Everydaystranger

In the office in London on Monday, I stood up and felt every single muscle in my legs screaming in agony along with me. I gingerly walked to the ladies’ feeling about one hundred years old and walking with the grace of a stork on steroids. Wincing, I sat down on the toilet [...]

Monaco was stunning.
Pretty fucking hot, but stunning.
It was apparent right after we landed that Angus and I are not cut from the same cloth as the people that party in Monaco. I have never seen so many Ferraris and Lambroghinis in my life. I have never seen so much Prada, Armani, and Bulgari [...]

I got an email this morning from my father. My father, the man whom I am closer to now than I likely ever have been. My father, with whom I have a relationship that is perhaps not the usual father-daughter relationship, but it works for us and I love him.
In his email he [...]

My apathy with work is stunning right now. Since last Wednesday and then the return from Monaco (which I will be blogging about once I get my head back on), I simply haven’t been motivated. 180 emails in the inbox? And? At the end of the day 18 voice mails? [...]

Because things aren’t fucked up and stressful enough at/about work, I had to get a visit from the Health Fairy.
Yeah. That’s right. The Health Fairy. And I’m going to rip her goddamn wings off the next time I see her.
Last Tuesday morning (the morning before Trade Journal Nightmare Day) I woke up [...]

And because I have a serious and desperate need to get away from it all and have some sun, sea, sex and sangria, we are off today.
That’s right.
Time to collect on that Dream Job award as Angus and I fly off for a long weekend in Monaco.
I’m ready-strappy sundresses, floaty skirts, a new and gorgeous [...]

Professionally, a stunning victory and a horrible blow.
Personally, a shattering pain and a humbling high.
I’m going to spend today going to High Wycombe to watch my niece graduate, to get over my hangover, and to figure out what the hell to do.
-H.

Two years ago today, I started this blog.
I remember it well. I had been debating starting it for a long time. I pondered. I wondered. I checked out Blogger. I sat at my desk that morning, that open plan desk on the 6th floor overlooking the internal guts of Company [...]

Angus is in Stockholm, returning today, so it was just Melissa and I yesterday and this morning. She went out with her uncle to see the new Star Wars film last night, and then she returned and we spent time applying Lush face masks that smell like honey and trying to look pretty.
Yesterday I [...]

Something a little different happened on Sunday.
On Sunday, my uncle, aunt, and one of my cousins came over to our house for a barbecue.
They brought with them my Japanese grandmother, who has flown over from the States and whom I haven’t seen in nearly 10 years.
She’s over here for my other cousin’s graduation from an [...]

That does it.
I’ve had enough.
I’ve had enough of trying to open the hundred and fifty+ a day work emails as fast as they come in. I’ve had enough of hurriedly typing my blog posts on trains and posting them surreptitiously. No more can I stand checking my phone at the end of the [...]

There are days that are triggered by the drafty air, the lack of light. A race into London only serves to exhaust, the trains whirring by in uncomfortable silence as I try to keep my skirt off the knee of the man next to me, as the man across from me tries to keep [...]

Angus calls her The Murderer now, and the name has stuck.
Mumin, my simple, daft cat, has turned out to have a bloodthirst that I never knew was possible in a black cat with the paucity of intelligence that she has. All this time I have been duped. While Maggie was plotting to take [...]

Remember how we had won the house in a tie with another couple, and whichever couple sold their house first and went to contract would be the winner?
The roller coaster has begun.
Yesterday morning Angus got a call from the estate agent to say that the house we had bid on and won in a tie [...]

This morning Angus rode the train into London with me, and we took a later train than usual. Whistling and happy in the sunshine, we park the car to hop on our train, when Angus realizes that he is wearing his business suit trousers and his tuxedo jacket.
Somehow, neither of us caught that as [...]

I have been to France many times now, and everytime I go there I enjoy it, whether it’s with Angus, work, or with a chipper redhead. Many things are said about the French, but if you’re willing to give the language a try and enjoy the local cuisine then chances are you’re going to [...]

As I had the “suspicious” mole on my face removed, with a neat strip covering the stitches.

The pleasures of the Skin Cancer tango.
And just for measure, I had some non-cancerous lump on my leg called a Hysterical Esis (or it was something like that, my medical jargon was not covered in Hooked on Phonics) which [...]