Monday, 2.57pm

I just went outside. And I realised the worst place to be in storm-struck NYC right now is actually twitter. From what I was reading on the internet, I was expecting to see powerlines down, freak winds and a ghost town of a city. As it is, the corner shop opposite is still running, people are still driving, the postman is still delivering and the wind and rain are battering down like one would expect them to in a usual storm. I realise it is going to get a lot worse than this, what with Sandy on his way in a couple of hours, but for now, I'd quite like the current updates to mirror what is going on right this minute, rather than what I should be expecting later. Everyone's getting frightfully ahead of themselves! My room doesn’t have an outside window, so I have no frame of reference other than news channels and twitter, and, when the storm gets heavy enough, sounds from what hits the roof. I was bracing myself for the power to go out any minute, and me to be on my own, in the dark with candles and books until at least Tuesday evening. I was getting ready to wallow! I’m now going to take a break from the terrifying news narratives and settle down to a nice calming episode of Middlemarch. Aaahh, Mr. Ladislaw ... 

Monday, 2.15pm

I got red on me. 

I only had a black sharpie and red nail polish to work with. It's suddenly hit me that we might lose water, and therefore not be able to wash ... and I might have to go into work tomorrow. I just stopped short of moving onto my face and neck, too. This was a rash decision. It doesn't even look real so I can't pretend I had an accident ... My room smells very strongly of nail polish. 

Monday, 12.28pm

Sometimes I like to pretend this isn’t a hurricane, but I’m actually barricaded in my house because of a zombie apocalypse. 

I don't know why I would attack a zombie with an ancient club. I definitely don't have access to one. I'm not one of the slag brothers. I think I need to seriously re-evaluate my zombie plan.

Monday, 11.30am

First signs of Frankenstorm – it’s raining and windy. I wish I’d bought some hot chocolate for this. That would definitely hit the spot right now.

Monday, 9.37am

My first full day of indoor storm-waiting is begun! I don’t know why I got up this early, I have a whole day to kill. I wanted to get a shower in before we could lose water, but now that’s done I’m at a bit of a loose end as to what to do. Should I put make-up on? It’s something to do, but then if we do lose water I won’t be able to wash my face and I’ll get spots. But if I have to be rescued by firemen …

Sunday, 10.46pm

My internet’s being frighteningly slow. I assume that’s because by now absolutely everyone is holed up in their homes streaming stuff. Broadband providers should have prepared for this. There’s obviously going to be extra strain on the … wires, or waves, or whatever internet runs on, during extreme weather. If they can get wi-fi on a plane surely they can make it work for me. I had to stop re-watching Gavin & Stacey half way through. I nearly cried. Anyway, without iplayer co-operating I have had to move on to Netflix, which I luckily put off starting my 30 day trial on, waiting for the optimum moment to make the best use of the free films. This is definitely it. So I looked for a tv drama to get suitably engrossed in. Oddly, I picked the 1994 BBC production of Middlemarch. It was a strange decision as I’m not exactly a sucker for a period drama and I also am generally against watching a tv series before reading the book. But this is a hurricane, all normal laws are suspended. Anything could happen, I’m letting LOOSE. I’ve watched one episode and I am already hooked. Why doesn’t Lydgate stand up to the banker man?? And why is Dodo’s new husband being so mean to her!? And why does Fred assume Mary wants to marry him? And why do all the women ride side-saddle? I know it’s dainty but my God, it’s definitely dangerous. 

Sunday, 6.42pm

After watching ‘Hurricane Central’ on the weather channel for the past hour, I’ve become convinced there’s going to be a power-outage. Deciding that I wasn’t suitably prepared for such an eventuality, I just went to the 99c store round the corner and bought 30 tealights, an alarm clock and 4 AA batteries. I’m now sitting on my bed eating a yoghurt, trying to think what I own that’s battery operated. Is anything battery operated anymore apart from tv remotes?

One Hour Ago

Our fridge broke again. The coils at the back get covered in ice and then it stops working, and every now and then we have to defrost it all and start again. At first we thought it was over-colding itself because of the humidity of summer. Now it’s happened in late October we think something’s wrong with the temperature regulator-thing (none of us are particularly technical). So after a confusing and crowded adventure in the local supermarket, I came home to see my flatmate with his head in the freezer, trying to speed up the defrosting process with a hairdryer. He’s still there now. And my foods still in bags. I’m looking over my pre-hurricane stock bemusedly while the white noise of the hairdryer makes me oddly calm. I’d never been to a supermarket the day before a potential natural disaster before. It didn’t occur to me how utterly mobbed it would be. It took me 20 minutes of ducking through people and trolleys and small children just to hustle myself a basket. Then there was the question of what to buy. Coming from England, where no freak weather ever happens, I felt quite uninitiated into the process of panic buying. I was worried, going round just picking up normal things like cereal and yoghurt. ‘Fool!’ the cashier is going to think as I go to pay for my goods, ‘she’s only buying regular food-items! Where’s her 6 kilo bag of oats, where’s her month’s supply of crackers? What an amateur!’ I embarrassedly presented my goods at the till, chucking in a pack of gum and some m&ms for good measure, as people around me were clearing shelves of paper towels and crisps as they passed them in the queue. I’m still worried I didn’t buy the last bag of bagels. Loads of people had bagels. I’m missing out by not having bagels. I bet there’s something that happens during a hurricane where bagels are really useful…

Sandy

It’s 5pm on Sunday the 28th October, and I’ve just got home, eaten, and set myself up in front of my laptop. Hurricane Sandy is heading to New York, due to flood our coastal areas and blow our power lines down with 35-55mph winds in about 27 hours. The subways will all be shut down in less than two hours. Having stocked up on tinned goods, bottled water, and checked that my phone’s torch setting still works (it’s an old sony, not a snazzy iphone. So when I charge it tonight, it will actually last me until next Wednesday and not run out of battery 3 hours later. It will also survive if I drop it down the stairs or spill detergent on it – and I know these things through experience. So I hope my mum will finally stop hounding me to get a smart phone. I just don’t trust things you can’t fix with sellotape. I hope you now see the advantage), I’m officially ‘prepared’. In anticipation of potentially not leaving my small apartment until Wednesday morning, and as this is my first hurricane, I thought I might write some ‘diary entries’ to keep myself occupied. Who knows, if cabin fever properly sets in, this may turn into a thrilling, real-time chart of my descent into madness, on the perfect gothic backdrop of the worst storm in New York history, the week of Halloween. One can only hope.

Challenge

So this week I’ve been asking for feedback on my blog posts, and in response, I was issued a CHALLENGE. This post is to only be about positive things.  Before my friend issued me with this task, he warned me not to ‘get mad, okay?’ I suppose because requesting a more positive outlook implies that my posts up until now have been negative and bad. I didn’t get mad. I readily accepted this momentous challenge, because, in all truthfulness, I know that’s exactly what it will be. And I’m interested to see if I can do it. Literally. My mum gave me a similar mission 5 or 6 years ago, when she said that if I (then her sullen teenage daughter, complete in purple lipstick, netted sleeves and chains clinking as I walked, like an eerie gothic morris dancer) gave up insulting her for lent, she would reward me in cash. I think I responded with some derisive comment about how having to buy politeness and respect must be quite a low point for her, thus forfeiting almost immediately (Sorry Mum). So never before have I actually tested whether my brain is capable of just, like, giving the verbal thumbs up to stuff that is good. No sarcasm or abuse included. I’m genuinely intrigued to find out.

I also think this will be a healthy exercise for me while I’m over here, as I’m conscious of becoming one of those horrible expats that just sing the praises of their homeland, and never shut up about where they’re from to the point where you just want to tell them to go home. And I DEFINITELY don’t want to come back one of them nationalists, ew. So here goes. These are some things I have noticed in New York, which are just good in and of themselves, and deserve no scorn on my part. Things that have brought me nothing but enjoyment and happiness, and deserve some recognition:

Good Things About New York

1.   The number of people begging on the subways: I know a lot of them are trying to fund drug habits etc etc., and regardless of whether they are or not, it’s depressing to see these real life reminders of the level of poverty and homelessness in the city, all met with silence and disdain. But as I watch them all go by, I get some twisted satisfaction to know that before the Wall St bankers can return to their uptown apartments, they have to come face to face with their antithesis. For half and hour every morning and evening, they can't stay in their wealth-bubble. Plus, having the subways as such a free space means you get treated to some pretty cool shows there too. Travelling underground on the weekends you can buy sweets, listen to mariachi bands, watch break dancing, and much more without even going out of your way. It’s like a lovely, creative pic’n’mix. You can make eye contact with people on the New York subway, too. Sometimes people say words to eachother. OMFG. 
2.  The pervasion of left-wing propaganda: It’s shielding me from the tide of fearsome Republican announcements probably coming straight from the Deep South to the U.K., striking fear into the hearts of informed British citizens. Living here makes it hard to believe the polls are near tied. I forget the size of America and the insignificance of the Williamsburg electorate, most of whom are probably too hipster to vote anyway. I’m potentially in for a shock on election day
3.  The soldiers in Grand Central Station: They always wear camouflage even though it doesn’t help them fit their surroundings. I never stop finding that amusing. 
4.  The surprising lack of pigeons for such a dense and crowded city
5.  The abundance of public water fountains

That list awkwardly fizzled pretty quickly. I don’t think the tourist board are going to be hiring me any time soon. And despite the scant nature of my ‘good-things count’, I still find it hard not to end my positive post with some kind of final cutting remark; an injection of balance is needed in this overly optimistic and celebratory piece, this unapologetic, unrelenting cringe-fest of HAPPY.  Perhaps I see the bad in everything. Or perhaps I am unfair to America. On reflection, I think it’s the latter. I have a feeling that what made me study the States, and what made me come here, wasn’t deep interest and passion, but a wild obsession which has transfixed me from afar for years. I didn’t come here with the intent of immersing myself in the culture, but rather as a curious observer; someone with a morbid fascination with spray on cheese and the electric chair. Rather than dismissing them as marginal and not worth my attention, as I might do with the EDL for example, I lap up American right-wing vitriol about ‘slut-pills’ and ‘legitimate rape’, and spew out my resulting outrage in big Daily Mail headline font. With the concentration of a child sitting over an ant with a magnifying glass, I sat on twitter late into the night, awaiting the judge’s verdict on Troy Davis. Fox News is my equivalent to voyeuristic 80p gossip magazines. In my first year of uni, I remember being ever so slightly disappointed, after being told that a new girl had moved into our halls from Georgia, to discover that she didn’t have a southern-drawl, red-neck politics or bible-belt religion, but was actually the friendliest, nicest new flat-mate any of us could have hoped for.  So I suppose I am incapable of observing with balance and sincerity. I seek out the strange, maddening aspects of things, and am constantly in the mode of sarcasm, looking to be provoked. And that has made me represent you unfairly, America. I am very sorry. I know you have moderate politicians and unbiased media outlets, and normal, agreeable people. But they’re like the quiet child in the class that does all their work without a fuss and so gets no attention. The naughty ones like Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin with their hands in the air throwing their books on the floor, telling on the immigrants and blaming the ‘abortionists’ for 9/11 are unfortunately impossible for me to ignore.

So how did I do, Mark? I feel like I might have failed. I hope you will believe me when I assure you that despite what my writing might suggest, I am not spending my whole time in New York City holed up in a dark room, writing snide hate-mail to the outside. If you were looking for some reassurance that I’m not depressed or sad, but am really getting an exciting and new experience, please set your mind at ease. Angry and ranty happens to be my modus operandi, but please don’t take me too seriously. 

(If you were just trying to make me a bet, then I owe you a beer.)

This is a picture taken from East-River State Park in Brooklyn. If you jump the fence, there’s a wall by an old warehouse that you can climb to and sit right on the East River, and see the New York Skyline. The Empire State Building was just yellow that night, but it shines a different colour for special occasions. Sitting there, it’s hard to forget where you are. 

See that massive glow in the sky? Like a dangerous chemical attack, or space-time cracking? That’s the light from Times Square. That’s the effect on the sky every night; that’s the amount of energy being consumed and spat out by that small section of land 24/7 365. I mean fuck. Just Fuck. 

Today I Forgot to Put a Notebook in my Bag

So I wrote just a few of my thoughts on a scratty bit of paper instead. 

It got a bit crinkled, and some of the dye from my jeans made the edges quite black

I don't like not having a washing machine:

It makes me dirtier. Having to go all the way to round the corner with a bag of smelly clothes is just not something I ever have the inclination to do. I can't just throw a bunch of stuff in the machine when necessary and take it out again a couple of hours later. Why has New York not undergone the transition that seems to have happened everywhere in Britain, where a washing machine is an accepted essential in the home? I thought America pushed the whole 50s housewife, kitchen appliance consumer culture thing much more than we did. Why is it acceptable to make washing your dirty laundry so public here? 

Imagine that scene in Trainspotting, where Spud wakes up in a strange house after a bender and realises he's shat the bed in a monumental way. So he sneaks downstairs, to try and get cleaned up, and bumps into the parents of the girl who brought him home (because - as he later finds out - she's only 15). The mum offers to help; Spud refuses, but she's quite insistent. So they're there in the kitchen, fighting over these sheets, her trying to take them off him, him desperately clinging on, and they start to tug, and then, in one sudden movement, they both fall backwards, and shit sprays everywhere. All over her. And him. And her husband. Imagine that, yeah? But in a New York setting. Where those sheets get taken the laundromat. You don't want to, do you?

So who's more sophisticated, America? In the UK, there are conveniently placed washing machines in every home. Evolution that is. You can stick your 4G up your arse. Think about it, New York. Think about it.

...

Is it worrying that I was writing this at my desk rather than scheduling our CEOs meetings or keeping spreadsheets up to date or doing something else that I should have been doing at work? 

Coping Test

Thursday night was BritishAmerican Business’ Transatlantic Business Awards Dinner. An annual event at the Pierre Hotel in New York’s Upper East Side, where tables go for over 25, even 50,000 dollars; high powered businessmen drink wine and scotch, eat well, and watch four honourees accept awards for their contribution to international business relations. The whole thing is fucking swish: black tie, precision planning and the utmost professional conduct throughout. How exciting! It’s the biggest event in the BritishAmerican Business events calendar. Forewarned by my colleagues that - having never been to a black tie event of this calibre before - I would be enthralled by the precision and class of the night, I decided to use the evening as a benchmark. Perhaps being surrounded by bravado and success would finally spark my latent passion for business.

Metaphorical litmus paper having been dipped in the acid of a world class business awards dinner, I can now officially declare the evening thoroughly vom-tastic. The whole thing made me literally sick. From leaving the office at 4pm to leaving the Pierre at around 11pm, I had a slightly pukey sensation at the back of my throat. While I sat infront of my $5000 dinner, listening to some of the most powerful men in the business and financial sector making blasé comments about the state of the euro-zone, having a casual chuckle at the expense of starving Greeks, my gag reflex threatened to completely give in. In fact I would have loved nothing more than to have personally thrown up on the expensive tux of every attendee.

Getting driven from the office was very strange. Speeding down 5^th avenue in a black town car with leather seats, the driver apologizing for the state of the traffic, felt surreal.  In the end I had to close the scenario for the night (which I had had open on my knee, memorising the names and faces of the guests of honour), and get out my notebook instead. The only words I had time to scribble down before we turned on to 61^st were ‘So I quit. I don’t feel snazzy’.

My sense of unease increased when I stopped at the Pierre, and had the door opened for me by the hotel doorman, and shut behind me by my driver. Intentionally swinging my crinkled h&m plastic bag by my side for all to see, and feeling slightly rebellious, I walked inside.

I wasn’t hit by an aura of money and class when I walked in. My first reaction to the building was how antiquated it seemed. Attempts had been made to bring the tiled entrance hall and old chandeliers up to date with some abstract art on the walls, and a large wooden carving in the lobby, which I’m fairly sure was of Vishnu. I’d apologise for my potential inaccuracy, but I doubt it was positioned there with worship in mind, and I’m sure the person who bought it didn’t have much preference as to which oriental god greeted their guests, so I feel unlikely to have offended them by not being 100% sure. Given its setting, rather than looking trendy or up to date it looked, frankly, colonial.

Preparation for the night began after a quick ‘touch up’ in the ‘powder room’. I don’t think I’d ever heard anyone use that phrase without a hint of sarcasm before in my life. Everyone else seemed to know what they were doing. I slapped on some mascara, more to fit in than out of actual want, and then had nothing else to do really, so sat in the corner and watched everyone else put their faces on. Had a sandwich too. Ham. It was good. The time then came to set up the registration desks, and circle round the ballroom to make sure all the programmes were laid straight on the chairs and to straighten up after the catering staff, as apparently they can sometimes be ‘slapdash’. I got chatting to an old Spanish waiter during the sound check (‘It’s like being in the movies, no? I don’t feel like I’m at work, I feel like I’m in the theatre!’) Positive as the old guy was, rather than make me feel happy and jovial about my surroundings he just reminded me that he was being paid to be there. That sounds very very very ungrateful. And it probably is. I tried to stifle these thoughts, but being completely truthful, that was my gut reaction. His use of the word ‘movies’ and ‘theatre’ in a comical foreign accent, while wearing a white, Manuel-style waiters jacket again made the high-ceilinged ballroom, complete with columns and red curtains, feel intensely old fashioned. I wondered how long he had worked there. And whether his father or his grandfather had come to the States, from Puerto Rico, or Mexico, or Dominica. References to the euro-zone and the economic crisis aside, the whole night could just as easily have happened 60 or 90 years ago. Despite not feeling that the awards were much to be proud of, I was still irked that no women were being honoured at all.

In fact, greeting guests, I noticed very few women entered the reception at all without a male chaperone. I noticed a lot of things which I found very strange actually, for example, about half an hour after registration opened, a woman asked me if I knew of a discreet place she could change her shoes. I was flummoxed. There was a chair right behind her. She had tights on. How much discretion was needed? In fairness, she didn’t realise she was asking someone with what I must assume are lower standards than most for such proceedings. Leaving Reading Festival early one year with two split wellies, I found it necessary to sit down in the edge of the concourse at St Pancras International, get out my shoes, dry socks and baby wipes from my rucksack, and clean and dry my muddy feet before getting on the train home. I still maintain such action was preferable to squelching the length of the world’s longest champagne bar. I directed her to the restroom with the look of a confused child who’s just been asked the square root of pi.

I probably found the whole evening more absurd than it actually was, because I was thinking so hard about how to fit in, analysing and trying to identify accepted behavior with almost autistic precision. I wasn’t sure the British Ambassador, or the chairman of Standard Chartered would appreciate being welcomed to their awards dinner by a smirky girl who drops her t’s, so I tried my very best to be a refined and well-spoken New Yorker. I’m not certain how well this went. I will admit that I’m not the most comfortable of people in any sophisticated situation. I’m the one who feels uncomfortable being waited on in Pizza Hut. (‘No no, don’t worry about rectifying my order, that’s an extra walk for you … Well no I can’t drink the apple juice, but I’ll just drink from the water jug … well if you’re absolutely sure…’). No matter where I am in it, I never deal well with hierarchy. Which is why I warmed instantly to the guest in the red bow-tie who chatted openly to me and high-fived his wife when she pronounced my name right. It’s a pity he’s probably one of the men responsible in the current breakdown of the western economy. 

I’m conscious of appearing (as JP puts it in the new series of Fresh Meat) as a ‘money racist’. I mean, I was brought up knowing Margaret Thatcher to be an evil woman before I even knew who she was, and I do find it hard to put down an Irvine Welsh novel... As a Brit, I’m preoccupied with class, right? But class and money are not inextricably linked. I don’t begrudge these men their hard-earned millions. I begrudge the extra tens and hundreds of millions they made after that, by exploiting their political leverage and crippling the banking system. I begrudge their continued flippancy towards the downturn they’ve created, and their steadfast claims that it takes ‘courage’ (rather than a blind sense of entitlement) to uphold the values they extol in this current climate. When I booked my plane tickets home for Christmas, I was faced with a big banner from Virgin Atlantic: ‘Did you know you’ve just paid the highest air-tax in the world, to the British government? Make a difference, sign our petition today.’ This was news to me, and the knowledge didn’t make me feel robbed. It gave me a warm feeling of patriotism. Don’t give in to the bigwigs, Dave. If I can afford it, they can. 

No I Will Not Grow Up, Mum

The other day, I told my mum that I wanted to run away from New York and go back home, because the city isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and my job is massive pile of corporate EW. She told me to grit my teeth and get used to it; there’s nothing actually badly wrong, it’s not forever and, in all fairness, I’ve had it pretty cushtie up 'til now - I have to grow up and face the real world some time.

This is all, ostensibly, true. I can’t give one factual, unemotional reason as to why I should definitely be at home right now and not in my blazer and pencil skirt in my central midtown job. In fact, saying that I’ve had it cushtie up until now implies that my current situation is a decrease in circumstances, which it most certainly is not. Career-wise, I have gone from speaking to graduates on the phone about library buildings and to eccentric London folk about old coins, to speaking to executives and directors of an array of international companies about … well nothing much. Their chat is shit. And this is where dear mother, at the risk of sounding like a bad teenage record stuck at 1968, I have to disagree with your sage advice. I will not grow up, and as for ‘the real world’, well that’s just a ridiculous concept that icky people like David Cameron and George Osborne use in suspect rhetoric about union strikes and NHS cuts. It’s a semantic device employed by people when they want to make an opposite point of view look absurd. I mean, nothing could undermine the notion of reality more really, than the implication that there’s a second, superior and intangible universe operating within wider society, that only people that hate their jobs are a part of. I’ll continue in my blissful muggle ways if you don’t mind.

When I first arrived in the states, before I found a house, I was staying in hostels. In these places a high number of my dorm-buddies were permanent travellers, who at 23, 26, 28 had not yet ‘settled down’, and had no plans to. I’m not advocating this as a permanent lifestyle, and I doubt they would either, but my point is they were still adults. They still had an amazing amount of experience under their belts, and all taught me loads. And they were very, very happy. Despite the fact that I am and adult, I’m also young, and it’s almost inevitable that I’m going to make mistakes. Although, I think that’s what you’re meant to say after you’ve made a mistake. It’s probably not the same to use it as justification for doing something that you’re pretty sure is going to turn out later to be a mistake. Which seems to be what I do. I’ve let myself skip school, drink too much, smoke, treat boys badly, jump of high things and so much more, purely by saying to myself before-hand ‘well, we all make mistakes!’ in the same off-hand tone someone might say ‘well, it is fair-trade!’ to justify spending £5 on a tub of Ben & Jerry’s. There might have to be a cut-off point one day. This may not be a practicable system for life. 

It’s funny really that I’m feeling so homesick for England and tired of New York, because there’s probably something of an American influence at play in my sudden, sentimental desire to drop everything and run. It’s not very reminiscent of the British stiff upper lip; the culture that I miss so much. Ironically, it’s probably in part the Romantic, openly emotional side of American culture having an effect on me that’s made me frank, sincere and dramatic enough to see upping and leaving the country as a viable option.

And, in all fairness, I can’t say I’ve been putting maximum effort into fitting in. Being Englishly reserved and reasonably unwilling to talk to strangers is a general handicap, but it’s one that I’ve not been particularly active in trying to rectify. A slightly moody, reclusive version of myself is emerging, one that doesn’t have very much interest at all in making friends in this ludicrous city, where no one has a washing machine or t.v. but nearly everyone has a really small dog which they actually carry around in a bag (I know, I thought it was only Paris Hilton too). But if that’s what it’s doing to me, why should I make the effort to stay? I’m a nicer person in England. So yes, it’s all on me. I do not blame you, New York City, but I want to come home. The corporate environment is no place for a girl like me. And if I’m going to do something I later regret, now is the time. Sylvia Plath ditched it all in, and she did alright …

oh, wait …  

Today I Made a Boo Boo at Work

The title of today’s post is but one more in an ever-increasing line of examples demonstrating that I am not mature enough be to working in a grown-up environment. (Some others include me having my own fist-bump with the UPS man and screaming loudly in the lobby when the doorman gets me into the elevato-LIFT!  Sorry, lift – last minute.) 

Today I did something I feel I have to share to deflate the bubble of awkward swelling in my head. Because at the moment, I feel a bit like you do when you’re on your own and you fall down in the street. There’s nobody with you to help you up and share in your misfortune, so you have to just furtively sneak back on your feet. People walking past can’t laugh at you, because let’s face it, it’s London; they wouldn’t stop if you were David Cameron (in nocturnal reptile form) standing in the middle of Westminster Bridge, shooting fire out of your eyes, screaming ‘desist in your futile pursuits humanfolk, the end is nigh!’, while flickering your black lizard-tongue Anthony Hopkins style over your next prey. So you can either be the weirdo who just stacked it in the road and hopes nobody saw, or the weirdo who is laughing wildly to themselves in public. You hope to at least catch the eye of someone who’s slightly amused, otherwise you just have to keep on walking, hiding your red face until you’re pretty sure everyone around you is a new stranger that didn’t see you trip 10 minutes ago.  Anyway, I digress.

So this morning, I’m leaving a voicemail for some important executive at some big investment firm. This guy doesn’t have an assistant, so it’s not my usual girl-to-girl ‘can our CEO come play with your managing director for an hour or so next month? No, of course he can come here, we would be happy to have him. They get on so well together after all, don’t they?’ Instead, I’m leaving a message directly for this actual man, and I’m probably getting ever so slightly tongue-tied. Anyway, I’m nearly at the end of my message. Leaving my contact details, almost home and dry. Just got to sign off and hang up. And what do I say?

‘bye bye’

Yes, ‘bye-bye’. Not the formal, sophisticated ‘goodbye’, or the quick, simple ‘bye’, both of which would have been fine. And not even the slightly twatty ‘bu-bye’ which, when not suffixed by ‘now’ or ‘darling’ or both of those, is passable. No. I hadn’t decided on a sign off, and while my brain was passing me the one syllable ‘bye’, my mouth had clearly prepared itself for the whole two syllables, and was unstoppable after the first. The result of which was that I put equal emphasis on both ‘bye’s, ending this train-wreck of a voicemail with an expression last used in the plural, voiced by Toyah Willcox and prefixed with the phrase ‘time for tubby-’

‘Uh-oh!’

So there’s my verbal stack in the street. And with it another name is added to this list of powerful New York businessmen who have probably stopped returning my company’s calls on my account. Unfortunately I couldn’t share it with my adult worker type ‘colleagues’ because they wouldn’t laugh. I’m therefore sharing it here.  Let it serve as further substantiation of my immaturity, awkwardness and whimsy which will one day earn me the official government classification ‘unfit for office’.

Although, while we’re on the subject of phrasing...

I have to deal every day with Americans using ridiculous lexical inventions like ‘FYI’, ‘going forward’, ‘diarize’ and ‘vaca’ without a hint of sarcasm in their tone. It’s hard for me to accept this and continue as if nothing absurd or laughable has just happened. Just saying. I feel like I’m in an episode of some naturalistic satirical* comedy like ‘Veep’ or ‘The Office’.  

*Is that an oxymoron? Comments please nerd-types.