acechick

dogsitting

Next-door-Nancy went to Yorkshire for past life regression therapy and needed someone to keep an eye on her pack: 

I gladly accepted the challenge, after all she has cable and puppies!

Still-nameless-puppy (I took to calling him 'Baby Boy') napping. Rather than face that nasty drive, I opted to take the overground train from Hackney to Hampstead.

It was a... change... from the usual crowds of the underground.

Gail's birthday

Happy birthday to Gail.

We got together at the Britannia for lunch and a few bevvies.

I can't believe I didn't get any pics of the birthday girl. A little more from Helen.

Mad Hatters

Now that we're both unemployed, we have to find interesting ways to pass the days without killing one another. Today we went to the Royal Inn for lunch.

The evening promised fun at the V&A for the Mad Hatter's Friday Late.

Unfortunately, it wasn't as fun as anticipated. The crowds were huge and all the workshops booked up. I had met up with Lotta & Lucy and we decided that drinking was in order to salvage the evening. But where to go in South Ken (completely out of our ken)?

La Cave à Fromage, my new favourite place!

hozzy

On the way home from our trip I managed to hurt myself. Not on any of the ski slopes, or in any fascinating city, but on the baggage carousel at Heathrow's terminal 4.

Don't laugh, it was quite painful. I was hauling a bag off the carousel (you know the type of force required to get the moving bags up and off) and it landed by one wheel on the top of my foot. Did I mention the bag needed one of those "overweight" tags?

The next day I rang NHS Direct to check if I needed an x-ray, and if so how to go about organising one. The lovely nurse at the other end of the phone assured me that it didn't sound broken and to see my GP if it failed to improve.

Cut to 2 weeks later, with little improvement, I went to see my GP. She encouraged me to go to the hospital for an x-ray. Via A&E! Surely there is a more efficient way of doing this, but armed with a book, knitting and iPod I headed up there. The new 425 bus is door-to-door, sweet.

All up it was about 5 hours, not too bad. The verdict was soft tissue damage. Nothing can be done to help.

No excuse to keep avoiding the gym.

Français

Finally, I've started learning French.

I was never that interested in the language and preferred to learn Italian, but it seems I spend so much time in France (& French-speaking Switzerland) that it's a bit of a no-brainer.

So here in my unemployment I find myself at the Institut Français for three hours on a Wednesday in South Kensington. Conveniently it is on the District line, which runs to our local. So while it's not the quickest place to head for it's direct.

I was quite late to the first lesson (half an hour!), getting lost amongst all the Cromwells in the area (there's a road, street, mews, place...). It was only as I was leaving that I discovered joy across the road:

La Cave à Fromage.

Delicious!

Wednesday is of course knitting night. This week we met 'west' at the Marylebone Crêperie with the intention of celebrating Våffeldagen with our token Swede, Lotta. Ahh, Pancakes, waffles... they're all the same in their liquid form, right?

[Above: Emma knitting]

On the walk from Bond Street tube I noticed the Button Queen has relocated (down the road):

Shame really, most of the appeal of the Button Queen was in the oddness of the premises. I can't imagine this slick place living up to it, unless of course they actually have a decent range of buttons now!

Also, happy birthday Phil!

new baby

Next-door-Nancy* has welcomed a new puppy into her pack:

He is an 8-week-old mini poodle (or fartle as Fred pointed out) and arrived at her home yesterday, much to the dismay of Gimba.

The problem is, what to name him?

I suggested Morty, which needs to be said with a broad New York accent (which Nancy reckons would need to be suffixed with 'already'). She was think more along the lines Marcus Aurelius (because he looks so Roman with his curly hair), which has morphed into Lucius (loo-shus, although I prefer loo-si-us).

And then came:
Angelo
Giorgio
Keith
(can you guess my contribution?)

And she's still no closer to a name. Can you suggest anything?

New baby (top) with siblings.

*Nancy is no longer living next door, but in Hampstead goddammit!

Happy birthday Natalia

7 today! Or nearly yesterday, Sydney time. Although, she was born in the evening — I remember this as it was after netball that Karen & I snuck in to the hozzy to see what was happening. We were definitely in an area we weren't meant to be, and I'm sure Lara didn't actually want us there. But somehow Dave was alerted to our presence and took the digital camera that I had borrowed and captured the first of these photos.

On our recent visit to Australia, Natalia (and Carl) loved playing with the photo booth feature of my mac:

Happy birthday!

the Heath

We visited Gimba and (formerly Next-Door-)Nancy at their new digs in Hampstead, and took the girls for a walk.

Breezy Bree has also moved to Hampstead which has Fred and I wondering if we are also destined to migrate north. It was on our list of possible park-side areas when we first moved, but it's rather suburban and not real value for money. Beginning to re-evaluate this assessment.

Must find a route home that doesn't include the middle of Camden, ugh.

doggy style

Japan is full of crazy shops and dogs, so it's no surprise that the two intersect. We couldn't resist buying outfits for the dogs in our lives.

Gimba is a terribly good sport about it.

 

Mum & Dad's dog Reggie wasn't keen and needed to be bribed with food.

Purchased in the big dog section of Pet Paradise in Jingumae, Harajuku.