fat and fatter

Just got back from Corner Shop - I went to see if Tiger the kitten was still there, but now that she is bigger, she is not allowed to come into the shop anymore, I was a bit sad coz she was the best thing about going there. I say to Lyle that it's a bit fucked up when a trip to the local supermarket constitutes 'a day out', and even worse that I am enjoying it so much. I have to buy new towels, the ones I bought last time have mysteriously been imbibed by the house never to be seen again. Things here have a finite lifetime, some of them leave in your laundry basket only to return a flattering shade of Kabul grey, other items leave and are never seen again. On the towel front I went for clean white, baby chick yellow and of course, girly pink. A couple of friends from the UK are due to visit shortly and I'm determined to offer them a few home comforts to make up for the fact that they'll be suffering the delights of Kabul and my electrocution shower. I manage to steal away from Lyle and Mazar into the linen aisle, I have a couple of minutes of peaceful browsing (consumer grazing it feels like to me) before my shadows catch up with me - where's the short Chinese chick? Lyle says. I was rather hoping that I'd be mistaken for a boy in my baseball cap but my kittenish excitement over the furry toy dog in a furry kennel that's sat on one of the shelves clearly gives me away. We don't find Tiger but I do get my towels and some cheerful penguin stick on hooks - such small pleasures ;)

I am also watching animal planet, non stop animal wank for those that love the furry creatures - A man was watching a red squirrel as the squirrel ran up into the branches and started licking the sap oozing from the bark of the tree. Later, the man tried the stuff that the squirrel was eating and discovered a sugary substance with which he could sweeten his food.

Lunch today was chips, baked beans and chicken cordon bleu (an interesting excuse for eating processed, freeze-dried chicken wrapped in bacon and cheese and deep fried in greasy breadcrumbs). Dinner was lasagne (double cheese), chips and baked beans. Lets just say that I was feeling both lardy and British as I joined Lyle, Rommel and Rob for chow. It's times like these that I am reminded of school dinners; I never wanted to eat like a soldier or a guest of Her Majesty and here I am up to my armpits in Brit canteen food.

I've been quite good though and with Lyle's encouragement have managed to get my arse into the gym most mornings. The last few days have been a bit rough as they've straddled a sequence of St Paddy's day celebrations, all of which involved vast amounts of booze, bad Irish music followed by bad British disco music and embarrassingly bad British dancing. Slightly the worse for wear I have waddled through the days only to end up this morning bemoaning my love handles; Lyle tells me that they'll be difficult to rid of coz they're not muscle.... Later in Corner Shop he reminds me that m&ms are what love handles are made of and I have to quickly steer the shopping trolley away from the chocolate and towards the muesli.

Fuck me! Now I'm watching a tiny little bird (on the TV) as he catches an unsuspecting lizard, flies up into the branches of a thorn tree and makes himself a lizard kebab - impaled on a sharp thorn the diminutive (rather cute) bird rips the poor little lizard to bits! Yum...

Oh yeah, a new word for the day: Locationship - A friend told me this word, something I'd never heard of before, and, as you might imagine, it's one of those fling things that happens purely coz you're both in the same place at the same time and neither of you are at home. The concept slightly fills me with dread as it smacks of the kind of relationship that are ten a penny out here - convenient, corrosive and ultimately bad for the soul. I feel rather naive most of the time, having grown up in a rather innocent family, I am sometimes shocked by the hard edges people acquire here.