Fast and faster. Spent a day last week working on a very fast re-redesign of this site as I wanted simplicity. Don't despair -- it's not finished yet and I'll be working on it for weeks, no doubt. Then this weekend I continued the trend of financial mismanagement and bought the new Powerbook G4 that Ive been drooling over for some time. It's a beautiful machine. I want to show it off to everyone which is guaranteed to create spite and jealousy everywhere. So much for not being materialistic!



In very happy news, it appears we will be moving our office to Covent Garden. Goodbye the leafy suburb of Queens Park and hello, London!

I wake up in the morning to the sounds of Radio 4 and the endless debate about American treatment of the Taliban prisoners. They risk losing a lot of respect in the world, apparently and it isn't helped by the fact the Radio 4 manages to find the most stupidly inarticulate Americans to interview. In other news, I spent the weekend buying new clothes (for business) and dancing in a club until 5am with a very cute Scottish boy. Not sure what's going to happen next -- although I do need to soak my feet -- but it was a brilliant night out (and morning in.)

Bad luck. President Bush almost chokes on a pretzel just days after telling us there would only be new taxes "over my dead body." Am I laughing over the irony? Had a fairly quiet weekend -- cooking, cleaning, watching several hours of the fantastic oceanographic documentary, the Blue Planet. Not exciting, but I'm just now feeling rested form the holidays. Must plan a trip soon, I'm thinking Vienna would be lovely in the Winter.

Happy New Year. After an all too brief trip to the US for Christmas with my mom, and a fast roadtrip to Santa Barbara to see Kelly, and a single night in San Francisco to see friends, and a lovely wait in the upper class Virgin lounge at the airport, I'm back in England. Flew back with Robert to meet Kate and Anne who had spent the week in my flat. We've been shopping and sightseeing -- the new British Galleries at the Victoria and Albert are as delightful as promised. New Year's was spent at home eating sublime snacks from Selfridges and drinking too much champagne. Hope you had a blessed and happy new year.

Cornwall. It took us 1.5 hours to travel the six miles down Cromwell Road to the A4. I was pretty much out of a roadtrip frame of mind by that time. But there was adventure ahead. Kirsten and I stopped in a Moto in Reading and I got behind the wheel for the first time in England. It's terrifying. I felt 15 again, sitting next to my father panicked about where to look or turn. The biggest problem with driving wasn't staying in the left lane or turning left into roads but trying to remember that there is a whole half of a car on your left side. It's impossible to know the distance between your car and other things on the left hand side. I almost removed a couple of mirrors! But Kirsten was patient and kind. Add to that problem the fac tthat I was driving a stick shift with the gear on the left, that the English drive 90+ mph down the motorway, that is was rainy and foggy and nighttime, and that they have roundabouts, and you get an idea of the terror I felt.



Trethurffe Manor was lovely. An enormous rambling country manor in the rambling Cornish countryside. It pissed rain, but we got out to the Eden Project (bio-domes where they replicate various world climates and vegetations -- steaming jungle and dry mediterranean fields.) We visited the seaside, including Mount St. Michael, a 13th century monastery on an islet and St. Ives, quite near the Western-most point of the British Isles. We ate -- haggis, pheasant, an enormous Martha Stewart recipe Thanksgiving dinner (I made whilst drinking champagne -- surprisingly, very good) and drank three cases of wine. We played silly parlor games and watched as our Md stuffed ten raw brussel sprouts into his mouth. (I thought I was going to pee my pants with laughter.) I'll post the pictures soon.

The iPod has arrived. It's beautiful. It's steel and lucite and beautifully white (for now.) It took 4minutes to download 1.5 gigs of songs (338 to be exact) through the Firewire. This may be my favourite product I've ever purchased. Off now for a long weekend in a manor house in Cornwall.

Grateful. I got my health... I got a job... My family... Coffee in the morning... British documentaries... My lovely friends who come to visit... Fountain pens... I live in London - cool ... Digital cameras... The Italians who work on the corner deli... Rainy London nights... Music... My new shower... How good I sound singing in my new shower... Emails that make me feel in touch... How good Judi Dench was in that play... Long weekends in Cornwall... Co-workers who don't mind that I'm occasionally an ass... My mother telling me there's nothing going on then gossiping for an hour... A hope for peace in Afghanistan... Planning a trip to California... My team... London friends who keep me rooted... I've counted my blessings and find I'm on the credit side. Happy Thanksgiving.