We get up early and head down to Willoughby Methodist Church to cast our votes before work. Having never received polling cards, we turn up to the church hall hopeful that we are in fact registered properly - and it takes a few minutes of flicking through the pieces of paper on the table to find our names and get our ballot papers. It seems crazy that a general election in 2010 can be run so primitively - and it turns out later in the day that there has been chaos in other constituencies where people have queued for hours and even been turned away from the polling stations. Don't they have touchscreens in the US?!
Work passes fairly smoothly and afterwards I get the tube to South Kensington to meet K. The National are playing at the Royal Albert Hall and we have free tickets, but first we head for some dinner at a place called Cactus Blue, where we have a voucher for 50% off their tasty-looking Mexican food. As it happens the food is very nice, but after they sneak a £4 bottle of mineral water onto the bill and whack a 12.5% service charge on there we barely save any money and I leave feeling a little ripped off.
No matter, as we walk off the fajitas on the way up to the Albert Hall. I've never been here before, and it's certainly an impressive piece of ostentatious Victorian architecture - though it seems oddly intimate when we get to our seats on the first tier above the stalls. The acoustic diffusers on the ceiling are cool too.
The National come on just after nine and, while looking a little overwhelmed by the venue and a bit awkward with the rows of seated fans staring at them, get into their stride over the course of the next hour and sound wonderful by the end. They're truly one of my favourite bands these days and while it's another weird place to see them (the last one of their gigs I went to was at the Royal Festival Hall) or indeed any other rock band, the gig is fun and we head out into the night at 10.30 to beat the crowds back to the tube.
When we get home at around 11.30 the first election results are coming in and we sit down with a bottle of wine to watch the coverage, first on Channel 4 with Charlie Brooker and David Mitchell, then at 1 switching to the traditional Dimbleby-Paxman-Robinson programme on BBC1. Like most election programmes, it is incredibly compelling viewing - especially this year as none of the results coming in seem to point to a winner, with the exit polls predicting a hung parliament. After the wine, K goes to bed and I switch to Jack Daniel's and Coke to keep myself awake - but finally succumb to exhaustion at 3.45, little the wiser to the result of the election.
Monday, 10 May 2010
Thursday, 6 May 2010
Wednesday
Tonight there will be a book launch celebrating former-Rolling Stones and Grateful Dead tour manager Sam Cutler, specifically his memoir, You Can't Always Get What You Want. As the book is published by one of "my" clients, it falls to me to arrange bits and pieces of the event, as well as travelling down to Notting Hill to sell copies of the book and generally help out. The first part of that is this afternoon, when I head to NatWest in Wood Green to collect change for the float.
The bank is absolutely packed, and I find myself 20th in line. It's a good thing I'm in there "on business" rather than trying to squeeze a bank trip into a lunch break or the like. When people ask the staff what's going on, the curt answer is "oh, it's because of the bank holiday". The fact that that was two days ago - and that bank holidays happen regularly enough that you'd think a bank should be able to recover from their own holiday - doesn't seem to register here. I stand in the queue for 40 minutes before finally getting hold of the coins I came in for and heading back to the office to make up a couple of posters and make sure everything else is in place.
After work I head home to stick a shirt on in an attempt to make myself a little more presentable. The venue in Notting Hill (Beach Blanket Babylon) looks like a bit of a swanky place so I feel it might be a good idea to make even the tiniest effort in this department. I jump on the tube at around 6 and after trudging up from Notting Hill Gate through some of the posher residential parts of this city (and man, the posh people look a bit weird around here - it's all a bit Stepford Wives) I arrive at the bar a little late and a little hot and flustered.
The place is just as posh as I'd expected, gaudily decorated with crazy paintings and presumably expensive gold-edged furniture. It is very much "not for the likes of me", but it's nice to step into places like this once in a while. We set up our little bookstall and meet Sam Cutler, who turns out to be a very charming guy with that look about him that suggests he's seen and done a few things in his time. The place starts to fill up and Claire and I start to sell books to everyone who comes in, while overseeing the signing of the books.
The most notable guest? Well that would probably be Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, who strolls in to whispers and nudges from the elderly-rocker crowd (I am the youngest person here by at least 20 years) and happily poses for photographs with everyone who asks. There are other crusty musician types around too, but I fail to recognise any of them, ignorance-of-youth style.
A young Lithuanian waitress keeps bringing me glasses of red wine, so by the time we are packing up I'm a little drunk - but I am sure to get Sam to sign a dedication to K in one copy of the book, in which he writes: "To K, I've taught Mat a few rock n' roll tips, he'll be much better in bed now, get ready for a crazy ride! Sam Cutler".
Great work.
The bank is absolutely packed, and I find myself 20th in line. It's a good thing I'm in there "on business" rather than trying to squeeze a bank trip into a lunch break or the like. When people ask the staff what's going on, the curt answer is "oh, it's because of the bank holiday". The fact that that was two days ago - and that bank holidays happen regularly enough that you'd think a bank should be able to recover from their own holiday - doesn't seem to register here. I stand in the queue for 40 minutes before finally getting hold of the coins I came in for and heading back to the office to make up a couple of posters and make sure everything else is in place.
After work I head home to stick a shirt on in an attempt to make myself a little more presentable. The venue in Notting Hill (Beach Blanket Babylon) looks like a bit of a swanky place so I feel it might be a good idea to make even the tiniest effort in this department. I jump on the tube at around 6 and after trudging up from Notting Hill Gate through some of the posher residential parts of this city (and man, the posh people look a bit weird around here - it's all a bit Stepford Wives) I arrive at the bar a little late and a little hot and flustered.
The place is just as posh as I'd expected, gaudily decorated with crazy paintings and presumably expensive gold-edged furniture. It is very much "not for the likes of me", but it's nice to step into places like this once in a while. We set up our little bookstall and meet Sam Cutler, who turns out to be a very charming guy with that look about him that suggests he's seen and done a few things in his time. The place starts to fill up and Claire and I start to sell books to everyone who comes in, while overseeing the signing of the books.
The most notable guest? Well that would probably be Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, who strolls in to whispers and nudges from the elderly-rocker crowd (I am the youngest person here by at least 20 years) and happily poses for photographs with everyone who asks. There are other crusty musician types around too, but I fail to recognise any of them, ignorance-of-youth style.
A young Lithuanian waitress keeps bringing me glasses of red wine, so by the time we are packing up I'm a little drunk - but I am sure to get Sam to sign a dedication to K in one copy of the book, in which he writes: "To K, I've taught Mat a few rock n' roll tips, he'll be much better in bed now, get ready for a crazy ride! Sam Cutler".
Great work.
Wednesday, 5 May 2010
Tuesday
Back to work after another long weekend and straight into a week of catching up and preparing for our next month's sales kit. There is plenty to do that's dull and time-consuming - though I suppose time consumption is what I'm after in the long run. There's nothing worse than having time drag in a silent office, the working day can feel interminable.
At least 11 minutes of my day is consumed on the phone to Haringey Council chasing up my polling card for Thursday's general election. Friends and colleagues who live in the area seem to have had theirs ages ago; and while I know you don't actually need the card itself in order to vote, I do need to know where my polling station is. I am placed in a lengthy queue to speak to someone in the Electoral office - but when I get through they are very helpful and happy to confirm that both K and I are correctly registered and that we should just turn up on the day.
In the evening, we watch the much-praised recent British film An Education, having downloaded it on the back of a raft of recommendations. It tells the story of a 16-year-old girl at a posh school studying hard to get into Oxford, who meets a dashing older man who introduces her to a world of glamour and romance and trips to Paris and so on. As she gets more involved in his life, her schoolwork suffers and she contemplates throwing away her education to be with him - seeing him as a shortcut to the life she wanted after university anyway. I really liked it - it's one of those films that are just impeccably well-made, with no extraneous detail and extremely efficient storytelling.
The central performances are brilliant and Nick Hornby's screenplay is typically witty and believable. Funnily, it's a very similar story to last year's Fish Tank, a film I loved, albeit a very middle-class retelling of the tale. In short, though,it's just nice to see great British films still being made, especially at a time when our television drama is being massively overshadowed by the US.
At least 11 minutes of my day is consumed on the phone to Haringey Council chasing up my polling card for Thursday's general election. Friends and colleagues who live in the area seem to have had theirs ages ago; and while I know you don't actually need the card itself in order to vote, I do need to know where my polling station is. I am placed in a lengthy queue to speak to someone in the Electoral office - but when I get through they are very helpful and happy to confirm that both K and I are correctly registered and that we should just turn up on the day.
In the evening, we watch the much-praised recent British film An Education, having downloaded it on the back of a raft of recommendations. It tells the story of a 16-year-old girl at a posh school studying hard to get into Oxford, who meets a dashing older man who introduces her to a world of glamour and romance and trips to Paris and so on. As she gets more involved in his life, her schoolwork suffers and she contemplates throwing away her education to be with him - seeing him as a shortcut to the life she wanted after university anyway. I really liked it - it's one of those films that are just impeccably well-made, with no extraneous detail and extremely efficient storytelling.
The central performances are brilliant and Nick Hornby's screenplay is typically witty and believable. Funnily, it's a very similar story to last year's Fish Tank, a film I loved, albeit a very middle-class retelling of the tale. In short, though,it's just nice to see great British films still being made, especially at a time when our television drama is being massively overshadowed by the US.
Tuesday, 4 May 2010
Monday
After the excesses of Saturday and Sunday, this bank holiday Monday is destined to be a quiet one - and accordingly K and I have plans to stay in and make our way through the beginning of Mad Men series 3 while she stitches together a felt doll version of herself for the 'StitchLondon' competition at the Science Museum.
We do leave the house, once - to walk to Wood Green so K can buy materials, and we wander through the various clothes shops and gathered nutters as one is wont to do in N22's Shopping City district.
We have some lunch and laze around watching TV for most of the afternoon. Ghostbusters 2 is on so we half-watch that, and when the eighties movie bug has got us we put the Spaceballs DVD K picked up for £3 on and I very nearly nod off. It's not nearly as funny as I remember it - but you probably have to be a certain age of New York Jewish comedy fan to get all the little jokes. John Candy is still great though.
After waking myself up by making a very spicy Tikka Masala, we get into Mad Men and race through four episodes. The third series shows no signs of flagging and the show is still as consistently mesmerising as ever. The only thing that annoys me slightly is the introduction of two typical Englishmen-in-a-US-drama characters, who are terribly well-spoken and sit drinking cups of tea while the American ad men drink whisky, bemoaning the lack of a "decent pub" in Manhattan. Hopefully they don't dip into parody - especially in a show where the characters are usually so well-drawn and believable.
We do leave the house, once - to walk to Wood Green so K can buy materials, and we wander through the various clothes shops and gathered nutters as one is wont to do in N22's Shopping City district.
We have some lunch and laze around watching TV for most of the afternoon. Ghostbusters 2 is on so we half-watch that, and when the eighties movie bug has got us we put the Spaceballs DVD K picked up for £3 on and I very nearly nod off. It's not nearly as funny as I remember it - but you probably have to be a certain age of New York Jewish comedy fan to get all the little jokes. John Candy is still great though.
After waking myself up by making a very spicy Tikka Masala, we get into Mad Men and race through four episodes. The third series shows no signs of flagging and the show is still as consistently mesmerising as ever. The only thing that annoys me slightly is the introduction of two typical Englishmen-in-a-US-drama characters, who are terribly well-spoken and sit drinking cups of tea while the American ad men drink whisky, bemoaning the lack of a "decent pub" in Manhattan. Hopefully they don't dip into parody - especially in a show where the characters are usually so well-drawn and believable.
Monday, 3 May 2010
Sunday
Today is the birthday of K's sister Lucy, so we make sure she has a nice cooked breakfast and a few presents to wake up. I give her the newly-published paperback edition of Richard Dawkins' The Greatest Show on Earth - a book I have read around half of in hardback, but keep finding the thing too heavy to read in bed and too bulky to take on the tube. As a result, I bought two copies at Sainsbury's yesterday in the hope that I can finally finish the very interesting book in a handier format. The hardback will just be for show, I suppose.
Another of Lucy's presents is the film Avatar on DVD. Having been suspicious of the gimmickery of the 3D cinema experience, I had made sure to avoid the film when it came out last year, but since it's now become the highest grossing movie of all time by some distance, I feel I should probably watch it - so we stick it on after breakfast.
I am surprised to find that it's very enjoyable indeed - the effects are obviously very impressive and, unlike in certain other effects-based films, it's easy to forget that nothing on the screen is real and, apart from the indoor scenes with real humans, there aren't even any shooting locations. The story is predictable but there are some nice details, particularly in the design of the animals and some of the human technology, as well as the practicalities of having humans pilot the organic Avatars. In short, I'm shocked to realise that the film has probably been unfairly slagged off by those I've talked to - though I still feel that the 3D stuff would be unnecessary, and that I haven't missed anything by not watching it in that format.
Just as the film finishes, Alex comes round and we head to the Hope and Anchor to watch the Liverpool v Chelsea game, which is a 1.30 kick off and, potentially, a title decider. I'm a little nervous about the game but, thanks to goals from Drogba and Lampard, Chelsea win 2-0 and remain in control of the title race. I still refuse to be particularly comfortable about it all - they still need to beat Wigan at home next Sunday; exactly the kind of fixture we've ended up drawing in the past when points were needed. We shall see - but either way I leave the pub feeling much more relaxed than when I entered it.
Joined by Will, we walk down to The Kings Head to meet K and her sister who are having lunch and sampling a range of guest ciders. I keep it classy and order a pint of Red Stripe and we chat happily while the girls eat. By 6.30 or so we've all had enough of the pub - so head back to our house via the Co-Op to finish off our left-over wedding booze (which includes a few beers, a bottle of Jack Daniel's and a bottle of champagne) and play a bit of Scrabble. Over the next few hours we're joined by Nick, Rich, Helen and Ant - leaving a nice round number to play with four teams of two.
But not before Will and I have brought back the old days with a game of the BBC Match of the Day quiz game. I got this for Christmas in 2006 and we spent many hilarious nights testing each other's esoteric football knowledge, accompanied by a ridiculous electronic scoreboard containing such sound effects as "That's a yellow card for sure!" and "The flag stays down...it's a goal!". Getting it out of the box after at least three years of neglect is great fun - except that the batteries have half-destroyed themselves over this time and make the poor commentator's voice sound frightened and pained. And really funny.
Another of Lucy's presents is the film Avatar on DVD. Having been suspicious of the gimmickery of the 3D cinema experience, I had made sure to avoid the film when it came out last year, but since it's now become the highest grossing movie of all time by some distance, I feel I should probably watch it - so we stick it on after breakfast.
I am surprised to find that it's very enjoyable indeed - the effects are obviously very impressive and, unlike in certain other effects-based films, it's easy to forget that nothing on the screen is real and, apart from the indoor scenes with real humans, there aren't even any shooting locations. The story is predictable but there are some nice details, particularly in the design of the animals and some of the human technology, as well as the practicalities of having humans pilot the organic Avatars. In short, I'm shocked to realise that the film has probably been unfairly slagged off by those I've talked to - though I still feel that the 3D stuff would be unnecessary, and that I haven't missed anything by not watching it in that format.
Just as the film finishes, Alex comes round and we head to the Hope and Anchor to watch the Liverpool v Chelsea game, which is a 1.30 kick off and, potentially, a title decider. I'm a little nervous about the game but, thanks to goals from Drogba and Lampard, Chelsea win 2-0 and remain in control of the title race. I still refuse to be particularly comfortable about it all - they still need to beat Wigan at home next Sunday; exactly the kind of fixture we've ended up drawing in the past when points were needed. We shall see - but either way I leave the pub feeling much more relaxed than when I entered it.
Joined by Will, we walk down to The Kings Head to meet K and her sister who are having lunch and sampling a range of guest ciders. I keep it classy and order a pint of Red Stripe and we chat happily while the girls eat. By 6.30 or so we've all had enough of the pub - so head back to our house via the Co-Op to finish off our left-over wedding booze (which includes a few beers, a bottle of Jack Daniel's and a bottle of champagne) and play a bit of Scrabble. Over the next few hours we're joined by Nick, Rich, Helen and Ant - leaving a nice round number to play with four teams of two.
But not before Will and I have brought back the old days with a game of the BBC Match of the Day quiz game. I got this for Christmas in 2006 and we spent many hilarious nights testing each other's esoteric football knowledge, accompanied by a ridiculous electronic scoreboard containing such sound effects as "That's a yellow card for sure!" and "The flag stays down...it's a goal!". Getting it out of the box after at least three years of neglect is great fun - except that the batteries have half-destroyed themselves over this time and make the poor commentator's voice sound frightened and pained. And really funny.
Saturday
It's rare to wake up on a Saturday without a hangover - but of course it's very nice. We have a leisurely breakfast and I watch Football Focus while K heads down to Waterloo to drop her brother off. There's a really rather moving piece on there about the Bradford City fire in 1985 that took place two weeks before the Heysel disaster and claimed the lives of 56 people. It's not something I knew much about beforehand - I can only assume that Heysel has traditionally overshadowed Bradford in the history of football disasters - but the BBC's coverage is tasteful and genuinely affecting.
After Focus I head to Sainsbury's to meet K, and when we've properly stocked up on food for the week it's off to The Queens to meet some of the various boys and girls. We have a couple of pints and even win a free round of drinks after collaboratively cracking a code pub-quiz style and spelling out the special May bank holiday message. Later we make our way to The Bull on Upper Street as it's Helen's birthday and a special area has been reserved upstairs. The weather is atrocious and we're a little late (having been reluctant to leave The Queens in the rain) as well as being well on the way to drunk - but it's nice to see everyone there and the pub isn't too busy.
However, by 10ish both K and I are probably done for the evening, so we wander back up Upper Street to Highbury & Islington tube and make for home. Getting home early is nice - despite getting into a row over a blown fuse in the kitchen which I drunkenly and angrily fix so we can heat up a pizza. I also make the mistake of heading to bed with the key still in the door - effectively locking K's sister out of the house when we'd said she could stay over. Whoops.
After Focus I head to Sainsbury's to meet K, and when we've properly stocked up on food for the week it's off to The Queens to meet some of the various boys and girls. We have a couple of pints and even win a free round of drinks after collaboratively cracking a code pub-quiz style and spelling out the special May bank holiday message. Later we make our way to The Bull on Upper Street as it's Helen's birthday and a special area has been reserved upstairs. The weather is atrocious and we're a little late (having been reluctant to leave The Queens in the rain) as well as being well on the way to drunk - but it's nice to see everyone there and the pub isn't too busy.
However, by 10ish both K and I are probably done for the evening, so we wander back up Upper Street to Highbury & Islington tube and make for home. Getting home early is nice - despite getting into a row over a blown fuse in the kitchen which I drunkenly and angrily fix so we can heat up a pizza. I also make the mistake of heading to bed with the key still in the door - effectively locking K's sister out of the house when we'd said she could stay over. Whoops.
Saturday, 1 May 2010
Friday
After work I get the tube to Waterloo to meet K and her little brother who's up to visit. It's his 15th birthday next week so we're taking him for some dinner and to see Iron Man 2 at the IMAX. In truth I'm far more excited about seeing the film than he probably is - but the tube journey is a hot, stuffy, uncomfortable one and the Victoria Line train sits at Kings Cross for ages which ends up with me being 20 minutes late and in a foul mood. The plan is to go to Burger King in Leicester Square (in the absence of any nearby restaurants with any space and the fact that their new Angry Whopper burger is officially Iron Man 2 branded, don't you know) so I grump off across the footbridge to Charing Cross with K and her brother in tow.
We get to Leicester Square and order our burgers - double Whopper with onion rings and jalapeno peppers, really rather hot and pretty tasty - and I'm feeling immediately, predictably better. I apologise to K for being a dick and we walk back through the rain towards the IMAX.
It's easy to forget just how big the IMAX is - the last time we were here was for Watchmen last year - and there's that rather fun buzz when everyone is waiting outside the auditorium to head in and be staggered by the sheer size of the screen. We have great seats about halfway up on the right and the trailers get me fully in the mood for the film. I had loved the first Iron Man and would go as far as to say it's my favourite Marvel movie - Downey Jr. makes Tony Stark a properly three dimensional character and gives the whole enterprise a bit of warmth and charm to enjoy beyond the fighting and explosions.
The second one turns out to be very enjoyable too - though has nothing of the exciting novelty of the first, which is hardly the film's fault, I suppose. The effects are great, the lines are still fun and the only problem seems to be that it goes on a little long and tries too hard to fit in new characters and "fan service" type references to the film's comic book heritage. Mickey Rourke is great as Whiplash and the scene where he attacks a motor race in Monaco is probably the film's highlight.
We head home at about midnight - but not before a raging tramp gets to scream "give me a cigarette you fat cunt" at me charmingly on the way through the subway - totally shattered and conspicuously sober for this time of the week. That's what happens when you hang around with 14-year-olds I suppose.
We get to Leicester Square and order our burgers - double Whopper with onion rings and jalapeno peppers, really rather hot and pretty tasty - and I'm feeling immediately, predictably better. I apologise to K for being a dick and we walk back through the rain towards the IMAX.
It's easy to forget just how big the IMAX is - the last time we were here was for Watchmen last year - and there's that rather fun buzz when everyone is waiting outside the auditorium to head in and be staggered by the sheer size of the screen. We have great seats about halfway up on the right and the trailers get me fully in the mood for the film. I had loved the first Iron Man and would go as far as to say it's my favourite Marvel movie - Downey Jr. makes Tony Stark a properly three dimensional character and gives the whole enterprise a bit of warmth and charm to enjoy beyond the fighting and explosions.
The second one turns out to be very enjoyable too - though has nothing of the exciting novelty of the first, which is hardly the film's fault, I suppose. The effects are great, the lines are still fun and the only problem seems to be that it goes on a little long and tries too hard to fit in new characters and "fan service" type references to the film's comic book heritage. Mickey Rourke is great as Whiplash and the scene where he attacks a motor race in Monaco is probably the film's highlight.
We head home at about midnight - but not before a raging tramp gets to scream "give me a cigarette you fat cunt" at me charmingly on the way through the subway - totally shattered and conspicuously sober for this time of the week. That's what happens when you hang around with 14-year-olds I suppose.
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