MORE ON TURKEY DAY

Well, I just got back from visiting Laurence. I'm never sure whether to hang out for longer, or if that would be overstaying my welcome, so here it is about 7:00, and I'm back looking for work again. I decided against the opera tonight, because although I usually really enjoy going to things whether I'm by myself or not, tonight just feels like one of those times when I'd end up crying if I went alone. Silly, I know, but one of the great things about being born a girl is that you're allowed to be silly sometimes.

I went over to Laurence's house--he lives in Camden, which is a sort of Berkeley-esque part of London, if you're not familiar with it. We drank tea and caught up, and went to a garden center and then repotted some of his plants and listened to show tunes and had more tea and then went and grabbed something to munch, and I told him about jobs I was interviewing for, and then we went and looked at estate agents for flats in his neighborhood, and I do think that if I end up getting one of these two jobs, I'll try to live near him--for reasons of both neighborhood and company. I like the neighborhood. I would like to live somewhere close in, because the real pain about living all the way down south where I do is that when I go out in the evening, I have to be really careful about what time it's getting to be, because the last train leaves from Balham just prior to midnight, and I have to leave, say, Soho before 11 pm to make it in time. One of the reasons I am not going to the opera tonight is that I don't know what time it would get over, and having to leave early is just another one of those things that would probably make me cry.

At any rate, I had such a wonderful time, and Laurence is such a good friend. I swear, I don't know why I bother with straight people in the first place.

I don't know if I've really mentioned much about Laurence. As far as I can tell, he doesn't really work for a living. He lives in this great little studio in Camden. He was born in India, and moved over to London when he was either a teenager or close to it. Yes, he sings show tunes sometimes. He was raised in a very religious household, and just in general we have a lot in common and he's wonderful and I love him to death.

He told me where to get lizards, just so that I would be prepared if and when I get my own flat.

I really want a job now. Not that I didn't before, but it's like you just don't get your hopes up, and you don't think about spending money that you don't have. But then when you have a couple of interviews lined up, suddenly you start thinking, wouldn't it be nice to be able to buy a new pair of shoes? Ones with boxy toes, because the toes on these shoes are not exactly au courant, and I'd really like to have shoes that were. Maybe that's shallow, but I don't care. And I'd like to buy a new pair of earrings. And a plant. And a pen cup. And a mouse pad. And a towel. And maybe some of that nice conditioner for my hair. And my own teapot, because Peter's is gross and he washes it once ever ten years whether it needs it or not. And I'd like to have my own place with Internet access and not have to listen to Peter get up every morning.

Peter gets up every morning in the following method: He has the radio and the alarm set for the same time, so all of a sudden you hear REALLY LOUD Radio 4 and BEEP BEEP BEEP. After a minute or so, they are shut off. Then, about five minutes later (estimated), the telephone rings, because he has it set somehow to ring and wake him up in the morning. So he gets up, runs across the room and answers the telephone. A few minutes later, another alarm goes off.

He shuts off the third alarm and then emerges from his room. He stands in the hallway and sighs. Then he pads downstairs, hopefully remembering to turn off the burglar alarm before it goes off. Then he puts on the teakettle for a cuppa. Then he comes back upstairs and starts the bath. Then he goes back downstairs, and there is much clattering of dishes.

I guess that all in all, it could be worse. Everyone has roommates. I just wish that mine didn't come with quite so many bells and whistles. Not after he's been playing the Hammond until past 1 am.

I'm really going to stop kvetching now. Honest.

I have received yet another email today on the topic of Henry Winkler. I don't quite know how to react to this. This second email said, "You know what I think is interesting about Henry Winkler?" That's *two* people in *one* day referring to him as somehow intellectually engaging.

I wonder if there's a full moon.

Happy Birthday, Charity!