An Evening at the Museum, and a Party in the Park

I think that I'm going to endeavour to update this at least once a week. Clearly, I've failed this week, but I promise I'll try harder in the future. I'll try and make my posts shorter too. I'm also threatening to review every book I read once I finish it for writing practice, but I might yet do that in a new blog. We'll see.

Following my last post, Charlie came to visit for the weekend, bringing with her a batch of homemade, teeth-meltingly sugary penut cakey biscuit things. They're lovely, I should add, but to be consumed in moderation. We're still at it. Anyway, Saturday lunchtime provided a great opportunity to have lunch at The Angel Inn up in Highgate proper, which was actually very nice indeed (their tv screen with football on was quite small and shoved in a corner, which added to this). Later, Laura shuffled off with her beau to celebrate him finishing law exams or something, so Charlie and I settled down with pizza and a copy of Troy. Troy is one of the few historically-orientated films that I don't mind watching for some unknown reason (and not because it features Brad Pitt in a skirt, Orlando Bloom as Paris getting beaten up is more appealing, in honesty). This is in contrast to The Last Legion, of course, which makes me want to throw the television out of the window and beat the writers across the face with my shinai. 

But I digress. We had a tasty Sunday lunch in the Wagamama at Bond Street (we were aiming to have cream tea at the Wallace Collection, but didn't have the time), bought macaroons, cupcakes, and Nerds in Selfridges, and then parted ways. It was lovely, as usual, to see Charlie.

It was also a pleasant surprise to see Maggie and Michael on Sunday evening, where I had my second dinner of the day (I did not know how large the portions are at TGI Fridays, in my defence) and embarked with them on an epic walk from Covent Garden, to Trafalgar Square, back down the Strand, then down the Mall past Buckingham Palace and over to Victoria station where I hopped on tube home whilst they went to locate a coach. It was a nice evening for it.

Moving on, Monday evening saw the British Museum Friends evening. I attended two talks, one on body perceptions in ancient Greek society, and another on the statues within the Enlightenment gallery in the museum. The first of these was very much a lecture, and I am sorry to say that I was nodding off by the end of it. This wasn't due to the the subject matter, but the way in which the male speaker who talked for most of the duration read from a pre-prepared script. I think he looked up at the audience maybe half a dozen times in forty-five minutes, and the result was very dry and characterless indeed, which was a shame.

The second talk was given about the contents of the King's Library as we walked round it, and was decidedly more interesting. However it was the things that I saw in between the two events that were most fun. For example, there was a lady reciting the story of Persephone's abduction by Hades in one gallery. She knew the story by heart and threw herself into it, sometimes using a frame drum to add a bit of drama. It was very good and she had managed to draw quite a crowd. I wish I'd gone to listen to her, rather than the first talk, but we live and learn. Next time I'll go for the more creative stuff. Regardless, it was very nice to mosey about the galleries after hours. It was so much quieter than usual that it felt quite peaceful, and for once I could actually get near the Rosetta Stone and take my time reading item information without being jostled.

Skipping forward to Thursday, I found myself quite well occupied. Three o'clock saw me in the Hachette building near Warren Street once more for another job interview, this time for a marketing assistant position within Headline (last time I was there, it was sales). It went as well as most interviews seem to. Regardless, I was one of the last to be interviewed, and was emailed quite promptly the next morning with a rejection. Shocking. I do sometimes wonder if I largely get rejected because I let too much of my personality bleed out in interviews. I suspect that I'm unnecessarily prolix, jumping from thought to thought out loud in a manner that suggests I'm deranged or, at the very least, scatter-brained. Or perhaps it's just my previously mentioned struggle to show enthusiasm. I am rather introverted of late, and I worry that it's beginning to become apparent to strangers. I shall have to work on that. I like to blame it all on my minimal experience, however, so hopefully once I've done my internship at the BM, I'll do better. Still, it's probably for the best that I didn't get the job, as then I'd have had to turn down the internship, and that would have been devastating. 

Anyway, moving back to Thursday, I went straight from the interview to Regent's Park for a Laura's pre-birthday party. I had to wait around for everybody else to show up, clutching bags of cake and Pimms like an alcoholic fatty near the children's playground. I did get some funny looks. Still, there was a fun afternoon had (including over-candled caterpillar cake), and I got pretty wasted on about four glasses of strong Pimms and a small amount of cider. I'm sure Laura's work colleagues appreciated me gleefully ruffling their hair. 

Lovely as it always is to see people from London, it was a particular treat to see Rachael Cartlidge and Pippin, who stayed with us on Thursday night and accompanied me on a jaunt to Camden the next day before running off again. I was mainly in Camden looking for a nice-but-reasonably-priced parasol. I didn't find one. I am not paying £35 for some lace on a bamboo stick. So instead, I went to Oddballs circus/juggling shop and splashed out on a hula hoop. Oh yes! What stripy glory! It fluoresces! It's fun! It even comes apart to be twisted down to half its full size!

Of course, it turns out that I'm pretty average at hulaing now that I'm no longer eight years old. And these adult circus hoops are heavy. I think mine weighs about half a kilo, and when you get it up to speed you do feel it. I got over-enthusiastic the next day and now have light bruising around my midriff and angry brown marks on my hipbones. Oops. It has not put me off though, and as I have not yet destroyed the television with my efforts, I shall persist in looking like I'm having seizures whilst I practise. Laura's getting into it too, and wants her own so that we can hula together on the lawn round the back of the flats. It's fortunate, then, that it's her birthday tomorrow...

And that's enough for now. I shall let you know why I spent most of Friday night spinning on the spot in my next blog.

Oh, and if anybody noticed Boydy's absence, it's because she's still at terminal velocity, in her underwear, in Spain. Yes.

Our cheese expenditure is way down for the month.

Museum Trip

I can not decide what colour to make this wretched blog. This is starting to irritate me massively. Please bear with me until I make up my mind. Also, if the background image makes things hard to read, or is not tall enough, please can somebody tell me.

Not that I really do much at the moment besides crafting increasingly outlandish covering letters, but I suppose I'm due for a update.

The highlight of these last few days has, I suppose, been my jaunt to the British Museum to see the Renaissance drawings exhibition and my interview with the British Museum's publishing company afterwards. One thing at a time.

On Tuesday lunchtime I trundled down to the BM and finally gave in to my urge to get a membership. For a moderate sum of cash, I now have free access to all the exhibitions no matter how many times I choose to visit, invitations to members' evenings, invitations to lectures, free use of a members' room in the west wing, and, of course, the obligatory tri-annual magazine. Lovely. I've put in a little extra too, so that I can haul a guest along for free to all events. Now I just need to find a friend who's interested.

(There's actually a members' evening on Monday, which I'm quite excited about as the lectures sound pretty interesting and I've managed to get one of the lats tickets to the one I'm most interested in. But I digress, I'll tell you how that goes once it's happened.)

Immediately utilising my rapidly dog-eared receipt (my membership card will hopefully show up in the post in the near future) I bypassed those queueing at the door to the Italian Renaissance Drawings exhibition on my way in. The current transformation of the circular reading room is pretty impressive. If you don't know what it usually looks like, here it is. Yes, I have borrowed this for my background.

For the exhibition, however, the desks have been covered by decking to form a new floor, the windows blacked out and a number of walls erected to hang stuff off. It's eerily quiet, except for the shuffling feet of those with audio guides, and the lighting is almost atmospheric (this is somewhat ruined by the result being that you need to be a lot closer than you would usually to see the items). The domed ceiling looms unlit in the shadows above. It's a nice setting for the content, bar some of the lighting. But perhaps a bulb or two had blown.

The drawings themselves are ordered to demonstrate the move from the Gothic period to the Renaissance, though not necessarily chronologically. There are a couple helpful video projections telling you about techniques, materials used, and such. I think I have a soft spot for silverpoint. Anyway, I obviously can't describe the pictures, but there's enough in there to keep you occupied for an hour or so if you're reading everything. I definitely would recommend trying to go when it's quiet though. I was there at around 12:30 on a Tuesday, and I was having to wait for people to get out of the way to look at things. Perhaps it's the aforementioned lighting, or the average age of the visitors I saw, but a lot of people seemed keen to stand with their noses a couple of inches from the glass for overlong periods of time. I get that they wanted to appreciate the detail, but so did I, and it's tricky when somebody's head is obscuring the entirety of a small sketch.

Bizarrely, the thing that most caught my eye was a very dark drawing by Benozzo Di Lese - 'Totila's Assault on Perugia' (c.1461). I have likely seen it before, as it normally lurks in the lovely Uffizi in Florence and I did spend some hours wandering its corridors back in 2008. Perhaps that's why it caught my eye. Apologies for the quality of the picture, but there seem to be no images online so I have photographed from the paperback catalogue that officially accompanies the exhibition and tweaked it to make it more intelligible. It's better in real life, of course.

Unfortunately, my mother rang me halfway round so (being intimidated by the library-esque atmosphere – well, I suppose it was in a library) I had to breeze through the second half of the exhibits in order to return her call. I intend go back to finish the tour in the next couple of weeks.

From there I made my way out of the north entrance to Russell Square and the British Museum's publishing company. I applied for the 3-month, part-time, September-start, sales/marketing/publicity/rights internship a week after the deadline, so I was surprised to be offered an interview. Yet I was, and I had quite a pleasant half-hour taking to a couple of ladies about how I was so keen for the experience that I'd probably gnaw my left foot off to get it. I did, of course, express this slightly more eloquently, and was told that they'd be in contact to let me know if I'd gotten through to the second round of interviews. I thought it went pretty well. I usually struggle to express my enthusiasm for things in interviews, but in this case I probably looked like I was taking personality tips from Mr Bingley. Excellent publishing experience + working for the British Museum =  Hell yes.

So, off I skipped to hassle other people for work (including a part-time job with a literary agent that would compliment an internship like that perfectly).

Well, perhaps my luck is changing, because I've just had a phone call. Apparently they liked my foaming-at-the-mouth verve. Never mind round two, they've offered me the thing! YES! And apparently, it might yet be extended to four months to start in August. I am quite keen for this. Admittedly, I'm probably going to have to flog myself to a pulp in some part-time job for three days a week (with three at the BM) in order to have enough money to live, but I suppose I can man up and deal with that. I am pretty happy.

I have another job interview for a marketing assistant position next Thursday. Knowing my luck, I'll get it and have to choose between a paying job and something that I'd love to do. That would really suck and probably be just my luck. But we'll see. Fingers crossed.

Well done, by the way, to all of you who've finished your degrees! You all seem to have great results – I hope you are celebrating appropriately! Pimms and barbecues ahoy!

Charlie's coming to visit for the weekend tomorrow. I am excited about this, but the flat is disgusting and everyone else is out (Boydy is at terminal velocity somewhere in Spain, and Laura is in South Kensington with her beau, despite maiming her feet in a way that makes her walk like an Igor) so I guess it's up to me to tidy up. Damn. 

(Insert Hay-related Pun Here)

So, I figure that seeing as I have more time on my hands than a clumsy hourglass maker I should maybe start blogging again before I forget how to write entirely and scupper my career plans.

Status: Still unemployed and pretty pissy about it. I want to get into publishing, but it turns out it's hard.

Also, it is now sunny enough for a fifteen minute exposure to give me noticeable sunburn, so I am forced to slather on the sticky white emulsion, stay indoors or scuttle along shady walls like an overgrown albino cockroach. Marvellous.

Still, I shall not whinge further. This is not a Deadjournal.

Instead, here is what I did this last week.

After some decidedly unsubtle hints from my parents I ended up heading back to the Midlands for a couple of days. I actually decided to drive up on the Saturday, despite the car being overdue for yet another epic failure of some sort. Remarkably, both the car and I got there in one piece, and I successfully managed to whisk Charlie away from her visit home to trundle into Loughborough for a coffee. We bought cheesecake and were peculiarly recognised from school by someone much younger than us whom we have no recollection of. We also participated in the age-old tradition of buying some chips from the excellent Devonshire's and eating them in the car while it pissed it down outside. A most enjoyable couple of hours.

Grandad was staying over for the weekend, so I could only hare off to Nottingham for half an afternoon, sadly. If I didn't see you, this is why. I will be making an effort to make a proper visit soon. Still, it was great to be back, even if only briefly, and it was good to see those who I did. For those who evaded me – I shall get you next time!

Late on Monday I made the decision to visit the Hay Festival for a couple of days, so managed to get one of the few camping spaces left nearby and on Tuesday drove for about four hours o'er hill and dale and tiny rickety wooden toll-bridge to a land where my phone might as well have been made of cheese for all the connectivity it had.

If you're not aware of it, the Hay Festival is a literary shindig set just outside the improbable Hay-On-Wye just north of the Brecon Beacons. I say improbable, because the main industry there seems to be second-hand books. There are more bookshops in the tiny town than anything else combined. Other shops include a small Spar, a delicatessen, half a dozen pubs, three posh clothes shops, a perpetually-closed bank, an outdoorsy shop and a pharmacy that was, unexpectedly, bigger than the Spar. I guess the well-dressed locals eat books and then take lots of vitamins to counter the malnutrition.

But I digress. The festival comprises largely of a massive number of authors giving talks on their specialist subject, whilst those not attending dine on overpriced organic whatever and drink Pimms whilst reading something highbrow. There's also a handful of stalls by companies like The Balverine whiskey, the London Library and Oxfam.

It may be unsurprising to hear that this is all sponsored by The Guardian. In fact, the owner of my campsite referred to it as 'a Guardian readers convention'. Almost everybody there was a rah, wielding 2.4 children, or a retired, white, upper-middle-class couple. Don't get me wrong, those who I spoke to were all lovely, but it was a little disconcerting. I went to see Ross Noble, who did a good show on the Tuesday evening, and one of his opening remarks was about expecting a crowd of bearded tweed-wearers muttering about Richard Dawkins. He clearly didn't see the lady sat near me in a tweed vest top. Or her beard. I will compliment him on suitably ridiculing the venue though - The Barclay's Pavilion of Wealth. Oh yes. Enter stage left the Tepee of Joy, the Tent of Glory and the Cloth Warehouse of Magnificence.

Anyhow, I enjoyed the experience, spending most of my time at history-orientated talks. Not that anyone's particularly interested but I attended talks by Robert Ferguson on Vikings, Paul Cartledge (whose books contributed heavily to my dissertation) on Greek Democracy, Adrian Tinniswood (whose book I posted dozens of during my publishing work experience) on the Barbary pirates, Richard Miles on Carthage, Tom Holland on west Europe c.1000AD and a couple of guys (whose names I've lost) on mappae mundi. They were generally all very interesting, and I even had time to go for a walk on Wednesday evening (though I nearly got stuck down the bottom of an embankment near the river, which will teach me for going exploring inappropriately dressed).

I thought I should really get back to London and apply for more jobs, though, so I made the five hour trip back late on Thursday morning. My god, I feel it. I'm as stiff as a board from the combination of driving 500-odd miles and sleeping on a sliver of foam in a field. Everything aches, including my stomach muscles, which I have no reasoning for. The first half of the drive back was awesome, though. Driving at speed through the glorious Brecons along windy roads whilst listening to classic rock and playing 'spot-the-castle-ruins' (a rather dangerous game as a driver, it turns out) is one of those things that I really enjoy a lot. It would only be improved by doing it on a motorbike. That said, I drove past Raglan castle, and now immensely regret not stopping to have a look. I shall have to go back sometime.

I also got to drive across the Second Severn Crossing though. That is one hell of a bridge, I must say.

So now I am back to the noisy humdrum of the city. It is as hot as the countryside, but with added pollution. I don't like this.

But that tedious ramble brings me up to date, anyway. I shall try to do more interesting things in the future.