Week 2: Go Mammoth Circuits

Highlights:

• School electronic gates complete with Stephen Hawkins intercom
• Tyrone the instructor being the only man in the world to work the 3/4 length trouser over leggings look
• The it-must-be-worth-it muscle ache of not being able to get out of the bed normally for a week

Having sacked off my expensive gym membership, caught up in the heady delights of Dodgeball and with the seductively subtle marketing talk of Go Mammoth’s Fitness Manager James, Jolly Dodgerettes Abbie and I had enrolled on the Tuesday night Circuits class in Stockwell (this). Yes, you heard. 100% a good idea. Not one horror story of senior-school circuit training where you couldn’t even do one pull up and you got hit in the face by a medicine ball came to mind. Hello ripped abs and Amazonian strength; we look forward to meeting you.

With a full belly of carb-y pasta, last week (our first class) we hadn’t quite left ourselves enough time to get to the venue. It took us about five minutes to work out local parking, and then ten minutes to work out how to break into the school where the class was held. We eventually found a gate and were patched through an intercom system (with a Stephen Hawkins ‘You. Are. Now. Being. Transferred’ message) to the 24h receptionist (mental! Even my office isn’t manned beyond 5.30pm). After going through the electronic gates, we walked to the main block and signed in. If I’m honest, I was slightly disappointed that this wasn’t one of those schools that had metal detectors on entry. Bloody sensational media! Letting me think that all South London yoofs carried knives and wanted to stab me up so that they could join a gang called All Bout Money*, and schools were now just prisons and teachers over-qualified riot police. Ridiculous. If it’s not true in Stockwell, I don’t think it’s true anywhere.

So that week we arrived with mere tenths of a second before the class started, un-stretched and Abbie with a full bladder. Lesson learnt, Stockwell.

This week we arrived twenty minutes early, and raced over to the fitness studio block to prepare for the class. With the fishy smell of another 24h receptionist’s dinner lurking in the air, we stood lunging/stretching/chatting on the stairs until the Go Mammoth Boxfit class finished. An Australian teacher and classmate turned up and after a brief chat about Caitlin Moran, we watched in disbelief as in Mary Poppins bag/Tardis style, person after person left the studio in what seemed to number bodies well and truly beyond the room's capacity. Perhaps Boxfit was actually some sort of survival of the fittest fist fight for access to the limited amount of air in the studio?

Instructor Tyrone must have quickly swept the oxygen-deprived Go-Mammothers into the cupboard, because the floor was clear when we entered and the only evidence of the hunger games battle was a few open windows with survivors standing by, victoriously breathing in the fresh air.

This was only mine and Abbie’s second week of Circuits, as we’d signed up slightly late to the classes and had nervously joined on week 3 fearing that we’d enter a room full of committed triathletes and sports fanatics who would scoff at our pitiful attempts at a press-up and would have furthered the already gaping fitness gap with those two extra sessions under their maxi-muscle belts. But after an amazing workout, with an enthusiastic and carefree instructor (Ty) and friendly group of Go-Mammothers of varying fitness levels, we were well up for our second week, and the fourth official week.

There were a few less attendees than week 3 but given that our aches from that class had only just subsided (if this were an arrested development episode, it would flick to footage of me repeatedly attempting to lift myself into a sitting position in bed two mornings later, before having to roll onto my front and fall sideways onto the floor, and of Abbie having to be dressed by her boyfriend because she couldn’t get her arms to work) we presumed the muscles of others had put up better protests than our own and were imprisoning their eager-to-work-out bodies to comfy sofas and forcing them to watch bad TV. Tyrone gave us a high-five when Abbie announced her surprise that we’d made two classes in a row before we got down to business and started warming up.

The warm up was different from the previous week (when we’d used skipping ropes) and as the class progressed, we subtly noticed that the instructor had taken everything up a notch, forcing us to all push ourselves a little harder. He went through various circuits, each focussing on something different (be it power, biometrics, resistance or cardio) and being long enough to cause you a little pain, but short enough that you don’t start praying to God to KILL YOU NOW. As a small, insider tip, I found the easiest way to stay focussed was to count the number of repetitions you were doing, rather than spending the 1m work-out wondering how on earth life would ever be the same again and wondering if Tyrone needed the battery in his watch replaced because you’ve clearly been doing lunges from a bench for FIVE HOURS NOW ALREADY.

I won’t reveal the structure of the class, as one of the best parts of the first week was not knowing when the circuits were going to end, and the euphoric relief when Tyrone changed the pop music (which I say with absolute delight is not the sort of dance shi*e that you get at a spinning class) to some calmer numbers for a quick abdominal workout and the warm down.

We're by no means uber fit. Aside from Go Mammoth Dodgeball, Abbie cycles to Uni and I run home from work once a month. And so whilst effective and tough, we found the class in no way intimidating or suited only to the mega fit. The instructor is encouraging, without having to resort to aggressive TOUGH LOVE and doesn't bring group attention on you when you're struggling. In fact, it's such a personal work out and about individual effort that you can't focus on anything but trying to coordinate a press-up hand clap without falling on your face or fighting not to accidentally star-jump backwards into the wall. If you ever are struggling, Tyrone will just come and quietly do the moves next to you to keep you on pace, and when explaining the moves in each circuit, generously lets you ogle his strong, sculpted arm muscles and toned body do the moves for a few minutes without making you feel like a trench-coated man at a children’s playground.

*Note, ABM is actually a real gang, and gang culture amongst children is not something to joke about. I think Dappy and that Bloods and Crips documentary have taught us that.

Day 129: London

Highlights:

• Wellcome Collection people watching
• Death: A Self Portrait, and particularly 
• Argentinian Collective Mondongo
• Subversive Spanish painter, Francisco Goya

Sitting in the Wellcome Collection cafe was an experience itself with its impressively diverse clientele. I sat with a coffee watching the raised eyebrows and smirks of the middle-aged woman opposite me clearly discovering the S&M delights of 50 Shades of Gray; the old guy to my left peering through his glasses at his touch screen phone whilst adjusting the cord that held them around his neck; two modern vikings with woolly coats walking past talking in a Scandinavian language and finally a 20-something guy dressed like a backpacking Crocodile Dundee. It was the finest visitor crowd that a European museum could offer. 

The glasses cord old guy next to me had a friend who was clearly a journalist. After discussing how newspapers should be bound by the shit-loads of stalker legislation currently in existence, he told a story about an article he'd recently written about a man who had called the police to report that his neighbour had stolen all of his plant pots. The police arrived at the neighbour's house later that afternoon and said if the plant pots weren't returned in 24 hours, they'd have to arrest him. So the guy returned the plant pots. Probably like you, I admit I was expecting a twist in this story and so was a little disappointed to find out that the whole purpose of the story was that sometimes police are good, quick to respond and use common sense. I suppose his point was just an extension of his criticism of media and the ridiculous sensationalism of modern journalism. I openly eavesdropped until they stood up, put on almost matching Canadian Mountain hats (like this), and left.

 

Abbie arrived a little later and after she’d eaten we lurked in the foyer waiting for her speech therapy mates; Canadian Kira and Chaotic Clare*. I picked up the Wellcome Trust guide and on the first page I opened, slap bang in the middle was new Dodgeball team mate and friend Ben Thompson, sporting the stylish cardigan/exposed socks and brogues look:
 

I mean, we knew he worked at the Wellcome Trust, but we presumed his science writing work kept him desk bound rather than allowing him time to pursue his museum brochure modelling career. Abbie sent him a ‘who’s this handsome devil?’ email and we sacked off waiting for her mates and just went into the exhibition.

We’d seen adverts over London for the past few months, but didn’t know a great deal about the actual exhibition other than that it was entitled ‘Death’ and we’d liked how that looked in our diaries (“Oh Thursday evening? No, I’m sorry, I’ve got an appointment with Death then”). But I impressed even myself when literally the first piece we examined, a photo of a skull-topped cane, I already knew the entire biography of the photographer. Complete fluke, but a few years ago when I was on a wave of reading musician biographies, I read Just Kids by Patti Smith, an account of her first serious relationship, which happened to be with tortured artist Robert Mapplethorne. He and Patti broke up owing to his commitment to being homosexual, though remained emotionally connected until he died of AIDS in 1989. I imagine the inevitability of his death at that time was the reason for the move away from BDSM art to photos like this skull cane, and his inclusion in the room titled ‘Contemplating Death’. 

The exhibition was nicely curated, with each room presenting a different stage of approaching, experiencing or coming to terms with death. We were examining a painting of the Good Man and the Bad Man, which indicated how the level of purity in your life will dictate the manner of your death (basically, don’t drink or have wild sex, kids. You’ll die like the baddie in Patrick Swayze’s ‘Ghost’) when Dodgeball Dr Ben turned up. He gave us a useful express tour of the good stuff in the exhibition (or at the least the stuff he knew a little about) and with his Wellcome Trust staff identity pass, we felt like we were hanging with a VIP. In the next room, the highlight was this incredible plasticine skull made by Argentinian Collective ‘Mondongo’. It’s so intricate and made up of such a large number of popular culture references, there’s no way any photos online do it any justice. You really should go see it yourselves. We’re talking Pacman meets A Clockwork Orange. 
 

The next room was called ‘Violent Death’ and mainly consisted of art about war, by Jacques Callot, Otto Dix and Francisco Goya. I’m mentioning these names in a way that suggests I knew who they were. I really didn’t. I’d completely peaked at Robert Mapplethorne. But later that evening, attempting to be a proper socially-aware grown-up, I was downloading some Radio 4 podcasts and stumbled across ‘Great Lives’ and a podcast specifically about Goya. Using the selection process of what to learn that I’d developed on my trip around Europe (whereby if the same thing coincidentally appears twice or more in a short space of time, I’ll read up on it) I figured I should have a listen. So turns out Goya was a Spanish painter whose works were pretty subversive and at times risque (he painted a nude woman with pubes. Goya, you ruddy devil). The podcast explained his progression through royal and noble courts, and his reliance on his wife Josefa as a sometimes muse and as a carer after he went deaf and suffered a mental breakdown. Over his lifetime, his non-commissioned work became pretty macabre, and it was some images from his series entitled ‘The Disasters of War’ that were in the Wellcome Collection. These were relatively miserable, though Otto Dix was probably a bit more disturbing and this was presumably because he’d actually been a soldier during WW1 and so all of his paintings were versions of his memories on the battlefield. Pretty dark. 

In later rooms there were some clever paintings with scenes that could also be viewed as skulls if you looked at them the right way (called ‘metamorphic postcards’, apparently. See here), and some sculptures, models and mexican puppets as well as some random photos of people holding skulls (and I use random in the correct sense; the curator Richard Harris had just found a selection of photos of unknown people who were holding skulls in their holiday snaps). Abbie liked the Victorian photograph of some science students standing next to a skeleton on a table, all typically unsmiling even as the guy on the end turns the skull to look at the camera. 
 

The last room contained an infographic about death and the causes of death during 20th century. Those Chinese have got a lot to answer to apparently. Two civil wars and then all that communism? Rotters. We were discussing non-communicable diseases when Chaotic Clare, Canadian Kira and Toe-Shoe Matt turned up. After briefly looking at the bone chandelier (see the timelapse installation of that here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TioV1BWjiyM) Abbie and I went to the permanent collection upstairs as they looked around, though called it a day after looking at the mummified man and the extracted, preserved tattooed skin of some 19th century LADS (minging). 

I figure if I end this post with the following, I’ll look look a prop-ah writer:

Death: A Self Portrait, curated by Richard Harris, is displaying at the Wellcome Collection in London until Sunday 24th February.

*A week doesn’t pass without Abbie coming home with a story about how Clare has lost something important, forgotten about an exam or locked herself INSIDE her own flat. I’m impressed how she happily functions in such chaos. 

Day 70: Camber Sands to Hamstreet to Ashford to London

Highlights:

• Taxi driver from Hamstreet to Ashford
• Showering
• Going Dark at The Young Vic

There was a somewhat optimistic check-out time of 10am. I managed to get the ball rolling and started clearing up the jelly and mulled wine remnants of the previous day. I took our keys to the pirate ship to check out; this formal process consisting of our keys just being dumped in a pile with no ticking off of the number on them. Pontins just about does ATP (though it really was a brilliant weekend. The best sort of festival you can imagine).

Chris Bunting from Farnham offered to drive us to Rye, if we didn't want a lift all the way to Guildford. We picked the former, though due to some poor navigation on his part we ended up in Hamstreet in Kent. He gave us both hugs goodbye, and thanked us for our hospitality and welcoming natures. We didn't share contact details. 

Turns out Hamstreet has an extremely irregular train service, and the next train was coming from Rye with (we expected) a packed carriage of ATP goers. We decided to try the bus, though just as we were walking to the bus stop, one pulled out. The next bus wasn't for 50minutes. We truly were in the middle of nowhere. We called a cab, and a nice Ashford local came to pick us up. He was a United fan, as his only football influence as a youngster was from his Uncle who lives up North. Definitely not a glory hunter; did you know that Manchester United were relegated in the 70s? This guy supported them throughout. He dropped us at Ashford International with some useful stats; it's only 50 miles to London from Ashford and this new Hi-Speed train takes 36minutes. I jumped off the train at Stratford International and left Paddy to go to King's Cross. He needed to get home quick to sleep, ahead of going to 'the Ryder Cup of Pool' at York Hall in Bethnal Green. Yeah, it exists: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosconi_Cup.*

I arrived home and SHOWERED. I spent the afternoon unsubscribing myself from all the remaining mailing lists I'd been added to when I entered those competitions in late November. I received a message from my friend Lucy showing me the headline about the Facebook party in Billericay. It was on her old road, Pauline Gardens and just seems a little extreme for suburban Billericay. The article is a tad confusing (here) as it seems to suggest the mum was there for the entire party and continued to let guests in even though the house was being completely trashed. Still, I've promised Abbie and Tony that when they're away for New Year I DEFINITELY WON'T hold a Facebook party at our flat. Definitely. 

Tony came home from a long day at the Studio (11-3pm, then a few beers in the pub) and invited me to the theatre in place of his original date, Ian. Ian works at a company which (I think) consults theatres on sets, lighting and sound for their shows, and they fund him to buy a number of tickets for plays each month as research. He had to pull out last minute to fulfil Dad duties and as Abbie was out, I was third choice to go see 'Going Dark' at The Young Vic (promo photo below). 

We caught a bus which (despite usually including this mundane information in my blog posts) I understand is not at all comment-worthy, except that I think it was the first time I've ever seen Tony on a bus. It was pretty harrowing. Whilst I tried to point out the viewing benefits of the top deck and seeing London in a different way etc., Tony just seemed frustrated that we had to stop to pick strangers up. You don't have to do that in a car apparently. We had the front seats of the top deck though. Just like a couple of year 7s before they get moved on by the older kids. We got there just in time before Tony had a complete meltdown. Abbie's since told me that you have to tell him it's a big red taxi. It's the only way to make it acceptable to him. 

There's a really nice bar above the Young Vic theatre, which I'm not sure if you all know. It's called The Cut and is just quite comfortable, friendly and does a good selection of wines, cocktails and food. Good for dates, I think. There were three plays showing that night though I hadn't realised the theatre had so many different rooms. I've only ever been to the main one before, the last time being to see Bingo with Patrick Stewart (who I unrealistically assumed I'd share a taxi with back to Bermondsey; he owns a pied-à-terre there, you know). Going Dark is being shown in The Maria Theatre. As it was all a little last minute, I had very little info about the play beyond Ian's comments that a lot of it was actually in the dark and it was about the Cosmos. You're advised to leave your coats and bags outside as you had to keep them on your laps during the 75minute performance (presumably for health and safety as people could trip over them in the dark)**. There are lights under each seat to guide you on the way in, but as soon as the performance starts, the room goes completely black. You can't even see your hand in front of you, and there's not even faint light for your eyes to adjust to. 

So, Going Dark is written by Hattie Taylor with assistance from Sound&Fury to really make some powerful connections between the plot and the audio and visual experience. It's a one man play, though there's a recorded voice for another character at various points during the production. As the light came and went, you could see audience members peering to see if there was an actor behind this voice. It really is an incredible show. The limited light, this great actor (and at one point, dancer) and all the sounds around you, alongside some substantial 'accidental learning' about the Cosmos make it well worth going. One of the strongest, most unique shows I've seen in a long time. I left with more knowledge of the astronomy than I EVER picked up at school and wanting to star gaze, though sadly in London we could only see one star. But I now know how to find Polaris (follow the two stars on the front of the plough and it's the constant, though fainter than you'd imagine, star not far ahead), know that Sirius is the brightest star in the sky, with only two planets being brighter (Venus and Jupiter) and know that Orion's armpit is called Beetlejuice. I also know how and why stars turn into Supernovas and that the nearest next galaxy (which can mainly be seen as a blur in your peripherals just below the second 'V' of Cassiopeia) is called Andromeda. I'm not going to use all my knowledge now. Saving that for dinner parties over the coming months. Watch out for my astronomy chat, guys.

We caught the tube back (I could literally feel the relief pour out of Tony) with a greater awareness of sound over vision. I came up with a project for tomorrow's blog. 

End of day 70.

*Apparently Paddy didn't end up going, though he informs me the US were winning after yesterday.
** My one criticism of the performance was the naff collection point they allocated for the racks of coats. The four racks were lined up down a thin corridor with only one entry/exit point and it only allowed single file, so you had to wait for everyone behind you to pile out before you could escape. I mean, it wasn't a deal breaker on my enjoyment of the evening, but still, fix up, Young Vic. 

Day 45-46: London

Highlights:

• Blackwood reunion
• Charge's comedic timing
• Children In Need with Hayley and Alex

THURSDAY

The new Blackberry Facebook app automatically imports people's birthdays into your calendar and so even though I definitely had remembered Thursday's birthday kids, it was an easy reminder that it was my old boss's birthday and on texting him I got an invite to drinks that evening. Socialising sorted, I got out of bed to discover I had horrendous dodgeball muscle ache. It really is one of the best work outs you can have; with all the bending down to collect the balls, the leaping and dodging, and then the throwing you can guarantee you'll hurt at least somewhere you didn't know it was possible to hurt. I shuffled around the house painfully and then after my first beans on toast in a long time (another British cuisine that is under-appreciated on the continent), applied for some jobs and listened to Blitzstein's weird U.S. Air force symphony (remember Blitzstein who was murdered by those Portuguese sailors?) and then some more of the new Bloc Party album. I really love it, so give Kettling a listen at least if you're up for some weird, metally Bloc Party.

I went to give blood at 2.55, but was told there were running 45minutes late as someone was sick and they also only had three beds. I literally live 2minutes away from the venue, so asked if I could check-in but go wait at home. Not allowed apparently. After my aggressive attempt to get you all to stick needles in your arms, the right thing for me to do would have been to wait around and give that day, but I didn't do the right thing and figured I could book into another appointment next week. It'll serve me right if there's a 2hour queue there.

I was going to head to the V&A (the last time I went was about 12years ago, and the William Morris stuff was so boring I've not been back since) but after receiving a fitness message from Abbie and knowing Lewis was at the gym, I decided to go for a run. There's a nice park called Burgess Park between Bermondsey and Peckham which has recently been done-up. It has a lake, a BBQ area, a kids park and some 'green gym' equipment. Not sure if you've seen this, but they're basically just gym machines that are cemented around parks but obviously don't require electricity to run. They have some in Southwark park as well, though they're grouped together. In Burgess Park there's one machine every 30metres. For an isolated workout.

Later I walked my old commute along the Thames, through Shad Thames and across London Bridge into the City. I've accidentally worked in the City for years, and whilst I don't really miss it, there's something cool about the little cobbled lanes and back alleys around Bank. I stopped off at my office to say hi to the building reception guy Joe, and fortunately bumped into my old colleague Chris who walked me to the pub where Banksy was having his drinks - The Cock and Woolpack on Finch Lane. Not a pub I'd necessarily go back to (the worst part of working in the city was mid/post work male drinkers. Awful). So it was Banksy's 32nd birthday (though a 10-Years-Younger style survey he did on his clients that day placed him a fair bit above that). I worked with him my entire time at Blackwood, but only started calling him Banksy like everyone else this year. I used to prefer to wind him up by calling him Andrew. Keep him in his place. It was a good little work reunion. I got all the latest gossip, baby announcements and envy at my freedom. I got a little drunk with my friend Louella and then went home to bed.

Abbie arrived home with her friend Jonny around 11pm, so I got up, put on some clothes and had another drink whilst catching up on Jonny's latest activities. I think I have an affinity with him due to our mutual lack of commitment to higher education. Stuff like that is binding.

FRIDAY
I got up on Friday morning and talked to Jonny for a bit before he went to the Entrepreneurs Conference 2012 at the Excel Centre. He's going in to business by himself as an eco-surveyor (not sure if that is his actual job title but it seems quite apt given that he goes round to properties and tells them how they can save money by implementing certain energy saving changes) after his former boss (at their two-man company) became somewhat impossible to work with. He'd signed up for the conference a while back and knew it was going to be a little bullshit (I think you can make strong comparisons with David Brent's motivational speaking career and those of the speakers there), but he had a mate working at the event who told him Bill Clinton was speaking on the Friday so it was worth going for that at least, and he planned to spend the rest of the day slating the shit speakers on twitter.

Being one of the only people I know to have plans to go top the Excel Centre, I recommended Jonny arrive in style by taking the Olympic/TFL Ski lift from the O2. The best possible use of an Oyster card:

After he left, I did my standard few hours of job searching before committing a full hour to entering on line competition. There are HEAPS of them. I completed loads of surveys targeted at housewives, was asked questions on every possible subject and only called it a day when I became worried that I wasn't putting enough money aside for my funeral (apparently we should all be concerned over the rising costs). A few years ago I did really well out of competitions (two Reading festival tickets, a Field Day ticket, few other miscellaneous gigs and a box of CDs. As I haven't won the lottery since I'm pretty sure I'm due at least an Argos voucher from this latest drive.

I was catching up with the first episode of the new series of The Hour when I heard the charming vocals of baby Charge coming from the living room. Abbie called me in with a "you've got to see this, Nicole!" I popped in to see Charge lying on his front on the sofa with his face smushed to the side. Almost immediately (after seeing me?), he threw up a little bit of milk baby sick on the cushion and settled in with satisfaction. We mopped it up but be careful where you sit next time you're over as we didn't dis-infect at all. More of a wipe really. Just before Ellen left, she confirmed her position as the coolest mum in the world by asking us if we wanted to see something she'd discovered recently, then proceeded to show us how Charge's whole fist could fit in her mouth, leaving his little baby arm looking like a sort of human lollipop stick. Bloody hilarious. She couldn't understand why the other baby mums at the mother/baby screening of Skyfall that morning (it is a 12A) weren't impressed. Squares.

After Charge left (and Ellen with him) I went for a run with Tony. I'm a little out of practice, and his slow run was faster than I'd have been inclined to go at even during my peak 5-times-a-week gyming period (back when my gym was in the stylish old Highbury stadium wing). I've always been a bit of an independent runner. I figure there's no need for anyone else to see me beetroot or judge how often I stop. After being jokingly shoved into a lamppost by Tony (he didn't realise I would actually run slap bang into it), and then him dancing to Carly Rae Jepson as we ran, I think I'm going to continue being an independent runner.

I went to meet Hayley at her flat in Bow in the evening to take her the bottle of wine I'd booze-cruised back from Paris. It was a Medoc. A nice musty number. Good legs. We toasted Hayley's new job and watched some Children in Need. Just a few notes about CIN this year:

• So, first thing's first; what was with the sexy, cartoon Pudsey bear? They kept showing a clip of him dancing sexily to some sort of smooth music, with a really creepy zoom and focus on his crotch area. His little animated hips gyrating to the the beat. Yuck
• Girls Aloud; not sure I approve of their new Stylist. I think drugged, anorexic, fake-tanned, gaunt drag queen is a bit 2007. I don't like to comment too heavily on female image (did anyone hear Clare Balding's amazing statement on HIGNFY about women in media, and newspaper focus on 'sexy' teens turning legal? Completely on the mark) but I really wish they'd grow older a bit more gracefully. They're still only late 20s but their attempts at beauty somehow have the reverse effect of making them look like 50 year old mutton dressed as sunbed lamb. The only one I can look at for longer than five seconds is Kimberley, who has retained a slim but not skeletal figure and some nice warmth to her face, keeping her looking her actual age, if not younger, and making her the only candidate for a half decent role model to young women (though after Darcy Bussell outrageously told her she needed to do a few more sit ups on Strictly this week, I imagine she'll struggle with weight issues before long).
• Good to see Dave Benson-Phillips back in business. After spotting his LinkedIn profile a few years back (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/dave-benson-phillips/21/450/67), I presumed he was struggling. Clearly not if that Horsham charity stint is anything to go by
• The Eastenders/Alan Sugar skit that could have been completely appalling if not for the one slightly redeeming line where he calls Billy Mitchell a 'Cockney SatNav'

I had meant to go to a housecooling party at Dom's (sorry Dom! I had the hat ready and everything) but Alex and Hayley kept me there with extra wine, telling rude jokes regarding the CIB equivalent of working with animals (too inappropriate for this audience I think) and showing me videos of Nick Helm performing (check out "He Makes You Look Fat" here). Even our near friendship-breaking disagreements on the qualities of Matt Baker (hero, if you've ever seen the Blue Peter episode "There's a Nomad In My House") couldn't drag me away. Hayley and I got the friendship back on track when the conversation somehow turned to deaf actors and when I mentioned the pretty, blonde deaf lady from West Wing, Hayley guessed it was the same actress who appeared in the L Word as there couldn't be two people in that category. Yep. It was the same actress.

I left after doing a few lunges behind the couch (my hammies* were killing me) and as Hayley cried with laughter as Alex declared himself victorious for winning a six year relationship with her only by staring at her for weeks across the dancefloor of a student indie club like some sort of creep. No need for roses or sweet talk with Hayley.

* I'm so, so sorry for using the word 'hammies' even as a joke. Sometimes even I want to stop being friends with me

Day 44: London

Highlights:

• World Press Photo 2012 at Royal Festival Hall
• Sir Paul Nurse and the Last Supper at the National Portrait Gallery
• Go Mammoth Dodgeball in Clapham

After a solid morning job search session, I signed up for my next blood doning session. This isn't a good-deed name drop but they're really short of blood at the moment, so if I ever try to convert you to anything, let me just persuade you to pop along to a centre and let some nice/brutal (it's pot luck really) nurses take some blood...they only take a pint, and that replenishes in no time at all. And the smug feeling you get from your good samaritanism is un-quantifiably high. I normally hear a lot of bullshit 'I'm scared of needles'. I'm sure it's a genuine fear, but I think it's probably a good experience for you to face your fear in the name of helping humanity. I'm just saying, you pansies. Plus sides are that you save lives blah blah blah, get free walkers crisps and biscuits, find out your blood type and about all sorts of exotic, if a little niche, sex partnerships that you're probably not even considered (have you had sex with a man who has paid for gay sex in Africa etc.), and get to go on the powerfully-named website www.blood.co.uk.

In the afternoon, I grabbed the tube to Waterloo and then wandered down to the Southbank. After a disappointing stop in the National Theatre (I'd read that they had an interesting exhibition on but the only thing I could see was about jewellery. Yawn), I struck lucky in the Royal Festival Hall where the World Press Photo 2012 winning photos were on show. It's displayed over both sides of the foyer on the bridge level with quite a few prize categories (nature, reporting of world event, individual shots, landscape shots etc.), but I only got around one side before I became a bit too tearful to continue. It's fair while ago now and so in case you've forgotten, 2011 was a bit of a rough year. The Arab spring, the Japanese Tsunami and nuclear disaster, continued economic downtown (leading to 4million US citizens losing their homes according to this display) and all sorts of bad shit for sex workers in Ukraine (HIV hotspot). I'm not sure how long the photos stay up, but you should check it out. It's free and afterwards you can check out the Christmas market tat stands. The stand-out photos in the display include (and if I accidentally sound flippant, I really don't mean to - the photos were really powerful and sobering) the shots of devastated now-rubbled Japanese towns, the Ukrainian interrogation photos, the drug cartel shot of Acapulco* complete with the dawn off arms and head of a man just lying in the street and then somehow the most moving were the photos of the recently evicted families in the US just sitting outside their old properties, surrounded by all their stuff, looking completely desolate. 4million is a lot of people to relocate. Abbie looked at the photos on the other side as well, and her favourite (if not her favourite, at least one she thought was a strong photo) was this:

I headed out across Waterloo Bridge. A man had just bought a Big Issue in front of me and the guy asked me to buy his last one. It was sunny, and I was in a good mood, and the last issue I bought was actually really good. So I bought it, earning a little banter in return that went a little like this:

Man who looked a little like a younger, toothier Hulk Hogan: Where you from?
Me: England, from Essex.
HH: No! You look much more exotic. Like you're from the place with all the Ferraris....(mumbles something that sounds like 'Goodbye')
Me: (affronted slightly by quick end to conversation) Oh, ok, goodbye.
HH: No, goodbye!
Me: Huh?
HH: The place with all the beaches and people in ferraris (acts driving a car). Hoobye!
Me: ...Dubai? I look like I'm from Dubai?
HH: Yes! From Dubai.
Me: Right....ok, that's a compliment I suppose? Thanks

Apparently I also pass as a Middle-Eastern. I walked up past Charing Cross to Trafalgar Square to go to the National Gallery. After a scene in James Bond (it's not a spoiler if I tell you that at one point he's sitting in the room with the Turner and Constable paintings), I had an urge to revisit. It's been about 10 years of no noticeable changes in the layout of the gallery but suddenly they've had a nifty reshuffle of the art in the main rooms, in part to include this cool photo/painting comparison where they put a painting of a naked figure next to a Degas, and a little explanation of the differences and similarities. I charged through the gallery, dominoeing tourists into the walls either side of me, to see my favourites. Cezanne, Claude, Canaletto and that. I was going to add to the 'suggested donation' pot but saw that they'd upped their price. Since then, I've noticed everywhere has done it. The suggestion amount had doubled in the Portrait Gallery. 

First time I went to the National Portrait Gallery it was full of loads of boring old portraits titled 'wealthy merchant's wife' and 'unknown man' and stuff like that. Really dull. I went back a while ago with my friend Tom Mayo to see a painting of Aleister Crowley (that's a Led Zeppelin story for another time), and discovered that the gallery now has a selection of modern portraits, probably making it my favourite gallery in London. There was a photographic/magazine exhibition of Marilyn Monroe and her British appeal, presumably because this year is the 50th anniversary of her death (she died in 1962 for the mathematically deficient). She really started out very sweet looking. Not all glamourous and pouty like the image most of us probably have of her, but just a pretty, happy and lively girl-next-door. The chronological magazine ordering was useful in seeing how she changed. 

Aside from this, there was a £2 exhibition I didn't have time to see (the 2012 Photographic Portrait Prize, featuring Mo Farah and a Pastry Chef) and then the collection of modern portraits. It's broken down into categories now as well, to give equal focus on all key figures in society, rather than just displaying artists' self portraits, so there's a section for politicians, scientists, artists, athletes and a few other categories. Alistair Morrison had taken a probably obvious, but well delivered photo of the last supper, featuring Colin Firth, Michael Gambon and Julie Walters (see here here). There was a bit of a weird head cast by Mark Quinn, which was made out of liquid silicone and the artist's own blood. Yeah, that was a bit gruesome. There was a portrait of Johnson Beharry, who I think probably deserves a particular mention, as he is the only living solider to have been awarded the Victoria Cross. On wikipedia it quotes him as saying 'sometimes you're the bug, sometimes you're the windshield', which I quite like. Nice to see him getting a place in the gallery, rather than focussing solely on David Beckham (a video of him sleeping by Sam Taylor-Wood) and the Beatles. My favourite painting by far is by Jason Brooks, of the doctor and nobel prize winner Sir Paul Nurse. You'd swear it was a photo until you get close and see it's a painting. Incredible. (here). I'm putting a few links on here rather than the actual photos, as I'd really recommend you go see it for yourself.

I walked home from the National Gallery along the river (the below is taken behind the ITV studio part) and whilst on the phone to my Grandma (usually no shorter than a one hour call), missed three calls from Abbie about dodgeball that evening. It was earlier than I realised, so after a super-quick turn around at home, and then a sprint from Clapham North station to the sports centre, I only just made it. 

Abbie and Tony started playing dodgeball last year, and then set up their own team this year. The company that runs it is called Go Mammoth, and after making excuses for months about why I couldn't play, I finally gave in and went along for a match. I bloody loved it. It's surprisingly fun and a really good workout (you ache for days after), and after the first ball flies past you, you lose all fear. Go Mammoth do loads of other sports as well and put together teams of individual players if you're looking to try something new and can't make up a team, or even if you're just looking to make friends. We were three players short, so Abbie called one of the put-together teams for reinforcements. The other team only had two players, so we won by default but we lent them some players and after some feet-dragging by the ref, we got started. On a weeknight you play three sets of three games, which lasts about 40minutes (apparently you play longer on the weekend league). I have what you might call a losing record at dodgeball. We lost each game I played before going away, but then the team started winning. We're not drawing a correlation between those two things. This match was really close. We won a set, they won the next, and then the last set we were tying one game each. In the dying moments of the last game, I was the only person left in against two others. A chance to prove myself at last. So I gathered a ball, flexed my muscles and lobbed it at the weaker one's (the girl's) calves. Only, I'm a bit of an inaccurate thrower, and it just went straight into her arms and so she caught it, meaning I was automatically out. Lose. And it turns out, we hadn't registered with the ref that they hadn't enough players and so it went down as a loss on our record as well. Shit.

We went to the pub after (The Loft near Clapham North), which offered discounts to Go Mammoth players. Two bottles of Becks for £4. It was like uni prices. Almost. I bloody hate Clapham and everything and everyone that is associated with it (only a few, very special exceptions) but this bar took you up a level from the highstreet and had lots of nice sofas and space, and wasn't particularly busy apart from dodgeball players. We hung out with our reinforcement team and some others for a while (see below photo), and then Abbie and I caught the bus to Elephant and Castle where we decided to have a Top Gear style race; her on a Boris Bike, me on the bus. I've been out of London a while, and everything all looks the same in the dark (…) so I sort of forgot where to get off and ended up in the middle of nowhere on a road name I half recognised. I had to wait for another bus for 15minutes, and then that took 20minutes to get back. So Abbie arrived home around 11pm, and I got in just before midnight. My phone battery had died, and Abbie was waiting up like a worried parent. Whoopsy.

* Acapulco like the song. Former holiday resort, now caught up in a drug war so perhaps head to the Copa Cabana or somewhere instead on your holidays if there's a choice

Day 41-43: London

SUNDAY/MONDAY

Six weeks travelling, eating barely any fruit and vegetables and living off mainly beer and bread but remaining completely healthy, and then three days back in London and I pick up a vicious cold. It happened on Saturday, in the space of about 30 minutes. You know when you can literally feel the sickness developing inside, but not being able to stop it? A slight discomfort in the throat, a sneeze and then BAM, death's door. Consequently, after a night out drinking on Saturday, and with this cold to beat all colds (well...not quite...but I was a little poorly) I did absolutely nothing on Sunday. I slummed around, completely guilt-free. I got out of bed around 3pm, and then eventually out of my pyjamas in the evening (rediscovering my onesie and then actual clothes). Tony cooked us a roast dinner and heated up a nutroast for me. Common misconceptions about vegetarian food aside, it was actually really tasty. I mean, it's just nuts and beans joined together with some cheese. You can't really get that wrong.

I still had the cold on Monday, so I moped around in the morning, feeling sorry for myself. I made it out of the house a few times to do errands, played on my Kindle a bit and then waited for Abbie to get home, at which point I stood around annoyingly as she made a tartlette and couscous for dinner. Ian and Ellen came over with baby Charge. It was all going swimmingly, until he threw a bit of a tantrum and started crying. You could confuse him for a few seconds and he’d stop crying, but then a second after he’d remember what he was supposed to be doing and belt out a few more tears. Film and TV baby cries are slightly misleading, or perhaps Charge has just developed his own unique style of crying. He sort of makes sounds like a pterodactyl when he’s in the throes of his unhappiness. Eeeeerch, eeeerch, eaaarrrrck. Those sort of sounds. Ian and Ellen seem to take it in their strides though, and adultly try to reason with him to stop, though there's varying success with that method. The old bounce and bop generally seems the best way to silence him.  

TUESDAY

Things got interesting on Tuesday. Well, in comparison to the past four days, things got interesting. After promising Abbie by text every day that I was going to go to the gym, and then afterwards head to the Design Museum, I finally found my membership card and made it there (no gym, though. I was in recovery from that brutal cold, wasn’t I?). 

The Design Museum is in the Shad Thames wharf and was set up by Terence Conran back in Thatcher's day. He tricked her into agreeing to part-fund the museum be saying that it would be a place to display British design and ingenuity. Terence, father of Jasper and founder of Habitat (R.I.P.), had his own exhibition at the museum a few months back called 'The Way We Live Now', which showed all the cool things he'd done in his life. He takes credit for revolutionising the sex lives of Brits by bringing the duvet to the country. Pre-duvet, we just hard horrible rigid blankets. Not conducive to sexy-times. Aside from the duvet, Jasper and Habitat, he's also designed the chairs and crockery for a lot of top London restaurants. 

As I’ve got a membership, I really need to go to every exhibition to get my money’s worth and the last time I went was a few months before to see the ‘Designed To Win’ exhibition (which I think is closing soon, given that all Olympic feeling is nearly depleted). On the walls as you head up into the exhibition, there are lifesize outlines of lots of famous athletes and a few stats about them. You feel slightly torn looking at these, as whilst you may be only one month younger than Lionel Messi and nowhere near as famous, talented or successful, you’re also the same height. Shorty. The exhibition itself displays all the top developments in sports technology, so from this lethal-looking time-trial bike (here) to the Speedo LZR (here) BSA: START I wrote a joke article about the LZR a few years ago with some friends (here) and then felt pretty pleased with myself when it came up as a question on University Challenge, and I could answer it correctly END

That was a cool exhibition, and at the time they also had the Designs of the Year 2012 displaying on the top floor which was INCREDIBLY cool. Covering all areas (entertainment, transport, public services, architecture, landmine-detonation devices, fashion etc.) it was so impressive and really inspiring to see design being used for things beyond the asthetic of various products. My favourite items were the landmine-clearing device (below), the earthquake table (here) and the Tesco virtual shop in South Korea (here). I bought the book showing all the designs if anyone ever wants to see it. 

At the moment they’re showing ‘Digital Crystal’, which is sponsored by Swarovski (I will consider it a major life achievement when I’m certain of the pronunciation of that word). I don’t know much about crystal or how it’s formed, but if it’s anything like the cool video you see on entry, then it is ridiculously cool. There were two long screens either side of a darkened corridor showing these enhanced, sped up videos of crystal growing as they played these eerie noises littered with crunching sounds as the crystal broke free of the ground:

The exhibition itself was cool (see photos below) and used a variety of devices to display the ideas, including a cool 3D projection thing you could only see as you got close up, like some sort of Star Trek technology. There was this cool ring of crystal, which looked relatively nondescript from the outside, but as you cut down through it, you created polar bear shapes (I've included the white one, as the crystal is too difficult to make out here). 

As a side note, Swarovski was founded by Daniel Swarovski in a place called Wattens in Austria, after he patented a specific sort of crystal cutting machine. Just so you know.

I didn't bother going in Designed to Win again, but headed to the top floor which is now displaying an exhibition called 'Thrift' by the Designers in Residence 2012. I think the museum funds a few young designers each year to get them started. Supposedly after being given access to as many materials and equipment as possible at university, when designers leave they've not got the funds to buy any of those things, so generally have to start out using either cheap goods or changing their styles completely. This is only a small display, but there was a cool PCB (Printed Circuit Board...) that looked like a tube map:

And another woman had created a new product from wool cast-offs from carpet factories, by mixing it with starch. She showed how firm the material could come by putting it in a toastie maker. Yummy, gluey wool toasties. 

After the exhibition I had a walk along the Thames, and took some photos of the nice sky and the seagulls flying over the river in front of Canary Wharf. Beauty in what would otherwise be a pretty grotty area. 

I then headed to the Woolpack pub on Bermondsey Street. This was my first day living as a London Tourist, so I had to resume my European lifestyle of a glass of wine at 3pm each day. Their house wine was a Hungarian wine called 'Moonriver Pinot Noir' (from Aszar-Neszemly, Hungary). Compared to cheap European prices for decent wine, I felt a bit hard done by for the £5.60 medium glass cost for something that was pretty minting. Probably not going to take Gabo up on his offer to show me round the Hungarian vineyards. 

I had to bring my costs up to a £10 card-payment minimum, so I ordered the next one up, which was 'Tilia Malbec' (Mendoza, Argentina) for £6.10. Steep cost, but it tasted much better. I probably can't afford this on a daily basis though. I mean, I've got no job. Can't really justify expensive wine purchases over paying my bills. Before going for the second glass, I went to the loo (don't worry, this is going somewhere) only to find the toilet didn't flush. I told the barmaid, but said it was fine and didn't look bad; it just had a bit of tissue down it but it wasn't gruesome. She went silent for a moment and I presumed the conversation was over when she suddenly said "Have you seen Dogma?". I have seen Dogma. I imagine it must be considered an appalling film by the reviewing community, but I loved it. Alan Rickman with no penis? Matt Damon and Ben Affleck as fallen angels? Alanis Morrisette as God? Amazing. I immediately knew the barmaid was thinking about the Shit Monster scene, where Jay and Silent-Bob have to fight a monster made of shit that comes out of the toilet. That barmaid is a legend. What a brilliant response to a non-flushing toilet warning! 

Went back to the flat to meet Abbie, Tony, Lewis and Abbie's Mum for a group cinema outing to finally see Skyfall. There's a big Odeon near us in Surrey Quays, and on Tuesdays with Abbie's premium card (which I think is a free loyalty card), tickets are only £5.50. Cheap for London. Abbie's mum bought us ice-cream to thanks us for taking her out to the cinema (it was originally supposed to be a date between her and Tony, until Abbie, Lewis and I crashed) and we settled in.

So, given that our housemate has been working on the score to Skyfall, and has had the film lying around on his computer since June, we've all done pretty well to not know any of the plot. Cue a phone conversation with my brother on Friday telling me he'd seen the film, and before I could even draw a breath, revealing what happens in the last scene. Thanks, bro. I presume it's payback for me convincing him to let me tell him what happens in HP and the Half Blood Prince (about a certain wizard dying...). In my defence, I at least gave him the option of not knowing. He just blurted it out before I could stop him. Also, when Abbie was booking our tickets online, in the customer reviews below the ticket options the  douchebag reviewer had revealed the same plot development in the first line of the review. So we went into it knowing at least part of what was about to happen.

Pre-film, there was the benefit of the Kevin Bacon advert being shown in the trailers, and then the Les Mis trailer. That's a family-induced guilty pleasure. Can't wait for it. All those celebs singing? Brilliant. They also showed the Life of Pi trailer which looks insane; it's been given a sort of mystical realism style and whilst I'm not sure I'll actually see it or if it's any good, I reckon it'll be visually impressive if nothing else. Another version of Great Expectations is coming out soon as well, though given that there's only just been another BBC version, not sure there was any point to a film? I wonder why they never check what's coming out before releasing two versions of the same thing in a short period. They did the same with Robin Hood.

Back to Bond; I haven't seen Quantam of Solace and I fell asleep during Casino Royale, so I wasn't really expecting to be blown away. But boy, was I blown away! I'm not going to reveal anything (because that's cruel, isn't it Tom?) but the opening credits are amazing (they go on for about 5 minutes and it's the most visually amazing thing I've seen in a while) and the film is generally great. Action, but without having unnecessary explosions/car chases serving no purpose to the plot, a good story, beautiful/bleak/hectic locations, a great villain (whose first scene might be my favourite Bond/Villain scene in the film series' entire history. It's hilarious. Watch it if only for that) and just brilliant cinematography. Not like your traditional Bond lady-killer stories, but for the first time I felt that it didn't matter. Daniel Craig's Bond is so much more engaging than any of the former ones. If you haven't seen it, I seriously recommend it. Also, there are loads of London scenes, and a nice Ben Whishaw in the National Gallery moment. BLOWN AWAY. We stayed to watch our housemate's name in the credits and then went home to have a beer.