Summer in the City

The iniquities of London Underground this summer are already well documented by caddyman. I cannot emulate his wit in describing the chaos, circumstances which led to me being in a very difficult situation, endless travelling and horrendous exhaustion. My heartfelt thanks go out to _kol and liza_shepherd for their exemplary kindness and hospitality, and my deepest apologies to the very patient colonel_maxim and caddyman for letting them down.

It was good to see squeezypaws, november_girl and liza_shepherd, and our hunting was successful; Q three rather lovely bridesmaid dresses at the perfect price. Now all we need are shoes, guns, and bling and we're ready for the big day.

Certain aspects of my staying in London are being thoroughly marred by the transport absurdities being enforced on the denizens of the city; I don't know, I leave the place for 3 years and come back only to find it an incoherent wreck; Or maybe that's just me. It's not that the work is gruelling, far from it, the work is the easy part and I want more. But the transport is just insane; see, a lot of the Underground tracks are old and desperately need repairing, a lot of them. Now, when could this be done? When is a good time to shut down the city's arteries? Rush hour on weekdays? Clearly not. How about between 11 and 4 on weekdays when no-one is really going far cos everyone's in work? Too easy. Better do it on the weekend, when everyone and his dog are out shopping; this way we get to triple the crowds of exasperated punters on the edge of heat stroke and log-jam the city with cars. I take it the congestion charge does not apply at weekends, or Red Ken may well become the first Mayor of London to end his tenure through assassination.

For the first time ever, my wonderful ridiculous work did not make me smile; Don't ask me how it's happening but we hit record levels of traffic for a monday night; the producer is a very happy guy (he's the one who wore the sumo suit last time) and the Head of Production phoned in to congratulate us all. Still, I couldn't be happy. Exhaustion had turned this stint into a nightmare and I was crying on the way back, not from any great sorrow but from pure physical wipe-out. This must change.

Today I come back to mountains of correspondence; chums who have sent emails, please forgive my delay in answering, I really am inundated, and I feel like hell in a handbag.

Revolting predicament

In order to go out to the shops,or even the back garden, I must now put some clothes on.

What a stupid rule.