my fun haircut

I thought I should take a picture of my bangs before they grow out. Not sure if I'll keep them this length, but I feel quite proud of myself for braving bangs, what with the curly hair and all.
I feel a bit disloyal cheating on Donna, my hairdresser in Toronto, but she wouldn't move to london with me. what's a girl to do?
Yesterday, discovered it was possible to walk to Hamstead Heath from the apartment. Gorgeous day and woods out of Robin Hood (kevin costner edition). Climbed on ancient-looking narled trees.

new format

I can explain the new format. Earlier this evening I brutally murdered my blog and now I'm too scared to play around with the html. And I'm tired. so for now, the new format stands.
Enjoy the soothing italics while you can; they'll be the first to go when the new regime takes over.

A Day in Pictures

This saturday was really lovely, sunny, sort of warm.
So we went to Brixton and Electric Avenue. The picture on the left is a sign we found in the market





Cobbled street in Borough Market



Thames pebbles

Blackfriars Bridge.


When we got to Wateloo Bridge we noticed an unusual crowd. My razor-sharp journalistic instincts kicked in and I knew it MUST have something to do with the whale. Within minutes the bridge was packed, cars had stopped and police boats were in view. We could just make out a fin on the rescue boat.

Picture from Waterloo Bridge












Chameleon John blends into his surroundings at this great spanish bar off tottenham court rd.

Election

London has fantastic radio stations. Or, more specifically, the BBC has fantastic radio stations. I recommend loading up the old BBC website (www.bbc.co.uk) and having a browse. The most thrilling part is that all the programs can be streamed up to a week after the original broadcast.
It completely puts the CBC to shame. For shame, CBC.
However, the BBC is propped up by a fat T.V. licensing tax that anyone owning a T.V. must pay. You can't just opt out by only using T.V to watch DVDs, or anything else sneaky. Trade-off is no commercials and really good programs.
So perhaps it should be, For shame, Canadian government, for shame.
In unrelated government slagging, why are they (by they I mean the Broadcast Consortium and those in power) still not letting the Green Party on the televised Leaders' debate?
At least provide a benchmark for guaranteed inclusion.

The televised leaders' debates for the 2006 election have excluded Green Party of Canada leader Jim Harris, despite his leading a national party running candidates in all 308 ridings and having earned the votes of over 580,000 Canadians in the 2004 federal election. Leaving these decisions to the unaccountable Broadcast Consortium that controls the debates is a threat to Canadian democracy


http://www.greenparty.ca/leaders_debates.html

I'm still very impressed with the Green Party's platform and while I understand the need to keep the Conservatives out, hence voting Liberal (boring), I think they're worth a look.
For shame, Broadcast Consortium

I'll try not to sprain my ankle getting off my soapbox

'The sidewalks are watching me think about you'

I feel my blog needs a bit of pizzazz.

So Miss M, I'll see your lovely, snowy Toronto street and raise you an ambigious, grimy London street.

'Musings on the past' or 'my actual high school sweetheart was a bit mental'

When I think about the idea of high school sweethearts, I think of faded rose petals, wine-stained menus, and simpler times. It's the guy that you don't remember why you broke up with and always wonder if you'd still be in love if you bumped into each other down the road. With that in mind, I had a realization the other day. Toronto is my high school sweetheart.
When we first met I was dazzled. I couldn't believe that Toronto would be into ME. And, I'll admit it, we had our fights, but I was happy. I grew and changed and drank beer on lots of patios every summer. But three years on, I was getting bored of its cheap restaurants, dive bars, great shops. I started picking fights and talking shit about it. I can't take all the blame. Toronto sometimes tries a bit too hard, its a bit too proud of its achievements and sometimes it's a little arrogant. And let's face it, Toronto's a bit small. Then I met another city. A cold, indifferent city. London. London didn't care about me, but I was convinced I could win its love. So I left Toronto. There were tears, recriminations, second thoughts, but we were over, dammit.
I've been with London for 5 months and I'm still in the honeymoon stage. London frustrates me and sometimes I worry that I might not be good enough. I know I'm not ready to leave.
But I am nostalgic about Toronto and all the good times we had. I find myself wanting to walk certain streets, see familiar graffiti and to just have a good, easy chat. Now I'm quite sure that I won't ever love Toronto like I once did, but I hope that we can still be friends. in the summer, definitely not in the winter.
Oh! Depeche Mode just came on the radio. Talk about ol' times.

Under the auspices of auspicious beginnings

All should be thankful that I didn't actually post the drunken entry that seemed really funny on New Years Eve when I was blearly writing it. And I'm going to try to condense the holidays into a few choice words for ease using only H words.
Hectic: finished work at 4 on x-mas eve. ran (well, quickly walked) along the bank of the Thames to catch a train to Andover.
Hospitality: Wayne and Patricia took excellent care of us. Excellent care included lots of tasty food, warming booze, delightful tour of Salisbury and surrounding area and a drive to Gatwick so that we could catch a plane to N. Ireland.
Hung-over: most mornings
Hoards: of relatives
Haunted: the castle/hotel that my cousin got married in. It was a really lovely (short) ceremony, but I didn't see any ghosts
Harrowing: Our plane back to London made an emergency stop in East Midlands because the pilot smelt smoke in the cockpit. We were bused to Gatwick-- a short three hour journey.
Hardpressed: to think of another appropriate H word to describe the holiday that isn't sickly sweet.
Wayne and Patricia came to the city for New Year and we went out for sushi and drinks. We only saw the attempt to blow-up the London eye on T.V., but it was still impressive.

And so far the New Year is delivering. An article I'm actually quite pleased with is finally online, as is my profile of the Urban Annex. Rumour has it that I dun good at my placement and I've also got a contract job for the next month.

Right on 2006