Twelve pounds of salad

I forgot to mention the weekend. I love a weekend. Quite quite partial to one. I love waking up without a hangover and actually doing something in the day. It's still a toss-up to whether I prefer big nights out, or cultured Saturdays, so I'm straddling that fence. You could call it the fence of maturity, one day I might topple off and onto the lawn of old age, but at the moment, the view is pretty nice and it's comfortable up here. May and I woke up Saturday morning sans hangover and decided to totter over to Angel for life drawing with Tony Picasso. We arrived late and were hurriedly fisting our Pret sandwiches into our mouths so we could attend class... Somedays you're better than others at drawing, it can depend on the model. This week we had an eighteen year old Taiwanese girl model for us, and I can honestly say she was the best model I've ever drawn. I'm not into Asian babes, but this girl was like a china doll and was able to stay stock still for hours. Miles away from Curvy Michelle and millenia away from that French punk with rotary kebabs for legs, May and I enjoyed her curves and congratulated ourselves on an early afternoon well spent.

After that we ventured out west for a tasty alternate shop from Oxford Street. It was the first time I'd wandered around Whole Foods in Kensington. It's very impressive! May and I got excited about the fine array of foods and spent ages putting various pick and mix salads into a box for our lunch. After we'd done, we went over to weigh our boxes, but decided to leave them both on the side (with all the others) as the scales calculated each box to be just over £12!!... Twelve pounds a salad!!... Fuck that!

'Father' not 'Fazzer'

It's fun at work recently. I think it's because I'm actually doing things I enjoy, it really makes a difference. I've really cut down in drinking in the week as I'm so useless with a hangover, and can't afford to sit at my desk pissing about any more, especially as the department shake-up has left me sitting with my screen exposed for all to see... No matter on Friday though as I wasn't at my desk anyway, I was down the recording studio with Ben and Will 'laying down' the voice over and backing track to the Lacoste animations I'm doing. Ha! I say studio.. we weren't allowed to pull the flush as you'd hear the sounds of the cistern over the mic! Anyway, I was there directing this French guy called Nicola how to say 'father' and not 'fazzer'... every time he'd tell us he'd got it and in recordings he'd revert back to his gallic ways. We'd even got him a couple of cans of Stella to lubricate and loosen, but after half a can he was struggling more than ever, apologising and telling us over the mic that he was 'feeling a leedle beet tipsy'.... We got it finished eventually, it's amazing how a slight intonation and accentuation change can really make a sentence mean something else. Like that guy off 'Allo 'Allo... "Ah was just pissing by..."

Postal packets of odd

I love receiving things through the post, today was a good day. Maybe it's why I'm into buying useless pieces of tat on ebay, just so I can get a parcel or two a week to satisfy my thirst. I knew by text that today would be a good parcel as Kate had informed me yesterday but didn't hint as to what it might be. This morning it landed on my desk and I opened it fervently.

What is it?... You decide. I like the packaging, however a glimpse through the laminate window shows dried seahorses, fungus, goji berries, roots and pupae. The woman on the front looks happy, maybe she's had her brain and tastebuds removed.... I'm told by the best before date that I've got a year in which to consume the contents... I better get cracking.

Making a splash

Well at last they're starting work on the swimming pool, so we can all put our minds to rest!... That's right, we're getting a swimming pool built here at work!.. Whilst people get laid off left right and centre, leaving the building like a ghost town, the remaining employees can remain safe in the knowledge that after a hard day's work they can ease their tired minds with a dip in the Pentland pool. Brilliant. I'm pretty sure it will be the epicentre of bacchanalian decadence with ex-Miss World contestants employed solely to feed you seedless grapes as you unwind after an arduous day hunched over a computer.

Grandma sketch

I've been thinking about Grandma and Grampy a lot recently. Whilst I was over at Kyleigh's at the weekend she showed me a picture of Grandma taken from when the two of them went out Christmas shopping recently. She looks happy in the picture, she looks her usual cheeky and slightly mischievous self... Quite a lot different to how she was looking when we visited her in the hospital over the weekend. The picture Kyleigh took inspired me to create this sketch.

I'm thinking of colouring it up properly soon.

Wherever I lay my hat

Moving house soon has made me think about all the other places I've lived in since moving to London... So since 1994 when I first moved up from Bournemouth, I've lived at 21 different places!!

Mathematically 1.4 residences a year!

Rickmansworth Road, Watford with Mum and Mick

Delancy Street, Camden with Gigi

Cromer Road, Watford with Alison Dickie

Stavanger, Norway with Anne-Charlotte and Gigi

Endell Street, Covent Garden with Emma

Acton Town house with Whatley, Le Chris, Big Dan, and Mat

Finchley Road, Swiss Cottage with Emma, Ciaran and Lou

Glenlock Road, Belsize Park with Kev and Dan

Bayham Street, Camden with Kev and Dan

Travelling around South East Asia with Sara

Winchmore Hill with Sara, her mum and Ayden

Sydenham Hill with Mat and Whatley

Stoke Newington with Sarah

Felsburg Road, Brixton with Simon and Melanie

Homewood Road, Brixton with Mel, Maggie, Kate and Rani

Southampton Row, Kentish Town with Sam

Kilburn Lane, Kensal Rise with Jenny

Caledonian Road, Islington with Tom

Cowper Road, Hanwell with Rowan

Ashburnam Road, Kensal Green with Rowan

Bethnal Green Road, Bethnal Green with Laura and Sarah

and finally, Stoke Newington with May

I intend on staying here for a while. I'm fed up of boxing things up again.

Douglas Pine 1917 - 2009

Yes yes, it's been a very lonngg weekend. Crazy, and a what a mix of emotions. May and I had arranged a viewing of a flat in Stoke Newington on Friday night which turned out to be absolutely ideal for us. We would get it at a reduced rate as the woman who owns it is May's mum's best friend's daughter. Sounds very tenuous, but I assure you it's like that in her boho family. It's a large and very tastefully decorated one bedroom flat with a lovely kitchen and garden accessed through a fauna archway (What are those things called?)... We move in just under four weeks!... Can't wait. We celebrated with a slap-up meal for two at the Three Crowns on Church Street. Which incidentally would be our local. Lovely.

I got woken up early on Saturday morning with the news that Grampy had died at 8:30am... Kyleigh and dad were there to say goodbye, dad actually holding his hand as he peacefully slipped away. He was 91 and wasn't in tremendous pain which is comforting. May and I got ready and caught the train down, met up with Cara and Dom and went off to visit Grandma in Ward 4... She's looking frail. She's all skin and bone and actually looked smaller than she did when we visited her on Tuesday, bless her!... I don't think she knows that Grampy had died. She'd been told, but she's very forgetful and possibly failed to recall the news, so we sat there and watched her eat her calcium tablets, and flick through her Take a Break.

The four of us stayed at Kyleigh and Gerald's that night, Gerald cooking a fantastic belly of pork. We ate like royalty which prepared us for the meeting with dad and Jean on the Sunday... Hmm. Awkward is a term I'd use for that particular meeting, so much to say but nothing being said. At least it will make the funeral a bit more bearable.

Classic Colin

Jonny Herbert turned 33 yesterday and we celebrated in typical Pentland-esque style. With that I mean a pub crawl through Kentish Town to Camden. We never made it to the Proud Galleries, and finally stopped at the Hawley Arms. It was a good turn out actually, Aaron and Colin turned up, as well as Design Poolers young and old. Colin had pretty much just got off the plane from his honeymoon in Thailand. I think he enjoyed himself, he looked pretty lobstered. Telling us that it was really cool, really fresh and really different, he likened Chang Mai to Milton Keynes. Expecting him to bring out a handful of Thai money when dipping in at the bar, he informed us that he'd spent his last baht on a tuk-tuk fridge magnet... I'm going to miss his quotes actually. I managed to get a sixty-four page word document at ten point type out of him before he left.

Here are a few at random. I've not got time to go through the lot and choose my favourites. It would take weeks...

"Howard Jones had got a point.. What IS love anyway?"

"There were some great box shots in the gym today. It looked like she had a ballbag... I know some blokes who would be happy with that n'all."

"I've got no time for bad feet"

"I love foreign food me... Chips in Amsterdam, smothered in mayonnaise"

"What do I hate most in the world?... I dunno, I hate so much it's hard to even start.. Somalians?"

"Oooh sex and typography, two of my most favourite things."

"I saw the Wurzels at Alton Towers once. I didn't see them play, they were just there. Queueing for the Corkscrew."

"You forget though, women have got problems all day long... All day long."

"My mate's very right on. He's a militant... He's got a 'Free Palestine' sticker on his snooker cue case."

"I had a mate who was half black and half Scottish. We used to call him 'Chock'."

... Fucking hell... The list is endless. Colin, you will be missed.

Vintage tickets

I've gone mental. For some reason, I've just spent a small fortune on old London Transport tickets from the 50's. I blame Kurt Schwitters. I've been obsessed with old tickets since I was sixteen and only now have I decided to act upon it. You don't even get old printed sugar paper tickets any more, any tickets you see nowadays are printed by computer and look horrible with their dot matrix type. The lovely worn serif figures do something in me I cannot explain. I don't even think I want to frame them as you won't get to see the backs. Such a shame. All I can do with them at the moment is hold them delicately in my hands like a wounded butterfly and admire the muted dusty colours and badly inked type. The individuals which have been clipped make me think of the bowler hatted businessman holding onto the back of the Routemaster as it dashes through the smoggy streets of old London Town... Like I say. I've gone mental. 

Gramps

I went down to 'sunny' Bournemouth yesterday and met up with my sisters to visit my grandparents in hospital. He's in Ward 4 and she's in Ward 2 of the general. I likened them to E.T. and his flower... When one has a bad day the other one does too. It was shocking to see them in such a crazy state. He's on an oxygen mask and could barely speak. His skin looks slightly yellowed and he's lost loads of weight. Bless him. He's 91 and still as cheeky as hell. If he was more mobile, I'm pretty sure he'd be slapping the nurses arses, but he's hardwired to a gin drip, so it's practically an impossibility. I made each of them a card using a picture from his 91st birthday rave. My nan asked who it was in the photograph, she didn't believe it was Gramps as he 'looked so old'. Kyleigh said that she'd bring in some pictures from the 80's as her memory clearly stopped there... Round about the same time we found the tomato ketchup in the freezer when we were looking for the Vienetta.

So anyway, she's dotty as hell but hilarious with it. Kyleigh and I had to walk off at one point as we had the giggles so badly. She always makes us laugh, there was such a palava about her bloody false teeth, see, she'd lost hers and ended up with two sets which we were having a whole heap of fun with. She eventually gave up and finished her act by munching away on a tangerine with her gums. Bravo... After a quick coffee, I was back on the train to Waterloo. I think they appreciated us visiting them, I wish them the best...

Wonkeis....

I met up with Diddy David Whattler last night. Whenever we meet, we go for a cheeky Won Keis. I was even wearing my tshirt, so I was carried shoulder high and treated like Asian royalty... I had the standard. I'm addicted to the chilli sauce there, so I had to have barbeque pork noodle soup and a side of green vegetables with oyster sauce.

Whenever I eat there, I always think of Gigi and his 'assorted meat' ho-fun... I also remember the nosebleed I had as a result of the chilli sauce heat-off with Ciaran back in the day. Speaking of chillis, Whatley inhaled one and it hit the back of his tongue which resulted in him sweating profusely, dripping down his nose and into the beef and black bean sauce he was spooning into his gob. At  the end of the meal, I tried tipping a pound but he made me realise it's illegal to do so in Wonkeis, so I put my coat on and left.

Two weeks off

Well well well... I can barely remember how to type after all that luscious time off! Two weeks is a long time and definitely enough to forget how to delete a white hue to a different linear light source. (Ask Jonny Herbert!)... So Christmas was good, relaxing and indulgent. TV was off and games were played. After that Boxing day came and went in a haze of charades, white wine and friendly sheep, then it was on to Colin and Emma's wedding. December 27th is a crazy time of year to get married, but for the self-appointed 'Crayzee Col' it was a walk around the barns. Sausages and mash was the order of the day, which seemed to work out well as the girls could manage only two of the three which meant the boys got four sausages. At that time of year, any less would be a diet! ... The following day, we left Welwyn Garden Toytown and headed back to Northampton for some surrogate motherly love. By the time the 31st came around we were so relaxed, I felt like someone had hooked me onto a cheese drip and had been wheeling me around the home for a few days. This all changed with the drive up to Newcastle where we had to fend for ourselves, on our own in a car on the M1... With our navigational skills!? After a diversion around Darlington, we found the Angel of the North where we stayed, along with the other token hetties for a couple of days with the friendly gays and their pug puppy. We ate drank and were merry until we drove the long road back home to toast our toes in front of the open fire once more!... Lovely!... Back to work today though, May starts her new job in town I just hope she wasn't too upset when I dropped her off at the school gates!