- thinking about kicks condor all day everyday
- having breakfast by the rock then going for a 'supermarket walk', dragging the funny basket-trolley with only coalhada and garfield chocolate in it
- reading kicks condor while jack watches a francis bacon documentary
- staying in, eating tricolor pasta with garlic and butter and watching sopranos while it rains and thunders outside
- making it to pagham! i've been so anxious about this moment and i'm finally here
- settling in the first day, feeling really cold for the first time in two years, long nap in the afternoon, spaghetti bolognese and university challenge in the evening, jack saying 'i feel like i'm coming back to a very specific part of my brain'
- such silence my ears were ringing all night
- buying a jumper my favourite colour for a pound
- even reading hello magazine waiting for jack at the dentist's office
- walk along the surreal beach, the street of rail carriages, around the churchyard and back home, getting reacquainted to the cold sting on my ears, all the colours of the much more angular sun
- walk up to the windmill, but especially the interesting déjà vu standing on the doorstep in the dark, the feeling of thinking about magic when living here versus how i think about it now, living in rio
- the whole day at chichester, writing in the tesco cafe, looking around kim's bookshop, perfect weather for that kind of rambling-ness where you can go to a museum then have lunch at the other side of town then walk all the way back there just to pick up a postcard or something
- falling asleep on the sofa at camilla's with max periodically coming in to "cut our brains out"
- watching oscars highlights with jack and sally in front of the fire
- falling asleep to the sopranos every night
- nice e-mail from bárbara
- the windy walk to see the high tide
- hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows
- buying the m&s cardigan for my grandmother
- sitting at the park tavern working out our london itinerary
- boozy all-day lunch at nigel and madori's
- the pizza saul ordered when i was disoriented and exhausted
- breakfast at the portuguese place and 'flavour coffee'
- the tom hanks freebie at the entrance to madam tussaud's - best-kept secret in london
- getting mildly lost in london but seeing lena dunham as a result of it
- acknowledging my craving for chain sushi when faced with the overwhelming array of options that is central london, and having a very satisfying lunch
- being handed a newspaper by a silent, mysterious man when i didn't have anything to sit on to eat my sandwich in the rain
- jack's poached eggs
- taking the plunge and paying 20 quid to go inside westminster abbey, worth it
- iain nairn's description of those crazy, spanish (?) steps
- and what he says of 'one of the best views of london': 'pure fantasy'
- sneaking out to chicken cottage
- when o. came to sit next to us at the irish pub
- dancing to sports men!
- hugo yelling from across the room 'this is the best song of all time!'
- so much weird stuff that happened at clover's dinner party
- us standing on the wet roof is one of those images that shimmer around the edges
- not settling for yet another overpriced brunch place, persevering and finding a really great place for a coffee and a full english
- the beagle getting all wet in west hampstead
- going to the bfi on a rainy sunday and sitting at the mediathèque watching archive films
- then walking to the seven stars and settling in with a mezze and a cider, even though such simple pleasures so often cost half a kidney in london
- everyone singing along to chumbawamba, the kind of surreal just-rightness that's really the main reason i smoke weed
- stolen moments of bliss reading joan didion in the mornings
- three-way hotmail exchange with jack and kicks
- a whole rainy afternoon catching up on reading and work
- remembering how good nando's chicken liver rolls are
- operation ouch is amazing
- watching videos of jack and camilla as kids! the very special and unique feeling of seeing a loved one as a child. loving that child on video in such a strange and adorable way, a person you never met and at the same time the same person you know most intimately
- finishing the year of magical thinking on the toilet
- david's story about the oxbridge-bound pupil - "what do you mean by boundaries?", "i just didn't understand the question", "exactly! you didn't understand the question"
- stratford was a lot of dissociation but rich and meaningful in its own way, i'll be thinking about it for a while
- the pigeon curled up on top of the door frame at shakespeare's school
- falling asleep in the car, my brain a soup of free association, waking up at the mcdonald's in bognor, and how that quarter pounder hit the spot like no other
- staying in and reading the captain is out to lunch on my last day in the uk
- the guy next to us on the flight watching clifford the big red dog, laughing his ass off at everything, how enthusiastically he addressed everyone on the flight, his pantomime trying to call an attendant
- jack getting a high score on the trivia game and celebrating with a norwegian beer, he got me a hot chocolate
- coming home and seeing the cats
- morning coffee at the pigeon problem place on carnival monday felt like a 'welcome home' moment, a good one
- watching the samba school results and getting drunk at pierot
- cheering at edifício master, drunk
- binge-watching love is blind in two days, mostly drunk, pausing all the time to theorise and point out random details
feb 1 2020 ∞
jan 18 2021 +