivational thing thinks that wheel nuts are basically so simple that a trained monkey could do it, and they would never think of practicing it.

To which my response is "Honey, that's why you ain't in the NASCAR pit crew." The point is, that's the guy's job. I'm willing to be that some days he loves it, some days he hates it, and some days are in between. Which makes him like any other guy or gal on the job. But because it is his job, he better know what he's doing or he isn't going to be keeping his job. The initial commentary (from a newsletter called Just Sell, so you know the kind of people they're marketing to here) is that "By practicing, I'm sure he tends to perform better."

No kidding. Just as I get better writing skills the more I practice, or learn to speak languages, row better, play better squash, or do any other job, task, memorization, activity or what have you, the more anyone will get better by practicing whatever it is they do. I remember discussing this with one of my rowers that by doing all our practices, that's how they improved, and that applied to anything, even tests. This particular girl tended to panic under exam stress, and said that she didn't think it would help her, so we practiced stuff for her history test (I think it is actually called studying, but don't tell her that!) and lo and behold, she did much better. That's why the slogan is "practice makes perfect".

But no, then it has to go on. Because you never can have enough business double speak.

"What I find really interesting is not the practising in itself, but the sophistication of the rig the mechanic is working on, and the presence of a dedicated observer by his side. Clearly, he and his team are serious about performance improvement.

This picture really speaks to me in my periodic role as a trainer. Challenging exercises and accurate feedback are the keys to performance improvement."

Ahem. Again, patronising. Seriously patronising. Not to mention, how on earth do you know that it is a dedicated observer next to them? Looks to me like some guy who happens to be looking in that direction and is in the camera lens. As for the sophistication of the rig, when you think how much money is in NASCAR, you think these people are going to cut back on this aspect? No.

And again, "challenging exercises?" The man is doing his job, and being ready. This is not necessarily a challenging exercise. This is the practice. The NASCAR equivalent of shooting free throw after free throw after free throw so that your game percentage is solid. This is not a challenging exercise. And as for the accurate feedback, it doesn't seem to me that you're even assessing the picture correctly so I hope to high heaven you're not giving me feedback, as accurate may not seem to apply. All in all, this is the kind of thing that Dilbert makes fun of, so I won't have to go too far forward.

But it just goes on and on and on. Take a look at this one: Authentic Facilitation. What the heck is that? Why is it that if you call it Authentic, it seems pretty fake? Here's another classic example from that website, starting off with "putting humanity into branding":

"Most efforts at increasing engagement fail because they repeat the classic marketing error: repeating a one-way conversation. Branding spin erodes trust, disillusions people and leads to apathy."

If all else fails, obfuscate, obfuscate, obfuscate. Although I do have to say, this guy does seem to know how to conduct the one way conversation. If marketing is done well, it is a great thing, But there's so much of it that is just rubbish. People spend money for the services of the above two guys, but I'm glad I'm not.

But my absolute favorite comes here, and is filled with all kinds of little gems like this:

"There are twice as many lawyers as a ratio of non-lawyers today as there were in the 1970's. We are competing for half of the business."

Now, this ain't necessarily so. It is only so if there is the same amount of legal work that there was in the 1970s. Is there? I don't think so. The internet, for example, has created volumes of new legal work that wasn't there in the 1970s. It also makes the assumption that all lawyers are working as lawyers. And any lawyer will also tell you that is false. They may maintain their bar membership, but they work in other industry, write books, or frankly just can't get a job. And of those who are working as lawyers, any number of them aren't competing for your work. For example, I don't compete for conveyancing work as I don't do conveyancing. Criminal lawyers don't compete with me as I don't do criminal work. So this whole assertion only works if there's the same amount of legal work in my particular field of competition and twice as many lawyers in that field as there were in the 1970s. That's an awful lot of qualifiation, isn't it?

But the logic sounds nice, doesn't it? Of course it does. And hey, a stopped clock still tells the right time twice a day. But the rest of the time? Not so much.

Stop the insanity folks. Just go do your jobs, do them well, and get on with it.

Love,

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Takes Her Driving Test

It had to happen at some point. You'd think, after 19 years of driving, that I'd be immune or exempt from having to take a driving test, but that would be wholly untrue. I'd let my US license lapse since they have to be renewed every few years as a revenue grabbing exercise by the State, and since I wasn't driving at home (or here, for that matter) it was ok to let it go. Besides, I don't have a home address in the US any more for them to put on the license so it wouldn't be able to happen anyway. But the good news was that if I passed my UK test, that license would be good until I was 65, barring suspensions for speeding, etc, none of which I plan to get.

That was the good news. The bad news is that I'd have to pass the test. And compared with the US, actually compared with any where else in the world, the UK is incredibly difficult. You spend about 40 minutes on the road, just you and the examiner, taking turns, following directions, heading across roundabouts, making sure all your signals, etc are correct. Be sure to check your mirrors every five seconds. I'm not making that up. Go over the speed limit, that's marked. Go more than 4 miles over the speed limit in any area, that's marked as a serious. One serious fault, you're done for. More than 14 minor faults, you're done for. If you do something so badly wrong, it is within the driving examiners powers to order you to pull over and you both walk back to the test centre, which may be a few miles away at that point.

And they're looking to mark you on everything, which is why less than half the people taking their test pass it. Go too fast, you'll get marked. Go too slowly, you'll get marked for being hesitant. Take the test in an automatic, your license won't let you drive a stick, and so on.

The person taking the test will be required to perform two manouvers. The options are reversing around a corner, parallel parking, reverse bay parking, and a turn in the road. You will not get to choose which two - the examiner gets to choose for you. Hitting the curb=serious fault. One in three people will also have to do an emergency stop. It isn't quite so bad as all that, in that the examiner tells you that you're going to do this, and checks to see if there's anything behind you, etc. Then you just drive along waiting for him to go "Stop!" at which point you slam on the brakes. the key seems to be not to panic, and react quickly (don't react quickly enough or hard enough on those brakes, and thank you for playing, we have no parting gifts for you). It is even ok to stall the car, so long as you use correct stalling procedure. But stall away, brake away, and if you for get to do a massive check of every possible blind spot on the car before moving off, that's a serious fault, and thy name is toast.

You can see what I was up against. I even took driving lessons, just to figure out what they wanted of me. The observation things were interesting - I do feel I actually learned something from them and not just how to pass the test.

In the end, I did incredibly well. The average for people who pass is 11 faults. I got five. Which is pretty incredible, really. I thought I'd lost it at one point when driving along a rather busy road with not much place to pull over, all of the sudden there were flashing blue lights and a siren behind me. Not the police - no, that would be too easy. Bomb disposal unit! Why? Why does this sort of thing happen to me? I've never even seen a bomb disposal unit on its way out before, so why now?

It didn't matter. I still passed. Go me! (Do I have a car? No. Do any of my friends have insurance that lets me drive their cars? No. So the point is? Of that I'm not quite sure yet.)

Love,

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Gets In Touch with Her Crafty Side

I had to attend a wedding on Saturday. Wait, that sounds a bit harsh. I wanted to attend my friend Susannah's wedding, very much. And Susannah wanted me to attend as well. Specifically, she asked me to attend "wearing a great big hat." Now I love Susie, and was happy to accomodate this request, but of course the issue was finding the hat.

In what seems to be universally regarded as "a really Anne thing to do" and also "super cool!", I signed up for hat making class. That's millinery to those of us in the know.

I didn't know I had it in me. Despite having my knitting pattern published in Stitch and Bitch Nation, also for a hat, this seemed pretty different. That was just simple knitting. This was things with blocks. And also, as it turned out, steamers, ropes, feathers, my whisk handle (which I ususally use for spinning sugar for decorating cakes and croquembouche things, etc) hand stitching, and the like. Frankly, I thought that it would be a pretty simple affair, since it was my first hat. What I wound up with, however, is a completely different story.

It wasn't bad. In fact, I sat around staring at it for two days before unilaterally declaring it the best hat in the history of hatting. I'm still trying to get the photos uploaded - the best one was taken on my phone and doesn't seem to want to be saved as a JPEG for some reason. The only other photo is this one, which was taken well under the influence of champagne.

I was voted best dressed guest. That's got to be a first. The last I heard about my mode of dress was that my family thinks I dress like a prostitute. They have yet to comment on the hat, it must be said. But everyone else loved it. The groom greeted me with "That isn't the hat you made. It can't be. It is incredible." I suppose if you think about that it is a bit insulting, but I knew what he meant and I also know that Bruce is one of the nicer people on this earth. But it was definitely a hit!

Love,
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Encounters Her Deeper Fears

There are many things in the world I am afraid to be near. I think that's pretty normal. For the most part, I'm pretty good at saying "This is scary, but I'm going to do/go/eat it anyway." And then there are the things to which I am truly phobic. Highly irrational, but screaming terror get away from me, eek eek, you get the idea. Thankfully, these things are limited. First off, and the subject of today's little venting, is my mortal enemy, the snake.

Snakes, man. Can't stand 'em. But this is so far beyond that I can barely tell you. I walk across Boston Common, perpetually looking for snakes. I've never seen one, but I'm telling you they're there, waiting to slither up to me and slide across my foot. When we were in Winchester the other week, talking a lovely walk along the river Ichen, something rustled in the reeds and I grabbed my companion's arm with maybe a little too much force as I said "I thought I heard a snake." Re-assured by the transparent lie that I so wanted to believe that before St Patrick went to Ireland to rid it of snakes, he first practiced in Winchester, our walk was saved. But it turns out, not saved for that long.

Total, I've lived in England for about seven years. And in that time I've taken a lot of walks in a lot of places and not seen one snake. Not a one. Ever. I know they're here. Mike has regaled me with tales of how he once pulled a harmless grass snake around by the tail when he was a kid. But I've never seen one, and let me tell you that I have looked.

You may have foreseen by now that this is all about to change, and you'd be correct. So there we were on Saturday, wandering along down by the Quay. Center of Exeter, nice and busy, boats in the water, people on the sides, people on the bridge, and me on the phone talking to someone. It was the fact I was on the phone holding a conversation that stopped me from screaming, although it is a miracle I didn't drop the phone into the river. It was the same sort of reaction as Winchester, though. Namely, to grab Mike's arm, yank him towards the edge of the bridge, and point to the FOUR FOOT SNAKE THAT WAS SWIMMING ALONG DOWNSTREAM.

Mike thought it was fascinating. While i was trying to get as far away from what was as far as I could tell the Loch Ness Monster on holiday, ready to chomp me into little pieces, Mike was running closer to it on the bridge, watching it swim underneath, crossing over to the other side to watch it keep going. I, on the other hand, adopted a state of vigilance that was a little beyond the pale, particularly near the river. We had to go over a little footbridge, which prompted me to be so startled by a duck (obviously a killer stealth duck, you see), that I did in fact jump and scream out loud. Having to cross over the main river twice that day didn't help, and near hyperventilation ensued. Mike, in the meantime, had named the snake Barney and thought it was a friendly little thing, all the while acknowledging that it was a four foot long grass snake. He refused, just plain refused, to concur with me that it was obviously searching for blood.

The amazing thing was that with all the other people around, no one else noticed it. None of the boaters, none of the other people, no one. Just me, and then when half dragged off the bridge, Mike. It was shocking. As Mike even said at the time, "This could only happen to you. I've lived here all my life and never seen a snake in the middle of the city. But with you, sure, why not?"

The movie that combines all my worst fears and phobias, one Snakes on a Plane, opens today. I won't be going!

love

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Completes Her Transformation into a Cottage Industry

A couple of years ago, while at a wedding where I was a witness, read a poem, kept the groom's mother under control and made the wedding cake, I paused during the reception to hand a friend and his wife a baby sweater I had just knit for their then forthcoming child. Which reminds me, I need to knit something for what is now their next forthcoming child. But I digress. He said to me at the time "You realize, Annie dear, that with Martha Stewart in prison, your career path is now clear."

Oh, how we laughed.

But now I have to go to a friend's wedding here in England. It is going to be one of those big posh English things. They're well off, so the reception is in the "garden" (I used to live on a farm that was smaller than their garden!) and the bride, who is a dear friend, has specifically asked me to wear a great big hat. Sho nuff, honey, it is your big day.

Except that I've got a big head. And that hats seem hard to find. And they're even harder to find if you've got a big head. The answer, it seems is so Anne-oriented that I can only smack myself in the head why I didn't come up with it sooner.

Take a class. Or, in simpler terms, make my own durn hat.

So that's what I'm doing. Class is August 30-31, and I will leave with one and a half hats (I finish the second one at home). They're going to be big, and they're going to be decorated, and no one will be able to get within five feet of me. I am only limited by the dimensions of the boot of the car I'm travelling in, which is a BMW Z4 convertible. It is the convertible bit that makes putting it in the trunk a necessity. Otherwise that hat will get lost down a little country lane at a high rate of speed.

Pictures to come, folks.

Love,
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Gets Around to Updating her Blog
Where does the time go, eh? The issue about not updating is pretty simple. I don't have net access at home yet, and the Blogger is off limits at work. So, there you go. I'm not dead, I'm actually very happy, and life continues on.

There's a lot to recap. In no particular order there was
deportation and readmittance to the UK with a five year work visa
some exams
figuring out how to import the cat (this is in process)
being rotavated at church (suddenly, I'm all having to do readings and the like. I don't mind, but this is rather new.)
Getting my bike down here
Back injury and rehab
Organic lamb dinner parties
Acquisition of a sofa
Acquisition of another sofa
Making friends and influencing people

And so on. If I'd blogged about it regularly, this would be easy, but since I haven't I'm just going to pick up from right now. If you want to know about anything else. you'll just have to e-mail me.

Saturday night I went to my friend Helen's party. The theme was "Toffs and Chavs". I don't own a lot of clothes here, and not wanting to spend a lot of money, I was wandering down the High Street trying to figure out how to pull this off. When everyone went by, I was struck by inspiration. Football fans are tres chav. (I've also figured out that my ex boyfriend is mega chav, since he lives in Dagenham, was raised in Essex and Liverpool, and well, that dress sense baby but I digress). So I went into M&S (which is not a chav shop, but if I was going to get a shirt I wanted something I could wear again anyway), bought a nice red football shirt, got some face paint from Woolworths and then went home to chav myself up. I painted a very cute flag on my face (if I do say so myself) and then some crosses on my toenails with Tippex (like White Out). And then shimmied out to the car and climbed in, only to have my friend Clare say

"Why do you have the Danish flag painted on your face?"

Yes, sports fans, it is true. Cross of St George, white with red cross. Danish flag, red with white cross. Not my finest hour of being a foreigner abroad. I am American. Popular vote decided to find it charming.

The next day I was watching World Championship series rowing on BBC 2 (I love a country which takes rowing seriously), and Denmark was doing very well in one race. I put my toes up on the coffee table to let them cheer.

Turns out Tippex is next to impossible to get off of toenails.

Love

Anne

In Which Our Heroine Improvises around the Key of Pistachios
Ah, so much to tell, so much. I almost don’t know where to start.  So once again I shall go the easy route and just answer people’s questions.

So what about the new job?
So far, so good.  I have not at least been sacked, although due to European working practice being a bit different from American I spent the first week utterly convinced I was about to get stopped before I even started.  I had to fill out a health questionnaire when I started work, and then when they admitted that they weren’t doctors and didn’t understand what it was I’d just told them, they sent off my form to some specialist doctor they use.  I had to consent to this (privacy regulations and all that) and I was quite sure it was only a moment of time before either the epilepsy, Cushing’s or PTSD meant that I was not long for the working world of Devon.  The stress was seriously getting to me by the end of the week, and I had placed a call to my friend Steve, who conveniently happens to be an employment mucky mucky partner up at Hammonds to ask him what my rights, if any, were in this whole thing.  He filled me in on what was actually going on, which was that legally they were under a duty to make sure that if I could be accommodated, I would be, and were just getting background information and it was all standard.  The law is pretty much the same in the States, actually, but they don’t ask you these things ahead of time, the onus tends to be more on you to go and say “I have a disability.”  Disabilities make it one thing, but I do not consider myself to have one as it really doesn’t interfere with my work, so in the States disability law doesn’t really apply to me.  There are certain times that they’re allowed to say “this condition means you can not be employed in this job”, for example I could not pilot a plane as an epileptic, for the safety of the passengers, and I am too tall to be an astronaut as they’d have to redesign the space suits (I am not making that up.  I checked the NASA website.), but really I can do almost anything else.  I was glad Steve phoned me and sorted this out, even though it was late on Sunday night, as first thing Monday morning the doctor phoned me up and started asking the practical questions on my illnesses, etc and what work could do to help. Knowing what was actually going on made the conversation quite practical and focused, and not panic inducing at all, and then I could get on with my work.

What is your middle name?
I don’t get Gmail at work, so I set it up to forward automatically to my work account, and I reply from there.  People now frequently get reply e-mails from axw@my new firm.com and consequently keep asking me suddenly “What is your middle name?” (frequently phrased as “What does the X stand for?”).  The answer is, I don’t have a middle name, but the convention of the firm uses three letters so for those of us without middle names, they put an X.  I suppose were there more of us with the same initials, they would move to Y or Z or Q or something.  In the meantime, the new answer to the above questions is that it stands for what Xs usually stand for in my correspondence.  Kisses.  Now that makes a great middle name.

Are you making friends?
Of a fashion, I guess I slowly am making friends.  Mostly from work so far, as that’s who I’ve met.  There’s my landlord, for a start, who also works in my department (if you look over there off to the left you can see him.  He’s by the window.  Wave if you feel like it. The whole place is open plan, so you can see all the people I talk about here if you would just look around.)  He’s been very sweet and kind, and things keep arriving at my flat to compensate for the fact that I don’t own, say, a Hoover, or chairs.  And when the washing machine didn’t work (even though it was brand new – there was a leak somewhere) and I was running out of smalls, he offered and executed to drive me home one night, pick up my laundry, take me to his, cook dinner (ok, I wound up making us soup from scratch, but he did offer to cook me dinner so points for effort), let me do my washing and then take me home.  He’s also offered to take me to the store outside town to do a big shop if necessary, but I’m managing so far at the shops in town and toting it on the bus.  I’m working on a minor deal with him as well, and so far have managed to not get berated, either because he’s exceptionally nice or my work is sufficiently up to scratch, maybe both.

I haven’t really been out though, as I’m not so good at meeting people and really dread walking into places on my own.  My one night out was to watch another work guy play water polo.  Yes, I said water polo.  I will even confess that this is not the first time I have watched water polo – there was a period a while back where I knew someone who played and would go along and cheer.  After nights of being cooped up watching telly (which has arrived, and is very good, although it looks rather odd having a big telly in a room whose only other furniture is two folding chairs, a file cabinet and a small table), even a night out at the water polo watching someone who at that point I didn’t really like that much seemed like a welcome respite.  I didn’t like him mostly because a) I was greeted the first time I met him with the phrase “So, you’re South African, right?”  This confused me.  I did not find it insulting, just very very odd.  When I said no, not to be deterred, he said “But you’ve just been there, right?”  Well, no.  Not recently, not ever, although I would like to go at some point.  Puzzled, I went off.  Then followed what I now refer to as “The Great Beehive Hat Debacle”.  As most of you know, I have my little knitting pattern for a Beehive Hat published in Stitch and Bitch Nation.  After a conversation with a potential client about knitting (it happens, and she brought it up, not me) I’m sending her a copy of the book and some local organic wool to go with it.  Having ventured into town for this, I brought it back, and water polo picked up the book, immediately liked the look of the one sweater, kept going through, and when I suggested to look at the appropriate page, took one look at the hat, at MY hat, and said “That’s awful! Truly heinous!  Hideous!  Who would wear that?”  It took two days for someone to point out to him that my name was at the top of that page, by which point the iron was starting to enter into my “I’m going to get fired because of my health” soul.  He was, to his credit, truly sorry for what he’d said, and was happy I was going to go to the water polo.  For my part, I was just happy that I wasn’t sitting home of an evening.

It was fun, actually.  I enjoy watching sports, and I enjoy watching men in their swimmies (although desperately trying to avoid looking at work colleague as, well, I have to work with him.  This is a basic rule of mine: desperately try to avoid seeing work colleagues in their Speedos.) and I enjoy shouting at really lousy refereeing calls, of which there turned out to be many.  Thankfully, Water Polo’s team won, which puts them through to some sort of national final.  And then in the great English tradition, everyone adjourned to the bar, which I was duly warned was not very nice, and there might be (and there was) karaoke.  Exceptionally bad karaoke.  And loud as well.  Never mind. It was an interesting exposure to Devon nightlife.

That’s it?  Water Polo and Karaoke?
Well, no.  First, I went to church at the Cathedral on Sunday, where one of the nice vicars turns out to have done a year of his training at my church in Boston, and also introduced me to the younger people of the congregation, meaning people my age.  This is good, as up til that point I had been chatting to a nice man in his late 70s who had been a Hammer Horror (I think in the States this is what we classify as a B movie) film actor long ago and freely admits to having ripped off Bela Lugosi in his portrayal of Dracula. A bit of a shocker, actually, as this morning a formal, handwritten card has arrived here at work from this gentleman, asking me to dinner.  I was stunned, to say the least.  Then I thought I might be getting the wrong end of the stick, so I handed said card to Water Polo and said “Am I misinterpreting this?”  His reaction, and I quote here, was “Oh My God!”  Watch this space.  And no, I can’t get Kirsty MacColl’s “I’m Going Out with an 80 Year Old Millionaire” out of my head either, so just you stop.

I’m not going to church this weekend, however, but nothing to do with that. Instead I am away on the Company and Commercial Department (affectionately known by all as CoCo) training weekend.  Near as I can figure, the training involved is the surfing lessons we have arranged for tomorrow morning.  Wetsuits, boards and instructors have been hired for those of us who don’t know how to surf.  (Lots of people in my department do know, actually, and own their own boards.  Surfing’s popular here.)  This seems to violate my rule about work people and Speedos, though, and I think if pressed that rule also applies to seeing work people in wetsuits, or in fact being see in a wetsuit myself by work people, or for that matter by anyone.  Being new, I’ve been roped into providing dessert for Saturday night dinner.  This has proved good fun, as I haven’t had a good cook up for a while.  I’ve spent the last two nights poaching pears (most of you have had those), making an absolutely divine cheesecake with an artistic topping of pistachio brittle, a tart of apricots roasted in earl gray tea leaves, sugar and lemon and surrounded by cardamom infused cream, and making chocolate caramel and fleur de sel truffles by hand from scratch.  Given that my kitchen gear is all borrowed, this has proved a challenge as I’m rolling dough without a rolling pin (tin of apricots), and chopping nuts by mooshing them with a bottle of framboise, and haven’t really cooked in Centigrade before, there is a lot of “work around” going on.  Hopefully it will all pull together in time.

Waves for the weekend are rumoured to be ten feet high, and we’ve been asked (jokingly, I think, but I’m not sure to be honest) to submit our blood type to the coordinating secretary.

And on that note, back to work.
Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Puts a Roof Over Her Head

Well, here I am. The great South West, by hook or by crook. And I have to say, initially it wasn't looking like a good idea but things have settled down.

You wouldn't think, with cash in hand, that finding an apartment would be all that hard down here. Looking on the net, there were lots of furnished places that seemed to be going, and I wrote and left messages for the estate agents (in American, that's "real estate agents") thinking that ever eager to make a sale and get commission, they would be eager to help me find a place. Turns out, this is not so. I don't know what if anything the estate agents are paid by the landlord's over here, but rather than the month's rent in commission you'd have to pay them in Boston, here you just pay a flat fee, which ranges from £60-£100, at least here in Exeter. Consequently, the push just really isn't on so much from the agent's point of view. Lots of places don't even "do" letting of places.

It also turned out that I chose the week to come down and look for a place that was the same week that the freshers and the post-grads started at the local Universities (of which there are two in town). So I found myself traipsing from agency to agency, recognizing the same groups of people, almost all of whom were looking for two bedroom furnished flats. It then became clear why just being invited to sit down at an estate agents was becoming a major accomplishment. Heck, now it is two weeks later and I still haven't had a phone call returned from four places. In fourteen agencies, I managed to arrange one place to look at, that appointment would be in three days, I got a phone call subsequently to say it had already been let, and frankly at that point despair was beginning to set in.

All those freshers and post-grads seem to have Mummies and Daddies and require interim places to stay of their own, so it had been impossible to find a B&B or hotel room for under £150 a night, so I had grabbed a bed in a youth hostel. In fact, I managed to grab the last bed in the youth hostel. It was close enough to town and things for walking to all those estate agents, but really it wasn't very nice and being stuffed on the bottom bunk with my feet hanging over the end just wasn't helping the situation any. It was starting to feel as though I just wasn't meant to live here, whatever job I'd arranged, and I was getting more stressed about it as the hours wore on. Yes, hours. Nervous just doesn't cover it!

The answer came, as it so frequently does, by way of my friend Lian. Through my wailing and gnashing of teeth down the phone at her about how horrible it all was, she quickly pointed out that I had one thing that the grad students didn't have, which was an income and therefore I could rent an unfurnished flat and quite simply purchase a sofa and bed and chairs and the like. It didn't need to all happen over night. She made complete sense. Immediately after her, I talked to the Bakers (who I spend Christmases with) up in Bristol, as I was going up there for a home cooked meal and a little TLC the next night. I told them my new plan. Mr Baker immediately threw his shoulder behind the grindstone, and got quite excited in fact. Things were moving quickly. In fact, very quickly, as I had been notified that someone in my new firm in fact had a flat for let, but since it was unfurnished, I had written it off as a prospect. Arriving the next day at the firm to sign contracts and things, I asked if it was still available, and on finding out it was promptly was whisked upstairs to be introduced, and as it turns out, to head out and look at the flat immediately.

It was fine. More than fine – it is great. It is brand newly built, so it doesn't seem to leak or anything, and the insulation and heating are all top notch efficiency, etc. I am the first person to live there, and while I was given the keys right away, I had to take up the sticky plastic they'd put in on top of the hallway carpet to stop construction people from getting mud and stuff all over it. It is also an easy 15 minute walk to work (and an even easier walk home since that's downhill that way). Life was goo again, and so I left for Bristol with a large chunk of life seemingly settled and a huge weight off my shoulders.

The Bakers were incredible in helping, but they really do excel at this sort of thing. While I had been just coming up for dinner and to stay the night since the trains would be late and I wouldn't have to be anywhere the next day anyway, I wound up staying most of the day going through their attic, and having them take me to look at the bed a friend had for sale cheap since she had moved to Australia. I arrived back in Exeter with a box full of cutlery, plates, saucepans, and a radio to make me feel not quite alone in my flat. Even more importantly I had not just one but two types of home made Mrs Baker jam, the pleasure of which cannot be over-estimated.
With my little radio (complete with short wave for listening to cricket commentary) plugged in, I rapidly became addicted to Radio Four, which was a little odd as it kept never being what I expected. First up was "Book at Bedtime" which rather than being a soothing little nighty night story was this week excerpts on the devil from Milton's "Paradise Lost." Not quite soothing. Thankfully it has now finished with that, and is on to Graham Greene. I then recognized the theme tune to the Archers (very perky, very quirky and upbeat, and suggested by Billy Connolly as the alternate to the British national anthem) so I listened for the first time ever. I thought it would all be tepid and rather, well, geriatric, but no. Someone's leaving her husband, telling him that the baby is some other guy's, etc, and then whap, after the high melodrama, there's that perky theme tune again. I was shocked, shocked I tell you! And of course immediately addicted.

Never mind, there was a flat to set up. With still no bed (the Bakers were bringing it down on Sunday, with a spare chest of drawers, bless) I attempted to blow up the air mattress to discover it had a slow leak. Still, sleeping bag on the floor was fine, and much better than the bottom bunk of the dorm room in that hostel. And I thought a hot bath would go down a treat, but it meant that I then had to figure out how to turn on the never before used hot water, and at that moment I was not up to the task. So after a cold bath, and the discovery that totally unfurnished means things like no toilet paper, paper towels, etc etc, I gave up and went to bed anyway. All that could get rectified the next day, and indeed it did. I also got to discover my closest town, which is Topsham. Topsham is very Olde Worlde and pretty with an excellent real ale pub down on the water, and is less than a ten minute stroll from the flat. It also has an incredible cheese shop. These things matter to me.

Right, that's long enough. I have work to do and I'm going to do it. More on starting work later. Suffice it to say for the moment that everyone is incredibly friendly and nice so I'm sure I'll fit in eventually!

Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Emigrates

Well, things are in full throttle here at GoAnneGo Towers. Having the job offer made, I have now accepted, and things are moving quickly. Very quickly indeed, as I start a week from Monday. This involves minor things such as moving down to the West Country and finding a place to live. Getting to Exeter is easy enough - just train it down from Paddington or Waterloo. They leave every hour at least and arrive two and a half hours later. The only problem is that with my back I can't currently carry all my stuff at one go. Thankfully Harters has a shed. Granted, it is more of an outdoor patio thing than your usual shed, but it is just right for storage of two large bags for a week or two. I am using the 'net to find flats to look at on Saturday and Sunday, and to find accomodation in the meantime. Still, it is stressful. But I know how to deal with stress and I know how to prep for travel to a foreign clime (ok, we're talking Devon, but still I don't know anything about down there.) I therefore killed two birds with one stone and hit the five level Waterstones on Piccadilly, where I purchased the following:

The Rough Guide to Devon & Cornwall (what to see, where to go, etc. I will never use Lonely Planet again as they are useless.)

The Hound of the Baskervilles (Set right there on the Moors.)

Lorna Doone (which is not in Scotland the way I thought, nor does it feature those little cookies of the same name they always give you when you donate blood)

The RSPB Guide to British Birds (a duplicate copy, to give as a gift to Harters as his book has nothing but European birds in it for some reason)

A Bad Birdwatchers Companion, mostly because I still can't classify that many birds, and this sorts out the top 50 in the UK. Which is handy when you can only classify the magpie, the wood pigeon, coots, herons, greylag geese and moorhens. Oh, and of course crows, robins and blue tits. But I digress.

I have a sneaking suspicion that I won't want to move to Devon after reading Hound of the Baskervilles late at night, but then risks must be taken. Apparently I also need to get ahold of some children's book called "Tarka the Otter" which is renowned as an example of both Devon and nature writing. I even passed a surprise quiz this evening by looking at Aki and saying "Hey! Those cufflinks are the Devon flag!" He was most impressed.

I've also been studying up on my new county and have started to crack it. In a nutshell, it is just like Massachusetts, except it isn't.

Coastline? Check. Loads of it.

Pilgrims? Check. Left Devon, arrived Massachusetts.

Sylvia Plath? Check. Left Massachusetts, eventually arrived Devon. (Ted Hughes is buried here.)

Top university? Check. Exeter University is pretty renowned. I hear rumors that some place called Harvard is ok to do A-level equivalents.

Associations with tea? Check. Devon cream teas (and clotted cream) are famous. Boston Harbour a teapot tonight and all that.

Crime writers? Check. Agatha Christie v Denis Lehane.See? Just the same, really.

I'm now pricing out where to live on the web. Conveniently, it looks like I will be able to afford something with two bedrooms, which given that so many people claim they're coming to stay is a good thing. You are all welcome, just let me find a place first. I almost lept for joy at one listing until I found out it wasn't furnished. Two bedroom, 10 feet from the sea, 1 minute to the train station to work, thatched cottage (you shouldn't own them as they're a pain to maintain, but to rent hey it is the landlord's problem!), oak fittings, big fireplace, £600 a month (my budget). If it wasn't unfurnished, I'd have been in like a shot! But the quest will continue, so start pricing out those flights! The cheap flights are already upon us and will continue til the end of March so get your eyes peeled now.

And to answer all the questions that have been flooding in:

Who are you working for? That's not the kind of thing I put on the web. If you really want to know, e-mail me and if I know you I will e-mail you back their website to check them out.

Are you a solicitor or a barrister? I will be a solicitor, but there's an exam to take yet. Solicitors do not wear the wigs. Unless they really want to at a fancy dress party.

Are they sponsoring you for a work visa? Yes, they are. Otherwise I'd be home soon.

Is "Congratulations. Oh crap." an appropriate sentiment? Apparently so. It has been expressed in various forms by a few people. I understand. I'm pretty excited, but definitely miss my friends back in the USA.

Is it Devon or Devonshire? It is Devon.

What is the town like? I defer to wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exeter

Can I come and visit? Yes, you can.

When? Whenever you like once I have a place, which of necessity means any time after a week from Monday. Try to call first so I can prepare your room, but if not we'll wing it. Stay as long as you like.

What about your cat? I am having him chipped and he'll be here six months after that. This is turning out to be a real pain (and is currently falling to my friend Heike, bless her), but hope perserveres!

Will you post pictures? Yes. Give me a little time!

Is it really ok to come and visit? Yes. Stop being nudgy or your invitation will be revoked.

Are you going to row? Yes. Exeter Boat Club has an excellent sculling program and I'm already in touch.

Why does clotted cream clot? It is the cream content in unhomogenized milk, which rises to the top when you heat it on a low temp for several hours. The best stuff is from the butcher's, not the supermarket.

Is there a God? You may wish to talk to someone more theologically qualified than myself about this. I am, however, quite certain that God does not take either the form of Shane Warne nor Louise from Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps nor David Icke, whatever any of them may try to tell you.

Right, back to the house hunting.
Love
Anne

In Which Our Heroine Agonizes Over the State of Her Nation
It is hard to take, watching all the news filter through out of New Orleans. What is even worse, although totally understandable, is having to be the resident American around these parts. It means that people keep asking me "How? How has America let this happen? And why hasn't Bush lost his job already?" There is a perception here that it might all be race related, as it is almost nothing but black faces you see on television. I keep having to tell people that 70% of the population of New Orleans was black to start with and of the underclasses that wouldn't have been able to evacuate, that percentage was most likely to fall into it.

Then, of course, I have to explain that Bush can't lose his job. The "lame duck" concept isn't sitting too well over here. Were this sort of thing to happen on UK soil, Tony Blair'd be out of a job in hours with one "no-confidence" vote. The spectacle of celebrities managing to get in there to help (Sean Penn) and airdrop food with their own planes (John Travolta) just seems to pound it home. The government won't help, but celebrities will. Shocking. Completely shocking.

I don't know what it is like there in terms of press and things, but the news reports here have been pretty harsh towards Bush, and that's even the conservative commentators. The news though that the head of FEMA hadn't heard there were people needing to be rescued there until Thursday was pretty galling, particularly when you find out he has no emergency management experience and was sacked for not being even able to organize horse shows, at least according to this link from Sunday's "Observer" paper http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1562515,00.html. I think this guy is going to be the first to go. Sadly, he may well be the last.

I couldn't help but notice that when the government made up its mind to get people out, it happened. So why didn't it happen sooner? I have even tried to cut Bush some slack. Knowing that I don't like him, I think it prudent to actually look at what's happening rather than just take the easy tack of dismissing him altogether because he's a jerk. Unfortunately, actually looking at what he's doing or not doing just makes me even angrier.

I then feel in the weird place of having to defend my government's indefensible actions, just by dint of being the one who can explain the system a bit better. It is very odd to be the foreigner abroad. If I was just a tourist, no one would ask me. They're certainly not stopping the annoying tourists in Fortnum & Mason's (where I had to go shopping for a little pressie for my friend Brian. Great food, but you'll pay for it, and the first floor (or tourist floor, as I call it) can try the patience of anyone). But if you know an actual American who you can ask her opinion, which of course I give all the time anyway, all the better.

I've spent the time kind of in retreat. Done nice things. Went to Kew Gardens to check out the Chiluly exhibits and get a sun burn. Gave my Victoria & Albert Museum membership card a workout. Having tea tomorrow at the British Museum with a friend who works there in the European Art division and checking out the Arabic Calligraphy exhibit (another of my weird interests, that.) , checking out the Stubbs and the Horse exhibit at that National Gallery. And of course writing my Dar Williams article. But in the offtime, I keep catching myself tapping into a more frenetic mood while listening to The Killers at top volume, maybe with a bit of Goldfrapp thrown in to calm down. Obviously, I'm not calming down as much as I want, and have become obsessed by the news.

I've been to New Orleans, and it was a great city. I have confidence it will rise again. I have less confidence the US government is going to be much help with that, although I have awful premonitions of Bechtel getting contracts out of it, notwithstanding their lousy experience in Iraq and with the Big Dig (now springing more leaks in a large tunnel near you).

Right. Time for more diversion, obviously. Tonight: theatre tickets to see Euan MacGregor and Jane Krakowski tap dance and sing their way through "Guys & Dolls". Civilization goes on, I guess.
Love
Anne