Foxfield

The great day of Foxfield finally arrived at last. (Those who read TSD will know something about it already. For those who don't, Foxfield consists of an enormous field on the side of a hill, with a steeplechase track round the outside and about five thousand people in sundresses, chinos and various stages of drunkness on the inside.)

I've been looking forward to Foxfield for ages, and I've been watching the weather forecast like a hawk for two weeks, with a view to giving the dress I had lined up for my father's wedding a trial run. But the forecast was looking increasingly dodgy all week, and this morning when I got up at 7.30 (on a Saturday, oh woe, because Vince's memorial service was happening at school at 9am) the weather was unbelievably - almost Britishly - bad: had been raining all night and was misty, damp, grey and cold. Somehow a red, pink and white halter neck just didn't seem to fit the bill.

I sadly switched to black and white from the back of the closet, nothing fancy, and it seemed to be appropriate for Vince's service as well as the tres miserable weather. Actually, as I discovered later, the mud and the cold didn't seem to deter everyone within a 100 mile radius between the age of 16 and 32 from showing up at Foxfield dressed straight out of this spring's J Crew catalogue, in pastel cotton strapless sundresses and mud. It was quite an awe inspiring sight: in fact I was not the only one to note that it looked like a cross between Henley and Glastonbury.

***

Both of the last two years I got tickets for Foxfield and never went. The first year I seem to remember the weather looked too dodgy; the second year my cab never arrived (Airport Cab Company, if you are reading this - I am still waiting....)

But really those are just poor excuses for the fact that FF, like TNDC, was the sort of thing that induced severe social anxiety syndrome in me. I absolutely would dread turning up to something like that for fear there would be no one there I recognised and I would have noone to talk to.

This year, despite the crap weather, and the mud, and the fact I was a bit emotionally wrung out (having gotten a little tearful speaking at Vince's memorial service earlier on), I ended up having such a good time that I had to be literally dragged away from my spot in a '04 v '05 flipcup tournament to go home.

One reason was probably my unplanned but excellent strategy of knocking back a couple of Mint Juleps early in proceedings. Mint Juleps are the traditional drink of the Kentucky Derby. The horseraces at Foxfield are no Kentucky Derby, but still. They consist of bourbon, sugar solution, mint leaves and ice. Yum. Guaranteed to cheer the spirits within 25 minutes.

Then, at risk of rapidly descending into the sort of Jennifer's Diary column that is only of interest to the people mentioned, of course there were a whole bunch of other people that I haven't seen for ages and probably, visa issues being as they are, will never see again. Lots of Class of 04: most of the "local" gang, plus healthy contingents from Boston, NYC, Baltimore, and DC and some brave souls who'd even flown in on the red eye from San Francisco: Chris Cooper, Chris duP_ (of whom see more on TSD...), Rebecca Gordon, Todd Whiting, Sarah Spiewak, Dave Lee, Riley O' Brien, DaveRouse, Jim Wininger, AsianStudiesMeredith, Chris Borunda (wearing a very fetching pair of J Crew green critter pants), Derek Dickey, Katherine Neebe, Abby Rohman, Leslie Curry, Dennis Ortiz, Jose Salinas, Jorge Palet (aka el orso a Paddington hombre) and probably even more people I've forgotten or more likely never knew the names of anyway...

Plus, of course there were those who skipped FF but went to Vince's: Chantal Chellar, Marcus Kritzler, EnglishNeil, Emily Chen, Uday Gupta and Bob Bell; and of course absolutely pots of FYs and SYs: Mac, Marcie, MarriedSpencer, "Spanish"Bastien, Walt Leddy, NickTheBrit, CBL, Tom Hunter and so on.

***

It was nice, but kind of sad to see everyone. I really should have been feeling this way this time last year, when everyone else was partying like it was 1999. But my wildly social/sentimental spell seems to be happening now, a year after graduation. Not even TNDC can faze me. A roomful of FYs I don't know? Bring 'em on.

***

Gossip postscript:

1) who did I see but rowingMelissa? (the fourth member of my ladies four from last year, the other two being ArmyLisa and CanadianHockeyAnna) And, who was she with but Tom Hunter? That guy has such persistence, I am delighted for him. He was sharking her 18 months ago and she would hardly give him the time of day. Now they are dating with a capital D.

2) DaveBertelli and EnglishHelen have bought a house in Richmond, their first home they've owned, all v exciting.

3) And kind of unrelated, as he wasn't actually THERE, Matt Scharf and Rebecca just had a baby girl called Olivia.

Paddington Comes to Nowheresville

At some point during my Darden experience, I was talking to a Peruvian student about Peru.

"My knowledge of Peru," I confessed, "is confined to three things."

The Peruvian looked excited. (Apparently three is quite a high number).

"Guinea pig eating."

Oh yes, he said, a very great delicacy indeed, you should try one.

"The Inca Trail."

He nodded. Very beautiful.

"And, of course, Paddington Bear," I concluded,

The Peruvian looked bewildered. What?

"Paddington Bear. He's from Peru."

The Peruvian shook his head, clearly trying to recall the P section of his English/Spanish dictionary. I'm sorry, I don't know this 'Partington Bare'. What? Are you sure you are not thinking of another country?

"No," I replied firmly, confident of my ground here. "Paddington Bear is definitely from Peru. Darkest Peru. You must know that. He was found at Paddington station with marmalade sandwiches under his hat. "

***

Many months later, the Peruvian approached me again, this time with a broad smile on his face.

You know, he said, now I know this Paddington. I have some friends who live in England visit me and they also tell me about this Paddington Bear. I say, it is not from Peru. But they say, yes, English people believe it is so. So I say, OK, it's from Peru.

***

I remembered this story today when I realised that in the last week my diet has consisted almost entirely of marmalade sandwiches.

(To Americans, of course, this may not seem unusual: it is not that dissimilar from PB&J sandwiches, but without the PB. But for me, this is unusual )

For the most part, my marmalade sandwich diet is financially driven. I discovered a large unopened jar of Coopers Original Oxford Coarse Cut Seville marmalade in one of my boxes while I was packing last week, and it seemed a shame not to eat it rather than go out and buy more food from El Gigante with dollars I don't really have. And, it turns out, marmalade eaten in sufficient quantities has the unexpected but welcome side-effect of being an excellent appetite suppressant.

If anyone sees me hanging round the AmTrak station in a duffle coat, please don't tell my mother.

***

I don't have much more to say today except to lament the weather forecast for Foxfield on Saturday, ie totally crap: thunderstorms, wind and 80% chance of rain. Fabuloso.

The incredible disappearing Canadian

Once more a quick gossip update: KeithZ is getting married, in July! Apparently he proposed having already booked the church and reception: a brave man. And Noelle and Vikas are also apparently getting married, god help their children.

***

Went to Tuesday Night Drinking Club last night. For some reason, Tuesday NDC is always a lot more fun than the traditional Thursday NDC. Maybe it's because the Tuesday version is always in South Street Brewery, which is a relatively decent joint, compared to the absolute dives which always get picked to play host to TNDC. The SSB at least has reasonably clean floors, serves beer in real glasses not plastics, and the music is low enough you can hear yourself shout.

Over dinner with AsianStudiesMeredith, KeithZ (who out of the blue announced he was getting married and moving to Syracuse) and an extremely entertaining Asian American FY called Mac, we were trying to pick out nice looking guys in the bar for ASM to go up and talk to.

ASM looked gloomy.

"There's no point," she said. "I'm moving to San Francisco soon."

(Now I am hardly an expert in how to approach people in bars - even people who aren't strangers: the Irish Bar in Philly was very definitely an aberration. So it was perhaps a bit disingenuous of me to persist. But it all seems so much easier when you're giving advice to someone else.)

"Rubbish!" I piped gaily, gesturing at an inoffensive blond guy in a green striped shirt having a quiet drink with his mate. "Look! I bet that man there is visiting from San Francisco, and he's thinking, there's no point talking to any of these girls, because I'm not around for long."

ASM did not look convinced.

However here comes the weird part.

I got up to go looking for my Canadian friends at the other end of the bar, and just as I passed the GreenstripedshirtGuy, I heard him say.. "... and I just arrived from California three days ago."

I stopped dead in my tracks.

"Are you from San Francisco?"

"Yes."

Ha.

***

He turned out to be the new chief of staff of radiology at UVA. OK, so he isn't going back to Stanford any time soon, but hey, the moral victory was all mine.

***

But I digress, onto the main business of the evening. I was also meant to be meeting my Canadian friend HockeyAnnaMac, who I hadn't seen for aeons. Not since we went on a girls weekend to DC last summer, I don't think. She's been doing a PhD in psychology at UVA, and rowed in my four last year.

Anyway, I almost didn't recognize her. She had lost so much weight- well over 20 pounds, she said. And this is someone who was only 5' 5 in the first place, and who played sport (ice hockey and rowing) several times a week. I was completely amazed, almost to the point of forgetting my manners. It did give me hope, however. She used to have a chest the same size as mine, and now there is hardly anything left. So it just shows that it can be done.

But there was more big news to come from the incredible disappearing Canadian. She is literally disappearing, in the sense that she is dropping out of the PhD program. She's got her masters, and reckons that she can get just as good a market research job with that than sticking around for another three or four years in academia...

It's all happening down at the SSB.


***

Last of all I must say welcome to all the new readers kindly directed here by Lloyd over the course of the DRC's trip to Philly. Thanks Lloyd. Your new name, effective immediately, is BigMouthGuy!

The Condemned Woman

Gossip wise, the scoop is that someone terribly famous (although I am 100% certain that when we are told who it is, we'll all say "errr, who??") has been offered the Dean's job. An update is due mid this week. We may have a new Dean lined up by the weekend!

***

It finally occurred to me what has been going on. My eyes keep tearing up at the most inconvenient moments, you see: today, in one of the academic assistant's offices; yesterday, walking down the Downtown Mall; driving on the R250 all the time; and on Friday, about a dozen times while I was updating EnglishJustin and Nathalie on what I have been up to lately.

I remind myself of the final episode of Dawson's Creek, when everyone discovers that Jen is suffering from a mysterious illness and only has days to live.

I feel as if I had only days to live.

People talk about things that will be happening later this summer- even I talk about things that will happen later this summer - and then I suddenly remember that I will not be here, and these things will be happening without me.

Yesterday I was repacking my possessions into new moving boxes, and kept finding things I wanted to give away to people: bequests, if you will. ScaryCzechLady is getting a lovely green pair of shoes from Nine West that I bought myself as a graduation present last year, but never wore. TheSplash is to be the lucky recipient of a book from the UK (ex libris) about Investment Banking in Europe that I never read. LandladyLynn will be getting my Japanese tree, my lemon mint plant, and all my fairy lights. EnglishJustin I gave my collection of smuggled-in Twinings tea. And CFYRG is going to receive my treasured copy of Steve Redgrave's Guide to Rowing, c 1991.

***

I did find a few interesting things in my boxes, including some old rowing photographs I forgot I had. This reminded me of my claim to fame (other than being the elder daughter of Miss Aston Villa 1970, that is). Tim Rawle, of Cambridge Portfolio photography fame, mainly takes pictures of architecture and landscapes. He has, however, published precisely two rowing pictures in his career, and I am in one of them. Literally thousands of people own calendars and diaries featuring my busily rowing mugshot (under June, because obviously the May Bumps are in June). If you want to check me out, go to

http://www.cambridge-portfolio.co.uk/cppl/imageinfo.asp?caller=imagelist.asp&id=1051&seq=0

Aren't we well sat?

Bourdain's Beef Stew

For those who are interested, HotTubRon has just got engaged to a vet and is getting married in October. Ladies of Nowheresville, weep your hearts out.

***

I decided to make something new last night for the English who were coming round for dinner: boeuf bourguignon. I am usually not impressed with the results when I try to cook stews and the like. For some reason the meat and liquid never quite bond to form a mellifluous whole. My curries have the same problem. So I normally pin all my hopes on pudding and hope people manage to choke down the main course as best they can.

This time, the recipe I used came from Anthony Bourdain's Les Halles book. He is the guy who wrote the scary book Kitchen Confidential, which describes how and why most chefs in NYC are ex-con cokeheads. His recipes are also quite scary: things like tripe, or civet of wild boar, with about fourteen zillion ingredients. Of one recipe, he says, "it isn't very difficult and won't take too much time if you spread the work over three days."

The boeuf bourguignon was one of the less intimidating choices in the book a) because its ingredient list was mercifully short b) there was no offal involved and c) the cooking time was only about three hours, as opposed to one week.

The major problem turned out to be finding the beef: a very particular cut from the shoulder which the French call paleron, and (some) Americans know as chicken steak. (Chicken steak is not to be confused, in Jessica-Simpson fashion, with chicken, chicken of the sea, chicken-fried steak, or chicken tied to a stake.)

I visited five supermarkets looking for it. The conversations I had in each were almost identical, whether it was the high fallutin' Whole Foods, Anderson's the alledgely expert butcher or the really dodgy Reed's:

Me, wearily: "Do you have any chicken steak please?"
Meat Lady: "Chicken? It's over there ma'am."
Me: "Not chicken. Chicken steak."
Meat Lady: "Chicken fried steak?"
Me: "Not chicken fried steak, chicken steak. It's a cut from the shoulder of a cow that once went moo. It is lean but not too tough, just right for a stew that only simmers for two hours."
Meat Lady, blankly: "Don't know about that, ma'am. But how about a nice bit of sirloin?"
Me: "Er, no."

Finally, on the fifth and last supermarket (the much maligned El Gigante on the way home) I struck gold. The master butcher overheard the above conversation with the Meat Lady and escorted me straight to the gold@ Chickensteak, on special offer, only $1.80 a pound. I LOVE El Gigante.

***

At first I was a little worried. As it was cooking it looked sort of grey and insipid. Not exactly appetising, and nothing remotely resembling the picture in the book. But it got a lot better, and anyway, we ate on the screened in porch after it had got dark, so noone could see what color their food was. And it actually tasted rather good.

So here, with acknowledgements to AB, is how you make it.

Ingredients: 2lb of chickensteak (or in the UK, chuck steak rounds), cut into 1.5 inch pieces. 4 onions thinly sliced, 6 carrots cut into 1 inch pieces, one garlic clove, quarter of a bottle of red Burgundy wine, 3 tablespoons of demiglace, a bit of flour, olive oil, bouquet garni (bay leaf, fresh thyme and parsley) and parsley to finish.

Serves four hungry people, or six thin ones.

1) Season and fry meat off, in batches in a big pot, until golden brown. Not grey.
2) Take meat out, turn down heat to medium low, and cook onions in the pot for 10 minutes until soft and golden brown.
3) Add 2 tablespoons of flour and cook for 5 minutes, stirring. Add wine, being sure to scrape up brown bits from bottom of pan. Add meat, carrots, garlic and bouquet garni.
4) Add demiglace, and enough water to cover the meat by one third. Bring to boil then reduce to simmer.
5) Cook for about 2 hours until meat is tender. You will need to stir it well every 15-120 minutes.

Eat, with mashed potatoes and with a bit of parsley on top.

***
Of course, things didn't go entirely well. I was so excited about the beef that I forgot to take pudding out of the oven. My friends were forced to eat, in true Bridget Jones fashion, burnt marmalade pudding. Nathalie and the CRM speculated generously as to what it would have tasted like if it hadn't stayed in the oven over twice as long as it should have, while EnglishJustin merely confined himself to the observation that it was "chewy". Oh well, you can't win em all.

Taedium vitae

Last night I dreamt that Citibank (of all people) came on grounds to interview people and hired just about everyone except me. Then they had a kind of induction session in a massive basketball stadium for all the thousands of people round the world that they had hired. And the chief hiring guy who was leading the session then played aloud a tape recording of a tearful voicemail that BigMouthLloyd had left him, along the lines of “thank you so much for hiring me, this has changed my life, I am so grateful”.

It was so moving, that at that point I woke myself up in floods of tears.

***

One of the only genuinely emotional classes I ever sat through in business school was in first year marketing. Spekman was teaching the Monsanto case, and it was all about how Monsanto was struggling to come up with a way to persuade the British and Europeans that GM ingredients weren't so bad really. The response from our class was remarkable: the Europeans had become impassioned even before the discussion had begun, and the Americans were reacting with bewildered incomprehension.

"What I don't understand," whined one American female (actually, the same woman who once emailed me to ask what the conversion rate of British pence to pounds was) "is why these people complain about what goes into their food when they all smoke. They're all killing themselves anyway."

Painstakingly, my European friends: Portuguese Pedro, Italian Roberto, German Philip, tried to explain the role of food in their culture. Why it mattered to them where asparagus had been grown, or what a pig had been fed when it was being reared, or how many hours ago a sardine had been caught. The more culturally sensitive Americans listened politely, but it was clear that the overwhelming majority were not sure why there was anything to discuss. Food comes from supermarkets, right? The only questions are, which brand is it, and how much does it cost?

***

Cut forward to a couple of weeks ago. The ClosetRower and I had met for the first time only minutes before, and we were already exchanging crucial information: where we had attended school. (And by that, I mean high school). My memory may be confused by wine I was drinking at the time, but I seem to remember that this was the first piece of information I learned about the CRM. And this is by no means unusual. I've had the same first conversation with British strangers all over America. Where did you go? Millfield. Rossall. Repton. St Paul's. The British are less inclined to bring up the American classic opener What do you do? until much later, and then only with a slight air of apology. (Now I think about it, I have many old friends whose employment status remains a complete mystery to me.) And the question is very rarely asked with a view to instantly assessing the net present value of the individual you are speaking to.

Not all British people ask each other where they went to school, I admit. The question is only asked if you are already pretty sure that the other person went to public (ie private) school. But fortunately there is a perfectly acceptable substitute question for use in just about any circumstance: Who do you support then? Southampton? They were crap against United last week... And so on. And a perfectly good conversation can be thus sustained for the rest of the evening.

***

The link between these two seemingly unconnected anecdotes is this:

The British are obsessed with labelling (and by that I mean the small print on the back). We British want to know where things - and people - have come from. We want to know the circumstances in which they were brought up, so we can compare them with our own and decide how comfortable we are going to feel with them: how easy it will be to find enough in common to be able to get along.

Just as it reassures me to know that my jamon is from the Iberian mountains: that the pig roamed around on the mountains for wild acorns and that his ham has not been pumped full of water to make it weigh more, I am reassured to get a fix on the origins of the people I meet. Such as, where they went to school and which football team they support (which in turn can reveal all sorts of things: where they were born or brought up, how strongly they feel about their home town, and even their relationship with their parents).

The Americans, on the other hand, are more interested in the future. What are you doing? Where are you going? How fast? How much are you going to be worth? Is this brand of bacon one that a successful person might buy? (I have never, ever, ever seen an American shopper look at a packet of bacon to see what the water and salt content is. They don't even need to look to see what cut it is, because it's always streaky.) Even steaks - steaks! - are branded now. Is this an aspirational branded steak? Are you an aspirational young Wall Street analyst? Good. In the cart.

***

ScaryCzechLady tells me that today in Czech-land it is national Alexandra day. All Alexandras are celebrating their name day. I shall have to give some thought as to how to celebrate.

Gossip

The latest: Yiorgos is leaving Darden to go to the Global Financial Strategy Group at Citibank, in NYC. Leaves May 31. Officially a two year leave of absence, but will he really come back?

***

I am sick of the Pope coverage on CNN etc. I don't see what the fuss is. Popes are WAY overrated.

***

Went round to TheSplash and ScaryCzechLady's last night, for the first cookout of the year. Both on great form, as usual. They came back from Philadelphia completely in love with CuteFirstYearRowingGuy. Apparently he was too modest to wear his medals. In contrast, evilAaron was awarded zero out of zero points: despite not turning up to a single outing this year he turned up in Philly and announced that he would be stroking the experienced men's eight and the men's A four. Now, if he were Steve Redgrave or James Cracknell this might not be so shocking, but evilAaron is a village rower even when he practices every week. It must have been a delicious moment when evilAaron learned he would not be rowing in the men's eight at all...

Little bits of news

The hunt for the new Darden Dean, which is not altogether dissimilar from the Papal Conclave in terms of the amount of information released on its progress by the selection committee, drags on. Word is that the shortlist is down to three, all of which are candidates from academia. This is a bit like saying that there are three leading candidates for Pope, and they are all cardinals.

I am pretty sure that Jeanne Liedtka is one of them. I've passed her office a couple of times and she has been wearing some extremely smart suits lately, much smarter than anyone would usually wear around school. Promotion 101: Dress for the job you want, not the one you have.
I don't think she will get it, but I can see why the selection committee wants to say that they considered at least one internal candidate (read, Italian cardinal).

The other bit of Darden gossip is that Yiorgos is leaving school for two years. He is being very coy about where he is off to, but my bet is either a) in house at some bulge bracket investment bank to be resident egg head or b) London Business School. Tomorrow I will go in and see if I can track him down to get the full scoop. Of course you will all be the first to know.

***

You know, Martha Stewart isn't too bad looking for her age.

***

News just in: Oxford University has decided to license its name to appear on stuff like t-shirts and memorabilia. Duh, I thought these people were meant to be bright.

***

This is kind of cool. Washington DC has just got its first pro baseball team since, well, for a long time. A local guy called Mike Panetta is trying to raise $1m to purchase the naming rights for the stadium where the new team will be playing. What does he want to call the stadium? "Taxation Without Representation Field".

***

I had a weird experience today. I got a call from a cute sounding guy (I can't tell you why he sounded cute, he just did) who identified himself as Henry Scott and seemed to think I should know who he was. I had not a clue.

"I'm from Metro," he said "in New York City. I was kind of surprised you didn't reply to my email, seeing as you sounded pretty keen to work for us. So I thought I would just give you a call, on the off-chance."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I had sent Metro my resume entirely speculatively about two or three weeks ago, and of course never heard a squeak back. This didn't surprise me in the slightest, as I am convinced that half the corporate email addresses in the world lead directly to a dustbin. And I didn't really have anyone to follow up with - the only vague contact I had there was given to me by someone who had warned me on no account to use their name as it would probably do more harm than good.

Apparently though, Henry - who turns out to be the Publisher of all the US editions of Metro - had emailed me right away to say they would like to talk to me. But I never got his message (he says he has had a few email problems recently...) and have been wallowing in glorious depressive oblivion for the last three weeks as my visa ticks down to zero.

The unbelievable part is that he called me. Correct me if I am wrong, but I have never, ever, ever heard of a recruiter ever who has called someone after they failed to reply to an email. At least, not a recruiter who was on the receiving end of a cold-dropped resume out of the blue. Henry's stock (and Metro's) has risen enormously, and not just because working for them would be my version of ESPN Dream Job.

The Bird Catcher

You may have seen on CNN last week that a controversial new law has been proposed in Wisconsin to allow cat hunting. The idea is that any cat wandering outside without a collar on could be legally shot. The argument for doing this is to protect the bird population: experts estimate that almost 8 million birds are killed every year in Wisconsin by stray cats. As you might anticipate, the public meetings held to discuss the proposal were highly emotional.

"My cat is so fl-fluffy," one woman sniffled red eyed into the microphone, "you can't see his collar, and he would be sh-h-hot".

I don't quite know what to make of this. I am personally all in favour of collars, the brighter the better. Before we knew he was definitely male, I went out and bought NewKitty a collar, hot pink with pawprints that glow green in the dark. However, I am not sure that I want vigilante gangs of mid-westerners prowling the streets shooting cats. And as I found out today, keeping collar-less cats indoors is not necessarily any protection for the local bird population...

Birds quite often get into this house. They fly around for a couple of hours, causing general havoc, in any direction except towards the wide open doors. They quite often mistake an armchair or the carpet for a toilet. Chasing them is not much good, because they just fly up out of reach to perch under the skylights. Last time a bird got inside, in desperation I eventually settled on a tactic of leaving a trail of wild birdseed from the bird's current position on the mantelpiece to wide open the french windows. It didn't work. Eventually, it randomly flew in the opposite direction, out the front door, and I was left to clean up the half pound of birdseed on the carpet.

Today another bird flew in, this time through the front door while I had it propped open for a few minutes. This time, it had the misfortune to run into NewKitty, who was in a surprisingly business-like mood, given he had eaten a large breakfast only half an hour earlier. He herded it away from the room with the skylights, and into LandladyLynn's study, where the ceilings are lower. In the flash of a whisker, he had bounded onto her desk, caught the bird and killed it, with only the merest squawk of protest. For a cat with no front claws, this was impressive work.

The only slight problem with all this was that Newkitty failed to clean up his dead bird mess. Given MrBird's murder was perpetrated with his paw, behind the printer, this seemed rather bad manners, and likely not to go down too well with LandladyLynn, who is due to return from California this evening...

***

For those of you who did not read the New York Times style section yesterday, there was a very helpful website featured called www.airlinemeals.net, self described as "the world's first and leading website about nothing but airline food£. You can click on just about any airline to see reviews of their airline meals (with lurid pictures), plus lots of hot gossip on which airline has cut which service lately. Apparently, for example, RyanAir are saving money by eliminating window blinds on their planes. I share the NYT's opinion that cutting darkness is a bit drastic.

triumph

Victorious at Wharton (l to r) CFYRG, Andythecox, BigMouthLloyd, Thesplash, MarriedSpencer, BFR, OtherAndy, Rowing TurkeyGuy

victoire victoire...

Darden Rowing Club did great at the Wharton Regatta. Kicked butt in every race. Best of all that prat Aaron was the only DRC person not to win a medal, which serves him right for being President and not lifting a finger all year. If it were up to me, I would report him to the Honor Committee for putting DRC President on his resume.

***

Performed my alto duet at recorder society tonight. Went v well, although we went off so fast in the second movement that I ran out of breath and almost died of hypoxia by the end. But I was pleased - probably the first time ever that I have performed and really enjoyed it. I am really going to miss the recorder people.

Psychic (or Physic?) Penance

Today was the Wharton Regatta in Philadelphia. As usual before any kind of rowing race, I've been a nauseous insomniac for two days. The only difference is that this time, I wasn't actually going to Philly to participate. I decided earlier in the week that I really couldn't financially afford to make the weekend trip just to cox one men's four in a single six minute race, particularly after I had had to write out a massive tax check to the US Treasury on Tuesday.

I very nearly changed my mind on Thursday though, at the last practice before the regatta. Three of the four men I would have been coxing in Philly were there (two experienced rowers, plus the novice CFYRG), plus a girl called Elena who has only been on the water about twice since she learned how to row a year ago. Even worse, we had too many people on stroke side, so poor CFYRG, having been switched back to port/stroke side on Tuesday, was forced to try rowing on starboard/bow for only the second time in his life. And this outing we would be doing starts and short pieces at high ratings. The omens did not look good.

Amazingly enough, they were brilliant. It was a sunny day, though remarkably windy and choppy for the Rivanna. But the boat was balanced, timing was good, and they flew. I started the series of pieces at a low rating - 20 or so, with low expectations, and incredulously kept upping the rating as they blew piece after piece out of the water. We ended up at about 35, which is about double the highest rating CFYRG ever rowed at before, and they looked great. Then we did starts, which weren't perfect, but still pretty darn good. Even Lloyd in the motor launch, who would be rowing in our other four against these guys at the regatta, started to look a bit worried. I was very proud of them. And did feel sad that I would not get to see how they raced in the real thing.

Later at TNDC that night, CFYRG and I had a long chat. I am wondering whether he is just very shy, a slow burner. Anyway, he is so psyched about rowing, it is great to see. He even wants to sign up for a rowing camp this summer. What is also nice (and unusual) is that he is so thankful to Lloyd and Sean for spending the time to teach him how to row. Most novices take the coaching they get totally for granted.

I am dying to know how they did.

***

Also on the subject of rowing, I discovered today an interesting fact about EnglishGuy. Although Sean, Ladi and I inferred from his modest "oh no, couldn't possiblys" the day we had dinner last week that he was not enough of a rower to row with the DRC, it turns out that he is a very good rower indeed. My knowledge of ARA classifications is ten years old and very hazy, but from what he says it seems like he's won an awful lot of pots. So, I am renaming EnglishGuy (a name I never liked much but couldn't think of anything better at the time). His new name in any future mentions will be ClosetRowerMan (CRM).

***

I learned about the closet rowing at the bottom of a canyon in the national park. In a penance for missing rowing, CRM and I went up to the park to do a hike. It was only much later that I saw a description on the bottom of someone else's map that described this particular hike as "very strenuous". This was reassuring, as my legs and lower back were telling me it was very strenuous long before I looked at that map. Anyway, although it was only just over 8 miles, it featured a 3000ft drop in elevation down a canyon over 5 miles, then (the worse bit) a very rocky 3000ft ascent of 3 miles. And when it was too late to turn back, I realized with horror that it wasn't quite a circuit hike: we were going to be spat out onto the Skyline Drive, just as the sun was going down, about 3 more miles down the road from where we left the car.

The first serious hike of the year is always a bit of a nightmare. I knew that all along. But I must say, the ascent out of the canyon was not pleasant. It was rocky, uneven, wet in places, and unrelentingly steep. I had no choice but to resort to my Everest Death Zone technique (which involves plodding along, one step at a time, with regular pauses, and giving myself stern talkings to about what my mother would say if I died from starvation and exposure on the side of a mountain). A pair of hikers caught us up at one point on the ascent, looking hopeful. They too had left their car three miles from the trail end. We gave them a granola bar but were unable to give them any good news about transport, so they left us behind and vanished up the canyon out of sight.

The old adage of hare and tortoise proved true yet again, however. We finally reached the road, and almost immediately accosted a startled Iranian-American couple to give us a ride back to Skyland. So we would have beaten the other hikers back by about forty minutes, except we were feeling magnanimous and made the Iranians stop to squeeze them in too, when we passed them a mile down the road.

***

Just one last thing. The Daily Regress is a really bad paper but they had a good story today about a 75 year old Virginia woman who got stuck in the bath for a week before she was discovered. When she was eventually removed, what was the first thing she asked for? Her pack of Parliament 100s (ie fags) and a Coke.

I'm still in Schock

I think my mission this week is to prove my statement of yesterday, that America never ceases to amaze.

I was reading Time magazine in the waiting room of the local Ford dealership this morning (where, embarrassingly, I have to regularly take the car because I've never figured out how to screw the petrol cap on properly, thus causing the check engine light to come on).

Three staggering facts caught my eye.

1) 74% of silicon breast implants rupture within ten years. 74%! Those who know me know that this is a disaster I am unlikely ever to have to experience, but still. Seen in this light, plastic surgery is a brilliant business model (for the surgeons): you are essentially not buying new breasts, merely renting them.

2) $7 billion in social security taxes are paid each year by illegal immigrants (and legal non-residents who have a lazy incompetent moron as a payroll manager), even though they are not eligible to receive social security benefits. This is equivalent to 10% of the entire US social security surplus last year. So, Lou Dobbs, chew on that one next time you start ranting about how middle class Americans suffer from all those evil illegal immigrants.

3) RowingTurkeyGuy was telling me today in the boat that, the way things are going in this country, he was worried the whole of American would have fallen victim to the religious right within ten years. Well, Time Magazine says otherwise. Apparently a performer by the name of Martha Wainwright has just released a new album called Bloody Mother F********* A****. Long live the USA!

I'm in Schock

I was telling someone the other day why I felt I wasn't ready to go back to England right now. It's because, I think, England has ceased to surprise me. The US, on the other hand, continues to provoke almost daily amazement. See what I mean, here (discovered on the Eurotrash blog).

Internet Peril (TSD)

I realized that last month I promised to share with you (ugh, I never said that before I arrived in America) a couple more of my Great Website Discoveries. Inspired by the wisdom of CuteItalianVaticanAnalystGuy on CNN last night ("after a fat Pope, a thin Pope"), I would like to mix things up a bit. So as March's GWDs were rather practical - how to make free international phone calls and book hotel rooms at stupidly cheap rates - April's are going to frivolous.

First up, The Famous Football Supporters Page It seems odd to think that only four years ago I was knee deep in the UK General Election campaign, to elect an EllisOut! candidate as MP for Sutton Coldfield. So it does seem somehow appropriate this month to direct you to a website where you can see which clubs are supported by which "famous" folks. And I will take this opportunity to give you a preview of the goodies on this site, by revealing (yet again) that Tom Hanks and Prince William support Aston Villa.

Second, I had hoped to bring you an exclusive preview link to El Ricardo's new Radio4 play, but I have been slapped on the wrist and that's not going to happen. So instead, I suggest something much more frivolous: The Smoking Gun's collection of backstage riders. These are the contractual demands that rock stars etc make of the venues when they go on tour. Some of them are quite loopy. Which star, do you think, insists on a backstage supply of Cadbury's dark chocolate and sauteed green beans almandine, crisp, not soggy? Who demands boxer shorts and incense holders? Who wants her dressing room to be painted white and furnished with entirely white furniture?

***

SeattleTreeza and I were talking last night about this and that.

She was not happy because her attempts at internet dating have crashed and burned. She said that things would start off well, then she would get to about the third email or so, and then men would stop responding, no reason given. She couldn't figure out what she was doing wrong: what, in other words, in these emails was garlic to the dating vampires.

She offered to read a few of the offending emails to me. They were slightly on the competitive traveller side ("Oh, you haven't been to Macchu Picchu? You should." kind of thing) but to my admittedly untrained ear they sounded pretty good, and she has a couple of cute sporty photos up there.

"When did you send that last one, to the surfer guy?" I inquired, trying to figure out if he could have been on holiday and hence been out of touch.

"Two weeks ago. Not a word back. I guess he must have really hated me" said SeattleT, despondently. "And he was the one I liked."

I didn't know what to say. It didn't make sense, but there seemed no other explanation than that SurferGuy et al had indeed been terminally horrified by SeattleT's admission that she had not inherited her mother's ability to speak seven languages.

"WAIT!" she said. "I don't believe it."

"What?"

"My last email to SurferGuy, it's not in my Sent Message box."

"Uh?"

"I never sent it. And look, SportsGuy, my email to him isn't there either."

"So you never actually replied to any of these guys last email to you?"

"No."

"So they don't hate you?"

"No, they definitely hate me now, for not replying to their emails..."

Tax panic

I bunked off rowing today, and not just because I've decided I'm not going to Philly.

I know this is probably highly uninteresting to anyone except myself, but this morning I got an incredibly annoying letter from UVA with a corrected W-2 (statement of 2004 earnings) enclosed. This means that the tax return I filled in last week is completely wrong and has to be redone and resubmitted. (The tax deadline in the US is April 15th, ie this Friday ...) It seems that for the third year running, UVA has incorrectly treated me like a US permanent resident and deducted all kinds of irritating stuff they shouldn't have done. I love how when it comes to tax, everyone wants to treat me like a US permanent resident: but when it comes to visas etc, it's a whole different story.

So I've spent the whole afternoon (which, along with rowing, I had originally earmarked for searching for new articles about corporate social responsibility for Spekman's journal article - not an intensely thrilling task but necessary in order to eat) in a complete panic, rummaging around my tax forms trying to recalculate the figures all over again.

***

I am concerned about the whereabouts of spring. It made a brief showing earlier this week and has disappeared again. If anyone finds it, please let me know: I slept under two duvets last night. I feel for the guys out walking the AT right now.

***

Ralph Lauren has come to town, in the shape of a store called Rugby. Rugby stores, according to the Boston Herald, are a new RL brand aimed at the 18-24 yr old college crowd, and this one is one of only three in the entire world. Until now, the only thing Middleofnowheresville is famous for when it comes to shopping, is that its main mall is the setting for a terrorist attack in the latest John Grisham novel. This might make it seem an odd choice. But apparently RL honchos have decided that, along with Boston and Chapel Hill, NC, we have an abnormally high concentration of students who can afford to drop $80-$300 on cashmere sweaters.

Who's Who in NotSoDizzy-Land

NOW UPDATED!

It has come to my attention that readers who have not been following this blog from the beginning sometimes find it hard to keep up with the identities of the constantly expanding cast of characters that inhabit NotSoDizzy-land.

So, for latecomers, vacation takers, and just plain slackers, here's the run down (now divided by geography and species):

In the UK:

BatterseaEmma (aka EmmaWithTheStalkers): Friend of Author since age of 16. NiceMartin is her boyfriend.

B__k: Author's long suffering younger sister, also the family travel agent.

El Ricardo: Undiscovered screenwriting-genius resident in deepest darkest Suffolk. Married to Jane: father of WeeRobbie (Author's godson).

Father: Self-evident. About to hitch himself, in Charles and Camilla-esque fashion, to TheWoman. Fortunately completely computer illiterate.

FilmGuy: A former bf of Author. Arrogant Oxford graduate, mocked at the time, but now seems on track to win best director Oscar by age forty. Author nonetheless does not harbour any regrets.

JambonGris: Castle-dwelling nearly-famous author, oarsman and man about (London) town. Has known Blog Author since hacking her (for votes in the Union election) at university.

KiltGuy: Author's immediate former bf. Currently still resident in the NotToBeSpokenOf pile, due for parole board in 2012.

Mother: self-evident. Has recently been complaining that is not featured enough in Author's Blog. However, when is featured, does not like the mentions. Hard to please.

TheNose: Possibly oldest friend of Author (since primary school). Unfortunately does not have a nose. This is one name that the Author did not invent: blame lies firmly in Author's Father's camp.

PubHound: Fellow blogger and Trennels freak. Sister of PubShy.

PubShy: Paranoid female friend of Author, has V. High Powered Job in London.

IN THE US:

Animals

NewKitty: Cat, circa five years old, with Dickensian life story of hard luck and neglect. During one chapter in his life, used to belong to DanBrown: is now sought after for adoption by NoCatDan (no relation).

SapphireTheCat: Incumbent cat, circa sixteen years old. Dark brown and shiny, a feline Brando. Has diabetes but deals with it philosophically.

Zephyr, Le Chat Extraordinaire: Hyperactive tiger striped kitty belonging to BostonKate. Occasionally cat-sat by Author.

People

ArmyBrian: 1) married to ArmyLisa. Now serving in Home Depot army.
2) married to Heather. Still in US Army: drives tanks when not instructing at WestPoint. Famous for the oar shaped hole knocked in front teeth during rowing race in Philly.

ArmyLisa: former Darden classmate, was in US Army, now doing V High Powered Job in California. Married to ArmyBrian (the one with teeth).

ArmyTom: former Darden classmate, was in US Army, now freezing butt off working in Minneapolis for Target. Hawkish on US foreign policy and English Premiership football.

AsianStudiesMeredith: Third year Darden student, hence still around in Middleofnowheresville. Still a little bruised from her encounter with CrapBrazilianGuy, but has promising potential as companion on Author's martini drinking expeditions.

BigMouthLloyd: Current supremo of Darden Rowing Club. As a joint degree student, has been at Darden since the Ark. Married to BostonKate; father of YoungWill.

BostonKate: Liberal cookie baker and all round Good Egg. Married to Lloyd; mother of YoungWill, owner of Zephyr, Chat Extraordinaire.

CFYRG (CuteFirstYearRowingGuy): First year Darden student, nice to look at, hopefully more to than just looks.

Darden: Not a person, but a graduate business school. Scene, in one way or other, of much of the drama depicted in this Blog.

EnglishJustin: friend of Author's, bizarrely met while both were taking figure skating lessons at the Middleofnowheresville ice park. Possesses uncanny abilities to repair things. Married to FrenchNathalie.

EnglishNeil: former Darden classmate, also visa-challenged. In year since graduation, has managed to move in with girlfriend, get job, resign from job, write book, get publishing contract, and apply successfully for PhD program. Note contrast to Author.

LandladyLynn: Devoted owner of SapphireTheCat, tolerant roof-provider for NewKitty and Author.

Middleofnowheresville: Small university town in Virginia not far from the Blue Ridge Mountains, where Author currently lives. Apparently extremely inaccessible to Author's UK friends and family. Also named (by KiltGuy, in rare moment of lucidity) CrapFoodsVille.

NoCatDan: A first year at Darden. Wants to acquire NewKitty. Has so far failed to pass preliminary due diligence.

RowingTurkeyGuy: English PhD student at UVA. Rows. No relation to TurkeyGuy, thank God.

SeattleTreeza: Darden classmate of Author. Has glamorous dot com job in Seattle.

ScaryCzechLady: New wife of TheSplash, now works at Darden in the careers office, but formerly was the premier bladder control expert on Long Island, NY. Has taught Author how to guzzle 28oz diet coke and then sit through entire feature film without getting up for loo.

TheSplash: Flamboyant alumni from the Darden school (class of '03). So named because of an epic Frank-Spencerish fall off boating dock into dank, freezing reservoir. Recently married to ScaryCzechLady.

TurkeyGuy: Turkey hunter (not a Guy from Turkey) from W. Va.. Went out with Author briefly, but alarm bells of many different intonations rang.

WhartonStalkerGuy: Bane of Author's life for a couple of months. Now hopefully gone for good.

Blah!

My worst suspicions have been confirmed. Lloyd has lined up an alternative (male, and I hate to say it, lighter and better) coxswain for Philly this weekend. Which means if I go, it is to row. And I am not bloody rowing. There is just no point: at the slightest inkling of a race I turn into a blithering wreck.

Impending Doom

It's still six days away and I'm already beginning to feel a sense of doom. I'm talking, of course, about the Wharton B-School Regatta. Even though I am only going (officially) to be coxswain, I beginning to worry about that (when it comes to steering on the huge windy swirly Schuylkill River, I ain't in Kansas any more...) and also have this sneaking suspicion that I will be co-opted to row at the eleventh hour. Knowing Lloyd and The Splash, they would think it a huge joke to secretly "volunteer" me to row behind my back. Oh well, hopefully the weather will be good.

Meanwhile I am trying to divert myself by projecting some of my doom onto Cutefirstyearrowing guy. He has never rowed in a race before - in fact, he's only been in a rowing shell about ten times in his life. He has no idea what's going to be waiting for him in Philadelphia. The fastest stroke rating CFYRG and TallPete have ever rowed at is about 17. So I had great fun informing him last night that the men's race will probably go off at about 32 and wind down to 28. I am not entirely cruel though. I am going to do him a huge favour, ie telling TheSplash to put him back onto port/stroke side. Asking anyone to switch sides three outings before a regatta is bad enough, but for a guy who only just learnt to row, it's too much. And I am not saying that just because CFYRG is cute, I'm saying it because I will probably be coxing and I do not want a crab mid-race. Plus, CFYRG might not look very cute with all his front teeth knocked out, as happened to ArmyBrian at the same regatta two years ago.

***

It's been a social week. Outing with ScaryCzechLady, TheSplash and EnglishGuy on Tuesday, then dinner and TNDC on Thursday, then a brief appearance at the DardenDays "welcome" event on Friday evening, then the big bash at Ash Lawn Highland last night.

I had never been to Ash Lawn Highland but it was very cool. It is the former home of President James Madison, the President that came after TJ. It helped that it was a beautiful evening with clear skies and spring blossom everywhere, of course, and that this year they hired a decent Bluegrass band to play. (Last year they hired a very dubious and noisy rock band. They were so loud, there was an exclusion zone of 100 yards around them. Plus, all the Mormon and born-again folks took huge offence at the content of their lyrics, and took their kids home after fifteen minutes.) With the great weather and excellent (and free) wine on tap, everyone was in good spirits. My only quibble with the evening would have been the appearance of the dreaded southern barbecue food (see February's postings on that). I went the whole way down the buffet line with an empty plate, until the very last dish which was lettuce leaves and tomatoes.

Anyway, it was good, met some cool admits, and, completely bizarrely, a partner of one of the admits who told me that CFYRG was her date to senior prom ten years ago. At one point I got stuck with a French dude called Pierre in the current First Year who I didn't take to at all-and of course who promptly came on to me like a steam train. Unshaven, bloodshot eyes, smoked like a chimney, dismissive of everything, talked very fast French for ages to another French guy right in front of me (v rude - and I could understand just enough to know that I was being mentioned...) I finally made my escape when an admit with a squint in both eyes came over and joined us: I mumbled something about getting myself a glass of water and legged it...

***

I didn't execute an entirely clean getaway however, because in charge of the bar was NoCatDan. He is the one who was talking before Spring Break about adopting NewKitty. I actually only met him in person for the first time the other night at TNDC. On that occasion, he pounced on me and asked if we could go back to my place to see NewKitty right there and then (it was about 11pm at this stage, and I live at 20 minutes drive away - I thanked him for his enthusiasm but politely declined the offer). I must say, I do seem to be having a run of bad luck lately - it seems to be the ones I really don't want pouncing on me that have been, with the possible exception of GayborhoodMike, but I think he had a girlfriend.

Anyway, one of the unusual things about NoCatDan - which he is very quick to tell you when you meet him - is that he got his undergrad degree from the University of Phoenix Online. When he told me this, within the first five minutes of running into him at TNDC, I wondered why he added "Online" to this statement. I mean, there isn't a U of Phoenix offline, so why bother highlighting the fact you got your degree online? Most British people who haven't watched as much American TV as I have wouldn't even know that the University of Phoenix is an internet university unless you told them.

Fortunately last night NoCatDan was safely on the other side of the bar, so pouncing opportunities were mercifully limited, and I was able to get away. It was then that I noticed I have become somewhat of a celebrity among the FYs, admittedly probably a dubious honour. LOTS of people came up and said, "Look, there's that girl who wrote the case". One FY introduced me to his friend as "she's the PhD who wrote the case" (rather flattering but untrue) and girl I'd never seen before who was wearing too much perfume came up and said "Aren't you the one who got BrianB_ into Darden?" (flattering again, but also complete fiction - it turns out that in 1995 I worked with a guy who, eight years later at a different bank, wrote BrianB_ a recommendation for business school...) Seems almost a shame, now I am famous, that I will shortly be leaving and in no position to cash in on my fame.

Two Tales - of Men and Mortals

Coming home from TNDC (Thursday Night Drinking Club) it suddenly struck me. There is a definite trend: men are much more crap than they used to be. And as the following two tales show, the problem is a global one...

Over a couple of "Mr Big" martinis pre-TNDC, my friend AsianStudiesMeredith told me how, a year ago this weekend, she met a dude at Darden Days.

Darden Days, for those who have not had the pleasure of experiencing them, is a weekend in which technically speaking, admits - people who have been made offers to attend the school in the fall - can come and look around and decide if they like it. Non-technically speaking, it is full of male admits coming to check out to see if there are any hot women. I went to Darden Days in 2001 with KiltGuy. We both thought that the fixed grins and relentless enthusiasm was somewhat reminiscent of Stepford. This year, I anticipate even fixed-er grins than usual, given that applications are down 20% and they are literally searching under rocks to fill 300 places.

Anyway, AsianStudiesMeredith and the admit (who hailed from a country south of the equator that speaks Portuguese) got together on the first day of DD and henceforth were inseparable for the rest of the weekend. When she went off to Japan for six months, as AsianStudies people are wont to do, the admit was determined not to lose touch. He phoned. He emailed. He sent postcards. He instant-messaged. "Oh, I read in the paper there was a typhoon in the Far East - are you OK? I've been so worried about you!!" And so on.

I don't think ASM can be blamed, therefore, for expecting at least a minor league gesture of enthusiasm from this dude when she returned to Middleofnowheresville around Christmas-time. And indeed, on email and IM, enthusiasm was the order of the day. But as soon as ASM suggested meeting up for a quick coffee, CrapGuy-from-south-of-the-equator reacted as if she had proposed marriage. "Why do you have to rush things, I want this relationship to happen naturally!" he bleated.

Then the serious crap started to go down. Details of the 23 year old girlfriend, who had been on the scene all along, suddenly emerged. CrapGuy blocked ASM from IM-ing him (the ultimate gesture of hostility in the modern world). CrapGuy started making cryptic comments to ASM's male friends, along the lines of, where is she, don't tell me, I want her, I don't want her. One year on, with this crap still going on (as recently as two days ago), ASM has no choice but to ask herself: what was that all about?

***
The second story involves my sister, B__k.

In January this year, she met a nice guy, M_, they went out regularly: he seemed very keen.
After about six weeks of everything going great, B__k, who works for a major international airline based in Britain, started wondering to herself if she should make him her Designated Travelling Companion. (DTCs get a 90% discount on airtickets). She knew it was early days in their relationship, but her airline is very strict about only letting you designate your travelling companion once a year, on March 1. And she felt like if this really was going somewhere, she would kick herself later if he wasn't able to accompany her on flights. So, without mentioning it to him, in mid February she filled out the form and designated him.

Two weeks later (on March 5), they arranged to meet up to go shopping in Selfridges. They had a great time. As they said goodbye, he said he would see her the following day, a Sunday. And then he disappeared: and that was the last she ever saw of him.

In some ways, I wish the story ended there. But it gets worse. A couple of weeks later, B__k having spent some considerable time begging her employer to let her change her travelling companion, on the grounds that her Designated One had vanished off the face of the planet, her mobile phone rang.

"Where is he?" an unidentified woman's voice demanded.

My sister replied that she thought the woman must have the wrong number.

"No, I don't. Tell M_ I know he's there! This is his wife speaking!"

My sister had no choice but to reply, truthfully, that there was noone called M_ at that address. And ended the call post haste. It was clear that even under the most generous of construals, M_ (who had claimed he had been separated from his wife for some time) had not been strictly truthful with her; and all things considered, she recognized she had had a lucky escape. But she still wonders to herself: what was that all about?

***

Driving home, I reflected on these two tales. My own outing to TNDC that night had featured a couple of inexplicable displays of crap male behaviour. What's it all about, for example, when a guy fights his way across a crowded room to your side, insists on buying you a drink, talks to you intently for over an hour, then suddenly announces he is going home now with his mates, abandoning you alone at the bar?

Anyway, here's my theory. These days we women know we need to be logical, not emotional. We know we have to play by rules that men invented. (That's one reason why we put up with two years of business school...) So these days, we subscribe to theories and frameworks, such as HJNTIY and the dreaded Rules, all designed to help us recognise, compartmentalise, rationalise and respond appropriately to various forms of acceptable and non-acceptable male behaviour . In other words, the woman of today knows she is not meant to dissolve into hysterics everytime someone doesn't call her when he said he would.

But the difficulty with the kind of behaviour as displayed in exhibits 1 and 2 above is that it is displays absolutely no logic whatsoever. As Dr Spock might say, "it does not compute." Even the most rational of women cannot make any sense of it. It's almost as if men are rebelling against being rationalized: they are regressing into randomness and whim just as women are becoming more Vulcan-like than ever.

It's incredibly frustrating: I have to say, I'm with the man with the ears.

Richmond cronies

Brief by-word before I get started. No, I have not heard a squeak from the WSG (A Good Thing). Yes, I did meet up with the EnglishGuy this evening. Yes, he was very charming, and no, he did not pounce on me. Way too gentlemanly. (None of this "friendly" Philadelphian business.)

Btw, EnglishGuy, if you are reading this - and thanks to ScaryCzechLady's big mouth I have to accept there is a good probability that you are - hello.

***

So today saw the First Ever Teaching of my Euronext case. I was pretty nervous. You have to be nervous about any First Year MC (management communications) class in the fourth quarter. There was a good chance that absolutely noone in the class would have their eyes open, let alone having bothered even reading the case.

In the end, it was OK, I think. The first class went well. Marc Modica is obssessed with negotiation frameworks, and I think that approach actually does work quite well with my case. But at least half the class seemed to be paying attention of some sort (having at least one eye open, for example).

In the second run, with a different group of students, it was a disaster. I was cringing madly. Those who were awake sat there playing solitaire on their laptops. Then when forced to speak, rather than discuss the issues, the students started debating whether it was OK to use bullet points in a memo or not. Such tangent chasing is a classic diversionary tactic employed by those who have not read the case, and have no intention of even trying surreptitiously to do so while the class is in progress. How do I know this? Because I am poacher turned gamekeeper.


***

Last year, as publisher of the Darden school newspaper, I decided that rather than applying myself to the job hunting and whatever academic delights were served up by the second semester, it would be a good idea to publish a Zagat-esque independent guide (as in, not written or censored by school administrators and faculty) to second year elective classes. I am a great believer in free markets, but free markets only function if the participants have adequate information.

But when I mooted the idea last year, the school administrators, predictably, were less than enthusiastic. They had visions of furious faculty picketing their offices following negative reviews of their classes. The beauty of the US, however, is that one just has to mention the words "First Amendment" and even paranoid ultra-cautious school administrators tend to get right back into their boxes.

So we went ahead, my fellow classmates submitted their reviews, and while on grounds of taste I chose to edit out the very most gratuitously personally insulting bits of the reviews, 99.5% of what was said ran. And despite all the administration's direst forecasts of doom and disaster, no ceilings collapsed, no picket lines formed, and everyone generally agreed it had been a fairly useful venture.

This year, a new dude was in charge of the Elective Guide. It came out today, and I couldn't resist flicking through it. On the whole, I thought there was just the right amount of criticism and adulation. However, one comment did stand out. The teachers of the Corporate Governance elective were described as "three old has-been Richmond cronies stuck in the 1800s". Seeing as all three of these guys are extremely successful businessmen, authors of one of the most recently published textbooks on subject, and one of them has just been to Geneva at the invitation of the UN to advise on corporate governance issues, I felt that was a little bit harsh. But maybe I am biased because they always wrote nice things on MY weekly book reports...

Whether to Laugh or Cry?

I am back from Philly. Just got back, this afternoon, after once again coming incredibly close to being sick on the plane. I don't know what's up with me. I've been on literally hundreds of aeroplanes in the last 30 years and never have I been airsick until this month. The resting pilot sitting across the aisle, and looking happy about that fact, said I was a good little trooper.

But you don't want to hear about my airsickness, right, you want to hear about the Wharton StalkerGuy!!

Well, I met him. And, of course, it was a disaster.

My sister and I had decided earlier on Thursday that we would both go and meet him for a drink that night. (She had actually suggested going and pretending to be me, but that didn't really solve the problem of what to tell our mother in the event of the WSG turning out to be a mad axe murderer - in fact, from my perspective, it would be even harder to explain). We had even worked out a secret code, by which we could make a hasty exit if need be by triggering one of our stock of standard getouts: such as the "unselfish" excuse ("You have to work tomorrow, we don't want to keep you...") or even the tried and truster "jetlag" excuse ("Oh dear, my sister's tired, I need to take her home to sleep").

***

As it turned out, best laid plans totally flopped. My sister, who had been upgraded to BA business class where champagne flows freely down the aisles, passed out from "jet lag" before we had even left our room. I was left to venture out to meet the WSG alone, fortified only with a swift and large vodka martini from the hotel bar to see me on my way.

I got to the Irish Pub on Walnut Street first. At the bar, I randomly looked at the shelf, and on the grounds that if the WSG had nothing to say for himself I could at least drink something I liked, went for a Glenlivet straight up. The barman's eyebrows rose: not for the last time that evening.

Then the WSG showed up.

At first sight, not hideous, exactly, though it was clear he was going to need a really really really good personality. Unfortunately, it was not on display that night. The WSG was the sort of person who swallows Dale Carnegie without chewing. All he could do was ask me endless personal questions about myself. I felt vaguely resentful. I tried asking him a question. He dodged, and just asked me the same question back without replying. He was beginning to really piss me off. Then he started asking me what I was going to do about my visa situation. I really didn't want to talk about it, but he started going on about Vegas again.

"I told you, I can't afford you!" I am still trying to be light and polite.

He was not. "Well about if you pay me 10% of your future earnings?"

"You do realize, don't you, that 10% of nothing is nothing?" I asked, through gritted teeth.

"You could work as a waitress with green card, and you can pay me 10% of your wages and tips."

He really was not joking. Unfortunately, after this topic of conversation proved to be shortlived, he really had nothing else to fall back on. No humour or wit was forthcoming. There was only one option, the option of a desperate man. Get her paralytically drunk.

***

Five shots later (the two vodka, then three more whiskies straight up, all on an empty dinnerless stomach), he was finally getting somewhere.

"So. Wharton have this big party tonight, at Pure. It's Studio 54. Do you want to come?"

"Erghmm," said I, hiccuping. "I suppose it's not like I have anything better to do."

The WSG beamed. "I think you just paid me a compliment. Shall we go then?"

"Erghmm," I replied. I slid off my stool, and lurched towards the door, as the WSG leant over the bar to sort out dollars with the barman. As I lurched, I spotted a young guy sitting at the jukebox. I don't usually stagger up to strange guys in pubs, but he had a nice smile, not all beady and desperate like the WSG.

"Hullo! What are you playing?" Hiccup.

He smiled. He looked very young. "Come and look. I'm Joey by the way. What do you like?"

We flicked through the selection. Almost immediately, I spotted Achtung Baby, one of my favourites from my first year at Cambridge. And we were in an Irish Pub...

"I move in Mysterious Ways!!!" I cried.

"I know. Come and meet my friends," Joey said, comfortingly, "They're just over here.."

I went over. They seemed happy to see me. I was quickly introduced to Brillo, Pad (yes, really) and Jen.

"Hi guys, it's great (hiccup) to meet you. But I have a - um - friend over there, who's waiting for me. I ought to...."

I turned round. There was noone at the bar. The WSG had gone.


* * *

I didn't know whether to be outraged, or relieved. What a cheek! On the other hand, what luck escaping from someone who had so little self confidence he couldn't even tap me on the shoulder and say "Shall we go then?" or even, "Are you coming with me, or shall I see you there?" But still.

Joey's mates were less bothered. Come and join us, they chorused. I drew up a stool. Then a fifth friend arrived, Mike. He kissed my hand, and later they all invited me back to their house round the corner for more beer. Before I knew it, it was 2am, I was standing in a quiet street with Mike, surrounded by fairy lights in trees, and then I was being bundled into a taxi.

***

The next day I woke up with a crashing hangover. It took three Tylenol, a muffin and three bottles of water before I was able to get up and head out for some touristing with my sister, who was now annoyingly fully recovered and raring to go like a greyhound in a trap. Later, we walked home through the "Gayborhood" where Joey's mates lived, and in vain I tried to figure out which street had had the fairy lights; which house contained the sofa I had sat on the night before wrapped up in Mike's blanket, drinking beer; and what on earth we had talked about all that time.

So, a disaster that worked out OK in the end. And I guess I don't need to worry about how to reply to the WSG's emails any more.