ganching

Internet Relationships

Tryabake has been very busy recently at his Institution.  As far as I can tell this involves a great deal of sitting around thinking while drinking coffee and looking stuff up on the Internet.  Occasionally though when TB is not googling  "why do some people on public transport always end up sitting next to the mad guy or is that just me" or "cleaning products; are there any that don't give you cancer?", he also has to interact with students.  Fortunately for them, they live in other parts of the world and only have relationships with TB via the Internet. Most of them have never actually met him.

The people I interact with on the Internet are all, without exception, cultured, sensitive and well-rounded human beings.  (Well, I say without exception, but that's not strictly true. Some of the people who comment on this blog I actually know in real life and the things I could tell you!  Others are capable of writing the most appalling things.  One, (I hesitate to name him) once wrote the most shocking and obscene fact about himself.    Having considered it at length I now realise that what he wrote was almost certainly a lie and in fact he does like poetry.

This is the problem with the Internet, people can very often get the wrong end of the stick.

The other evening Traybake called unexpectedly and co-incidenatlly at 10.25 just as Newsnight was starting, and said he had something to show me.

"Have a read of this and tell me what you think".

Dear Traybake

I am very tired so I have decided to have a rest from working and thinking and immediately I think of you!! 

I have been working so hard and now I am having a rest.  The weather here is very warm and I am lying on the sun lounger next to my very large swimming pool.  I am a little moist, from swimming, and the only small problem I have is that it would be good if there was someone here to help rub in some sun tan lotion as I already have a deep golden tan all over my body and do not wish to get any browner. This is the problem with wearing a bikini but as my now ex-boyfriend says, if one looks as good as I do it is only right to share it with other people.  He was a very silly man and not an intellectual like you!!!

Traybake the reason I am tired is because I invited 49 people for dinner last night ( I am very lucky to own a house  - outright - with a dining room large enough for inviting big groups of people) and I did all the cooking myself!  I am a very, very good cook. The food was delicious. I wish I could have invited you.  If you had been able to come you would have been my "special" guest..... ;).

The house looked very lovely and the garden was filled with lights which is just as well as otherwise, the guests would have got lost in the shrubbery.  The garden is very, very large.

Now Traybake I am writing to thank you for all your help this year.  You have been so patient with me and all my silly, little anxieties as well as being a brilliant teacher, an inspiration, a role-model and a special friend.  The Institution is very, very lucky to have you!!!

I am very much looking forward to next year especially as I am planning a trip to London.  I have been a little bit naughty but I will tell you about this when I next send you an email.

Yours in anticipation,

Gabriella

"Well, what do you think?"

"What do I think? I think you should change your job immediately and leave the country!"

In Which I Visit The Doctor Part One

A Pig In Clover
Originally uploaded by ganching1

I may have mentioned before I have bad blood or, to be more precise, I have a low iron count.  A few weeks ago I went to have a blood test and had, what I consider to be, a proper South London experience.

I got lost, I got shouted at and someone stuck a needle in me.

 The clinic that I went to is in an achingly, over designed contemporary building that has the stamp of an architect's first big job all over it.  There was no obvious front entrance and the signage was shockingly bad.  When I arrived I had to speak to about 6 different (and indifferent) members of staff before I found the right place to go.

Beside the reception desk was one of those ticket machines that they have in supermarkets next to the deli counter but instead of waiting your turn for a half pound of Wicklow breaded ham and a quarter of cream cheese you had to go and sit down and wait for the lab person to come and get you. 

I was number 94 and I could see a woman holding number 93 sitting in the waiting area.  A Somalian woman with two small children came in after me and took number 95.  A few minutes later a young, boisterous South Londoner came in and tried to take out a ticket only to discover that the ticket roll had come to an end.  After waiting a bit for the receptionists to stop talking to each other and acknowledge that a patient was standing in front of them she interrupted to ask for a ticket.

"Get it out of the ticket machine!"

"There ain't no tickets in there."

"Yes there are!"

"There's not!"

"There is! Try harder!"

Eventually, one of the receptionists got off her arse and came round to check.  A few moments later a new roll of tickets was inserted and the girl took the first one which was number 77.  Another young woman came in and helped herself to ticket number 78.

We all sat there waiting.  After about 20 minutes a woman in a white coat appeared and, I felt reassured that finally someone who looked vaguely professional was in the room.

"NUMBER 92", she bellowed and a small, elderly woman got up and hurried over towards her.  She roared out for 93 and 94 and the Somalian woman and I got up.

"NINETY FIVE?"

Nobody moved.

"Where is NINETY FIVE?"

"That girl's next.  She came in second after me." 

She turned to the girl,

"What number are you?"

"I'm 77.  The ticket mach........"

"That's not right.  It's not you!  NINETY FIVE?"

It took four of us to convince her that what we were saying was true.

"Follow ME!"

She marched off, her white coat flapping in her wake with a trail of patients trying to keep up.  We were all herded into the treatment room and sent to sit in different corners.  There was already another employee in there who luckily was dealing with me. The two of them pulled the curtains around us so there was a modicum of privacy.  The man taking my blood was fine until he started having a shouted conversation with Ms White Coat who was too busy shouting at the elderly woman to hear properly what anyone was saying.

"You had a cup of tea?  NO, NO, NOTHING to eat or drink. NO TEST TODAY!  Come back. 7.30 TOMORROW!"

I wondered at this point if it had been a mistake me having a large bowl of porridge with a dollop of golden syrup and a big mug of coffee for breakfast.  Thankfully, they didn't ask me if I'd eaten anything.

On my way out I passed the STD clinic which was empty apart from one woman sitting on her own.  God knows how she was going to be treated, stripped naked and paraded through the streets of South East London with a placard round her neck saying "I AM A SLAPPER!", no doubt.

Today I got my test results.

The Bloody BBC

Traybake claims that the best decision he ever made was getting rid off his television set.  Soda Farl and I are more ambivalent about whether or not it was such a good idea as, unfortunately, he didn't also make the decision to stop watching television.

At 10.00 p.m.last night there was a rat-a-tat-tat on my door.  Downstairs Soda Farl was breathing a sigh of relief and relaxing for the first time all evening.

'I'm just after watching the match with Soda Farl and I'm ready for my tea.'

I go into the kitchen to put the kettle on while TB settles himself in front of the television.

'God there's nothing on!  I s'pose we'll have to watch the BBC news. Have you noticed how almost everyone who works there can only speak Estuary?  It's sec-RE-tary not sec-A-tary, you gype.  God what are they on about now? What a rightwing shower they are!'

I feel compelled to point out to TB that there are some that believe that the BBC is a hotbed of radical socialsim.

'Really? They must be very, very stupid.  Oh now that feckin' eegit, John Simpson is on, thankfully not in a burka.  It's disgraceful him out there putting indigenous peoples' lives at risk just so he can get a story.........

I go back into the kitchen to make the tea and while I'm in there I decide to wash a few dishes and give the fridge a wipe down and mop the floor and count all the money in my change jar and put the tins in the cupboard in alphabetical order.   After 20 minutes I run out of things to do and return to the living room.

..........and as for the football commentary on the BBC - the banality of it was beyond belief.  It was real Janet and John stuff. Here is the ball.  The ball is brown.  The ball is round.  The ball is brown and round. Here are the Spaniards.  Here are the Germans. Run, Germans, run!  The ball is in the net.  See the Germans cry. Cry, Germans, cry!  Appalling!  And another thing - their attempts to pronounce the players' names were laughable. 

I finally run out of patience and demand that TB changes the subject and the channel.  We switch over to ITV where they are showing highlights of the match.

'Have you noticed how Torres looks like the captain of the girls first eleven hockey team?  After this he's probably of to play a match against the Four Marys.'

I switch off the television and tell Traybake to go home.

Get Carter Or Talking To Strangers Part 3

Get Carter
Originally uploaded by ganching1

I have been away for a few days doing important urbanist work in the North-East of England.

Circumstances meant that I had to travel on a Sunday which, as everyone knows, is an insane thing to try and do. Every weekend the rail companies dig up large sections of the network.  They say it's "engineering works" but I have my doubts.  I think it's really just a way of creating a bit of excitement for staff in underused stations.  Imagine what a thrill it is when the London-Aberdeen Express disgorges all its passengers on to your little hanging-basket bedecked station platform and you are given the important job of herding them all on to waiting buses.

My train was leaving from King's Cross and I got there with only an hour to spare.  I had taken advice from Traybake on what time to leave to get to the station on time.  We are both slightly neurotic travellers and like to spread the anxiety around.

'I've got to be at Heathrow for 2.00? What time do you think I should leave here?'

'Heathrow? For two o'clock? Tomorrow? Cutting it a bit fine, aren't you? Let's see. Twenty minutes from here to the station and let's say the train is a bit delayed - or cancelled - so an hour to London Bridge and then you have to buy a ticket there and there's always problems on the Jubilee Line and then change at Green Park - miles away from the platform you want - then on to the Piccadilly which can take forever.  Then, of course, you have to leave time for security and all that stuff so if it was me, I'd leave now! In fact you might as well start unpacking as you've almost definitely missed it already.'

From King's Cross I had to take a train and then a bus and then a train and then another train.  What with all the chopping and changing I had lots of opportunities to observe my fellow passengers. I had reserved seats on all of the train bits of the journey.   On the first lag I sat next to girl who ate a M & S sandwich and then went to sleep.   On the bus it was a free-for-all and on the next train I had a seat to myself.  This time the sandwich-eating girl was seated next to a young man.  They were soon chatting away to each other in broad Yorkshire accents.  Being a bit of a nosey cow a keen student of human behaviour I was listening to their conversation.  I discovered they were both 'at uni' and that she worked in a coffee bar and thought that anyone who came in after six o'clock was a 'loser'. Apparently proper people go to pubs at that time of the day.  In the midst of this his mobile phone rang and he had an extremely loud conversation which went as follows:

'Yeah, well that's what the solicitor said. I've got the charge sheet here. It says [he proceeds to read out his name and address in a booming voice] has been charged with common assault and racism. Bastards......and they say I have a problem with lesbians.  Whatever you do, don't tell anyone - nobody's got to know. It has to be kept secret. Say nowt to anyone!'

(Interested parties can apply here if they would like further details like his name and address.)

By the time I got on the last train I was sitting close to a Chelsea Pensioner and a couple in their 30s.  They seemed to be travelling as a group but I couldn't guess what the relationship between them all was.  Mainly this was because the conversation was being dominated by the old man and the other two were saying very little.  At one point though they began exchanging email addresses and I realised that they had only just met on the train. The CP was a bit more clued in than I would have expected.  He was talking about Anthony Gormley and offering to give the couple a tour of the Chelsea Hospital the next time they were in London. They began writing down each other's addresses. I was sitting there thinking how I would never, ever give my details out to some random person and wondering if maybe I am just a wee bit misanthropic when I heard this:

'Only ever been one decent, honest politician in this country.'

He waited expectantly for the couple to say something but they remained silent.

'Yeah, only one decent one in the last 50 years!'

I could sense that the couple were beginning to feel uneasy.

Eventually the male half  of the couple who was American, said,

'Winston Churchill?'

'Nah, not him. The one they sent to Northern Ireland.  You know, the one who was going to deal with all the coloured people.  Enoch Powell!  That's the one. Only honest MP we ever had!'

My advice to anyone travelling on public transport is always bring earplugs, never admit to speaking English and always give a false address. Oh and try not to be a lesbian or black.

When You Are Old or Talking To Strangers Part 2

'Are you related to Arriety?'

At London Bridge I'd spotted a very stylish woman in her late 40s.  She was impossibly slender with black hair, going grey in that interesting way that only very dark-haired woman do, and was dressed in skinny trousers and clumpy high heels: a very difficult look which she had managed to pull off.  I imagined that she taught in the local university or was some kind of artist, (this being the Hoxton of south east London there are quite a lot of artists who live round here).  The only incongruous note was that she was carrying a big box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

We both got up to get off the train at the same stop. I noticed she was staring at me.  As I had been looking at her earlier on I could hardly object but at least I had tried to be discreet about it. Then she spoke.

'Are you related to Arriety?'

'I'm sorry, who?'

'Arriety? Are you related to her.'

'No, I'm not.'

'You could be. You could be Arriety's mum.  She's got blond curly hair exactly like yours!'

'Lots of kid have blond curly hair.'

'Arriety's not a kid!  She's 25!'

All of this said in the most accusatory tone.  The woman stomped off leaving me feeling as if somehow it was my fault that I wasn't Arriety's mum and also taken aback that I looked old enough to be the mother of a grown woman, which I am but I don't necessarily want strangers pointing this out to me.

On Talking To Strangers Part One (or where is Boris when you need him?)

On Tuesday evening Traybake and I were in Waterloo station.  The place was packed with people who looked liked they had just come from a wedding in Billericay: lots of men in hired morning suits and women in big hats and even bigger heels.

Traybake had just come back from Ireland and claimed that in Dublin they talked of nothing but the Lisbon Treaty and Leonard Cohen while in the north it was all Iris Robinson and homosexuality.  Traybake, who had had a drink or three, was regaling me with tales of Radio Ulster phone-in programmes. As always when Traybake is going on about stuff I wasn't paying that much attention.

"......so your one's going 'In Leviticus it says for a man to lie with a man is an abomination' and the interviewer butts in and says, '...but in Leviticus it also says you shouldn't eat certain foods, like if I went out with the wife and had a prawn cocktail that would be an abomination as well?' and then the other one is going, 'I didn't come here to talk about SEAFOOD'.......  I don't know where these people come from. Well I do.  The seventeenth century.  If only there were more people like me in that place..........".

"What? More people who really do believe that prawn cocktails are abominations?"

We were interrupted by a man, smiling beatifically, clutching a half-drank bottle of wine and dressed in a morning suit.

"Hosshw are youse ones thsshs shevening, so?  Iissh a beautiful shevening, so it is.  Ahscot slovely place so it is, now.  Yousuns are lovely people, yessh ".

As he spoke the wine bottle slowly slipped out of his hand and fell at my feet splashing the bottom of my trousers with Chablis. With some difficulty he bent down and picked up the bottle, shook it to see how much was still in there, smiled again and ambled off towards the platform.

Traybake thought he was sweet.  I was just worried that people would think I'd had an unfortunate accident. 

Enwrought With Golden And Silver Light

Sunbathers
Originally uploaded by ganching1

On Friday night I dreamt I had a boyfriend who wore a brown suit and ate madelines out of a paper bag. He held me close at a family party and finished all of the cakes without offering one to me. As I watched the final sweet crumbs fall down his starched front I knew that our relationship wouldn't last.

On Saturday a thin, bespectacled man sat opposite me on the train from Canary Wharf, and started reading a book. I had been to the shopping mall where I had blown this year's share dividends on 4 CDs and a bunch of roses. I'd also gone to Waitrose so was surrounded by shopping bags. The man on the train had very skinny legs and he was wearing too short, shorts. I felt resentful that he was exposing so much flesh and that he had chosen to sit opposite me when there were lots of other empty seats in the carriage. I then saw the title of the book he was reading, How Not To Be Bullied At Work, and was consumed with guilt.

Today I went to a car boot sale with friends. I bought 3 terracotta flowerpots and a Tottenham badge. After I'd paid for the badge I realised that the stall holder was also selling Ulster Loyalist badges and I was really cross with myself for giving him my money.

I saw this couple last week.   I imagine that they are retired academics who live in a high-ceilinged flat in Bloomsbury and never get unreasonably cross about things that hardly matter at all.

Some Woman's Yellow Hair

Window Box 31 May
Originally uploaded by ganching1

It is a well known fact that when women live together their menstrual cycles begin to align. I was thinking about this fact this morning as I was wandering down the road towards the clinic where I was about to have a blood test.  Then I began thinking about what happens to you if you live in a house where all the other occupants are men. Do you all begin to align yourself in some other way?

I was marching along with the following thoughts running through my head,

God, look at the cut of that woman - does she not have a mirror in her house? What's that awful toneless racket?  Oh no, it's me singing tunelessly to myself.  Look at that man! Smoking while picking up litter outside that university building.  I'm sure that's not allowed.  What's that sign saying?  Portage Department?  What's a "Portage Department" when it's at home? I have no idea so it must be something stupid. Oh look, spalling concrete. God it's hot out here.  Maybe I shouldn't have worn that woolly jumper and my winter coat - or my scarf.  Oh, what now? Someone smoking in a Council van!  I wonder if I could report him to his employer?

..and then it struck me.  My thinking patterns have been infected by the people around me.

It has occurred to me recently that I spend too much time in the company of men.  This was forcefully brought home to me yesterday when in order to cheer up the girleens at work (and exclude all of the men in the team without offending them), I suggested we could organise an outing to see Sex And The City.  Without exception all the women told me they'd already arranged to see the film with their big gangs of female friends.

There is a change afoot though. I am about to be ousted from my position as token only woman in the house as Soda Farl's girlfriend is moving in to his flat at the end of the month. 

[I just had to edit out a Freudian slip typing error in the last sentence.  I originally typed "this flat" rather than "his flat".......]

We shall see what happens.

Who Likes Girls Who Likes Girls

Great Spotted Woodpecker
Originally uploaded by nigel pye

I felt unaccountably happy at the weekend.  The sun was shining and I had nothing urgent to do. Instead I pottered.  I did a little light gardening.  You know, the sort of gardening you do when wearing a tea dress and carrying a wicker trug - deadheading and picking roses - that kind of thing. I also planted some seeds in pots indoors. In a few weeks I may have a fine crop of coriander, basil and rocket.

On Sunday morning I woke up really early because there was a shocking racket coming from the garden.  I looked out the window and spotted a woodpecker busily pecking away.  (This was extremely exciting for me as I have never seen a woodpecker before.  When I phoned Traybake to tell him about it I could hardly speak, "I saw, I saw, you won't believe what I saw, I saw a great spotted woodpecker on the clothes line!!" TB muttered something about me needing to get out more often before putting the phone down on me.)

Unfortunately the first woodpecker I ever saw seemed to be a not very intelligent one as it was pecking away at the piece of wood the boys next door use to prop the washing line up with.  I don't think that very many grubs would live in that particular piece of wood. Here is the photograph I took of the woodpecker which is almost the same as the photograph above although I think mine has more dramatic interest.

In the afternoon I went to meet London Sister in Bloomsbury.  It was London Garden Squares weekend when squares and gardens are open to the public  We spent a very pleasant afternoon wandering around places that we would normally not be be able to access.

LS told me that on her way to the station she'd decided to make conversation with at least one stranger. "Imagine," she said, "if a visitor to London met one of us and we spoke to them they'd leave with the impression that London really was a friendly place!".  It must have been the sun or something, but for some reason I thought this was a good idea.  I decided to put it into practice myself.

LS and I parted at Charing Cross and I went down to the Embankment to catch the ferry to Greenwich.  In the queue for the boat I was standing next to a man who I knew was desperate to start talking to me.  Eventually the ticket collector came along and we both bought a single ticket to Greenwich.  This gave the man his opportunity and he started to make conversation.  Every fibre of my being was shrieking "MOVE AWAY FROM THIS PERSON NOW!" but I stood my ground and made a few desultory remarks myself.  I was feeling just a little smug.  We were all herded onto the ferry and everyone rushed to sit outside as it was such a beautiful afternoon.  There was an empty seat next to me.  The man who had spoken to me was looking at it, weighing up if he should come and sit next to me.  He didn't.  I was very relieved.  Instead a man with a small girl came and stood next to me.   He was wearing a t shirt that said "I Like Girls Who Like Girls" and I was wondering if this was the most appropriate outfit for a lone man in the company of a very small girl, when he asked me to take a photograph of him and his daughter.  Obviously this involved more conversation. The first man was still looking longingly in my direction.  I was feeling more and more uneasy.  A third man then hoved into view.  He had already had a drink or two and was on the wrong side of 70.  He was also wearing a joke tartan hat, the kind of thing if it was in a cartoon, would be worn by a man called Jock.  He plonked himself down next to me and started muttering. By this stage I was thoroughly fed up with the talking to strangers lark and irrationally cross with my sister for planting the idea in my head that this was a good thing to do, in the first place.  "Jock" began talking to me but, as I couldn't understand much of what he said and what I did understand was him giving out about foreigners, I pretended not to speak English.  I also pretended to be engrossed in the Observer magazine and he eventually gave up and lumbered away.

For the whole 50 minutes the boat took to get to Greenwich, the first man continued to make eyes at me.

Sometimes London feels like a very small place.When I got home I had a cup of tea with Traybake.  He had been to his Institution in London where he was carrying out an experiment on a glottal stop and, on the way back he said he'd seen a man with a little girl, wearing a very "inappropriate t shirt".  

"The 'I Like Girls Who Like Girls' man? He's my new best friend."

Give Us Yer Money (Again)

Once again it's time to start rattling the collecting can.  A few months ago I linked to a post by the blooming Peach . She had decided to put together a book to raise money for a charity and was looking for submissions.  In the end she got around 400 and, after a mammoth piece of editing, she and her team of volunteers pared them down to around 100.

I found out yesterday that the book is now out and is on sale for a mere £12.50, the bulk of which goes to the charity.  So go on, get ordering.  Apparently it is just packed to the brim with really good entries (and one from me).

  It's all in aid of War Child which is a really worthwhile charity and one which of those of us, who have been touched by conflict (in however a minor way) might think about supporting. 

I have to say my contribution isn't the cheeriest but I'm sure it's not all like that.

This time I really am going to have to give a copy to my mother but I think I may have to subject it to a bit of this first.

So, come on, get your wallets out.