2013. The year that really, really was.

Well 2013 has definitely been one for the books. As its final moments eek away I’m still grappling with everything that I saw, did, ate, accomplished, learnt, discovered and appreciated. I’m really not ready for 2014 to start and feel like I’m being dragged along, heels firmly entrenched, towards Getting On With Things when I’m still not ready to let go of London. So, really, New Years Eve is the perfect excuse for some indulgent looking back. And there’s a lot to twist the neck for….

Amsterdam. Or, My Last European Adventure For A While.

So my last European jaunt c.2008-2013 is officially done. And it was delightful.

Gem and I started talking about a weekend away months ago, when her UK trip was first mooted and credit to us both for actually booking the fucking thing and not just talking about it as something we should totally do.

I’m not sure how we decided upon Amsterdam but I was happy to go, never having been before, and happy to look past the weed and porn clichés in the hope of experiencing something memorable for all the right kinds of reasons.

Ode to Berlin

So, Berlin.

Berlin was, well, it was wonderful. I love Berlin. I love its history, its architecture, its graffiti doused scrappiness, its people, its wide streets, its bars, its flea markets, its café culture, its energy, its bike friendliness, its green spaces, its ease and in the summer, its beguiling weather. All of it and so much more I just love.

In case you haven’t gleaned, my affair with Berlin is not a recent thing. Really, it goes all the way back to 2006 when it changed my life.

Golden Thistles and golden weekends

The sunset out of Maidenhead. 

So last week was all panic and post-it notes and well, a bout or two of overwrought, overwhelmed tears (one of which may or may not have been at work….) But this weekend just gone has been the loveliest – an abrupt and necessary circuit breaker – and the chance for some perspective on these next seven weeks, which seem to be tripping over themselves in the hurry to be over and done with.

Reykjavik

So Reykjavik is a funny little place. And I’m being literal about the little. Perhaps my expectations of a European capital city have been mis-managed after jaunts to Berlin, Istanbul, you know, Paris, but Reykjavik, as I suppose naturally befits the capital of a country where there are more sheep than people, is small, kooky, quiet and strangely, wonderfully contradictory.

Inside Harpa, Reykjavik

First class problems.

I was on the bus this morning, on my way to work, blah blah blah, on the phone to my sister.

Her: How are you?

Me: Oh, I don’t know. Tired. Hormonal. Busy. Distracted. In need of another day of nothing but we’re away this weekend in Reykjavik and away next weekend in Paris, which I’m really looking forward to but I’m going to be so tired.

(Pause.)

Me again: I know, I know, my life is a series of first-world problems. I should just shut the fuck up.

Her: No, no. Reykjavik one weekend, Paris the next – that’s not a first world problem. That’s a first class problem. So yes. Shut the fuck up.

Did I mention I’m off to Reykjavik on Friday with Lovely Boy and his parents? Whale watching, blue lagooning, eating, wandering. If only all my first-world problems were this awesome.

Sunshine. And a look back at Venice.

It’s a beautiful, nay, glorious day here in London. It’s hot. As in SUNNY. You know, Properly Warm. And SUNNY, did I mention that? And so what have we done?

This isn't London. Obviously.

Absolutely nothing.

Oh hey, Venice...

Just a quick one to say...

Oh Venice, I do love you.

It’s going to be a busy, dizzy, dazzling couple of days and I CANNOT WAIT.

I dipped my art toes this afternoon, disappearing off to spend a couple of hours at the British Pavilion, under the guise of work, to make a short film about what it's like to work as a steward at the Venice Biennale. Hashtag Frequently Love My Job. 

I  left Mum, Max and my Lovely Boy to drink beer and soak up sun. They coped. 

Anyway, tomorrow it is ON so you better bring it, biennale. Because me, my semi-art-literate family and an Artlink commissioned review are coming for you. 

Mantua, mouthfuls and a lesson about vinegar

So Mantua is a charming, funny little part of the world. Shakespeare banished Romeo to Mantua in the late 16th century so I’m not sure what it was like then, but today there’s definitely worse places you could send a lovesick teenager I’m sure.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s a beautiful, quiet, medieval town surrounded by miles of farm land that’s only punctuated by other quiet, medieval towns, but the eating is good, the cocktails are pretty sensational, there’s a stunning theatre built entirely of wood and it’s easy driving distance to a whole number of other great spots, like Lake Garda to the north and Modena to the south, where you can do things like learn about balsamic vinegar and eat at the number three restaurant in the world.

At the risk of sounding repetitive, or worse, smug, it’s been, yes, another good couple of days. 

Lunch with Leger. Or why Nice is nice.

I’m getting used to this grand tour style of travel – gallivanting from one part of the world to the next in search of enlightenment, that in our case comes dressed as more pink wine, more art, more food, more architectural and geographical appreciation and more pink wine.

Today was our last day in Nice. Already. It’s been a beautiful, relaxing, ideal couple of days, an ideal post-script to a brilliant, curious week spent exploring Provence.

Let's Go to Arles, Darls

Today was incredibly moving. Just on the outskirts of St-Remy, a 20-minute amble from the centre of town, lies the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum where, for 12 months in 1899, a deeply troubled Vincent Van Gogh was a voluntary patient. During his stay here, Van Gogh painted over 150 works, many of them now iconic and decorating the walls of the National Gallery in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and countless student flats around the world.

Vincent Van Gogh, Irises, 1899

Food porn et Paul Cezanne

Another cracking couple of days chilling in Provence with LB and Le Parents. We spent the best part of this morning having indecent thoughts about cheese and prosciutto and fresh strawberries and macaroons and more cheese and more olives and warm baguettes at St-Remy’s weekly farmers market. (I just started typing an analogy about food porn and this market taking things to the next level but it started to get a bit unseemly so I deleted it. So I’ll just say this: Oh. My. God. Best farmers market. Ever.)

Provence (and my 200th post)

The surest way to my heart is through a flea market.  So St-Remy and I are sure to become very good friends.

What a seriously beautiful town. Not a lick of lavender to be had anywhere in bloody Provence (seems the shitty spring weather wasn’t just restricted to London…) but there are poppies and wildflowers everywhere and in St-Remy, even without the constant sunshine (see previous point about shitty springs) there’s a lot to love, not least the fact that I see Van Gogh paintings in every field. But I'll get to that…

From Paris to Provence

We arrived in Provence this afternoon, in the lively, lovely town of St-Remy. Max and Lovely Boy survived their Ryanair flight to meet us in Marseilles and the collective mood, given the indecisive sunshine, is still largely positive. So bring on a week in Provence, oui?

If only we'd bought an umbrella. And not shoes...

Mum and I have had a lovely couple of days in Paris. Froze our fucking arses off completely, got rained on, got battered by the wind and ended up sacrificing a pair of sodden shoes to the Parisian rain gods but still, a lovely time.

We both had a sartorial agenda for our 48 hours in this lovely city – mine involved sorbet coloured ballet shoes, Mum’s a visit to a small boutique she’d read about on the Left Bank near the Musee d’Orsay. We'd both agreed on a visit to Printemps. The rest of our time was spent drinking wine and shivering.

It feels like Christmas Eve

I’m not quite on holidays but I may as well be: the parents arrive tomorrow. Work’s been typically chaotic but with only two days left now until two weeks off I figure the stress is a small, preliminary price to pay.

I’ve been stalking them all day. It absolutely blows my mind that this blinking dot moving across my screen is in fact a Qantas A380 jet carrying 450-odd people, two of which are my Mum and step-dad, wedged up the back in rows 86 and just-call-this-hell.

They’re due to arrive at some ridiculous hour so Lovely Boy and I are going to meet them for breakfast and then tomorrow evening I’m bringing them to work, for dinner at the café and then a performance by the Irish artist Orla Barry. I’m a little worried how this will go down to be honest. Contemporary live art is one thing (LB is going to LOATHE it…) but contemporary live art after two glasses of wine and 24 hours of jetlag? Well, it’s going to be interesting.

A Suitcase and a Spatula

There are moments in a friend’s life. Birthdays 18… 21… 30… (god, 40), the first dates, the weddings, frequently babies. There are dream jobs, first houses, fuck, sometimes there’s just a really awesome pair of new shoes and a bottle of good wine. And then, well then there’s the launch of a first book.

Easter: the Pemberley and other bits

So we survived bike riding in the snow, a little muddier for the experience but otherwise intact and made off for the town of Buxton. Our accommodation for the night was the Old Hall Hotel, where Mary Queen of Scots used to stay. It was more tired granny grandeur than anything once regal but a huge bed, a hot shower and a good night’s sleep left us with zero complaints. We hadn’t originally planned to stay somewhere old school shabby posh but it was the only place in the entire region that welcomed single night stays, this being the Easter long weekend and all so really, we were just grateful they’d have us.

Easter: the bits with the walking and biking

If it were not for the lingering chocolate in the house, I’d swear Easter never happened, it really does feel like that long ago. I’m not sure what that fact bears witness to – the slightly insane work situation perhaps (when four became two) or the fact that Spring has, almost, nearly, kind of, sort of sprung and the longer days and (albeit weak) sunshine feel like the end of the apocalypse and the start of life anew? Either way, Lovely Boy’s and my week away traversing the northwest and west of the UK feels like a surreal, visually stunning intermission between “before” and “now”.

The plan was to cram in all the parts of the UK that we hadn’t seen before, in the way that only Australians can. And by that I mean, casually intending to spend seven days driving 1252km and explaining to English colleagues who look at you like you’re fucking mad that hello, it’s only 876km from Sydney to Melbourne. 1252km is but a scenic spin.

Doughnuts and a vitamin D deficiency

We've been back from our mind-blowing, bum-numbing Easter driving holiday for a week now and already it feels like forever ago. It was an incredibly memorable week, for all the right kinds of reasons this time, and I'll get to a succinct digestion of all that we saw this weekend with any luck. But for now though, I want to talk about doughnuts and other things that start with D.

Driving into Snowdonia National Park

Some thoughts on art and other things

Swings and roundabouts. Last weekend I left the house once (for chocolate). The weekend before I was out and about all over the place. 

I was actually working last Saturday, overseeing the production of a short film for work, part of which involved orchestrating and participating in a walking tour around some of the lesser known art spaces in Peckham.