eh? a goat with tits? what use is that?

Just confirmed with Anvil today that I will be states-side till mid July... All you Brits may now commence celebration. Shaun - I will be back in time for your wedding though, I haven't forgotten =o]

Upon my return I want everyone to speak to me in exaggerated Cockney, Brum, Scouse and Geordie accents so I can speed-acclimatise and lose any horrible yank-isms I've caught. I'm, like, _so_ not wanting to sound American already.

Mr Cake

Went to a great South African resaturant in Brooklyn with an ex-date (if there is such a thing. Probably I suppose) who's a foodie. On the way back she says we've got to go get cake from this amazing cake shop. Of course at this point I'm thinking of Chris Morris style cake and the dangers of such consumption, but wtf, you're only young (old) once.

So we get there and all the staff are really polite and well turned out. Which is odd. Turns out they're all dead religious. But it's not a prob since they don't try and convert you or anything. Anyway, the shop is called "Mr Cake" and Mr Cake is really well known. Apparently he was next door at the barbers getting his beard trimmed. He's known throughout Brooklyn as "Mr Cake" and is cake-maker to the stars! There was a photo of him with Morgan Freeman taken only last month, after his Oscar triumph. Mr Freeman's Oscar triumph, that is. Not only is Freeman a good actor but he knows his cake, evidently.

Anyway, the cake (which was blood-red with white icing) was fucking delicious and came in mammoth $5 slices which was more than enough for both of us.

So the moral of this non-story is that I had my cake and ate it. And will have to go running 8 times this week to negate its calorific content no doubt.

birthday blog

it's my smarie, I'll fry if I want to. Or something. I'm 30 now so I can spout senile stuff with impunity. No great stories of late spring to mind other than the fact I got utterly wasted at my piss-up on Saturday night and didn't get home till 4a.m. Yes Stephen - that's four a.m. AND I had more pints of stella and hoegaarden than I can remember. Literally.

Lots of sightseeing has been done of late - I've been on hols since Weds. That's why I have no interesting stories - sightseeing is dull unless you are the one doing the seeing of sights!

Actually two things of note spring to mind. One is that this is the first birthday in about 10 years where I've not felt desperately depressed. That's got to be a good thing. Second is that since I put one of the davidShapiro.net photos on the dating site I'm on, I've got about 5 emails a day!!! In the photo I'm wearing a suit. An M&S suit. Brilliant. It's either that or that now I'm 30, I match a whole new slew of people's search criteria e.g.

hair = lanky and long
nationality = north Walian ONLY
mental wellbeing = fucked
age = 30
laptime of central park = less than 45 minutes
last book read = The Dragon's Dwarf Biscuits by Terry Hatcher
hobbies = crippling spiders by removing 6 of their legs

Peace-out.

p.s. new photo album up pedrffynnon's photos .

frozenSnot

Fuck me it's cold tonight! I just did a brisk 5 minute walk from the train station. It's -9C and very windy. The result being that, when I got inside, I'd snotted almost into my mouth without even sensing it... I nearly had enough for a snot-icle!

Nearly as embarrassing as the other night, when at midnight after returning from a night out, I decided to head to the giant 24 hour pharmacy across the road. My scalp was ultra-itchy and I needed some soothing lotion-y stuff or something. The upshot being that I found myself, at gone midnight, standing in a queue with an enormous pump-action bottle of Vaseline lotion... "having lubrication issues, sir?".

davidShapiro.net evidence && frozenArms

First off, the slimeball that is davidShapiro.net (see smug kingswell ) has put up the photos (good shout Nigella) of that "crazy" night. See me looking sheepish at first, then rather smug as the alcohol hits home and 3 lasses are literally hanging off me.

And second, I'd previously thought the New York runners in Central Park were a bunch of poofs. Not in the gay way, in the "oooh, I can't possibly go running without 3 layers of intelligent fabrics, sunglasses, hat, waterpak and iPod" way. This evening, I found that at night, at least some thermal layering is a good idea...

I went for a run in my short-sleeved Wales top and shorts, which was fine. Till I got a bit lost and it got dark, and significantly colder. I only noticed towards the end of my run, that I couldn't bend my wrists. The air hitting them had sort of frozen them! D'oh. The temperature round here changes much quicker than back home I thought, as I rooted for my keys, looking like a stiff-armed robot.

There're photos of me with frozen hair in the usual place pedrffynnon's photos .

A tribute to the ODB

This is the ODB and he's part of the Wu-Tang Clan, who I loved for years (but not now cos they're later stuff is poor). They rabbit on about Staten Island where they're from and I always wondered what it was like. Oh, he was shot dead last year. Probably his fault mind, he was a proper addict and psycho. But an unbelivably brilliant and inimitable MC.

So, with the ODB's fantastic debut album "Return to the 36 Chambers" blasting down my earholes I boarded the Staten Island ferry. Which turned out to be the highlight of the whole trip since Staten Island (correct me if I'm wrong) has absolutely nothing on it. Apart from some wildlife that you need a car to get to.

Returning to Manhattan, icy wind blasting in my face (photos to be uploaded soon - I look appropriately freezing), the gruesome aggression of "Proteck Ya Neck II in the Zoo" hurtling into my brain I felt sad that ODB's not around any more to make listeners go "what the... !?!" to his mad music.