Reading/Watching/Listening to:-

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day

Films:

This week I’ve seen two films, both set in totally different versions of London, yet both completely charming in their way.

Somers Town by Shane Meadows is set in that small pocket of the city stage right of King’s Cross and where until recently I lived.  I laughed so hard at points: the ducker and diver neighbour with the leopard print ensemble is genius.  “Where am i?” Tomo asks hungover on his fake leather sofa; “Barbados”, he replies, quick as a flash.  North London quick wit – gotta love it!

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day

Dolly (Anna Trevelyan) is my former assistant and sparkly soulmate.  We met up for a summit meeting in Soho Square: she was channelling Nancy in a slashed stonewashed denim homage to her one true love, Sid Vicious; I had enough jewellery on to give me neck ache.  After Japanese food (Dolly) and green tea (me), while swapping advice and mutual appreciation, we went by chance to see Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day.  It was the perfect antidote: satin and deco elegance, I wanted to live inside this film!  Set just prior to WW2, it casts a glitterball light on the games pretty girls play to survive inside the glamour dome; but how true love conquers all and feeds us more than furs, lingerie and stagelights ever shall…  Smiling and calmed, I went onto Carnival, Dolly to a friend’s dj night; both daydreaming of bias cut romances.

Books:

Currently reading

Marianne Faithfull: Memories, Dreams and Reflections

How I would have loved to have studied at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics!

Kate Atkinson: When Will There Be Good News?

Not quite sure darling!  As the story takes twists and turns in Scotland with past and present crimes.

Am reading in search of the best book to start my book club at Bistrotheque (am super excited about this: dinner, books, chat: heaven).  Please let me know if you have any suggestions for this.  Claudia suggested ‘Eat, Pray, Love’, but it was only by the time I got to Bali – ie the third/love section – that I realised I had in fact read this before!..  Not quite as bad as The Celestine Prophecy and good for her to write a bestseller to tell women to dump the man, travel and find a better version of life, but no this is not on the list…