Transfixed by terror. But with tutu

Apologies to anyone who has already seen my costume on Facebook but I just wanted to show you quickly where we are so far with my outfit for UK Amateur Pole Performer.

Ignore the yoga mat. I love the corset but if I lose one single pound I shall slide straight out of it so I shall be mainlining digestives between now and the end of July. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it

I've ordered a big feathery mask from Ebay (what could go wrong there??!!) and now I'm working on my routine. If you've ever choreographed anything, well, to start with you're a better person than me, but, it's difficult, isn't it?

It is striking me (again, too late) that competing in UK Amateur Pole Performer might be a bit scary. Indeed: I am shit scared. That's the technical term. But at least I have a marvellous tutu. Could I get away with gold body glitter, do you think? (I imagine I won't be allowed anything that will rub off on the pole).

Last weekend I did a couple of pole dance workshops in Shoreditch. Last week, I took people into dark corners and corridors and insisted on showing them the resulting bruises, because there was one on my hip that swelled up just like an egg and it was very exciting. One of the workshops was in slightly ratty-looking dance studio behind a sex magazine (I know I sound like Alan Partridge), where you have to climb up a fire escape and it all looks a bit unpromising. As I climbed the fire escape, with my pole shoes, half litre bottle of Evian and my liquid chalk in a little bag dangling from my wrist, I did have a moment of thinking, what am I doing? I am 38. I have a veg box. I ought to be at home ringing the gardener (I know) about what we're going to do with the back bit near the shed, not wandering about up Shoreditch fire escapes considering whether I ought to buy a size down on my stripper heels.

But then it came to me. I am a Seeker. I look for new experiences. I look for new things to learn. And sometimes things grab me and sometimes they don't and sometimes the things that grab me are not necessarily the ones I might have chosen in the cold light of day. I think it's probably a good thing to be a Seeker and I'm not just going about looking for trouble. What do you think? (I have got to ring the gardener tomorrow, though).

Once I ran to you. Now I run from you.

Well, readers, the other weekend I did my first race. Yes: I am now a runner. I trot round the streets behind our house for 30 minutes very, very slowly three times a week (my colleague said ‘well, if you’re running in Arbury, at least you’ll learn to run fast’ but I do not listen because actually Arbury is not as bad as people think it is, and the streets behind our house are very nice. The street with our house on isn’t nice, but you can’t have everything.) When I say I run slowly, I am not exaggerating. Today I was overtaken by a woman in a pink anorak with bags of shopping, and often cats wander past me and look at me thoughtfully. Anyway, as I often have more enthusiasm and chutzpah than sense and experience (remind me to tell you about Dan’s and my projected trip to Warsaw!!!) I felt that running along a flat street for 30 mins slower than a woman carrying shopping bags was excellent preparation for fell running. Indeed: I felt that in being able to run for 30 minutes I had so far exceeded my own personal expectations that I might as well enter the Olympics or jump off the University Library and fly to John Lewis, as anything seemed possible.

It was not.

I am going to try to extract a moral from this, readers. I did the race (5 miles with a 600 foot hill) with my brother Dan and his friend J, and our first clue that all might not be well was when we got to the beginning. I was expecting children. I was expecting people dressed as chickens. I was expecting, ooh, I don’t know, a hot dog stand, at least 5 octogenarians, someone with a Labrador wearing a themed jerkin, but no. What we got was a gaggle of sinewy men in lycra and women in team vests stretching their thighs out and running backwards and forwards just for fun. The only person who looked remotely less fit than me was the St John’s Ambulance man. Everybody set off twice as fast as I was used to, and when I came to my first hill I made like a Dalek and kind of gave up. I considered taking a short cut and going to wait for Dan and J in the pub but then I thought, no! I am not a quitter!!! (This is where I always go wrong). So I pushed on and I came last. I mean, I didn’t come last by a tiny bit. I came last by a decent margin (apart from all the people who did not finish or indeed, did not even start).

 

A hill in Derbyshire. The thing to do is to make sure you don't run up it

So I said to Dan we would do the same race next year but this time I would train and would do something called Fartleks which apparently are nothing like they sound, much like Burpees aren’t and I don’t know why you can’t call exercises something sensible. So Dan said, we could do that. Or, alternatively, we could do this killer half marathon and it would be lots of fun. So now I am doing a really hard half marathon this time next year, I have suckered in my friend too, and Partner is practically considering getting power of attorney to stop me making independent decisions as it is certain that no good can come of any of this. So here is my dilemma. Obviously I should be ashamed that I came last. I should be humiliated. I should give up. But I kind of… am not ashamed. I kind of.. forget about the coming last part and think, I did a 5 mile fell run! Very slowly!! I finished it! I didn’t die! I am a runner! I am amazing! I am going to buy new trainers and a proper sports bra so I don’t have to strap myself down with layers of lycra! I am proud of myself! Even though I have absolutely nothing to be proud of. I even bought myself a reward for finishing my first race. Admire the practicality!

 

Czech crystal. I am so bad at buying practical things to wear that there are no words. I buy this and then I wear pants with holes in them and have one work cardigan. One!

One more thing (in terms of over-ambitious physical stuff). You may remember, I am competing in the UK Amateur Pole Performer heats this summer (only at beginner level. It will be ok). I am working on my routine, and I have got my song: Marilyn Manson’s cover of Tainted Love. This was my idea for a costume: tell me what you think. I thought I could do a kind of deconstructed punk-burlesque look. So I was thinking a corset like this which is very cheap:

some kind of either short tutu or frilly bloomers:

(I have to have very short bottoms so I have lots of leg flesh exposed to stick to the pole. You see, it’s glamorous), possibly additional feathers around the cleavage, some kind of feathered headband and a great deal of dramatic eye makeup, or, a venetian-type mask if I could see enough to dance:

All deconstructed a bit (bits of ratty lace added? Dyed? Not sure yet).

How does that sound? I’m slightly concerned about my capacity for dancing in a corset: I thought perhaps I could buy it in advance and try it in the comfort of my own home which will finish off the window cleaner if he appears with his Squeegee at the wrong moment but tant pis. And in any case if I collapse through asphyxiation or bang my head on the pole and knock myself out because I can't see in that bit where he goes ‘once I raaaaaan to you. Now I RUUUUUN FROM YOU!!!’ it couldn’t possibly be more embarrassing than the fell run. Except, there might be a YouTube video, though. Wait… O_O

Things I don't understand about the USA (linguistic)

I am down with the American language, I really am, or at least I try to be. I understand that pants are trousers, pantyhose are tights, fanny is something quite different, a jumper isn't a jumper but some kind of bizarre pinafore, all of these things. Moreover I know that you cannot let your cat out lest it is eaten by a coyote, there are not as many pavements as in the UK, and you can have your post collected by putting it in your own individual postbox and not going to the post office or a red postbox (I find that very odd),

I can crochet in American and I understand that a double crochet is a treble. I can even bake in American because I have little cups which I bought from Lakeland Plastics, even though I find it an incomprehensible system because the flour goes everywhere whereas if you use scales you can just pour everything in the same bowl and a cake appears eventually.

I am crocheting this in American. I am bilingual

However there is one thing I do not understand and I would like someone to explain it to me because whenever someone says it I think they are just wrong and I want to tell them, and, as we all know, that way misery lies.

When you are trying to convey that you do not care about something/ someone, in Britain you would say, I could not care less. This is because, you could not care less, because you already care absolutely nothing. That is the point. You cannot care less than nothing. You cannot care a negative amount (well perhaps you can but for the purposes of this argument we need to agree that you can't. Just agree with me. Thanks).

However, when I see US people say this online, possibly about the fact that Knitpicks does not ship to Scotland or something else, sometimes they say, I could care less. I have seen enough people say it to make me think it is an actual saying and not a mistake. But, if you could care less, that means you must care more than nothing! You must care a bit! You are saying, I care at least a bit and possibly a huge amount about this thing, as my language is utterly ambiguous even while I think I am conveying disapproval, disinterest, and possibly contempt!

How does this work? Am I wrong? Is there a level of meaning I have not been appreciating? Please tell me so that I do not ever get myself into pointless linguistic arguments and annoy people on the internet any more than I already do.

And one more video quickly (I have been looking for ideas for my routine).

I love this woman's work, I think she's fabulous. There are {clears throat, gathers blog readers in cross-legged posture around self} two different schools of pole dancing, I feel, one of which focuses more on the athletic side and one of which focuses on it as a sensual dance. I think she is more of the sensual dance type (although her pole tricks are just fantastic), which is interesting. I actually think that although it is arguable anyway that pole started in strip clubs (do you know, I wonder if I feel a thesis coming on), certainly strip clubs have been part of the evolution of it, and although there are (very sensibly) moves to get it away from that and give it a wider audience (because pole does not have to have anything at all to do with stripping, any more than, say, gymnastics or ballet do), I also think it's nice to acknowledge and transform (and not reject) the work of women who do it in a different context. I do.

I feel myself moving inexorably and possibly unhelpfully into post-feminist thinking here, so I shall go down and get a muesli bar, but, I also wanted to say, what I also love about this video is the music, by Lucinda Williams. I love it! I love it so much I downloaded the album (also on ITunes obvs) and listened to it on my way to Hot Yoga which was a particularly exciting class because it overran and two people fainted. I love her voice. (Dan - google UK tour dates, see where she is this summer, think on...)

Alpacas and cats make it better

Dan has sent me a photo of some of his neighbours to cheer me up about the beanbag. Duly cheered. Thanks Dan x,

These alpacas are arranged perfectly. Have they been choreographed?

And I have been looking at pole dancing videos on YouTube (pole coming NEXT WEEK) and a hitherto unexpected potential problem has presented itself:


This will probably be my luck. I had better perfect my cat-dragging-away-from-pole technique, because it will surely be needed...

Tell me this wasn't a mistake

But I've just ordered my very own pole for at home. It'll be fine! We can put it in the kitchen! You can take them down quickly!

{Eeeeeek flail}

Irritated and sharing

V quick post. I have been intending to share with you the enormous fun I had at my recent fan dancing class but thought I ought to do a Proper, Well-Thought Out post with research and opinions, hence have just googled 'burlesque and feminism', read a couple of old Guardian articles (and the comments...) and absolutely lost the will to live. Then, in a fit of horrified masochism, I have just googled 'pole dancing and feminism', and got this beauty from 2010:

Actually, you won't find female empowerment halfway up a pole: David Mitchell

I actually remember reading this at the time (because I am a fully paid-up, muesli-eating, fairtrade-wearing vegetarian middle-class Cambridge graduate Guardian reader): it made me put pole dancing on my list of things to do. I'm mean that way. And generally I love David Mitchell, but, hmm: whence the vitriol, David? Perhaps you should examine that one.

I give you this gem (read it: you'll see I'm not cherry-picking):

Pole dancing is grim and I don't see anything empowering about learning it. Even if you say that it's just dancing and good exercise, surely it would be more empowering to learn a dance that can be employed in contexts other than strip clubs?

Because David has never been upside down up a pole, but I have (albeit very briefly, in case Lydia ever reads this ;-) ), I am now going to list for you the reasons I have found pole dancing genuinely empowering (although that is not a word I like):

1. Pole is pretty much the first exercise, apart from a bit of C25K, I did since I was 12. Now I do yoga, run, and am fairly fit, but only because of the initial motivation to get better at pole. When I am still fit enough to backpack round Goa when I am 70 I will have pole to thank.
2. Pole dancing is hard. It is really, really bloody hard. The instant you do it, you respect anyone else who does: anyone.
3. As I said above, pole dancing is hard (and let me emphasise that ;-) ) - every new move has felt like an achievement. Sometimes I look at people who annoy me in other contexts and think, yes, but, can you do an attitude spin?
4. I learned so much about my body from pole - what I can do easily, what I can't do at all, what I need to work on. I suppose I could have learned that from something nice like tennis. Guess what, though. I never did.
5. They may not all be like this, but, the classes I go to are great - supportive and friendly, and the teacher deserves a medal for putting up with me and my Inversion Issues. Not like the games teachers at school: see point 1.
6. Without doing pole, which I thought I would never be able to do at all, I would not have had the courage to explore dancing, burlesque, or theatre: and that would have been a shame.

I have a reasoned response to the article, and it is: fuck off, David Mitchell. I like you in other contexts, but: in terms of this article, even though it is three years old, you can fuck right off. Or, better, go and learn a few pole tricks (because actually, men do do it too), and then come back to me and tell me it's only for naive women who want men to ogle them. We'll talk when you've mastered Gemini.

Now I'm afraid you'll have to have my fan dancing post later this weekend without me engaging with feminism at all: I just don't have the energy. We'll just have to accept right from the start that I'm quite wrong for doing it at all (it wouldn't be the first time...)

Return of the mac

Well, people, I gave up blogging and now I am blogging again. My IT issues got the better of me – nothing was compatible with my computer any more and it was all just exhausting blah blah blah first world problem. Anyway it turned out there is a solution, which is, to ring up the Apple store and just try not to cry so loudly at the point where you have to give your credit card number that they can’t hear it to put the payment through. So now I have this huge flashy monstrous thing and it is not the same as the old computer blah blah blah first world problem again to which I was emotionally attached, even though it did not actually work any more. Anyway it is all fine, because I have Apple Technical Support and I am going to ring them tomorrow and say, I cannot understand Chrome and why won’t it scroll and what the hell is this thing where if you catch the mouse at the wrong angle everything wiggles and I cannot find the hard drive. I am not a person who likes technical things. This is only Partner’s and my third computer ever, and the first was a Mac Classic. So I am gritting my teeth through the inexplicable wiggling and calling of things ‘launchpad’ – why so? Have Apple mistaken me for Sheldon? Because at least I can load up blogger now and that is an improvement. And now we will be able to watch videos of cats on the internet without going off and making a cup of tea in the middle while it thinks about its buffering. I’ll be fine soon. It’s just taking some getting used to (seriously I know I shouldn’t moan about having a spanking new Apple),

Anyway, any quick developments since you saw me last. Ooh actually here’s one I would have told you if I’d had IT: I’m still Poling, and I’m in the UK Amateur Pole Performer heats in Hertford this July. No, seriously, you read that correctly. Just in case you are now sucking your teeth and thinking oh no this will end badly, it is ok: I am only competing at Beginner level where I spin and do not go upside down, but honestly I do think that is enough of a challenge. I am trying to work towards the splits for my routine, but I am still a way off yet and also something terrible happened to my right hamstring in Pigeon pose yesterday so I don’t know. I have to have a costume of at least hotpants and a crop top, so we are provisionally working on the idea of sequined hotpants and a fuckload of makeup and I am secretly having thoughts about peacock feathers. Any suggestions, don’t be shy: I am going to use this as the music for my routine. I think it will work well (imagine me body rolling to ‘et puis, je fuuuuuuuume’).

You remember I bleached my hair? I’ve just gone pillarbox red with a tiny hint of new romantic in the cut – it looks very cool I think.

That hand's actually attached to me and my face isn't blue! The shelf is quite untidy though. And you see those pictures? I DID THEM

I am too old: I don’t care. I did check at work that there was no dress code: I could see in their eyes that the honest answer to that was, we haven’t needed one until we acquired you how did this happen,

This is entirely and utterly the fault of Vivianne from Kismet’s Companion, who put the thought into my innocent and credulous head many moons ago and who I imagine must feel horribly guilty: I may have attended a burlesque lesson in London. I may be attending a fan dancing lesson in a week or so. I may be considering doing a course of burlesque lessons later on this year. Hmm. Burlesque. It was kind of sort of one of those things that you do and it is like, **mind blown** – I may do a blog post about this one and the Feminist Implications thereof (oh yes!!!) – yes I think I shall,

I’m still doing physical theatre. I signed up for another term. I’m still vegetarian. I’m not going to say anything about Horse Burgers. I’m still with Partner. I’m still distressingly pursued by our feline brethren (mrrrrrooooowwwww!!!). I gave up taking photos because I couldn’t share them and now I shall start again. I can do a headstand now but only against a pole and in a low-ceilinged room (I don’t know why) so Cirque Du Soleil haven’t been in touch quite yet. There, people, that’s me for you. Hello again!

And am I still knitting with all this going on, you may ask? Mais oui, although I have to say I’m not finishing much: but I’ve got a few things on the go I’d like to show you. I’m charging the camera up now for future use. God! It’s like having proper technology again!

Coming to inversions

I have found somewhere with wi-fi and a plug and I am going to attempt to update my blog with PICTURES, hooray, before I have to dash off to buy yet another aubergine before I meet my friend for lunch, you see the glamour of my life. Firstly, however, there is a deeply unfortunate development I'm afraid I have to tell you about.

I have changed jobs, and I now have a job where I am supposed to roll up reasonably on time looking professional and say things like 'and have we factored that in to the project plan'. What actually happens is that I roll up looking just on the relatively acceptable edge of bizarre and fight over the coffee in the machine AND WIN (memo to self, try to cut down). I am not helped, however, by some particularly vocal harrassment I encounter along my route. And I can't avoid it! There's no other way! That's the way I have to go past!

Why hello

This is Bad Stripy Cat. This cat strides out and shouts at me when I pass him. Sometimes he shouts at me when I am 10 metres away and because I am an idiot I shout back. 'Mrrrrrrrrrooooooow! Mrooooooooowwwww!' he shouts, furiously, and I call out, hello kittycat what's going on with you today and then we have a conversation.

Me: What on earth is it, puss cat?

Cat: Mmmmmrrrrrrrooooww! (Furiously)

Me: Are you alright? What's going on?

Cat: Mrow mrow mrow mrow MMMMMRRROOOWWW!

Me, sympathetically: Poor Pusscat! Did they really?

Cat: Mrow!

Me: I've got to go to work now. I'll see you later.

Cat: MMMMMMMMrrrrrrrrrroooooooooowwww.

Me: Don't make me feel guilty. I've got a busy day. I've got to go!

Cat: Mrow. (sulkily)

Sometimes passers by join in. That is how loud this cat is. I mean, I am not easily embarrassed, but the whole situation is just very difficult. Because I am an utter sucker, and it now happens to me so often that cats just stride out and shout at me as I am passing innocently, I perform a brief health check while I am stroking them in case they are unhappy. I have a white pussycat friend on another road who I think is too thin, and once I flagged down his neighbour (no, really, I did) and quizzed her about the cat's medical history so I could judge if I needed to put the cat in my bag and rescue it or not. She was a very middle-class lady with fuschia lipstick. The cat is fine. It is old and has a longstanding medical condition for which it is under the care of a vet. Bad Stripy Cat, however, was fat, warm and sleek. I do not know what he is trying to tell me. I do not know.

Quilt of boringness

This is my quilt I am making. It is the Quilt Of No Brain. It is 6.5 inch squares joined together and I am going to add a pink border and then I am going to wrestle with batting and swear. I have so many quilts and blankets on my bed at the moment that one day I will probably be discovered smothered under them and then who will Bad Stripy Cat have to shout at in the mornings, hey?

And finally I wish to report an utter triumph. This is the move I am working towards on pole at the moment (picture from this book – this is an expensive but helpful book).

Imagine me with gritted teeth shouting 'no it's ok, I think I'm locked on'

Actually, I can do this move, I just do it in a ratty tshirt rather than a bikini and I have a tortured expression and someone has to hold my head so I don't drop on my neck and break it, which would be unideal. However, this is the move I NEED TO BE ABLE TO DO BEFORE I CAN MOVE TO THE ADVANCED CLASS:

I don't even know why this pig is so hard. I think I approach it in a limp-wristed feeble manner

Readers, it has been agonising and I am not there yet. Every week I whimper at the mention of inversions. It has not even been that I am nearly there, I am just so completely wrong that I thought I would have to give up and get another hobby which did not involve chalking my inner thighs. However, last night I nearly managed it – I touched my legs above my head on the pole and I think I have got the right action. So I feel there will be inversions in my future. Inversions! I am going to open the biggest bottle of champagne you have ever seen when I have managed it. I am chuffed with myself. It has taken some perseverance. Again I muse on why I chose such a difficult sport but there we go. Perhaps it chose me?

In My Hands

When I was younger (in those innocent halcyon days) I only ever thought of my hands in terms of whether or not they were attractive and if any of my nails were broken, which was obviously a disaster of epic proportions, oh the naivety of youth. Nowadays I am much, much more paranoid about my hands, but I do not care any more what they look like, in fact I would not care if they suddenly became green and hairy (well, I suppose I might a bit). No: I am paranoid about getting cuts, burns or other injuries, as I am always doing so much with my hands that it is just so inconvenient to have them out of action. The other night there was a bit of an injudicious moment with a piece of hot aubergine and I was completely furious with myself, but luckily I have no blisters (not as bad as the time I put my finger in hot fudge. Don’t ever do this. Learn from my mistakes).

OK so I bleached my hair so I look the part, but it turns out you actually have to practice your chord changes as well. So bourgeois

These are my roughened and calloused fingertips from playing the guitar. I do not know if my guitar just fights back more than other people’s, but, I get actual string indentations in my fingers which last for days. The fingertip issue is my least favourite thing about guitar playing (it’s going very well, thank you for asking). I find it strange and creepy having reduced feeling in the fingers of my left hand. Actually, if I stopped to think about it too much, I might panic and run around the house squawking. Also, I do not know how this can be and I am sure I must be wrong, but, it does not seem to me that there can be many people who both play guitar and knit lace out of laceweight silk, because, when you knit lace with very thin slippy yarn you kind of have to flick the yarnovers with your left hand sometimes to separate them out as they get mixed up on the needle (do you know what I mean?), and, this is more difficult to do when your left hand fingertips are knackered and a bit numb, as are mine. I feel if this were a common problem there would be some kind of a product for it. At work we have a Special Rubber Knobbly Finger Thing for when we are counting out sheets of thin paper. Perhaps something like this would be a good idea, but then, I don’t know how I would get it to stay on, so perhaps I will leave the Special Rubber Knobbly Finger Thing in its Special Place behind the till.

Note to self, next time use more dry talc as hot skin on metal does not go well. I bet this kind of thing never happened to Anastasia

Blister from pole dancing: I took the top level of skin off. I have bruises as well, all over my knees and down the insides of my legs. I have been trying to get a good photograph for you but frankly I started to think that was a little odd, so I’m afraid you will just have to imagine. I recently found myself considering ways to ‘improve my upper body strength’ and pricing up – wait for it – gym memberships??!!!! (fyi, the YMCA seems to be relatively affordable although I stress the relatively - £10 a month?) as I had a vision of myself toning my biceps using some kind of a machine and then being able to hang upside down effortlessly from my pole. That sentence just there is top of my list of Things I Did Not Think I Would Ever Write. Readers, I am frightened: what if pole dancing is The Sport For Me? That would be crap, wouldn’t it? That would be far worse than falling in love with someone you shouldn’t fall in love with (as the song goes), because, experience tell me that I should not in any way underestimate my ability to domesticate & indeed render monogomous even someone utterly unpromising, but, I do certainly doubt my ability to fit a pole to the ceiling joist of our living room. In fact, the rooms in our house may literally not be wide enough to swing a cat in so what that says for me swinging round a pole with legs extended I leave to your imagination. I may go and google boxercise classes instead as this whole pole thing may be one of those things that do not end well. Anyway off to the pub to ponder these things further.

Out in the world in my Fairysteps shoes (fairysteps.co.uk) with the green laces. So comfy! I want a pair of the boots for winter but will have to rob a bank first! Don't worry though, I'll make sure I go for Barclays!

(It costs £150 for a pole. I do the research, so you don’t have to. You’d probably have to get someone to fit it, though. Good luck explaining that to a carpenter).

Saying thank you and a quick update

I am checking in to say thank you so much for all your comments on my last blog post, it was very encouraging. Also I wanted particularly to say to Sarah who said about that terrible sinking feeling you get when people want you to read their books that, yes, I understand completely and I know that feeling, because not only have people done that to me (I once didn’t get beyond the first line of someone’s novel, and yes, I still feel guilty) but I also used to read unsolicited manuscripts for an agent. And it was at this time in my life that I learned a very, very important lesson, which I should perhaps have applied in other contexts: if anyone ever asks you if you are broadminded, you say NO, because no good will ever come of saying yes. Just trust me on this one. If they have to ask, you are not close enough for your being broadminded to lead to any fun. I may think of a way to shorten that and put it on a tshirt.

I hate to be judgmental about wildlife but I really feel this might be the ugliest duck I have ever seen. Is it even a duck? We could not decide

Anyway, so I am going to get my novels up asap, and this is how we will do it: I will make them available, tell you when, and then we will never mention it again: you can read them, or not, as you feel, and I shall be happy and grateful to know that I have uploaded them with the potential of them being read one day by someone. I do not need to know if you have read them, I do not mind if you read the first page, think, NO, and go and eat biscuits or read Twilight, I do not mind if you hate every single one of my characters including the horse they collectively rode in on (there is no horse, this is a turn of phrase. There is a dog called Rex though, I had forgotten Rex) – this is all fine. We can move on. I will still love you. You can read my blog (or not). I have cat pictures. But thank you for your support, as it means a lot to me. X x x look, kisses for you all.

I cannot walk past black/brown/grey spots cat without her having a sniff round whatever I am carrying. Cat, in this bag is a canvas upon which I will paint a picture of Aunty Kath in which she looks as if she has been exhumed, which will cause all the art class to ask if she is as fierce as she looks, and me to reply, yes

I have realised there is a slightly depressing bit in the first novel, despite what I said, but I would like to reassure you that it all turns out fine in the end. Indeed, the only person I have allowed to read my novels who does not actually have to be nice to me as he is not bound by ties of blood/ affection/ mortgage said he ‘never realised I was such a cheerful person’. And that was his only comment (and I feel fairly secure in saying that cheeriness was not a quality he was ever going to admire me for). We have not discussed my novels since. I am saving that one for if I ever become famous for anything and you have to give examples, for an article in the Observer or similar, of when people in the past damned you with faint praise, as I bet no-one ever said that to Kafka.

(In other news: I am painting a picture of Aunty Kath and it is so bad I actually can’t show it to you. I am going to give it to her for Christmas and insist she hangs it somewhere really visible. Also, in an act of minor triumph this week, which is not an easy week, I managed to do this in pole dancing (with no hands). This does not look hard but it is, you have to grip very firmly with your thighs; however, when you have mastered it, you can start to do more complicated moves. Where will it end? I just keep thinking, as I add more kinds of spin to my repertoire and some floor moves like on the Pineapple Dance Studios programme, if things go really, really belly up and I have to look penury and despair right in the eye, which I actually might, although I shall not bore you with my Difficult Situation again, at least I have a marketable skill now! I will be fine).