London In The Snow

We get extreme weather in the UK, but not enough of it to justify air conditioning for the hot days and snow clearing gear for when it snows. As a result, when it snows, everyone has a day when it takes them three hours to get to work. These photographs were taken on the Sunday before that Monday. I just love it when the guard tells us that the driver is "going to reboot the train". Ctrl-Alt-Del and we're on our way again? It could only be England.

January 2013 Review

Eight per cent of the year over already. I finished January with a nasty bout of food poisoning that started the evening of Saturday 26th and had me on a telephone consultation with my GP late Monday morning after a visit to the Teddington Walk-In Centre. If you have never had food poisoning, you have no idea what I went through: if you have, you do. It leaves you weak, distrusting food, dehydrated and wondering if all of your life has been a vain effort at nothing. I cancelled a massage I had booked that Monday evening, got hit with a cancellation charge, told them to keep the appointment open and made it. I found out which muscles in my right arm were tense so that my right elbow was hurting, and that there was some knotted stuff in my left shoulder that made it a little unstable when bench-pressing. Not sure that the guy did much to fix it though. A couple of mornings later I woke up and my arm was tense and sore, which it hadn't been the previous night: aha! I'm clenching my fist in my sleep. I am going to be taping up my right hand lightly each night for a while to discourage it from clenching. 

I bought three new pairs of flat-front wool trousers and four blue shirts for work, all from T M Lewin, and it's a much cleaner look. The trousers are 37" waist, two inches thinner than the previous pairs I bought about three years ago. I got a decent haircut at Huckle The Barber to go with all that as well.

I shifted my eating habits: I have a sandwich at 11:00, take a lunch break at 13:00 when I buy another sandwich, but I don't eat it until 15:00. I don't feel as dopey in the early afternoon. Instead of sitting in a cafe, and despite the fact that it's been freaking cold, I've been taking some walks: it's really not that far down to the Thames and back and it makes me feel like I'm in the real world for a while.

I've talked about the preview visit to The Shard, with lunch at Mildred's in Soho afterwards, and let's add in Django Unchained, McCullin, Looper and Gangster Squad as well. Sis and I had our monthly supper at Skylon, and I had a month-end lunch at St John Bread and Wine, and I'm sure it wasn't the deep-fried rabbit that did the harm. Maybe the test results will show. 

I'm stuck on the Ezra Pound's final Cantos: the Pisan and later are nowhere near as comprehensible as the earlier ones. All that polyglot stuff is just showing off - like people who quote "from the original". As soon as those are done, I'm moving on to Musil to get one of my objectives started.

Training has been iffy because of the arms, and delayed by the food poisoning: you do not lift weights when de-hydrated. 

In summary, I have been experimenting with my daily routine until I can get more zip back, and I have done some stuff "just because".  The CV and agent mailing is pretty much drafted. I'm clearer on the terms I want to go back into dating and whatever else. I'm still not sure about the logistics, but I did give myself the first three months to sort this stuff out. 

And everything you have read about the benefits of magnesium oil rubbed on your skin (aka "topical magnesium") is true. Works for me. Not sure what 200mg is, but I put three spritzes on each leg and rub in. Leg because there's less between the skin and the bloodstream: don't want to be running it in on fat. Sleeping better and feeling... calmer, more whole.

Views From The Shard: Part Two

The owners were having trade-related folk through to debug the whole process and get the staff used to the procedures. The Shard is the only super-tall office building, along with the Heron Tower with an observation floor in London - you can't go up One Canada Square, and the Heron Tower and Tower 42 aren't quite in the same league. The lifts whizz up in two stages and the final ascent is made by stairs. You can go out into the open air, as you could on the World Trades, but I found it all a bit too exciting when I tried - I've had my feet on the ground for too long and I'm not good with heights any more. People were playing "Spot the landmark" and "I can see my flat from here", and on a clear day I'm fairly sure I could see Hilltop House. Not that Saturday, as it was all a little misty as well as being very cold and windy. We stayed up there over an hour and barely noticed the time passing.