100 things: 100 photos - photo 4

I have fallen hopelessly behind on my 100 things. I have fallen hopelessly behind on many things. My to-do list is only getting bigger and bigger, and no matter how much I try I don't seem to be making even a small dent in it. I really don't know what is wrong with me, except for the fact I need a holiday. I have booked a flight to go to Greece in the middle of september for a bit of a rest, and hopefully some sea and sun. Until then my 100 photos will be a countdown of summery images of Greece. This photo wasn't actually taken in the summer, but the spring. But it makes no difference. It is the view from the beach under my greek grandmother's summer house in Dilesi. Dilesi is a village opposite Evia, which means the sea is closed in and there are no distant horizons. Where ever you look there is land near by. My grandmother got swindled and was persuaded that buying a plot of land in Dilesi to build a summer house would be a good idea. As a result we have ended up with a summer house that is slowly slipping down the cliff in a very boring part of Greece next to one of the worst seas in Greece. The house itself is nice and fits a lot of people. When I was young we would often go for weekends. More often that not together with a bunch of relatives and family friends. So I have a lot of memories from this place. The house in the photo isn't my grandmother's house, I am standing on the beach under her house looking to one side.

I have a confession

First things first. Guys I am sick! I have been since saturday, and I just want to sleep forever and forever. The doctor had no idea what I have (as usual) and all I can do is wait and hope it goes away. So I'm lying low at the moment and lurking around (in my breaks between dozing and feeling sorry for myself.) Anyway. My confession. I wanted to confess that yes, I do like some of Phil Collins songs. *hangs head in shame* There is one particular Phil Collins song that I really love. *blushes in embarrassment* Here it is as heard in one of my favourite scenes from a film. (You can so totally tell my age from this clip!)
*sigh* The Paris metro is so much more like the NY metro than London's one... There are days when I really miss Paris...I have a confession

I am a year older

...which is pretty much bleurgh. Can I stay 30 for ever? Or even better 22? Last weekend I went to LFA2011 again and this week I had training at work (which was a lot of condescending rubbish) and last Thursday my mother came for a visit. So now I am enjoying a lot of arguing going on between my mother and my grandmother. Fun, fun, fun. Yesterday was my birthday! For my birthday I went shopping down-town with my mother where I made her get me the loveliest waterproof mac from Hobbs.

It's gorgeous, isn't it? Afterwards I had booked a table at Rosso Pomondorro (an italian restaurant) in Covent Garden. It was a nice restaurant, with good food and they put up with me changing the number of people the reservation was for multiple times. But on the other hand, the service wasn't the best. Maybe because it was Saturday and they were too busy and harassed? In any case, not the best service. I had a small gathering of eight in the end: my sister and her boyfriend (who got me a lovely book from Dover books with Kay Nielsen's fairytale illustrations and some adorable postcards with ink drawings of anthropomorphised animals), Natasha and Theo (who got me a cute ethnic cushion) and my friend Amin from Paris - who had come over to present a paper at a conference in Cambridge - who brought two friends of his with him. We had fun and it was a laugh. Not a bad birthday gathering. My only wibble was that I was sort of hoping to share a birthday with Natasha's any minute to be born baby boy. But it was not be. He's still not ready to come out.

100 things: 100 photos - photo 3

I am really behind on my 100 things. I have got to step it up, or I will never finish! I am thinking that since it's summer and I am stuck in this miserably wet english weather they call summer here, I will just inundate you with photos from better climes and better times. So be prepared for lots of summer vacation holiday photos! Every summer I always used to spent at least a week on an island or somewhere by the sea in Greece. When I was a kid with my parents, and since I turned 16 with friends. Sometimes it was just a week, other summers I went for as long as a month. Prices used to be cheap, both boat fares - especially if you had a student card - and rented rooms. Then when prices went up, I started going camping. Sometimes organised camping and sometimes free camping. This will possibly be my first year of not going anywhere. Even last year, I pitched a tent in a forest on a small island for a week before coming to the UK. So yeah, summer with no sun and no sea is not really summer for me. This is a photo from August 2010, taken on the seafront promenade of the village of Panormos in Tinos. It is such a typically greek summer vista. It is evening, as you can see from the long shadows under the chairs. After a long day of sightseeing - we had rented a car to see the island - and swimming, we finally sat down on a seafront taverna to eat. I took this photo while sitting down at our table. The sky is typically cloudless and the sea dark blue. What you can see of the island is barren and arid, as the Cycladic islands are. And of course boats... Okay, now I'm getting maudlin and home-sick.

Last weekend

Remember how I keep on telling you what a bad blogger I am? Here's some more proof. A whole week later I have decided to tell you about what I got up to last weekend. Maybe next week I will tell you about this weekend. So the London Festival of Architecture is on. It lasts about three weeks. I went to see some things the weekend before, and I went to see some more things last weekend, (and this weekend too). Exhibitions, actions and events in parks and squares, architectural practices letting you visit and showing you around. Last Saturday night I went to an indie concert in a little pub in Farrington. You know the sort of concert where it's you and the bands's closest friends. We went because the headliners, the Occasional Flicker's, are a greek indie band - based in Edinburgh - are kind of known in the greek indie circuit. Which isn't hard to do. There are so few bands, that we know them all. They aren't a bad little band, with some nice tunes. The singer has the strongest greek accent though!

Opening acts were John Collins that tried his best to make interesting and engaging banter, but wasn't really my thing, and another scottish band, Spaghetti Anywhere. No, unfortunately, there were no spaghetti western references in their music. I was very disappointed. They were a typical miserable scottish indie band. (There is only one Belle and Sebastian!) The singer had an interesting voice, if they just wrote some more interesting melodies...

Hear that accent? Because I can never resist a scottish accent (any scots on my flist?), I drank a pint of cider, screwed up my courage and chatted up the singer a bit after the gig. He was a very nice guy, we had the typical awkward conversation you have with a fellow indie person... I spent the night with my sister and her boyfriend in Wimbledon. I slept in their south-african room-mates empty bed - he was on holiday. And next day I went to an architectural walk organised by Atkins - a very big architectural and engineering company. The walk was led by one of their senior architects and was very enjoyable. One of the best things I've been on in this festival. That and the Developing City exhibition in the Walbrook Building (just opposite Cannon Street Station). If you live in London, are interested in the history of the City and like big well made models of buildings, you should check the exhibition out! It's free and open until the 9th of September, except Mondays.

Software excitement and inspirations

It's been a while. I get into phases where I'm not very talkative or social, just ask anyone who has ever lived with me how often I hole myself up in my own room and do my own thing completely ignoring other people. It doesn't help that I have been busy applying for jobs with a new found desperation, and reading up on InDesign. Guys! InDesign is a pretty awesome program! It's one of those programs that reading a book on how to use it actually makes me smile with excitement! Not because I'm a computer geek, because I'm not, but because I'm a design geek, and the possibilities it offers are exciting! How did I live so long with just Photoshop? It's an awesome layout program, all the nifty stuff you can do with text and graphics and layers! And you can create multipage files! And save as multipage pdfs! Yay! And if you're a seasoned photoshop user, the interface and the logic is very easy to learn. I actually made a new portfolio and other stuff with it before even reading the book! Back in the very very beginning when I first installed it a couple of months ago, and had only seen a couple of informative tutorials on the web, I made a little portfolio of inspirations for a job application. Sometimes when applying for architecture practices they can ask for the damnedest things. This particular practice had asked for five things that inspire us architecturally. This is what I came up with: > > > > >

I went shopping again

So anyway I didn't get the job, obviously, and the new manager is still driving us crazy at work. I can't wait for him to crash and burn so we can get a new one. I am considering writing a letter of complaint about him. A number of people would sign it, it's just that no one seems up to writing it. And as the most educated person there, maybe I should do it. I did a bit of retail therapy yesterday to cheer myself up. I got a pair of turquoise skinny jeans from urban outfitters (yes, I'm too old and fat for skinny jeans, but whatever).

I couldn't find a photo of the turquoise colour I got. And I got a black shirt from Mango for any prospective interviews or future office jobs (we got to keep on hoping against hope).

And worst of all I went to John Lewis and ended up buying a skirt from Hobbs. It was 60% off, but this is Hobbs... For non UK people, Hobbs is an upmarket shop for serious clothes. The skirt I bought was from their casual line, but my plan was to wear it to prospective interviews or future office jobs (yup, it goes with the shirt).

Question: would you match a pekan coloured skirt (yes, that's what colour it is) with a magenta jacket? How about with cinnamon tights and top as well? Also I have been busy wearing this cool scarf I got from Oasis a week ago:

For all you who didn't already realise, I have a bit of a thing for clothes... Next thing on my list: summer brogues. Any ideas?