Happy St Paddy's day!

A catholic Irish holiday dedicated to a protestant Brit.

Tube strategies

*Disclaimer: "As sarcasm doesn't translate to writing very well, I must note that everything on this blog, maybe especially this post, should be considered to be written with a sense of sarcasm." "Thank you captain Obvious." "You're welcome, lieutenant Sarcasm.")

As I tend to spend a large amount of time on the tube each week, and as the underground isn't the most exciting place to be (understatement of the century there), I've come up with some strategies to make it more interesting. One of these is following cute guys hoping they'll get on the tube I have to get, and then sitting next to them (yes, just sitting next to them, how very decent of me). Until today, this only worked out once, but I did get to sit next to the new Doctor Who that time (without knowing that he was in fact the new Doctor Who, whilst reading an article in the Evening Standard about the new Doctor Who, and eventually telling him that I hated the new Doctor Who as he could in no way live up to the old Doctor Who. Imagine my surprise when I saw the episode in which he featured as the new Doctor Who).

And I say until today, as my strategy proved rather effective again today. As I was making my way through Victoria station, I spotted a guy that, from behind, looked promising. As a (by now) experienced stalker,  I followed him around the tube station, and he happened to go to the right tube line (yes!). And of course, during the creepily-following-him-around-the-tube-station phase, I got a chance to get a better look at him, and decided to dub him 'The Gareth' as, from behind, he had a kinda of Gareth Campesinos! (that fine looking young men in the picture there) going on. Too bad he was going a bit bald and had an ugly very ugly backpack (there's only so much you can use to judge someone from behind), though a very nice but. Yup.

When we got to the platform ('we' from my point of view), and he turned around, I was shocked to find out that it was actually Gareth Campesinos!. Hoping he didn't see the initial horror on my face at my discovery, I scurried past him and had to take another few glances at him to be absolutely sure. Now, as you might have read on this blog, I've been seeing a lot of Los Campesinos! lately, and I even own a mug that says 'Go Green! Fuck a Vegetarian! signed by this particular guy. Though all of this might suggest otherwise, I am not a groupie. They just happen to be in London a lot lately and I've got a live-music addiction with my 4 gigs a week average. After having gathered enough courage, I went up to him (wow! I went up to a guy!) and we talked for a bit. As always, Gareth was really nice and I think even a bit flirtatious. He may have asked me out for tonight, which didn't really work as I was already going to the gig he was inviting me too. So I guess I'll be seeing him again tonight. Yup (and they're playing Sheperd's Bush Empire in May, should I try and score some free tickets to that tonight?).

I can now say Gareth is really looking forward to playing in Amsterdam next week, though they still have to find something interesting to do that day, as they normally just hang around the bar next to the Melkweg all day when they're there, that he can speak French, and knows Nijmegen. Though only through football, which is enough as most people have never heard of anything outside of Amsterdam in the Netherlands.

So yes, if I hadn't hosted a radio show for the first time this week, this would have definitely topped the list of most exciting things happening to me this week. And could I please ask you to warn me when I'm becoming to creepy? Following men around on tube stations is just for entertainment value, if you'd have to travel by underground, you'd come up with similar schemes (I have prove that other people have!).

So, who listened?

Just made my radio debut on the Rare.FM reviews show and discovered the hottest (with regard to temperature that is) place on the northern hemisphere at the same time.

So did anyone listen? At some point during the show, we managed to have 4 listeners, which is one more than the show has on average. So yay me! If you missed it: don't worry: I'm definitely doing it again sometime soon as I've discovered a knack for pushing play buttons.

On orange Sainbury's bags, Chinese New Year & Gordon Brown being 2nd worst PM

Well, I guess the picture on the left says everything (except the part where I had to go to a FRENCH website to find a decent picture). I was starting to feel that I was literally the only person in the whole of London who cared about speed skating, but last Friday when my Dutch supervisor brought in some HEMA stroopwafels (nom nom nom), I discovered some love for the sport in her family as well. Ah, discussing the possibility of an Elfstedentocht and whether we'd catch a plane to go see it over Pickwick tea (yay!) and stroopwafels...

Mark Tuiter's victory was, of course, the highlight of my weekend. Or wait, make that week. I had to watch it in the kitchen on my laptop, and at the minute Shani Davis passed the finish line and I started to cheer with actual tears of joy in my eyes, one of my flatmates walked in. After a short confirmation that I was watching speed skating again, and again in the middle of the night, he offered me an orange Sainsbury's (the English version of Albert Heijn) bag to use as an orange flag, which I eagerly used to dance around the kitchen with. Yup. With five more days of Olympic speed skating to go my flatmates already think I've completely lost it. I also might have compared last night's victory with winning the world championship in football to justify my actions. But it is, isn't it? The 1500 meter is distance everyone wants to win, and is able to win: the sprinters, the stayers, all all-rounders have to able to skate a decent metric mile, and then there's the specialists like Mark. And as was said last night: 'we' have been waiting since 1972 for someone to win Olympic gold! That's 15 years longer than I've been alive! That is a long time to wait.

Other things I've done this week: Chinese New Year! Officially that was last week, but in London it's celebrated today. And as London is the home of the largest community of Chinese people outside of China, that's a rather big celebration. I took some pictures, but my battery died after like the fourth picture. The lion on the last two pictures actually went on to walk right past me, but you'll have to make ado with the crappy two pictures below. I also tried a lotus bun, which looked amazing and had some green stuff inside it. I expected some kind of vegetable, but it turned out to be really, really sweet. Rather nice actually. Also, there were a lot of stalls selling Chinese food stuffs of which I recognised absolutely nothing.

Other things I've done this week: make a Toblerone cake (in the oven right now, so no word on what that's gonna taste like), celebrate pancake day and watched a lot more speed skating. Also: I'm gonna make my 'real' radio debut on 2 March. *puts on radio voice* Tune in to Rare.FM on the 2nd of March at noon to catch me on the air (well, technically speaking it's glass fibre) on the Rare Reviews Show! (That's English time, so it's 1pm in Holland). Link on the right. Somewhere.
And apparently, we've lost another government led by Balkenende. Surprising. I think Gordon Brown is treating himself to a KitKat to celebrate not being the worst PM after all.

And gig reviews again:
Spoon/White Rabbits @ The Electric Ballroom When I first heard the single of Spoon's latest album Transference I wasn't that impressed. However, as it turned out, the song just needed some time to grow. 'Got Nuffin' is now one of my favourite songs by Spoon, who've been named best band of the last decade by both Metacritic and the Guardian. Both band were pretty good live, even the venue was the worst I've ever seen. I could write an extensive review, but as they played in Amsterdam just two days later other people have done a better job at that than I could have done.

Beach House/Lawrence Arabia @ Bush Hall Beach House's new album is my favourite album of the year so far (though Joanna Newsom's new triple, 3 hour long is a serious contender for that title) and I might have promised to write a review on that album, but as it's already a month since it has been released I think I might just give up on actually writing that (or do it next week when I'll go to Stonehenge by bus). Live, they're possibly even more amazing, just as last time I saw them. I absolutely adore Victoria LeGrand's voice and her ability to head bang to her own music. Lawrence Arabia are just a slightly less bearded version of Fleet Foxes, so if you're into that (or beards), give them a listen.

The Sunshine Underground/Cosmo Jarvis @ Koko Yeah, about that... I think I've mixed them up with another band. They're now officially added to the list of bands I walked out on (a list including the likes of White Lies, Glasvegas, Vampire Weekend and Florence + the Machine). I went to watch speed skating in stead and saw Laurine van Riessen en Annette Gerritsen win a bronze and silver medal. Much more rewarding.

Pantha du Prince/Walls @ Cargo And now for something completely different... Don't you just love London? Pantha du Prince for free! And not even at a record store but at a proper venue (okay, one with a queue of sometimes immense proportions but still, it's free!). Walls could be described as a sort of minimalistic Fuck Buttons wannabes, but with less creativity and less noise. Mildly entertaining. Pantha du Prince was a lot better, which was to be expected really since the man just released his highly rated debut album Black Noise. Live, Pantha du Prince turns his album into an hour-long DJ set and shows he knows how to get his audience moving. After starting of with some more ambient tracks which allow for some subtle dancing-with-your-eyes-closed, he throws in some more beats AND THEN IREEN WÜST WINS ANOTHER GOLD MEDAL! *Gets out another few Sainbury's bags and her Unox hat and starts celebrating*

Pancake Day!

Don't you just the love the English for coming up with a national holiday like this? Well, technically they didn't came up with it, as it is just their version of what 'carnaval' used to be about with us: 1 day of indulgence before Lent (i.e.: the four weeks of 'vasten' before Easter). Some idiots in our country decided to turn that into the 5-day-long-horror that it is today, but here they've made it into this beautiful thing called pancake day. So tonight for supper: pancakes! And as dessert: pancake-cake! Can I just make a subtle suggestion to introduce this day in the Netherlands as well?