I was on the train the other day when a startling broadsheet headline caught my eye. In stark, bold type it simply read "GO BACK TO WHERE YOU CAME FROM". As an Englishman I was immediately horrified and drawn into the article. Back in London, such headlines are the relics of the blatant racism of the tabloid press in the seventies. The ( Read more... )

I can't be bothered to do a 'proper' update right now, but this is just to let you all know... Amanda's visa application for the UK was passed yesterday in absurdly speedy time! This means that a lot of the threats they were making about us having our shit together were somewhat hollow. Amanda walked in there with a huge plastic folder filled ( Read more... )

And so to Quebec City. Before I really get underway on this entry, I suppose I should apologise in advance for the potentially ungrateful levels of unenthusiasm that may seep through. It's not Quebec City's fault. The city - like an old French town draped in perpetual blankets of snow - isn't ugly, and has much going for it. Indeed, we arrive ( Read more... )

The more eagle-eyed (or terminally bored) amongst you might have noticed that I'm presently 'locking' some of my livejournal entries for 'friends only'. This means 'livejournal friends', not friends in the real world, obviously. There isn't an option on here that allows you to do that, unfortunately ( Read more... )

At the same time I heard the sad news about Matt we were actually staying in Toronto with Amanda's brother, Tyler. Toronto is often known as being the 'centre of the universe' to many Canadians, and often in a not tremendously flattering tone of voice. It attracts the same sort of jealousy and hatred that London, New York and Sydney suffer from ( Read more... )

This morning I opened my e-mail account to some appalling news. Brendan had got in touch with me to tell me that last Saturday my friend Matt had died. He was out on his regular Saturday cycling trip when he was the victim of a hit and run incident. The driver turned himself in to the police 11 hours later - possibly, they suspect, to give ( Read more... )

It occurred to me the other day that as of 2nd February this livejournal will be exactly one year old. I don't know whether to be flabbergasted at my persistence (even I suspected it would be a three month wonder to start with) or to hack both my hands off in order to prevent further similar self-indulgent exercises. It's touch and go ( Read more... )

Two weeks in Canada, and I suspect an overwhelming percentage of them have been spent indoors. There are very practical reasons for this, of course. For one thing, if it's less than minus thirty degrees outside with the wind-chill factored in, even a short walk from the car to the nearest hostelry becomes a mammoth expedition. As you open the ( Read more... )

As a 31 year old, there are numerous things I should (by now) have done with my life that I haven't got around to. The most obvious, in my opinion, is learning to swim. Aquaphobia has always been the master of me, and I aim to get some sort of hypnotherapy to deal with it when I return to London. I have an acquaintance who is a recently fully ( Read more... )

Montreal is cold. That in itself isn't a particularly incisive or descriptive sentence to begin a journal entry with, but sometimes the bare facts need to be stated without fanfare. Besides which, if you were walking down a street in Montreal braving temperatures of minus 25 degrees (celsius), poetry and metaphors wouldn't come easily. All you'd ( Read more... )