MY WEEKEND

Saturday, I spent a lot of time getting ready for the upcoming holidays. My friend, Sarah, is going to stay with me for the first few days, since her flatmate's family is coming into town, and he said, "Oh, hey, they'll take your room, and you and I can sleep in my room."

So, yes, she's staying with me.

Tuesday night, we are going to see Eddie Izzard together at Wembley Stadium. Wednesday night, we are going to see Return of the King, and then Thursday night, aka "Christmas," we are going to stay in my flat and get roaring drunk. I have agreed to this as a sort of bribe. It's the equivalent of losing a bet.

Anyway, I've been working more than 40 hours a week outside of my regular 40-hour-per-week job, so as you can imagine, at this point I am exhausted, and my house was a mess as well as completely devoid of supplies. (Cue Chinese man jumping out from behind a bush.) So Saturday, I did some housecleaning, purchased 10 bottles of wine and other random necessities, and met the bunny I will be bunny-sitting over the holidays. His name is Spike, and he is the Cutest Bunny Ever. He is housetrained and adorable.

After that, I did more work. (I am working on flash animations with voiceovers of patients talking to their doctors about their various mental illnesses. This gives me much amusement. For example, when I screwed up the timing, it sounded like the man with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder kept interrupting his doctor.)

Sunday, Sarah called, and asked if I'd like to go look at artwork with her. It was a beautiful sunny day, so I figured it was time to take a day off and go play. Which I did.

We walked for miles and miles, looking at paintings. I ended up buying two, and somehow agreeing to create a website for a couple of painters. This happens.

Frequently.

I'll probably end up taking more artwork in trade, although I'm not really sure.

We walked through Speakers Corner at Hyde Park, where I was informed of the following Valuable Facts:



1. We do not need Viagra(tm) because we have Olive Oil.

2. We are all going to burn in Hell, and will be raised up as worms which crawl on their bellies.

I am passing this wisdom on to you, because I care.

By the time we finished looking at and purchasing paintings (and being informed of the doom which awaits us all, as whores), we decided it was time to sit down in a warm building with beverages. So we walked a bit until we came to a weird little pub in Soho, and then went in.

I know I've mentioned this before, but the attitude toward pubs in this country is completely different from the American. They're not so much dingy bars as they are neighborhood meeting places, and there are often children inside as well. It's just interesting, because spending six hours in a bar in the US would be just an entirely different thing from spending six hours in a pub in London.

I think that's about how long we ended up staying there.

We sat down and had drinks and gossiped a bit about random things. It was only a matter of time before we needed to take turns going to the bathroom. Sarah went first, and when she came back she said that there was a big table of 20 or so people in the back, half of whom were Americans, and that you needed to scoot by the table in order to get to the restroom.

So I got up and walked to the back of the pub, and said, "excuse me" as I scooted around this one woman's chair.

She turned around and said, "I'm sorry, but you can't get by without the password. What's the password?"

I said, "Hey, I'm an American! You have to let me past."

She said, "Oooo, then you *really* need a password. Come on, what's the password?"

To which I responded, "Um, 'we've got the bomb'?"

Which was applauded and I was let by.

Turns out there weren't actually any Americans at the table after all.

When I got into the restroom, the men pounded on the walls until I came out again, at which point I received another round of furious applause. I bowed, thanked them, and said that I hadn't received this much affirmation for going to the bathroom since my toilet training years.

I went back to my table, where Sarah was waiting, and she wanted to know what had happened (she heard the applause and roaring), so I told her.

The rest of this is being cut-and-pasted from an email to a friend, because I'm tired and can't possibly type this again. But I had a sort-of-boyfriend, once, who used to cut-and-paste "heartfelt declarations of love" to me from letters to past girlfriends (some environmentally-friendly people, evidently, feel more strongly than others about the benefits of recycling), so whenever I plagiarise myself like this, I feel the need to inform the reader. So here is the self-plagiarised rest of the story:

Sarah had been drinking. And she tends to enjoy going home from pubs and parties with people of the male persuasion. This is not even remotely me, but I don't think anything badly of anyone else for being that way. Just a different personality is all. Less uptight.

So anyway, she decided she wanted to meet these people in the back room, or at least the male members of the party.

Eventually, she went back to the bathroom, and not much happened.

Then, a few hours later, I went again (remember, we were at this pub for like 6 hours) and this time, received thunderous applause, was informed on my way in that I was being timed, and when I came out, they handed me an award (a silver drinks tray) and demanded a speech. I thanked the academy, my parents, and my brother in lustful Hilary Swank fashion. I then left, and Sarah asked what had gone on *this* time, and I told her.

So, at this point, I dragged Sarah back to the back room and demanded that she also receive recognition for her fabulous toilet ability.

Yes, my life really is this surreal sometimes.

Okay, so the rest of the evening was...well, it's like this: I have no intention of going home with anyone I have just met in a pub, regardless of who they are. Ever. Sarah is of a different bent. So men from the back came out to get drinks a bunch of times, and Sarah talked to them, and I chatted politely when spoken to. So, of course, my polite indifference rendered me *completely irresistible*.

I wasn't quite sure what to do with Sarah flirting outrageously with these men, while I was trying to be polite and friendly and yet distant enough not to end up having to extricate myself from anything, especially since the more I was polite and friendly yet clearly not trying to pick anyone up, the more picking me up seemed like such a Fine Idea. I didn't want to put a damper on Sarah, but also didn't want it to come off like I was in on this whole Take Men Home Plan.

What do you do when your friend is talking about things like, uh, well, breasts? On the one hand, you don't want to ruin anyone else's evening, but on the other hand, can I just repeat, what exactly do you do when your friend is sitting across the table from you, talking to a strange man about her breasts?

So at some point this guy that she found particularly delectable sort of hinted that he wouldn't mind getting together after the pub--the problem, of course, being that he was saying this to the wrong woman. And she didn't hear him say this, so of course I just ignored it. And then she found out later that he may have been interested in going somewhere, only she didn't really know the context, and she was flabbergasted that this offer wasn't being taken up on.

Of course, my only defense here is that he was talking about me and not her, but it's not like I am going to tell her that. So I'm afraid she's back into the realm of thinking that I'm dreadfully prudish or something.

Incidentally, in case I haven't made it abundantly clear, Sarah didn't do anything at all to embarrass herself in any way, and she's delightful and so was well-received. It's just that I'm a girl who wanted to go home alone.

And did.

And then I immediately checked my email and did a small amount of work, because that's just what I do.

The end.

Oh, PS: my favorite conversation-with-a-stranger last night was with Mr. Delectable, and it went like this:

Mr. D: I'm a cartographer. Unfortunately, pretty much everything is mapped at this point, so there's not a lot for cartographers to do.

Me: Oh, you should move to San Francisco, then, where freeways are occasionally leveled by earthquakes, and then they decide not to rebuild them. Everyone would be wandering around going, "Hey, where do we go," and you could be all, "Stand back, folks, I'm a cartographer."

...I guess you had to be there.