Annie

I've been up to London again- and managed to cram quite a lot into two hours: two bashes at Christmas shopping, Annie at the NFT, a meal at an Indian restaurant, and a trip to a friend's house where we watched a DVD.

The first part was with my brother and Ginger. The train my brother and I travelled in on was half an hour late, which meant a cold wait, but I took the opportunity to make and write Christmas cards for people I'd be seeing the next day, and then once on the train it had to wait 20 minutes at a signal because there was an on time train coming the other way on the single line, and we couldn't delay that by making it wait while we used the single line first. I didn't really mind that because it gave me longer to have a nap. I used to spend train journeys reading, or looking out of the window- really savouring them- but now I seem to consider that a waste of a good chance to have a nap, I'm not quite sure why. And if the train journey takes 2 hours then I can sleep 2 hours, no problem, and feel better for it. Whereas if I'm feeling tired and am not terribly busy and decide to have a nap in bed in the day time (something that really doesn't happen very often at all), if I sleep for 2 hours then I feel ill when I wake up. Maybe it's to do with not being horizontal and wrapped up in the duvet as well as having clothes on when I'm in a train.

It was really foggy on the way from my house to the station, with a light frost, but when I woke up as we were passing Didcot in the train, every tree and bush was a white outline that looked really amazing. It looked like snow, but I'm sure it was just frost.

I texted Ginger to let her know I was going to be late, and suggesting we make it half an hour later instead- even though the train was originally supposed to arrive at 10.30 and we weren't meeting till 12, with the train being 50 minutes late I thought I still wouldn't make it. But in fact, when I got to Tottenham Court Rd it was 12 exactly, and Ginger couldn't get there till 12.30 (I texted her to say I was there already in case she was hanging round in the neighbourhood), not because as we weren't meeting till then she'd set out later, but entirely coincidentally. I'm not sure if that qualifies as irony, or whether it's just the opposite of things working out nicely. We spent the afternoon shopping (I separated from my brother at Paddington and he went off to do his own thing), and Ginger managed to get a DVD and a comic book for her brother, an audio book for her grandma, and a book about farting for her dad, who has that kind of sense of humour, while I got a DVD and a comic book for my brother, and failed to find a couple of things I was looking for for my dad, who for once has actually asked for some things he wants (usually there isn't anything and it's a real struggle buying him presents. Especially since his birthday comes so soon after Christmas). Bizarrely, what he asked for was a lamp that will clip onto a bed head (we saw one in a relative's house back in the spring), and one of those tennis balls on a string on a post that you can hit by yourself. I had no luck at all with the former, but found the latter in Argos- except that it wasn't in stock. So I'm now planning on keeping those for his birthday. The tennis ball on a post I was getting on behalf of Mum anyway.

I also got some re-writable CDs so I can finally get round to backing up my photos and stuff, and a couple of CDs of Christmas music, which were probably an extravagance I shouldn't have gone to- but it was something I'd wanted for several years. One was a CD including five or six songs that you can't escape at this time of year, but which I actually like, like Last Christmas and Fairytale of New York- but unfortunately it wasn't possible to buy them without about 55 other songs spread over 3 CDs. So, as the whole thing cost about £15, it probably worked out at about £3 per song (that I actually wanted), and I would probably have done better to download them from the internet, but there you go. The other was harder- I wanted a folk Christmas CD, based on my parents having played a folk Christmas cassette several years when I was little, but they can't now think what that could have been so I had no name or title to help me. So I wasn't looking for exactly that one, as it seemed impossible, but just something similar. However it seemed after an exhaustive search of HMV that there was no such thing as a folk Christmas CD- till just as we were leaving I spotted something called Winter Harp, which looked promisingly folkish, if the clothes of the people on the front cover were anything to go by. I wasn't sure whether it'd be what I wanted or a complete disappointment, but at £5 I decided to go for it, and am currently listening to it- luckily it turns out to be pretty much what I was after. It doesn't have the song/ tune/ whatever that I remember and really liked, but then that was to be expected, and it does at least have the same kind of sound- and it's good in its own right (though probably not the kind of thing I would listen to out of a Christmas context, even allowing for the fact that it's largely carol based).

We met my brother at Waterloo at 5.30, and walked over to the NFT. Amazingly, in spite of being a film studies student, he's never been to the NFT. Shocking, isn't it. Ginger on the other hand had never seen Annie- my brother and I have seen it quite a few times as we videoed it off the TV ages ago and it was one of the things he used to keep watching, and I'd watch too sometimes. But I hadn't seen it in a long time. I'd forgotten how painfull the singing of the girl playing Annie (Aileen Quinn) is- or else my ears have got more sensitive to in-tune-ness in the interval. Still, Ginger managed to enjoy it in spite of that.

We went for a meal at an Indian restaurant together, which was pretty good, before my brother went back to his halls in Roehampton, and Ginger and I went to my halls near Liverpool St. Somehow we'd managed to get quite tipsy on just two glasses of wine each, and sat up a long time laughing after we got back- to the point where my cheeks started hurting. It's just as well the girl with the room next door to me is back in Hong Kong for the holiday, and most of the others are home too, as we were laughing pretty loudly. It was just like when we were in halls together in First year, and often one of us would pop round to the other's room. Though we did somehow stumble onto a serious topic and lost the laughter rather, spending an hour or so debating free speech, child pornography, and incitement to violence before finally turning in.

We found it quite hard to get up this morning. I set the alarm for 8.30, and kept setting it for another five minutes' doze till 9, when I was going to finally make the big effort to get up, but then I got a text from I, whom we were supposed to be meeting at Bond St at 10, saying she was running 1/2 an hour late, which was just as well. So I had another 10 minutes, and then I was all set to get up again, when Ginger asked if she could use the shower, so I thought I might as well go back to sleep till she'd finished. But we made it out in the end, and got to Bond St in good time- especially as I sent us a text saying she was going to be another 10 minutes late on top of that.

I managed to tick off a lot of boxes this time- a friend, and a good bit of Dad's present, which left me pretty much sorted (which was a relief). And we still had time to wander round Selfridges window shopping expensive stuff (and laughing at how much some of the hair slides and jewellery cost when they looked like something you could find in Boots, or considering how ghastly some of it was), and to have a bite to eat in cafe (we were all quite hungry as we hadn't really had breakfast). We picked up a chocolate Yule log and a bottle of champagne in Marks and Spencer, to have something to take as we were visiting S, then went to Charing Cross where we were supposed to meet S, and two other friends, one who started on the maths course at UCL with us but stopped after a couple of months as she wanted to do Chemistry instead (she came back to UCL the next year to do that), and one that I think S met on the bridging course that was held at UCL for two weeks before we started the maths degree. We were 20 minutes early, they were on time and S was half an hour late, but it was ok because we had a chance to have a good chat. I've never really been close to those other two, and have always been kind of awkward talking to them before, as I didn't know them very well, but today I got on really well with them, which was nice- I'd like to see them again really.

S's house is in Hither Green, so we took a mainline train (and stopped on the way back to get some pizza as a late lunch). It's a flat really, and quite small, but she's actually bought it, rather than renting, which is both impressive and scary. Another friend has also recently bought somewhere, but I haven't visited her there yet, and she bought it with her boyfriend, whereas S bought hers all by herself, so it really is something. It was actually a nice place, in good condition and without any unfortunate interior design, and had a nice sofa and nice blinds that she bought herself.

We watched Breakfast at Tiffany's, and ate pizza and Yule log, but we were actually talking a lot of the time, so didn't follow the plot too well, even with subtitiles on. We did get vaguely what was going on though, and luckily it reached the denouement just in time for us to see it before dashing off to get the train that'd get Ginger to Charing Cross in time for the last coach back to Kent (at the ridiculous hour of 6.30 pm), though we couldn't quite stay to see the end.

We didn't drink the champagne in the end (there was another bottle as well as the one we brought)- or the Bailey's S had. At one point S or someone asked if anyone wanted a drink- Ginger said that would be nice pretty emphatically for her (she's usually very very diplomatic about decisions- too diplomatic really), and S said no, she didn't feel like one either. I thought someone must have spoken at the same time as Ginger saying they didn't want one, and that I hadn't heard them because Ginger was nearer to me, but we were talking about it in the train on the way home afterwards and apparently S must just have misheard. Then I mentioned a little later that it would be nice to have a drink but S apparently didn't hear her. And then a little bit later S said she supposed it all needed drinking so we had better open it and make a start, but we didn't actually get as far as taking any action on that. But I suppose I wasn't too bothered about that- I didn't feel too much like drinking either.

I was telling me in the tube on the way back about the programme she's doing at COMPLEX at UCL (Masters followed by PhD, using maths for biological research), and how it might be suitable for me too- apparently it's possible to focus on statistical approaches though she's just doing mathematical modelling and not using statistics, which, it sounds like, is what most people are doing. Actually she was telling me originally in the cafe in the morning, but she told me more on the tube, It's definitely something to consider. I wouldn't need funding, as they actually pay you a stipend of £16,000- which is not of course a huge amount of money but would probably be enough (after all this year I'm living on £10,000 not including fees).

At Paddington I got another pack of buiscuits for Dad, and an Oyster card- what better present than a 50% saving every time you use public transport in London? Not that he goes to London that often- and I bought Hogfather for myself- more extravagance, that I really should have avoided: I do have a copy, I just can't find it. But I do like to read it at this time of year. It's actually my third copy- I bought one in Japan as I didn't have my copy out there, and left it there when I came back as weight was limited and there was no point in having two. And I got a smoothie because I had a sudden fruit craving (not something that happens all that often). Once again, I slept all the way home.