Con·den·sa·tion

con·den·sa·tion

1. The act of condensing.
2. The state of being condensed.
3. A condensate.
4. An abridgement or shortening of something, especially of a written work or speech.
5. Physics
a. The process by which a gas or vapor changes to a liquid.
b. The liquid so formed.
6. Chemistry A chemical reaction in which water or another simple substance is released by the combination of two or more molecules.
7. Psychology The process by which a single symbol or word is associated with the emotional content of several, not necessarily related, ideas, feelings, memories, or impulses, especially as expressed in dreams.
con den·sa tion·al adj.

With this convoluted introduction I am of course referring to the need to abridge my life over the past month and a half into a post that is reasonable enough in length so as not to bore you, dear reader, to tears. The most appropriate definition for my use of the word in this context, therefore, would be number 4, though number 7 sounds far more interesting and may well be something I revisit later on, when I have both more time and imagination….

In fact, as time is indeed short, I shall document the most notable occurrences in a similar format to the above definition:

Bel.in.das.life

1. Work continues to go from strength to strength, the biggest recent highlight being a trip up to Norwich last Friday where I was interviewed by Sky Real Lives (I nominated one of our families for the ‘Family of the Year Award’ run by National Family Week and they’ve been shortlisted in the final four!) Also have some exciting House openings coming up in Arrowe Park and Birmingham, all of which serve to keep me busy, stressed, but also motivated, which basically stops me from dwelling on anything negative. Which is basically all good.

2. The triathlon continues to sneak up on me – only 11 and a half weeks to go! A friend of mine did one last week and said the swim was harder than he thought – bearing in mind a) his swim was in a pool rather than the Docklands b) it was also shorter than mine and c) he’s a much stronger swimmer than me (wouldn’t be hard) it’s fairly safe to say the fear of God is now alive and well and residing firmly in the pit of my stomach. I may well die. Not ideal.

3. Once again my writing has fallen well and truly by the wayside, unless you count a couple of social commentary-type articles I recently wrote with a view to submitting them to the London Paper. I’m not short of inspiration, exactly, perhaps more short of motivation – could be because I’ve been channelling all my motivation into work. Or whatever. Either way, am useless and running out of excuses.

4. Swine flu is on its way people – according to the paper this morning it’s going to affect 1 in 3 of the world’s population. Which surely gives us all the more reason to throw caution to the wind and have a bloody good time while we still can, no? (Hmm, could this attitude have something to do with my lack of readiness for a certain looming sporting event? Have had some really good nights out lately though..my love of drum and bass music lives on!)

5. A lot of things have made me sad – thinking about the injustice in the world, mainly, one example of which can be seen in Omar, a ten year old boy staying at one of our Houses whose kidneys are failing and is almost certainly going to die. When I visited him in hospital the other week I took him a Spider Man comic and he was reading Stephen Hawking’s Brief History of Time. If he lived to be an old man I’m certain he’d make an amazing contribution to the world.

6. Have also been thinking a lot about Africa, and the orphanage I taught at in Kenya. They often email asking for monetary assistance, and after much soul searching I’ve decided I can’t just ignore them. Giving money isn’t the way forward, in my opinion, as I can’t 100% trust they’ll use it wisely, but I can offer my resources by helping them apply for grants, writing up profiles of the children and generally getting a better handle on how its run so I can help them to communicate with the outside world. It’s easy to bury your head in the sand with things like this, but the way I see it, it’s not often you get a chance to get personally involved with a cause, and whilst I do have reservations I can’t just stand by and do nothing.

7. Hit a bit of a milestone last weekend as it was The Ex’s sister’s wedding. I’ve been giving her a wide berth for the last couple of months as it made me feel so sad not being able to get involved, but last week I went to see some mutual friends for dinner and she came along with her fiancé. Was wonderful to see them both, but all the wedding talk did make me feel like an outsider, which was inevitable really. The second they left I burst into tears but nonetheless I was glad to have had the chance to catch up. It did mean, however, that I spent the next week thinking about it non-stop, and when it got to Friday and I found myself Norwich-bound and alone, I have to admit I shed a tear when I texted their mum and she wrote back with a really lovely message that showed me how much she still cared, but on the day itself I stayed strong – more than that, in fact, I managed to put it out of my mind completely, and that, to me, is progress.

8. Had a bit of a revelation last Thurs when I went to a friend’s ‘pre-Cannes film party’ at Movida nightclub in town. I used to love immersing myself in that scene, but the minute I got there I realised something inside me had changed. Everywhere I looked there were stony faces, sipping champagne and eyeing one another with suspicion. I spent a good half hour trying to make conversation but the minute I said I worked for a charity their faces clouded into incomprehension and they lost all interest. When I did finally find a nice girl to talk to she had a domestic with her boyfriend right in front of me! Then to top it off I had a row with a male friend of mine and was forced to watch as another friend’s very drunk girlfriend flashed her knickers to the entire club. Clearly it was not my night, so I drained the dregs of my £9.80 gin and tonic (!) and made a sharp getaway.

9. Had a fab night down in Brighton this weekend with the girls. Went to Funky Buddha where I proceeded to try and pull a stupidly hot boy all night to no avail (well, to the point where he was holding my hand and dirty dancing with me, but for some reason refused to kiss me – another example of the weirdness of men). Afterwards we were staggering around in the street contemplating home (to our hostel - ha!) when I heard someone shout my name and turned around to see a friend of a friend who I fancy something rotten but has a long term girlfriend. Turns out he was on a stag do which we subsequently crashed - ended up buying booze and piling back to their gorgeous rented house, where half of them passed out and the other half played drinking games with us until 6am! Eventually my friend was so drunk she fell off her chair and we had to leave (!) - but back at the hostel she went AWOL a couple of hours after we went to sleep, only to turn up an hour later still in her black dress but minus her Spanx pants!!! (having pieced together the evidence we suspect she sleptwalked out of the room and may have gone to a toilet on another floor and for some God unknown reason taken them off and stuffed them behind a pipe! Weird, I know, but considering she was still drunk come 2pm her behaviour is hardly surprising!)

10. And finally, the inevitable topic of men. You may be surprised to hear that Boys A, B and C as mentioned in a previous post have all now bitten the dust. Longer story than I care to go into but suffice to say Boy A (friend of the Ex) was a bit of a non-starter, Boy B (ski romance) turned out to be more keen on me than the other way around (plus ordered prawns on our second date in spite of the fact he was allergic to them - ???), and Boy C, in spite of his intelligent conversation and the fact he not only made me laugh but also made it to date 3, turned out to be just another guy after one thing (thankfully I can at least hold my head up high and pride myself in the knowledge he didn’t get it). Other than that, my Ex’s sister is trying to set me up with a 40 year old ex-didgeridoo player (!) - a temptation I have somehow so far resisted, the 24 (now 25) year old remains on the scene but in the background and yes, remains an absolute idiot, and tomorrow I have a date with a 31 year old surgeon called Sven, which promises to be interesting..

Hmm, not quite as concise as I’d have liked, perhaps, but think I got most of it in there, which at least paves the way for a more insightful and less egotistical entry next time around.

Goodnight!