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happy bank holiday. it's dec 26 and all is good in the world. steff made it here safely. life is just too damn busy lately to post. and this is a good thing. christmas was spent among friends and food. tomorrow stonehenge, tuesday the world: there are plans for shows, eats, and amsterdam.
Christmas is quickly approaching and love is in the air. I do love the holiday season - it's my favorite!
Things at work have been insane - we've all been busy getting our spirits up for the holidays. Last Tuesday we went out for a 12-hour lunch. The whole afternoon/evening is a bit of a blur - a big beautiful blur of Christmas merriment! Ho ho ho. Here's a photo of me with my workmates.
It is no surprise to me that alcohol consumption rises at Christmas more in the UK than any other leading Western country.
But I can't say that I mind it . . .
Random message of the day - from Jason, who will be duely missed this Christmas:
JasonGalli: Hey, you sexy tart.
JasonGalli: ...or crumpet or something.
In case you're at all curious about my new digs in London, here's a few images of the scene outside my flat.
This is the house I live in. Lovely, classic London don't you think? I wish my flat was the one with the big huge arched window. Alas, I live in the space at the very bottom: my door is the one next to the garbage cans.
The first thing I see when I step outside of my flat is the New Eagle Chinese Takeaway across the street. No, I've never been drunk or lazy enough to patron the NECT. But it's good to know it's there in case of an emergency.
The mornings are so dead here - all of the shop fronts are closed and covered by a wall of sheet metal.
Note the kick ass graffiti next to the NECT, along with the bags of trash piled around the light post. That's no shop front - the graffiti and trash are permanent Balls Pond Road fixtures!
It's not the greatest, but it's home. Sometime soon I'll take pictures of the inside of my flat, which I assure you is more cheery - especially now that we have a Christmas tree!
I know I'm about a year behind on this one, but whatever. Streamripper is the mad 1337 haxx0rs gift to listeners of streaming audio.
Yesterday, while working away on something important, listening to indienow.com radio, I got to thinking about how much I was enjoying all this new music I was hearing (especially the lamenting indie pop ballads) and how cool it would be to save the tracks. Then I had a sudden flashback to something Skipper Michael told me about (nautical title in reference to an image of his on myboosh.com).
Streamripper: an app that records tracks off of an audio stream and saves them as mp3. Each song gets saved individual, with track information and everything.
Brilliant!
But what made my afternoon was discovering that an OS X version exists, and its open source, and it works really really well.
When I woke up this morning, I had a whole bunch of new stuff for the iPod to keep me company on the way to work! Happiness!
I'm taking station recommendations. Bring it on!
Here's a link to some pictures I took while out on the town yesterday (Sunday).
Sunday in the spirit of the proverbial laundry list:
Breakfast consisted of oatmeal and water, if I recall correctly. Pure, clean, and necessary: essential after an italian feast the night before.
Did laundry - sheet load. Not having a dryer sucks.
Returned to Camden to actually buy stuff. Found some lovely presents. Yay the holidays! Rue the crowds. Had lunch at the Bento Cafe - Japanese food. Good and cheep, but Tim seemed unimpressed. Perhaps it was the seemingly depressed kimono-clad wait staff paired with the bland atmosphere?
Went to Runners Need for some new running shoes. Was impressed with the advice. The dude had me run in each pair of shoes I tried on. In the end he recommended I try "normal" running shoes instead of shoes designed to compensate for over-pronation. He reckoned the extra support in my current shoes might be keeping my feet from rolling properly, hence causing the ankle pain.
Home again home again. On the train. Love the silverlink.
After dropping off our stuff and recovering from the crowds, we were out again for the sacred "dinner and a movie". We tried out Beva, the new Turkish place down the road. The place was expensive, the service, over-the-top friendly. The food? Overwhelmingly average. My veggies were overcooked. The hummus was nothing special. Don't think I'll go back.
After dinner we went to the National Film Theater to watch a special screening of The Evil Dead, the original! We owed this delight to the currently running History of the Horror Film festival. Bruce Campbell is definitely the man - his priceless facial expressions made so many scenes in the movie. For all of its 80's cheese, The Evil Dead still manages to scare. Loved it!
Apparently Tim's been suggesting Bic Runga to me for years, but I guess I just wasn't paying attention. A couple weeks ago I finally caught up with his reccomendation and I just can't stop listening to this album. Bic Runga's voice is AMAZING, absolutely lovely. The lyrics: like goosebumps in musical form.
For the triple en-zed get - your - ass - kicked - by - a - lovesong cumshot, check out Together in Concert Live with Bic Runga, Dave Dobbyn, and Tim Finn. The three songs I can't stop listening to: Drive, Just Add Water, Good Morning.
See the stars and all the planets
Fly the great wide world and have it all
Yeah better get a ticket better get in line
I'm praying now for beautiful weather
Take a car and drive forever but I'm
Only ever sitting at the traffic light
And all the world to see is too much
Sometimes for me
Good morning baby
I hope I'm gonna make it through another day
First Run since the 10k - discovered London Fields: Sooooo less kept than Highbury Fields, but oh so much more community character. Graffiti art galore. Saw a dude carrying a can of corn whose face may or may not have been smashed by the same can just hours earlier: his flesh wounds weren't exactly fresh, but they clearly hadn't been cleaned either. His eyes appeared hungover from the night before. Can't quite figure out where the can of sweet corn played into things, and I guess i'll never know.
This juxtaposed against the frolicking dogs and generically cute English kiddies made for splendid people watching.
Cereal, laundry, blah blah blah: must get out of the house!
You know you live in London when you randomly run into someone you know on the train: this afternoon, found Zoe and James on the Silverlink en route to the same destination as Tim and I -- £2.20 for a return ticket from Dalston (my doorstep) to Camden. Not too shabby.
Our specific destination: Camden Markets.
But first: the pub for pints and chips with Z&J.
(Numbing es necessario for battling the Camden zombies.)
Horrible service, but what a view. The sun was shining, and we sat on the deck overlooking the Camden Lock. Against the wintry fog of our shallow breaths, we drank Kronenberg Blanc and froze our tushies off: brilliant.
We only had time to merely browse the endless stalls of stuff: some cool, some crap. Christmas shopping potential abounds.
But that's for another day.
Home for yummy Italian flash-back dinner: pasta, garlic bread, Montepulciano, The Breeders, Pantera (RIP Dimebag), the Buzzcocks, et al.
Re-viewed Grosse Pointe Blank: still kickin ass after all these years.
Some people say forgive and forget. Nah, I don't know. I say forget about forgiving and just accept. And... get the hell out of tow
This article about the lonely whale is extremely touching. This particular baleen follows atypical migration patterns, all the while singing its siren song at a frequency of 52 hertz, much higher than the 15-20 hertz range of most whales.
Sometimes I feel like a lonely whale, singing my song, beached on the seashore of awkward silence.
(Thanks, BoingBoing.)
While exploring London last night with Tim and Rory, we came across the Scooter Club meet-up at Bar Italia in Soho. It warmed my heart to share a brief moment with three of my favorite things: scooters, coffee, and Christmas lights.
Not feeling the blog thing at the moment, but here goes anyway... And so last monday began Life After The 10k. My knees and ankle were sore, my muscles duely in need of rest. So this last week I thought I'd take a break.
I treated myself to a beer on Monday. I ate some cheese. By Wednesday I was back to my old irresponsible self. A Work Dinner quickly turned into a Work Evening which eventually became a Work Morning. My wine glass never seemed to hit empty. There were many laughs and moments shared (now if I could only remember them all). I do remember the most beautiful Christmas tree EVAH in Trafalgar Square. Something about that tree - it was the kind of magic I'd been waiting for this holiday season.
I love Christmas!
Sobriety, balance, reason, whatever you want to call it - it's definitely not in my blood. Thursday was spent in recovery - a sleep in until 10:30am, followed by a minutely productive half-day at work. This my budget couldn't afford but nor could my aching head afford the fluorescent lights and glowing computer screen.
Yesterday I went to the company Christmas party. For all the hype, it was pretty bland. I didn't get drunk enough to dance, which is probably a good thing.
Feelings at the moment: thoroughly sick of work junk.
With the weekend quickly spiraling towards its end, I'm pretty keen on getting back to being a health nut. The week off was fun, but I didn't come out of it feeling any better about myself. Oddly, I do feel a little better about the city. More romantic or something. Whatever. All I know is I feel more interested in getting out of my head and into London.
I've started up the sketchbook again (the moleskin blog inspired me). We'll see if that goes anywhere. I miss my drawings! Took a walk today. Have a burning desire to walk and walk. Especially now that it's cold enough to don the warm winter hats! Today I found St. Mary's Church Garden in Islington, a lovely small patch dotted with cool old crypts and tombstones. They have a Crypt Cafe open on Thursday evenings that I hope to check out this week. Had a spectacular dinner at La Piragua on Upper Street - fried plantains are "the business". But salsa with bread? What's that all about? I yearn for Trudy's corn chips (what was I saying about getting back to being a health nut?).
Other things I yearn for:
Dilmah Tea
Boots
Kindred spirits
New Music
A game of Scrabble
Personal space in the tube
Ice skating
Snow
NASA has released this amazing image of Saturn's tiny moon, Mimas, taken by the Cassini space probe.
In a splendid portrait created by light and gravity, Saturn's lonely moon Mimas is seen against the cool, blue-streaked backdrop of Saturn's northern hemisphere. Delicate shadows cast by the rings arc gracefully across the planet, fading into darkness on Saturn's night side. [Read on...]
