Lying on a pancake cloud in blueberry heaven

The last two days we have both worked all day. We work away on our laptops', Kai in his room, me at the table in the sitting room. Come twelve I am starving so I make lunch. These last two days we have had blueberry pancakes for afters. Pudding for a working lunch, I know, I know, but is it Christmas. I think Kai likes having me home.

The blueberries are chucked in to the pan a few seconds after the ladleful of batter spreads as far as it is going to go and has a slightly crispy light brown bottom. They are ½ inch thick American style pancakes, but the blueberries are extra large, so they stick up out of the batter like plump blue children swimming in a doughy lake.

Then when the bottom has turned a golden brown, and the top of the pancake is pockmarked with a few crumpet-like holes, I flip it over.

The blueberries are still sticking out a bit, so they make the pancake uneven for a few seconds until they cook down. The sticky juices of the berries melt into the batter and form midnight blue crusts in the toffee coloured swirls of the pancake.

And then as the last of the sizzling butter is sucked up into the batter, I flip it onto a plate, pour a generous golden glug of maple syrup and serve with Greek yoghurt and more fresh blueberries.

When you bite into the blueberries in the pancake, the sweet jam like juice squirt into your mouth mingling with the maple syrup.

Delicious.

Pretty woman, ugly trade

The other day a crack whore shouted at me. Or I thought she did. Every now and again, on a corner near my home there are one or two sex workers plying their trade. If there was scale of prostitutes with Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman at the top, these women would be at the other end. The scraping the barrel end of the scale. The only thing going for them, in terms of getting work, is that they are young. But other than that, they are skinny, pale (even the black ones) and angry.

I was looking at one of these women, as I walked by the other day, wondering what had happened to her. What twists her life had taken which meant she had to have sex with strangers to earn money. To stand on a Hackney street corner, two days before Christmas, doesn't indicate a life well lived, full of luck and opportunity. I wondered if she was an eastern European who had been tricked into coming to this country. I wondered if she was hooked on crack or smack. I wondered if she was scared, or more scared than usual, because of the women who had been murdered in Suffolk.

Then she started shouting (at me I thought at the time but apparently it was at another woman nearby who had had a go at her)

'What the f**k? Why are you f**king staring at me, just because I'm standing here. None of your f**king business, you stuck up b*tch..'

She was local, sounded in fact like a Hackney girl. She could have gone to my school.

I have very mixed feeling about these women, I feel sorry for them, but I wish they weren't standing on a street near my house. I think it is appalling that they have to have sex with men they don't want to, in dark corners. That they have to put their lives at risk, from fists and feet and from unprotected sex. Would it be better for them if prostitution was legalised. Would they be safer?

I must apologise for my English

So we've been to the wedding. It was wonderful, romantic and almost entirely in Norwegian.

There were a couple of things that meant this didn't matter and I was able to understand most of what was going on.

In an inspired table setting that impressed me on many levels, I was sat next to my other half, Kai, on one side and by a friend with impeccable English on the other. So as the speeches were made, I leant my head on Kai's shoulder and he whispered the translations into my ear. It was like having my own huggable babel fish. Perfect.

I mentioned my table neighbour's high standard of English. On the whole the Norwegians I have met (including, professors, supermarket cashiers and ski lift operators) have a similar impressive grasp of my native tongue. On top of this they also tend to be polite and considerate. So, at the party after the wedding I wandered from group to group and as I nodded hello, the singsong lyrical sound of Norwegian would melt into lightly accented English. Added to the vat-like proportions of Champagne consumed at dinner, this had a most pleasant dreamlike effect.

When talking in English, they would be chatting away and say something like,

'What is that word for a mixture of salt water and fresh?'

'Brackish?' I'd say.

'Yes, I must apologise for my English.'

Good news

The passport arrived at 11 yesterday - phew - I nearly kissed the postie. So after an afternoon relieved packing and tidying, we got the flight to Oslo and are now happily tucked into boyfriends parents place, over looking the river in Fredrikstad. Fredrikstad is sort of the Brighton of Norway. Without the gay people.

We have been enjoying;

Gløgg - spicy ribena, you can have it with brandy or just water.
Lefse - square floppy potato pancake
Sylte - like a fragrant pork pie without the pastry and scary see-through jelly stuff
Fredrikstad Pils - local beer

You put a slice of Sylte inside the Lefse, pour a little white wine vinegar and a touch of black pepper and then roll in up and stuff it in your mouth. Delicious.

The brother's wedding tomorrow. I've been to a Norwegian/Danish wedding in Italy, a Norwegian/Welsh wedding in London but not a Norwegian/Norwegian wedding in Norway. Can't wait!

People in glass houses shouldn't sit semi clad in bed - & other stories

On Monday morning – 8 am

I decided to get up with my other half, so he wouldn't feel so bad about going to work on a dark and damp Monday morning. Probably not that much better for him leaving the warm flat with me perched on the sofa reading a book. But anyway that's what I did.

When he left I jumped back into bed with a cup of tea and said book (hey, it's homework)
Imagine my surprise when a skinny Rasta with a yellow hard hat walked passed my window. Our flat is on the second floor.

I had totally forgotten that the building was swarming with Bob The's putting in double glazing and a new roof. I nearly jumped out of my tracksuit bottoms and sweatshirt. It gave me a right shock. The builder managed not to look at me as he sauntered along the wooden platform. I was just about to strip off and get in the shower. Holy Shit.

But all this paled, as I did, when I realised I'd left my passport in Cornwall. Due to fly to Norway on Weds, this is a fan hitting scenario.

My wonderful Landlady put it in the registered post, due to arrive at 1 today.

Guess what

It aint here.

After crying on the phone to Royal Mail's customer service they as good as promised it would be here tomorrow.

Fingers crossed

Maybe it because I'm a Londoner?

Back in London, and boy it feels strange. First thoughts coming back into Paddington were,

..ARGH all these people, all pushing and rushing...

Then I got into the swing of it, I am a moody Londoner after all, and started to feel at home. The faces of my fellow passengers on the tube, Black, Asian, European, made me feel at home. I understand London, I am at home here, even though there are times when I want to escape.

At the 106 bus stop I was surrounded by people. We were all huddling under the shelter as it was raining. No one was speaking english. One guy was speaking Japanese into his mobile. Two young women, one with a baby in a buggy, were speaking an eastern European language or possibly Portuguese, which sounds so Russian. Another older couple, sitting on the bench, were speaking an African Language, which I don't know. I got a sudden rush of affection for my dirty ole city, my home for so many years. I felt like hugging everyone at the bus stop and telling them how welcome there were.

Then the bus arrived and there was a godawful struggle to get on. My hugging mood left me. Managed to get a seat though – ha, all those years of busing it to school were not wasted.

I once got told off by some out of towners who could not believe I was not queuing neatly behind them. But there is space for two people to get on the bus at the same time, I thought as I leant across them to press my oyster card to the yellow pad. Plenty of space.

Fresh air vs air freshners

Today, I’ve mostly been thinking about air fresheners. I just can’t stand the stinkin' things.

As time goes on, the Air Wicks of the world get more and more sophisticated. So now the adverts proudly display a plug-in air freshener with three different ‘fragrances’ that alternate every forty minutes.

How much does your house have to smell before you need a squirt of air freshener EVERY FORTY MINUTES.

It is ironic - and not in an Alanis Morissette kinda way - that many of the fragrances used in air freshensers mimick the natural world. We have 'Fresh Pine forests', 'Soothing Lavender' and 'Festive Oranges and Cloves'.

So we've destroyed most the forests and natural places in this country to build our lovely warm boxes. These boxes get a bit smelly cos we don’t open the windows. Then we destroy a bit more of the planet, using up energy, chemicals, metal and plastic, to produce fake natural fumes in a handy plug in dispenser.

What should we do? Throw away the things (or better yet – don’t buy em), don’t smoke inside, give our carpets a good Hoover and open our windows once a day to AIR the place. That is use real air to freshen our homes rather than air fresheners.

That should do it.

Ding Dong

Blimey, it is only gone and turned into December out there. As in, deck the halls, drink yourself into a coma, eat till your kidney's implode, it's bleedin Christmas in a few weeks.

So approaches the festive season as a student, with minus in the bank account. As I've worked in the Charity sector for the last blah years, I've never been rolling in it, but this will be the first christmas in ages where I will be really watching the pennies. I wonder how it is going to be? I have planned a headache inducing amount of home made presents, aren't my friends and family going to love me.

It is going to be strange being back in London with no money coming in. It works ok down here cos we are all in the same, poverty ridden boat. Ah student life. But when I'm home, back in London, I'll be meeting up with people, going for drinks, and them drinks are going to be at London prices, rather than friendly ole Cornwall prices.

Solution - drink less. It's radical but I am going to try it.