me me me

Isn'ty it funny how the word "meme" is like the first two-thirds of my title here? Odd, that... anyway, I've been tagged; had it been by anyone of a lesser standing than the time-travelling Political Umpire himself I might not do it - but I know that if I don't, I'll get some sort of comeuppance about two years ago.

So, gee, eight things about me... me me me... hmm...

1. Descended from John Milton. Via his daughter Mary, one of the long-suffering reader-to-ers. Oh, I'm waiting for the day I develop as supple a line.. and I don't mean a chat-up line, though that might be fun too. If it worked. Meanwhile I practice my blank-verse skills.

2. Summer squash - they're sort of like yellow zucchini, but fleshier, with big flat seeds. Love 'em. Very hard to find in London, but they seem to be selling them in Fresh & Wild at the moment, for well under a tenner each! Right now I'm eating one cooked with asparagus, and an egg, and sourdough toast.

3. On that note, my pepper mill is a beautiful wooden sphere that I bought in Copenhagen for quite a lot of money when I was about 25. It has a Nissan grinding mechanism and I never tire of its beauty.

4. I have finally finished my Louis MacNeice essay, and I am assured by two separate people that not only is it really real (I wasn't quite sure, as long as I was the only person who had seen it), it is enjoyable! As one of these two people is the editor, I am very happy indeed. (In fact, his words were, "you've done it again." Thank Christ for that.) It came to 8,012 words including my name.

5. The flat is disgusting. I need to hoover but don't have the energy. My hair, on the other hand, is pretty good at the moment.

6. My idea of disgusting will not be the same as some other people's, but it is still driving me nuts.

7. I have a gorgeous new silver pendant, long and sinuous and twisty, with leaves and vines and little nobs on the ends of them (hard to describe) that was a present from Ms Rational Self-Determinism today. We went into our favourite jewel shop - Metal Crumble, in Church Street - where we are friends with the Polish guy who works there, and it's the sale! Hurrah! All of a sudden she held up this thing of intense beauty, said it would look beautiful on my chain with my other little baubles that I always wear (though in truth it is three times their size) and that she was buying it for me. And lo, it is lovely! It was half price. The excitement.

8. I'm currently reading, thinking about reading or about to be reading, the following books, all of which are in my home:

The Lyric Touch, John Wilkinson (essays; Salt)
Gods Behaving Badly, Marie Phillips (v funny; summery novel)
poetry collections by John Ash, Oliver Reynolds and Andrew Waterhouse
Peeling the Onion, Günter Grass' memoir
Selected poems of WS Merwin
Selected poems of Frances Presley
How to Shoot a Movie Story (I'm thinking about general imagistic structural technique here, not making a movie)


(P-Ump: you happy now?)