Danger! Moving Parts

On Friday night I got off the tube at my home station at the same time as a mother and her small daughter, aged about four.  The mother was pushing an enormous buggy and the daughter was trailing a small (although it looked very large against her) pink wheelie case.  They got to the bottom of the escalator marginally before I did, and the mother urged her daughter to walk onto the escalator in front of her, while she followed on behind.  As I usually do, I moved into the fast lane and prepared to walk up the escalator.  However, as I did so, disaster struck.  The daughter made her way onto the escalator, and tried to turn to face her mother.  However, she had placed her feet just over the join of a step, and, as the escalator began to rise and the steps split, she lost her balance, falling face first back down the escalator.  There was an immediate terrified wail, as she felt herself falling, and she tried to scramble back towards her mother, but was unable to do so.  She was therefore stuck, head facing down the escalator, legs tangled up in her bag, crying her eyes out.  The mother was hampered by the buggy that she was pushing so, in a split second decision, I stepped in to help.

The girl was, luckily, a total sweetie.  I know many children that would have refused help from a strange adult, but she accepted the hand I offered and didn’t mind at all when I picked her up bodily, as being the only way to get her upright again.  We disentangled her feet from her bag handle and the wails of fear stopped, to be replaced by tears of pain, as she realised that she’d banged her knee as she fell.  There was a beautifully touching childlike moment as she pointed to her knee, just assuming that, because I’m a grown-up, I could make it all better.  As we reached the top of the escalator I took her bag and offered her my hand, which she trustingly took, and we made it safely off the top.

As we turned to look back down the steps and wait for her mother to arrive, I suddenly felt awkward.  My instinct was to give the girl a hug -  she was clearly far more shaken than physically hurt, so all she really needed was comfort – but such is my ingrained London-ness nowadays that I half expected to be given a mouthful of abuse for touching someone else’s child.  Thankfully, however, the mother was also lovely, and gave me a big smile and a thank you before comforting her daughter.  A happy ending.

Gritty Southern Drama

I live very close to Kilburn High Road, and walk along it every morning as I go to the tube. One of the interesting things about Kilburn High Road (and one of the reasons it was a bit shit for many years) is that it is the dividing line between Brent and Camden authorities, and so neither really wanted to take responsibility for it. Anyway, it received a grant all of its very own a few years ago and has been being improved ever since – although I do miss the shitness at times. It’s lovely having a Caffe Nero etc, but the character’s rather gone. Anyway, I digress.

It was icy this morning, as expected. I had worn my Cat boots in readiness. These, combined with fishnet tights and a pinstripe skirt, made me look like a bit of a twat, but at least I didn’t fall over, and I made it to work with warm, dry feet. These things matter in my old age. Anyway – once more, I digress.

I left my house, which is on a road on the Camden side of KHR. Plenty of snow still, and an awful lot of grey, frozen slush. Lovely. I stomped confidently in my big workman’s boots, sneering at the fools who had chosen to wear normal shoes. I then crossed the road, to the Brent side of KHR, and realised that there was something different about the surface underfoot. It was gritted. All at once it dawned on me: Brent have actually been gritting all winter. Camden – well, not so much. Suddenly the buses being taken off the roads yesterday made a lot more sense to me. Last night I pontificated to my mother on the fact that SURELY the main roads should all be salted and why on earth weren’t the buses running? However, when each bus is likely to be running through areas run by different authorities, there is no guarantee, if the difference between Brent and Camden is anything to go by.

Seems like local isn’t always better, after all.

Smokers

If you must continue smoking in the face of the ban, at least have the decency to stand out of the way of the door so that other people can get in and out of the restaurant.

Woman outside Browns last night, I’m looking specifically at you.

How to be dead

In contrast to Ms P’s post on Vox today, I tried to be a good Samaritan this morning and nearly got myself beaten up for my pains. As I walked down the street outside Brixton tube I saw two people bump into each other, and a phone dropped to the ground. It looked to me like it had fallen out of the girl’s bag, and so I picked up the phone and ran after her to give it back. Before I reached her, however, I was grabbed around the back of my neck and shaken by a guy yelling, ‘where are you going with my phone?’ All I could do was stammer an apology and hand it back, but it scared the hell out of me. My hard London exterior is not feeling very tough today.

What I did at the weekend, by Katja, aged 31 1/4

On Friday I snoozed my way through most of the work day, waking up at 16.59 and zooming out of the door at 17.00, straight into the pub, where I waved goodbye to a colleague who was leaving to go to another job by downing three pints in an ill-advisedly short space of time, before wobbling my merry way home to change and go out for the actual evening’s entertainment.

This week, it was the aftershow party for Masque of the Red Death at BAC, at which my friend Tim was DJing. Oh. My. Goodness. What a brilliant evening. There were masks. There were men in faun outfits. There was a lot of dancing. There was a tequila bar. There was Katie Melua playing live (I’m not a fan, but she’s a big name to be playing at BAC). I danced with many, many people and have a singularly bruised foot to show for it, but had an amazing evening. The show’s run has just been extended, having previously been completely sold out; if you can’t get to see the show, however, the aftershows on Fridays and Saturdays are definitely worth going to, I’d say.

Saturday was spent lazing around in bed for most of the day, then braving Oxford Street and Selfridges in the afternoon. I think we must still have been drunk. Still, a most successful shopping trip. Ridiculously overpriced and frivolous garments were bought and yea and verily the shoppers were pleased. Even if the boy’s bank manager wasn’t. He he he.

On Sunday I dragged myself out of bed at lunchtime in order to go to the Golden Age of Couture exhibition at the V&A. Quite frankly, I was disappointed. Not by the exhibition, which was fabulous, but by the way the V&A had packed so many people in. This particular exhibition is run on a timed ticket arrangement. Ours were for 2.00 and we were told that if we arrived after 2.15 we wouldn’t be allowed in. Fair enough. However, the V&A had sold such stupidly high numbers of tickets that one couldn’t get anywhere near most of the exhibits. Certainly not close enough to read any of the information about the various dresses, if you could even see the dress in the first place, past the throngs of people. Sort it out, V&A – I expect better of you. There are limits to the number of people you can sensibly fit into one exhibition, and you had certainly doubled, if not trebled that number.

To cheer ourselves up, therefore, my fashion-loving friend and I went for tea and cake. This did the job admirably.

When I then got home to find my chap cooking roast beef, with friends on their way round to discuss skiing holiday plans (now booked – woo!), the evening just kept on getting better. Wine was drunk, Guitar Hero was played and far too much food was eaten. Hurrah for weekends, say I.

Theatrical round-up

I’ve been seeing a lot of shows over the past week or so. Being lazy, I’m not going to write full reviews, but I will say that Saint Joan at The National is far too long and not very well directed. However, it has some great central performances (particularly Anne-Marie Duff, Paterson Joseph and Angus Wright), and some fabulous music. As a disclaimer, I must say that I do know one of the musicians, but I do genuinely mean it when I say that the music is good and really atmospheric.

Little Shop of Horrors (now, sadly, closed – I went to the final performance) was, on the other hand, fabulous. Sheridan Smith as Audrey started off somewhat subdued – her portrayal of a battered girlfriend was a little too real for a piece of fun musical theatre – but perked up in the second half and showed that she really is so much better than the television show for which she’s most famous. Paul Keating as Seymour was also wonderful, singing and dancing up a storm – I think I have a new crush *sigh*.

On Sunday night I went, not to the theatre, but to Trafalgar Square, for the Chemical Brothers gig. Calvin Harris was supporting and was a bit disappointing. The show had been hyped to have 3D effects, and we were all handed 3D viewing glasses as we entered the square. However, as always happens with cheap cardboard glasses, the effects were somewhat lost. We spent more time debating which way round to wear the glasses than we did listening to Calvin’s set. Oops. The Chems, however, were fantastic, backed up by the most amazing light show. I didn’t stop dancing for the whole set, which, considering my ankle still hasn’t recovered properly, is testament to how good they were. I was in pain the next day, but it was definitely worth it.

Then last night I went along to Spamalot. Oh my goodness – I haven’t laughed so much in ages. Supremely silly and hilariously funny. Even though one knows exactly what’s coming next in the script, it’s kept fresh with the insertion of lots of new song and dance numbers. Hannah Waddingham, as the Lady of the Lake, deserves particular mention. She has fantastic range and the most unbelievable voice, along with being funny, and having a great sense of comic timing. Really, I’d like to kill her, but I’ll settle for worshipping her from afar. If Paul Keating is my new main crush, Hannah’s definitely top of the girl crush list.

Marilyn moment

There are moments in a girl’s life when all she can really do is thank heaven she’s wearing nice knickers, give the bus driver a cheeky grin and carry on walking.

This morning was one of those times for me.

When You’re Tired of London…

Walking through Chinatown to meet a friend for lunch, the roads are being dug up, the people are unsmiling, it’s grey and dark and rainy….and yet….suddenly my heart leaps up into my mouth. I must have looked like a madwoman as I stopped dead, turned my face to the sky and just grinned.

I love this city.

I love that I can leave my flat and 20 minutes later be completely surrounded by the sights, smells and languages of a country thousands of miles away. I love that I can sit in a restaurant in Theatreland, surrounded by well-known faces, and no-one bats an eyelid. I love that everything you could ever want is available here…at a price. Most of all, I love that this is home. We’ve had a love-hate relationship over the past 10 years, London and I, but we’ve never given up on each other.

London has my heart.