When he climbed the stairs with a cup of the sleepy herbal tea that sends me away he found me staring in disbelieving comtempt at Sarah Michelle Gellar.

“What IS this?”

“Feh,” I disgustulated. “Movie.”

“Is that Sarah Michelle Gellar?”

“Yes”, I spat.

“You like her, don’t you? You like Buffy, don’t you?”

“Buffy, Yes, but this? THIS!?”

He looked it up. Simply Irresistible, read the IMDBumph, scanned the cast list, winced through some reviews.

“Yes” he agreed “It sounds rubbish”

“It’s not that. God, this is awful.”

“Is it that guy? Is it because it’s got someone from The Wire in and you don’t like seeing him in something so bad?”

“No, it’s not that. God, I feel sick”

“What, she’s a cook who makes magic food, and it’s a whimsical romantic comedy, and - what?! It sounds like something you’d actually watch, at least when you’re this tired”.

And he was right, of course, he was right. In fact, I had been reaching for the remote to record the rest of the movie when I first noticed it. And a few years ago, it’s not something I would have noticed at all.

Yes, she was a chef. That was a Nice thing, I like cooking, and I love eating out, and it would seem to follow that I would like this film. But, standing in the kitchen of her failing restaurant, she was running her fingers through her long, thick hair, picking up raw ingredients, putting them back down, running both hands through her hair once more, going and working the till for a while, feeding the fish, then coming back to the kitchen, fingers in hair, leaning over the preparation area until you could be pretty sure all dust might have gone, reapplying her nail varnish and then rubbing her chopping board.

And then, oh I don’t know, she asked her sous-chef to scratch an unreachable spot on her arse with the crab they were preparing, and then blew her nose on a lettuce.

Now I know full well that people have to be allowed creative licence, but for the Love of All that is good and holy and antibacterial, can we not be creative and wash our hands As Well?

I don’t care how magic her food is. I’m never fucking eating there.

(Which slightly detracts from my originally intended question - IS it any good? Should I have persevered? Because my little whimsical inner romantic says yes. Sadly, however, I think it might be too late. My tired little inner health inspector has had the damn place closed down)

[As part of Challenge Anna (the things-I should-do-before-my-thirtieth-birthday countdown) - which you can find something about here and a full list of my reader's suggestions here]

“Can you let go of my arm, please?”
“In a minute”
“Or at least loosen the fingers?”
“In A Minute”
“Anna, it’s gone dead”
“In a minute! Seriously. Someone’s rung the bell. He has to stop. He HAS to stop.”

‘Take a spontanous road trip’ said the suggestion in the long long list. This, I thought, we can do, on such a lovely weekend as this - this is something we can do. Spontaneity! Fun! Larks! A road trip!

Granted, we don’t have a car, and neither of us can drive anyway, so it wouldn’t help if we did. And with the trains running north out of Brighton royally screwed this weekend, our exciting road trip was by neccessity composed around the movements of the planets. Sorry, not planets, buses. The movements of the buses.

Buses: which are like planets, except more rectangular, and have more old people on them. And are less ‘in Space’ and more ‘on Timetable’.
And are driven by performing circus monkeys wearing old-man-flesh-balaclavahats.

Or ours was, anyway.

We had tried to find a number 30 bus, but there wasn’t one. The number 29 ended up in some roughass housing estate, and the number 35 is half way to forty and we’re not even thinking about that yet. So we went with the Plan B - get on the first bus that comes and stay on it to the end.

After wandering about and taking some photos for another challenge altogether, we arrived at the bus stop, as did a bus. One body (us) penetrating the other (the bus) through the medium of lovingly parted driver-operated doors later, and with the social and economic lube of a daysaver, we were off to Eastbourne.

All the way to Eastbourne! This was going to be a great day out. My Beloved seemed enchanted and got very carried away by the thought that we might get off at Beachy Head and pay some homage - or perhaps drink a toast - to my very favourite (and the sadly quite sucidal) singer-songwriter Nick Drake. As I’ve managed to make it to older than he ever did, my beloved decided, we should get off at Beachy Head and say hello, and this would be a suitable thing to do.

Yes, I said, it would. If he hadn’t died from an overdose in Warwickshire.
I wasn’t sure if he’d ever been to Sussex, in fact.
Although if he’d taken an overdose of drugs in Warwickshire that had led to him consequently flying off a cliff in Sussex, I would be quite up for taking a much smaller dose of those same drugs. Because they sounded ace.

My beloved was quiet for a while, I assume simply soaking in my wealth of rock knowledge for use at a later date.

Well, quiet, that is, until the double decker bus headed up the hill, and turnipped the corner.
['Turnipped' - in this context being 'turning, but with a fair bit too much tipping for my liking.]

At what felt like 60, 70, 180 miles an hour the performing monkey in the uniform and old-man flesh-hat was having far too much fun for my liking. I clung on to the arm of My Quite-Unhappy-About-It Beloved, held my breath, clenched the muscles of my pelvic floor, and bit my finger till it almost bled.

If this man was going round, near or over Beachy Head, I wasn’t going with him.

And thus, we ended up on our wild, impulsive, spontaneous road trip in a little suburb/village approximately 6 miles from our house, sitting on another pebbly beach under a white cliff, listening to women shouting ‘Jade, stop throwing rocks at your brother‘, the sea, lapping, and seagulls, as always, everywhere.

It was very nice.

It was lunchtime, and there were places to eat. But everywhere that could possibly be eaten in I would rather have chopped my own arm off, marinaded it in tears and grilled it over my lighter than eat in, so a fruitless tour that amazingly found us back at a bus stop, within fifteen minutes we were we were somewhere near civilisation*, and all roads were leading toward noodles.

Of course, as chance would have it, we had exactly the same driver on his return trip, so noodles were appetised by at least half my finger. I start to believe that far from being discouraged, drug use in bus drivers should be compulsory. But just not high-flying long-range NickDrakey drugs. The other kind. The opposite drugs.

Spontaneous things are all well and good, and road trips are road trips, and this was a lovely idea. But at the end of the day, Sundays are sacred, noodles are neccessary, and in the city, you always know that everything’s going to be open at least some of the time it thinks it is. Unlike bloody villages.

- There seem to be a billion things going on and none moving forward at all.

Staring at the screen, computer and ‘tother, and trying to remember what I was meant to be doing, and trying to decipher work from pleasure and blah blah blah blah blah.

- The project-of-the-type-I-should-never-set-myself-because-pressure-makes-me-cry is ongoing, and I will report back where things are at as and when I know what they are and how they are going.

- You know, productivity was a lot easier before, somewhere in the middle of last week, I discovered Bloons. And then More Bloons (via JayIsGames). Don’t click on either, no, ANY of those links if you ever want to get anything done. Ever.

I thought this one would be easy. I mean, last week I had to go and visit some Museum of Relationships, Sensuality and Larking About With Other People’s Genetalia for a piece I was writing anyway, so thought that while I was there, I could knock off one of the suggested ‘pre-30′ list items right there and then without even barely trying.

It was a posh sex shop, obviously, because it was in the respectable pretend-museum-place, thus it wasn’t as scary as the usual black-windowed-smuttery. More of a bootytique, really.

Still, I blushed hot red wandering around the pokey little pokeyparlor, pondering the efficacy of paper underwear, picking up things, then dropping them when I realised that the things shaped like hot potatoes were not only hot potatoes, but hot potatoes you were meant to stick up your bottom. Or something.

And then there was chocolate that cost three times as much as chocolate in other shops (which is probably miles nicer); I think because it had a bow on it, the word ‘Sensual’ in its name, and some kind of innuendo in the blurb on the back. And probably a leaflet inside with directions of how best to stick it up your bottom. I generally suspect I’m a little too English for sex shops, really.

Anyway, in a big tray over in the corner of the In-Out-In-Outlet, there were a number of subtle, classy little boxes, with fancy scrolled text and, little writing.

They were all manner of different things, beads and balls, and buttons and batons and blah blah blah. And then I found one box tucked away at the back.

‘Mini Vibrator on a Keyring’ it said.

Not only a mini vibrator, which is fine, obv, but ON A KEYRING.

Well who knew? There IS somewhere I haven’t thought of looking for my keys after all.

Quite apart from the whole social embarassment of having a gently humming tiddler tickler hanging off your housekeys, it just led me into a world of mental possibilities that I hadn’t before that moment even considered a possibilty.

“Oh no, I have lost my keys”
“Do you remember where you last had them?”
“OH! Um… Yes?”

Or the look of horror as your keys come dancing out of your handbag, thrown on the table in an important meeting, dragged by a little buzzing clitorjiggler, jangling their way across the table making sure to draw everyone’s attention before clattering to the floor.

I stood there with the box in my hand, mind tumbling over the comedy potential of owning such an object.

“£24.99″ said a voice at my shoulder.

The racytail assistant had clearly mistaken my amused confusion for serious interest and, having nothing so common as price stickers (I assume they chafe) was coming over to whisper the damage delicately in my shell-like.

Reader, I failed the challenge.

I have no keyring vibrator.

Come ON, it was £24.99, and I already have a small Lego Darth Vader that serves me awfully well, thank you very much.

At keeping my keys together.
It serves me well at Keeping My Keys Together.

Jesus, you people are filthy.

Ok, so. I haven’t wanted to post anything much until I had time to collate the whole list of things that people I had suggested I try and do before my 30th birthday. Annoyingly, what with having a very busy (though very productive and good etc) this took me so long that I’ve probably wasted a bunch of time that I should have spent trying to do the things.

No matter. Here are two versions of the list - one which just lists all the things suggested in the comments (and thank you again for all your suggestions, even - or especially? - those of you who got a bit over excited), which you’ll find below .

And one which has ben annotated with my thoughts on how likely it is that I’ll do them, which I’ll post in a post underneath this one, when I’ve managed to annotate all of them. Things I have already done are in italics, until I can think of some way of making them feint.

1. Release a downloadable Best of Anna Pickard - spoken blogs & childhood squeakings. (michael dolenzio)

2. read “84 Charing Cross Road”, by Helen Hanff. Have you already read it? Good!! You can cross it off you 30-things-to-do list!! (france)
3. Go busking. (JonnyB)
4. Stop being twenty-nine (Dominic)
5. Jump out of a helicopter and run up to random passers-by asking them if they have a clue (Dominic)
6. Bottle Feed A Lamb? Achievable AND seasonal (SophieW)
7. The London Marathon is on 22nd April and is nearly 26.2 miles. It’s a little late to do the run but you could walk 3.8 miles from the finish line in the Mall to make it 30. (Murph)
8. Buy a little red plastic boat and launch it in the Thames at Charing Cross. A picture would be good. (Murph)
9. Get Married?… (Debster)
10. … have a baby? I dunno… (Debster)
11. how about buy a kangaroo? (Debster)
12. Kiss the next [real - not virtual] person that makes you laugh. (Andre)
13. Go to the supermarket in your slippers and pajamas. (rachie)
14. Go see a movie at the Electric Cinema in Nottinghill if you haven’t. (Adrian)
15. Have the blackened cod from Nobu (Adrian)
16. Place a wager in a bookies (Adrian)
17. Go swimming in the sea at sunrise (Adrian)
18. Do a tequila body shot (Adrian)
19. Get a tattoo (Adrian)
20. Go to a live football game. (Adrian)
21. Go to a live cricket game. (Adrian)
22. Eat an Ice Cream in Trafalgar square sitting on the walls at the side watching people. (Adrian)
23. Go up in a hot air balloon. (Adrian)
24. Cook something you have never cooked before. (Adrian)
25. Dye your hair a colour it’s never been. (Adrian) Um, that’s it for me for the moment. If I think of any more I’ll let you know. (?!)
26. Do the Star Wars marathon thing.
27. Get married. (Laura)
28. Write a letter to your parents or mother and father depending on the ‘family structure’ and tell them things you’ve never told them before. But only nice things. (Laura)
29. Have a great professional picture taken. (Laura)
30. Skinny dip (Laura)
31. International Dance Day on 29 April… Try a class in something new. Salsa? (Tuuli)
32. Booo. JonnyB stole my idea. Except I was going to mention Brighton sea-front and a Kazoo. (Mr Angry)
33. Stay up till dawn, both drinking and putting the world to rights (live blog it, if necessary) (Mr Angry)
34. Do some volunteer work locally (hour, afternoon, or a full day, up to you) (Mr Angry)
35. Walk across London town. (Mr Angry)
36. Make a bet that is sufficiently big to scare you a little bit, then watch the ensuing action, live. (Mr Angry)
37. Ooo, I’ve got one - do the bet thing on the Grand National, put an each way bet on NUMBER 30 (see what I did there?), it’s called “Naunton Brook”. It’s got a good each-way chance (so tipsters better than me claim) (AndyB)
38. I like the betting idea a lot too - I’ve never done it either. How about thirty 1 pound bets on thirty different horses (or dogs, or beasts of your choice) (with the silliest names possible, obviously)… that way you’d be bound to win something! (Eloise)
39. Drink champagne on the beach at sunrise. (This can be combined with Adrian’s, which I’ve just noticed… grr.) (Mike)
40. Post pretentious poetry on your Livejournal. (Mike)
41. Mosh. (Or crowd-surf. Your choice.) (Mike)
42. Go through a faux-mature “settling down” phase, eg. staying in on a Saturday night so you can buy something nice from Habitat with the money saved OR throwing an over-elaborate three-course dinner party, using recipes from EITHER Jamie Oliver OR Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, with EITHER James Blunt OR James Morrison on the CD player. (Mike)
43. Protest about something in public (ie. t’Internet doesn’t count) (Mike)
44. Invite a homeless person round for a cup of tea, because you, like, rilly want to get to know them as a person? (Mike)
45. Go through a 1980s Retro phase. (Mike)
46. Meet up with someone you haven’t seen since School/University/your first job. (Mike)
47. Schmooze your way onto the guest list for an ultra-hip club night, swan ostentatiously past the queue (Ha! Plebs!), drink over-priced cocktails (and ENJOY them), pretend you recognise the tunes (”Yeah, I got this on promo months ago actually”), and sneer at anyone who looks over 35 (”God, have they no self-respect?”). (Mike)
48. Have t-shirts printed with “I am a twenty-something” and wear them every day until your birthday. (Anxious)
49. Publish a ‘Best of Little Red Boat’ by Anna P, via lulu.com if needs be. (f:lux)
50. My God, I’m amazed no-one has yet mentioned it: you should definitely have a threesome before you turn thirty. (OneTrack)
51. Read “Little, Big” by John Crowley. (Sophie)
52. Eat out at thirty restaurants before your birthday. (Some Catchy Chic)
53. Make a time capsule containing something important from each year of your life - and then plan to dig it back up on your 60th - adding a further 30 years worth of memories. (joanne)
54. Learn how to make a decent martini (if you don’t know already) and get all your friends to come round and drink them. (Nic Dempsey)
55. Take a photo of yourself every day until your birthday and put it on the site (Nic Dempsey)
56. Plan a huge birthday party (Nic Dempsey)
57. Tickle a (on-duty) policeman. (Becky)
58. Hold a one-woman protest outside the Houses of Parliament: protest about something very odd but be very sincere when you shout your slogans. How about an apathy protest? “WHAT DO WE WANT?” “DON’T KNOW!” “WHEN DO WE WANT IT?” “OH, WHENEVER!”. As it is a one-woman protest, you will have to both ask and answer these questions in a very loud voice. (Becky)
59. Eat a whole chocolate cake to yourself. (Becky)
60. Watch the sun come up on a beach. (Becky)
61. Swim in the sea with a dolphin: you don’t have to travel far to do this, as I believe both Ireland and Wales have ‘Ambassador dolphins’ living off the coast who are only too happy to frolick with humans. Be careful though - as Terry Pratchett once wrote, never trust a species that smiles all the time. (Becky)
62. spontaneous road trip (ladybird)
63. host a fancy dress party (i’m very much looking forward to LittleBTS eurovision party - ooh are you liveblogging the eurovision? you so should..) (ladybird)
64. go to that fab kareoke bar near soho. (ladybird)
65. send a message in a bottle. (ladybird)
66. engage in the facebook poking war of all poking wars. (ladybird)
67. bury treasure. (ladybird)
68. race 30 little red boats down the Thames, we’ve all seen the rubber duck races, why not tiny boats? (ladybird)
69. go to a pole dancing class. (ladybird)
70. The monopoly board pub crawl. (ladybird)
71. do something for charity, and hang out with some cool people (www.londonsairambulance.com) (ladybird)
72. Oh, bugger, is a bit like the boat idea… But I think you should put thirty messages in bottles. Possibly little red messages, or little red bottles, or something. And then release them off Brighton pier, and see what happens, what exciting people (if any) write back and where from. I have always wanted to put messages in bottles and this is an excellent excuse. Or you could release them from all sorts of different (seaside) places, cos I guess it would make a difference where they started from. I suppose it could work with little red boats, but they would be mroe likely to sink before reaching far-flung shores. Or you could release messages on thirty red balloons. Or thirty pigeons. Or thirty red cards left around London with a favourite blog post on one side and a message to people to take them somewhere else and leave them and see how far they get… (Eloise)
73. You could spend one lunchbreak trying to give away single flowers on the street, to strangers. See if you can give away 30. (katoutthebag)
74. Record a record. Better than that, do it as a podcast. Ukelele accompaniment, obviously. Perhaps a video version posted on here. (dury)
75. Show us pictures of your favourite 30 things in brighton, these could be either stuff you have lying around in the house or things outside the house. (andrea)
76. Make a mix CD that reminds you of your teenage years. (andrea)
77. Make a list of your 30 favourite words starting with W. (andrea)
78. Dress up as a Pirate Wench.
    Commandeer an old-stylee sailing ship.
    Mount a raid on a trading ship in the Spanish Main.
    Get thee loads of doubloons.
    Arrr!
    Well, perhaps just the dressing up bit then? (Farty)
79. For the birthday party: 1) Hire an indoor swimming pool facility. 2) All guests must be in their “birthday suits.”
    Potential drawbacks: 1) Violates your “Not Tits” instruction. 2) If the water is cold, your male guests may not appreciate the venue. (xl)

80. Pretend to do an Earl. Un-shoplift sweets or drinks in a corner shop and then post it on You-Tube. (Salima)
81. paint a picture (Salima)
82. have a spa therapy, chocolate wrap or similarly decadent sounding thing (Salima)
83. watch the sun-rise (yep I know its been said but i wanted to say it too) (Salima)
84. visit an orphanage (Salima)
85. How about making your own little red boat? Natural materials only. Must be seaworthy. (sooz)
86. Apply for ‘The Apprentice’. (sooz)
87. Go on a spa break - to get yourself in shipshape and Bristol fashion for your birthday celebration - must be blogged about though. (sooz)
88. Pick 3 studio audiences to sit among wearing your most red of clothes and hogging the camera as soon as it swings your way. (sooz)
89. Wear an enormous pair of fake breasts to work and pretend that there’s nothing ‘different’ about you. (sooz)
90. Dress up like Marc Bolan for a day. He died when he was 29 you know. Obviously try not to die though. That would be silly. (Amy)
91. Take a photo of what you’re doing every half an hour on a normal day. There will be about 30 pics. Then look at them when you are 40. (JT)
92. Or for a month take a photo of every friend you meet. Then look at them when you are 40. (JT)
93. Surely doing something with a red boat is kinda compulsory.… (JT)
94. and a sunrise. (JT)
95. Go on a pub/bar crawl of every place you have had a drink on previous birthdays. I hope you did not start drinking at an early age or things could get messy very quickly. (Invader_Stu)
96. Have to say I’m with The Girl on this one. Sexually deviant behaviour all the way. See in 30 in a tangle of sweaty limbs… (H Factor)
97. Bake cookies and give them out to the cookie-worthy people in your life. (Tasha)
98. Phone/email/meet up with some of the people you’ve been meaning to stay in touch with but work and life and stuff keep getting in the way. (Tasha)
99. You should hold a birthday party on the pirate ship on the south bank, i always see school kids over there in pirates hats and it looks like fantastic fun (ladybird)
100. Love the idea of leaving posts on little red cards all over the place. (ladybird)
101. Go to work in face paint - a different face paint design every day for 30 days… (ladybird)
102. Overcome a fear. (Any genuine fear. Maybe not mouses-big, but one that really bothers you.) (Fraz)
103. Spend a whole day being excessively nice to everyone you meet. Carry some cakes/biscuits/sweets and hand them out to anyone who even looks at you. Then try to avoid arrest. (Fraz)
104. My Mum spent her 30th birthday with her legs apart, giving birth to me. I guess you don’t have 9 months left to plan that one… (diamond geezer)
105. Scarily, I Googled it and got this link: One of which involves shooting something. Hmmm. I think your list will be nicer! (SophieW)
106. I think the plastic boat idea has legs (if that’s not a contradiction in terms). But its not very interactive or 360 degree-thingy, so.. Buy the cheapest GPS tracker you can find (flaw #1: probably not cheap) - it needs to send the position back at regular intervals like on ‘Spooks’ - affix it to the boat, and then one of us can produce a trendy ‘Google mash-up’ so everyone can follow the boat on its epic journey. If it lasts for more than 30 minutes without sinking (flaw #2) there’s probably a book deal and a radio series in it for you. Or at the very least paint the website address on the side of the thing in case its finder can be bothered to trace the vessel’s origin. Sorry, but I do have an urge to ruin ‘lovely’ ideas with unnecessary technology. (William T)
107. Thirty different dance classes? Lots of fun, but possibly a bit tiring… (Eloise)
108. Thirty ships (little red boats) in thirty bottles? No? (William T)
109. Eloise and William T - is that thirty messages/ships per bottle, and thirty of those bottles? Because 900 messages/ships is rather a lot. (Liam)
110. Eat a cheese and chocolate sandwich (Clare)
111. Do a podcast of yourself singing your favourite song (Clare)
112. Start a worm farm in your garden (Clare)
113. Gain an ounce a day in weight (Clare)
114. Dye your hair pink (Clare)
115. Get a tattoo (Clare)
116. Climb the highest peak in England (Sca Fell, Lake District - it’s not very difficult, beenu p it several times meself, although I guess you may already have done this) (Clare)
117. Swim a width underwater (Clare)
118. Do some weird dangerous sport (hang-gliding, bungee jumping, whatever) (Clare)
119. Go on a helicopter ride (Clare)
120. Write a love poem to the internet (Clare)
121. Something for charity (Clare)
122. Do a good deed every day (Clare)
123. Give a small inexpensive present to a random stranger every day (Clare)
124. Give away a home-made candle to a different blogreader every day (I know you have tons of spare home-made candles) (Clare)
125. Link to a different Favourite Blog every day (Clare)
126. Or… find a brand new blog what you have never read before every day, and link to it. (Clare)
127. Read the first page only of 30 books from your own bookshelves wot you’ve never got round to reading, then compose a poem made of the 30 First Words. Then pick your favourite, and read it all the way through. (Clare)
128. Buy something in a sex shop (Clare)
129. Go with your beloved to one of those seedy red-light cinemas (Clare)
130. Fill your wellies with jelly and wear them to the beach (Clare)
131. Go on a donkey ride (Clare)
132. Go and visit Anthony Gormley’s sculptures on Crosby beach (Clare)
133. Fly a kite from the top of a tall building (Clare)
134. Learn how to walk on stilts (Clare)
135. Buy a spacehopper and bounce the length of Brighton beach
136. Knit yourself a toast rack (Clare)

Jesus.
Annotated version to follow…

You are under no compulsion whatsoever to read this. I’m just publishing an annotated version of this because I’m stubborn and a little OCD and needed to for completist reasons, and also wanted to get my thoughts out loud.

Ok, that being said…
(more…)

But I will be maybe tomorrow hopefully.

But in the meantime, here are some places that I actually am.

I am describing my visit to the launch a Sex Museum (of which more on this site at later date)

I am tearing into Natasha Bedingfield’s new video, in the persona of, erm, Natasha Bedingfield.

And tonight, later, I will be joyfully yet utterly pointlessly cataloguing the real-time events of a television programme, as usual for a Wednesday night. Well, not *utterly* pointlessly, apparently it’s quite a good recap. And some people seem to like it, though most (I think) only read the comments, which is fine, because the commenters are extremely funny.

(And to any of them who have migrated over here, hello. I’m not saying nice things about you just because you’re here, almost certainly)

Tomorrow I will be badgering away at a keyboard for the first couple of hours, before stopping and having a bank holiday weekend two weeks late, yay.

And what do you do with time off? Why, you blog. Obv. Oh, and maybe drink some. And maybe go to some cricket.
Anyway.
Still not here.

Which was, as it happens, a mis-typed title, but I like it so much it can stay.

I am not really here. I am just here to say that I am

a) not really here but
b) contrary to possible popular opinion, not dead
c) having a really cunty first-half-of-week
d) very well aware that I’m supposed to be in the middle of a project building up to my birthday
e) planning to catch up with blogging duties on Thursday, which is
ei) After the big deadlines that I am currently living under have passed
eii) The beginning of my exciting postponed bank holiday weekend yay.
f) Going to the launch of a Sex Museum tonight which won’t provide blogging material sadly, as it is for work. But it may provide the opportunity to cross another couple of things off my Birthday Challenge List. Maybe. And thus provide covert blogging material.
g) staring at a ‘To Do’ list as long as the A6.
h) Tired and a bit fuzzy-headed.
i) Sorry for not blogging enough and hoping that’s not going to impact on everyone’s willingness to buy me presents (have I blazenly publicised my wishlist, yet? Well, I will - hang about long enough, I will)
j) Currently giggling at some Aussie TV show.
k) Getting excited because we might finally get our home internet connection tomorrow.
l) Realising this has been sitting on draft for a very long time while I have been too runny-about to publish it.

Balls.

Anyway. I am not here. I will be here later in the week, but I am decidedly NOT here now.
And I am not dead.
And I am lots of other things see above.

What are you, please?

“But what’s the difference between That slip and This slip?”
“I don’t know. That one has boxes on it, though”
“Yes. But I don’t know if boxes make it More or Less confusing…”

We’d already walked past the bookies twice, once having needed to get some kind of cash, once because we were just too scared. Now we were standing, coughing, at a counter in a smoky betting shop, filled with old men, flashing machines, television screens showing the programmes I flick past and walls lined with the newspaper pages I use for cleaning the windows, unread.

“This, right. THIS seems to be a Grand National special betting slip.”
“Yes, but it’s only got tick boxes for iddy biddy bets.”
“Maybe that’s a sign?”
“Yes, maybe it is. Maybe this big blank one for BIG bets is what the sign is indicating!’
“Um…”

So I’ve never bet on a sport before. I’ve never been in a betting shop. I’ve never watched a horserace with any kind of vested interest.

And, coming up to my 30th birthday, I’m trying to do things I’ve never ever done…

Adrian in the comments of ‘Challenge Anna’ said I should place a bet, in a bookies. I mentioned that I liked the idea, and that the Grand National was coming up. AndyB said that I should place something on Horse No.30, Naughton Brook.

And in my head, that became the plan for Challenge One. Except that I added a proviso that it should be enough money to make some difference, won or lost.

“Maybe £30 is too much. Maybe I should just put three quid on, maybe?”
“But that’s not the point. It has to be enough to HURT”
“Well, it DOES bloody hurt.”

I checked the chart on the wall, brightly coloured shirts and silly names and numbers agaist numbers and numbers. Read the predictions. Sighed, heavily.

“30. That one. Horse number 30. To win.”

I said, to the lady behind the counter.

“Sorry, I’m not sure I put the right thing on the slip. But it’s Horse number thirty, please. Thirty pounds, on horse number 30. Nono, not each way. Just to win. Yes. Silver Birch, is it?”

(more…)

There have been two stories in the last few days that to my mind are very similar, but to which other people’s reaction has been markedly different.

There was a photo story today, for example, about a man who got his hand bitten off by a crocodile (NB: do not click link if you do not particularly wish to see a crocodile with bitten-off hand in gob).

Now the general reaction to this image, and my reaction, obviously, was ‘Euw. I do not like that image. Euw euw’.

Which is natural, because the rational human does not much want to look at human flesh getting munched by scaly monsters.

And that was my reaction of course, when faced with a picture of some small fish chewing on the dead skin of an adult extremity (NB: do not click link if you do not want to see small cute fish swimming in bath around someone’s feet)

Now, the reaction to most people around me to THAT picture was ‘Oh! That looks nice, I would like that, it would be tickly, isn;t that cute’.

Wrong.

It is, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, EXACTLY The Same Thing.

Crocodile chewy hand? Bad. Fish chewy feet? Also bad

And clipping your nails on public transport. And picking skin off your feet and putting it in a small pile on the coffee table. That’s also the same. And bad. And wrong.

I rest my case.

All right, I haven’t actually formulated the plan, yet.

But I’m going to look at all the suggestions below (I’m rather taken by Laura, by the way, who not only got married for her 30th birthday but seems to be planning on getting married to celebrate every big birthday thereafter) and formulate a plan later. Keep adding suggestions. Whimsical things with boats are looking popular, and are likely. As are whimsical things with multiple sexual partners, which aren’t.

In the meantime, something that concerned me this morning. I weighed myself, which is not a rare occurance, but not daily, and discovered I am now less weight than all the other times I have done the weighing, which is good (yay), and provides false optimism for my unspeakably unrealistic ‘target-30th-birthday’ plan.

HOWEVER. I then put on my bra, and for reasons that I cannot now remember, weighed myself a second time. And discovered myself to be ALMOST a WHOLE ‘LB’ heavier.

Is this normal? I cannot imagine it is.

It therefore means one of two things:

1) My scales are shonky. Boo.
b) That penchant for lead-lined underwear is where I’ve been going wrong all these years.

AKA: A potentially really stupid idea for which I need your help

So I’ve been trying to think of some kind of build up project to my birthday, because it’s the kind of thing I like doing in theory, and also ensures that everyone knows I have A Birthday Coming Up.

It’s my thirtieth as well, and not that I’m panicking, or anything - if you don’t count staring at some annoying stjoodents in the pub quiz the other night and lamenting that Oh GOD I’ll Never Be Young Again - but the thirtieth seems like the kind of birthday to which one ought to build up to. Through one’s blog, I think. Which of course has a wishlist on, handily.

So I’ve been asking around for possible ideas of projects, and time is running out, because surely, if I’m going to do something, I have to start tomorrow. It may have to be a collection of things. Meg suggested some 30 second videos and thirty word posts, which may be a part of it, but without internet access at home (STILL) I can’t really countenance too hi-tech things right now…

So.

Mr Angry came up with an idea, which might work, or might not. But let’s just ask. Hell, it’s the interweb. It’s 2.0. It’s intermajactive and everything.

Maybe if I were to ask you for suggestions for THINGS I SHOULD DO BEFORE I’M THIRTY, you might come up with some things and I might pick some of them, or a lot of them, or maybe thirty of them and try - god knows when, and if not I can always make it up or use it as inspiration for something - to do and record the doing of them in the next month, starting tomorrow.

Bear in mind, they can’t involve extensive travel - seeing the pyramids not really an option right now -, or large chunks of time - childbirth is probably out the window, then (not literally, that would be Wrong)-, or huge amounts of money - unless you’re going to be providing it.

But beyond that, I don’t know - they could be little whimsical things, or other things, experiences, movies I should really have seen by now, or books I should have read, things I should get out in the open (NB: Not Tits) or write about in general or lists of things I should tick off or, or, or, you know, or anything, really.

So please, be kind - but help me.

For the upcoming month, a theme of ‘THINGS I SHOULD HAVE DONE BEFORE I TURN THIRTY’

Ladeez and gentlefolk, over to you.
‘THINGS I SHOULD DO BEFORE I TURN THIRTY’.
Suggestions, please?…

<ducks>

On Friday I went to work, and, at lunchtime, started feeling decidedly stupid. Not sick, not ill, not poorly as such. Just stupid, like someone had dipped my face in porridge and asked me to inhale deeply, powerfully and until it filled my whole skull.

For the rest of the working day no one noticed that I was spectacularly more stupid than usual, which is slightly disappointing in a way.

Although understandable in that it was a lovely sunny bank holiday Friday and the very few people with me in the office were ALSO feeling quite stupid, although in their case it was mainly for agreeing to be in the office at all on a lovely sunny bank holiday Friday, and not for porridge-inhalation reasons.

By the train home, however, my immense stupidity was very noticable. It mainly manifested in my saying ‘Umnch?’ to every question my Beloved asked, and sneezing a lot, before bursting into snotty tears at the realisation that neither of us were carrying tissues.

By Saturday I was the South Coast’s biggest mucus factory, specialising in snot. My cries were plaintive, and mainly unintelligable.

‘Why’vIgoddacode? I dake VIDDAMINS. Dint FAIR.’

‘Haven’t TIBE to be Illfergood’essake. Illisstoopid. Bleurgh.’

‘WAH! I lost by tisssooooss. Aboo seed em? I NEEDEB! I need TISOOS’ I would whine at my Beloved, who in turn might look at me, head cocked to one side, and try to translate. ‘What’s that, girl? You’re hungry? Too warm? There’s a boy stuck in a well?’ before I would give up and blow my nose on his jumper.

By Sunday, the ill had shifted out of my head, deciding to sit heavily on my chest for a while. I tried to shift it with pharmacuticals, hot toddies and all manner of medicinal CD shopping (well one has to get out of the house, does one not?), and eventually decided that if it was going to go away, it would go away when it felt like it.

And then it was Monday and, having to head back into work, my cold announced itself to be just about over (apart from sneaky snot-attacks on the train which, finding me bizarrely without tissues again, would leave me wondering whether it was worse form to blow my nose out of the window or just stick the emergency tampons at the bottom of my handbag up my nostrils until I reached my destination). Which was good, as there was no one else to cover my desk at work, so I had to be there.

And now, the cold, it is gone. Or mainly. Just in time for the rest of my working week.

This was my Easter bank holiday: two days in the office, two days in bed, four days ill, three days whining.

I demand a recount.

If I was in any doubt of the wisdom of volunteering to work on the bank holidays (and choosing, therefore, to spend the sunniest days of the year so far at my grey desk in an office far far away from the four-day sunny beach extravaganza of Brighton Bank Holiday) my doubt ended when I got home.

I walked out of the station and was faced with a marauding horde - quite literally, a Marauding Horde, I’m sure there would have been vikings in there if I’d had time to focus - of day-trippers surging up the hill toward me.

It was like all the stupidest people in the world had challenged all the ugliest people in the world to a race, and all the drunkest people in the world had decided to join in for a laugh, and I was standing at the finish line watching them all rumble toward me.

I pinched myself to check it wasn’t a dream - I had a dream about being in a high speed chase in a world made of lego during my mid-headcold-nap yesterday, and it was quite like that but better (and weirdly a bit sexual) - but four small quite ugly toddlers running headstrong into my knees told me it wasn’t, so I tried to sidestep the horde and stepped in some horde-sick.

As I scraped the sick off my boot, some ugly parents scooped their I’m-sorry-but-somone’s-got-to-say-it unattractive toddlers up, nipping back into the race with all the stupid people, running for the trains back to the city, in a please-jesus-don’t-look-at-the-camera photo finish.

I couldn’t look, and dipped my heel in a puddle. Whoever won, looks like it wasn’t the drunks.