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'Don't you worry, this will all make sense tomorrow.' - Alison Moyet, Ordinary Girl

Yesterday I watched a woman in a headscarf and a jilbab kiss her man late in the afternoon on the 300 bus.

She held his hand; otherwise they didn't touch, except for the lips and the clasped fingers, clenched tightly.After the kiss, they leaned back and gazed into each other's eyes. A gaze so powerful I could feel it from my side of the bus. At the stop before mine they stepped off the bus at my stop and walked into the distance, not touching. She demure, him aloof.

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I drove, half-asleep today at midday, from where I was to where I am. The sun shone for a while. I listened to the radio, but I couldn't tell you what was playing because I didn't really hear it.

Later, I visited the apartment I'm going to move into in August. The owner, who is Portuguese, made me instant coffee with milk powder and heaps of sugar to drink while we viewed the flat.  I was transported immediately to my boarding school where we premixed instant coffee, milk powder and sugar and then ate it out the jar instead of making coffee with it.

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I visited the flower shop where I used to work to talk to my ex-boss, and, coincidentally (there are no coincidences) my other ex-boss and her husband came in to discuss the flowers they are ordering for the re-dedication of their wedding vows. Surrounded by the scent of paper whites we discussed divorce, while they pored over books of wedding flowers.

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I lay in my bed with Seb and read some of The Dark is Rising after he finished watching the rugby. I talked on the phone and heard things I wanted to hear. I ate strawberries with yoghurt. I have The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle next to my bed to read in a minute, but I really want to be reading We Need to Talk about Kevin. I might read nothing at all. When faced with what I must do and what I want to do I rarely choose either option, preferring to flee.

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I'm giving it 100%. Because anything that's worth doing is worth doing well. Right?

'A long time ago we used to be friends, but I haven't thought of you lately at all.' - The Dandy Warhols, We Used to be Friends

Hitting the delete button seems so final doesn't it? When I first started using social networking applications I couldn't delete, couldn't get my mind around the idea of just sending a person (and all their stuff) to the recycle bin. It just seemed so mean.

Facebook is especially adamant when you hit delete:

'This action cannot be undone'.

Today I deleted a whole lot of people. People I don't talk to, people I added because they asked for an add and I felt bad saying no, people I don't really want poking their nose in my profile anymore, people I just think 'ok, I've read all about you and now I'm moving on'. 

It's not a personal thing, it's just more a 'why?' thing.

Why keep someone on your 'friends' list forever when you're actually not really friends?

Someone told me the other day, I think it was at book club (Dory moment here), that a study showed that you only really have 50 concurrent friends/good acquaintances. As one new one is made, one old one has to make way.

A huge part of it is the mobile culture we live in. No-one is where they grew up anymore really, and even if you are, perhaps your job or your lifestyle means you're different from the people around you. Online social networking let's you look into the lives of people you knew and compare yourself and see if you came out better or worse. But once you've compared your achievements and had a look at yourself through the eyes of people you knew 15 or 20 years ago, what other basis do you have for continuing an acquaintanceship?

Take a high school reunion for example. The only reason people go to those horrible things is to see whether they're better or worse off than their former peers. No-one really keeps in contact after a reunion unless there was some unresolved business from before or unless they already kept in contact before the reunion.

Then you have the random messaging type of online social networking friends. So you message a few times and then you get the 'let's be friends' and then you message a bit more and find out that really, no, you have nothing in common. Delete really seems the best option here.

It seems that every 30-something and 40-something is in a crisis of making new relationships and friendships. I've never had any trouble making acquaintances so I can't imagine what it must be like to struggle to do that. Apparently people do, and some canny investors saw the gap in the market and made off line social networking groups. They're springing up all over the place.

My one trainer, 30 something, single, female, not dating, at the gym directed me to this website :

Nieuwe Mensen Leren Kennen

Another acquaintance directed me here:

'I''ve been looking so long at these pictures of you that i almost believe that they're real' - The Cure, Pictures of You

How adolescent of me. Don't laugh.

So, it's Saturday. Way-hey.

This week has been kind of crappy, despite the horoscope predictions of a fabulous week. Monday was good.

I spent some time working out on Monday evening and the company was fab. That just happens sometimes, you know? 

Thursday was good too, it was Ms Blonde But Bright's birthday drinks. I drove with Citizen Stu to Leiden and we had a little mini-blogger meet in amongst all the real people. Thanks J!

I got lost on the A2 driving Stu back home because I was talking too much, but it was fun. Stu, let's get lost again together sometime.

In retrospect it hasn't been crappy at all. The only aspect that's been crappy is money.

The loss of it, the not having it.

Oh well.

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Saturday seems to be the day when I collect all my uncollected thoughts and put them in one place. Here's one - how odd it is that I can read enough German and French to order from various online shops? Linguistic shopping abilities - chalk up 110% for Ash. Real life German and French skills? Uh.

Here's another: Tamara-the-uber-trainer told me today that people find it difficult to step over the threshold and get themselves into a gym because once inside you are confronted with yourself.

Not only the physical shortcomings, but the mental ones too, determination and drive, fear of failure. I never thought of it that way but it's true. Every time you walk in you make a choice. I guess I'm not so bad at making choices after all.

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The online shopping I did was at amazon.de. I bought a whole heap of books. Carol Ann Duffy's Rapture, The New Rules of Lifting for Women, Tim Winton's Cloudstreet and Henry & June, Anais Nin.

Don't try and find any connection between any of the books on the list. Unless I'm bodybuilding to find rapture on Cloudstreet using Anais Nin as my guidebook?

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I trained so hard today that I thought my nose might bleed. Unrelated to that: coconut really is the best flavour of protein powder.

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The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl came! (Addressing Shauna directly) Woweeeeee babe! You are so hot! I had never gone through your whole blog before because I only started reading about a year ago but so much of what you say in the book is my story too. I could tell you all the similarities but that would be boring. Instead I'm just going to say thank you so much for sharing what you have to say! Big hugs!

(Addressing the rest of you lot again) Go and buy Shauna's book. Even if you're not trying to lose weight, not struggling with an eating disorder, even if you're a man and you think it's a girly book. She's side-splittingly funny, she has a perspective on life that is guaranteed to be different from your own, she comes from a time and place very much like mine. Oh, and I'm telling you to. So shoo! Go!

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Last Sunday evening I went with my girlfriend T to the possibly-ultra-hip&happening Panama. I say 'possibly' because these places are not usually hip once someone tells someone else that they're hip. Know what I mean?

We went to watch Xandra van Rossem, a friend of T's who I had met once before at a different concert, sing at Jazz it Up.

I was completely speechless. She is breathtaking. I can't remember what she sang now, but the atmosphere was amazing and her voice is piercingly clear, yet surprisingly warm.

The club felt so 1930s. The piano and a barstool for the singer in the centre of the room, beanbags and low stools arranged all around, tables and chairs at the outside. The fake fog swirled, the conversation flowed, the jazz types were there in their hats and suits. Couples kissing on the beanbags while Xandra sang.

It felt glamorous and grownup. I could see myself in a cocktail dress, stocking-clad legs crossed demurely at the ankle, lipsticked mouth neatly sipping from my glass while I sat across the table from my partner in crime who carefully leaned forward to light my cigarette.

To listen to Xandra you need to click this link, then choose Nederlands (the English version isn't done yet), choose music, scroll down and listen to my favourite, Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Ah.

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A photo of mine was used for Schmap!  Cool beans, huh? It looks like a cute application. In the summer I plan to photograph more. You can trawl  through Amsterdam's Schmap yourself to find the photo.

Other great photography that I came across this week is from Xelia. Go see. Take heed, flickr will ask you if you want to go back to the kittens. 'Tis all I'm saying. Beautiful photography. I love it.

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I rejoined the Daring Bakers. I will be daringly baking tomorrow. Anyone want some? Come over around 4. Phone first please, let me know you're coming. I wouldn't want to be surprised.

And that ends Saturday's long, languid post. Long and languid is the best kind, right?
 

'You got a way of walking, you got a way of talking...' - Shane McGowan & Sinead O'Connor, Haunted

I was browsing youtube yesterday and I came across that video up there. It's a film someone made for filmschool - pretty damned good don't you think? It also is sung by the Pogues, who you know I like from before.

Yesterday I was the one haunted by the ghost. Not the ghost of your precious love like in the song.

The ghost of lost youth and forgotten holidays. Even though the youth was just a year ago and the holidays were just a week ago.

At work it was as though someone took a hefty dose of discontent and circulated it in the airconditioning. The director was pissy and it filtered down from there. By 2 pm everyone had had a bollocksing. The irritation was palpable in every office. I think it had finally settled in that the vacation was over and this was real life.

Later on I was in the gym and it was all midlife crisis in action. Testosterone spill.  You could almost smell it in the air.

Poor darlings, their new year resolutions all parked outside with their inappropriately expensive shiny cars. It's always like this in January but it seems more desperate this year.

Maybe because today I'm 34! I get to join with in the midlife crisis crowd and this time I can play too!

Other birthday stuff later.

'So mothers keep your girls at home,
Don't let them journey all alone,
Tell them this world is full of danger,
And to shun the company of strangers'
- Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, The Kindness of Strangers

The girl walks up the steps, doesn't punch her card. Sits down with one foot on the back of the seat in front of her. Small, dark skin, doe eyes. Straightened hair. Cheap perfume.

She wears a white puffa coat, jeans, a black belt. Nameless sneakers. She eats McDonalds fries out of their paper packet and watches the door. Her mp3 player, (it's not an ipod), blasts nameless music into her ears.

She taps her foot against the chair.

Opposite her a middle-aged woman, shopping bags in hand, lifeless skin, deflated breasts, soul escaped. Bags from Blokker with gifts for her children who are probably just as lifeless as their mother.

Destined for a bleak future.

Then a boy walks in, sits down, kisses the girl for just a little too long for them to be only friends. She leaves the headphones in. They don't talk. His hand rests on her thigh, near the top, just below her crotch. She eats her fries and listens to her music.

The middle-aged woman watches them. She's trying not to watch, her eyes pretend they're looking out of the window. She's not watching. But she is.

If she would speak she would say, 'I was 17. I ate fries while my boy put his hand on my crotch. I pretended I didn't care.'

If she would speak she would stand up and howl. The windows would shatter.

She likes to think she wouldn't be invisible anymore. She likes to think the boy and girl would notice her.

She'd be shaking her fists, roaring into a void.

Screaming, 'I'm here. Look at me!' Her voice would rasp and grate along the words.

They'd keep listening to their music. Their feet would tap to whatever it was.

The girl would leave his hand near her crotch. He would think about how he wanted to get into her pants. She would think about nothing.

The woman sitting opposite them is invisible.