Better than Oxford and Cambridge

I was sick (again) yesterday, so I spent yet another day on my couch, wrapped up in blankets, watching tivo'd tele that I never get a chance to watch. Yesterday I found a rogue University Challenge lying about from god knows when, which I love. For those of you who don't know University Challenge, it's a fantastic knockout trivia quiz show where teams from different universities battle it out, answering questions on anything like 16th century literature, medical terms, history, picture and music rounds. The flatmate and I love it, and whenever we get a question right, we've taken to doing a "Dr K", which means raising both hands in the air, loudly saying "YES! BOOYA!" and the other flatmate congratulating them (K never actually congratulates, he just says "I would have got that"). Whenever we don't know the answer to a question (which is more often than we like to admit), it generally leads to both of us giving an answer combining the words "jimmy" and "bob" such as: Question -"Who was the 12th century Earl of Wessex, who descended from King Ethelred I, elder brother of Alfred the Great", Our answer - "Jimmy Jim Bob Bob, Earl of Wessex!". Question: In what year was Newtons derivation of Kepler's laws from his theory of gravity read by the royal society?" Our Answer - "In the year of Bob-die Bob Jim Bob", and so on and so forth.

Yesterday though, they had their music round, which is usually something like "name the composer of this piece of baroque music" but in this case was "name the song title and the band". By the second beat I had already shouted loud and proud "Girls Aloud! Song title: Biology! YES! BOOYA! BOOYA!", and was dancing in my coughing, sneezy way on the couch. And I have to say, I felt so happy because none of the 8 Oxford or Cambridge students knew it! Yes yes yes! I'm smarter than the 8 geeks from Oxford and Cambridge! In your face smug uni geeks! In your face!

Your Friday Moment of Zen: There's nothing as scary as a clown

I wasn't a big fan of Sony's "ball" ad (possibly because it was filmed in San Francisco and I'm not a fan of that town), but I do love their new "paint" ad for the Bravia. Directed by Jonathan Glazer, the man behind the horses running through the surf ad for Guinness, this was filmed in July this year on a soon-to-be-demolished council estate in Glasgow using 622 bottle of paint bombs, 455 mortars, 57 kms of copper wires and 1700 detonators! I especially love the fact that when they made this, they had to cover the surrounding houses in tarpaulin to prevent them getting splattered with pain, and paid for trips to the seaside and discos to local residents to compensate for any disruption.


There are loads of "in the making of" films on youtube, like this one and this fantastic 5 minute documentary:



For a detailed analysis check out the bbc's page here

There you go, paint and scary clowns. A true Friday moment of zen. Enjoy!

Confession

I have a confession to make: I was thinking about giving up meat until Christmas.. but I don' t think that's going to happen, because I've just eaten almost my whole body weight in Sarrano Ham I bought from Brindisa today as a snack. And as it's almost finished, I'm even contemplating licking the wrapping paper it came in...

I feel a bit sick now... but I'd do it all over again!

Snap!

I've had a rash on my eye lids for months now, culminating with the skin on my eyelids drying out and cracking - which is especially painful when you tears get into your eyes. If you're defective like me, every time you yawn tears come streaming out of your eyes like you've turned on a faucet, then you end up screaming cause your eyelids feel like their burning. (nice).

After months and months of procrastinating (and because I didn't want to go to the doctor just because my eyes had some bad skin.. how uber high maintenance is that?), I finally went to the doctor who took one look at my eyes and diagnosed me with seborrhoeic dermatitis. eeeww. to me this sounded gross, but it just means that my immune system was in overdrive to handle a form of yeast that everyone has on them (that's right people we're all covered in yeast. Look at your arms: yeast covered.. legs? yeast covered too... neck, face, throat back? uh-huh.. that's enough to send a paranoid person off the edge). Apparently it's not that common, and about 3% of adults get it. Doctors don't know why it occurs in some people and not others, since it's not contagious, it just happens. Much like stuff or shit.

When I got home from the docs, the Flatmate asked what was wrong with me, and when I told him I what I was diagnosed with he said "no way. That's what I've got!". Snap! We then went and compared prescriptions, swapped stories of pain and woe, and showed each other the areas where our skin was breaking, much like a couple of proud lepers.

We're such a caring, sharing pair the Flatmate and I - if only it wasn't the sharing of the same uncommon disease, it would be almost sweet.

Bacon Caramel

This recipe from Eatin' and Drinkin' is so strange. My instincts say "YUCK" but something deep inside says "hmmmm.. but you do love pancakes with bacon, smothered maple syrup....". This recipe is just classical caramel (sugar, cream and butter), with some pre-cooked, crispy bacon added at the end. Apparently, according to slashfood.com, the non-traditional bacon uses have been around for a while, and this is just one of a long list: bacon cereal, bacon ice cream, bacon baklava ....

I'm not sure if I'm going to try this recipe... but I thought I'd throw it out there into cyberspace, seeing as I seem to have an obsession with all things piggy (like those healthy, delicous pork scratchings). So you decide: Bacon Caramel - delicious and a must try or plain disgusting?

Not so dainty letterpresses

I have a confession to make: I am in love with stationery and stationery related paraphernalia. Honestly, nothing is sexier to me than lots and lots of beautiful paper, pens, paperclips, staples, pacers (self propelling pencils if you from the UK).. you get my gist.. I'd spend days in paperchase just walking around, looking at blank handcrafted paper if it didn't make me look like such a loon... and if I could get away with it without being man handled out of the store by my friends..

At the moment, I am particularly in love with letterpress stationery, and these two companies have definitely caught my eye, because of their incredible tongue-in-cheek cavalier attitudes:

Paperstories do this fantastically halarious range called "bittersweet" which I adore. This range includes such lovely phrases like: "suck it", "thanks for nothing" and "sometimes i just hate you".

Ella Studio do a similar range, with these really cool notebooks. They also do a range of cards, gift tags in the "pinup" range (above).

There is something deeply satisfying about letterpress which take the piss like these ones. Mostly because I always associated letterpress stationery with wedding invitations, and obsessive bride-zillas who want every part of their wedding to be so damn perfect, and lord help you if the invitations aren't gold embossed with tiny flowers on them. To them I say:

Friday Moment of Zen: Brought to you by sad songs that'll make you cry

For no reason whatsoever I'm listening to my "sad and depressing" playlist today. So I've put my list up for you, as well as YouTube links (where possible) so you too can enjoy the sadness.

My favorite is definitely You Am I's "Heavy Heart", played here by Timmy Rogers on Recovery a few years ago. You can see a a live version, played in Ireland here

Get Drunk, Ring Yer Friends - You Am I
Hallelujah - Jeff Buckley (not greatest version, but best I can find)
Please Don't Ask Me To Smile - You Am I
Mr Brightside - The Killers
Run - Snow Patrol (Currently doing the rounds on "Wide Saragossa Sea", on BBC4)

You're Friday Moment of Zen: Brought to you by beautiful boys and their guitars.

Trump this

I've just finished watching the last episode of the third season of the american version of "The Apprentice" (yes, I know, I watch alot of tat on tv), and I am incensed and outraged. Here in old Blighty this show is only on at very, very late at night on BBC2. Plus, doing a quick scan on the net, I've just realised that we are about 2 years behind, because I think they're filming season 410 now or something, with a very, very, very old Donald Trump and his masterpiece wig (because lets face it kids, he clearly went bald at 20, and the thing with the most talent on this whole show is definitely his tupee. I mean LOOK AT IT!).

This is the second season I've watched this show, and from what I can gather, the "Apprentice" gets to do a high profile, high risk, and challenging job working in the "Trump Organisation". This 3rd season it has ended with two girls bitch fighting it out to sell their souls to high business. So what do these ladies get to choose to do as the reward for months of slogging it out against a bunch of backstabbing, arsey people, doing incredibly stupid tasks to be able to show a rich man they can make him even more money than God? What is their reward I ask you? Is it good? Is it challenging? This season, the two girls got to choose between:

1. Redecorating a house on Palm Beach.
2. Oh, now wait for it, cause it's every girls dream: organising Miss World!

Yup you read right. Organising MISS FREAKING WORLD. Oh WOW! Dream come true girls! Let's spend our time working out which tiara would look bettter on the stick like and clearly anorexic girl in the two piece see through swim suit, who only wants "world peace", a big fat pay check, possibly a sex scandal with a millionaire or politician, and her yearly supply of tanning oil.

Fuckin' hell. What a completely patronising, pathetic, insulting show. Ooh, organising Miss World. If the Apprentice is the way to get ahead in this world, I'll just stick to being a lowly programmer, because at least that way, I won't have to work out if cerise or baby pink looks better on a sash.

Talk about rejection!

I've been involved in the interview process of new people at our company for the last few months. I've looked through about 50 CV's (most of them get filtered out before it gets to my stage), and interviewed about 15 people now. After months of searching, we'd finally offered 2 people jobs. Both accepted, both were supposed to start next week.

Last week, the first guy who accepted called us to let us know he was just offered a placement at a corporate graduate scheme he had applied for previously. That's kind of fair enough. He did say he had gone of that position when we interviewed him, and but he hadn't heard back from them, and that was what he'd set his heart on. Ok. It was a shame, but you know, no hard feelings.

Today however, the second guy, who I wasn't convinced was going to stick around anyway, changed his mind about us. Just like that. No mention of another job, no mention of why he'd changed his mind. Nada. Nothing. So how did he let our manager know he didn't want to work for us? Did he come into the office? Did he call someone on the telephone? Did he send a "Dear John" letter in the post? Like fuck he did. He weasled his way out via email. Via email. He didn't have the balls to, at the very least, call us up on the telephone and explain. What a complete coward. When a company offers you a job that you accept, if you decide to change your mind, a week before you're supposed to start, you ought to have the guts to actually speak to someone, not do it via the impersonal and frankly pathetic medium of email. What a complete git.

Then to top it all off, we were about to go into an interview this afternoon for yet another applicant, and 15 mins before he's due to come in, he calls up and leaves a message with reception saying he's just accepted another job. 15 mins before the interview.

What is wrong with people these days??

This much I now know

When your plucking your own eyebrows, the difference between looking well groomed and looking permanently surprised, with a gap in one of your eyebrows so it looks like you're trying to communicate via morse code on your forehead, is about 5 hairs.

Good work me.

Too many things.. but first, the property two step

Recently I've noticed that I've done things in my life that I've either barely metioned or not blogged at all. Some small (making pasta for the first time on Saturday with the new pasta machine I've been eyeing for years now), to really, really big things (like going home to Australia for a week, and for all my bitching and moaning surprisingly enjoying myself in a way that I never thought I could have).

The biggest, life changing event right now is that I'm buying my first house. I put my offer for my new place the very day I left for Sydney, back in August. In fact, as I was going through passport control at Heathrow, I had the blood sucking estate agent on the phone, congratulating me because my offer had been accepted. Since the Flatmate is finally moving back to Australia, I've been trying to find a new place to live for months (if you remember my first dismal attempt, or the nest of geekdom that was the second place I liked). This apartment however is different. It's a huge ex council 2 bedroom ground floor flat, about 5 mins from two tube stations. And it's lovely on the inside. A few years ago, a couple of architects had redone it and it's just my sort of taste. Really crisp white walls, dark floors, big bedrooms, and a kitchen that blew me away, mostly because it was bigger than the 3 by 2 foot one I'm living with now.

So why didn't I blog it? Why didn't I say anything? I've been wondering about this for a while, and the only explanation I can come up with is this: I am dead shit scared. And if I don't mention it, don't talk about it, it's almost like it's not really happening... though £530 worth of surveys will tell me otherwise. Scared of a mortgage I'm worried I can't afford, scared of possibly living properly on my own, scared that since this is a ground floor flat my complete paranoia will lead to me never ever opening any windows in case someone breaks into my house whilst I'm sleeping, steals all my stuff, kills me, then uses my scalped skin as a suit to dance around in. (Oh believe it, I am this crazy.)

So first thing's first. Fear of a huge crippling debt: I couldn't work out why people were always so scared of having mortgages, but now, after the sleepless nights of me staring at the ceiling wondering if I can possibly afford to do all of this, I understand where that deep fear comes from. What if I lose my job? What if, despite all my careful planning of my finances, I've fucked up and in fact I'll be able to pay my mortgage every month, but have to start eating cat food because I can't afford anything else, and at least cat food has more nuitrients than cheap 2 minute noodles? What if I end up booted out of my house, having to sell all my possessions to pay the bailiffs, wondering the streets with a shopping cart?

Living on my own on the ground floor: Ever since I've left Australia, I've lived with the Flatmate, so whenever I heard anything vaugelly scarey at night, I'd run into his room, fearing we were getting robbed. I did live in Belgium for almost a year on my own, but since I went back to London on weekends, I never really felt that bad. Besides, it's hard to feel scared when you live in an apartement hotel, with a concierge downstairs. This new place will be completely different, mainly because this is a GROUND FLOOR flat. For the last 4 years the Flatmate and I've lived in a 4 storey block. The bottom 2 storeys are a marine engineers office, and the top two floors are our apartment. There's no one else in our building. You'd have to break into the building first, then the dead locked apartment door, before you've got a shot at getting into our place, so essentially I've been living like that princess in the Never Ending Storey, i.e. in a huge, tall, fuck off tower. And on top of that, this flat has been my home for the last 4 years. It's the first place I really felt at home in, and I've had so many memories here. I really love where I'm living now, and ever time I walk home from work, it feels like the last time and I end up like Barbra Striesand in the "The Way We Were", all teary eyed, singing "Memories... like the corners of my mind" (i.e. pathetic). I'm paranoid as all hell in our current fortress like building. God knows what sort of wreck I'll be in my new flat. They'll find me, sitting in the corner of my new bedroom, tennis racket in hand, trying to pathetically defend myself from intruders, windows and doors bolted shut from all air and light.

Despite all of this, it's too late to back out. The surveys are done, I've got a lawyer, I've got a mortgage. Like the song goes "nothings gonna stop us now". And despite all of these fears (most of which are really unwaranted, and frankly insane and stupid), I wouldn't back out even if I could. I'm shit scared, but I'm also excited. This is how I felt when I left Australia to move to the UK. Scared of what could go wrong, but wanting to find out what is happening next. This is a huge turning point in my life... I never would have missed moving to the UK, making all my friends, and having the most amazing time of my life here, I don't want to miss out this first proper step on the property ladder, on this new home... I just hope I have the courage to open my windows...

You're Friday Moment of Zen: Devils Drink

I feel terrible today. Last night, after our french lession, Calv and I went out for a few drinks and some food. Unfortunately for me today, I had two too many almangacs in lieu of desert, (looking back in the cold, sober, painful, and oh so terribly bright light of day, really one almangac is the optimum number). However, this did not stop me at midnight starting to watch yet another episode of the West Wing, whose lethal, sleep deprived grip I'm currently being held in.

All day I've felt really off my game, and I had to try to rush around terribly hungover, gripping walls between the toilet and shower room, fighting with a pair of tights, trying to not fall over getting my boots on, and I had to try and get to work early because I've been giving interviews todays. There really is nothing worse I think that having to pretend to be intersted in what a potential employee is saying, all the while trying to keep from ever so gently swaying, eyes glazed over, and a grin plastered on your face that is threatening to turn into a grimace..

You're Friday Moment of Zen: drinks that I do not want to touch again. Enjoy, don't enjoy, just don't throw up.

Lego Cool

Finally blogger has come back to life!

Continuing from last friday's moment of zen , I found these at slashfood.com and despite what I said about Lego, I do think they are very cool. Lego, who have pretty much merchandised every possible item in the world, have moved into kitchen ware:

Lego Ice Cube Tray (though you may not be able to build your own Lego sculptures from these blocks), Lego Salt & Pepper Shakers, which look a little sinister, Lego coasters , and the Lego apron, which isn't exactly made of lego, but it will give the cook a cool lego body.

I will conceed these are pretty cool, and there are a whole range of other Lego kitchen ware items out there. Unfortunately, their website is a bit of a bitch to maneouver through when you're in a hurry...

Around, not round

On a packed train this morning:

Me: So, after the Run London, are there any more 10K runs happening before the end of the year?
K: Yeah, one in about a month.
Me: Any later on in the year?
K: Not sure, why you thinking of doing it?
Me: Well, kind of I guess... I'm not a runner, but you know... maybe..
K: Ah you want to run around, so you can stop being round eh?
Me (eyebrows knitting with displeasure): hmmmmm
K: You're going to blog this aren't you?
Me: You can bet your arse I will.

Sickedy sick sick sick

I've been sick. This, in fact, has been the 4th day I've had a pretty horrid cold, which has moved from tonsilitis like symptoms where my gynormous tonsils have gotten so big I can't breath if I tip my head in a certain way, to a blinding sinus headache, which has led me to squint at the sun, clutching my eyes and head whenever I moved, and I've blown my nose so much I think I've blown out my left eardrum.....

Despite all of this suffering, I've now had 2 days off from work, and I've got to say, I really like it. I like it so much, that I think I could do this for a living, however that might constiute as me being unemployed, thus making rent a thing of difficulty.

In the last 4 days, I've watched copious amount of absolute trash that I've had recorded on my tivo for the last few months, and there is a lot of glorious rubbish on freeview. I won't go through it all (though a quick aside, I've sacrificed myself so you don't have to: never, ever, ever, ever watch Elizabethtown. It's TERRIBLE. Even now, I couldn't say what it was about, because this film did not know what it was about.. love story? story of a mans failure at work? story of a man trying to connect to his now dead father? Road trip story? I do not know. It was TERRIBLE. I like Susan Sarandon. I do not like hearing her say the words "I felt my neighbours boner" whilst she's on stage, before going into a tap dance routine as a commemoration to her late husband,
whilst a rock band play and a giant papermache bird cathes on fire that causes an entire hotel to almost burn down. Do you understand what I'm talking about? That's ok I don't either).

Anyway, the absolute worst thing on tv right now is ITV's Ladette to Lady. This is ITV at it's all time low. This type of reality tv is even worse than shows about people who like to "do" their pets, or "plastic surgery gone wrong". Basically, they've taken a bunch of badly educated, poor girls who like to get wasted on weekends, get into fights and flash their breasts in nightclubs, and are using 1950's etiquette school training of eloqution, society ettiquette, cooking, dressmaking lessons, and the most important skill of flower arranging to try to turn them into "ladies". All of the teachers, one of whom I am convinced is a man dressed up in drag to look like the queen with horrendously yellow, crooked teeth, are filmed trying to "teach" these girls all the while making them feel as bad as they possibly can about themselves through a heady mix of bilttelling, flattery, and screaming. At the end of every epiosde there is a big dinner party with "Britains most eligible batchelors" where the girls mix "with millionaire stockbrokers, viscounts and gorgeous heirs". (some of whom are old enough to be their fathers "yar yar, do you think any of them would like the 'older gentlemen' yar yar"). At these dinner parties, these "gentlemen" get these girls really drunk, then try to take advantage of them (I saw one dirty old one man actually pinch one of the girls nipples, whilst she had to cling to the chair she was sitting on because she was way too drunk). The only reason why these men are allowed to be called "gentlemen" is because they have alot money and a posh accent. These rich, discusting, lame and sorry excuses for "men" should really never, ever be allowed out of their pens, because they are absolute pigs, and I don't understand why having money means a man feels they can grope a girl infront of a camera. At the end, the girls are all lined up, and verbally executed by their teachers, before one of them gets thrown out of the school. The girl who leaves is filmed, wiping her nose with her hand, whilst proclaiming she "don't fff-huckin' need dat anyways, cos I don feel like me, know-wha-I-mean", then they burst into tears because they don't want to go. I know it's wrong, but this show has to be the very definition of car crash television, you know that it's wrong, and bad to stare at these vicitims going through hell, but you just can't look away. Besides, I now am am desperate to know if the blonde skinny girl who knocks backs drinks, gets really drunk, then makes a complete arse of herself will get thrown out. Somehow I doubt it...

So, that's where I've been for 4 days now. On my couch, watching tv, drinking juice, and, in the proper tradition that would make my mum scream, eating candle toasted marshmallows on a fork. The good news is that I've finally started to feel better, the bad news is that means I have to go back to work.

Your Friday Moment of Zen: To all the toys I've loved before

In the office we're embroiled in a "discussion" (read war) about which kids toys were the best when we were young:

Guy 1: "Action man was the coolest"
Guy 2: "No GI Joe was better - he was bigger and taller"
Me: "You realise that they're all still dolls right?"
Both guys: "No way! They're 'action figures' not dolls!"
Guy 2: "GI Joe can't be a doll, he had a car."
Me: "So did Barbie. A pink convertible. Face it fellas, all the boy dolls only existed to be boyfriends for Barbie anyway"

I'm not getting into the lego vs mechano vs whatever else is out there. Let's just face facts: Playmobil is the best. I did say this, and mentioned the fact I never really got into Lego, which sparked this exchange:

Guy 3: "Well, that's probably cause you're a girl, and girl's don't really play with Lego. I don't want to say anything prejudiced but.. "
Me: "Too bloody late for that don't you think?"

This Friday moment of zen is dedicated to Playmobil: My dad bought me the Knights Empire Castle below when I was 4 years old. I also go train sets, and a Playmobil train station, road construction sets, and Playmobil warehouses. I think he really had wanted a boy. But still I loved them anyway. I guess I never was a girly girl...

Friday Moment of Zen: Sponsored by toys you had when you were young. Enjoy!

Throwing the gauntlet down at you The Magic

I've just created my "singstar classics" play list containing:

• Groove Is In The Heart - Dee Lite
• Gold - Spandau Ballet
• A Little Respect - Erasure
• And oh yes baby: White Flag - Dido

The Magic: I'm throwing the challenge out into cyber space at you. About 3 bottles of wine, 15 bottles of beer, lots of crips, everyone we know and I think a 1 am Sing Star battle should take place. It's been too long my friend, and oh yes, you're going to LOSE!

"And when we meet, which i'm sure we will, what was there, will be there still. I'll let it pass, and hold my tongue, and you will think that I've moved ooooo-oooooooo-ooooooooooooon" (gasp,gasp,cough,gasp,breath,breath)

The next Tracy Emin

Stumbled across a London based design shop, Thorsetn Van Elten, and I love the things I found on their site! I especially love:

Still Life by Barnaby Barford & André Klauser:
"Who needs a Vermeer if you can have the "Still Life Fruit Bowl". Create your own masterpiece with this bowl and frame that can be combined in 4 different ways."

I think this is sooo cool AND it has the added advantage in our house as we no longer would need to feel guilty about our fruit going old and mouldy, because it's art darling. Art.


Stamp Cups by Valeria Miglioli & Barnaby Barford:
"Those irritating ringmarks that mugs and cups leave..... well, you can turn them into a nice floral pattern now with a set of Stamp Cups. The pattern on the base of the cup match up so you can join as many marks as you want."

With these cups, we could now just use big long pieces of butchers paper instead of a table cloth, which could then be turned into a piece of art, with the added bonus of not needing washing when it does get too dirty.


Whilst all these potential art pieces aren't quite the same as, say a tent with the names of all the people you've ever slept plastered inside, I think they're definitely more appealing.

Not quite like Aunty 'Melda

I know I've got lots of shoes. I've got boxes and boxes of shoes under the bed, inside my cabinet, and a pair or two on every stair going up our apartment. Flip flops, boots, kitten healed stilletos, trainers, slippers, pink ballet shoes with sparkley things on them so they look like rainbow trout. The thing is, I don't really feel like I've got a shoe fetish. It's not like I can't walk past shoe shops without going in, I'm not desperate to own Manalo Blaniks and I don't stand by a shoe shop window cooing "hello lover" or anything.... And to make matters worse, I don't even wear most of them, for several, very good reasons:

1. Won't wear them if they are not waterproof, and in Britain, that's quite important. If there is even the remotest chance that my feet could get wet, the shoes will stay in their box, waiting for an elusive sunny day.
   
2. If the shoes have got a heal, then I find as soon as I get to the end of the street my feet feel like they're important documents, being shredded into tiny, little pieces, and it's really unsightly watching someone walk along, blood trailing behind, and stumps at the ends of their legs, encased in painful torture devices.
   
3. If they've got a heal that resembles anything like a stiletto (oh yes, even if the heal is only 1/2 an inch high), I can't even walk from one end of my room to the other without falling over. Honestly, I've tried. It's really embarrassing.
   

This means that in my world, the trainer is king.

Having said all that, I must have some sort of disease because I have found some really cool boots (thanks to design*sponge) by Tamara Henriques that I love, and I fully intend to track them down here in London so I too can own a pair of wellies, that I will never ever wear.

I want them, especially the S&M loving black cowboy boots. Yeeha grandma. Find your very own pair here.

Today I hate

• Trying to fix bugs in ODBC connections to Oracle since I've spent the last 2 working days trawling the internet trying to understand why ODBC CHANGES THE GOD DAMN FUCKING DATE FORMAT ON INSERTS, SO THAT INSTEAD OF INSERTING 19-SEP-2006 IT THINKS IT'S 20-SEP-0009. As in the year of our lord 9AD. 9AD! GRRRR
  

• Deciding that rather than wearing my usual uniform of t-shirts and jeans, I thought I'd actually try wearing a skirt today. Since I cycled in to the office, I put all of my clothes in my bag (skirt, t-shirt, tights, little dainty shoes that I never wear), and forgot my freaking jumper. So now I'm sitting here freezing my arse off all because I was too preoccupied worrying about making sure I brought the right tights in. And then those stupid tights had holes in the foot, so when I walk all the blood gets cut off from my big toe. And the t-shirt I'm wearing is bright turquoise, which looks great under a black v-neck jumper, but overly 80s bright on it's own. Who the hell can actually pull turquoise off? Lord knows it's not me.

• I hate the fact that ALL of my socks and tights in my closet have holes in the toes. And despite the fact I bought 50 pairs of socks a few years ago, I've lost every single one of them. Seriously, every single one. And our house isn't even that big. And yes, I've look under my bed, couch, and the dining table. No socks. Anywhere. I believe they've all been socknapped, being held ransom because they match. If you have them FREE MY SOCKS!

• The fact that for the past 2 months I seem to be on the same toilet cycle as a girl in another department downstairs. Even though I'm quite good friends with her, it's now becoming extremely embarrasing that everytime I go to the loo, she's there. We make polite conversation, as you do when you see someone in the ladies you know, but it's starting to feel like I'm stalking her, so now I'm holding off going until the point where I can barely walk down the stairs because I've got such bad cramps.

• Stupid, stupid clients who change their specifications, then 2 months later, change their specs again, then 2 months after that go "oh wait, you had it right the first time. Could you change it back?". GRRRRRR. UNDERSTAND YOUR BUSINESS LOGIC THEN COME TO ME. NOT BEFORE.
  

So, now I've got that off my chest, what do you hate today?