The Sneaky Magpie

After being bored at work for few weeks I am in the thick of it. I am working on a very exciting project for WHO’s Unitaid. Sending a very very small crew with a camera to Cambodia, Nepal and Zambia. As usual there is no time to do anything in a normal way, am stressed but happy at the same time to be busy again.

I started to cycle to work every day on my small blue bike with a basket which leaves me exhausted. I also do Pilates every Thursday which I love but yesterday I thought I would fall asleep, I guess this is a combination of cycling, stress, heat (no air con at work just stagnant hot air) and running around getting visas and vaccinations sorted for my crew. As the week goes by I get more and more tired.

I was so happy when I got home this evening, am home alone tonight, I made a dinner and just lounged on a sofa watching movies, flipping through magazines and blogs. I am about to have a lavender bath and read a book that I got absolutely hooked on – Crimson Petal and the White. I don’t really read much modern literature but was being persuaded by one friend for a while and given the book as a birthday gift by other two friends so I didn’t have much choice. I am all about the lives of Sugar and William and co in Victorian London.

This weekend I am going to get a haircut, my hair is a mess, I go to 10500 in Notting Hill and only get cut by Magda, she is wonderful. I am also going to hang out with a friend who is visiting from Amsterdam. Really looking forward to just chilling out and not doing much. I might take advantage of my friend’s pool, she lives in a crazy mock-Tudor apartment block with an outdoor pool with salt water instead of chlorine. Sounds very tempting.

I am off to get relaxed in lavender fragrance.

Yesterday I hopped on my bike and went to meet a couple of friends in King’s Road for some shopping. We started with charity shops and that’s where I made my favorite purchase of the day from British Red Cross, which BTW has got a fantastic, well organised shop with some really good stuff on offer. There was a fab black wool skirt from Dolce&Gabbana, Loewe lizard skin purse and much more.

I’ve been wanting a small black satchel bag like this for ages so was very chuffed to find it, it’s made of leather and suede and the size is just right. Wore it to a dinner party last night and it got a lot of compliments.

Afterward, we went to the Saatchi Gallery for a quick look. It was ok, I am not a fan of conceptual art and frankly all the consumerism inspired pieces started to bore me a long time ago. PS their website is horrific.

Today, slightly tired, am yet to plan the day but the following activities are very likely:

Laying on the Clapham Common and reading

Laying in bed and reading/watching Mad Men

Eating a lot

The cycle trip to Richmond Park will not happen….

Yesterday went all wrong, I was supposed to cycle for the first time to work armed with my nice new basket and Bern helmet however it decided to rain, and rain and rain…so I changed to wellies and brolly and a coat and off I went, about 10 minutes into my walk it stopped, arghh.

The day was dragging on, boring at work at the moment, grey outside, I started to daydream about this cake I baked some time ago – flourless chocolate cake topped with raspberries with little cloudberry jam nipples. The recipe is from Times and you can find it here. It’s really easy, delicious and always a winner with people.

However, I don’t have an oven or the ingredients at work to bake so I settled on a fab coconut and passion fruit cake from Le Pain Quotidien. My favorite cake ever from LPQ is the carrot cake, best one in London but this one hit the spot.

My day did not end up well, rushing to the tube to get on a train before 7.00pm (the strike started at 7.00), I was on the Victoria Line, then planning to change at Stockwell for the Northern Line to Clapham but they decided not to let us off at Stockwell because of overcrowding. The train stopped, you can actually see the other platform from the train and there were no people there! And they still decided not to open the door for us. So I had to leg it from Brixton. Oh well.

People are curious creatures, I popped to my local supermarket to get some berries and the whole fruit and veg section was barren. People were panic buying. Buying everything. I suppose if you get stuck at home because the tube is closed all you can do is stuff yourself for two days.

This morning I did cycle in, it was horribly busy and extremely badly managed. Boris, it’s minus 10 points for you again I’m afraid.