Nailed it

There are many things I find strange about New York City. People are much politer than in London. Traffic is allowed to turn even whilst pedestrians are crossing. There are an astonishing number of ugly old men with gorgeous, young, blonde girlfriends staying at my hotel.

But the weirdest is toenails.

A work conversation the other day:

Colleague 1: I saw this woman on the subway the other day and she was wearing sandals and had like no nail polish on.

Colleague 2: Ewww! Gross!

Colleague 1: I know! I mean, why wear sandals if you have gross feet?

This confused me. I am not a particularly girly girl, and on average, I'd say I paint my toenails twice a year. And yet I wear sandals for at least two or three months of the year. I have never considered my unpolished toenails to be gross.

I dismissed it as a peculiarity of my colleagues. Until I was on the subway earlier today. I should tell you that by a random twist of fate, Nice Kate's wedding last weekend meant my toenails are still bright red, painted in honour of the occasion, and to match the belt that went with the dress I wore.

So I was on the subway, getting lost as ever because the NEW YORK SUBWAY IS THE SINGLE MOST FUCKING RIDICULOUS METHOD OF TRANSPORT EVER. Digression: they have multiple subway stations with the same name (a bit like having six Leicester Squares), you have to enter on different sides of the street if you're going uptown or downtown, and often can't switch if you realise you're on the wrong side, each colour line goes in several different directions, and is distinguished by a letter on the front of the train, there's no board displaying when the next train is due, so you can wait for ages and ages, then finally, to add insult to injury, some trains don't stop at every station, and others don't run at weekends. They let you guess which is which.

Anyway, I was on the subway, probably going in the wrong direction, and a lady said to me (because for some reason, people in New York don't know the London rule of 'shut the fuck up because someone might stab you'), looking at my feet "Cool nail polish. That's OPI, isn't it? I recognise it. I'm like, 'They do so many different shades, I get overwhelmed'."

I smiled, had no clue what OPI is and told her I did it in London. Myself. "You do your own nails?" she asked incredulously, like the fact that half of my toe is usually covered in polish isn't enough of a clue. I didn't tell her why. It didn't seem to be an appropriate time to mention that every pedicurist I've ever had, I've managed to kick in the head. The curse of ticklish feet.

Maybe I should try it one more time...

Experienced Virgin

Dear Ploggers,

Welcome to my 800th post. 800 bite-sized, fun-sized, drivel snacks. Aren't you lucky?

So... why the radio silence this end? Well, I have been doing all manner of Very Exciting Things. Exciting Thing Number 1 was Nice Kate and Kev's wedding. (It feels wrong to say "Nice Kate and Kev", like I'm implying that Kev isn't nice. He is nice, it's just that "Nice Kate" is Nice Kate's name. I told Monty Cat's babysitter, Mel that I had been to Kate's wedding and she said, "Oh, Nice Kate?" Which pretty much proves it. My parents have met Nice Kate and Kev, and still only know Kate as "Nice Kate".)

Anyway, the wedding was lovely, everyone looked beautiful and behaved well, apart from TheBloke (TM) who firstly decided he was going to be the Pope by putting the napkin on his head, and later decided my fascinator looked much better on him than it did on me. Sadly he was right.

And it's been a whirlwind - no sooner did my arse touch my sofa in London, it was time to pack my bags again for New York - a work trip.

Please skip the next few paragraphs if you still want to be my friend. Because I am about to be more Annabelle than Annabelle herself.

So, I'm currently sitting in Virgin's Upper Class Lounge at Heathrow. The day so far has gone like this:

9.14, one minute before my agreed pickup time, I get a text from my limo driver to say he is here. He puts my bags in the limo and drives me to Heathrow.

10.30 We go through our own special entrance at Heathrow. Thanks to sat nav, the staff know I have arrived and greet me by name, whisk my bags away, glance at my passport, hand me an immigration form, and point me in the direction of the lounge ("The Clubhouse").

10.40 After wandering through Duty Free ("Where our prices are inflated by 17.5% to negate any savings you might make!") I enter the Clubhouse. They greet me again by name, as if they were expecting me. I am informed that the tables have waitress service, or if I prefer, there is a deli bar serving everything from smoked salmon to pork pie, to panini, to a pint of prawns. I do not know what a pint of prawns is, but I imagine it might be a pint... of prawns.

I have a wander and find myself in the spa area, where they book me in for a complimentary manicure. I could choose to sit by the pool or the sauna, or go get a spray tan, but - silly me - I didn't put a bikini in my hand luggage.

10.45 I wander up to the roof garden, past the 3D cinema, where a bunch of kids are watching a DVD of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, but to be honest, I can't see any 3D glasses available, so this bit could be a bit rubbish. Still, there is another massive cinema, twenty feet away, showing news, sport and... well, at the moment, adverts.

10.50 I decide I'll have something to eat and select from the breakfast menu (though as I type this at 11.26, I've only got four minutes until the lunch menu starts, so who knows, I might go for a second round), and I order Eggs Benedict. They ask me if I want a cocktail, but as I've still got work to do, and drank quite enough at the weekend, I decline and opt instead for a freshly-made, frothy hot chocolate. It arrived within five minutes and was delicious.

All this is - of course - free. Or perhaps "included in the price of my ticket" might be a better phrase. As you can imagine, the ticket wasn't an Easyjet special.

I believe I can opt for a massage on board (but probably won't, as I don't have a good history of foreign massages - see Hong Kong and Turkey), and there's a cocktail bar actually on the plane. When I arrive in New York, a chauffeur will pick me up and drive me to my hotel. Which will probably seem utterly crap in comparison.

Oh. My. God. I just realised - I've been sitting on their computer bank next to what I assumed was condiments for food - sauces and the like. It's actually a "help yourself" pick and mix counter. I would keep typing but my mouth is now crammed with toffee and it's hard to type whilst your fingers are still in the sweetie jar.

Annabelle moment over. Sorry about that.

800th Plog complete!

Take Two

I see they're making a remake of The Karate Kid. This disturbs me slightly. Not just because it encourages violence and parodying of "defence moves" amongst young boys, but because, let's face it, the original was a bit shit. It certainly didn't merit God knows how many sequels.

Cult classic maybe, but the only two things anyone can tell you with any surety is there was an old Asian guy called Mr Miyagi, and a scene where the boy had to wax a car. Call me obtuse, but that does not good cinema make.

More worrying still is that this paves the way for yet more shit remakes of originally shit films. Here are some ideas, updated with a "modern" twist.

1. Grease. The original taught us that if we wanted a boyfriend, we needed to dress slutty and start to smoke. The remake could involve Sandy deliberately getting pregnant to get a council house, and smoking a crack pipe.

2. My Girl. The original was a fairly sweet coming-of-age film about a girl whose best friend is allergic to bee stings and dies. (Sorry for the spoilers, but really, come on, the film's like twenty years old.) The remake involves the part where they become "blood brothers" by cutting their fingers and pressing them together, transmitting the HIV virus and being a modern cautionary tale.

3. Dirty Dancing. Would need to be dirtier. Much dirtier.

4. 10 Things I Hate About You. Today's audience has a shorter attention span and is unused to hearing harsh feedback: hence Six Things I Could Give You Constructive Criticism About

5. Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Obviously would need to concentrate on the environmental and socially irresponsible way they alter history. Would need to include a bleak scene at the end where they realise they've inadvertently stood on a butterfly and destroyed the world as we know it. Ted cradles his dying father, who's final words are, "Why, Ted, why? It was only a school report..."

One to watch

Ploggers, I don't do this often, and that is why you should listen to me. There is a book you're going to need to buy, and you're going to need to buy it now.

"Wow," I hear you say. "Is it Audrey Niffenegger's latest, Her Fearful Symmetry? After all, you did love The Time Traveler's Wife."

No, Ploggers, it is not Her Fearful Symmetry. It was OK, but I saw one of the twists coming a mile off, and besides which, Niffenegger has a crap ear for English UK (as opposed to American English). When did you ever hear of an English person "petting" a cat, rather than stroking it? And would you ever say that you were "wanking off" over someone's shoe? OK, you probably wouldn't admit to it anyway, but surely, fellow Brits, we'd say "wanking over her shoe" not "wanking off over her shoe". As opposed to the Yanks, who would surely use "jerking off". But this is a minor, and masturbatory point, and not at all the reason for this Plog.

The book I'm about to recommend to you, I grabbed from the library shelf in a last-minute, "fuck it, I can't be bothered to stand here all afternoon and choose". It is David Nicholls' One Day.

I had read Starter for Ten (loosely set at Bristol Uni and loosely set around University Challenge - two good reasons for reading it) by the same author a couple of years ago. It was OK. Had a few funny moments in it, but was pretty forgettable, and I didn't really like any of the characters. So it was with pretty low expectations I took One Day home.

And over the next day or two, on my two-hour tube travel each day, its protagonists, Emma and Dexter, became my new best friends. Well not Dexter, he was a tit. But Emma was lovely. She made me laugh out loud. I would definitely have let her sit next to me in French lessons. The novel also has a brilliantly-sketched failed stand up comic in it, playing barely-disguised comedy dives I remember gigging at myself. And it is funny and clever and special and moving, and I refused to read the last chapter until I was away from public transport, so I could savour every last word. (Anyone who thinks they spotted me crying on the 7.30 a.m. train at Canning Town, that was probably my over-emotional twin. Ignore her.)

What does it remind me of? Well, a little bit like the Time Traveler's Wife - not for any magical hokery pokery, but because time itself is almost a character in the novel - the book is narrated on 15 July each year - and takes a snapshot of the characters' lives at this time. And of course, I did actually read it on 15 July, which made it even more special.

It's also very Thomas Hardy - letters which never reach their intended recipients, and fate playing its hand the way it will.

A bit Nick Hornby. Blokey humour. Shagging. Drugs. Fast cars.

It's a little bit Larkin too. Nicholls quotes him a couple of times, but actually, the line it brought to mind to me wasn't used in the novel - "What will survive of us is love".

Read it. Then read it again. Then put it on your shelf and don't lend it to anyone. They might not give it back.

Living in a box (room)

Each summer weekend I get at least one full day to myself. TheBloke (TM) toddles off to play cricket, and I, car-less and carefree, have a whole day of poddling to myself.

Except I tend not to poddle. Unwilling to take the tube on the two days' respite I get from it, and otherwise house-bound, I tend to do a whole load of chores (whilst simultaneously avoiding the chore that needs doing the most). For example, this weekend the little room needed clearing out. It's not a small task, but eminently achievable given an entire weekend. So far, I have put six items in a charity bag and giggled over my own genius in stand-up comedy material.

However, I have:

• Done three loads of laundry
• Done seven hours of gardening
• Made poached haddock pate (nicer than it sounds)
• Made roulades from smoked salmon
• Written lots of emails
• Finished my novel (reading someone else's novel, that is, not writing one, sadly.)

I like to think that actually, despite not yet achieving my goal for the weekend, I have at least made significant progress on some other chores that needed doing around the house, and managed to fit in a spot of relaxing too.

I'm off to New York for work in a couple of weeks, and will be gone for the best part of a fortnight. (Did you know Americans have no word for 'fortnight'? Weird. For the Americans, I will be in New York for almost two weeks.)

So, I asked TheBloke (TM) what he would do whilst I was gone. I was expecting him to say he'd finish off the decorating, or tidy the utility room, or maybe arrange for a tree surgeon to lop down the unwanted rowan tree...

No.

He's going to build a fort. "A really good one". He has forbidden me from throwing away any of the recently-accumulated cardboard boxes, or the old broken bed. There will be no girls allowed. Monty Cat will be allowed in because he is a boy.

TheBloke (TM) is thirty-five years old.

So there you go, Americans. Another definition of "fortnight" - building a fort on the nights your partner is away.

Waiter waiter, there's a fly in my soup...

Too... hot... to... type. Eh, who am I kidding, I love the summer. Although I'm due to go to New York in a couple of weeks, where it's apparently beyond stifling at the moment. So ask me again mid-August.

So, amongst sunbathing, pulling up weeds (which in most cases turn out to be flowers, and in one memorable case, fresh from the smugness of pulling up an entire bramble, realising it was actually nearly-ripe blackberries), I'm trying to clear out the little room. We have three bedrooms, though the little room is really only suitable for dwarves with growth impairment. I think it would make a nice piano room. TheBloke (TM) thinks it would make a nice home gym, but he is wrong. And importantly, not in the house today.

So, I'm trying to clear out the little room, which has been a repository of junk ever since we moved in. The contents include (but are by no means limited to: cricket trophies, broken suitcases, an entire dismantled broken bed, a selection of badges, a dental retainer from when I was seven years old and a whole load of paperwork).

I made a start. But it was only a few minutes into the "tidying" when I stumbled across some notes I'd made when I was still doing stand up. I used to keep a notebook by my bed, as ideas often occurred to me when I was half asleep. Perhaps I was half asleep when I wrote the following; I have absolutely no memory of it. It's in note form, and I'm 99% certain I never tried the material on stage, because I don't think I ever actually turned it into a joke. Enough. Here you go - a Laura Nunn original:

Nazi dinner party: Gestapo soup.

You won't be surprised to hear I don't do stand up any more...

Ring sting

So, the whole engagement thing has lent itself to some amusing stories already. This is the main reason I agreed to get married. Material for the Plog.

So... TheBloke (TM) and I decided to try and find a ring that I liked. I though this would be easy as I have No Opinion On Jewellery Whatsoever. Or so I thought. Let's just say I've spent more time in London jewellers than most London jewellers over the last month or so. Turns out I had quite a specific idea of what I wanted... and no-one seemed to manufacture it.

Anyway, there's one big jeweller in London who advertises themselves as having seven floors of diamonds, come to their London showrooms! I wouldn't be so mean as to name them (www.cooldiamonds.com), but I thought, "Seven floors! Well, they must have every type of diamond possible there!"

So TheBloke (TM) and I turned up. "Do you 'av an appointment?" the French attractive receptionist man asked.

"Erm, no. We kind of thought with your seven floors, we could just wander round a bit."

"Is no problem. Follow me." He then tried to use some smart fingerprint technology access to get to - presumably - where the diamonds were. But it didn't work. He intercommed Barry, who was less French and who let him in.

We ended up sitting in a scruffy office, with two French girls eating their lunch and talking in French, whilst the French man pulled up the webpage of diamonds (which of course we'd already seen, but assumed this was just a sample of all the stuff they had on their seven floors). Nothing really appealed, but to be polite, we mentioned a couple which were OK. We assumed we'd then be allowed to go upstairs to their seven floors.

"No!" said the French man. "I will now ask them to send down your ring." He went to his CCTV pictures and phoned Tom. Tom didn't answer. He then used his PC to instant message Tom. We were shown magic hydraulic tubes which were used for whizzing diamonds around the seven floors.

We waited for half an hour. The French man smiled. I told him we only had another fifteen minutes - would the rings (which we didn't even like all that much) be ready by then? He called Tom again. Tom didn't answer. Then Tom sent someone else's ring down.

At which point we gave up.