A wet Saturday in Hampstead

You'd think that amidst a recession on a wet Saturday afternoon, the staff at the gastro pubs in Hampstead  would at least try to act friendly.

In our usual haunt, The Holly Bush, I've yet to come across bad service, but oh my, does The Horseshoe miss the mark.

Husband and I met up in 'the village' after we'd each had some Saturday errands to run (mine was having a pedicure and a manicure ready for my skiing trip next weekend - not really an errand, I know). I was the last one to arrive and found him in one of the tables in the middle of this trendy pub/restaurant/bar. I was cold, miserable and hungry. Celeriac soup seemed a brilliant choice. I left Husband to do the ordering while I visited the little girls' room downstairs.

Now, I've been to The Horseshoe before and was wary of a report which I read (I think) in the Zagat guide that the food is good but the staff seem to be having such a good time amongst themselves that they forget about the customers. Bearing this in mind, I've taken the haphazard service just as a feature of the place.

But after watching the excellent TV series 'Michel Roux's Service' on BBC 2 earlier this year, as well as the 'Mary Portas: Secret Shopper' on Channel 4, I am more unwilling to put up with inferior customer service while I am the paying customer.

So, I came up from the rank smelling cellar where the loos are and as soon as I sit down, Husband nods at one of the girls wearing a bright red mini-skirt and heavy make-up. I don't think she's his type at all. Besides, how unkind could he be - here I was, as a result of the rainy weather, with hair as if I'd been dragged through the hedge backwards, my feet wrapped up in cling film in my trainers (to stop the varnish from sticking), and wearing no make up whatsoever (I'd left the house in a hurry as usual).

'That's funny,' said Husband. And I saw what he pointed at was a bowl of chips. 'They told me I couldn't have chips.'

'What?'

'The woman told me they don't do side orders so I couldn't have chips.'

This is taking things a little far, I thought. If they had chips on the menu (which they did) how difficult could it be to serve them as a side? Surely in a place where people bring their kids to eat too, a bowl of chips is the most common side to be sold? Or did she, knowing how unhealthy chips are, decide that a man with greying hair was too old for such a treat?

When our order arrived I was even more amazed - Husband had ordered something which looked very much like a burger. It turned out to be a sausage ring in a bun, but still.

'And with that you couldn't have a side of chips?' I said to the waitress pointing at Husband's plate of food.

She gave me a look that said, 'Bitch,' and out loud, pronouncing each syllable very carefully, said,  'Hope you enjoy your meal.' She turned on her heels and went to talk to her mates - the other members of staff.

Chipless meal

It was only because I was starving after the boredom of sitting in one place for an hour and a half, and because of the cold weather that I actually ate my soup, which was nice enough. But then who'd not be able to make a decent bowl of soup out of anything really?

Soup was tasty

Michael Arditti at England's Lane Books

Michael Arditti's latest novel, Jubilate, came out last week. It's a beautiful love story, set during a pilgrimage to Lourdes. This small village in south-western France is famous for the Marian apparitions of Our Lady of Lourdes that are reported to have occurred to a local girl, Bernadette Soubirous in 1858. A total of 67 miracles have been reported at Lourdes since the apparitions.

Here's a brief resume of the evening with author Michael Arditti. 

As a writer you are known to write books about faith. Are you religious?

It's true to say that I am a believer; I believe in miracles. Although Jubilate is not a religious novel. It’s a book about another kind of miracle; that of love. Vincent, the male character, is not at Lourdes because of his religion - he's there to film a documentary - but he ends up finding a different way to look at faith.

Did you always plan to set the novel in Lourdes?

I wanted to write about pilgrimage, and about Lourdes.  It was important to me to create a strong sense of place, so Lourdes as a place was obviously a factor. Above all, though, I wanted to write a love story.

The novel is about love between two middle-aged people - that's quite unusual in today's literature. Was this a conscious decision?

Michael Arditti

I wanted the two characters to have had lives before this story - I wanted to create a conflict between them. Both have a lot at stake: Gillian made her marriage vows, which she firmly believes she shouldn't break. Vincent, on the other hand, believes that the breakdown of his marriage has made him a loveless creature. He thinks he no longer has the ability to love.

The whole cast of pilgrims you created are often funny. In fact there's a lot of humour in the book. 

There's a lot of humour in Lourdes - and in Christianity. It's a defence mechanism; a way of coping. I like drawing peripheral characters and with them as well as with the main perpetrators, I tried to reflect the Lourdes experience. I wanted the other pilgrims’ stories to mirror that of the two narrators.

The structure of the book is quite unusual in that we follow Gillian's story backwards, while Vincent's narrative starts from the moment they meet. Which story came first?

The structure came to me straight away when I decided on two narrators. I found it interesting to have unreliable narrators tell a story. In general I think it's hard to give a definite view of an event. But I felt parallel stories could perhaps be a little plodding, so I decided to change the timeline. I wrote it exactly as it reads, so I had to plan the book very carefully. Of course the moment of truth comes when their two tales meet in the middle.

I found the point when Vincent and Gillian's stories meet very moving. I felt as if the intersection formed a symbolic cross - was this the intention?

Well, perhaps. I knew the Wednesday had to be the point where the two stories meet, and had to - just like my previous book Easter - be very careful that I had everything in the correct order. I felt the two narrators must have their own versions of the events - at the same time their experiences can't be too different; they are lovers after all.

In some of the reviews of Jubilate you are described as 'brave' for writing books about faith. Are you brave?

I think you have to be brave to write about anything. We are living in a very secular age, so I guess it's brave to write about something that’s not so popular. But some 5 million people go to Lourdes every year, so if everyone there bought my book...of course faith isn’t sexy, it isn't fashionable, but to me faith is how we measure ourselves. You are Christian, Muslim, Atheist… I think it's a wonderful way of getting to the heart of the matter.

  

You set Jubilate in Lourdes and went there - did you purely go to research the book?  

No, not at first. I went there to seek a miracle, like everybody else. But while there, I saw what a wonderful place it would be to set a book in, so I went back to do the research. Of course none of the characters are based on anyone in particular. Neither Vincent nor Gillian are people I know or have met. Although I had a distant relative who had an accident whilst playing tennis. He became a man with the mental age of seven, but with normal sexual urges of that of a grown man. I met him and his wife a few times when I was a child and often since wondered how his wife coped with the situation.

Was Richard difficult to draw as a character?

Of course I researched brain damage and how it can affect a person, and also drew on my experience of my relative and his wife. In the book I also used Richard’s mother, Patricia, to facilitate the drawing of the character of Richard. It was easier to show the relationship she has with her grown-up son. She makes comments such as, 'He's still a handsome man', because she has great difficulty in dealing with the brain-damaged man who used to be her child. But in general with a character like Richard you just have to go with your instincts.

Michael Arditti was interviewed by Danielle van Emden

I haven't read a book for some time which has affected me as strongly as Jubilate. Michael Arditti's prose is beautiful; the way he's drafted the progress of the miraculous love story at the heart of the book is genius. I was sad when the book ended. 

The story of Jubilate will stay with me for a long while.  

Learning Danish

In the past week we've entered a TV viewing zone called The Killing. This is a cult Danish thriller series which has finally reached Britain. It's shown on BBC Four on Saturday nights in double episodes, and I think they're still all on iPlayer. We began our viewing on Sunday night, thinking we'd watch just the one of the episodes we'd saved up, but after getting through four understood that this was compulsive watching.

The story of Förbrydelsen centres around a murder investigation, which slowly entangles the lives of a politician, a teacher, the female detective, Sarah Lund, played by Sofie Grabol (above) with her family and colleagues, and obviously the victim's friends and family. The nineteen-year-old girl is murdered after suffering a weekend of abuse. At first everyone who has come in contact with her is under suspicion. The series is filmed in the classic Nordic style, with most scenes shot in either driving rain or in bleak twilight. There's even an initial scene where the female detective gazes into a row trees framing a vast field - very Wallander indeed.

But true to stylish Danish flare, the viewer is soon very sure this is no Wallander. Especially the political scenes showing the cut and thrust of a modern society seem somehow more Danish; while the clothes and dialogue show a far more relaxed attitude to life - even when a murder investigation clashes with an election campaign.

Troels Hartmann (Lars Mikkelsen) and Deputy Superintendent Sarah Lund (Sofie Grabol) in The Killing. Photograph: BBC/DR/DR

But I'm no expert on Denmark. I've only been to the country a few times, mostly travelled through it, not even leaving the train while on my way from Sweden to the UK.

But watching The Killing I've found the language quite a revelation: I understand much more than I thought I would and after a two-hour session of the series, I'm sure I could quite easily tale Dansk if push came to shove and my life depended on it. Well, I'd have a go anyway. I'm sure my lovely blogging friend Mette Bassett would disagree and even laugh at my efforts...in her very Danish, jolly way.

A Valentine's Surprise

I love surprises.

Yesterday morning after a busy week of theatre-going I woke up with a terrible throat and no voice.

'I'm not going anywhere today,' I whispered to Husband.

'Oh,' he said and sounded really disappointed.

'They won't mind,' I said a little puzzled. I'd organised for us to go out to the pub for Sunday lunch with friends and then to the cinema after, but I knew they would understand as soon as they heard my voice (or the lack of it) on the phone. Besides, he'd said he had to work so it was just going to be me and possibly Daughter anyway.

But now there was a long silence. I thought the man had gone back to sleep. It was only seven thirty on a Sunday morning; we'd got in at half past midnight and my head was hurting.

'Ok, I'm going to have to tell you everything,' he said.

When a Husband says something like that early on a Sunday morning you take notice. I opened my eyes and lifted myself into a sitting position, all ears now.

It turned out that my lovely man had organised a bunch of romantic activities for the day. 'I thought since Valentines is on a Monday we'd celebrate it today.'

He'd booked one of my favourite restaurants one month before. When earlier in the week I told him of my lunch plans he phoned our friends to cancel and told them not to say anything to me. (Which they didn't) When I sent him the link to the cinema booking, he phoned them to cancel. When I then told him our daughter would be coming home for the weekend from uni and go back on Monday morning, he added another place to the Sunday booking. 'I've spent the past week undoing everything you've done, and now you're ill!' he said.

It may be that I'm just a person impossible to organise a surprise for?

London Life: Children's Hour at the Comedy Theatre

Image from childrenshourtheplay.com

There's been a lot of conflict about this play in our household. Months ago, my friend, 'the theatre agent', found seats on a matinee that fitted our busy calendars. We decided to treat our daughters to it, thinking that our husbands wouldn't be interested in a play about a girls' school in New England. This was well before I knew that the subject matter was largely lesbianism, which in this case would be acted out by Keira Knightley and Peggy from Mad Men (sorry I know her real name is Elisabeth Moss but for me she's forever locked in her excellent TV character). It was also well before all the hype created in the press about the play.

Husband wasn't impressed 'What? I have to suffer your bleak Ibsens and Strindbergs and then when there's Keira in a hot steamy sex scene with Peggy I'm not invited?'

After seeing the play I could, with relief, report back to him that there wasn't even a whiff of a girl-on-girl action. Sadly, I thought the whole performance boring.

The set-up with the young students (girls in far too realistically unflattering and uncomfortable-looking potato sack uniforms) went on for far too long. This first scene was only rescued by the scatter-brained, mildly drunk Lily Mortar (aunt of Martha played by Carol Kane), a teacher who in her previous life had been a stage actress. She spent her time swigging from her hip-flask and instructing the flock of highly excitable teenage girls on what was ladylike and what wasn't. This scene was the only entertaining part of the play.

I also felt the widely celebrated performance of Bryony Hannah as the obnoxious 14-year-old girl Mary Tilford who, with her lying and blackmailing, causes the school to close down thereby destroying both the lives of Keira Knightely and Elisabeth Moss' characters, was false. Her hand wringing, teenage outbursts and jerky movements are highly unbelievable.

When Keira Knightley makes her long-awaited first entrance to the stage, I got a strong sense that the audience was supposed to clap, such was the power of her celebrity. Not in a million years did I ever feel that she actually was a wronged teacher in a girls school, nor did I believe in her relationship with the local doctor, Joseph Cardin, played by Tobias Menzies. The thin blouse she wore without a bra (we saw too much of her two pointy female bits - a pay-back to the few male members of the audience?) did little to convince us of any head-mistressy dowdiness.

Elisabeth Moss was more convincing, although in the last pivotal scene when she finally comes out with her confession of love for Keira - something which had been so obviously signalled throughout the play I was incredulous that she hadn't guessed - she too feels the need to overact.

The last scene, where Keira Knightley dramatically opens up the windows to let in sunlight (signalling new hope) was so far from subtly symbolic and so farcical I very nearly laughed out loud.

I know I may sound harsh about this play. It may be that I was just 'over-theatred' this week after seeing two other plays in almost so many days. My expectations could also have been too high due to the excellent reviews that The Children's Hour had received in the press. Or the fact that I kept seeing it as 'the hot ticket in town' in every magazine and newspaper in the last two months or so. Or I might be in a bad temper because the cold which I've been trying to fend off all week finally broke through last night and this morning I woke up with acute laryngitis. (Nature's way of shutting me up for a day or two,' says Husband who's still bitter about missing 'the lovely Keira')

Whatever, I woke up this morning having decided last night to just write a one-line review of this play, 'The cast all believe their own pr,' but couldn't resist having a more of a rant.

So many apologies, I promise now to crawl back to bed and try to make myself better in mood as well as in health for the week ahead. After all, theatre-going is all about the lows as well as the highs. Seeing something you don't enjoy makes plays that are excellent so much sweeter. That's the theory, anyway.

London Life: Becky Shaw at The Almeida

Well, my wish to have a jolly play next came true. Becky Shaw, a modern, witty play by Gina Gionfriddo, was just what I needed. (Don't be fooled by the poster above)

The play, which is set in New York and Boston among other places, centres around the fall-out from a father's death in a dysfunctional family. Sounds gruelling? But the play is above all a comedy, and a sharp and quick-witted one at that.

The marvellous Daisy Haggard, who's currently starring in BBC's 'Episodes', in the title role is as gormless as she is intense, totally meeting the challenge of being the desperate, funny singleton a la Bridget Jones.

Daisy Haggard

Haydn Gwynne (I remember her best from 'Drop the Dead Donkey') as the cynical mother of the family is also excellent, but the performance I most enjoyed was by David Wilson Barnes, who as the dry, realistic, un-emotional step-brother of the highly-strung Suzanna (Anna Madeley) really hit the mark, igniting many belly laughs from the audience. 'My date is Amish?' he comments on hearing Becky doesn't own a cell phone.

From left to right: Anna Madeley, Vincent Montuel (Andrew) and Daisy Haggard

David Wilson Barnes who I find myself having a tiny, tiny crush on this morning (though not my type at all!)

Haydn Gwynne

In spite of the gags, the play still tried to examine the state of the modern family and marriage. Here I must say it failed, trying to go deep into the psyche of the characters in a play, so littered with excellent comic dialogue, is not advisable in my view. It goes too near TV sitcom territory, which this play really didn't need to do. Ignoring the final scenes where attempts at some seriousness met with a stone-walled silence from the audience, the majority of the play was incredibly hilarious and with the casts' unfaltering American accents made a throughly enjoyable night out at the theatre.

Can't wait for Children's Hour later today, though after this weekend I think I might need to got to some kind of clinic to dry out from an overdose of art - the gym perhaps? Now that's an idea...

Trench coat shopping

Befitting the weather in London today (rain and more rain) I'm lusting after a proper mac. It's not that I don't own one, I just down't have one in the right colour. Due to some terrible lack of foresight I threw away my beige Michael Kors trench coat in The Big Move. I think I thought it had had its day. At least it went to a charity shop so I hope some lucky girl somewhere is wearing it right now. I won't go into how lovely it was, it's too upsetting.

So basically, I want a replacement for that mac. I don't want exactly the same, as one of the reasons I didn't like the coat (then) was that it had no collar. It was very sporty, though, and a little military, so on trend although I'd had it for over five years. But like most of the items I've ever bought in New York, it lasted and looked good year after year. Oops, I said I wasn't going to go on about it, didn't I?

Ok, so the choices for a replacement I've seen so far are:

1. Burberry

Burberry cotton blend trench coat £650 at Net-a-Porter

There's also a shorter, waterproof version at £695 and a two-in-one trench which you can wear as long coat or as a cropped jacket.

Two-in-one twill trench Burberry £850

I really, really want one of these coats, but they are so very expensive. On the other hand, items that I've fallen head over heels for and that have at the time seemed to cost the earth are the items I've generally worn the longest. Pieces like the red Burberry mac which I already own and which I'm going to be wearing later today, has been in my wardrobe for longer than I like to think. Also the two-in-one would actually give me two coats, both of which I'd use. Ahem.

My red Burberry trench which is at least 6 years old

2. Uniqlo. The new Jill Sander collection has arrived at this Japanese store and they stock three different trench coats, all of which I'd be quite happy with. Although the +J collection prices are fairly hefty at a penny short of £200.00 (don't you just hate when stores do the 99 thing? As if we consumers were stupid enough not to understand that £9.99 is really £10). As a comparison, this store, which prides itself on good quality at reasonable prices has another trench coat for £69.99 (ie £70).

I've been wearing a dark grey military coat I bought from the previous winter +J collection for two winters now and it's still going strong. I'd show you pictures of the new collection but this store is very protective about its images. Here's a link though.

3. Isabella Oliver.

Isabella Oliver 365 The Classic Trench at £239

I love this online store. Started as a maternity wear retailer, it now stocks every day classic pieces as well as easy to wear jersey skirts and dresses. The trench as far as I can see only has one fault - there's no buckle, just a tie-on belt. But with a code from the wonderful fashion blogger LibertyLondonGirl there's 15% off the collection which would make this coat nearly the same price as the Uniqlo +J one. And less than a third (or a quarter for the two-in-one) of the Burberry one.

Decisions, decisions...

Small Hours at the Hampstead Theatre

 My marathon week of theatre-going started tonight with a one-woman play at Hampstead Theatre. This play, starring Sandy McDade and written by Lucy Kirkwood and Ed Hime,  has been selling out since it opened on12th January with a 'World Premiere'. The run was extended by two weeks to allow more people to see it.

All I knew about this play was that the audience would sit around the living room where the action takes place. What I didn't know was that we had to leave everything that we couldn't keep on our laps in the cloakroom (not a problem) and take our shoes off in a downstairs ante-room (a problem if your socks aren't immaculate which mine obviously were...hmm...), or that the audience was so very small in number - there must've only been twenty of us in total sitting around a basement flat living room.

To me the play was uncomfortable both physically (we were sitting on a hard veneer sideboard) and mentally. The subject matter of a young woman trying to cope on her own while her partner is away is so close to my heart that I very nearly left the set. But I remembered the little talk we'd been given just before we were told to remove our shoes about the play being an installation piece, where the audience is present but mustn't partake and most pointedly mustn't leave the set unless absolutely necessary. They even told us that there was a guard member of staff posted outside the door in case we tried to escape leave mid-performance.

Seriously, though, the play and particularly the performance of Lucy Kirkwood as a woman on the very brink of mental and physical breakdown is explosive. But watching her private hell at such close quarters seems wrong somehow. Several times during the hour-long play I found myself turning my face away from her, and I noticed others around the room do the same. So it begs the question, do we go to the theatre - or to any art exhibition or performance - to enjoy ourselves, or do we go to watch suffering? There must be a middle way. Let's hope my next two theatre pieces this week have a little more joy and happiness in them...

London life: Sunday night is movie night

I've written before about how, when we moved up to London from the country, we promised ourselves that on every Sunday night we'd go to the cinema. In spite of an initial poor start to this plan, we've recently seen a few more films.

Last weekend it was Barney's Version, a film which wasn't exactly top of my 'must see' list, but when we eventually got around to booking tickets at the fantastic Everyman Cinema in Hampstead, this film was the only one with seats available for our favourite five pm showing.  

And even though this is not a film that you'd rave about, it's a pleasant way to spend two or so hours. The performances by Dustin Hoffman as Barney's uncouth ex-cop father, and Rosamund Pike, as the love of Barney's life, were particularly good. Paul Giamatti in the title role was also excelled. I loved him as John Adams in the TV series and at first had difficulty in imagining him as a raucous 20-something instead of an honourable American president, but I soon got over that hurdle - the first drunken scene made sure of it.

The story of Barney's Version basically centres around a TV producer, Barney, whose life is characterised by his impulsive nature. Sometimes this is a good thing (when he meets and woos Rosamund Pike) and sometimes it gets him into trouble (he gets married three times). What I was most impressed with was the make-up, however. I don't know anything about it, but to me it was incredible how natural the cast looked as their young, middle-aged and old selves. Usually when an actor is made to look old (or young) on screen, you can spot the silicone (or whatever it is they use) on their faces a mile away, but in this film the young looked young and the old were old very naturally. 

This week I'm not sure we'll manage a Sunday night cinema because I'm going to see three plays before that (including Children's Hour at the Comedy Theatre, which as a fan of Mad Men and Elisabeth Moss I'm very excited about) It means we're out both Friday and Saturday nights. But if we are up for it, I think I'd like to see Brighton Rock this coming Sunday.

Photograph: c.Everett Collection / Rex Features

Another film that's caught my eye is Archipelago. It's not going to be released until 4th of March, but having seen the trailer it looks very Bergmanesque. And this from a British female director! Joanna Hogg's latest film is set in the Scilly Isles and whether it is the bleakness of the cinematography, or the documentary style of her direction, but I really felt I could have been watching a film by the old Swedish master himself. I'm obviously yet to see the whole thing, so watch this space; I'll be reporting back when it's out.

Photo from www.bfi.org.uk

Doesn't this picture from the film look like a scene from, say Autumn Sonata by Bergman? 

Liv Ullmann and Ingrid Bergman in Autumn Sonata 1978

There's an interesting interview with Joanna Hogg (in which she looks gorgeous!) in this month's Vogue. I haven't seen her debut film, Unrelated, but I'll be looking out for it on the TV listings, or I might even buy the DVD if it's out.

The London Train by Tessa Hadley

I've spent many hours on the train between the West Country and London, so the title of this book immediately spoke to me. I'm also a great fan of Tessa Hadley and her neat writing style; of her slow but determined narrative where an extraordinary story emerges from perfectly ordinary circumstances (taking the train to London).

The story of The London Train is told in two separate parts. First we find Paul at an old people's home where his mother has recently passed away. We follow him through his grief as he tries to carry on his life as normal with his second wife in the Welsh countryside. He struggles to write - his profession - and to be a good husband and father to his three daughters - two with his current wife and one from a previous marriage. While still having vivid dreams about his mother, he receives a call from his first wife to say Pia has gone missing. Paul goes in search of his ninenteen-year-old daughter, and finds her in a 'bleakly unloved' block of council flats near King's Cross. Unwittingly, he's sucked into her new world, and into a completely different life from his own literary one in the country. 'He had always had a superstitious fear of being shut up somewhere without books; now that it had happened he hadn't even consciously noticed.'

The second story centres around Cora, who after first losing her father, then her mother, decides to leave her civil servant husband and move to her paternal home in Cardiff. In contrast to her hectic city life as an English teacher, she starts work in the local library and begins to examine her life so far: her ambitions after university and the subsequent disappointments of her affluent life with her serious husband in London. 'I don't know how people go walking around after their mother dies. I don't know how they keep getting up in the morning.'

Both of these stories are linked by a chance meeting on the train, an event which happened three years before. At this point the pace of the novel suddenly picks up and we realise why the action in previous chapters has been slow - almost hazy. This is where the brilliance of Tessa Hadley's writing really comes to its own; with suspending the pivotal piece of plot in the novel to its last part she rewards the reader. The realisation why both Paul and Cora acted the way they did previously becomes clear, their motives understandable whereas before their actions could have been interpreted as rash or inconsistent.

This method of only revealing the past after the main stories of the characters have been told can be precarious - if we don't know the juicy part, why should we be interested in the characters in the first place? But Hadley excels in describing the ordinary to make it extraordinary - and the satisfaction of knowing the characters when the plot thickens is so much sweeter than it would've been if she'd merely told us the story in the usual timeline narrative.

I urge you to go and buy this book, and if you haven't read Tessa Hadley before, there are three other novels by her to enjoy: Accidents In The Home, Everything Will Be Alright and The Master Bedroom. These are all available from good independent bookshops. (But then I'd say that, wouldn't I?)

London Life: Getting out meeting people

Picture from art of the prank website 

For the last two days I've been forced to work away from home because we've had the builders in the flat. I've decamped into the safe bubble of Soho House, and while trying delve into the deep recesses of my mind, I've not been able to resist half-listening to the conversations around me. As Jojo Moyes noted at the Shoreditch House Literary Salon yesterday evening, writers are the nosiest of people (I know Damian reminded us we were to follow Chatham House rules, but I'm sure this is not any kind of revelation).

Listening to people talk business of all kinds in the bar at Soho House (I'm a gentlewoman enough not to break the Soho House rules and kiss & tell) has, though, been a real revelation. It's got me thinking that if they can do it so can I.

Sitting alone at home with the Macbook and the terrier for company, trying to complete the daily target of 1,000 words of my latest manuscript is depressive, even in the city. Being alone anywhere seems to make my confidence slump. If it wasn't for the lovely bookshop I'm sure I'd be a manic depressive by now. Even in London, where I can get out at any time, I still actually need to go out and find people to interact with - even if it is just to eavesdrop on their conversation.

It's OK, I know I'm a strange fish indeed.

London Life: Lost item found

Last week a card was popped through my letterbox. It was from Transport for London lost property office and informed me that they had an item that I'd misplaced. It didn't reveal what it was, but it stated that there'd be a £4 restoration fee.

It took me a while to ring them because I had no idea what I'd lost. I wasn't missing anything and in spite of the Twitter suggestions of it possibly being my 'mis-spent youth' or 'dignity', I knew it was something that had my name and address on it.

Eventually this morning when I had a moment I got around to ringing the TFL.

'Do you know what it is you've lost, Madam?' the guy at the other end said after he'd gone through the formalities of establishing my identity.

'Actually no, that's the puzzling thing...'

'It's your driving license, Madam.'

I was quiet while I listened to him smile at the other end. When at last I recovered from the shock all I could say was, 'You're joking, right?'

'You didn't realise you'd lost it?'

God, I felt like a complete tool, and a blonde one at that. All I could hope for was that the same man wasn't at the office when I went to collect my licence.

While I sat in the number 13 bus on the way to the Baker Street Lost Property Office, I imagined what the office would be like. Images of a dust-filled, spiderwebbed back office came into my mind. The reality couldn't be more different. The place was modern, there were no queues, and the staff were bright and friendly. Only strange thing was that there were two counters: one where you showed your card and another one opposite where you picked up your lost property. (Why couldn't it all be done by the same person???) With relief I noted there were no men on duty; I was safe from the smiling guy on the telephone.

Happily, clutching my driving licence, I took the tube to Liverpool Street to spend the day busily tapping on my laptop at Shoreditch House. Sitting here in the Soho House bubble, I promised myself to be a little more careful with my important documents. Just imagine what would have happened if the driving licence would have ended up I the wrong hands? I shiver at the thought.

(The photo is an old Finnish passport I found at Ellis Island museum in New York.)    

All on my own

One of the reasons we decided to move from the country to the city was that I hated the times when Husband was away and I was left in the large house and grounds on my own. The feeling of being utterly cut off from the world just doesn't suit me - I was born in a largish town in central Finland and spent my life in various cities until we moved to the English countryside. In the sticks I'd shiver on hearing the owl on a moonlit night. I'd rather listen to a car alarm go off in the night than the eery silence of nothingness. In the city I like the sounds of human life around me. The echoes of high-heeled shoes hurrying home on the street below while I'm reading in bed comfort me. The distant sounds of a police siren don't frighten me; quite the opposite, they make me feel secure in the (possibly naive) belief that help is on its way to those in trouble.

All the same, I was not wholly looking forward to the first week on my own in London. I did what I used to do when faced with the same situation in the country: I filled my days and evenings with as much activity as possible; lunches with friends; nights out at the cinema and theatre; a visit by my mother (some of which I've written about below). On top of that I planned tasks for the few evenings I was going to be home alone; to write so many more words; finally organise the study; give my wardrobe a good sort out.   

But it's so much easier to increase the pace of your social life in London than it is in the country. As it turned out, the one night I stayed in was taken up by East Enders on iplayer. (I've become an addict). So, as you  may have guessed, I didn't get around to the extra-curricular tasks: instead, even if I was out, I came home and took my laptop to bed, going to sleep far too late and waking up far too early. At the end of the week when Husband came home, I was exhausted, and all I wanted to do was to sleep.  

I think I could call that a result and proof that the decision to move to London was the right one?

I'll leave you with a picture of the Afternoon Tea (with coffee for us Finns, obviously) my mother and I had at Liberty's. So superior - and less than half the price - to the one we had at The Ritz before Christmas.