i miss you, london

To celebrate your own failed (or temporarily suspended) love affairs, click here.

faces in the stars

WHEN you are old and gray and full of sleep,

And nodding by the fire, take down this book,

And slowly read, and dream of the soft look

Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,

And loved your beauty with love false or true,

But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,

And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,

Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled

And paced among the mountains overhead

And hid his face among a crowd of stars.

William Butler Yeats

I built an ark

I am ill and grumpy today.  I have a bizarre flu, that is awful when I wake up and before I go to sleep but sort of levels out to general lethargy and self pity for the remainder of the day.  And, hot flushes.  I'm only 29, so hopefully it is not the onset of early menopause.  Good times.

So, no work for little old me yet as I have spent the last two days staring at the ceiling cursing the world and imbibing vast quantities of nurofen plus.  Joy.

Anyway, the neighbourhood possum (one of, there are HUNDREDS) came to my back door last night to eat from the cat's bowl, complete with little baby possum on board.  And then, today, I heard the bowl knock over and upon investigating found a massive blue tongue lizard just snacking on the cat biscuits.  

Yep, the flu, possai and lizards is all I got today.  

Tagged

My first meme, I've been tagged by the lovely FTW....here goes...

Here are the rules:
1. Link to the person that tagged you
2. Post the rules on your blog
3. Share 6 non-important/habits/quirks about yourself
4. Tag 6 random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs
5 Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website
6. Let your tagger know when your entry is up

1) I can't stand chipped finger nail polish. Drives. Me. Bananas.

2) Even if I'm running late in the morning, I have to have a cup of coffee with cream before I leave the house.

3) I never feel a greater surge of excitement than when I arrive at an airport in a foreign country that I've never been before.

4) My patience for public servants is extremely limited, and I am one. (I want to be a lobbyist, so you gotta do the time).

5) If I ever have a valium before a flight, I have to take it with coffee because I read somewhere once the caffeine aids the absorption.

6) I've been flying since I was a little girl, but became fearful of it in my mid twenties, which, you know, is a bit of a bummer because I generally take upwards of 20 flights per year. So sometimes, if the valium ain't working, I will have a conversation in my head with grandfather, who was in the airforce and loved planes, and it calms me down.

I tag anyone who wants to do this!

And I think you should all check out my lovely friend Chloe's blog. She's tops.

life and love and stuff

To the cynical, and I count myself in that demographic ordinarily, the following will probably invoke some nausea. 

In countenance to my cynicism, I am a die hard romantic. 

Quite some time ago, late one night, and shortly after the first declarations of love were made,the boy rang me and read me this poem...

  

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

I have one wish.  That no matter what life throws at me (and there has been some clangers), I always, always, want to believe in the joy I felt at that moment.    

Maybe the secret to a happy life is appreciating, in isolation, the joy of all these individual little things that happen along the way.  Free of any expectations that life will continue on the merry path of wonderfulness until the ever after.  

Plus, there is always the thrill of anticipation of never knowing when it might happen again.  

i give thee thanks...

Here's the low down: dot point style:

• I'm on holiday for a week.  I have not organised myself to such a degree that I will be going away anywhere, but I am presently on leave from my (at times) ridiculously demanding job.   
  
• I regularly, and moreover very recently, have mind blowing sex with a man who I not only love insanely and happen to think is the sexiest creature on earth, but who feels exactly the same about me.  Even if the world were to somehow pull us apart; I will always remember the electricity he can send charging through my body with both his touch and the whisper of .... *swoon*.  
• Today I went to the hairdressers and was given some delicious smelling Aveda Shampoo and Conditioner.  For free!
• I went home, ate my sushi lunch, made some small talk with Jesus, and had myself a lovely afternoon nap.
• As I type, a summer thunderstorm does its thing outside.  

Good times.

**Jesus is the cat. 

good times

I'm tipping the exhaustion scales this evening.  It was steaming hot today and I am completely spent.

Unfortunately for me: the neighbors; not so.  Last night's car crash involving a rather cerebral drink driver desperately trying to hide his car in the nearest driveway (!) has been outdone this evening by a rather loud domestic, complete with "Get away from my boyfriend you fuckin' slut!" and "He pulled a knife on Tommo" which has just been brought to its climax by the wailing sirens of our boys in blue.  

Word up, inner city living.

I'm emotionally tired, too.  Work has drained me.  Love has drained me.  Life has drained me.  All I want it is to sleep and I can't.  

I look at my life of recent times, and I don't really have too much room for complaint.  I've worked in remote communities in Africa, lived in London and Paris, held interesting and rewarding jobs and i've had me many an adventure.  

And whilst most of the time I convince myself that I am a successful, independent, and modern woman who needs not a man by her side and the thought of children to look forward to... some days its really hard.   

  

feminism schemenism

I love the New Yorker.  I love New Yorkers even more.  What I do not love, however, is Sarah Palin.  I have spent much of the last month agonising over the selection of this women to run for the vice presidential office of the United States.

Now, I am not an American.  If I were, I certainly would not be a Republican.  For fucks sake, what were they thinking?  Actually, I know what they were thinking and that makes my blood boil even more.

As a reasonably successful professional, I believe it is appointments such as these that do a disservice to all women that aspire to a career in politics or public life.  Argh.  

May I suggest that everyone visit this link.   

I heart Obama.