MarkCity

Sunday, November 27, 2005
 
Thanks to the magic of Friends Reunited, I met up with one of my best friends from school on Friday. David - who reads this blog and who featured in the goth photos that appeared on here last year - lives in Melbourne now. I hadn't seen him for 12 years, so I was nervous about meeting up. What if there were long, awkward silences? What if we didn't have anything in common any more? Thankfully it went really well and it's a shame he's going back to Oz tomorrow.

Only four weeks to Christmas. My God. The effort of buying presents and being jolly is just too much. We're going to be spending Xmas in Yorkshire this year. Butter's Grandma rang today and said, 'Don't bring them rats with you.' Poor little unwelcome creatures. I've bought tickets to see Edward Scissorhands at Sadler's Wells as a treat for Butter. Yes, another Matthew Bourne ballet. What have I let myself in for?



Sunday, November 13, 2005
 
We've just had a rat photo session which wasn't very successful due to excessive wriggling. No, not me: Muffin and Flake. They just won't sit still. Here's what we got, anyway. The solo pics are of Flake, who is a lot braver than Muffin.







I'm becoming increasingly obsessed with the X Factor this year. Last night, a terrible travesty of justice occurred when Louis 'Son of Satan' Walsh sent home the very sexy Maria over the very sexless Conway Sisters. The Conways sang 'Hold On' by Wilson Philips, which is apt because both groups contained a fat girl who stood at the back. My favourite this year is Chico, a lonely goat-herder who can't sing but sure can move. He claims to have bedded over 100 women - hey, it's quality not quantity that counts, Chico - but is a strict Muslim who wants to marry a virgin. After the X Factor finished, I watched The Simon Cowell Story. Yes, it was a Saturday night. I should repeat that. While the rest of the world was out having fun, I was sat at home watching The Simon Cowell Story on ITV2.

My excuse is that I was recovering from the previous weekend's revelries, when a triple-whammy of late nights marked my 35th birthday. Thursday night I got very drunk with my 'London' friends in a pub called The Slaughtered Lamb; then on Friday, Butter took me to the v posh Hotel du Vin for a slap-up binge; and on Saturday we went with Richard and Debbie to the Bowlplex, which was empty, and we ended up being the only 4 people left in the place, with the dancefloor to ourselves. We got the DJ to play various indie hits and went ker-azy. It was a fun end to a fantastic trio of days.