January 4th - 7th 2006
Sunday Watlington
Saturday Hot or what?
Friday Watlington
Thursday And now it's over
Sunday 7th January
Watlington, Winter 2006
Saturday 6th January
CAUTION. Should you notice smoke or an unusual smell coming from the lens, remove the battery immediately, taking care to avoid burns.
Thus the instructions of my new Nikon lens. Told you it was hot.
Friday 5th January
Watlington, Winter 2006
Thursday 4th January
I might just grudgingly admit that I actually enjoyed Christmas this year: certainly it's the first time in living memory that I haven't spent the 'festive' season stewing in a miasma of resentment, nursing my grudges.
I put that down to nothing more complicated than the fact that the nation's retailers had such a bad time last year; this time round, I sensed a distinct holding-back from the welter of Yule-themed nonsense that made last year so dismally trivial.
Or maybe I've just finally organised my life efficiently enough to be able to entirely ignore what's going on elsewhere in the nation? Though I didn't exactly behave like a hermit, as far as I can recall:
Sun 24th Dec: Christmas Eve. Invited to meet friends at Comptons in the afternoon, but went to South Central in the evening instead. Not strictly Horse Meat, and relatively quiet. Heidi gave me the biggest mince [sic] pie I've ever seen, which was delicious. Stuck to my resolution not to miss the last tube home, and thereby saved myself, ooh, fifty quid?
Mon 25th Dec : Christmas Day. Worked. (And got generously for it) (Though not as generously as last year.) Finished fairly early and took three straight colleagues to the Swan, which was pretty empty. (They still managed to get themselves gay-bombed though, which was only proper.)
Tues 26th Dec: Boxing Day. Met Andy and Kevin at the RVT for one of Dame Edna's Christmas shows, then met David and Marcus at South Central.
Wed 27th Dec: Last Amateur Strip of the year: White Swan absolutely rammed. Jonathan, Drew, Andy and Craig seemed to enjoy it. I certainly did.
Thurs 28th Dec: Gave up any hope of the Nikon lens arriving this year and bid for a wide-angle Sigma zoom on eBay; checked Amazon's retail price after my bid was successful, and discovered I'd saved all of £10. Ah well. Went to work. First night without a drink for seven days.
Fri 29th Dec: Edited, as per. Contemplated hanging around to cover the hanging of Saddam, rumoured to be scheduled for 3am, but decided I wasn't being paid for that, so made intelligent fall-back plans and went with David to Bar Code instead. It's what he would have wanted.
Sat 30th Dec: Pixmania delivers the Nikon lens! Grr. (But it is fabulous). Went to the Swan, and then on afterwards - to an unspecified venue where I got to hear what has to be the Best Line of 2006, utterly unrepeatable here.
Sun 31st Dec: Entrained for Norfolk, to see in the New Year with 16 of my nearest and dearest, ageing as gracefully as we can.
Mon 1st Jan: Returned to London in time for Horse Meat's 3rd birthday celebrations. (I love my friends dearly, but when it comes to the choice between them and a roomful of cute strangers, I'm afraid there's no contest. I'm shallow that way.) Bumped into Marcus and Janne coming out of the tube. A great night, most of which I spent talking to Oscar's mum, an exxtremely attractive woman of-a-certain-age (ie three years younger than me).
Tues 2nd Jan: Went into work, and to a non-drinking venue thereafter. (That's the detox then.)
Wed 3rd Jan: White Swan was pretty empty but I had a long chat with Ashleigh, which was nice, and then came home and watched Shortbus, which was even nicer.
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