It's all in the wrist

Well, what a lovely weekend.  Surrounded by school friends though always makes me reminisce about school days.  So here is a vignette for you, from Loughborough High School for Girls, 1995.

On Wednesdays during assembly time there would always be a staff meeting.  For the pupils this meant that prefects, rather than your form teacher, would take the register, and, crucially, the deputy head rather than the headmistress would lead assembly.

The headmistress, Miss Harvatt, was a formidable lady who drove high standards of academia through a mixture of fear and... actually it was mostly fear.  Brilliant at her job, and driven beyond belief, the staff seemed scared of her; the pupils were terrified of her.  Whilst 100% of pupils received 9 GCSEs at grades A* to C (mostly A*), 100 % of pupils had also crossed her in the corridor at some point with the greatest imaginable schoolgirl crime: having the itchy, grey knee-high socks pushed down to the ankles, so as to appear slightly less swotty.  This was something of an achievement when you were dressed head to toe in the same shade of grey.

Wherever Miss Harvatt travelled, the corridors would echo with her war cry of, “Socks!”.  As someone who was perpetually cold, with socks generally pulled up as much as possible, I was only “socked” once; however, it was memorable.  I will say this: it’s very hard to pull up your socks whilst carrying a school bag, a gym kit, a hockey stick, a violin and a cookery basket.

Anyway, I digress.  Wednesday assemblies were the deputy head’s domain.  Very much the White Rabbit to Miss Harvatt’s Red Queen, Miss Steel scampered around mostly looking tentative.  She was a pleasant lady, organised, good at timetabling, but didn’t nearly have the authority of the head.  Her shining moments of the year were Prizegiving and the Carol Services – anything where she could make the whole school stand up, sit down, file in and file out with a wave of her hand.  I see her wearing white traffic warden gloves, but my mind may have invented that detail.

Schoolgirls being cruel, Miss Steel was mostly famous for her speech impediment.  She had a soft “R” (making her the White Wabbit, I guess), and for some reason, tortured the word “foyer” out of all recognition.  Believe it or not, I don’t recall the school actually having a foyer, yet somehow she seemed to say “ferwoway” at least once per week as 500 girls tried (“twied”) not to titter.

1995 was a hot sommer.  As a sporty institution (apparently – although the closest I ever got to a sporting activity was hide and seek in the library – where generally I was hiding from the PE teachers where were trying to make me throw, hit, run towards or run away from something).

Loughborough High School for Girls’ tennis team had been doing very well.  (“Twuly vewy well indeed.”).  Miss Steel congratulated them on one memorable Wednesday morning.

“Congwatulations to the Under 18 tennis team who won the final wound of tennis this weekend in Wichmond, beating Wutland and a vewy stwong team fwom Weading.”  She paused and beamed out at the 500 girls.

“I am vewy pweased to announce that our school is now the top wanking girls’ school in the countwy.”

Twue story.  Happy days.

Just when you thought it couldn't get worse...

The phone rang.  It was Mr Nunn.

"I've read your Plog," he said, "about Mrs Nunn and the Vintage Vamps."

"Oh," said I, half expecting a telling-off.

"Have you seen their prices?" he said in a shocked tone of voice.  "I've told your mum to sign up now and I'll take a cut.  I'm going to put her out to work!"

"Dad, erm... wouldn't that make you a pimp?"

"Well, I prefer the term 'manager'..."

"You're putting your ho out to work for you, and taking a cut.  That makes you a pimp."

"Oh well," he said cheerfully.  "I'm in London tomorrow so I might check them out.  Though you'd have to be interested in archaeology to give some of those girls a go.  Byeee!"

Shudder.

Mum's the word

Some emails make you smile.  Some make you laugh out loud.  Sometimes it's a nice surprise to hear from an old friend.  Sometimes (quite often this week) it's a confirmation from Amazon that you're well on your way to completing your Christmas shopping.  And then there are the emails that simultaneously make you feel a little bit sick and strike fear into your heart. 

I received one of these emails earlier this week.  It was from Mrs Nunn and was entitled, "Wey hey!  Time to register!"  I opened up the email.  It was just a link.  There was no context, no explanation, just the link.  Which I will now share with you.  Look away now if you're of queasy disposition:

http://www.vintagevamps.co.uk/vamps.html

Now, I'm not sure if Mrs Nunn is considering a new hobby, or if she's bored of retirement already, but please, please, if you ever see her photo on this site, do me a favour: don't tell me.

Devon knows

So last weekend, I went to Devon for a friend's wedding, as I mentioned previously.  I arrived very late at night, with the wind howling and the fog swirling, and I fancied I could hear the sea crashing against the rocks.  I felt like I was in a Daphne du Maurier novel, and that any moment, a creepy housekeeper would sidle up to me saying, "You'll never take her place you know."

Thankfully, there was no creepy housekeeper, and the weekend went without a hitch.  Actually, that's probably not the ideal phraseology for a wedding.  A wedding without anyone getting hitched would not be a very good wedding at all.  You know what I mean.

So, I left TheBloke (TM) at home in the London Borough of Redbridge, and put him in charge of Monty Cat.  He assures me he mostly did dull things like buy a new mirror, put some laundry on and feed the cat.  Yet, when I got home on Sunday, his mobile rang.  His mobile never rings.  Unless it's me.

I only heard TheBloke (TM)'s side of the conversation at first.  "Hello?  Sorry?  What do you mean?  You called me!  I think you have the wrong number.  Nikki?  I didn't!  Who?"  At this point I motioned for him to put the mystery caller on speakerphone.  A girl with a Scouse accent that could strip paint was on the other end of the phone.  Hilariously, TheBloke (TM)'s South African upbringing (versus my misspent youth in front of Brookside) meant he could only understand one in three words she said.

"Yer did!" she insisted.

"When did I give you my number?" he asked.

"Last night," she asserted.  "Yer passed me on the street."

TheBloke (TM) was genuinely flummoxed, "We were packing sweets?" he queried.

"Are you black?" (or in Scouse: "Are youse blachhh?") Nikki queried abruptly.

"Erm, no."

"How auld are youse?"

TheBloke (TM) lied and said he was 20.  She said she was 17.  Then hung up.  Ten minutes later the phone rang again.

"So, do you want to go out for a drink then?" Nikki asked.

"Erm, not really.  I'm watching a film," replied TheBloke (TM) truthfully.  Though he accidentally omitted to mention he was sitting with his fiancée at the time.

"Go on," Nikki wheedled, "I'll meet you in town."

"Which town?" asked TheBloke (TM).

"Liverpool!" said Nikki like TheBloke (TM) was a bit thick.

"For a drink?" he asked.

"For a spliff," said Nikki, who, though tender of age, was clearly a bit of a stoner.  "What do you do?" she asked him.

"I'm a gay model," lied (I hope) TheBloke (TM).  Why this is the first thing that came to his mind is anyone's guess.

"Eww!  You're a Quagmire!" said Nikki.  She hung up and hasn't called since.  Neither of us knows what a Quagmire is.

So... answers on a postcard.  Did TheBloke (TM) stay in and feed the cat whilst I was in Devon?  Or did he go out on the pull in Liverpool?  And is he a part-time (or indeed full-time) gay model?  And what on earth is a Quagmire?

First class service

This weekend I took a trip to Devon (the county in the South West that isn't currently underwater) for a friend's wedding.  Not fancying rush hour Friday traffic, I took the train down on Friday evening, and, as it was only £5 extra, treated myself to a first class ticket.  This apparently gave me a wider seat, a selection of newspapers, snacks and complimentary hot and cold beverages.

However, when I got to the buffet bar, I was told, "We've only got tea and coffee."

"Do you have any snacks?" I enquired.

"Biscuits," the fine First Great Western employee retorted, slapping down a packet of Walker's shortbread.

I took my cup of tea and retired to my wider seat.  Opposite me, an ugly man sniffed and chomped his way through an M&S savoury wrap, whilst slowly encroaching on my table space.  The journey dragged.

The wedding was lovely, and it was much fun to see old schoolfriends again.  There was much naughtiness and misbehaving.

I took a train back to London this morning at the frighteningly early time of 9.07 - this time I was in standard class.  This was a wise financial decision.  A voice came over the tannoy:

"Ladies and gentlemen, our hot drinks boiler has broken down, so we only have black Americano available.  First class customers will not be able to have complimentary drinks, but you can buy a black coffee for £1.85."

This seemed a) weird and b) a bit unfair to First Class customers - the very least they could do was to give them their Americano for free.  But this wasn't my battle.  So I just sat back.

The voice came over the tannoy again, "As before, ladies and gentlemen, we only have black coffee available.  But we do have milk if you would like milk with your coffee."

Brilliant.  Only black coffee available.  Unless you prefer it white.  First Great Western - rubbish.  And a bit weird.

Why I don't wear a poppy

Remembrance Sunday.  Let's talk about Remembrance Sunday.  And let's be honest.

I do not like Remembrance Sunday.  I am willing to go further than that.  I dislike the Poppy Appeal.  Most of all, I detest the two minutes' silence.

This - I am aware - is an unpopular view - Jon Snow, the journalist, a few years back caused a furore over refusing to wear a poppy on air - citing "poppy fascism" - the pressure to be seen to be wearing a poppy on air.  Yet he stopped short of criticising the appeal per se, insisting in fact, he did have his poppy at home.

I don't.

Here are my reasons why.  Firstly, I find it surreal that we commemorate war dead above any other type of dead.  Yes, of course charities exist to find cures for cancer, to support disabled children, to rescue abandoned donkeys... but those who have died in a war are exulted beyond those who fell out of windows, got squashed on the M1 or died from TB caught from a passing tramp.

This - in some small but significant way - raises the profile of war.  I'll stop short of saying it's glamorised exactly, but it validates war's place in our culture - past and present.  It reminds us that actually, it's OK to solve any problems we have by hitting each other with a stick (or whatever the military are using these days), rather than approaching things from a non-violent perspective.

"But Laura," you may say, "the Poppy Appeal does loads of good work helping injured soldiers".  I wouldn't deny that.  But I would query if it's a charity's responsibility to put right the things that government policy has made go wrong, and - by virtue of their very existence - in some small way again, makes it a little bit more OK to have soldiers injured in the first place - there's a system in place to support them.

"What about the Second World War, Laura?  What about Hitler?  Would you like to be speaking German and burning Jews?"  No, to both of those.  And this is probably the hardest part of the argument - if someone else is fighting you - do you have to fight back?  I'm going with no.  Because yes, the ideology was horrendous - but the world has a way of balancing itself - through resistance, through education, through dialogue, and I don't feel bombs are the best way to do that.

I have friends in the military; friends who have gone out to Afghanistan and Iraq.  Friends not all of whom have come home again.  Do I feel proud of their sacrifice?  No I fucking don't.  I feel angry at the waste, and that's pretty much it.  For WW1 and WW2 you can multiply that waste by hundreds of thousands.  These deaths were not an accident - were not ill luck or fate like cancer or a car crash; groups of men led other men (and these days women) to death.

Finally the two minutes' silence.  God, I hate that.  Enforced reflection time.  A time when we switch our emotions to "a bit sad" but only for a couple of minutes, before we get on with our day jobs again.  Enforced reflection is a bit like the compulsory "fun" of a work Christmas party.

Every place I've ever worked, a voice comes over the tannoy, inviting those who'd like to to observe the two minutes' silence.  Of course everyone does; you don't want to intrude on someone else's silence.  But it's just awkward.  Torn between terror at giggling inappropriately, or worrying your office phone is about to ring, no time at all is spent reflecting on the war dead (or any other dead, come to that; see earlier resentment that war dead are somehow more important than other dead).  Every single one of the 120 seconds collectively spent by 50 million people is spent feeling slightly socially awkward.  Is that a good use of anyone's time?  I usually hide in the toilet.  The toilets are always full, so I expect I'm not the only one who adopts this strategy.

So I don't wear a poppy, and I won't take part in Remembrance Day services.  Because remembering the dead is something we need to do all of the time, not for two minutes on a rainy November morning.  And because war is ultimately a choice.  One which we all know is the dangerous option.  Yes, conscription took that choice away from many - but fundamentally - at some point a choice was made.  People chose to fight each other, aware of the consequences.  I do not wish to remember that.

Words on the Wharf

There are many things I dislike about working at Canary Wharf.  The vast steel and glass palaces, each more faceless than the last, the dead, soulless eyes of commuters, none of whose childhood dreams were to become a junior member of a derivatives salesforce or a senior project manager in IT.  Also the fact that even in mid-August, the chill wind off the Thames means the Wharf is plunged into an eternal winter.  These things I dislike.


Additionally, it's pretty much impossible to find lunch for under a fiver, and as a former resident of Tower Hamlets (in which borough Canary Wharf sits), it's astonishing to see the vast wealth on display - when barely a mile away, one of the most deprived areas in the country has seemingly no money spent on it - whilst the Wharf gets another three security guards in case a junior derivatives salesforce member gets his bike stolen.  Additionally the Jubilee Line is about as effective as hopping to work on a rollerskate, and they seem to strike more often than they work, meaning an hour's leisurely commute is usually turned into an hour and a half of snarling at the chav who's standing on my foot or reeking into my personal space.


But sometimes - just sometimes - it's all worthwhile.  They seem to have some interesting art projects going on at the Wharf.  Over the summer (well, what passes for summer at Canary Wharf), they had a project called Streetpianos  which was lovely; they basically put rickety old pianos all around the wharf, and chained a songbook to the piano - anyone could sit down and play.  This being Tower Hamlets, however, the "junior entrepreneurs" weren't slow; an exceptionally talented young black teenager I saw four or five times in one week, hogging the piano, and having improvised a busking bowl he'd chained to the leg of the piano stool.  I'm not sure that was the intention of the project, but everyone was enjoying his music, so why not?


Today though, I think I saw my favourite art project ever.  Those of you who know me know I'm not a massive fan of art in general.  Given the choice, I give art galleries a wide berth (and of course I'm given the choice; what sort of bizarre society would force you at gunpoint to the Louvre?).  I have been known to trek round the Tate Modern (which I fucking hate) saying, "I could have done that.  I could have done that.  I could have done that.  That's shit. I could have done that," and so on, until whoever I'm with tries to stab me in the face.  Unfortunately this is often seen as an avant garde performance and we normally get a round of appreciative applause and an encore.


But today I saw this.  It's an art project that fuses technology and nature, or some such bollocks.  But basically it takes a real-time feed from the Times website, and somehow, magically, makes words appear out of water.  I loved it.  Loved it, loved it, loved it.

It almost made up for the fact I watched a man in a large (life-size) paper boat almost sink into the Thames earlier today before he was rescued by Canary Wharf staff.  I bet he got fucking arts funding.  Sadly no pictures of that.


Hope you enjoy the video.  With luck the exhibition will be there for a few days, so why not pop down to the Wharf and have a look.  But not tomorrow.  There's a tube strike.  Of course there is.

Dramatic exit

Today was a day of theatre.  Actually, it's been something of a week of theatre, as I went to see the very good House of Games at the Almeida on Monday.

But today was all about Birdsong at the Comedy Theatre at Piccadilly.  I don't know whose bright idea it was to equate a gory war story with a theatre whose name conjures up images of laughter... but actually, unfortunately, they weren't far wrong.

By coincidence, I read Birdsong earlier this year, whilst I was in New York.  To be honest, I didn't really enjoy it.  Parts of it I found well-written, and the war scenes were so vividly horrific that I had to glance away from the page from time to time.  But it wasn't one of those books that held me captive.  Some of that may be New York's fault - vying for my attention in the way it does, the novel was never likely to win... but I found it had too many characters, none of whom I really liked, but I did like the twist at the end (which I shan't give away here).

So, off to see Birdsong with some friends.  To say that it reminded me of a sixth form play is perhaps to do injustice to most sixth formers.  A more literal interpretation would be hard to come by.  The narrator would "read" his diary, direct to the audience; in the background, actors would mime out what he was saying, and often the backdrop would display a photograph of whatever he was talking about, in case we were so stupid we hadn't quite worked it out for ourselves.  My favourite moment was this exchange:

Stephen:  Stretchers!  We need a stretcher!

Stretcher bearers: Stretchers coming through (carrying a stretcher)

Photographic backdrop: wartime stretcher bearers.  Genius.

Other favourite moments included Stephen saying to a nurse, "I'm alive!  I'm alive!  Do you know it?  I'm alive?"

She didn't, unfortunately, reply, "Yes, yes, I was aware of that.  I am a medical professional.  They kind of covered off these things on day one of nursing college."

My all time favourite moment though was when the French peasant (with a Bristolian accent - presumably to show she was a peasant) said, "War's a difficult thing".  All we needed was Baldrick adding his "ting a ling a ling", and we'd have had the full Blackadder experience.

At one point a young soldier, about to go and do battle with Germans, turns the gun on himself.  I couldn't help myself.  "Missed!" I said to my friend.  We got inappropriate giggles.

We couldn't bear it.  We left at the second interval - a list of Somme casualties slowly scrolling up the stage for 5 minutes.  A prissy couple of old ladies said to us, "It hasn't finished you know," as we exited.  "No," I said, "but I think we've had all we can take."

Uncle Trevor, you've let the family name down with this one.  Though it did give me a chance to storm out of the theatre.  Admittedly, storming is harder when you have a fit of the giggles.

Cost of living

I remember my first ever car - the K-reg Vauxhall Astra that lasted me the best part of a decade.  That's not to say that things didn't go wrong with it.  In fact - from memory, here are some of the expenses:

1998 - new immobiliser needed (because as we all know, the car thief's vehicle of choice is a K-reg Astra) £100

1998 - new spark plugs £50

1999 - new distributor cap £50

1999 - new rear windscreen wiper £40

2000 - new battery £100

2001 - new battery £100

2002 - new battery (not driving it much during the uni years wasn't great for it) £100

2003 - cam belt went at 85mph on the motorway (I mean 70 mph, officer) £400

2004 - new battery - £100

2005 - new radio - £50

2005 - cam belt went again £300

It finally retired in 2006, and I like to think went to a loving home where little girls fed it sugar lumps and polo mints.

The purpose of this, is there becomes a point when its existence becomes uneconomical.  But you're still anxious to get your money's worth, so, having spent £350 on it in 2005, it's even more galling to lay it to rest in 2006.

But essentially, it was becoming more expensive to run than a new car would cost. 

I think I may have reached that stage.  Not with my car; the Mini and me are still getting on very well indeed.  I mean me personally.  Between hair dressing appointments, new clothes, the costs of getting to and from work, house repairs, eyebrow waxes, mobile bills, mortgage, house repairs, TV subscriptions, income tax and national insurance, I've decided I'd be better off if I just paid some grease monkey from the garage £20 to take me away.

I wonder if I'm recyclable.

Singes capitulards bouffeurs de fromage

Ploggers, Ploggers, Ploggers.  I can only apologise for my protracted absence, and plead a recent cornucopia of overexcitement.

Sorry.

So, what have I been doing?  Well, TheBloke (TM), the romantic old fool, took me to Paris for the weekend for my birthday.  This lends itself to great jokes such as, "He took me up the Eiffel Tower", "We went on a boat trip: it was in Seine" and so on.  Paris was lovely.  Hot chocolates, croissants, snails, steak tartare, choux pastry and fondant chocolat all made it onto our Parisian palette...  But as ever, it's the mad bastards who stick in your mind the most.

So there we are, minding our own business on the Paris Metro, exiting at the station so we can go and see the Arc de Triomphe.  Apparently this was built to honour those who died in the Napoleonic wars.  Arc de Triomphe means "Triumph Arch", and unless my history is severely inaccurate, I think the French may want to investigate the naming of this.  It's generally not considered a triumph when you lose a war.  But maybe for the French it is.  In the words of The Simpsons, they are after all "cheese-eating surrender monkeys".  Triumph!  We have surrendered!  Break out the cheese!  Build an arch!

Anyway, we were exiting the Metro station through large metal doors that automatically open as you approach them.  Obviously these are one-way, to prevent people entering the system for free.  So they are pretty narrow - certainly only wide enough for one fairly slimline member to pass.  They are also opaque, so you can't see what's through them until they open.  My steel door opened as I approached.  I went through.  Unfortunately, at the same time, a mad, French, peasanty fare-dodger decided he was going to use my exit door to get a free ride.

There wasn't room for both of us.  I used my (let's face it) fantastic A-level French to say loudly, "Non!  Non!"  Of which, he obviously took absolutely no notice.  He pushed me.  I was forced up against the metal bars.  "Non!" I said fluently again.  But fat, ugly, stupid mad bastard French peasants will not be appeased.  And he ignored me.  Luckily at this point the doors closed behind me and he was thwarted.  Thwarted I say!

(Though I heard him say, "merci" to someone behind me, so clearly someone was more charitable than me.  "Merci" by the way, means "thank you".  This is why I got an A at A-level.)

There's always a story whenever I go to France.  Previous incidents have involved:

• Mrs Nunn almost getting arrested for (not) shoplifting at Carrefour
• Asking a supermarket employee if there were condoms in the organic jam
• Trying to buy peach wine and ending up with vin de peche (basically Tesco's "good with fish")

TheBloke (TM), a non-Francophone, learned three French words: "croissant", "oui" and "quoi".  These days, that's enough for an A* at GCSE so I'm thinking of entering him this summer.

Love hurts

This Plog is one which my more refined Ploggers may wish to skip.  Whilst you are considering if you are the sort of depraved individual who wants to expose themself to filth, we will talk about flowers and butterflies until you are gone...  OK.  Everyone still here?  Thought so...

Sexting.  Today we're talking about sexting.  For those of you who naive, innocent or backwards with technology, sexting is essentially texting sexual messages to each other.  Huge fun if you're 15, and have lightning speed thumbs (for a couple of reasons, actually)... less fun if you're over the age of 20 and in a long-term relationship.

To change the subject for a moment; iPhones are very clever.  You use its touch screen to input letters when you're texting, but if you're not accurate enough with the part of the screen you touch, and perhaps type "ans" instead of "and", or "kip" instead of "lip", it will guess what you meant (based on words you normally use) and automatically correct it for you.  Very clever indeed.

So, back to sexting.  Mostly because we were bored, TheBloke (TM) and I logged onto an iPhone app for anonymous naughty chat.  Well, OK then, I did.  TheBloke (TM) was watching Dexter on TV.

Straight away, a young lady (lady!) started sexting me.  Admittedly I have no evidence she was young... and plenty of evidence she was no lady.

"I am taking off your bra," she sexted.  (I was actually wearing a slightly manky sports bra, a bit clammy from the gym, but I didn't mention that to her.)

"OK," I replied.  This was apparently encouragement enough.

"Mmm," she tapped into her iPhone making extensive use of her "m" key.  "Your nipples are hard as I tub them against my face."

I thought to myself, "tub?".  She corrected herself: "*rub".

My sext partner continued.  "I'm pulling down you're panties."  I let the incorrect apostrophisation pass.  It would have seemed impolite to give her a lecture about the difference between the possessive "your" and the contracted "you are" at this stage.

"I flick my tongue against your throbbing clot."  By this point I was almost hysterical with laughter, and even TheBloke (TM) and torn himself away from Dexter.  She corrected herself again: "*clit".  It was this point she decided - clearly - she was going for her best move:

"I'm squeezing your breasts and kicking your clit."

Ouch.

Where the bi-polar things are

Recently I watched the film of Where the Wild Things Are.  Whilst I don't remember this myself as a young child, I do remember it being one of my little brother's favourite kids' books.  It was a nicely-drawn book of a little boy who gets sent to bed early without supper for being "wild", then travels to an island where he gets to be king of the wild things and gets rid of all his energy and anger.  Then, he wakes up, in his bed, and his supper is in his room waiting for him.  No massive metaphors from recollection, other than when you're a kid, everything seems so dramatic, but generally, your parents still love you and will make you dinner.  Job done.  Happy ending.

But the film, oh the film.  After a promising start with little Max getting angry at his sister, and an absent (or deceased) father and a mother who's having trouble at work, but who seems to be larging it on the dating scene, Max's story then takes a very troubling turn.

Christ on a unicycle, this film was like Pinter for children.  Despite some lovely visuals, straight from the book's illustrations, when Max arrives at the island of wild things, the wild things (monsters) were all chronically depressed.  The main male monster was called Carol (bad enough he gets a girl's name, and goes part-way to explain his inherent anger problems) but then appeared to have a really weird relationship with a monster character called KW, who might have been his mother, his sister or his girlfriend.  Whatever their relationship, it made me feel dirty.

(As an aside, KW has two new friends, who are two owls which she holds in each hand.  Obviously.  She gets their attention by throwing rocks at them to knock them out of the sky.  Which is a great thing to teach children about how to look after birds.)

The film was filled with lines like, "You know the sun is going to die", "everything turns to dust", "families are hard".  They then build a fort together (though there don't appear to be any enemies), and angry male Carol decides he's going to smash it up.

Max then leaves the island having improved it not at all, and if anything, has made things rather worse.

He runs back into his house, clearly some hours later, but his mother (now sans boyfriend), doesn't even appear to have called the police.  Though she does give him dinner.

The whole thing was disturbing.  If it can hold your child's attention through the meaningful pauses and the existential crises, you have a very special child.  Enrol it on a philosophy course immediately.  See if it can sit through all of Beckett's Endgame.  I couldn't.

Sick of travel

I have now lived in London for a long time. About nine years. And I have experienced many strange things on the tube in that time, which include, but are not limited to:

• A pigeon getting on at Gloucester Road tube station, and getting off again at South Kensington

• The announcement after a 15-minute wait on the Northern Line, "Ladies and gentlemen, I've finally spoken to the control room and apparently they didn't even know we were waiting." (Put your best sarcastic voice on), "Welcome to the Northern Line."

• A large number of people of indeterminate sex, which have provided me with endless internal games of "male or female?" Also, in a similar category, the favourite tube game of "fat or pregnant". Do you offer your seat to the preggos, or make the fatties stand as it's likely to be the most exercise they'll get that day.

I have also over the years, heard all the excuses for late-running trains, from the squishy, "person under a train" to the pathetic, "signal failure at North Greenwich". But today I think I heard my favourite.

On a train at Stratford this morning, an announcement came over the tannoy.

"Apologies for the delay, ladies and gentlemen. We are holding this train at the moment because of a suspected vomit in one of the carriages."

Suspected vomit? How hard is it to identify vomit? And what else could it possibly be? The mind boggles.

Exercise in patience

I have something to say that will shock and horrify you: I have joined a gym. Yes, yes, I know this isn't the first time - the monthly donations to Fitness First back in 2004, the work gym at my last place of employment (I maintain there's nothing worse than seeing Ugly Martin from accounts sweating all over the equipment... and it's worse still when it's in the gym. And don't get me started on having to watch Fat Penelope from Marketing get undressed. Well, OK, I didn't have to watch her, but there's a kind of horrified train wreck syndrome where you just cant' tear yourself away. And that, Ploggers, and the subsequent HR proceedings are why I no longer work at that company.)

But this time is going to be different. TheBloke (TM) and I have both joined a local gym (avert your eyes now)... and it's a "council gym". I worried about this at first. I don't really see myself as a leisure centre kind of a girl. I'm more of a spa, sauna and home for a hamburger type of girl. But, as I've put on two stones in the last year and a half (almost equivalent to two entire Monty Cats and he is not a petite feline) and I suspect upcoming bridal wear will not be forgiving to a spare tyre. (Thinking about it, perhaps I should have chosen a dress that doesn't have a spare tyre as an accessory. Now I consider it, it does sound a bit weird).

So, the leisure centre is actually pretty nice. It has brand new gym equipment with integrated TV, it has a swimming pool, and it even has a spa attached with a sauna, aroma room (whatever that might be), an "experience shower" (apparently mist or heavy rain, but basically a shower) and - brilliantly - a "bucket shower". This is (and I kid you not) a bucket of cold water that is balanced on the top of the shower, and you pull a rope and the cold water falls on you. Don't believe me? Check this out: http://www.thespalondonandessex.co.uk/experiences.html

Anyway, pool, spa, fancy gym equipment, you could almost be mistaken for thinking it was a David Lloyd. Almost. Because there's one thing the council do very differently from anywhere else. And that's staff. Now, any regular Ploggers will know that my battles - particularly with Tower Hamlets Council - have been frequent and - to a bystander at least - hilarious. Memorably I once had to explain to a Tower Hamlets' call operative what the word "minimum" meant. The guy at the end of the line actually used the sentence, "Sorry, what does 'minininium mean?" But I hoped that having moved to the London Borough of Redbridge, things would be a little better.

But no. The staff. Oh, the staff. Here are some genuinely true things about the staff at the leisure centre:

• It took an hour for us to join the gym. We filled out the paperwork in about five minutes and then had to watch the most stupid woman in the world type it all into her machine. One letter at a time. I asked, "Do you need to type all of this in now?" She said yes. I asked, "Should we come back later?" She said, "No, I'm always this busy." Thus missing the point that she was just stupid and slow and we didn't want to wait.
• There is a young, male, blonde guy who stands at the back of reception (not actually manning it), whose job it appears to be to smile apologetically at customers every time the reception staff do something stupid. As far as I can tell, he does nothing else. His face must hurt by the end of the day.
• Our £26 (each) gym induction consisted of, "Have you been to a gym before?" We replied that we had. "Well, basically, it's exactly the same. OK? Off you go."

I almost look forward to interacting with them, just so I have more stories for you. How I suffer for my Ploggers!

For God's sake

So I am currently reading Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion, only about six years after the rest of the population. And my word, it's made me all shouty. But shouty in a really, really good way. He articulates so simply things that have felt like truths for a long time... Here are my key takeaways so far (with apologies for inelegant paraphrasing):

1. Why is it "disrespectful" to question someone's religion? It's not something they were born with - it's a choice they have made to follow a faith. Yet if you openly disagree or call into question their beliefs, you are being rude. How can we on one hand encourage children to be scientifically rigorous and logical in their approach to problem solving, and yet when someone wants to answer, "I have to leave school early today because it's dark and it's a holy day," or "I need to find a prayer room before 3 p.m." we all say, "oh, right, OK. Off you pop"?
2. Tolerance. Why should I be tolerant of someone else's beliefs? Of course, I'm not the type of person to commit a hate crime - what would that achieve? But why should I accept that other people hold illogical beliefs without trying to understand and challenge the assumptions they're living their lives by?
3. Faith. The old fall-back by the religious. "I don't need to know because I believe and that is enough for me." Well, it isn't enough for me. If I told you that my god was a pink sandcastle who insisted I only ate lobster on Wednesdays, you'd think I was a nutter. But because there are lots and lots of you who think that Jesus wanted you to chow down on his body and blood on Sundays, this belief is sanctioned, whereas I am likely to be sectioned.

I cannot recommend the book highly enough. I nearly said, "Unless you're religious and would like to hold onto that faith" (for the reason that I think anyone of even moderate intelligence who reads the book cannot possibly continue with their belief system as is). So why didn't I say that? Because actually I can't condone people holding onto their faith. So I think everyone should read it. It should be mandatory for all A-level students, regardless of their areas of study. I cannot believe we had seven years at high school of religious education and never studied Atheism.

I have many friends who are religious. Whilst in every single case, they are happy, lovely, otherwise intelligent people - I find it incredibly difficult to reconcile that against the fact they believe a magic man (or woman) created the world, is sitting and judging them and listening to loads of prayers at the same time. Oh, and that this amazing, amazing omniscient being loves nothing more than to be praised by his creations. Preferably on a weekly basis. What an egocentric tosser.

A group of Americans were polled recently and only 49% would vote for an atheist (whereas over 75% would vote for a woman, a black person, a Jewish person etc.). The Scouting organisation will not allow you to become a leader if you are an avowed atheist - although they welcome people from any other faith. I lead a moral life (because I believe we owe it to ourselves to make our short time on this planet as pleasant as possible), I mentor young people, I take part in community activities, I recycle... basically, I'm not perfect but I'm at least as good as your average Muslim and a whole lot better than your average Fundamentalist Christian. But I am not allowed to volunteer my time to the Scouting Association because I refuse to swear allegiance to an imaginary friend. Brilliant.

I'm Laura, and I'm an atheist. As I now appear to be part of a heavily-discriminated against sector of society, I've got one thing to say: bring it.

Veiled enthusiasm

Number 3: The conversations

Returning to my "things I hate about planning a wedding" series. At number 3 we have the conversations. Without fail, everyone seems to think that having a wedding should be the most life-defining point, and therefore, you should think of very little else.

Browsing idly in a wedding dress shop the other day, the shop assistant came over to me and started talking - unprompted, I hasten to add - about tiaras. "Yeah, tiaras are really going out of fashion these days. People are asking for like clusters of jewels on the side... you know like Cheryl Cole had?"

Truthfully I replied, "No."

"Well, you know on The X Factor?"

Truthfully I replied, "No."

"Well, you know in the bridal magazines?"

Once again, I was truthful, "No."

But at this point, I began to feel pressured. Why don't I have opinions on these things? So, I parted with four English pounds and ninety English pennies and bought a magazine with pictures of seemingly identical dresses and utterly ridiculous articles.

Here is a genuine top tip from the magazine: "Planning a wedding tends to consume all your spare time, so it's important to try and do one thing for yourself each day that has nothing to do with the wedding - paint your nails, read a magazine, make a dentist appointment or just go for a walk..."

Erm... ONE thing each day? So whilst I'm sitting on the loo taking a dump, I should be thinking about table plans? And how is making a dentist appointment something I should relish doing instead of wedding planning? And really? ALL my spare time? Seriously? What the buggery bollocks are you going to do after the wedding if you've dropped all of your friends and hobbies in the months leading up to your dull, dull party?

Don't understand it. Do not understand it. But I am bizarrely interested to see what Cheryl Cole's tiara substitute looked like.

You're booked

OK, I'm taking a break from moaning about wedding planning to moan about something else instead. Facebook. Yet again, Facebook. Not the tool itself - as much as anyone else, I'm guilty of updating my status, stalking old friends (and enemies) and pointlessly clicking my life away.

My criticism today rests firmly on the "favourite books" section. You may think this is odd. You know I love reading. I get through approximately two paperbacks a week, thanks to a daily two-hour commute and a library near where I work. Why on earth should I censure Facebook's efforts to allow people to share their favourite reads?

I don't. My issue is with the stupid people. Here are some genuine(ish) favourite books lists of friends.

1. Jackie Collins, Marian Keyes, Harry Potter, To Kill a A Mockingbird
2. Ian Rankin, Dean Koontz, Voltaire - Candide
3. His Dark Materials, Lord of the Rings, Of Mice and Men

Basically, people read shit books. Because they are thick. And then they add one "good" book at the end. Let me define good in this context - a book which is deemed to be literary. Literary in so much as it might be (for example) included on an A-level or GCSE syllabus. And - what a coincidence - these were all books that we studied at my school, depending which class you were in. (In case of doubt, I am not classing anything Tolkein wrote as "good". Deal with it.)

So one of two things is happening here:

1. People read shit books. They know they read shit books, but are embarrassed by this and so put the one "good" book they've ever read on the end of their list. Stupid, stupid people.

Or

2. Perhaps they read "good" books all the time, but without a teacher to draw out the subtleties and take that understanding to a new level, they make little or no impression on them. Stupid, stupid people.

Or maybe they just don't read at all. Perhaps I only read so much because I spend so much time on public transport... but still, a good book is like a box of chocolates that doesn't make you fat.

Don't get me wrong, I like a bit of shit-lit as much as the next person. But with the emphasis on "a bit". Reading a Dan Brown novel is a bit like having a McDonalds. At the time you really enjoy it, but a few minutes later you feel guilty and a bit sick, and like you need something more healthy - perhaps a nice Ian McEwan (surely the literary equivalent of one of your five a day) or even a starchy Jane Austen or a fibre-filled Dickens.

So, Stupids. If you recognise yourself in the above, I recommend the following top picks. They're all pretty accessible, and there's loads of info on the internet about them if you need to know more:

1. Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier

2. Saturday - Ian McEwan

3. Atonement - Ian McEwan (watching the film doesn't count, stupids)

4. Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro

5. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

Also, Cloud Atlas (David Mitchell, but not that David Mitchell, Stupids) is brilliant and clever, but not suitable for Stupids. Sorry.

Dis-dressed

Things that irritate me about weddings.

Number 2: The dress

As mentioned in the previous post, I'm not a girly girl. But if you're having a wedding, you're apparently supposed to have a wedding dress. People take photos and everything. Mrs Nunn did not adhere to this, and went out and bought a nightie and got married in that. However, she also wore hot pants to her graduation ceremony on a dare, so I'm not entirely sure I should emulate her fashion sense. Also, Mr Nunn wore brown velvet flares whilst saying "I do", so the fashion bar wasn't set all that high.

So on Saturday I had a wander to a "wedding dress sale" - presumably a place that a) sells wedding dresses and b) sells them more cheaply than when they're not on sale.

Into the sale I went. I was greeted and told a wedding dress consultant would spend an hour with me. I asked why. I got a look. I was asked when the wedding was. I told her that it was going to be in March. She looked shocked. "This March?"

"Yes, March 2011," I said.

"Well, that's going to limit you," she said, glancing down at my stomach, presumably to try and ascertain if I was up the duff.

"Erm, why?"

"Well, of course it takes eight months to make most of these wedding dresses."

"Sorry, what?"

"It takes eight months."

"Are you joking? I could build a house in less time. I could make an entire human being pretty much in eight months."

"Oh, well, you can pay extra for a rush order," she said.

"Well there's a surprise."

"They have to sew all the beading on by hand and stuff."

"Mmmhmm," I said and went for a wander round. For about two seconds. Most dresses were over £1000. I'll say that again. Most dresses were over £1000. For Americans, that's $1600. In rand, that's R11,000. In Euros, that's... damn it, there's no Euro sign on my laptop. Any

way, you get the picture. It's pricey. Especially considering you're only going to wear it once. Well, maybe twice, but some second husbands are funny about you wearing the dress you wore to your first wedding.

Oh, and that wasn't all... you can't just order a size 8 and be done with it... you order the dress in approximately the right size, and then they fit it for you. Fair enough... except they charge an extra £200 for this privilege.

And with that thought, they can fuck right off. I'm off to get some hotpants and a pyjama top.

Cold reception

For those of you who were in any doubt, I'm not a particularly girly girl. I'm by no means a tomboy, but I have not yet seen any compelling evidence why I should cleanse, tone and moisturise every night (nor even one of the three - how dirty is my face supposed to get between daily showers?). In that category, you can also add putting make-up on before work; that's precious sleep time I'd be wasting. And finally, I do not believe I have ever "touched up" my lipstick after leaving the house.

I am at peace with all this.

So, it's with some difficulty I am reconciling myself to wedding planning. There are so many frilly little details I'm just not interested in. So over the next few days, I'm going to treat you to my top three wedding related gripes to date. Because I might hate girly stuff, but I sure as hell love to complain.

So, Thing number one: The Venue

I hoped this would be fairly easy; our plans are to get married out in South Africa, and I hoped to do it all by email, to cut down on having to go somewhere and squeal about how exciting it all was. The following exchange is a genuine one between a lovely elephant sanctuary and myself that we visited when we were in South Africa last where I thought it would be a bit different to hold the ceremony.

Laura:

Hi

My partner and I are considering getting married in South Africa.

We are not expecting many guests (max 30). We are considering holding it in April next year and are flexible about date.

Can you please let me know what wedding packages you have available and at what cost?

Thanks

Knysna Elephant Park:

Hi Laura

May I asked where you heard of the wedding venue at Knysna Elephant Park?

Kind regards

Marlize

Laura:

Hi

From this site:

http://www.sa-venues.com/gardenroute/weddings/knysna.php

Thanks

Knynsa:

Thanks Laura

That’s strange, because we aren’t listed on that site.

Keep well

Marlize

Laura:

Are you not interested in giving me a quotation for the day? We visited Knysna a few years ago and thought it would be a lovely venue for a wedding - but you seem unwilling to help out!

Thanks

This went on - believe it or not - for two months, with Marlize eventually giving us a quotation higher than the prices on the website... and when asked if she could negotiate, she promised a response a couple of days later... which took three weeks. When I finally got assertive by email, saying this wasn't good enough and that I needed a revised quotation and someone else to liaise with by the end of the week, she eventually sent through the same estimate (rand for rand) that she'd sent through two months earlier. Genius.

So, what have I learned from this experience? 1) I will not, sadly, be having baby elephants at my wedding. 2) I would not recommend Knysna Elephant Sanctuary as a wedding venue, nor Marlize as an effective employee.

Tomorrow... Number 2. (I really ought to eat more fibre.)

Powerful point

Where have I been? Where have I been? Mind your own business! Not really, Ploggers. I have been doing lots of very exciting things, like having an engagement braai (BBQ) where all guests had to wear a gay cowboy hat. The same gay cowboy hat though. Not one each. That would be opulent and decadent.

So, what I am I going to talk to you about today? Today, being a bank holiday Monday, I am going to talk to you about work.

Like many people who work in London, I have colleagues of all nationalities. There are South Africans, Australians, Canadians, Americans, Indians, and - my absolute favourite - New Zealanders. I can see you're puzzled. Why do I like the Kiwis the most? Well, for one very good reason.

PowerPoint presentations.

As anyone in the world of work will tell you, a few years ago, consultants from Accenture decided they needed to make themselves sound even wankier than they already were. They decided that the phrase "PowerPoint presentation" was too wordy, and, as they were incapable of asking for a cup of tea without gathering stakeholders to present some PowerPoint slides and do some blue-sky, top-down thinking, they needed a shortcut. Time is money, of course. So, instead of the perfectly adequate phrase "PowerPoint slides", they came up with the wanky wank phrase "deck".

This allowed them to sound even more pompous as they shout across the office, "Steve, I need you to do me a one-pager. Actually, no, make it a deck. I need a deck to show ExCo in the morning. Looks like we're going to have to pull an all-nighter." If this phrase alone isn't enough to make you want to knee them in their hairy balls (because, of course, they are all male), I suggest you go to Accenture's website and see if they're recruiting.

So the phrase "deck", to mean PowerPoint slides, has slowly filtered its way into the everyday business prattle of colleagues from South Africa to New Zealand and everywhere in between.

"But Laura," you say, "you haven't answered the question of why you like the Kiwis the most. I don't see how this works at all."

Well, Ploggers, listen up. As everybody knows, everyone who isn't from England talks funny. Scottish people are particularly good at saying, "there's been a murder!" (just sounds better with the accent), Americans say "I could care less," when they mean they couldn't. South Africans say "wun wun" instead of "win win", and Kiwis... well... they smush their vowels together. Fish are "fush". "Min" means men. And deck... Deck becomes "dick".

So on any given Thursday afternoon, you can hear the following up and down any given London office:

"Can you give me five minutes? I want to show you my dick?"

"I really like your dick. Do you think it could be even longer?"

"We're going to discuss Simon's dick in the ExCo meeting."

And my absolute favourite:

"David's put his dick on the agenda, but it should only take a minute."

Ah, Kiwis, you do make me laugh.