“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”
― Aldous Huxley
One thing that I really love about London is the juxtaposition. To the right, Handel’s house. To the left, Jimi Hendricks’.
Tag: Humor
“Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. Jobs, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence. Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.”
― Maya Angelou, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now
It’s Friday, and a long bank holiday weekend so I’m on vacation. Adios, kids!
Because I am still fascinated by the whole arc of this story.
And while we’re on the subject of British royalty, a number of succession laws have been updated including the sexist ones.
My inner Grumpy Cat says good. My inner Grumpy Cat, as it happens, hates soda.
Tom and Lorenzo have a podcast now! Get thee to an iTunes subscription!
Speaking of, since she’s the first guest on the aforementioned podcast and since there’s a lot of hoopla about the winding down of Mad Men, here’s an interview with costume designer Janie Bryant.
Weird and wonderful photos of animals in utero.
It’s been a while since we’ve had vintage photos with colour on the blog, let’s amend that!
I have very little patience for people who bang on about how much more horrible things are these days than [insert time period here]. Sure, we’ve definitely got some issues as a species, but as a collective, we’re doing demonstrably better than we ever have.
Any post that begins by quoting Euripides has my heart.
In this week’s lady news… (h/t Jeff who keeps an eye on all things sports in the SDS household)
“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”
― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own
The bad news, kittens, is that while I’ve found plenty that is decent, I’ve yet to find solidly amazing Mexican food in London.
The good news is that I might have found something better.
The other week, Jeff and I were both feeling battered from a pretty shattering time at work (which isn’t yet done, alas) and when we looked grimly in the direction of the kitchen and tried to contemplate dinner, realised we just couldn’t. The very idea was hateful. So we hopped online to try and swing a last minute meal. Back before we descended into the work-fog of the last six months, we were pretty good at researching shows we wanted to see, free things to do around the city, and interesting places to eat. We’ve gotten slightly out of the habit so it was gratifying to spend only a few minutes online when we found El Nivel and immediately we made a reservation.
It turned out to be a wise move because El Nivel truly is a hidden gem and getting in is not easy. First of all, it’s housed above another food joint and if you aren’t keeping a sharp eye out, you will miss the door directing you upstairs to food bliss. Second, it is tiny. The whole dining area contained a bar and half a dozen tables, and I’m pretty sure the floor space is about equivalent to our flat, which is saying something. In spite of the size, the place is laid out for chic casual dining and the first floor windows look out over a popular pub and brewery, and slightly into some of the windows of the Adelphi Theatre where I’m pretty sure I caught glimpses of costumes and wigs.
Blink and you might miss it!
This is, in essence, the entirety of the restaurant!
The food purports to be Mexican tapas, and it is…but it’s also unabashedly fusion. In a way that sounds like it shouldn’t work but does–gloriously. The menu changes constantly but when we were there, items like “chili verde” were cheerful mixed up with others like “Chinese pancakes.” We just ordered a bunch of stuff and dug in because it all looked (and turned out to be) delicious! The guacamole, for instance, contained strawberries and pomegranate seeds, which turn out to rock the socks off of a humble tortilla chip. Not pictured but noteworthy is the salsa verde…the first proper salsa I have tasted since alighting on these shores and worth a revisit for that alone.
I heartily recommend the chicken tacos. Little packets of refreshing goodness, with lime, ginger, and fresh pico doing the nicest possible things to your mouth. I ate one and then laid claim to the second of three, telling Jeff he didn’t get a say in the matter. I probably would have eaten all three but he wisely popped his in his mouth before I could get to it.
I’ve been loving my work, but it is demanding and after some of the days I’ve had, there comes a point where you just need to throw on some lipstick and go on a date.
Even if your boyfriend seems to be wearing a potted plant as a fascinator. My dining tastes may have improved, the photography to capture them has not.
“Grown ups are complicated creatures, full of quirks and secrets.”
― Roald Dahl
Inspired by a comment chat with the lovely and thoughtful Grace from Culture Life, on one of the weekend links.
I’m turning 29 this year, Jeff is turning 30. In four months we’ll celebrate our 6th wedding anniversary. Depending on who you ask we should have between 0 and 3 children by now. Some people are amazed we married as young as we did, some feel the need to caution us about our dwindling fertility.
Living in Britain means that the latter is a lot less common than when we lived in Utah when multiple people, including total strangers, would ask me about our reproductive plans every week, but it still happens simply because we’re married. It’s a natural progression in the social expectation. In Britain it’s not unusual to partner up but wait until you’re ready to have kids to marry, to have kids before marrying, or some other variation. It’s a lot more more live-and-let-live than the US is in a lot of ways, but family is a topic of conversation for a lot of people I know, particularly working women.
I’ve married a man who definitely wants kids, and who decided at the ripe old age of 23 that he definitely wants to have them with me. (Luckily for all concerned, he still does.) Which means that before we married we had a lot of frank talks on the subject and have maintained a pretty open dialog about the whole thing throughout our married life. One of the things we talk about the most lately is the financial realities of families for people like us. We also talk about about getting a dog.
It sounds like I’m getting off topic here, but I promise I have a point.
A while back I was speaking to a whip smart agent who works at a major global sales firm. The woman is very nice and always well put together, and I enjoy working with her. She mentioned that she had a dog, a breed that I like, and I asked how she and her husband managed to look after a pet since Jeff and I were interested in having one down the line somewhere. It turned out that she has a dog sitter look after her pup. Every single work day. Her dog needed a nanny.
And lest you think I’m telling this story to make fun of her, I assure you, I’m not. It’s just a reality for a lot of pet owners. Pets take care and if you want a pet you either need to provide it yourself, or ensure someone else is on hand to do it when you can’t.
The parallel to children might seem unflattering towards the latter, but I think it’s a fair one. London is an obscenely expensive city and when I look at my colleagues and coworkers, there are only two options I see for how they manage it. They either 1) make enough money for one parent to stay–or more likely work from–home with the kid(s), meaning they make an awful lot, or 2) they have help. And to make the second option work, that usually requires plenty of money again to be able to afford said help!
Getting this job effectively doubled our income, which has already been an incredibly positive shift for us. I’m still freelancing on the side, but now if we’re smart, we can pay off our remaining student loans within two years. I can’t begin to tell you what a relief it is to say that, because debt (even obtained in a good cause) is terrifying. However, we’re still a few years away from even thinking seriously about having kids. And in that time, we estimate we’d have to double our income again to afford a child because even though we’re bringing in twice as much, it’s not even close to allow one of us to stay home past a maternity/paternity leave–much less afford a nanny five days a week.
I know some people, in countries all around the world, who can afford to have and maintain a family on a single income. I know far, far more who can’t, and the trend is very much towards the latter from my generation. Wages have not kept up with cost of living and–in spite of what a lot of Boomers like to argue to the contrary–the evidence is that people my age are pretty frugal. Jeff and I sure as hell are! Like a lot of millennials, in spite of working hard (two jobs in my case) we’re swimming in debt which delays a lot of other financial considerations like buying property and cars (two things the American economy has depended on for half a century), investing…and having kids.
Spawning is a complicated topic for me. I’ve written several times about the fact that I’ve never felt a primal urge to have children like I know many women do. In fact, I dislike infants and babies intensely, silly or not childbirth actively frightens me, and human pregnancy looks to my eyes as if we should have tried one or two other evolutionary models before deciding on the one we’ve landed on. Add to the mix my slow and painful breakup with a religion that couches the female experience almost entirely in the language of motherhood, often (in my personal opinion) to the detriment of nearly all other possible life choices/realities for women, and you get some pretty conflicted views.
But financial issues conflict it even more. We won’t have our debt paid off until we’re in our early 30s, and I don’t want to have children in my late 30s. My mother did and even though it was the right choice for her (plus my little sister is pretty darn cute), it’s not an experience I want to repeat. Which means that our window to consider children shrinks every year. I’m personally fine with that, but I work hard to make sure Jeff and I are on the same page about it. We are. We literally cannot afford them.
And I don’t think we’re unusual. In fact, I think we’re the increasing norm.
Weigh in with your thoughts and experiences, kittens. I’m curious to hear them.
[Katarina evaluates a prospective job in the Middle East]
“Literally the only downside is…the Tailban.”
– Katarina
“A good half of the art of living is resilience.”
― Alain de Botton
Woof, this week. The training wheels are off, kittens. Development, project management, and construction planning is such an interesting industry because there are so many moving parts going on at any given moment. Our project managers conduct architects, artists, constructions workers, heritage societies, politicians, contractors, suppliers, and truly heroic amounts of paperwork. Though slightly less harrowing, working on marketing means that I don’t get to focus on just one project. I’m on all of them, all the time. It’s a lot of fun and the good kind of hard work, but there inevitably comes a moment each week where I feel like I’ve put together a really solid timeline or project and got all the moving pieces into a beautiful line…only to have one tiny thing that no one can control because it’s a provider or external system fall out of the row and take my meticulously laid plans down with it. I knew I’d “arrived” last week when a major timeline was pretty significantly impacted by months and my reaction was not to panic but to sigh, make a cup of tea, and just crack on with some solution options. Britishisation is almost complete.
Here are your links, tell me what you’re up to this weekend in the comments!
Perhaps telling you that Katarina and i have legitimately speculated on turning a good portion of 15th century British history into a totally fictitious web series, set loosely in a modern day high school or some place correctly hormone charged and overly-dramatic…will explain why I found this hilarious. No?
And while we’re on Buzzfeed, apparently I’m “West London Posh.” Ha. I’m a quarter WASP, a quarter Slovak, and half who knows, thank you very much!
Very much behind all of these.
Downton Abbey has little redeeming value anymore besides being a well-costumed soap opera. So here’s an interview with the costumer! I make no apologies for my continued plan on turning into the Dowager Countess in my old age.
There’s historical treasure everywhere. One of my favorite memories of the PD was being told to bin a ton of paperwork only to discover it was an unintentional archive of information about my alma mater from the perspective of its resident law enforcement office going straight back to the 50s.
Disney has it’s value, but I maintain it’s largely terrible at modeling life choices.
Interesting idea. I think I still have far too many bad American habits that likely set me back this side of the pond.
I have said it before, and I shall say it again. How do you lose something like this?!
This headline stands alone. Also, penguins.
A bit of a downer, but there’s this from the world of Mormon news. Whether you agree or disagree with the actions, this has been an interesting year for excommunications in the community and it’s worth having a conversation about why. You know, if you’re into that sort of conversation. If not, just ignore it.
“I have to write another funeral scene, ugh. I think I’m just going to skip over it and describe what everybody is wearing instead.”
“The proper, WASP response to bereavement.”
– Katarina and C. betray their sort-of-heritage
“All happiness depends on courage and work.”
― Honoré de Balzac
Hi, ducklings, I’m alive.
In October last year, I took stock of what I’d achieved with a year in London under my belt and what I wanted to do next. 2014 was my biggest freelance year to date, with my most notable bylines and highest amount earned thus far. But there are unique challenge to working for US clients while based in the UK (not least of which, the currency exchange), and so I decided to push hard to find some actual London based work.
I thought the process of finding opportunities would take a long time. It turned out to take less than a week. In late October I was interviewed for a temporary role as a Marketing and Sales Coordinator for a development firm here in London, and offered it less than 24 hours later. The 19th of December was supposed to be my last day, but they asked me to stick around through the new year, and last week, they officially hired me on in a long term capacity. I’m beyond thrilled to join the team I have, it’s an innovative, design-led company that’s in an exciting phase of expansion with some incredible projects and properties that make my nerdy little history heart flutter.
Some weeks I spend at my desk, organizing reports and spreadsheets, others I put on a hard had and boots and get to go through construction sites and protected historic buildings that we’re renovating and preserving (SO much better than tearing beautiful sites down), and yet others involve heels, LBDs, and events organizing. My baptism (by fire) into the company was throwing an event at Somerset House, a major venue in London, for nearly 80 VIP guests and two weeks to plan. The pace has largely kept up since.
And in the midst of this, I’ve maintained my freelancing. Meaning that after putting in at least nine hours in the main office, I’d come home to more work in the shape of freelance assignments.
Kittens, it’s been a bit brutal. When the most hard working and go-getter woman you’ve ever met says she’s worried about the pace you’re keeping, you know things are looking fairly grim. I literally worked myself sick at one point in January but with the new year (and its attendant rebrands, site overhauls, press releases, and projects) largely put to bed, I’ve been able to come up for air and have a look around. I know we’re a month into it, but consider this my glimpse ahead into the new year.
I’m on track to more than double our income.
We’ve paid off nearly half of our student loans.
We think we’ll be able to pay the other half off with one more year of hard work.
I’ve found the next step to take with my writing and marketing experience.
I finally have the space to work on my own writing projects for the first time in years.
Jeff’s nearly done with his exams.
Everything, as the kids say, is coming up Milhouse.
“Also, for your daily dose of Clueless Writing Inspiration, I literally knew nothing about diving when I started [nameless novel here], and now I have gone drinking with Olympians, have a chronic diving-related injury, and can pretty accurately score elite-level dives as well as describe any dive based on its numbers.”
“Are you saying I need to kill someone to write a good mystery? I question your methods.”
– Katarina and C.
“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice.”
― T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets
Well, hey there, well-beloved-but-desperately-neglected minions! We’re back from the States, back at work, and back at the grindstone. Let’s catch up. Jeff has dived straight into studying for his next round of exams (we’re down to less than a year of this slog), and I’m back freelancing and in the world of London luxury development. The first couple of week of a new year are always a bit hectic, but we might be setting a new record for post-holiday self-destruction. Luckily, there a few things keeping us sane.
We finally coughed up the money for a shiny new laptop that is causing me to coo, “the precious…” every time I open its sleek lid. It’s long overdue. I’ve been using a refurbished laptop we bought for about $400 at least three years ago that’s been getting increasingly clunky and hard to manage over the last year. When I couldn’t have two windows open at the same time without the whole thing freezing, I knew it was time to let Marvin go to his rest. Let’s just hope all my image and music files transfer over alright.
The intrepid Caitlin Kelly is in town and crashing at our place this week as she journeys around the city, conducts research and interview for assignments, and generally puts us all to shame with her pace. Last weekend, completely backward due to jetlag, we all went out on the town and had some much needed adventuring. We ate good food, had great conversations, and did some truly impressive vintage shopping. Caitlin’s got the touch for spotting a deal, let me tell you!
Less immediately important, but still pretty vital, I finally got my local library card and might actually have made headway in getting a British bank account. Long story, will rant later. In the meantime, I’m putting together budget proposals of numbers so high as to give me a nosebleed, working with a grade-A creative team and a world class illustrator, and checking off new items from my list with satisfying ticks. Here are your links, catch me up on your holidays and tell me what you’re up to this weekend in the comments!
Some people have more…something…than sense. Not sure it’s money.
You lucky ducks, Caitlin is blogging her adventures (plus tips on renting flats in Paris).
Unsure about the background of Tolkien’s mythology? CPG Grey is here to help.
Jezebel gives a pretty good account of the “fluffication” of this history surrounding Empress Elisabeth of Austria.
Headline of the week, I feel.
I barely use my iPod for music anymore, it’s all podcasts through and through, so this list from Medium about interesting podcasts from 2014 (minus Serial, because obviously) hooked me.
Women’s issue news worth sharing and a cause worth supporting.
Since I’m still working in London housing, this is fascinating.
Carmen Sandiego and Oregon Trail forever.
A response that moved me on the attack in Paris, a city where Caitlin is just visiting us from and returning to at the weekend. Thoughts for safety all around, please.
Small Dog Syndrome 