Man in the Mirror

Do you recall the woman on the bike with the basket full of kids I told you about? I was walking up to Primrose Hill the other lunchtime and I saw her bike tied to a parking sign outside this house. I felt like Jimmy finding Sting's scooter outside the Grand Hotel. It's generally been decided in the office that this woman is an eco-friendly rich woman who refuses to drive. The evidence being that she takes her kids to school in St John's Wood. Could this be her house? Is the four wheel drive hers? Who knows - maybe she's the cleaner. Unlikely though, I looked in the basket and it was full of rubbish.

Closer to home, I've decided I wear too much black. I only wear black shirts to work and I have loads of black t-shirts, yet I can't remember buying one of them. I have pale blue t-shirts, a bright red and a few stripey t-shirts, but I keep going back to black. I need more colour in my life. On Sunday I went shopping and bought a green t-shirt and new dark denim jeans. They had their first wear today. It felt good wearing something new and in colour. I need to sort my shoes out - I've been wearing very dull shoes of late. I also need to lose weight, I'm 12 stone. I'm not sure how all of this happened.

The whole new clothes thing though had something to do with Saturday. Every year my Mum's side of the family has a beach day and we all meet in Goring, Worthing. I turned up in - yes - a black un-ironed t-shirt and my slightly dilapidated walking shoes. Everyone else looked like they'd bought their clothes especially the day before. Not a crease in sight.

I've just hung up my clean laundry; colourful t-shirts hanging on the rack. They look so good there, so fresh and clean; it's going to be hard not to reach for the black shirts again tomorrow.

Small acts of kindness

This sign stands outside a church in East London not far from Liverpool Street station. What are Oranges and Lemons letters? Can someone send me some, please? We thought maybe it was a business name, but there were no businesses in sight with that name. Which is good, because Oranges and Lemons letters should never be corporate, never be official - they should be friendly, like the letter I got off my Mum the other week. It's so rare anyone sends a hand written letter anymore - yet they're the only letters worth receiving. My Nan used to send loads of letters and they'd tell you what everyone was up to and if I look back at them now they're great because they capture moments in time that you forget about. 'Life moves pretty fast, if you don't stop and take a look around once in a while you might miss it', as Ferris Bueller once said.

Small acts of kindness are unexpected in London because it has a reputation for being so unfriendly and harsh. But take a look around and they do happen. Last Wednesday I was waiting for a friend at Victoria station and an old woman was trying to get help with her baggage from the station staff. Due to some health and safety/ red tape/ corporate nonsense issue, the staff explained that he couldn't carry her bags anywhere until she was actually in the station. A gruff fellow clearly sick of this, lit a cigarette and strutted up to the woman and asked her in a belligerent tone, that may have slightly scared her, where she needed her bags taking to. She told him and he picked them up and marched them to the station for her. I liked the way he was being nice in a surly manner.

I recall the winter of 2007 when I was flat hunting and I rang a woman called Doreen Collar who had a room in a flat for rent. She sounded really nice, and quite old - she was from a gentler and nobler age - and she told me which bus to get and said 'I should ask the driver to let me off at a certain junction'. I love that line because my experience of bus drivers is of angry irate men who think you're out of order if you dare ask them a question. I like the idea though, that old people can still live in this world, with the drivers dutifully dropping them off at their stop.

I didn't end up going to see Doreen Collar's flat. A shame really, she sounded really nice. And I bet she knows what Oranges and Lemons letters are.

A Sopranos shaped hole

There is a Buddhist maxim that states ( and I'm paraphrasing) that you should live in the now. I'm so stuck in the past and the ideal imagined future it's untrue. I'm stuck in the past with TV too. I rarely watch it, I just play catch up on classic series. Matt lent me the Sopranos, and I've just finished 6 series and the final episodes. If you're wondering where your blog was last week I was watching the final episodes of the Sopranos. (Oh you weren't. Oh well. As a character says in another gangster film, 'do you listen or wait to speak?'. I'd have to confess to the latter).

I was worried someone was going to tell me the end of the Sopranos, but they never did. Now I can see why. What happened at the end? What did the black silent screen signify? Did Tony die or was it just saying life carries on, the loose ends stay loose and this is where we're ducking out of his life?

Whatever, it's a brilliant series, pretty addictive. It got me through some long winter weekends. In January I took a walk through Regent's Park on a freezing ice-blue Saturday. It was silent and eerie. I was going to take a photo and start my blog that way but I never took the picture. I wish I did. I wish... (Have a picture of Corrado and T instead. I love that scene:

     'This thing of ours. You used to run New Jersey.'

     'Oh, that's nice.'

That day there was nobody about in Regent's Park I went home and sat in bed watching the Sopranos. 

Now there's a Sopranos shaped hole in my life. Or maybe it's something else. On Friday I sat drinking coffee in a cafe with a good window to the Liverpool street below. I was writing out a card for Adrian, as he and Sam have just had their first daughter. It took me ages to work out what to write. I was looking out trying to recognise faces. I lived in that city for years. I only recognised one person: Gary Rigby. He's on the sick and saves up money to go abroad: India, Australia. He's possibly saving now. He just sits out the months until he can go away. Well I guess that's what he still does.

In the cafe in Belsize Park on Monday, where I was ushered in to shelter from the hailstones, I sat drinking coffee knowing I wouldn't recognise anyone who walked past. Now I've finished the Sopranos I'm not going to take on any more big tv series. I've got a million things to do, all those things hanging around waiting to be finished. Waiting to be started. I'm sure going to miss my Sopranos fix though.

I've nothing to say, but it's Ok

I've nothing really to write today, no picture to illustrate what I've been doing. (Above is Canary Wharf where I went for a meeting and co-incidently where my brother used to work. He also worked in the building in Swiss Cottage where I work now. This photo has nothing to do with the following text).  I've been to see a couple of properties but really I need to contact a mortgage advisor to see how much money they'd lend me before my dreaming gets the better of me.  I'd love to have my own place though. It's about time. I think about this a lot at work. You need things to think about to find a reason for all the small ridiculous tasks you're meant to do.

What is it with the modern office environment? They're forever offering you cake. Everybody's always celebrating something, or someone's neighbour has brought round a cake for someone. Then you get an email about it. I was on the phone today and a piece of cake appeared on my desk. I felt ungrateful but I didn't want it so I threw it away. 

Outside of the office I keep bumping into Talya. Last week she was waiting outside Waitrose for a Nun. That's what she said, and then a bus stopped and the Nun appeared. On the Saturday before last she was on the tube making her way to Brighton with a friend (she's one of those people who has millions of friends and you never see the same one twice) to play some rare musical instruments at a festival. 

June already, it's scorching hot outside, I need to get moving.