Luckily everything is now stuck on so nothing fell off or got bent, but now that its out of the frame I really ought to take some better photos (without reflections.)

Coral Final

Coral closeup

Eels

This was very quick and enjoyable to make. So I’m making a few more.

I bought some more ink (Holy crap! So expensive!)

While browsing through the shop and trying to decide between the bright pink or the crimson I accidentally knocked a bottle off the shelf and it shattered, leaving vibrant, bloody ink all over the floor.

Whoops.

I looked around in that panicked way I imagine people who’ve committed crimes usually do, but none of the employees even noticed. Not even the girl standing in an aisle next to mine.

Clearly the pay isn’t high in art supply shops.

Yes! I thought.

Now all you need to do is walk away Janine.

Just…slowly…walk away…

No one will even notice.

Just walk to the till like nothing even happened. You know nothing, you did NOTHING.

Whatever you do, just don’t look back!!

Anyone who has ever read any of the Greek myths knows you should NEVER look back.

Terrible things seem to happen to those who look back.

Unfortunately, I looked back.

I saw the ink bleeding out all over the floor and I lost my nerve.

My guilt trumped my desire to run away and I confessed to the oblivious employee in the adjacent aisle.

Which happily for the moral, turned out to be the right thing to do.

I said sorry, she just thanked me for letting her know and mopped it up.

I bought my 4 bottles of ink with only minor evidence of pink all over my fingers to show for it.

Whew. Tense there for a little while.

Then I spent the rest of the Sunday afternoon turning the living room into a studio (Ex was out naturally) and painted 4 more backgrounds, in pink and gold, green, blue-green and blue while watching the Big Bang Theory.

Very enjoyable.

It has taken him nearly 2 months to peak.

A slow grower, my wee Trappy.

I’m going to try to self-pollinate him.

Is that too racy to say on a blog?

I bought my own pillow like a lamo.

Then I stuck sequins on it.

I’m quite pleased with it it.

Ok I’m immensely pleased with it.

Isn’t that terrible?

But thats mostly down to the colour.

I love that particular shade of chrome yellow.

I really need to find customers other than myself.

Here: http://society6.com/JanineShroff/Rape-Rick_Pillow

Rape Rick Pillow

Rape Rick Pillow Closer

(So cute)

You know the type -

Auntie-uncle types who sit behind curtained windows, watching the street,

“Look at that girl,

Haan haan, new boyfriend.

She will fail exams.

I should do my duty and tell you madam

that your child is a shameless.

I saw her wearing short skirt

and talking to boys.”

Largely the ex does this via Facebook, (although the ex also occasionally does this literally, when feeling particularly suspicious of a parked car behind the flat) taking note of the people (largely old school friends) who have on weight.

I like virtual curtain twitching, taking note of:

1. People with unpleasant looking babies. (Especially ones with odd-shaped heads.)
2. Attractive women with podhu husbands. (Usually Indian women. There must be something in the water.)
3. Indian men who seem to get married and promptly grow a paunch and lose their hair. Maybe it’s a sympathetic pregnancy.

The ex received this letter in the post a week ago.

I think I died a little.

In a good way.

The Letter

The Letter Detail

“Dear <The Ex>

Re: <Flat Name>

Thank you for your email of 10 April 2013.

Our contractor has now had an opportunity to inspect the building and look for the missing brick in the boundary wall.

Unfortunately he could not find a missing brick, however, he did find a hole. He took a photo of the hole and I would ask you whether this is the hole that you are referring to.

If so, this is not a missing brick but an outlet in case the gully overflows. It has been there for years, which is why I need you to confirm if we are talking about the same hole.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind Regards.

Yours sincerely,
Liz”

The Evidence

Ideally and perhaps more poetically, this letter should have been posted wrapped around a brick.

This made me lolz for ages, not just because of this response, but also thinking about the ex sending the first letter about a missing brick to begin with.

Here are the various letters & complaints I have sent in the past. They are equally silly.

Not because the days at work or home have grown more dreary but because I feel spread a little thin, like someone being stingy with the butter on my toast.

I don’t think I can manage both drawing and blogging.

That being said I have now accumulated a decent backlog of fascinating non-events to report

1. I lost a piece of chocolate fudge cake the other day at work.
I bought it for lunch.
Then I ate lunch.
Then I went back upstairs.
Much later I realised I had left the cake downstairs.
I went downstairs to check. It was gone.
I was devastated.
There is no pain greater than losing a piece of moist cake.
That is also the only acceptable use of the word ‘moist’ in a sentence.

2. A client bought in a red velvet and buttercream icing cake.
It was a goliath of a cake.
A huge red velvet monster with an inch of buttercream top and middle.
I ate just one slice of this cake and was plunged into a sated, bloated cake depression, butter cream oozing through my pores.
The whole office developed a strange lack luster lethargy after eating this cake.
I started calling it the cake of depression.
Except Lottie, who had a fairly rock hard pice nearly a week later without particularly bad effects.

Side note
It may seem like there is a lot of cake in our office but I just tend to remember events that involve cake far more clearly than any other events.

Cake of Depression

3. I have a lot of spam to report.
The most recent one, which I particularly enjoyed, was an email,
converted into a jpg,
and then that jpg was emailed to me.
The subject title was “THANK YOU!!”
I like this man’s style.

4. Giant Eggs

I’ve been trying really hard to get Emma (Leo’s girlfriend) to cultivate hens that lay giant eggs because of an article I read in the Metro. (A worthy supplement if there ever was one)

I can’t even begin to tell you how much effort I’ve put into emailing her various words of encouragement with no success.

Apparently all you need you just need to feed them lots of broccoli but Emma is worried laying a giant egg will hurt them.

Emma has no scientific curiosity.

But I havent yet despaired. I’m going to try to convince her to invite us down to Cambridge and try feeding Honey, Sugar & Treacle (the hens) broccoli myself surreptitiously.

5. Monty has been sending me emails.
Then sends me texts to check if I’ve received the emails.
On principle I ignore those texts.
When did Monty turn into my great-aunt?
That’s what she does, but then she only just found out about the internet at 70+ something

6a. Regular Lunch

I briefly, sporadically made a huge effort of social skills and went out for lunch with the guys at work for nearly a week.
Shortly afterwards this burst of social energy died as suddenly as it began.
The guys at work eat far too early.
I like my work day split up neatly into 2 relatively equal chunks.

6b. Birthday Lunch

Yesterday the chaps at work all said

“Hey! Where do you want to go for your birthday lunch!?”

I was enthused! Yay! Birthday lunch.

“Yes! Can we go to Pizza East??”

They have the thinnest, yummiest pizzas I’ve ever . Their Margherita is particularly good.

JO & AL, who have lunch notoriously early said they couldn’t even wait until 1:30 pm.

We were in the middle of negotiating them down to a more reasonable time of 1:00 pm when Adam, killed the scheme and said we all had to go at 12:30 for some work related reason.

There is no way in hell I’m having lunch that early in the day. It leaves you with 5 hours of work without a break. The afternoon stretches out interminably.

So I didn’t attend what was presumably my own birthday lunch.

Mark later sent me an email with a photo of them all eating at Pizza East.

I sent him an email back rejecting his photo.

I refuse to acknowledge a birthday lunch for MY birthday when:

1. I’m not present
2. It’s practically breakfast.

They got me back a piece of cake though and a helium balloon. Which was so nice of them.

This post features a heck of a lot of cake.

Now for some photos for flowers I took a couple of days ago in the Canal park, which is exactly where I’m off to today. Its going to be a sunny day! Yay!

Dull stuff but its MY birthday and it’s MY blog.

SO SCREW YOU, REJECTED EARLY BIRTHDAY LUNCH!!

So spring has sprung and now begins a whole series of totally mediocre flower photos.

But don’t worry. I’m going to work up to it, slowly.

For now, just one.

Westbourne Bridge at twilight

Double rainbow, a sure sign that Spring is coming

Purdy Purdy

The best cat. Did I post this already? I can’t remember

Work meme

No one should pay for shipping

And I bought a rape rick pillow. I am my own biggest customer.

The ex is going to be so pleased.

Someone bought the iPhone Case. What excellent taste they have.