The folk from Wood Street*

*not its real name, but I wouldn't want anyone doing a search and getting upset.

When I can't sleep, which for some bonkers reason I couldn't last night despite being verrrrryyyy tired, I take familiar journeys in my head. One of my favourites is wandering round the house I grew up in, looking into all the cupboards and finding out which memories are clear and which are a little blurry, or just don't make sense. We lived there for 16 years, so the things I remember are a strange mix of being a kid and being a teenager.

Last night I decided instead to visit some of the neighbours.

We lived at number 154. Next door at 156 were June and Jim. They were there when we moved in in 1973, and still live there as far as I know.

They were a bit older than my parents and they had two kids who were both older than me and my sister. Jimmy was a lot older, he didn't live there. He got married and his wife was a beautician who worked out of their flat. That might have been because they had a baby. Anyway, I had my first leg wax on their sofa when I was about 15. It cost a fiver. I think my mum paid, she never was keen on body hair.

Lesley was June and Jim's daughter, she was about five years older than me. Before she left primary school she used to walk me to school and home again, without showing any deep embarrassment. She was nice.

She used to babysit us when she got a bit older, and she was crazy about Sting. I didn't get it myself, but then I was quite a late developer. She had a boyfriend called Johnny who went to my school. He was a little wild, I approved of him. She also had a friend who died of cancer, I remember her crying in the drive.

She came round to babysit once before she went out with him. She must have been about 17 and was wearing an alarming early 80s outfit with brown and black dogtooth tapered trousers, black patent heels, a creamy shiny blouse and a silky cravat-style scarf with a cream and brown pattern on it. And a big flick, and a lot of lip gloss. She must have spent hours getting ready.

She said 'I probably don't look very nice'. I remember thinking, boys do strange things to girls if they make them look like that. I said no, not very. I hope she wasn't offended, I didn't mean to be rude, I was just baffled and not very tactful.

I was a bit more tactful a few years later when I was called out into the front garden by my mother. Lesley had split up with Johnny and had been going out with Fran for a couple of years. Fran was a bit wet, I thought, but I was probably 17 myself by this stage. Lesley was crying and showing my mum an engagement ring. I remembered to smile and congratulate her, but inside I was thinking 'you can't possibly want to get married already!'

But she did. They are very happy as far as I know.

I can't remember much about June and Jim, except they had knocked through their kitchen and dining room into one huge room. Oh, and Jim used to work for Wilkinson Sword, because once he brought home two pairs of left handed scissors for me. I always used them with my right hand, because I had never had left handed scissors before, and they dug in.

Then he retired, or was he made redundant, and he started driving a taxi. His son used to drive it too. Occasionally I used to get a taxi home from my Saturday job at the bread shop (it was about a mile, but there were days my feet just hurt too much to walk) and it was always deeply embarrassing if it was one of them at the taxi rank. He also told my mum once that he'd seen me eating chips by the war memorial. I was incensed, because it was a cheese and onion pie.

And then there was the time my parents were away and I had some people over. It was all very tame, in fact we watched The Killing Fields on video and cried. I don't think anyone had sex anywhere or anything. Nonetheless, Jim reported to my parents that there had been a yellow Capri in the driveway until 1.45 am.

Neighbourhood Watch, I said. Neighbourhood Spy, more like.

joella

Times when it would be useful not to be British

Someone I know from work, not very well but I know her, heard I was going to India. She sent me an email yesterday saying she was too, whereabouts was I going, was it a romantic trip or could we maybe meet up somewhere?

I said it was an organised group thing with a few days either end, sent her the link to the details, said it would be great to meet up if our paths crossed. Went home.

Last night I went for dinner with two people I know much better from work, and she was there too. Looks like a great trip, she said, and there's one place left -- how would I feel if she booked it?

Absolutely fine, I said, what fun. She left a bit later and I proceeded to drink a whole bottle of wine and get myself into a right old pickle.

Of course I was not absolutely fine. It's been a hell of a year, M and I need a bit of space, we want to get as far away from everything to do with home and work as possible.

But why the hell couldn't I say that? She asked, why didn't I tell her?

I wrote her an email and went to bed, where I spent most of the night staring at the ceiling and cursing my cowardice. Don't worry, said M. She will understand, and if she went home and booked it straight away, well, we'll cope...

Came in with a hangover and feeling a bit weird.

She did understand, so he was right (and I would have understood, so there's no reason to think someone else wouldn't), but I do get so worried about these things. Must be braver next time.

joella

Pointless but brilliant

Check out let them sing it for you. The internet rocks.

joella

Not sports fans

Yesterday we started putting lining paper up in the kitchen-as-was. For DIY, you have to listen to Radio 1, it's the law. And so it was that we had the charts on.

Hang on a minute, said M. Isn't this UB40? What are *they* doing in the charts?

Sounds like it, I said. And they're singing Swing Low Sweet Chariot! (Bizarre -- hear for yourself). Maybe there's a big rugby match on or something.

But it's a spiritual, said M.

Yes, but I'm sure they sing it at England rugby matches, I said. And just being spiritual won't get it in the charts.

Suppose not, he said.

About two hours later, I found the Rugby World Cup Souvenir Special in the Observer.

See? I said.

We used it to lay out the takeaway curry to stop the new worktop getting stained.

joella

You can take to multiculture even if they don't drink

We spent Friday night and Saturday in Swansea having a lovely time with A&K and their boys, enjoying some fine conversation, some Southern Comfort, some less coherent conversation, some walking on a beautiful deserted beach by way of hangover cure, and some just being part of family life for a while.

We arrived back in Oxford at about seven on Saturday night, and as we got off the bus on Cowley Road I said 'oh god, they've put Christmas lights up. Save us from Christmas lights in bloody November'.

But as I got closer to them, I realised they weren't Christmas lights. They actually say 'Happy Eid'.

How many streets in Britain have Happy Eid lights?

What's Eid? said M. And to be honest I wasn't quite sure. I knew it was an important festival in India, and I guessed it was a Muslim one because the Hindus have only just had Diwali... and I thought maybe it was to do with it being Ramadan... but that was as far as I could go.

So when we got home I looked it up by using the define: feature of Google, which I have only recently discovered.

(Aside: I mostly get frustrated with Google when it doesn't immediately deliver sites *about* things, instead choosing sites selling them. About.com is a way of getting round this but I don't usually think to go there first. But anyway -- define: is a very useful feature, if a little immature as yet)

Eid mostly seems to mean 'Electronic ID' but let's ignore that for the moment and leap to the very useful definition in About.com's Ramadan Glossary

Eid is the holiday at the end of Ramadan. Which is pretty much exactly what I guessed it was. Cool.

I am warmed at the thought that the Eid lights will mean lots of people find out what Eid is. Unless I am exceptional in a) not knowing or b) wanting to find out because it's up in lights. Both of which I doubt.

And of course, being a Blackpool girl, I think the more lights the better. Come on you Buddhists!

joella

Getting bloody with it

I know it's gross to write about periods. Nobody wants to hear it.

But mine has dominated my day. I have been grumpy and tearful and a bit shouty, and then to top it off I bled right through into my trousers.

How does that happen? One minute fine, next minute splodge. I've been doing it for years. That's why pretty much all my pants are black, but you can't wear black trousers all the fucking time as well.

These are a kind of eucalyptus green. Now eucalyptus green with a reddish stain between the legs. I hate this.

joella

The dawn's early light

I turn the Today Programme on when my alarm goes off at 7.15, but I usually then snooze for at least an hour.

This means I often have weird dreams interspersed with current news stories or Thought for the Day. For ages I thought these stories and photos of Britain at 6am were part of a dream, but I was awake at the right moment this morning to realise that they are real.

King's College Cambridge gets my vote. I remember being out on the Backs at dawn (though a few colleges down...) after staying up all night writing essays. I used to feel like the luckiest person in the world having that to look at.

joella

Dusty bin

That's in the corner of the kitchen.

Dusty Springfield. That's M watching The Simpsons.

Dusty. Fucking. Everything. That's our house.

We are being sanded. We didn't do much by the way of protection, but given that there's dust in the *fridge* I think it would have been effort wasted anyway. At least when there's lots of it you can see where to Dyson.

Which is one bright side. I am looking for them very hard to stop myself running screaming down the street.

The only other one I can think of is it makes our solitary bottle of red wine look like it's been laid down for years rather than bought on Monday from Londis.

Time to crack it, it must be a good vintage. And my hormones need dulling.

joella

What's purple and shimmery?

Beetroot of course! I have just had some for my lunch and am struck once again by how beautiful it is.

And not only that, it is so bloody good for you.

joella

Television wars

I don't like big televisions. In fact, I hate them. Especially in small living rooms like ours. It is a living room, not a television room. I watch it, but I turn it off afterwards. I need this to be so or I go leetle crazy.

S likes to have the television on. If she's in the same room as one, it's generally on. She likes them big because then they are easier to watch.

M thinks he wants a big television but I don't think he does really. But that could be me projecting (arf).

Anyway, we had a small one. It was in fairness a little smaller than is practical if four people were trying to watch it, but there was no way you could say it dominated the room. Watching it wasn't much fun, so we didn't watch it that much. So far so good, if you are me.

Then from nowhere S bundled in an enormo-television that her Young Man's Grandad didn't want anymore. I protested, but there wasn't that much I could do as it was free and it was there now.

And I have to say it has made EastEnders more compelling, and has made DVDs more fun to watch.

However, it is now on the blink. So she went to look for a new one, and found another enormo one. This choice she justified on the grounds that it was no bigger than the current one (Enormo in this context is 24" -- I know TVs get *much* bigger than this these days but it's still too bloody big as far as I'm concerned).

BUT I NEVER WANTED THE CURRENT ONE! NOBODY ASKED ME! I WOULDN'T HAVE PARTED WITH CASH FOR IT! I WOULDN'T HAVE EVEN LET IT IN THE HOUSE GIVEN THE CHOICE!

I figured a 21" compromise would work. But M is on the 24" side.

If we had a big room I could probably cope. But we haven't. We haven't agreed yet, on the grounds that 24" TVs are significantly more expensive than 21" TVs, and that's before you get into the flat screen wide screen surround sound hoohah, but the pressure is on.

joella

Thought for the day

There is something unbearably sad about Tesco Value tinsel. With most Tesco Value products you can fool yourself they're just the same inside the packet (in fact I was once shouted at by a man in Tesco for *not* buying Tesco Value fish fingers -- they're just the same you know, he said, you're just paying for the packaging, you students, don't know you're born).

I wasn't sure about that, and I told him so, and when I look at Tesco Value tinsel I know I was right.

joella

Pleasant surprise of the weekend #2

Not sure if I've mentioned this yet, but in December we're going to India for nearly a month. While I am looking forward to this more than I can say, there's also loads to organise.

So while yesterday we spent the day doing household things with S (tip... insurance... tile showroom... trying and failing to agree on a new television given that ours now needs regular thumping... etc), today was Shopping.

I don't like shopping in Oxford at the best of times, and these weren't the best of times. Although better than a Saturday, the pre-Christmas fever is building up already. Boots was hell. There's no one to ask where anything is! And sensible shops that sell 'performance clothing' (ie stuff that packs small and travels well) are shut on Sundays, because all the people who buy stuff there are sensibly hiking up a hill somewhere.

So it wasn't long before we needed some lunch. After some debate, we decided to try the India Garden restaurant on the High Street -- it's tucked away upstairs but had its rather gaudy sandwich board out on the street, and we felt in the mood for something gaudy rather than something stylish but overpriced (one option) or chain-restaurant reheated hell (most of the others).

And what a fine fine choice it was.

We had the vegetarian lunch special: £7.45 for dal, dansak, mixed veg, bombay potatoes, onion bhaji and rice, plus fresh apple juice with lime and fresh ginger and some strange red syrup I couldn't identify. It was all absolutely fantastic.

The interior decor is also splendid -- raspberry pink tablecloths, bright yellow napkins and a mirror-tiled, neon-lit bay window stuffed full of fake flowers. I have been trying to persuade M of the value of kitsch, and this was a very fine example indeed.

Yet we were the only people in there. The manager said it was hit and miss, there was a lot of competition and they were upstairs and while sometimes they are busy people often just don't come up. Which is sad. We walked down Turl Street afterwards and the Beefeater restaurant at the Mitre was *packed*. What are people thinking??

As a final flourish, I have just found their website. While stylistically very different, it somehow manages to give a feel for the place...

joella

Pleasant surprise of the weekend #1

Last night we made a trip to High Wycombe to see The Mingers play. Talia, who sings, is my cousin -- I hadn't seen her for years, and punk isn't really my thing... so I was a bit unsure what to expect.

But she is lovely, and cool, and gorgeous, and she fronts the band (who are very very loud but very very tight so get away with it) like a demon. It was great. We didn't stay for the other bands, but then that wasn't why we went.

There was no bar, which I thought was a bit weird, though I knew that she didn't drink. I had thought that was a bit unusual, given that she's a student -- I am sure I have never known a student who didn't drink -- but then she told me about Straight Edge (which seems also to be known as sXe), a punk/hardcore movement which is essentially no drinking, no drugs, no shagging around. Vegetarianism / veganism seems to go with the territory also.

It's more philosophical and political than puritanical I think, about self control and avoiding dependency and exploitation, though at its extremes it can veer into weirdness, like anything else.

It also means you can play all ages gigs, and there were some pretty small people there having the time of their lives, as well as some splendidly Mohicaned very tall people (you can't get through doors very easily when you're over six foot with a Mohican, so points for effort. Though Talia told me they should really have put glue on the spikes to stop them fraying as the night wore on).

I loved the spirit of their music, even if I probably wouldn't put it on at home -- plenty of anger about the bad things in the world, plenty of energy to challenge them. And as we walked back to the car, avoiding the splatters of vomit and shrieking hordes that characterise the centre of High Wycombe (and most English towns) on a Saturday night, I thought it all had a hell of a lot going for it.

joella

Cheesy moment

Bad: inadvertently dropping grated cheese down your top while trying to sneak bits that are designed to go in the dinner.

Worse: getting caught fishing it out of your bra by the guy who is sanding the floor in the next room.

joella

More from the Onion

Oooh! Scary!

The Onion | Mom Finds Out About Blog

'nuff said.

Though maybe, as an anxious person, I am careful not to give out too much demographic information on this blog. My mother would recognise me, sure, but she wouldn't find me in the first place.

Same with people from work. Or at least that's the plan...

joella

OW!

So just to prove that I could, last night I went to Legs, Bums and Tums (known as LBT by regulars, and rather fetchingly as Abs, Fabs and Tabs by M).

But I couldn't. I would have walked out halfway through, except I couldn't walk anymore.

We did a million squats, moving through seven degrees of agony, and then we did a million more, interspersed with some lunges and some other things involving standing on one leg and moving the other leg around that I just could not even attempt.

The leg I was trying to stand on was shuddering, and the leg I was trying to wave around was just not going anywhere at all. So I stood there like a wonky lemon while pregnant women and pensioners went for the burn all around me.

Legs and bums sorted, we got to do the tums part. That was a bit easier, mostly because we were lying down and I only had to do stuff when she was actually walking around looking at us. The rest of the time I just lay there whimpering.

Which was fine until it was time to get up, when I realised that my legs were on strike due to unreasonable working condiitons. After careful negotiation they allowed me to shuffle out the door and hobble down the stairs holding carefully on to the bannister, but that was it.

Today I can't get up without help from furniture. It's so humiliating.

joella

Healthy caveat

Some parts of Year of Living Healthily may have fallen by the wayside, but two very important things have been integrated into my life.

1. I don't smoke anymore. I really don't. I've been to Glastonbury, I've been miserable, I've been very drunk, I've been very stressed, I've been very angry, I've been to the pub in Lytham, where *everyone* smokes, and I haven't smoked.

The hardest moments have been with smokers of roll-ups, as roll-ups are the friendliest of things to smoke, and I have thought well maybe just a very small, very thin one would be ok... but I haven't done it. I've dreamt about it, but I haven't done it. The year's not over yet, but I am relatively optimistic on that one.

2. I eat better. Lunch today: spiced potatoes, feta salad and green beans with tomatoes and olive oil from the Lebanese deli across the road. With a V8 juice and some pumpkin seeds (do you *know* how much protein there is in pumpkin seeds?). Breakfast this morning: two handfuls of dried fruit and nuts (never been very good at breakfast, but I try). Dinner last night: smoked haddock, poached egg, wild mushrooms cooked in olive oil, brown rice with onion and chilli.

I'm beginning to sound like a wanker, so I'll stop there, but basically I mostly avoid wheat, and I mostly avoid dairy, except when a) not to is a pain in the arse for someone else or b) I would go hungry otherwise. This has helped my slug of a digestive system no end, which is why I stick to it, but a side effect is that you are forced to think harder about food: you can't have a sandwich for your lunch, and you can't have pasta or pizza for your tea.

And if you're going to have to plan your meals, you might as well do it properly. I still struggle with lunch (I am nowhere near organised enough to take it into work, and instant options are v limited) but tea is another matter altogether. Never have I eaten so well. Lots of fish, lots of veg, rice, salad, tofu, stir fries, lentils, beans, nuts, curries, jacket potatoes, soups, stews... with almost nothing instant or out of a jar. It's an effort sometimes, but it's worth it.

So if I can bring myself to get off my arse three times a week, I'll be sorted.

joella

Playlist

I did my Not Little Anymore But Still Littler Than Me Sister a bunch of CDs for her birthday. One of them was a compilation and I'm very taken with it. It's a mixture of songs she must know but might not have, songs she might know but might not know she knows, and songs she might not know but really should. All chosen to go well together (if you are my sister), though I'm not sure Gil Scott-Heron fits as well musically in there as he does in sentiment.

Anyway, the track listing is:

She's in Love with Time: The Bevis Frond
English Rose: The Jam
A New England: Kirsty MacColl
Something's gotten hold of my heart: Nick Cave
Car Wash Hair: Mercury Rev
Frontier Psychiatrist: The Avalanches
Know Now Then: Ani DiFranco
Good to Be on the Road Back Home: Cornershop
When You Are Who You Are: Gil Scott-Heron
Yoshimi Battle the Pink Robots, Pt. 1: The Flaming Lips
Strawberry Fields Forever: Candy Flip
Ecstasy Symphony/Transparent Radiation: Spacemen 3
I Shall Be Released (live): Chrissie Hynde

English Rose is an achingly beautiful song, yet the last time I heard it was at N&D's place in Kent just after I had my wisdom teeth out, which I make to be about 10 years ago now. How can I have gone so long without listening to it?

I've got out of the habit of doing compilations, and even though they should be easier than they used to be when you had to do them on tape, they somehow seem harder. Maybe it's just I don't spend my whole life in my bedroom these days.

joella

Tears before bedtime

Well, the drive to get fit (I think I called it Active Autumn, as a sub-brand of Year of Living Healthily) is going dismally. Monday evenings are prime exercise nights but I spent yet another one in front of the television.

I did get to cry twice though, an activity which while not very active definitely counts as healthy in my book.

The first time was during a story on the 10 o'clock news about Aids sufferers in China. Hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of people have been infected *by the actions of their own government*, which encouraged them to sell their blood while not bothering to make sure equipment was sterilised. (More here).

Now they are dying in their thousands, on their own, with no state help, as the epidemic is alternately denied and ignored by the same government.

The second time was during the second part of Holy Cross. I remember how anxious I felt in September 2001. How much worse would it have been if people had been breaking my windows and spitting at me? How do you feel safe in the world?

Relatedly -- lest we forget. It's not often you see Flash used as sensitively as this.

joella

Possible pasts

Just got back from a weekend Oop North with what I used to call my APs (Aged Parents) and Little Sister. Only now she is 30 she is not so Little and I am beginning to feel pretty Aged myself.

Shite six hour journey up there thanks to four lorry collision on the M6 -- why do they have to do that on a bloody Friday afternoon -- but a relative breeze at three and a half on the way back. I wasn't driving and didn't look at the speedo.

I love going up there, but I always return slightly unsettled, as I get a glimpse into the parallel universe life I could have had if I hadn't headed off to university and never come back.

And it's not all bad. It's a small, friendly town. It's by the sea. There's lots of space. The shops are great: there's a local fishmonger and greengrocer and baker. The beer's cheap. There is a big, big sky. Lots of people were at the Remembrance Sunday service at the war memorial.

Having said that, as a teenager I couldn't wait to get away. It's a safe Tory seat (how many of *them* are there left) and every other shop sells bouffant leather couches and china shepherdesses. There's even a men's shop which specialises in 'cruisewear' (and they're not talking about Clapham Common).

Older women have enormo-hair, wear diamante and drive 4WD vehicles they are unable to park, while younger women wear very little and puke in gutters on a Saturday night. The men are (on the whole) either unreconstructed or paternalistic, and the local GP once wrote me a prescription for the morning after pill on his doorstep, presumably judging that a girl of such loose morals should not be allowed in the house. (By strange twist of fate I ended up at the same GP's house for the same reason about eight years later: this time he let me in, but I still had to suffer the indignity of having my blood pressure taken in the kitchen in front of his wife and labrador).

So on the whole I think I did well to escape to a world where trade can be fair, where eyebrows can be left unplucked, and where basically I do not spend a significant proportion of time feeling like a freak.

But sometimes I wonder. So many things would be simpler. Fewer decisions to make, and a big green to walk the dog on. If only I could be a proper woman.

joella

Final thoughts for the day

1. I am in *such* a bad mood at the moment that I think I might be getting my nicotine withdrawal symptoms ten months late. Is that possible? I did smoke for over 18 years (they start us young up north) -- maybe you store reserves up somewhere for times of trouble, and when they run out, *that's* when you really start hurting...

2. Mr B, happy fifth of November. For yesterday. I was no fun, so I never rang.

3. Happy birthday little sister.

joella

Shagged out

My strange job this week took me to Perthshire -- up on Monday night on the Caledonian Sleeper, back on Tuesday night, into work on Wednesday morning with a caffeine high and sugar buzz from the nasty coffee and 99% sugar blueberry muffin they brought us at some ungodly hour of the morning.

I am sooooooooo tired.

Thought: it's the only type of train I go on that I actively want to arrive late, as later is more sleep. But even if there's more sleep, there's never enough, and what you get is disturbed by a) the train separating (on the way up) or joining together (on the way down) in the middle of the night; b) the fact that you wake up seventeen times wondering if you're nearly there yet and even if you should be you're often not because it's stopped for an hour in a random siding; or c) your bottle of water donking you on the nose because you left it on the little shelf and the train cornered a little violently.

I was madly grumpy last night, and don't feel much better today.

Also, today I made a work-related link back into a my former life: we selected two ex-colleagues of mine to organise a big event next year. I have no doubts about their ability to do the job, they are very skilled and very dedicated. But it's also kind of risky as there is another ex-colleague I really don't want in my life, and I drew a line a few years ago that I swore never to cross.

But times change, M's links into that life have remained, I like the people we'll be working with very much, and I think professionally it was the best option. So it was a grown up decision. I hope it works out.

A further ex-colleague from the same house of weirdness (though different wing) remains a firm friend. I gave her a ring last night. Only a conversation with the Lizard -- about her personal finances -- could produce the line "We talked to Mad Mick the money man but he's insane in the membrane!" I love her. The past ain't all bad.

joella

Oh joy

I picked this link up from Jeremy, it's marvellous, though based on something that is opposite of marvellous...

If you spot terrorism, blow your anti-terrorism whistle. If you are Vin Diesel, yell really loud.

joella

Adult life isn't always rubbish

About thirteen years ago, I needed a new winter coat.

I had bought the one I already had from Oxfam when I was about fifteen. It was an enormous man's overcoat -- my mother hated it, the teachers at school had hated it -- but I loved it.

It had only cost £9 and was in perfectly good nick even if many sizes too big, so nobody had a leg to stand on, except the 'you look like a tramp' one. Good, I said. I wore it for years.

But it did eventually start to fall apart, and the time had also come for me to get jobs and stuff, so I trooped off to look for a new one. The one I found was in Miss Selfridge. It was like a duffel coat with a zip (I've never been any good at smart) and it came in black or red.

I wanted the red one. I wanted the red one so badly. If my memory serves, I even bought the red one, but was persuaded to take it back and swap it for the black one, because everyone knows red is not a sensible winter coat colour.

The next winter coat after that was also black, for the same reasons, and that is the one I still have. It is one of those military looking long waisted coats which is *very* 1994, and these days I only seem to wear it to funerals.

In the intervening years I have also amassed a brown 70s fake fur coat (also Oxfam, slightly too small), a big-lapelled grey fake fur jacket (glam, impractical) and a black North Face waterproof coat (mens, sensible but unattractive). Oh, and the leather coat my Australian artist half-aunt left behind (cool but slightly dilapidated).

But today I bought myself a new proper winter coat. It's stylish. It's proper. And it's very, very red.

The next funeral I go to I'm going to stand out like a sore thumb.

joella