Notes.iphonez

Not Pictured: My iPhone in my pocket

So I have developed the habit of carrying my iPhone with me everywhere in London.  Mainly, I play Scramble 2 and pretend that I am navigating important business ventures.  In a peacoat and with a new, European haircut I think I play the part semi convincingly.  Always with coffee in had too.  It seems so chic.  Oh if only people knew I was playing some free, knockoff version of Boggle!  Sometimes I think they do notice though and are silently judging me and my life choices.  Whateva!

I also use my phone’s notepad function with increasing frequency to remind me of the things that stick out day to day.  You’d think you would remember everything, living such a changing experience.  I find it to be quite the opposite; there’s so much stimulation everywhere that I cannot help but feel overwhelmed by everything that happens!  Then I forget the cool little things during the day.  Usually the big things are easy to remember, but, even though I like the little things more, I sometimes lose them in every other thing that happens here.  I guess that’s life in London.

Where was I going with this?  Ah, yes!  It’s time to share some entries in my phone!  Effectively, my little electronic notepad is serving as a mini blog…like Twitter…or Facebook…or Tumblr…or whatever.  Right.  So here’s some material from the iPhone of yours truly; I hope I can do them justice.  Chances are high that anyone reading this will be more inclined to think, what the hell are you telling us this for?  CUZ IT’S THE COOLEST!

Note 1: “Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood.  Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk by David Sedaris”

Can you tell that I’m a reader?  The first title I remember hearing about a while ago, years even.  I saw a guy on the tube reading it while I was flipping through the last pages of A Week in December.  He was smiling oddly and I thought that it must have been because of the book in his hands.  If a book forces a smile out of a Londoner in public…it must be pretty damn good.  So I wrote it down.  The second book is one that I have been meaning to read for a while—love(!) Sedaris.  I think it came out this summer, but apparently it’s becoming popular now.  I wrote them down so that I could remember to find and read them at some point.  I’ve already read 7 novels over here and I am currently thumbing through number 8, so I think it’s fair to say I could fit two more in!

Note 2:  “I don’t know if its shape reminds me of a FUPA or what, but there has always been a repulsion for me to the capital letter ‘B.’  It’s a little icky.  Okay, I’ll be honest.   It’s not the shape, it’s the way it looks on a paper.  Sure, it’s accompanied by a plus sign, but ugh.  There is nothing more unsettling than seeing that letter on something you thought you performed pretty well on, or at least mediocre.  Surprise!  You didn’t!”

I wrote this little self deprecating ditty when I was looking over some past assignments for Creative Writing.  I haven’t ever had my writing, at least of the personal variety, deemed B quality and it sort of unnerved me.  Anyway, just catastrophising.  Not worried about it anymore…sorta…*smiles nervously*

Note 3: “If there is one thing I love on the tube it is this: seeing someone who is reading the same book you are.  I love that shit.”

Truth.  I love it.  When you have that little spark of realization with the other person that you’re both reading the same novel and are more or less at the same part?  AH!  It’s so wonderful.  I can’t get over it even now.  I was sitting across from some woman on a nearly empty cart who was at the same part of “ONE DAY” and she actually shifted seats to come and discuss the book with me.  We both had similar feelings, which was nice.  Conversely, when I talked to a lady reading A Week In December, she hated the relationship between Jenni and (OHEMGEE I’ve forgotten his name) the lawyer.  I loved it and thought it was uplifting; so many of the characters are so sinister!

Note 4: “Drunk Irish man has lost his dog.  He is sad.  Does he really think that singing Auld Lang Syne is going to bring his dog back?!  Oh, I see, he’s wasted.  Haha.  How stereotypical.  Wait, why am I laughing at stereotypes?  Life fail!”

Right.  So it’s bitter out.  Like real cold, real wet.  I am only wearing a sweatshirt and flipflops.  Well not just those articles, but like, you know, those are important to note.  So.  I am outside the bus stop and at least four hundred fifty nine buses of the wrong number fly by before the 19 smiles down on my wet, frowning face.  As I am stepping on, a man with 9 teeth and breath that could knock out Courtney Love shouts into my face: “Does this go to battersea?!”  I reply that yes, it does, you’ll just have to take another connecting bus if you would like to cross the river.  “I lost my dog when all those fireworks were going off.  He fucking ran away, you know?  I have to find’m.”  I frowned and said that I hoped he’d find his puppy.  “He’s just a puppy, poor ol’ boy.”  I board the bus and climb to the upper level to listen to my iPod and read.  Incidentally, it was when I was finishing ONE DAY and crying…remember that?!  From below, I hear the Irish man break into Auld Lang Syne at the top of his lungs.  In between breaths, he sometimes reminds the people around him that he’s lost his puppy.  They try to console him, and I hear a sniffle or two.  I wonder if it would be easier for him to find his dog if he wasn’t so wasted.  Maybe he knows that he’s not coming back?

Note 5: “Little Girl on the Tube: what do you mean Blackfriars is closed?!”

Seriously, the girl was probably younger than ten.  I know I am terrible with children’s ages, but she was what I could classify as a 6-9.  Is that okay?  They’re pretty much all the same then anyway.  I mean I wasn’t, I was lovely.  But all other children, they’re the same. 

 

So, Blackfriars is this tube station that has been closed FOREVER!  I really don’t think it has ever been open.  It isn’t scheduled to receive people until 2011 because of construction.  For some reason, the little girl was mortified at the idea of it being closed.  I get that this does not sound at all amusing or even note-worthy, but to see a little girl so shocked that a tube station was closed, with an odd mixture of excitement and repulsion on her face, was too comical to not write down.  If it helps, imagine me imitating the little girl exclaiming, “WHAT DO YOU MEAN BLACKFRIARS IS CLOSED?!”  There.  Better, yea?

Note 6: “St Paul’s Cathedral; A Week In December.”

One of the latest books I’ve read was Sebastian Faulk’s, A Week In December.  The book follows seven individuals along the seven days before Christmas Eve and their interactions with each other and their world.  The novel is set in London, and it was so cool to read about places that I actually walk by everyday or hear about when I read the papers.  Anyway, I was on my way back from the Tate Modern and the fireworks show when I found myself nearly all alone on the Millennium Bridge looking up at St Paul’s Cathedral.  What a sight, especially when it’s all lit up at night.  The scene also is the cover of the above mentioned book, so I of course had to take a picture on my phone.  I thought it was neato burrito.

There are a few more notes on the pad, but I definitely need to save them up for a different entry about the crazy shit my friends say.  Most of them are quotes from Jenny Katz and even a few from Izzy Brown.  I think they’ll be more interesting when they’re piled into one entry about these crazy cats. 

It’s better, nes café?