Holmes Place Health Club, Hendon - I love these people!!

Ok, now the initial 'blogging every day' phase has passed. By the by, I think there's something wrong with my profile views' counter - it's been showing 24 ever since I set the thing up...

Anyway, nothing as exciting as what happens to Glyn and other bloggers happens to me, but yesterday, I experienced one of the worst panics of my entire life. Reading this, it might not seem so scary, but anyone who has been in this position will know how terrifying it is!

Ok, so I'm on the Northern Line after having met a friend. All of a sudden I am absolutely desperate to go to the toilet. Seriously desperate. The closest station is Burnt Oak - the train pulls in, I jump off and run up the stairs. No toilets. Ok, I think to myself, not many underground stations have toilets nearby, but there must be some near... I run around Burnt Oak for a good twenty minutes, completely unable to find a toilet. This was not funny! I had to be at uni to pick up my classification, and it was so bad I began trying to work out whether I would have time to buy new trousers before I had to be at uni and see people...

Anyway, I run back to the tube station and frantically look at the nearby stations. Hendon Central. That has 'Central' in its name, so it must be a pretty big place. I decide to go with my gut feeling and jump on the next tube southwards. Bear in mind that at this point it has become so desperate that I can't even sit down on the train. I was in agony!

After what seems the longest tube journey of my entire life, I jump out at Hendon Central, almost knocking people over as I run up the stairs and find the local area map (helpfully hidden away in a corner). A helpfully hidden local area map that doesn't show public toilets. 'Ok, ok, I can do this. I can make it', I think to myself - all the while knowing that I really don't have very long.

The first sign I see when I leave the station is a sign for a public toilet - 'THANK YOU!' I say (out loud) and I start running in this direction, but I couldn't find them anywhere. Close to screaming out at this point I turn around and see Subway, KFC, Domino's and loads of cafes. 'YES!!'

Anyone who's been to London will know that many 'towns' have a huge roundabout as their main attraction, with a confusing system of subways - Hendon was no different. (I know what you're thinking, but there were people in the subways - I know what else you're thinking, but there are no bushes at Hendon Central, people!). I ran through the (very long!) subway to KFC - no toilet; through the subway to Subway - no toilet; through the subway to Domino's - no toilet; into a cafe - no toilet, into a second cafe - no toilet. I was livid! (I never use that word, but it's so appropriate!) WHERE DO PEOPLE IN HENDON GO TO THE TOILET?!

I turn around and there I see it - Holmes Place Health Club, Hendon. The bright light at the end of the tunnel. I run (through another frickin' subway) and step into the rather exey looking Health Club. Very quietly I said 'I'm really sorry, but do you have a toilet I can use, or do you know where I can find one...?' - it was pretty obvious I was close to tears!

'Yes' he replied, 'you can use ours, but I'll need to get someone to escort you.' 'Ok', I said. Now, the entrance of this place was pretty busy, so you can imagine how red I turned when he shouted out. 'CLIVE (we'll say that was his name, I was in no fit state to hear anything) CAN YOU TAKE THIS GENTLEMAN TO THE TOILET?' How embarrassing. But then Clive came and showed me to the toilet and I think I was the happiest I've ever been ever! Sheer ecstacy. That was a great feeling (bearing in mind that nearly an hour has passed since I was panicking in Burnt Oak!).

I emerge from the Health Club, dancing in the air (in my head) - and I immediately see the public toilets, standing next to a lovely load of bushes.

I am a SOCA WARRIOR!!

On Tuesday night, I had the best tube journey of my life. Without a doubt. As a London commuter, I've had many, many, many, largely uneventful, tube journeys. Here's why this one was cool.

I'd just been to the Joe Satriani gig in Hammersmith with my brother. Hammersmith tube station was pretty full afterwards, but we all managed to get into a District Line train (probably my least favourite line - although the Waterloo and City Line is pretty stupid). The journey to Baron's Court (the next stop) was pretty regular. As we pulled into the station, there were about twenty Trinidad and Tobago fans (including some very pretty girls), all dressed in red, white and black, waving flags - and were without doubt, the loudest people I have ever met.

They crowded into our carriage - singing and dancing - man, these people have rhythm. They were belting out such classics as 'I am a Soca Warrior' and 'Deutschland, Deutschland, here come the Soca Warriors.' Their voices were great, and these were proper songs with verses, bridges and everything! (A little different to 'In - ger - lernd, In - ger - lernd') They danced the whole time and at certain points in the songs, they all had to jump simultaneously and boy, did that carriage shake.

I was kinda expecting everyone on the carriage to be very British and stare down the whole time, trying to ignore the whole thing, but they didn't. People were joining in the songs (I had 'I am a Soca Warrior' in my head that whole evening), clapping, dancing - it was unreal. Everyone was just really happy. Pure joy. Great stuff. No-one would believe these people had just lost their final game and been knocked out of the Cup.

Unfortunately, the whole thing only lasted two stops - they got out at Gloucester Road, and within twenty seconds, the carriage was back to silence, with the vast majority of people staring at the floor again. I looked around thinking - 'did that just happen?!' Then an old lady turned to her husband and said quietly 'that was the best tube journey I've had in my life', and I knew it was real (like when the boy finds that scarf at the end of the Snowman).

A moment of sheer craziness - I felt like I'd just been tangoed. That night, we may have been standing on a District Line train between Hammersmith and Gloucester Road, but in our heads, for just a couple of minutes, we were all Soca Warriors, dancing on a sunny, Caribbean beach.

It's not often that the District Line takes a detour through the Caribbean.

As promised...

I managed it! For some reason it's tiny, but it's here!

Mitchenstein in Liechtenstein

I thought that writing the dates in Icelandic would be a nice touch – hey, we could all do with learning a little Icelandic.

Anyway, I thought I’d jump on the band wagon and include one of those maps that highlights all the countries you've been to. Unfortunately, I haven't worked out how to do that yet. But I did generate it all the same. I thought I’d been to quite a few countries, but looking at the map, I guess I still have quite a lot to do… I guess Liechtenstein and Luxembourg don’t take up that much space. A trip to Brazil, taking in Russia and Greenland is perhaps necessary (You'll see the map itself in good time).

I reckon this would be a good time to tell you some of my Liechtenstein facts. I don’t get that many opportunities to talk about Liechtenstein, so, if you don’t mind, I’m going to seize this one. Some of my information is from my own knowledge and some comes from the fantastic ‘Neither Here Nor There’, by Bill Bryson (always give your sources!). That’s a great read. Yeah, there are a few bad words in the Hamburg chapter, but anyone who’s been there won’t be surprised by that.

Now, people don’t spend that long in Liechtenstein (even its Royal Family managed to avoid it for 150 years). This became evident when a busload of American tourists arrived in Vaduz (the capital) and were told that they had twenty minutes to look around. We stayed in Liechtenstein for three days – we realised that was a little out of the ordinary when on the third day we walked into the tourist office and were met with the words ‘Are you guys STILL here?!’

I loved Liechtenstein – although one guy got a little angry with me over the Liechtenstein-England game that had taken place a couple of months before. He was angry that fear of English hooligan football fans meant that the Swiss army had to be on duty at the game – ‘The first time foreign troops had set foot in Liechtenstein for X-hundred years!’

These are my facts that make Liechtenstein so cool:

1. In the above-mentioned Liechtenstein-England game, one of the home team’s key defenders had to miss the game because he needed to pick his grapes.
2. Last time Liechtenstein went to war, their eighty men managed to avoid the enemy and return with eighty-one men, after having picked up a friend along the way.
3. Women didn’t get the vote until 1984 (obviously I don’t find this cool, but you must admit that this is pretty late!)
4. Liechtenstein’s political parties are so similar that they share a motto.
5. Liechtenstein has more companies than people.
6. It is the world’s largest producer of sausage skins and false teeth.
7. Little Liechtenstein has four train stations in total – however, no trains stop there.
8. Liechtenstein’s national anthem has the same tune as ours.
9. The McDonald’s restaurant sells Rolex watches.

These are all the facts I have about Liechtenstein.

And so it starts...

So this is my first blog. First of all, I know I look like a plank in this photo, but the backdrop is more than cool.

Not quite sure who’s going to read this blog, but I think I’m going to enjoy writing it all the same. I was a little inspired by Glyn’s, Tim’s and Matt’s blogs and I thought ‘hey, I can do that too.’ I guess we’ll find that out now.

I’ve noticed that most people seem to start their blogs off with ‘I don’t know what I’m going to say…’ Yeah, I can’t write that because I’ve already decided what I’m writing about for the first three entries.

I’ll give you a few facts about me:

Favourite Book:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Secret (and perhaps slightly embarrassing) Fact:
I own three copies of Disney’s Hercules on DVD (it’s for the gospel-style music!)

Favourite Character from Friends:
Phoebe

Thing That Annoys Me Most:
People who don’t have locks on their bathrooms

Favourite TV Show:
Kath & Kim

Prized Possession:
My hokey-cokey Elmo

Ambitions for the Coming Academic Year (I’ve just finished uni, but I still think in terms of academic years):
1. Get a piece of music published by The Salvation Army
2. Get a book published (or rather, take steps towards getting a book published – so, therefore, Ambition No. 3 should be…)
3. Write a book
4. (Therefore, in order for No. 1 to be fulfilled, No. 4 should probably be…) Write a piece of music
5. Lose some weight – at a recent wedding, I was greeted with the words ‘Whoa, when’s it due?!’ It was then that I realised that I had probably eaten all the pies.
6. Start a blog (one down!)
7. Start a gospel choir (OK, these should really be life ambitions, rather than ambitions for the coming year)

I’ll leave it there – I reckon these are the most important facts you can know about a person.