Paper Moon

It is 4.30 am and Paper moon is on the television. Paper Moon is brilliant. Mose says "Don't you know what scruples are?" And Addy says "No, but if you got them they probably belong to someone else."

Insomnia

I have insomnia.
I am awake at 3.00 am.
 I woke up because Evil woke up. Evil was sleeping in our room because she is dying and she likes to sleep in our room. She woke up when the foxes started to scream in the street, Why do foxes scream in the street? Why?
Anyway Evil started to bark and john told her to shut up and I woke up and that was the end of my night.
"i can't go back to sleep," I tell John, "that's the end of my night. I look at my watch. It is 3.00 am. i had thought it was at least 5.
I go downstairs to the playroom. I put on Maisie's Ugg boots to keep warm and I turn on the television. There is a huge cat crap on the sofa.
I bloody hate animals.

French Class.

I am going to French class ce soir. I haven't done my homework so I decide to spend the day learning some French so that I don't appear to be so thick when I hang out with all the intelligent people at the university. I learn the subjunctive, I learn the passe proche and I learn the future tense. I then forget the whole lot but I remember that to 'tomber dans les pommes' is idiomatic for 'to faint'. I am not sure how useful or intelligent this is.
It is 6.15. I have to be at French class at 6.30 but Maisie has not come home from school. Maisie is an hour late. I don't know what to do. When I phone Maise's phone it goes straight to voicemail. 'Hi,' it says 'I'm not there right now, or I'm not answering my phone soo please try later.'
I can't try later because I am supposed to be going to French Class. Where is Maisie? Maisie hasn't got an after school club today.
Maisie should be home. I text Siobhan. Siobhan is generally more reliable than Maisie when it comes to picking up her calls.
 Siobhan doesn't answer.
Maisie is clearly dead. She has been run over and abducted.
Maisie needs to come home quite soon or I will have a heart attack.
It is 6.30 when Maisie comes home.
I don't go to French class.
I go down the road to the Lithuanian shop and buy some crap wine and some bread sticks.
I have wine and bread sticks for supper.
John is on the Fast Diet so I don't have to cook for him as it is a fasting day. I have failed at the God Diet and at French.
 I am a failure.

Ellis's House.

On Sunday evening, we go to Ellis's house for supper. Ellis has some friends over. They have 3 sons. two of them have red hair. we love red hair. We like Ann and Bin. We haven't seen them for ages. we haven't seen Ellis either. Ellis is very very thin. Hannah is not here because she is in Portsmouth or similar, training to be a midwife. Hetty has finally finished her A levels and is feeling much more relaxed than the last time I saw her and Ellis's youngest is very happy because he is entirely surrounded by boys.
We eat wraps with refried beans. We talk about Ellis's chimney fire, about A levels, about the cold.
 Bin who is really called Binesh gets very very drunk and quotes Hilaire Belloch verbatim.
Bin's wife gets a bit stressed.
 "All Germans are cunts." Shouts Bin. his boys roar with laughter, Ellis's youngest is thrilled. Ellis looks very stressed because his neighbours are very German and Georgian houses have very thin walls.
"I'll take him home." Says Ann.
We have a lovely evening.

Kentish Town Farm

We went to pick up Maisie from the farm. We bring Evil because as she is dying we bring her with us whenever possible. Maisie is still volunteering at the farm. She has had a lovely time mucking out the cow. Someone shot the pigs which is a plus because mucking out the pigs is a bit hardcore. It just shows, though how very rough Kentish Town is, they even shoot pigs. I am very glad that Maisie is not in a gang. We pick Maisie up and she is wearing her Abercrombie and Fitch top. She has her Ipad in her bag and she is BBM-ing on her Blackberry, young people are constantly networking.
"Are you OK?" I ask Maisie. "You look a bit pale." Maisie has dark rings around her eyes. I think she may be mourning the pigs.
"I'm fine," she says, "but I haven't had a thing to eat since brunch yesterday, I am so hungry."
Yesterday we were at Abigail's to celebrate her birthday. after John and I left Maisie and Abigail and Ben went to the zoo.
"Didn't you eat anything at all at the zoo?" I ask Maisie. "Nothing at all?"
"No." says Maisie. "We saw the pygmy hippopotamuses, and the camels but we forgot to eat."
"Breakfast?" I ask.
"No." Says Maisie.
Maisie is very very hungry so we repair to the Grafton Pub in Kentish Town. I am a bit worried because people in Kentish Town are a bit trigger happy.
We duck into the Grafton pub and order lots of food for Maisie. We order Sunday lunch and we feed Evil under the table.
I get a text from Ellis. It says "Ann and Bin are coming for supper, do you want to come?"
"Do we have to go?" Says John. I can't do any more socialising." John does lots of socialising.
"Yes, you do," says Maisie, passing some chicken to Evil under the table.
"Why?"Says John.
"Because, says Maisie, "She doesn't want to cook any more."
"O" says John.
I text Ellis back. I'm not sure that Ellis will get my text because texting is not his thing. "We'll come." I say "but after 6.30." We have to visit Terese at 6.00 because she is an artist and she has agreed to take Maisie for work experience.
After lunch we decide to take Evil for a walk on the Heath. We park in Savernake Road where Fran and Bill used to live. It is very sad to be back in Savernake Road. We walk up the road and cross the footbridge and then we are on the Heath.
Evil loves the Heath. She chases a squirrel, she runs up the hill. She stops to do a pooh. She does a pooh which is so runny that it is impossible to pick up with my pooh bags. She runs a bit more and we walk towards Parliament Hill.
"You are puffing." Maisie tells John.
"I am not." Says John.
"You are," says Maisie, "you are very unfit."
Evil does another pooh which is liquid, then she takes off and chases a crow.
"That dog is pushing her luck."Says John. "If she carries on like that she'll drop dead."
Maisie gives John an old fashioned look.
John is non-plussed.
Later we go to Terese's house. Terese lives in a beautiful house in Highbury. Terese is an artist. Her mother is 95 and she's dying in UCH.
"UCH is amazing," says Terese. "The care is extraordinarily good, if you are ever dying at 95, UCH is the place to be."
I try to imagine dying at 95 and I fail.
Terese says that Maisie can do silk screen printing for work experience. She says that they will sort cards and make a T shirt and look at design. Maisie is very very happy.

Abigail's Birthday. The Fast Diet 26th January 2013

Today is Abigail's birthday.
Abigail is 23 today. I can hardly believe it.
Abigail escaped from anorexia and moved into a flat with her boyfriend, Ben and my goddaughter Ellie. She got a degree. She got a job or two and a night shift on John's paper. Abigail has a good life. I am so relieved.
Maisie stayed the night last night with Abigail so John and travel to Abigail's flat by ourselves. this is how we will travel all the time when we are old, which will happen very soon.
"What do retired people do?" asks John as we drive up Camden Road. "How do they fill their days?"
 I am pretty sure that, for me, this will not be a problem.
Ben cooks us a lovely brunch. "
It's a Polish breakfast," he tells us serving up corn fritters and spinach and handing out liberal Bloody Mary's.
We give Abigail an Ipad for her birthday. She is very happy.
"I'm on the Fast Diet."She tells us. I am very uneasy about dieting and Abigail but The Fast Diet is very good for you because physiologically we are cavemen.
"That's a very good diet." I say, "you should try it John. Physiologically we are basically cavemen and the Fast Diet is a diet where you fast for two days a week and eat normally for the other five. Cavemen probably had to fast quite a lot." I tell him.
"What do you mean?" Says John. "We have evolved massively since we lived in caves. Our hands are bigger and more dextrous. Our brains are bigger and more functional and we can work an Ipad."
"If you mean we are cleverer, I disagree." I say. "People were smaller because they were not so well nourished. Their hands were very dextrous. How dextrous do you think you would have to be to build a dry stone wall, to embroider a firescreen or to play Handel's Water Music on a piano?"
"To be fair," says Ben who is a musician. "you can't play Handel's Water Music on a piano."
"Well a harpsichord then." I say. "Pretty dextrous, I'm guessing. And as for being cleverer, our IQs have increased massively since Victorian times but as IQ tests have been proved to be little more than a test of middleclassity or modernity and, since we all agree that Darwin was quite clever even though he probably had the IQ of a watervole, I think we can discount IQ from the argument."
John looks sceptical. "What are your sources?" He asks.
That is so rude. When people ask for your sources they are just being very rude. Next time I try to express an opinion I will bring my source book with me with names and dates.
"What are your sources?" I retort. " How do you know that everyone in a cave had tiny little pointless hands?'
"Did caveman play the harpsichord?" Asks Abigail.
"Why does having bigger hands that can work an Ipad mean you shouldn't fast?" Asks Maisie.
John pours himself another Bloody Mary. "I think," he says "that you are all missing the point."

French Lesson

I have a French lesson today. I can speak French but because I learned while I was in France by talking to the Romanian owner of a junk shop about wardrobes and woodworm, my French is very ungrammatical. In fact I don't actually know what the conjunctive is in English and I feel that it may be vital. I am not sure what it might be vital for, but if I am to take on Francois Hollande's impots and learn how to work the new French central heating system we have had installed in France I think the subjunctive would be helpful.
Alors, voila, French classes.
 A taxi takes me to City University London. the taxi driver is North African. "Do you speak French?" I ask him.
"Non." He replies.
O well.
Anyway we arrive at  City University London.
 "Go upstairs, room 407," says a boy at the front desk.
I go upstairs. I am feeling very very shy. I am not used to this at all. I haven't had an academic class in anything since I left school. I have never been in a University. Several very clever people walk briskly by. I pass a lecture theatre. I can't find my French class. I can't find Room 407. I find Room 302 and 301. I am clearly going the wrong way so I turn round and walk past Room 329 which is full of intelligent, switched on people academically learning something. Much later I find Room 407. Room 407 is full of people sitting in a semi circle.
"Bon soir, bon soir," trills the professeur.
"Bonsoir." I say, taking a seat. Just then my mobile phone goes off. It gets almost halfway through the theme from Black Beauty before I can find it in the bottom of my bag and switch it to silent. I feel very very shy and my face has gone very very hot.
A very intelligent young man sitting next to me turns his head to stare incredulously. "Black Beauty?" He says.
"Oui." I reply. How shy-making.
"Alors," says the Professeur "Pouvez-vous vous presenter?"
"Moi?" I say.
"Oui." She says.
"D'accord." I say. "J'habite a Londres."
Then I forget everything else about my self.
The intelligent young man next to me says he is an IT consultant who lives in St Albans. The beautiful Spanish girl opposite tells us she is being seconded to Paris by Michael Cors and has to learn to communicate with other fashion houses. The older man tells us he has a friend near Marseilles and needs to learn better French but is actually quite happy speaking execrable French but can tell, when he is in France, that no one can understand him. The Scottish man says he is going to Burns night and knows the sex of the baby his wife is going to have next week.
"I have three children." I tell them all and my face goes really really hot again.
I think there is definitely room for improvement.

French

"We have a house in France. We are very lucky because our house in France is very beautiful but it is actually Nowhere so we have to have to have a car in France too. Because of the car I have a phone call from our caretaker in France. It is early morning and I am half asleep.
"Allo," says Mathilde the caretaker.
"Yup." I reply sleepily.
"Vous avez un gros problème. Vous n'étiez pas en France le 22 Décembre étiez-vous?" "Were we in Paris on the 22nd of December?" I ask John who is sleepily snoring next to me. Then I realise that of course I wasn't in Paris. I would have remembered.
 "Non" I tell Mathilde.
 " Eh bien, vous avez une lettre d'une compagnie d'assurance Parisien dire que vous étiez dans un accident de voiture le 22 Décembre à Paris.says Mathilde.
 "Oui." I say "Non, c'est pas possible nous etions a Londres le 22nd Decembre. C'est tres extrordinaire.""
"Je sais," says Mathilde "je vais vous envoyer le courrier." 
I don't know what a courrier is. Courrier .... cyclist with very important package. Package? "Oui," I say merci beaucoup. Au revoir." I say.
 "What was all that?" asks John. 
"I don't know," I say "I think we crashed the French car in Paris when we weren't there."
"O" says John.

Gossip

Marco comes round. Marco has been bicycling to Highgate and back for months so he is very fit. "I'm not very fit,' he says 'I am entirely exhausted and covered in mud.' He is covered in mud so he leaves his bike in the hall and we sit in the kitchen and have a cup of tea.
'I have some amazing gossip for you,' says Marco. Marco always knows all the gossip because he has his ear to the ground and knows all the right people.
 'John's Editor is having an affair.' Says Marco.
'Quelle surprise." I say. John's Editor has been taking Fridays off for months. 'How do you know?' I ask.
Well, says Marco, 'A friend, who works in the same office as John, heard an Online Person in the lift saying, 'The editor was a no-show again today.'
And the other Online person said, 'I know, what's going on?'
'The Editor's PA says it's  absolutely not true that the Editor has booked a solo holiday in Goa for a week.' said the first online person.
'Well, it's obvious what that means.' said the second Online person. Marco nods significantly.
Much later I tell all this to John. 'Don't be ridiculous,' says John. 'He's married with children.'
Sometimes I worry about John. Is he really in the right job?

Faucets and Spigots

Our plumbing is making a terrible noise.
If you turn on the bath taps the kitchen tap whirrs and thumps then it spits and drips and you have to shout to make yourself heard.
I have looked up 'How to cure waterhammer' on the Internet so today I am going to cure the waterhammer and be done with it. First I phone Linden the plumber just to make sure that he won't be able to come, but he is busy, so it's down to me.
EHow on the Internet says, 'turn off your outside spigot'.
I put on Maisie's  bright pink hunter boots and I brave the snow to turn on the outside spigot but on account of all the snow the outside spigot is frozen solid. then I think that maybe a spigot and a tap are different things and so I run inside and look up 'spigot' on the Internet. Spigot and tap are more or less the same thing, so I run outside again and I turn on the outside spigot being very careful to direct the flow of water away from the house foundations and towards our horrible neighbour's horrible extension foundations. Unfortunately the neighbours foundations do not respond, nor does the spigot. I run inside again and boil a kettle. I am going to pour boiling water onto the hose attached to the spigot and try to improve the situation. While the kettle is boiling I run downstairs to the basement and as instructed I flush the loo and prop open the valve with a screw driver. I hope that it is the valve but I can't be sure. Next I turn on the washing machine and run upstairs again and grab the kettle. I skid round the side return sloshing boiling water into Maisie's bright pink hunters. I sit down in the snow carefully placing the kettle on the edge of the goldfish pond and rip the boot off. I push some snow into my sock to deal with the burning sensation and knock the kettle into the pond with my elbow.
I decide to go and watch TV for a bit. TV is very interesting. Apparently Prince Harry has killed a Taliban. I can't hep noticing that Prince Harry is going bald. Prince Harry is very annoyed that pictures of him were put in John's newspaper when he accidentally took all his clothes off in Las Vegas. "I forgot I was a Prince" says Prince Harry "and was more of a soldier at the time." Apparently soldiers spend their time, when not killing a Taliban, ripping their clothes off in bars in Las Vegas. I must tell John. John was the one that broke ranks and put the pictures of Prince Harry in the papers in the first place. "Well", he explained at the time, "everyone could see it on the Internet anyway."There are a lot of things that are on the Internet anyway, which we don't necessarily want in our newspapers," I told him. But John was adamant and every other newspaper got adamant as well and put all the naked pictures of Harry everywhere. Anyway my foot becomes a little less painful so decide to go back to the plumbing.
I turn off the stopcock in the playroom and open all the  taps/faucets. I am not sure if turning on the taps is exactly the same as opening the faucets but I look it up on the Internet and it seems that they are one and the same thing. Next, I run upstairs and find the little brass key for bleeding the radiators and I bleed them all and squirt dirty water all over the wall in Abigail's bedroom,  Zac's bedroom and on the landing where some of it squirts onto the carpet as well. By now the water in the kitchen faucet/tap is splattering into the sink in fits and starts and the noise is horrendous. I turn on the stopcock and the washing machine bursts into life with a screech, I forgot to turn it off before I stared all this.
I decide to give up on the plumbing and have a cup of tea instead. plumbing is probably best left to the professionals, I decide.
I turn on the tap/faucet in the kitchen. It rumbles into life with a sound like a reversing traction engine, but I can't have a cup of tea because the kettle has completely disappeared.
O well.

Haunted Shreddies.

It is quite late but John is not home because he has gone to see Ron Sixsmith with Digby Ogg. I have made John a very nice supper with roast chicken and grated lemon zest by Nigella Lawson, but I know he will be very late home so I leave it on the cooker and, as Maisie is staying the night with Siobhan, I decide to go to bed and listen to The Archers on my computer. On The Archers, Linda, who is married to Mike Baldwin from Coronation Street is digging a huge hole for herself by making up a friend from Jersey so that she can have an affair with someone, whose name escapes me. Meanwhile Tom wants to make sausages and can't because he has to milk cows. I know the feeling.
Anyway, I am just getting into bed when I get a text from Kate. It says 'Hi, I hope you are well (I haven't seen Kate for ages). Then it says 'Sorry to be out of touch, I've had a flurry of phone disasters. I was just wondering if John's newspaper would be interested in my box of Shreddies. It's unopened and it's moving, sounds like it has a live mouse inside!' I am so excited, 'It comes from Tesco' she adds.
This is such fun. Tesco have just been in the most enormous trouble for selling their Eight For a Pound Beef Burgers absolutely chock full of horse meat. This is very dangerous because most of the horse that ends up in the human food chain comes from ex event or racing horses which are chock full of toxic anti-inflammatory and performance enhancing drugs. Maybe Lance Armstrong didn't take all those drugs to win the Tour de France fifteen times after all. maybe he just lived off Tesco's Eight For a Pound beef Burgers.
Anyway, I phone John who is at the Ron Sixsmith gig. 'I can't really really talk,' whispers John. This is a very quiet gig,' he murmurs. I tell him very quietly about the Tesco's Shreddies with the potential mouse inside and John tells me to phone Jock on the night desk of their newspaper.
Jock is very laconic. Jock is a bit like John Lennon. 'Yeah,' he says, 'would be good if we could get a live mouse out of a box of Shreddies.' Jock says they'll send someone over to Kate's house.
I go back to The Archers. On The Archers there's someone having a baby and a village shop and a person who is quite clear that at no point is her husband going to help Tom With The Sausages with the milking.
Much later I get a text. 'How embarrassing a photographer and a reporter turned up and there was nothing in the box.'
O well.

The God Diet

I have to explain the God Diet. I have invented the God Diet because I have come to understand through close scientific consideration that some food is evil and that a little spiritual guidance is a good thing is you are a bit fat.
The empirical evidence for this is zero but I have a lot of faith. Faith is a functional prerequisite of the God Diet.
Working on the premise that all Gods have set their canons against greed, self abuse and crisps I see the God Diet as a intra-religious diet suitable for followers of all faiths. For instance Buddhists are encouraged to wonder around India hoping some nice passer by will fill their begging bowl as they search for enlightenment on their way to the Ganges. During Ramadan Muslims aren't allowed to eat all day and Jesus took off to the desert and was so hungry he saw the devil who could easily have tried tempting him with ice cream but was too stupid, and went for riches and power instead.
So.....God wouldn't want you to eat some food because:
A) You don't need it. You will be fine without it and feeling hungry is very virtuous.
B) It's a horrible processed piece of evil meat.
C) It's made of alcohol and will make you half witted, kill your liver, cost the NHS millions of pounds and make you fight someone or be boring.
D) It's not courgette soup or similar.
The essential thing to ask yourself is "Is this food evil, bad or toxic?" if the answer is "yes" or "probably" don't put it in your mouth. Obesity obliterated!
Follow these rules for three months and you will be very thin and happy.
Obviously I haven't tested my theory. I have been on the God Diet for one week and I have accidentally eaten alcohol and half a slice of bread and my Jigsaw trousers still don't fit me.
Nonetheless  I have faith.

Neighbours. Sushi Samba.

On Sunday mornings Maisie volunteers at the City Farm for her Duke of Edinburgh award.
Maisie quite likes the farm but she doesn't like getting there at 9. am.
John is going to drive her.
 Sometimes I drive her but last night I had insomnia and I am not going to drive around London while I am still asleep so John has to do it. Maisie and John leave in the ashen quiet of the morning. They slam the door and I snuggle back under the covers and try to go back to sleep. Evil slinks into my bedroom and coughs copiously, her congestive heart disease makes her cough a lot, if she didn't cough she would drown. Evil tries to jump up onto the bed but she can't do it so I reach down and help her up and we both snuggle down and try to catch up on some sleep.
 "OI!" Says the man next door. "OI!! Put it down Bo. Put it down now!" the man next door shouts all the time, especially on Sunday mornings. Bo screams. "Yeah!" Shouts the man next door. "No!" He says, he's very good at non-sequetors. I put the covers over my ears and try to get back to sleep. The man next door slams his front door and the house shakes. I hate living in a terrace. "BYE, DON"T FORGET TO PHONE LATER." He yells from the middle of the road, he slams his car door and revs his engine. This can't just be annoying for me, this must be pissing the whole street off. Perhaps he's deaf.
 I have given up trying to go back to sleep, so has Evil. She eyes me balefully from the foot of the bed. I decide to get up and wash my hair because after we have picked up Maisie we are going to Sushi Samba at the top of a tower in The City for lunch and my hair looks like candy floss only not so nice.
We pick up Maisie. "I had to muck the cow out for hours." She tells us "Do you know why?" She says, "it's because a load of community service people have been working there instead of going to prison and they didn't bother to muck the cow out for a whole week. they just lobbed a load more wood shavings on top of her dirty bedding and the poor cow has been standing knee deep in wet wood shavings for days. It took me and Daisy hours to clear up the mess. Can we go home so I can change, I smell of cow pooh,"says Maisie.
Much later we arrive at Sushi Samba. Sushi Samba is on the 38th floor of the Heron Tower. We take the lift which goes very very fast and is entirely made of glass. This is very scary and makes my arms go all floppy. "It's like Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator." says Maisie.
Maisie loves it.
 The view is amazing. the day is still and clear and we go out on the roof terrace to see London. We see the silver green river twisting away behind the Gherkin. We see tiny Georgian terraces hunkered down next to behemoth banks and we see, in the far distance, a march of tower blocks glinting pewter in the light of a low winter sun. "That's Canary Wharf." a waiter tells us, pointing. "I know," says John "I was working there when it was bombed."
Sushi Samba is very nice. We eat serviche of scallops, skewered black miso cod and chicken in sesame seeds and peruvian corn. We try tempura beans with garlic soy and Nigiri tuna wraps. I'm a bit worried about raw fish but the beans are very good and I like Peruvian corn.
"Maybe we should go to Peru," I say.
"What about Japan." Says Maisie.
"Or Brazil," says John.
"Can we have pudding?" says Maisie.

Doubtful Face

"Guess what," says Maisie after school "last night I changed my My Face status to Abercrombie and Fitch smells sooo nice, and Abigail replied with a doubtful face."
"A doubtful face," I say, "what does that mean? How can you reply with a face?"
"She just posted a little face which looks doubtful," explains Maisie. "she's not going to like my jumper either. She's going to be all like judgemental about it. She's always so judgemental. I can't dress like Abigail. I'm not Abigail, I have to be my own person, I can't like be a clone or something."
"Just doubtful face her back again." I say. "Just doubtful face everything on her My Face until she stops doubtful facing you."
"I don't think you like understand." says Maisie.

Abercrombie and Fitch and my Fit Bit.

We have to go to Abercrombie and Fitch.
We have never been to Abercrombie and Fitch before but Zac's god mother bought him an Abercrombie and Fitch hoody for Christmas and it is too small. Zac failed to change the hoody before he went back to university so I said that I would change it and that Maisie could buy something nice and that I would send Zac the money. BUT I am not going to Abercrombie and Fitch by myself so I have persuaded John to come with me. "We can go out for lunch and then we can pick up Maisie and all go together." I tell him.
"Why?" says John. "What for? Why do I have to come?" He adds crossly. "It's my day off." He says. I emphasise the 'lunch' bit. We could go and get something nice to eat." I say. John is also on the God Diet and is longing for something evil to eat. On the God Diet there are good foods and bad foods and foods that are not considered to be foods at all and John would like a mouthful of one of them. He is starving.
I clip my Fit Bit to my back pocket. My Fit Bit was a Christmas present from John and it counts how many steps you take in a day. Then it links up with a dongle and tells you how fat you are and how rubbish everything you try to do is, and draws a graph of the sheer pointlessness of you. I like my Fit Bit .
We end up in an Italian restaurant on Great Portland Street. It took ages for me to persuade john to come to Abercrombie and Fitch but in the end the promise of some evil pasta won the argument. It is 3.30 and John is eating spaghetti bolognese. I text Maisie. She phones me back. "Is she out of school yet?" Asks John. He looks out of the restaurant window. "There are some idiotic looking children," he says pointing with his fork, "they must go to Maisie's school. Does she know where we are?"
I tell Maisie where we are, and she arrives ten minutes later with a group of idiotic children. She stands in the doorway talking animatedly with them. she hugs one and joins us at our table. "Sorry sorry," she says "But Miriam doesn't want to share with Siobhan and Clara wants to share with her but she won't share with Rukshana who can't go unless she shares with someone she knows really well."
"What are you talking about?" Asks John. "Share what? When?"
"Duke of Edinburgh."Says Maisie, "camping in March,"she says.
"I'm not sure about camping," i say "Not in March, can't you stay in a bed and breakfast?"
 Maisie says nothing. She gives me a hard stare. Then she says, "are we going to Abercrombie and Fitch or not?"
we go to Abercrombie and Fitch. You can actually smell Abercrombie and Fitch half way down the street. "Mmm," says Maisie. "What is that frightful smell?" Says John."
Abercrombie and Fitch is pitch dark. There is very loud music. There are girls wearing sun dresses and flip flops and a boy with a six pack hugging Japanese people. "Hi guys, How are you today?" Say all the girls dancing about a bit in the gloom. "Hey, how's it going?" Asks a beautiful boy as we pass.
"Have you got this in a different size?" I reply. "Hey, I don't know," says the boy striking a pose and sucking in his cheeks. His eyes snap sideways and he tosses his fair hair out of his eyes as he catches sight of himself in a mirror. "I'll like ask someone." The boy disappears and we don't find him again.
"I need to not be in this shop." Says John. "It's my day off and the music is making my ears bleed."
"The service isn't very good here is it?" Says Maisie. She picks up a blue jumper. "This is nice. I'll have this." She says. The jumper has Abercrombie and Fitch emblazoned on the front.
"yes have it," says John. "Just get it and then we can leave. the smell is making my nose bleed."
"I like it." says Maisie.
"It's all a bit pick pockety." I say, "that man has just bumped into me twice, luckily I have nothing in my pockets."
We leave Abercrombie and Fitch.
"I think Zac should get a job in there." says Maisie.
When we get home we all collapse on the sofa.
"It's my day off," says John. "Can we watch "The Killing, series 3?"
"You're obsessed with Danish people," says Maisie. "You're probably obsessed with Sandi Totsvig"
I feel in my back pocket for my Fit Bit to see how far short I am of the 10,000 recommended steps I am supposed to take each day on my Fit Bit step counter. My Fit Bit is missing and I remember the pick pockety type in Abercrombie and Fitch.
 O well.

Death

I am going to take Evil for a walk.
 I have had a text from Beth and we are going for a walk together. We will walk round the park and we will talk about Fran who has died. Fran was our friend but we were not friends with eachother because Beth lives in Muswell Hill and I do not, so we never managed to be friends although we had high hopes that one day we would have lunch in Highgate. This never happened and then we met again at Fran's funeral and this walk is the result.
I will take Evil on the walk with us because she likes to walk. Evil has mitral valve disease and she is dying. She coughs and sometimes she can't breathe very well and I give her 8 pills every day but the vet says she will not get better. Nonetheless Evil is coming around the park. "Walkies" I tell her clipping her lead onto her shiny red collar. I forget the pooh bags and have to turn around and go back into the house to fetch them. Evil sits like a small black doorstop, waiting for me to sort myself out.
Beth texts me. 'I'm in the park' she says. Evil and I rush up the road, Beth doesn't know our area, she might be confused by the drug addicts who walk very fast at 11.30 in the morning. They need their drugs and they need them very quickly so although they won't mug you they may crash into you in their haste to meet their dealers. I am sure this doesn't happen in Muswell Hill so I must not leave Beth unattended in the park.
Beth and I meet and we walk. Beth tells me she has just been on a residential Spanish course in Bilbao. I tell her I am going to do French classes at City University so that I can understand the instructions for the central heating system in our house in France. We talk about Fran.
Fran came to France with me and John this summer. She and Bill drove down between Fran's chemotherapy courses. We sat by the pool and shopped in Brocantes. We bought antique picture frames at a Vide Grenier and we sat in a cafe and talked for hours. "Do you think people can tell I'm ill?" asked Fran. "just by looking at me?" I looked at Fran. She is wearing a sun hat, her fine fair hair hasn't fallen out because she is having very special chemotherapy at a very posh hospital near Regents Park. She had golden skin and looked very pretty. She was very thin but so are lots of people. "No." I said. "I'm going to come down here next year," said Fran "I'm going to go to all these antiques markets and buy ceramics, you can buy French linen and we'll have a stall and sell it all in London for a huge profit." Fran held up a coffee pot she had just bought for 2 Euros. "Look at that," she said "2 Euros, it's amazing."I tell all this to Beth. "I didn't even know she was ill," says Beth.
Evil is trailing at our feet. We walk past the deer enclosure. Evil says hello to a dalmatian. "This park is so lovely,"says Beth. "much nicer than when we used to live round here." Beth used to live near here 15 years ago but she moved to Dorset. "Dorset was great," she says. "We had a huge house with land and all our friends came to stay, it was like a permanent party but then there was winter, and spring took ages to arrive and then it rained and rained and we decided that actually the country is very boring. It's OK for a visit but it's not fit to live in, not really. So we moved to Muswell Hill."
 I love Beth.
I get a text. Ellie is at our house. Beata is cleaning and ironing at our house so she has let Ellie in and texted me. Ellie is very sad because someone has stolen her Iphone and her boyfriend was a shit and they have broken up. I had better get back home to talk her down. Ellie has a tendency to need talking down. She is like a kite with a very weak string.
Suddenly Evil staggers and collapses. Evil paws at the air and struggles on the ground. "What is the matter with her?" Asks Beth. Beth looks very worried. "Mitral valve disease." I say. "She might die. I'll carry her for the rest of the way." I pick Evil up and we walk towards the park gates. Evil rests her head on my shoulder and relaxes against me.
Poor little dog.
When I get home Athena is sitting in the kitchen with Ellie. Beata has gone home. "I'll leave you to it," says Beth. "See you in Highgate. Soon?" She says. I am so glad that we have met up at last.
"Do you want coffee?" I ask Athena and Ellie.
They don't want coffee.
 Athena is my old neighbour. She is a Greek Cypriot. "Oh, you are like my daughter," she tells me. "I am having so much troubles in my family. I can't talk about it to anyones. You knows how the Greeks peoples are. They gossip, " she says. then she tells me that her son in law has left her daughter. That he has cancer, that he wants to be alone and that her daughter has a broken heart.
I tell Ellie that I have texted her Iphone number telling the thief that they should be ashamed of themselves. "Good." Says Ellie.
"I can't beleive there are such peoples in the world." says Athena.
Ellie looks very tired. "I think you should go to the doctor." I tell her. "If you don't look after yourself the string will break and then where will you be?"
"Doctors knows nothing." says Athena. "But what can you do?"
"What can you do?"



s

2013. The God Diet.

It is 2013. That means it is almost 2020 when we will all travel in hovering cars and wear plastic clothing. I know this because in 197I stood by Beccles swimming pool, my blue and pink rubber ring had deflated and hung round my waist like a skirt. I looked down at it and asked my mother if in 2020 everyone would be wearing skirts like this and have cars that flew. "I expect so." She said, absently, taking a puff on her Silk Cut and narrowing her eyes against the smoke. "Now why don't you have a swim darling?"
So, anyway. Years later and I am on "The God Diet" it's better than other diets because I made it up and will be enlightening my reader over the coming weeks while the weight falls off and I reach spiritual nirvana or similar at the same time.
2013 means nothing to me, it is not a year from which I expect much other than peace of mind and elegant thinness, but we shall see.