Judit drove me to the airport last thing on Thursday night as I’d decided that it might be safer to get to Heathrow as early as possible. 12.30am seemed reasonable when I thought of it, but the check in desk for American Airlines didn’t open til 5am and for a while, I wondered whether there was anywhere indoors to wait, as the departure section of the Terminal wasn’t open.

Earlier in the day we had jumped in her car & delivered the broken Tambourine that I found outside the gospel church to Amanda Palmer. I had tickets for Evelyn Evelyn at Koko (though Evelyn wasn’t there, she got stranded by the ash cloud) and Amanda had tweeted for a tambourine and kazoo earlier in the day. After getting everything packed, I remembered that Tiina and I were going to bake that night - so although I was ready to go to the concert, I ran inside the venue, spotted a man with a headset who turned out to be the manager, showed him the iPhone tweets and he kindly took the tambourine off somewhere. I don’t know if it reached Amanda, but I’m glad I got it there. Judit was an absolute star, putting up with my craziness, but it felt important for me to give something broken a new lease of life. It doesn’t matter if you’re dealing with a Godforsaken & ruined tambourine, it can still bring happiness.

Once I was at Heathrow, I found somewhere in arrivals to sit down & wait. And Wait. And Wait. At one point I fell asleep on the phone to Brad & woke up 30 minutes later to find he was still connected - all together now, aaaaahhh.

Anyway, I checked in fine, the computer skipped the part where I pay an extra charge for my extra bag, OR the overweight fee (24kg and 26kg, both over the 23kg limit). I was seated right at the back of the plane and alternated watching DVDs of Mad Men with catching 45 minute naps. No vegetarian meal for me - so I went hungry. Thankfully I had already eaten a flapjack so wasn’t starving - but really, what’s the point of having that field in the booking system if it doesn’t get processed? I was told that the pancakes were “probably” vegetarian (they weren’t the last time I flew American, had a bit of smoked ham under them) but then they gave away all the pancakes before they reached me anyway. Fail. I am to call customer services before I leave and make sure it’s logged in the system. I might ask for Vegan on the return flight just to be EXTRA awkward now. Whatcha gonna serve me that has no cheese? HMM?

Since I’ve been here, I’ve been cleaning Brad’s disgusting kitchen (we’re talking WITHNAILIAN STANDARDS here) and mostly sleeping - although the theory was that an 8am flight would make it easy for me to skip jetlag as I’d just be staying up late once I landed, getting no sleep in the 24 hours preceding it really wiped me out! I think in total, I slept for 17 hours and lost all of Friday - oh well!

On Saturday we went to the “National Wholesale Liquidators” which is across the street from Brad’s place. It sells everything - computers, homewares, clothing, food - sort of like a giant Tesco but with bankrupt stock only. I got a hairdryer, straighteners, and a million storage containers to stop the cockroaches getting into things like dried pasta (see?). Also happy to discover that the same Polish gherkins as you find in Shepherds Bush get imported here, they have a huge section of the same dried pulses you get in Indian shops in London, so I’ve stocked up on red lentils, millet, and some spices. Today we’re going out REAL grocery shopping and I’m going to cook the world’s largest vegetarian lasagna. I might also make my old bosses’ Chickpea and Leek soup, which is delicious and which I messed up in January last time I tried to cook it. You just need to let the leeks & garlic cook REALLY slowly, so there’s a job that’ll kill time when Brad’s at school tomorrow.

Tonight we’re seeing a gig by a guy from Portland called cars and trains who is playing at the Cake Shop, which I think will be my new favourite venue! Jason’s already found a Sunday night open mic and I’ll chat to Cath about it - 2 girls, a ukulele and a glockenspiel…?

I’m going to be 30 tomorrow.
Weird.