Venus

I've had an average evening watching Wonders of the Solar System presented by Brian Cox.. . Brian has a permanent smile on his face, and, as well as being a particle physicist, used to be the the guitarist in D:Ream of "Things Can Only Get Better" fame.. I could go on but Wikipedia might do me for copyright. I made and ate a tasty butternut squash, celeriac and sage risotto.. the anni version.. without using any butter or cheese, and then read a story to my flat mates son Frank (aged 7). Frank is going through a faze of constantly putting his hands down his PJ's... So tonight I said "Will you please take your hand out of your PJ's... How would you feel if I did that all day?"... "Good" he said. Unbelievable! Wait 'til I tell his Mum.

Psychic Accountant

I am lucky enough to have a psychic for an accountant at work. She heals mind body and soul AND pays my invoices. I'm not sure that she predicts me a pay rise but today she saw me getting married!! I was just sitting at my desk writing a boring report intertwined with looking at hotels in New York when she said.. "I can see that you are going to get married in the next 2 to 3 years". Wow.. tell me more! Apparently my dress is off white, has straps, and my wedding cake is chocolate with lots of cream... I am getting married in bare feet, which saves on Louboutins, and pays for more cream. My engagement ring will be handed down from my husbands grandmother, or someone close to him, and may need adjusting... mmm adjusting.. an additional rock perhaps? I was loving every minute until BARBADOS ... I am getting married in Barbados... Am I marrying Michael Winner? Or Simon Cowell? Or are Sandals Holidays doing deals on wedding packages? I have been told that I must tell the Universe what it is that I wish for, so I might just tweak the location to another Carribbean Island called Parrot Cay and then I can invite Bruce Willis.

Best Western

I love Best Western Hotels... There, I said it. I stayed in one last night in a village near Brighton. I went there for one of my best friends wedding... and it was an altogether delightful experience. I tried to book a boutique 'contemporary' seafront hotel - wallpaper on one wall, suede head boards and fair trade coffee nonsense but they all make you stay for 2 nights of which we couldn't spare. The only other solution, suggested by one of my usually most stylish friends was to hire a Hummer to take us back to London.....the Best Western was starting to look like Claridges! Anyway my room was a dream, a mint green colour scheme with matching cushions, curtains and head board... a huge bath with Best Western shampoo and shower cap...... and the absolute clincher for me.. a kettle, highlights hot chocolate, 2 packets of shortbread and a mini bar courvoisier. While we waited for our taxi people were flocking to the Carvery... I watched, as a couple of ladies, clearly carrying a bit of extra timber, asked for every type of meat.... leaving very little room for onion rings - I couldn't fault it, everything was 'very well done'.. The puddings were under glass cabinets, it was like a 1970s pudding museum with profiteroles, fruit fools, lemon meringue pie and black cherry gateaux. I checked out this morning filling my pockets with Fox's Glacier Mints from the mahogany reception. There are 280 Best Westerns, all unique with there own charm and character... 1 down I say!

Quiz Night

It was quiz night in the school hall on Thursday night, and I actually got invited! More for entertainment value than contribution value... We ate a very bland veggie curry, and when I asked for some salt to try and give it a bit of flavour I was told that schools don't have salt and aren't allowed to add it....they should have put BYO salt on the invite not BYO booze. The first round was to name 6 very obscure flags... my team got them all bar one, a blue flag with a Union Jack flag in one corner and a sheep coat of arms in the other ..... my incredibly lucky guess.. The Falkland Islands was right! A flock of black birds is a 'murder', a group of chicks is a 'clutch' not 'Wags' as we put. Then there was the tasting round... I excelled at this, name the flavour crisp, fresh herb, cheese and chocolate.... not only did I give lime and chili flavour for the chocolate.. I knew the brand was Montezuma's AND the cocoa solids content.. surely an extra point! Then the bone of contention question... Who played Hannibal Lecter? The answer is actually both Anthony Hopkins and Brian Cox, Brian played him in the original film Manhunter.. so we (well not me) naturally put both names down ... the answer came as being Anthony with no mention of Brian.. UPROAR! Our markers tried to penalise us by giving us half a point! The rhyming slang round.. apple and pears, skin and blister, whistle and flute... "These questions are too BRIGHT AND BREEZY" I shouted out...Oops, was that really me? Unfortunately yes as everyone turned and gave me daggers. Would have been OK if I hadn't got one PETE TONG!

Tindersticks

I got a call last night from 'He who doth not want to be named' HE for short, to say that if I wanted something to blog about I could go with him to see Tindersticks at Shepherds Bush Empire. HE had obviously been blown out by someone, hence the last minute invite, and I had no idea who Tindersticks were, but for the love of BLog I said yes. TINDERSTICKS are a band from Nottingham (don't you love Wikipedia). The main man is called Stuart Staples and he sounds a bit like Leonard Cohen/Nick Cave and he has the biggest lamb chop side burns you've seen since Elvis. I spent the first half an hour of the gig thinking he had accidentally left his blue tooth ear piece in. Anyway I had absolutely no idea what to expect. If HE had said they are America's equivalent to Chaz and Dave I would have believed him. But no, this was 7 unbelievably talented musicians, proper incredible musicians playing more instruments than Wikipedia could care to mention... the vibraphonist was hot (wedding ring).... clocked it in the bar afterwards).

Blog Blunder

I am such a putz. A few pals told me I should take the plunge and post my blog link on FB for all to see. Last night, as my bath was running,I did just that. I then casually sauntered to the bathroom, dipped a toe in and thought FUCK! It wasn't that the water was too hot, but that I suddenly remembered I had made friends with my Dutch lover from GSoulMates on FB a few days before we met......and having taken the p slightly (i can't bring myself to highlight the mean things I said, but bald, he drives a hairdryer and NO were 3)...I literally pounced on my computer and deleted the link from my status... but shit it, someone had already seen it and commented, so what if he had clocked it too, within the 2 minutes before deletion? wow deletion is a word?... I had no idea how to delete a friend but needs did must, and I have never been so speedy at working something techie out... he was gone, removed, de friend ed... I feel terrible but will feel even more terrible if he reading this.... SORRY IF you are, last time I mention you I promise and the white BMW with 18" rims probably is really cool! Anyway I said on our date that I had liked Spurs since Vinnie Jones played for them, and you politely reminded me that Vinnie played for Wimbledon not Spurs.. oops.
Blog blunder no.1 of many I'm sure.

Botox

I went on a lovely family outing last Sunday. We went to a cast and crew screening of Nanny McPhee (small c big P) 2, and it was brilliant. On the drive home I realised there was now nothing between me and my internet dutch lover date at 3pm, other than a quick brush down to remove any pop corn kernels caught in my bra.... While we sat in traffic my sister decided that with less than an hour before my first ever blind date, she would use this as an opportunity to discuss my cosmetic surgery needs. It was like a doctor circling every pimple, dimple, crease and crevice on your face and body with a felt tip pen. Coming at you with a pair of secateurs all under one of those magnified mirrors with lights. 'Don't you think you should try botox?' she said. 'I mean it's not your fault, its from all the running' she continued. 'It's just that someone needs to be the guinea pig, so why not you?'. Apparently I could do with the diagonal line between my eyebrows freezing, my eye wrinkles plumping and reducing and while we have got the felt tip out, the removal of 3 moles, 'Are they spots or moles or what?' digging the sibling scissors in further. I went to my date feeling like a cross between Nanny McPhee, the She Devil with a bit of Worzel thrown in. I did however make it through my date confidently, in daylight, and without so much as a raised eye brow and with neither one of us mentioning the paper bag on my head.

Howard from The Wirral

I saw a poster the other morning, It was dangling from a bike lock unit (i have no idea what those things you tie bikes to are called??). It was inviting women cyclists to come and visit 'Dr Bike' for a full servicing for FREE! I free servicing, ooh Doctor, yes please. So i cycled to the 'under the Westway' location and was met by a gazebo and 2 hunky guys oiling some chains. The taller of the 2 Dr Bikes said he would be about half an hour and suggested that I go and wait in the leisure centre next door. I asked him if he knew whether the coffee was decent there and he gave a detailed response about how the coffee was motor-way service station standard, needed 6 sugars and that i was better off having tea. I said I would rather cycle to the Deli in Notting Hill to get one, and offered him one. A machiato for Dr Bike and a skinny Cap for me. Howard aka Dr Bike proceeded to spend nearly an hour on my extremely posh bike... Kensington and Chelsea Council, who funded the day, were probably trying to encourage the local estate mums and their bikes out of their high rises, not girls with £1000 Marins from Brakenbury Village... Howard was an absolute perfectionist. 3 pairs of latex gloves later he had tweaked my cables, polished my chain, put spokey dokes on my wheels (remember those!) and been very generous with his lube.... He mentioned the word lube a couple of times during our bike chats, and I am sorry but it is really embarrassing.... all bike shop people say it.. LUBE LUBE LUBE... its gross.. I literally can't say it.. i will say oil, i need it/stuff/thingy for my chain, point at it ,anything... but I will not say the word. He then took my bike seat off to check the seat 'post'... and then he greased it... it was soo embarrassing... i forgot what I was saying I was so put off my train of thought.... and you know when you know someone is reading your mind... I know he knew I was thinking willy thoughts.... ARh, poor Howard from the Wirral being subjected to a morning with a pervy minded girl and her well lubed hybrid.

Fat without a GSOH

So I finally did it... I am no longer an internet date virgin.... I arranged to meet my Dutch lover under Hammersmith Bridge at 3pm... I was early, but still, he should have been earlier. There was a busker under the bridge singing Quanta La Mera, how romantic I thought. 15 minutes later my busker friend was still playing Quanta La Mera on a loop.. great catalogue, and I was still waiting. Great, I can go home and have a tea and read the papers.. hurrah. I got half way home when he called to say he had just arrived. "I am sorry I am so late" said a dutch voice. "I didn't check my watch whilst I was traveling"he said. TRAVELING.. who refers to cycling along the river as TRAVELING... You are soo I.T. it's all wrong... I let him suffer Quanta La Mera while I turned around and TRAVELED back to the meeting point. When I saw him, he had a sweet smile, but NO... well as NO as you can be without giving someone a chance to even speak before ruling them out as being a potential love. We went to a great pub, and I drank a lovely honey dew ale and told him that Ernest Hemmingway and Dylan Thomas used to drink there... I like to give the impression that I read even though I don't. I took 2 amazing espresso chocolate truffles to have 1 each, but decided to drink quickly, go home and have them both for myself. I am kind of glad I have lost my internet date cherry, but having just spat the pip out I am looking forward to going back to the old fashioned way of boy meets girl... what ever that is... but that's what makes it exciting.

Scientology

Oh my god, nearly got GOT by a Scientology yesterday. There were some girls on a stand outside the tube station asking the public to have their stress levels tested on a 1950s looking stress monitor device. I would never normally have stopped, but in the name of the blog I thought it might make a good story in my otherwise humdrum day. I had to sit down and hold onto 2 electrode things... relax, and think of things in my life that make me feel stressed. 'Sitting in-front of Shepherds Bush Green at rush hour' I thought and the needle went whizzing up the stress o meter. Ok so I thought about money, lack of, and up it went again, and my biological clock, whoop, off the scale it went! The theory of overcoming ones stress is in a book by an American dude called L. Ron Hubbard... Ron reckons that our minds are split into our 'analytical mind,' the part that stores memories like files in a computer, and our 'reactive mind,' (the naughty part), that they say prevents people from being more ethical, more aware, happier and more sane, oh and can prevent allergies and sex deviations too apparently. I wonder if it helps get you sex, in order for you to find out if it stops you deviating? The goal of DIANETICS - 'The Modern Science of Mental Health,' as it is known, (not Callanetics the 80s fitness craze), is to remove the so called 'reactive mind'. My very sweet 'instant therapist on the Green' was selling Rons chunky book for £13. Apparently it has sold millions of copies in zillions of languages too.. so why a trestle table on Shepherds Bus Green I think to myself.....I have since discovered that it is practiced by followers of Scientology... no mention of that while I was squeezing my electrods.

LIFE COACH

I went to a LIFE COACH talk the other night. It was held at a private members club on South Molton Street. I shouldn't be too mean about it as they did give me 3 months free membership (not that private then), its . You can usually gauge the level of ostentatious lack of style of these haunts by their loo design, and in this instance it was off the chain. Quilted padded doors that resembled the back of a leather sofa, and those annoying taps that turn themselves on automatically every time you move. The talk was on HOW TO GIVE THE PERFECT INTERVIEW and was given by a lovely lady, a 'you can take the girl out of Essex' type, wearing a silky sleeveless blouse that can only be found in NEXT, with arms that needed covering, and fish nets. She read from a script and lets face it, we can all google 'top 10 tips on giving a good interview'. Luckily I had read the E invite to see that it clearly stated in small writing that it was a PAY bar, so while all the PA type girls were ordering their Cosmos and Caipi's I stuck to the cucumber water.. it was fun watching them trying not to look surprised when their, its only a Monday night, bills were bought over... We learned that body language accounts for 90% of how people perceive you... You mean years of trawling through the FT for show has been a waste of time? We learned that we must tilt our head slightly during the interview, I can imagine my potential employer asking me 'Do you need to see a physio? She told us to keep eye contact for at least 10 seconds when answering a question, I would have to use my fingers for this which might prove distracting. She said that FEAR stands for False Evidence Appearing Real... and that under no circumstances should we be late for an interview.... £15 to find out that turning up 10 minutes late for an interview doesn't mean you are busy or cool. When I asked her how you answer about having any date gaps in your CV, she said , 'You can say you were traveling'! Yeah, my 2 week trip to Goa ended in 6 months... that's really impressive. So from now on GOOGLE is my new LIFE COACH.

Go with the FLO POOL

I had my first swimming lesson in a bout 25 years yesterday, but not in any old swimming pool.. i swam in a pool called a FLO POOL, where you swim in a tiny plunge pool, against a current. There are mirrors everywhere so you can watch your style, or in my case, watch everything wobble and see the air bubbling out of your nose as you breath out under water...V strange. My amazing international swimming coach lady pressed a button and the current commenced. She twisted a twisty thing to make the current stronger and I started swimming faster and faster. It was utterly exhausting, and only a week after a marathon was probably a bit more than gentle exercise. I am hooked already... and can feel my swimmers shoulders busting out of my summer spaghetti vests just thinking about it, but hey at least I won't get marathon black toes with my new found sport. If fact the only downsides are having to keep a check on my bikini line and dealing with goggle panda eyes for the rest of the day.

Fat with a GSOH

I am in a terrible quandary. I have been all talk on Guardian Soul Mates for soo long. I treat it like FB, i just cruise around and stalk but don't actually make any contact.. My first message was from a girl called Donna who said she was BI CURIOUS, liked my look, and had a camera and mic if I wanted to chat.... GREAT!
Then I get a guy who tells me he has just finished reading a book called The Black Book by Pamuk about how people cannot ever really be themselves. " Is it good enough simply to try to be true to oneself most of the time?" was his question to me.. DRY! And he had a terrible under bite.
Anyway I exchanged a few emails with this guy 'who prefers brunettes', works in IT, is bald and from Holland.. oh and did i mention that he has a paunch? He drives an MX5 which he tries to excuse, but NOTHING excuses a hair dryer... and goes on to say how he would now buy a Z4 (in white, with 18" rims).... and I am thinking ... is that a joke? I literally don't know... but I think I am starting to forgive the MX5.. He wants to meet on Sunday but I am freaking out and haven't replied.. Oh what to do.....

Blogging for the sake of blogging

I have been trying to start this blog shenanigans for far too long, always finding an excuse to put it off... namely for the simple reason of what the hell I am going to blog about. First was coming up with a concept... A MAN HUNT? (oh god what does that say!)....So boys and anything that will ween me off and distract me from wasting time and stalking on FaceBook. I decided to call the blog DESPERATELY SEEKING SUSIE, inspired by the film Julie and Julia about a girl in New York who decides to cook a recipe from a famous cook book every day for a year and blog about it, I thought hey I can combine finding a husband with writing, GREAT, and go on an internet date with a boy every day for 365 days.....I know.... it sounds way more SLOG than BLOG! Then I thought, OK call it one date per week.... All I needed to do was take some hot shots of me for Guardian Soul Mates, and I would be away! Then my friend that's a boy said ... Forget it Suze... what does Desperately Seeking Susie mean anyway? As if you will go on that many dates, you joined 6 months ago, and you haven't been on 1... JUST START WRITING. And so thanks to my friend that's a boy here I am... coming live and direct, with a tropical mix of good bad and very ugly.