I fear it is only a matter of time before I re-enact this at my own workplace.

Speaking of work, I completely forgot to blog my latest exciting poetry adventure: one of my poems is being used as a translation task for some French/linguistics students here. Sample questions they have emailed me with: Can we translate "sideboard" by "desserte" in a kitchen? (Answer: I don't bloody know do I) and Would you change "marmalade" into something more typically French? (Answer: the marmalade is not vital. But isn't it? Maybe it IS. Oh shit, I don't know). I also have two new poems on the go - albeit only in my head until I can actually grab a moment to myself with access to a notebook - so perhaps my brain is emerging into the springtime and breaking free of depressing information retrieval assignments at last.

10:39

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Book 32: Perfume by Patrick Suskind
This was one of the books on my A Level list of 'books you should read if you're applying to university to study English'. It was also one of the few on that list that I hadn't already read (along with Middlemarch and War and Peace, which I STILL haven't managed to get through and at this point probably never will). Anyway, I don't know why I didn't read Perfume back then, nor why I never got round to it during the next 10 years. But finally, here I am. I have read it. I have no idea why it was considered indispensable for a literature student, but it's certainly very good, in that 'modern Gothic' sort of mode. I didn't realise it was German, either (another disqualification from any *English* literature canon, one would have thought). Oh well.

11:01

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Perceptive readers may have noticed that I have drawn a veil over the events of my Easter weekend. There are three reasons for this: 1) to protect the innocent, 2) there is really not much I want to say about either dog agility or caravans, and 3) I didn't get any Easter eggs and I'm still sulking. ALTHOUGH, like a particularly generous Easter bunny delayed by traffic, my best friend came round on Saturday with loads of flowers, one massive egg (Manchester United but that was all that was left in the shops) and many little eggs, which she hid all round my house while I was in the loo. So I am sulking less now.

Yesterday I went to Seaford for a wedding clothes summit (we discovered that, crucially, the cat likes my dress) and lots of sunshine, food and wine.

10:12

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