Alien Spouse

Such a Girl!

On Monday we drove to Winston Salem for Genetics Counseling ("Are you related?" "No, that seems highly unlikely - Did you clock the accents?" * ) and an ultrasound. At this point they can say, with 95% degree of accuracy, what gender your baby is and our tech was pretty certain that the alien spawn is a girl!

This is especially good because we were finding it difficult to choose a name for a boy, but we both really like the name Evalyn for a girl. I had a Great-Aunt Eveline who I was very fond of, and, whilst Doc C never met her, he just really loves the name. Just like my Aunty our daughter will be Eva for short, but we are going with a different spelling to make the pronunciation clearer - If we spell it Eveline she will almost certainly be referred to as "Eve Line" or possibly "Ever Line", and we want her name to be pronounced "Eva Lin". 

We were just brain-storming names when I first threw Evalyn out as a suggestion and I didn't think much more about it, until the Doc brought it up again when we were having the same discussion on another occasion. He really liked the name and was already very keen that we call our child that if she were a girl (I don't think I was even pregnant at this point!). I do think it's a pretty name, but it's also good that Aunty Eva was actually quite amazing in her own way. Eva was a Major in the army, which was one of those details of her earlier life that blew my mind as a child; because to me she was the woman who knitted me hooded cardigans, made me elaborate soft toys, gave me books like the "Chronicle of the 20th Century" and could be relied upon for incredibly rich tea-time confections. I also think it was damn cool that she didn't marry and never seemed to regret that particularly; she was proudly independent and self-reliant, so, whilst I'm sure we would disagree on things like politics if she were still alive today, her strength of character is definitely something that I hope my daughter will be inspired by.

 

* When we lived in London and were taking the night-bus home one evening, the drunk guy sitting in front of us turned around and, having clearly been eavesdropping on our bus-ride banter, abruptly asked "Are you brother and sister?" and then said "No, because you are British and he's American, so are you a couple?". Drunk guy's girlfriend was mortified, but it was really funny!

Saturday Shopping - Jeans and Soft Furnishings.

After breakfast (see previous post for details) we fed our friends' cats, which is always nice because they are so very pleased to see someone after a night alone - My Converse got a particular thorough loving from Molly Cat, but they are still cats so as soon as we had fulfilled our function and filled their food bowls we were ignored.

Doc C and I then went shopping, and I confirmed my suspicion that I have indeed gone down an entire size of jeans. This naturally called for trying on jeans in Levi's (even though I can't wear Levi's because my hips untuck the pockets somehow), Gap, J. Crew, Banana Republic and Old Navy. I bought very skinny (and very cheap - $10!) black jeans and wide legged blue jeans. Score.

We also needed stuff for the house, we bought a classic bamboo steamer, a huge stock pot and some nice firm cushions for the sofa.

Doc C and I compromised on these - He chose the floral (Ralph Lauren...) and I wanted the two London monuments (No name designer...). I'm usually skeptical about overtly British design elements, but these stark graphicsare so very fun and they look great; even more importantly they are really comfortable too. 

Middleton-Windsor.

When I got up this morning Nancy was meowing and meowing and meowing, so I turned on the television for her so she could watch the Royal Wedding. Nancy loves the Windsors. I watched it with her whilst I had my breakfast, and I saw Kate arrive at Westminster Abbey before getting ready for work.

At work the Royal Wedding was a very popular topic of conversation, so I ended up looking up all sorts of stuff on-line to properly perform my duties as resident British person. I found photos of everything - the dress (gorgeous!), the earrings, the bridesmaids, the cake, the cake from a different angle, the guests, the guests' hats, and the crowds. It was all quite lovely I thought; not necessarily the best use of several million pounds, but quite an impressive bit of pomp and pageant.

My opinion is that Kate seems like a very nice girl, and I also think William has done rather well. Also I think this whole think this makes me feel old, because I remember going to London for the day with my parents to see Charles and Diana's wedding. And that was 30 years ago.

Car Dependency - An Epiphany.

Recently my friend Shawn tweeted (@idleformat) that Brighton was third in least car-dependent UK cities list.  I followed the link he provided to see which UK cities had had beaten my old home in the survey.

Nottingham topped survey ahead of London despite a multi-billion pound taxpayer investment in the capital's tube and bus services that is the envy of sister cities across the UK. Brighton came third, reflecting its much-admired bus network, its umbilical rail links with London and a size perfectly pitched for commuting cyclists and walkers. 

I started my working life in Nottingham, before moving to Brighton and then London.  People are surprised I don't drive, but according to this report I've spent the majority of my adult life living and/or working in cities where it was totally unnecessary to own a car.

It's like a light bulb went off for me!  No wonder I can't wrap my head around a culture that relies so heavily on private transportation; I'm used to actively pedestrianised city centers, good public transport options and a semi-decent (let's not entirely fib here and say "reliable") national train network.  

And yes, I do think that's better actually.

*Postscript* The BBC has a report on the new double deckers that London's shelling out seven point eight million pounds for.  I like the bits that have been directly lifted from the classic Routemaster, and the reduced carbon emissions sound good too.

 

Beautiful Birthday Cards.

Doc brought me home at lunchtime, and on the way we stopped off at the post office where there were very exciting parcels from my lovely Mum.  They weren't there yesterday, so her timing was pin-point accurate and all the more impressive for it!

One of my Mother's many many talents is her ability to find the perfect card for any occasion, so it's always a pleasure to open an envelope with her writing on.  Look at these beauties:

I think I may need to get these framed.

Just so stunning, and almost guaranteed to make any Londoner and/or Brightonian get a lump in their throat.    Mum got these from the Obiko website, and they are from the Seagull sites range.  Also, Mum tells me the artist was very nice too!

Tattoo Jewellery.

So I was thinking about my tattoo, and, although I really liked the idea of having a tattooed charm bracelet, I can't quite imagine having the confidence to rock it in the work place.  My key is only two inches long and less than half an inch across, which is tiny really, and I still can't quite believe have a freaking tattoo.

Then I thought it might actually be more fun to be more literal about the charm bracelet and make, say, a dozen replicas of the key to wear on a chain on my right wrist, so the tattoo wouldn't be hidden but it would look like part of the jewellery from a distance.  I leached out the skin tones and flipped the photo to give you an idea of how one of the key charms might look.  Just imagine 11 more!

Of course, now I need to work out what on earth I would make them from.

In my mind's eye I think this would look great in a nice glossy black acrylic, like something you'd get from Tatty Devine, but although that would give me a great end product I know full well that I don't have the patience to accurately make an 12 identical keys by hand.

It's time's like these when a girl really wants her very own programmable laser cutter thingy, which I bet would also make world domination a breeze.  sigh.

Ooh! I wonder if there is an Etsy artisan out there who could be commissioned to make this for a reasonable cost?  I may need to investigate...

...Why, yes there is!  It would be $2 a key I think, but I'm confirming I've got that price right before I commission anything.  Still, a custom charm bracelet to match my tattoo for under $30?  That would be fabulous! Squee!

Smiley Face, New Bike.

Doc announced this morning that he was going to look at bikes today, with a view to purchasing one. When he moved to London he brought his trusty bike, The Beast, with him and I remember sitting on the grass outside the National Portrait Gallery when we first started dating and seeing him come cycling up and thinking what a handsome devil he was, so I was all for him getting another bike.  For the past year or more I have been trying my best to persuade him that it would be a good investment in his health, both physical and mental, because the man needs to burn off energy some how!

There are some really good bike shops in town so Doc didn't have to travel far for his fix.  He was gone for about three hours, I didn't go because I would just have been in the way really and I wanted to watch more episodes of "Fantasy Island", then I got a text announcing Doc C was a very happy man.  The smiley face I super-imposed on this picture looks positively dour in comparison to the expression he had on his face when he got home with his new friend.

It's a Tarmac made by Specialized, with an all carbon fiber frame, so it weighs a whole 17 pounds.  That's slightly less than the cats weigh, and you definitely can't get anywhere at all on them.

Smoggy Old London.

In the comments of my last fascinating post on the weather, Miss Joules (Hello!) mentioned that when she tried telling her family in America that "...England gets only a bit more rain than they do, only they get it over three weeks instead of three days, but their preconceived notions are stronger than my factual information."

OMG!  I know exactly what you mean!

Have you ever tried telling an American that London is not foggy?  They will look at you as though you are pathological liar.  They have seen Sherlock Holmes movies, thank you very much, which means they are well aware that London is foggy, so why would I say any different?  Well, because London really does not get "Pea Soupers" any more.  The thing is that actually what London used to get is smog, and  there is much less coal smoke in London, which means that you don't get the same impenetrable fogs in contemporary London. Sorry, I know that is slightly less romantic but it's also a lot better for your health, so there is that.

When I started writing this post I was intending to include a finale in the form of a hilarious anecdote about my lovely Mother-in-Law, but it has been vetoed by Doc C.  This leaves me without a big finish to this post, but trust me it was comedy gold.

Dance Amigurumi Dance!

This is the cigar box I bought on Saturday, doesn't it make a perfect theatre for Amigurumi?  I think that's what it will probably end up being, because it is exactly the right size for it.

In other news, I am a very bad friend and have still not sent Ferret his Victoria Page.  I think it's because I'm not a hundred percent happy with the hair, but I'm not sure what to do about that.  In this scene in the film Miss Page has her hair in one of those odd looking side up-do's from the late forties; the sort I suspect you can only get away with them if you have post-war facial features and my Amigurumi just doesn't.

Anyway, I keep thinking inspiration will strike and I'll work out a way to make her appropriately beautiful.  We shall see.

In the mean time she is very much enjoying being the prima ballerina in the ballet recital currently at the Partagas Theatre (just off Shaftsbury Ave., at the Piccadilly Circus end).

Philadelphia: We Take Our Leave.

We will be leaving this morning to head back to North Carolina.  I've had a lovely time, and Doc C seems to have found the conference useful.  It's a pity he won't get the chance to explore Philadelphia, but I promised that we could go to Dunkin' Donuts for breakfast (and, by the way, despite walking past a Dunkin' Donuts roughly every 50 metres, I have yet to eat a delicious morsel of sugary pastry.  I have been remarkably restrained.)

Philadelphia has been fun, and I recommend it to anyone who is starved for retail therapy outlets.  Thank goodness we visited just after pay day.  Usually I'd have visited more museums and art galleries, but I found that just walking around a big city with some beautiful architecture, jostling with run-down businesses and new construction sites was really quite fascinating.  I walked past the Liberty Bell every day, and I saw Betsy Ross' house too but I really didn't feel the need to study them in great detail on this occasion, it was just lovely to casually walk past history again.  It was like being in London and spotting a blue plaque that you can't quite read as you go past it on the bus, but it's still nice to know that it means something interesting happened on that location.

By the way, I have pre-posted a picture post which should come up this evening, and I will probably post or twitter when we get home just so you know I got back in one piece.  I know how you worry.

Cthulu Amigurumi Rampage!

I had an e-mail from my lovely friend Laura today, which told me that the Cthulu amigurumi I crocheted for her had arrived safely.

It was a surprise, so I didn't want to post pictures before she got it, but here he is menacing my Muji wooden London!

The inset is Cthulu nestled in the shredded red paper I used to pack him in.  I thought it lent an air of the Lord of Chaos wallowing in the entrails of the innocent sort of feel to it.

This was made from the pattern in "Creepy Cute Crochet", and the only things I changed were the eyes, clearly I love button eyes, and the base which I flattened so he could stand up.  Which means that, yes, Cthulu has a cardboard re-inforced bottom.  I wouldn't make any comments about that though, he's very sensitive.

Why I Miss London : Reason #476

I have no interest whatsoever in seeing "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button", but I am looking forward to "Coraline" with eager anticipation.  I know!  Who'd have thought I'd be more interested in watching a film featuring a performance by Teri Hatcher, in preference to a film starring Cate Blanchett?  It goes against all the normal rules of logic.

However, being realistic, I would be prepared to bet that whilst "The Curious Case..." will be playing at the local multi-screen (I'm pretty sure it's not big enough to be referred to as a multi-plex) for months, I'll be lucky if "Coraline" makes it to the local art house cinema (actually it's a bar with a large screening room) for a day or two.

sigh.

Goodbye Christmas.

As you can see from the pictures, I took down and packed away the Christmas decorations today.  This year was all about glitter, and I really liked being able to use three different sizes in the same colour way, which was all the more satisfying because the smallest set were not part of the Martha Stewart range but matched it perfectly.

If I am honest, then when I say I took down the Christmas decorations, I should really clarify by adding "...mostly".

It's still so dark and gray that I decided to leave the lights up, and I also kept the three glittery humming birds in the windows too.  The wooden London set that Mum sent me now has more space on the mantelpiece, and it looks really pretty with the tiny fairy lights.

One really nice thing is that our little tiny tree has some soft light green buds growing on it.  It obviously liked being our tree, which is very gratifying.

Sandwich Joy!

For Christmas my lovely thoughtful Mum not only sent us stockings, but also, via Amazon, a couple of cookbooks from our favourite UK based eateries.  There are several good restaurants around town, but there are still many culinary options that are currently unavailable to me, and these books have helped with that quite considerably.

The first book to arrive was the Wagamama cookbook, and Doc C has already cooked us a couple of fantastic meals from that.  Noodles rock!

The other book was the Pret A Manger cookbook, this may seem odd because Pret specialise in upmarket sandwiches, soups and wraps (Oh, and great cakes, cookies and slices.  And really good coffee.  And root vegetable crisps.  And their smoothies are fabulous.  And the best salads), but really a Pret sandwich is a thing of such joy that it's worth having a book detailing how you put your favourite ones together.  Today I made my all time favourite ever sandwich, roast smoked salmon with horseradish.

It was a delicious sandwich.

Making myself that sandwich, eating it with a nice cup of tea, and knowing that I have enough ingredients to make another such sandwich tomorrow makes me very very happy.

Boxing Day '08.

Ah Boxing Day!  I love it!  You are still in festive mood, and there is plenty of Christmassy stuff to entertain you, but it's more relaxing than Christmas Day.  All of the shops are open again so you can the bin bags you forgot to stock up on, and you can eat Christmas Dinner Left Over Sandwiches!  My favourite!

This year's sandwich is made with freshly baked whole wheat bread, a layer of roasted sweet potato, a layer of TVP with stuffing, and a generous swathe of red cabbage with cranberry (I forgot to buy apples, so this year's recipe was a sauteed onion and three cloves of roast garlic, add finely chopped red cabbage once the onions have softened a bit.  pour in a good splash of apple juice and the cranberries, then simmer until all of the cranberries have disintegrated and thickened the apple juice.  Season with salt, pepper, chinese five spice, nutmeg and honey to taste. Yummy!)

Of course the other great thing about Boxing day is playing with your Christmas presents.  So I carefully arranged the Muji wooden London that was in my stocking in front of the pop-up London card Doc C got from Mum, and then used the fairy lights to light it all artistically.

Thanks Mum!  I've been wanting one of these wooden London sets for ages, how did you know?

Not So Constant Comments.

On a blog housekeeping note, I've been beta testing the new Typepad Connect comments accounts and I had some feedback asking what the heck was going on!

Well the idea was that you could sign up for a Typepad Connect account which keeps track of your comments, and when people click on your user ID it takes you to a profile page.  If you comment on my blog when signed in that way anyone can then click on your ID and see where else you have commented, and that might introduce them to a new blog or just give them a better idea of who you are (Not your name and address or anything like that, just a better idea of your personality).  Setting up an account also means that you can select an image to have next to your comment instead of those spirograph images, although I do think those are pretty cool.  Essentially it's a way of creating ownership of comments, and making commenting much more of a community thing.

However I found that people didn't like having to set up an account, and it seems a bit buggy in relation to non-typepad blogs, so I've played with the settings so that you don't have to sign in to a Connect account anymore.  I mean you can if you would like, and I do use mine because it's just a really nifty idea, but it's not mandatory on Alien Spouse!

Comments will still require a name and an e-mail address, but I have also decided not to moderate so  they should now come up straight away.  Although, please note, any comment that doesn't meet my strict guidelines (on both commenting and chocolate) will still be smite down with a stroke of the mighty delete key.

Abby, I'm looking at you.

I Dream of M&S.

Last night I had a dream that I was working in a really nice office in London, then I went for lunch and realised that I was just round the corner from Covent Garden.  I went into a really lovely and huge Marks and Spencer (That's the point I should have known I was dreaming, much though I love the Covent Garden branch of M&S it is very small and the building is weirdly designed), before realising I had been on lunch for two hours.

When I got back to the office everyone was taking an afternoon nap.  I didn't have a duvet with me, so I went downstairs to the submarine and helped the polar bear work out how to send biscuit tins through the speaking tube.

It was an odd dream.

Then I woke up and had a lovely chat with my Mum, before starting to clean the house in preparation for Jason's arrival tomorrow.  I am very excited!

Don't Make Me Angry! You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry!

Doc decided to make hummus for tea, without having soaked the chickpeas in advance.  When he gave up on that idea and went to pick up a pizza instead, I stayed at home and flicked through the channels.  I found the 2003 Ang Lee version of "Hulk" on the Sci-Fi channel, and when the Doc came home I started filling him in on the plot points he had missed so far.

"Yes, I know.  We saw this."

"What?  No.  I've never seen this film."

"Yes we did.  We saw it at the cinema in London when it came out."

"Sweetheart!  I have not seen this film before, and I definitely did not see it at the cinema.  You must have gone with someone else."

"No, I saw it with you!  I don't go to the cinema with anyone else!"

I can't decide if that's really sweet, or really tragic, but I do know that it's blatantly untrue because I never saw "Hulk" at the cinema.  Damn it!

Banjo!

We live in North Carolina, so at some stage it was inevitable we would end up seeing a band that features a banjo.  So we decided to jump at the chance of seeing a band built around a hip-hop banjo player, Turbo Pro Project, because, come on, hip-hop banjo player!

The set was a mixture of their own songs with covers, and it included the classic dueling banjos, but it was the banjo versus a DJ on decks.  It was really fun.

The gig was in a local bar, and I had the odd feeling that I'd somehow been transported back to Islington or Hoxton; if I'd been bonked on the head at some point in the evening, I would have been seriously confused about where I was.  It was mainly that the atmosphere was the same, but the clothes were pretty much the same too.  True there were a couple of people wearing cowboy boots, and one guy wearing a really hideous polo shirt covered in Louis Vuitton logos; but apart from that it was eerily similar to the last time I was in the Hope and Anchor.  This might not seem like a particularly big deal, but fashions are usually noticeably different between NC and London, so it was really eerie to see a crowd of people dressed in a what looked quite European clothes.  I began to wonder if a branch of H&M had secretly opened that I was unaware of.   

Fortunately there was one major difference though; the security at the H and A had a proper ink stamp to stamp on the back of your hand to show you'd paid to get into a gig.  In NC it's a circle drawn on the base of your thumb in permanent marker.

Crusaid's Walk for Life - Sunday 1st June.

Cruisaid's Walk for Life is being held on Sunday June 1st this year, there are full details on the website.

It's a 10k sponsored walk through London raising money for, and awareness about, a great AIDS charity.  I really enjoyed the Walk for Life last year, and if I were in London this year I'd do it again. 

Should you happen to be in London on Sunday 1st June, I'd highly recommend it as a way to productively spend the day.  You can sign up in advance or register on the day, but in advance means you have a bit of time to get some sponsorship money together.  I'll warn you now that your legs may well ache a bit afterward, but it's a good ache really!

This year you can even combine the fun with some celeb spotting, I hear Danni Minogue, Four Poofs and a Piano and Alan Cumming will be there...

Seriously? The One with the White Blonde Bowl-cut?

Oh Dear God!

How the hell did Boris Johnson get elected as Mayor of London?  The man is a buffoon.  I'm sort of glad I've spent nearly a whole week in blissful ignorance of this fact.

Eastenders: Goodbye and Good Luck to Gus!

I keep up with the news via the BBC website, (which, by the way, I really hate the new re-design), and I also keep an eye on "Eastenders". I'm finding that reading a two page synopsis with photos is obviously much less time consuming than watching the show, and that means it's considerably less irritating when they have a spectacularly stupid storyline (Tania burying Max alive?  Then digging him back up again? And he's fine? Whoever wrote that, I'm looking at you).

This week Gus Smith is leaving the Square and I have to say that I'm pleased about this.  Not because I didn't like the character of Gus, but actually because I felt that character was woefully underused and that the actor who plays him, Mohammed George, could do a lot better.  The poor guy has been there for six years, and I don't think he's ever had a decent storyline he could really call his own. 

He started off as an articulate, sensitive young man who used poetry to woo Sonia and got his heart broken, but since then he's mainly been sweeping up around the market whilst wearing that hideous fluorescent yellow jacket, or he's been walking Wellard.  True, there was a period where his brother Juley turned up and was a nightmare; but even then I got the distinct impression that the script writers found rakish Juley more fun to write for, so poor old Gus was positioned as a boring goody-two-shoes.

It's especially weird when you consider how much that character could have been developed over that time period.  Why keep any character around for so long, if you're not going to do anything with them?

Anyway, maybe it's because I used to live in the Square in Dalston that is supposed to have been the basis for Albert Square, but I could never understand why Gus didn't just pick himself up and go somewhere more interesting.  All you have to do is catch the 38 bus, or the 242.

I'm glad he finally is.

Haircut - Second Salon.

After work today I'm going to get my hair done. 

This time I'm trying the place with the great big neon sign and the motorbike in the window (Thanks for the suggestion April!), it's about ten dollars more expensive but still ridiculously cheap compared to what a salon in London would charge.

I did some research before I booked in, and apparently they send all of their stylists to New York to be trained at Bumble and Bumble.  No doubt this means they will be pushing Bumble and Bumble hair products, but I don't mind that, it's good stuff.  Also the girl I spoke to on the phone was super nice, and that's always a good sign.

If this doesn't work out, then I've still got Aveda to try.  Again more expensive, but apparently you get hand and head massages, so that might well be worth it.

Of course, as always happens the morning of a haircut appointment, my hair is behaving itself today.  It's like when you've been ill for a week and you finally get a doctor's appointment, you drag yourself to the surgery and as you are sitting in the waiting room, you suddenly realise you feel a lot better.  That never fails with me.  I always have to try and remember what exactly my symptoms were before I arrived and mysteriously felt well again.

The hair gets no reprieve though.  It's been flicking out on the left side and curling under on the right for about a fortnight.  It has made me look demented.  It must pay.

I Heart Marks and Spencer. sigh.

I am missing Marks and Spencer much more than I expected to, in retrospect I seem remember to reading that other Brits who emigrate often report they feel the same way.  Naturally I thought that was silly, but now I realise that Marks and Sparks has always been there for me, and I hadn't fully appreciated how great they are, until now when I've been cut off cold turkey.  For one thing where am I supposed to buy my undercrackers?  I'm British, I need to know my knickers are from M&S to feel properly dressed.

I also really miss M&S food halls, because they are always such a reassuring place to be, and you know everything is going to be both good quality and delicious.  In particular I really miss their wide range of fruit juices, spicy red lentil soup and my default lunch choice of wholemeal pitta bread, red pepper hummous, raw carrots and falafel.  The night before my visa interview at the American Embassy, I went to the M&S at Marble Arch and bought that for my dinner, as a form of bizarrely healthy comfort food I suppose.

It's coming up to Easter and I know they'll be selling the quirkily traditional and delicious Simnal Cake soon, and there will be another fantastically blatant TV tie-in theme to their Easter Eggs.

Last year was Doctor Who, which was dizzying.  I bought these two Dalek Egg Cups for a pound each about a week after Easter. 

We haven't used them yet and they are kept on display in the living room, safely cocooned in their original packaging but obviously minus the actual easter egg they originally came with.  The egg itself was organic milk chocolate.  You have got to love M&S for that alone.

Bad FedEx. Go to Your Basket.

My shopping horizons have considerably diminished since I left my last job and moved away from London, so I'm aware that I'm getting excited by what I would otherwise regard as fairly mundane purchases.

Having said that, my Lush order arrived at the weekend, and I believe the noise I made was something along the lines of "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!". I love getting stuff from Lush, they send you their latest catalogue with your order and the box always smells nice, because they've popped in a couple of free samples of their lovely soap.

This month I only bought shampoo (Big) and conditioner (Veganese), but that was still pretty expensive once you'd factored in postage and everything.  I worried about the cost, but the Doc (who's paying the credit card bills at the moment, let's not forget) was very sweet about it, he said he knows not only how much I love Lush products, but also that being able to get them over here helps me to not feel quite so isolated from my old life.  So he was very supportive of my purchasing them, and he didn't complain about the cost at all, which was so sweet of him.

When the much anticipated parcel arrived I happened to be in the living room, so I saw the FedEx guy walk past the front window.  He then put the parcel on the door mat, rapped on the door and left.  Now obviously I was at home, but if I hadn't been my brown paper package would have been left sitting outside all by itself.  I'm not so worried about it being stolen, but I could have been away and it could have snowed, or rained, or something.  In which case the integrity of my lovely Lush stuff, particularly the recycled paper catalogue, could have been compromised.

This, people, is precisely why we got a PO box, I only wish we could get Lush to deliver to it.

Crime Fiction

Since about the age of nine or ten I've been a big fan of crime fiction, but I don't like anything too gory or sadistic, so I tend to prefer the relatively genteel work of the Queens of Crime.  The term Queen of Crime was thrown about quite loosely in the 50's but I would regard the true queens as being Margery Allingham, Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Gladys Mitchell, Dorothy L. Sayers and Josephine Tey.

I particularly love finding nice vintage copies of their work with a good cover illustration. Indeed I have been known to buy a copy of a book I already have purely because the cover illustration is better.  Somehow I resisted buying this copy of "Dumb Witness" from a book stall on the South Bank last summer, but I'm glad I took a picture of it.

I am also fond of Victorian and Edwardian crime fiction.  At the moment I am re-reading Sherlock Holmes, and I have to say I am shocked a new at how slap dash Conan Doyle was in his writing.

Already I've found a Scotland Yard detective who's christian name changes from Athelney to Peter between stories.  Even better when Watson's future wife first appears as a client she clearly informs Holmes that both her parents are dead, but a few stories later (now that she is safely married to Watson and, as such, rather in the way of the plot) she mysteriously materialises a mother to visit.

I know these mistakes have more than likely been spotted before, and I'm probably missing some slightly less glaring howlers but it is fascinating to see Holmes' creator not applying the meticulous attention to detail his own character was so famous for.

Wedding Parking Ticket

We got married at Hackney Town Hall, which was about a twenty minute walk from our home. The Doc's Ma had flown over from the States and my parents drove up from Norfolk for the day.  They parked their car outside our house, Doc C immediately filled out one of our visitors parking permits and made sure it was prominently displayed on the dashboard.

The thing was that he put the wrong date on the parking permit.  The man who never ever forgets a number got his own wedding date wrong, which he suddenly realised as we were at the Town Hall waiting for the registrar.

When we got back from the ceremony, of course, the traffic wardens had written out a ticket.

Basically what had happened was that we got married exactly one week after the Doc's Viva, the oral exam that is the final stage of a doctorate, so he'd had the 17th of January burned into his consciousness.  It's completely understandable, when two of the most stressful things you could possibly ever do happen within a week of each other, well, you are bound to be a little bit vague on details.

Instead of paying the fine immediately I wrote to the council and explained how it was that my husband had mixed up the dates.  I even offered to send copies of our wedding photos and proof of the Viva as evidence.

About a month later we got a letter back saying that, on this occasion, they would waive the parking ticket.  However my letter had been put on file, and they would not accept a similar explanation for a lapsed parking permit in the future.

Which I think was fair enough really.

Wedding Photo

Obviously I had to re-touch this photo to make it anonymous enough for Alien Spouse, so yes we usually do have reflections, and no we're not vampires.

Back to School.

It was the Doc's first day back at school today, he was a little bit nervous.  What if the new kids don't like him?  I don't think he needs to worry, but that is how the Doc likes to operate.  An absolute nightmare of a worst case scenario tends to be in his head at all times, so that way he gets a pleasant surprise when things turn out to be actually ok.

One good thing is that he has a new timetable for this term, which means he isn't teaching any early morning classes.  This is much better for two simple reasons, first of all the Doc really is not a morning person and it took a lot of pain and effort for him to be awake and fully functioning for those early classes.  Second of all, students definitely aren't morning people and they would either not show up the day after a big football match or party, alternatively they would show up, stagger to their seats and then simply have a little zizz in class.  Apparently one kid slept through most of last term, but he would turn up in the Doc's office later in the day to clarify anything he was snoring through and didn't understand from the notes (I hasten to point out that when the Doc is telling me amusing student stories he never identifies the student, so confidentiality is always respected).

It's going to be really weird getting used to hanging around the flat by myself all day again.  To re-cap, I still don't have a Social Security number and, based on the 15 week delay we were told about in December, it's likely to be at least another couple of months before I get one, so that means I still can't look for a job.  It's getting quite tedious.  Not that I'm not loving the free time, but the lack of salary obviously then leads to trying to think of activities you can do for free, which in London or Brighton was actually pretty easy but here?  Well, I think I've pretty much exhausted most of the possibilities already.

Fortunately Doc C came up with the brilliant notion of ordering the first three seasons of "The Wire" on DVD from Netflix, so that I can catch up and fully comprehend it's brilliance.  That means I'll be spending the next few weeks in the company of Dominic West.  So things aren't so bad.

Thank You Mum!!!

A few weeks Mum asked what I might like for my birthday, I answered immediately that what I really would like was a Union Jack cushion, having seen one in the Buckingham Palace gift shop.

Mum promptly went on-line, found the very item we'd been discussing, and ordered it immediately.  The Queen took her time in delivering it though, so Mum couldn't post it to me until after the actual birthday.

Now it is here, and I love it the vintage vibe it gives off.  Doesn't it look like it was hand-made by your Great Aunt to commemorate the Coronation?  Whilst we don't want to go overboard with the British theme when decorating our home, the odd touch here and there is quite fun.  This cushion, our Dalek egg cups and my framed photo of a Route Master bus should set the tone nicely I think.

I am also very taken with the Buckingham Palace apron, which you can see displayed behind the cushion.  I feel almost obliged to wear the apron whilst I whip up a batch of butterfly cakes, and hold a traditional Village Fete.  In North Carolina.  In November.

Apart from the patriotic treasures, Mum also sent some highly practical and much needed items, namely my pink satin quilt, a pepper grinder and an adaptor plug.

She really is the very best of Mothers, I can highly recommend her.

I'm thinking TINSEL.

Last night I started thinking seriously about Christmas decorations.  The local civic Christmas decorations are already up, our town has a sparse sprinkling of giant light-up snowflakes, whilst the next town over has every single lamppost garlanded with fake fir-tree trim and a huge red bow.

I love decorating for Christmas, I generally get so over-excited about the subject that I've been co-opted into decorating my last 4 places of work as well.  This was, of course, an extremely simple project when I was working just off Tottenhamcourt Road in London.  All you had to do was pop into the three storey Paperchase there and decide on a theme.

My themes don't tend to have an awful lot to do with traditional Christmas iconography, last year our tree was hung with die-cut cardboard movie stars of the thirties and forties, plastic silver roses smothered in glitter, plain white lights and then long strands of silver tinsel.  The tree topper was my fabulous diamante star, which goes with everything, Darling.  On the mantle piece we had red and silver glass tea-light holders, and a vase full of silver, red and black Christmas baubles of various different sizes. 

When we moved I had to get rid of a lot of my Christmas decorations for two fairly obvious reasons, they would take up a lot of room in a suitcase and most of them are fragile glass, so they wouldn't survive the trip anyway.  I kept the cardboard movie stars, the diamante tree-topper and the tea-light holders, everything else went to the Dalston branch of Oxfam.  sigh.

This year I'm starting virtually from scratch, and I simply don't have a huge Paperchase full of delightfully camp decorations to fall back on.  So I've decided to go in completely the opposite direction and embrace arts and crafts.

First of all, I found a step-by-step guide to make pomanders on Instructables, and I love that orange and clove smell, so I really want to make a few of those.  For the tree itself I came up with the idea of baking salt-dough disks, painting them matt-white and then gluing a row of silver sequins across the centre.  The tree decorations will either look elegantly rustic, or totally awful, but either way they should be quite fun to make and, even better, they'll be really really cheap.

Ornamental Cabbages

I've always liked ornamental cabbages. 

For one thing it's such a nice phrase to say, try it. Ornamental Cabbages.  Isn't that nice?

I also like how at first, it appears to be an oxymoron, because cabbages aren't generally held to be aesthetically pleasing, but ornamental cabbages are such lovely colours and the crinkly leaves are very satisfying.

These beauties were outside our local health foods supermarket, which I like because they also sell Green and Blacks chocolate.

When I first started commuting to London, I would catch a number 8 bus from Victoria station, and it has really lovely route around some of the more picturesque parts of London.  If possible, I would sit on the left-hand side at the front, on the top deck of a proper routemaster bus.

My favourite part would be the spin through Berkley Square, there was usually some public art on display in the gardens there, and, in my first winter of commuting, one of the offices had window boxes full of ornamental cabbages of every possible colour. 

It was always a nice way to start the working day.

The British Film Institute Changes It's Mind.

Remember how I was angry with the BFI on Tuesday because they had taken away my friend Danny's "Sight and Sound" column over a joke he'd made in January on his personal blog?  It was all a bit Dooce.

Well, it's ok now.  They've given him the column back.  Read the retraction here.

That's a complete 360 in less than a week.  Pretty impressive.

Scrabble - The final battleground between English English and American English

On my trip to London for The Visa Interview, I mainly spent the evening before in my hotel room reading through all my paperwork, and chanting the names of all 7 of Doc C's siblings, in chronological order, just in case there was a test on the live and times of Doctor C (There wasn't.  As I worked through this process I increasingly found that the film "Green Card" (1990) is a very misleading text to draw information about the US immigration service from.)

Anyway...

The only other thing I did, that wasn't related to my Visa application, was to visit Waterstones flagship branch on Piccadilly.  I used to work for Waterstones, they are still my favourite chain of bookshops and when they said Piccadilly was going to be a flagship bookshop they were so not kidding.  It is magnificent. 

I wanted an international Scrabble dictionary (meaning it's taken from the SOWPODS word lists), because that would have the most playable words as it draws from both the official American and British word lists, but I also wanted it to be the competitive version, as this also contains words expunged from the family edition word lists for being offensive.  Doc C and I are not easily offended, unless we are prevented from making a killer move because a word might be considered slightly risque by Mary Whitehouse.  I found they only had the Chambers British Scrabble word lists and dictionaries, and I asked if they stocked the international versions at all.  The answer was no, as they had had virtually no-one requesting that.

I bought the Chambers dictionary, & made a joke about Doc C, as an American, having to accept the British dictionary rulings and the Book Seller said "Well, after all, we did invent the language!" and I thought about that and said, "True, but they invented the game".

The Interview

I don't have a watch, and without my mobile phone with me I couldn't say exactly what time I arrived at the Embassy.  Why didn't I have my phone?  Because it said in all of the letters I received that I must NOT take any electricals like mobile phones, mp3 players or digital cameras, so all of those things were in my luggage in the hotel reception.  How annoyed was I when the girl in front of me had brought all of those things and was simply given a plastic zip lock bag to put them in?  Pretty annoyed actually.

Once through the security checks, which are similar to airport security checks, you go to a reception desk where you are given a number and asked to take a seat.  The seats all face two enormous screens which indicate where your ticket number is in the queue.  It is exactly like Argos.

It felt like it took years, and my heart was going like the clappers for the whole thing, but eventually my number was called.  I went to window one, and the woman dealing with the first part of the process was a little Chinese lady.  She spoke very fast and very quietly, so I could barely make out what she was saying.  It was extremely disconcerting.  Fortunately I just had to hand her various forms in the order requested, and one of my 2 inch square photos.  She gave me a scare because I hadn't made photocopies of all of my documents, I said I was sorry and she said "You will be sorry!".  Then I remembered that the interview letter had said they could make copies of documents there, she said "Well yes.  But it costs a pound for each copy and we don't encourage it!".  Then she took my finger prints on an electronic pad, and sent me to pay my processing fee of $380 to the cashier.  When I'd done that, she gave me a pink courier form to fill in and my chest x-ray from the medical examination a couple of weeks ago.

And here is my chest x-ray:

Isn't that cool?  What other blog gives you chest x-rays?  Alien Spouse for all your rib, spine and shoulder blade needs!

Then I had to sit in the waiting room again until my number was called a second time.  This was quicker, but my heart was still racing.  This time I had a very nice American lady, who I could hear clearly, and she looked at all of my forms.

Doc C had been getting particularly worked up about the tax forms he'd supplied as part of the affidavit of support, but she looked at those and said "Right, because he was living here for a few years".  Then she looked at the pay slip and the letter from his employers, and smiled "Give your husband a gold star!  He actually read the list of requirements, I've got everything here I need.  That very rarely happens first go."

I signed something (I can't remember what it said.  The American government wants my first born?  Sure!)  then I had to give my left hand finger prints again, finally I raised my right hand and swore the statements I had given were true.

The End.

Visa interview completed successfully.  Assuming those fingerprints don't link me to any major unsolved crimes (which they won't, they never found the man I shot in Reno just to watch him die.  Joke.), I'll be sent my passport with the visa inside and a sealed envelope which must not be opened before I give it, along with my chest x-ray, to the immigration officials when I get back to the States.  That is actually the final hurdle of this process, so it's not 100% approved yet.  It's more like 99.6% right now.

I went to pay for the courier to deliver my passport and visa in the next 3 to 5 working days, and then I left the Embassy.  I was originally planning to noodle around London for a bit, but I suddenly felt so tired that I had to come straight home, and go to bed for several hours.

Where in I prepare for The Interview

Where were we?  I was heading to London when last we spoke I believe.  The journey was without incident, and I made it to my hotel in excellent time.

When I went to check-in the receptionist asked for my credit card, and I explained that my Mother had already paid by credit card on-line.  This apparently wasn't possible, and they needed to have authorisation and a copy of the card faxed through.  There was some discussion about this as you may well imagine, but I rang Mum, and we got this organised.  I had to wait in reception until the fax had come through, as soon as it did I was given my room key.

The room was very swish, if a bit small but as the colour scheme was white walls with pink, orange and purple accents I was extremely happy.

Having seen the room and dumped my bags, I went to get my Visa photo taken.  These are similar to passport photos but the apparently crucial difference is that they are 2 inches square.  And it costs £15 to get two done.  I then went to Waterstones on Piccadilly and just generally walked around, finishing off by going to find the Embassy in preparation for the morning.

I spent the rest of the evening watching TV (Emmerdale had a very dramatic house fire, I don't watch regularly but it seems to me that soap opera is basically "lambing, lambing, lambing, DEATH AND DESTRUCTION, lambing".) and making sure all of my forms were filled in and properly organised in their plastic folders.

In the morning I was woken up at 5.15 by the sound of a newspaper being slipped under my door.  The sound was a mere brushing of the carpet, but I was so keyed up that was enough to wake me.

I got dressed in a charcoal grey pencil skirt, white shirt and black tank top (That a sweater vest to any US readers), and pinned on my silver shield brooch, which is enigmatically inscribed "G.W.L.G., Hockey 1933-34". At 7.30 I went to check out.

The receptionist took my key, and I arranged with the concierge to leave my bags at reception.  I turned to leave and the receptionist, who was a different person to the night before, called out "Excuse me! I need your credit card please".  Well, frankly, I was stressed out this morning so it was not the morning to mess with me.  I turned and said "NO.  I've discussed this once already when I checked in. My Mother has paid for the room.  A fax was sent last night with the authorisation, I wasn't given my room key until it arrived, so I know that is all in order.".  The receptionist fiddled with the paperwork for my room, and I could see the fax of Mum's card on the bottom sheet, so I pointed that out to her.  She said "Well yes, but it's a bit hard to read" and I stared at her with my bitch face on (I learnt that at the booth, it is one of my more important life skills).  Then she said "I'll take the number from the authorisation form".

I left the hotel, still fuming slightly, had breakfast at Pret and then set off for the Embassy.

Practical Arrangements for The Interview

My interview is at 8.30 tomorrow morning, and to get there on time from Norwich would involve me catching a train at 5.00 in the morning.

And then I thought, but what would happen if the train was delayed for some reason?  What if there were signal problems, or leaves on the line?  So instead I'm booked into a hotel about ten minutes walk from the Embassy and I'm going to London this afternoon.  It will mean I can, hopefully, get a bit more sleep so I'm not quite so jet lagged and it's one less thing to stress out about.

Doc C is practically having kittens about the whole thing, he's really worried that I don't have the right tax forms and just generally freaking out.  I think he likes to have a good fret, he's definitely of the opinion that the glass is half-empty and what liquid is in the glass is filthy and disease ridden.  I'd always prefer to check what's in the glass first, and if it's nice, well then the glass is half full.

I'm not taking the lap top with me, so I won't be posting the outcome of the interview until tomorrow evening, unless I happen across a nice internet cafe or something.

Oh, That Queen Charlotte! Right!

Remember the picture I posted last week of the statue at Charlotte airport? 

If not, here is a profile shot:

I knew the statue was of Queen Charlotte, but I hadn't thought about which Queen Charlotte that might be.  I hadn't even vaguely connected that furious looking Queen Charlotte, with the German Princess who married George III, until I saw a small museum display inside the airport. (Click on the image for a larger picture, from which you can read a short history of Queen Charlotte.  Bear in mind, however, that it doesn't explain why Charlotte N.C. was named after her, or why she look so vicious in the statue.)

Why had this link to the British Royal family not occurred to me?  Well for the very simple reason that the National Portrait Gallery in London has a large portrait of Charlotte Sophia of Mecklenberg, which I've seen several times, and have always paused in front of to think that she looks like a sweetheart.  In fact the NPG have several portraits of her, and she always seems very good natured from those. 

Mind you, none of those portraits have her falling backwards off a beach ball whilst trying to balance a coronet on her fingertips.  Maybe that's enough to make anyone a bit grumpy.

Alice in the Photo Booth

I forgot to tell you about this temporary statue that was on display at Victoria Station last week.

As you can see it's an enormous girl sticking her head into a photo booth.  It's sort of like a grown up Alice in Wonderland, who needs to get a new photo for her passport.  Or something.

It was actually one of several statues up in various locations around London to promote a television series about tattoos, called "London Ink".  I know nothing about the programme, but I like publicity promotions that think outside the box.

Blood Removal Day

Today has been super hectic.

I went up to London to go for my medical examination, I went early and popped into the Booth to catch up on the gossip.  My particular favourite story was Mike finding a family of cats under his bed.  Some people have all the luck, that never happens to me.

I got to my appointment early, and was whisked straight into the nurses office, where I was given a diphtheria and tetanus shot.  The nurse was going to give me the measles jab as well, but when I pointed out that was the one that gave me convulsions as a small child, it was decided maybe I shouldn't have that one.

My chest x-ray was fairly straight forward, except the machine was playing up so it didn't take the first time, so actually I was x-rayed three times.

After the x-ray I sat in a waiting room with quite possibly the least reassuring work of art in the world.  What were they thinking?  "Everyone likes fried eggs with runny yolks!  Everyone!  That'll make people feel a lot more relaxed."  Isn't it the ugliest thing you have ever seen in a frame?

Then I had to see the doctor, who it turns out is a friend of my friends Wayne and Rodney.  He talked me through my medical history, weighed me, measured my height, looked at my eyes and ears, checked my reflexes, listened to my chest and TOOK MY BLOOD. 

Actually it wasn't too bad.  He was very good at taking blood, and it was all over quite quickly.  Then I went to catch the train back to Brighton and ate a flapjack, to maintain my blood sugar levels.

Why I will be getting the vapours at approximately 4pm next Friday

I've made my appointment with Knightsbridge Doctors, who are the only doctors authorised to conduct medical examinations on behalf of the U.S. Government.

This means that a week on Friday I'll be going to London to have X rays and a blood sample taken, amongst other fun activities, and it's going to cost £200 (inc. VAT).

Blood sample taken.  Eep.

This is the part of the process I'm dreading, so I will be reminding myself that I'm doing this so I can join my gorgeous husband, who I love very much.

Blood sample taken though. Eeeeep.

For Educational Purposes

Whilst I'm away I thought you might want something to entertain you, so I browsed through the jpegs on my laptop & I found a picture of me in a fake beard. 

We were visiting a National Trust House, Sutton House in Hackney to be precise, and they had loads of activities for kids, including costumes that you could dress up in.  Well how can you resist that?  It's bringing history to life! It's educational!  It's a really good beard!

This picture was actually taken before we got married, and The Doc still went ahead with the wedding.  Wasn't that sweet of him?

With Regard to the final HP: No Spoilers Please! (10.36am)

Usually I am the Spoiler Queen, I am the very person who wants to know the all important twist in the plot before she sees the film (Or more usually because she has no intention of seeing the film, it sounds awful, apart from the twist so she just wants to be told that please)

Well I am not going to be buying "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"until I get back to the UK, so I'll be a solid month behind everyone else.  Some of you may even have finished it by then, so please bear in mind that for once I want it to be a surprise.

I could easily buy a copy in North Carolina, it is just as big a deal, however I don't want to do that for two reasons:

1. The American cover art is very ugly, and it wouldn't go with the rest of my Harry Potter books.
2. The spelling is altered, along with some of the words, for the American market.  This means that Mrs Weasley knits sweaters instead of jumpers, because here a jumper is a type of dress.  I'm sure you'll appreciate why that is unacceptable.

In the mean time I have three new Diana Wynne Jones books to read, specially purchased in the UK before we left.  I am actually more excited about those I think.  Ah Chrestomanci!

Ladies and Gentlemen: I give you Doctor C!

The Doctor, in his very academic and serious gown with matching hat, surveys some water.

100% Officially The Doctor

We are going back to London today to attend The Doc's graduation ceremony.  He will be wearing a funny hat and a robe.

Doc C wasn't originally planning to go to the graduation, but when we realised we didn't fly out until tomorrow we thought what the heck?  Let's cram it in!

It also means we can catch up with a few of his fellow students who we haven't seen for a while.  This includes Francisco and his lovely wife Claudia, they moved back home to Chile in December so it will be great to see them in particular.

I will be taking many many photos.

Krypton Factor Puzzle: Completed, in Record Time!

The elite removal team that is my parents arrived at about 10.30, and managed to get a staggering amount of our stuff into their car.  They were only here for about 90 minutes, it was like a very neat whirlwind.

However, in order to achieve this heroic feat of space management the back seats of the car had to be folded down, so there really wasn't any room for the Doc & I.  We will now be catching a train, after we've finished totally finished the packing, recycling and cleaning here.

This does mean that Doc C has time to bake one final batch of oat & raisin cookies.  When you live with the Doc, you soon learn that there is always time to bake cookies.

Let me see...

Nope.  I checked, like, twice.

Rio Memories

The Rio Cinema is such a great little cinema, and it's slap bang in the middle of Dalston. 

I haven't seen a lot of films there, but the screening of "The Da Vinci Code" I went to see was one of the funniest things ever.  For one thing whenever Paul Bettany's albino monk assassin popped out from behind a pillar, one girl about 3 rows in front of me just screamed her lungs out.  The rest of the audience collapsed in giggles every time.

My personal favourite bit was during a kidnap scene, Tom Hanks is feeling car sick, so Audrey Tautou places her hands either side of his face and he feels much better straight away.  A woman behind me whispered to her friend "That's Reiki".

Yikes!

I have no idea what they do with the rest of the human, presumably all the other parts are still full price.

The Film Shop on Broadway Market

Our nearest DVD rental store is Blockbuster, but I've never liked their emphasis on multiple copies of new releases and hardly any copies of anything actually interesting.

The Film Shop on Broadway Market however has their DVDs arranged by genre and then by director, as they clearly advocate the auteur theory of film.  They also have a list of 100 films they think you ought to see, which I've seen about 75 titles from.  It's slightly snobby, but I do love being able to find a good film that I've never heard of, and it certainly can offer that.  I also like knowing I can go there and easily find any classic film I care to think of, and a good selection of interesting new stuff as well.

They've decorated the store with tapestries based on classic film posters, which I like a lot.