One Stop Shopping

In London, I live just down the street from Harrods. When out-of-towners come to visit, the convenience of having a major tourist attraction so close by is always nice. But I often forget what a fabulous department store it actually is - complete one stop shopping.

In one go, I just purchased: a bottle of Moët & Chandon, Aveda conditioner, a ham & gruyere baguette, a headphone splitter, Day by A.L. Kennedy, echinacea, and a gorgeous little cocktail dress.

Doctor Zhivago Pretty

I hate snow. But it sure is pretty. I snapped this in Queen's Park this afternoon as I was crossing the U of T campus. The only thing I've enjoyed about this perpetually horrendous weather is how the snow made last weekend's Doctor Zhivago themed party very authentic. Siberia or Toronto? Tough to tell at the moment.

1600 Pages

What would be the most insane thing to do when I'm staring down the barrel of a thesis that seriously needs to be finished? Take on a 1600 page editing project.

Yes, this is what my desk looks like right now as I'm getting ready to dive into the manuscript. I think this may be the most extreme case of procrastination ever witnessed. But really, it's an amazing story and a huge opportunity and my brain is buzzing with the challenge.

Working Out West

When I'm deep into writing a chapter of my thesis, I can work anywhere I can spread out my notes (of which there are insane amounts: scattered on looseleaf pads, in the margins of books, in notebooks and even once on a cocktail napkin). And I sometimes prefer to be holed up at a desk that doesn't look out at much, so my computer screen is the main thing in my sight line.

But when I'm doing grunt work - researching, trying to find examples to back up my theories, basically playing connect-the-dots with lines of thought that shouldn't ordinarily be coming anywhere near each other, I need inspiration. I need space. So this is why where I am at the moment, perched on a rock overlooking the stormy Pacific Ocean, is the best possible place to be.

Christmas Eve 2007

This is where I sat for most of today. In fact, this is where I'll be sitting for the next two days as well. Devouring my holiday reading and only moving to devour leftover turkey and Christmas cookies.

The Perfect London Weekend

You can't plan the perfect weekend, it just has to evolve. This one was particularly special, as I will soon not be a full-time Londoner - and also, I took the entire weekend off. No thesis. I needed it. What does the perfect London weekend involve?

Friday night champagne cocktails at the gorgeous American Bar in the Savoy. Followed by some Gordon Ramsay cuisine.

Saturday sleep-in followed by a good ole' English football game. Watched Fulham beat Reading at Craven Cottage, which included a spectacular walk along the Thames on the perfect autumn weather day. Saturday night was drinks at one of my locals with old friends I hadn't seen in far too long. Much catching up and howling about the indiscretions of our youth. (Something involving Spice Girls costumes, cheap red wine, and being pulled over by the police.)

Sunday - another crisp, fall day. I spent much of it wandering around Spitalfields Market with a friend. It's such a great place to find off-the-rack clothes by young designers for a fairly cheap price. I found a gorgeous little blazer and an equally cute clutch purse during my outing. Shopping was interrupted for the best eggs benedict in London, at Canteen. Now I've just finished an indulgent curry dinner and am settling in with tea and the weekend papers that are piled on my coffee table. And even more indulgent will be the brownie I'm also about to eat, purchased at Spitalfields. Because indulgent just suits this kind of weekend.

Good Morning Humphrey

I'm making a concerted effort to take my camera out and about with me. Today, I actually took it out on my run. I run in Hyde Park most mornings and on my way from the flat to the park, I pass by a house with the loveliest dog who likes to hang out on the balcony. I've been calling him Humphrey for the past few months, as I think it suits him.

The Whelming

I am occasionally overwhelmed. In the best of ways. It happens, usually, during travel. Like when I found myself standing alone in the Gauguin room at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg: the quiet, the canvases all in front of me, the solitude, the hugeness of such a moment.

And yet, it happens also when (usually once a year) I take the ferry from Victoria to Vancouver. I used to take this trip every weekend as a teenager - commuting between school in Vancouver and my parents' home in Victoria and was completely jaded about it. I buried myself in textbooks and sometimes didn't even get out of my car. Now a dozen years later I find myself overwhelmed by the journey every time I take it. It's partly nostalgia, I realize, but also the solitude of the space (again), the salt smell, the kaleidoscope of muted colours, the clarity of everything in front of me. I never have my camera with me, but this week I did (for the purpose of taking a photograph of my very pregnant friend) so here you go.

Birthday Flashback

Celebrating my birthday today and here's a flashback to my 1st one. I've been feeling slightly nostalgic while at my parents' house and scanning old photographs into digital format. But today is a wonderful birthday - good coffee and running on the beach this morning, lunch with family, dinner with a dear, dear friend. And most likely, a martini or seven.

West Coast Moment

While I love running around the Serpentine in Hyde Park, running in London is certainly different from running on Vancouver Island. In London I usually find myself dodging grim faced, business-suited folk hurrying to work. This morning on a trail that runs by my parents' house, every single person walking, running, or cycling past me shouted out: "Good Morning!" or "Hey there!" or "Great day!" It was rather glorious...and then I came home to drink my coffee on the deck and watched these guys on the beach below me.

Two Things

I have decided two things. One: Working is much more bearable when doing it on the Eurostar, being whisked to Paris, avec un glass of wine. Two: Being automatically served hot milk with your coffee makes life tremendously more pleasant. Non?

Things I Currently Love v.5

• This past Friday night was all about Jack Daniels and dancing and cheap Chinese food. It was a much needed break from work monotony and I managed to allow myself a full day of recovery (because I'm old now, apparently) without feeling guilty about all the work I should have been doing instead. My new favourite quote was also born during this night out when my good friend said, "Sarah, most people find our personalities abhorrent. I choose to celebrate them."

• At the British Library, there are staff members who walk up and down the aisles of desks checking for banned materials or improper use of the collections. I am currently writing about fetishism and photography, so my desk was covered in books and photographs of pornography. Every time a staff member walked by my desk, they sloooowed down. Snicker.

• I think I was the last person on earth to see The Lives of Others. I'm not averse to seeing films by myself in the theatre, I do it all the time. But I kind of wanted a night out with wine and a good flick and interesting conversation. What to do? Ask who wanted to see it on my Facebook status, of course. I couldn't stop laughing that I was arranging my social life via Facebook - what a terrible cliché. But alas, it worked and the film (as you can see from the sidebar) was tremendous.

• It finally feels like summer is gearing up! I'm booking tickets to summer theatre runs, soon it will be time for tennis and the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, fresh strawberries will be at the Borough Market and fruit pies will be offered in the bakery, and it will be time for Pimms on the patio.

Cygnets in the City

How about some cuteness today? I took this video a couple of days ago as I walking through Hyde Park, on my way home from the library. After a day of filling my head with academic nonsense, spotting these cygnets with very protective parents (only slight alarm when mum came out of the water towards me...have you ever seen a swan attack?) was such a treat.

Week in Wonders

Wonderful: Equus by Peter Shaffer at the Gielgud Theatre. I expected the play to be good, but I didn't expect to be completely blown away by the production, which I was. That Harry Potter kid sure is good. Really, Daniel Radcliffe gave a virtuoso performance which is even more remarkable given that it's a rare feat to upstage Richard Griffiths on stage. The play was worth seeing just for the horses, which were performed by some wicked dancers. Gorgeous costumes and some pretty amazing fancy footwork - it made for a spellbinding couple of hours.

Not so wonderful: For the first time in seven years, as I walked down a busy London street, one of those bus tour operators tried to hand me a pamphlet. He thought I was a tourist. The horror.

Even more wonderful: Heading to Montreux, Switzerland tomorrow for a spa weekend with good friends. Wine, massage, good conversation, and the Alps. Not to mention Swiss efficiency, which I love.

Love Is In The Air

Do you ever have one of those days? One of those days where everything feels good? You wake up after a good sleep, the weather is to-die-for gorgeous, you burst into life with a delicious coffee and with the whole day ahead of you, think: What would be wonderful today?

So you head into East London and wander around Spitalfields Market and buy pretty jewellery and some brilliant art, sampling every olive and chocolate brownie on offer. Then you stop next to the sign that tells you Love Is In The Air and The Espresso Smells Fabulous for another coffee and watch the crazy world walk by. Heading over to Brick Lane you don't buy a peacock feather from the man with the wicked dreads, but you do stop to admire them, and then the smell of sizzling curry becomes too much and you gorge yourself on the best Bangladeshi cuisine in town. And now before your dinner plans with friends you sit in a sunbeam in your flat and have a cup of tea while the stack of Sunday papers sits at your feet, still waiting to be read. Do you ever have one of those days?

My So-Called Life v.3

A different city and a different desk, but the same old story. Still dependent upon the nalgene water bottle and the loosleaf pads. But I have a glorious window to work next to at the moment and I have the finish line in sight. Still a couple of months away, but I can now start letting my mind wander toward post-PhD themes. (And I can envision a time I will not be covered in papercuts from all of these articles and chapter drafts and file folders.)

A Weekend of Contrast

Sometimes there's nothing better than a night in. Friday night was all about eating soup, drinking tea and watching a week's worth of tv. I got through this week's episodes of The L Word (please, please more Pam Grier on this show), 24, Greys Anatomy, and Friday Night Lights. So I got my dose of smut, suspense, quirky, and high school self-absorption.

Sometimes there's nothing better than a night out. Saturday night was all about tequila. Fun at the time, not so much today. The only known cure for a tequila hangover is a Big Mac so I'm thanking the stars that I don't have a fondness for tequila because a) I don't like McDonalds and b) I probably would be dead of clogged arteries by now.

Stocking Up

As I pack to return home to the UK, I must include my favourite food stuffs not available there. None of these are daily food items that I cannot live without, but are basically comfort food items for those gloomy days when work is tough and I don't feel like cooking and need a little bit of O Canada.

Quaker Quick Oatmeal, for example, and brown sugar to go with it. You'd think you could find brown sugar in the UK, but it's refined and thus tastes weird. Kraft Dinner and Zoodles and cinnamon sugar. Betty Crocker Fudge Brownie Mix and Chewy Granola Bars and Kraft Smooth Peanut Butter. And thanks to this blog post, I received a whole whack of O'Henry bars for Christmas from various friends.

Sarah's Best of 2006

Personal Highlights
1) Moving Back to London. The city where it is impossible to be bored.
2) Wandering alone through the Hermitage.
3) Catching both Wimbledon and the US Open.
4) Friday Night Club with the girls. Life is too short for house wine.
5) Hugging Camels in Dubai.

Honourable Mentions
1) A summer of sport - NHL playoffs after not seeing them for two years and the World Cup to boot. Many raucous afternoons and evenings in the pub.
2) Two weeks in January in Hawaii.

Films
1) Volver
2) Little Miss Sunshine
3) Half Nelson
4) The Queen
5) Shortbus

Honourable Mentions
1) The Devil Wears Prada
2) An Inconvenient Truth

Books (Read, but not necessarily published in 2006)
1) Kafka On the Shore by Haruki Murakami
2) Black Swan Green by David Mitchell
3) The Nightwatch by Sarah Waters
4) Airstream Land Yacht by Ken Babstock
5) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

Honourable Mentions
1) The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
2) Lullabies for Little Criminals by Heather O'Neill

Christmas Recovery

When I was thirteen years old, Boxing Day seemed like the best day of the year. Frenetic shopping with gift certificates received the previous day ensued. And now Boxing Day seems like the best day of the year again. I'm not leaving the house and am curled up with books and Turner Classic Movies and the start of the World Junior Hockey Tournament. It certainly has been a great few days leading up to Christmas. Connecting with so many friends in Vancouver that I haven't seen in awhile, including all the girls who showed up to my ten year high school reunion. Riding the ferry back to Victoria, Santa appeared and handed out candy canes to the kids. This little girl sitting in front of me, maybe four years old, turned to her mother with this terribly serious look on her face and asked, "Is Rudolph down with the cars?"

Best Christmas gifts received this year? Tickets to see David Hare's play Amy's View next month. And from my dear friend who is an ND, an extensive naturopathic regime for a healthy New Year, complete with supplements. I shudder to think how much this would have cost me! (Thanks B!)