Picos Gemeos

It's 17.32pm Greenwich time and I'm drinking tea from a mug that says "Sex" while listening to indie music on iTunes shuffle. I've been alone most of the day - my boyfriend left in the morning to meet his sister across town and take a £13 yoga class. Like yesterday, he woke me with a cup of coffee before banging the front door in his wake.

I watched videos on my laptop for a while then took a bath (still can't take showers.) The plan was to take a bus to Stratford and walk to the communal garden - do a bit of digging in the dirt before heading downtown to meet loveinsuburbia for a drink. But the minute I stepped outdoors I knew the day was wrong: ominous drops hitting my head, heavy clouds over London, a sluggishness that couldn't leave me even with the help of soap box screamers outside Westfield. Bought some things in Sainsbury's (why were all the chocolate Easter eggs gone?!) and took the bus back home.

Did a creative writing exercise where I imagined myself to be a half-naked woman about to perform on a cabaret stage with two other lasses. Read a poem by T.S. Eliot. This made me think again of my story - of how the two cabaret dancers and I were performing to soldiers from the 1st World War.

Moved on to A Clash of Kings (the sequel to A Game of Thrones) while Radio 3 played Late Junction from a few days ago. Then I played Xenoblade Chronicles for a few hours (oh god it's going to take me years to complete this bloody soap opera JRPG).

When Sissy A was visiting, she let me copy dozens of films from her hard drive onto my laptop - we watched one of them last night (the new version of The Thing). A friend built a blanket fort in her living room two days ago and held a horror marathon underneath it - I'm tempted to do the same.

I'm lying in bed, under the covers, listening to my iTunes on shuffle and reading a crime novel by Miyuki Miyabe, "All She Was Worth". I'm craving pasta with meat balls after a tweet I read (I'm occasionally checking online through my iPhone.) I'll pop out in a sec to get food from the corner store and then watch a film in bed with wink_martindale. I also feel like playing videogames and reading C.J. Lines' "Cold Mirrors". It's that sort of bank holiday Monday.

I'm slightly hung over from hanging out with various friends last night (at the Victoria, at the Empress of India, at the Inn on the Park.) I feel like watching brasilian soap operas, I feel like having a glass of water.

A group of people stranded on an island - check. Mysterious going ons - check. Dark events in the past - check. Love quadrangles and sexy meaningful looks - check. Bad dialogue - check. A goth couple - check. A cute dog - check. About a gazillion episodes ahead of you before the truth comes out - check. If the producers of Harper's Island wanted a worthy successor to Lost they could have done much worse.

Harper's Island is a cross between The Bold and the Beautiful on a high budget with Agatha Christie's bloodiest plot lines and Sweet Valley High's characters. It's 90210 if you could enjoy a character getting murdered each episode. It's Jason Voorhees visiting Dawson's Creek. It's pretty bad but oh so addictive by episode 2. Like naturalbornkaos, I recommend you just watch it without investigating places like IMDB, otherwise you are likely to bump into spoilers.

Nothing like some sexy young people getting their heads chopped off to get you through winter!

This weekend, Kevin and I just chilled out at home and did my favourite thing in the world: nothing! Some books were read, some NaNoWriMo was written, some coffee was drunk and some trash reality TV was watched. Yesterday, we briefly walked around Victoria Park and I recorded my first two videos EVER on my brother's ancient hand-me-down digital camera. The first video is an experimental and heartbreaking portrayal of Kevin walking as a jogger goes past; the second video is a terrifying and gut-wrenching expose of seagulls going nuts over breadcrumbs.

Now I better stop procrastinating here and go kick some NaNoWriMo butt.

Victoria Park has these large asphalt lanes flanked by tall trees. One of them separates Regent's canal running North-South and the lake that dominates the southern side of the park. As I'm walking home, down this lane, a skein of Canadian geese fly over my head, followed by two pigeons late for the party. It's that glimpse into another world that you sometimes get when you are mellow for home, too much oxygem has hit your brain and the sun plays tricks on the clouds.

I found a bench facing the lake and pulled out my journal. Checked out the boys that came and went - some jogging, some strutting - until I heard a rambling drunk approach and ducked into my journal, hoping he wouldn't sit beside me. Two benches away, he found a young guy also drinking beer, plugged into his iPod. The young guy didn't seem to care when the drunk sat close to him and went into a monologue about their different choices of drink. A cute Jack Russell terrier, white-coated with black spots, belonging to the drunk who'd just sat down, played between their feet with a plastic 500ml Coca-Cola bottle.

The Jack Russell played a solitary game of throw-and-catch until the bottle landed in the lake. He ran to the edge and stared in desbelief as the bottle slowly drifted away. A whine grew in his throat as he edged back and forth, until it spilled out as a low bark. It grew louder, louder, and louder, until he was in doggy hysterics.

His drunk owner couldn't care less, but the people on the other benches stopped what they were doing to watch the drama unfold. The bottle, at first static once it was a few feet away, slowly began to drift back to the edge. The closer it got, the louder his barks grew. His little paws splodged no further than the scum-coated border, his black eyes never left what was so desiredly close. Not even a dog unflatteringly sniffing his butt, or a family pushing a pram who stopped for a minute to giggle at his despair, took his mind off the disaster.

All hail the Great Saint Bernard in the Sky! The bottle was finally at reach, so close to his snout - if only he were to edge a little bit in, get his paws wet, open his jaws and... off the bottle went again, disturbed by his frenetic movements in the shallows, drifting away from his reach.

'Go on boy! Go get it, boy!' Shouted his drunk owner from the bench, suddenly hooked like everyone else. But the little thing didn't; he barked and barked until I felt it was a giant pessimist lesson, in the molds of Beckett, on what happened to anyone in this life who chased a dream.

BUT THEN HE JUMPED! In less than 30 seconds he had the bottle in his possession and, dripping wet, was running up and down as if he'd won the canine lottery's jackpot. I nearly clapped.