Malcolm McLaren’s Long-Lost Paintings

Below is a link to my recent piece on Malcolm McLaren. 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/7725063/Malcolm-McLarens-long-lost-paintings.html

Bin Woes

Our wheelie bin was stolen the other day. ‘How rude!’, I thought when I ventured out to locate the nearest one on our Georgian square in my leopard print dressing gown (I think stylish, my housemates think more Doreen from Birds of a Feather). I tiptoed to the next wheelie bin, which was only three metres up the street, on the logical presumption the bin men may have pushed ours along slightly. I was then caught red-handed dropping a small Morrisons bag into what transpired to be, yes, our neighbours’ bin. The prim blonde lady who lives at No. 3 was standing at her front door. I caught her eye as the lid went down and said: ‘Oh, I’m sorry, is this…..’, ‘Our bin?’, she replied haughtily. ‘Yes’. She then strode towards her car, head tossed back, nose in the air. As I shuffled behind attempting to politely explain our dilemma, and the mysterious loss of our bin, she more or less ignored me as if I was someone trying to sell her hideous-looking dressing gowns. Or Immodium. She was not interested. We had dumped our small sack of waste in her dust-bin and despite the genuine error, this was crossing the neighbourly line.

However, on returning to the house I felt mightily indignant. ‘She was not neighbourly!’, I fumed to one sympathetic housemate as I peered like a mad woman out of the window. ‘I am going to go and find our bin’, I declared, striding out into the perilous world again. But on circling the square with the venom and frazzled appearance of a jilted Miss Havisham, I could not find our green wheelie-bin. We would have to order another one. 

Glamourpuss

The next day there was a BIG development in the wheelie-bin saga. Our neighbour on the other side – nice, sprightly-looking  septuagenarian with rimless glasses – passed me and I mentioned our bin issue. ‘Our bin was also stolen two weeks ago’, he comiserated, shaking his head. ‘Oh!’, I exclaimed, feeling less of a victim now we were one of many. ‘Poor you.’ ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘we had to order another bin from the council which didn’t come for ten days’. ‘So you must have found it tough during that time, not having a bin, what did you do?’ I asked. ‘Oh, we put our rubbish in your bin’, he said grinning.

Now this made me genuinely glad. Gleeful, even. I had not been a bad neighbour for accidentally plopping our rubbish in No. 3’s bin. I told the nice man from No. 1 that this was absolutely no problem, we were glad to be of service, and naturally we would be very grateful if he could return the favour. He of course obliged.

Returning home with this breaking news, I told my housemate Susi who had been following the saga: ‘Perhaps, I could go round to No. 3 and say that I thought it would be neighbourly to warn her of the bin thieves in the area.’ Susi looked at me, I thought at first empathetically, and said gently: ‘I think you need a new hobby Kat’.

Feline Fine

I caught a bit of Joanna Lumley’s ‘Catwoman’ programme last night, in which she analyses modern man’s relationship with felines. Being a cat fanatic I quite possibly shrieked with delight (or at least said, ‘Oooh!’ and did a little dance with the tooth brush), as I have been wanting to watch it and haven’t had time. For your benefit reader, my two prerequisites to marriage are: housework is shared 50:50 or else man pays for a cleaner to do his share, and I must be allowed at least one furry friend of the cat variety. Oh yes, I hear them scrambling to queue up for an engagement ring at Liberty’s as we speak……

What I saw on the programme was particularly moving and reinforced what my family have long said about cats (and many official surveys too), which is that having a cat can significantly reduce feelings of stress and for some people, even loneliness. A cat is a calming companion.

Lumley visited a children’s hospital for severely mentally handicapped kids who rarely have a chance to experience the joy of owning a pet. But these children have been given a rare opportunity to enjoy what are named ‘Pat Cats’; cats which, like guide dogs, have been specifically chosen for their consistent ability to aid humans. In this case, the docile and amenable Pat Cat provides their stroker with instant affection for therapuetic gain.  You could see the children’s faces light up instantly as the happy cat nestled into their jumpers and purred contentedly. What a brilliant idea. There are now 100 Pat Cats at work across the UK.  Like guide dogs, the cats wear customized neon yellow jackets so that people know they haven’t just escaped from Battersea Dog’s Home.  Aaaaaaaahhhh.

Whilst on the subject of cats, I thought it was very amusing when my father said matter-of-factly at lunch the other day that his three cats, Monty (better known as Meow-Meow for his maximum decibal meow), Freddie and Holly are such happy little troopers because of the quality of food they eat: ‘Organic fish and chicken, the usual’, he says (I think he’s joking). ‘We’re Michelin starred.’ Funny, true and mildly tragic; those cats are better fed than me. Now where’s my cat suit…….

‘David Clegg’

News tonight that Gordon Brown is to step down hasn’t come as a shock to the nation and is clearly the only option for the sidelined Labour Party.

The betting is that David Cameron will meet with the Queen tomorrow morning to make his position official as the new PM. Clegg and Cameron have been in talks all afternoon, presumably thrashing out the make-up of this historical cabinet. So Brown’s capitulation has not appeared to woo the Lib Dems into getting into bed with Labour. 

I agree with the Independent’s Political Editor Andrew Grice who spoke on Newsnight last night. He said that though Brown is one of the few unfortunate PMs to inherit his title rather than be voted in, he has nevertheless had an ‘epic’ career in politics, spanning 13 years at the top since he became Chancellor.  But Britain is tired and disillusioned with Labour’s catastrophic legacy of Iraq, Afghanistan (Blair), the recession and MPs expenses (Brown). Let’s just hope that the duo soon to be in charge stand by their word and do what’s best for the country.

Incidentally I found it very amusing that Labour’s former minister in Scotland, Henry McLeish, got a bit confused with the pairing of Cameron and Clegg yesterday, branding them as the singular ‘David Clegg’ by mistake. 

Is this some Frankenstein zombie soon to take up residence at No 10? If so, I’d vote for Clegg’s face personally.

Who’s That Boy?

This is a recent feature I wrote for the Jewish News – an interview with The Who’s Roger Daltrey. Click on the link below.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/31204500/Roger-Daltrey

Shouldering On

Here is an example of the celebrity spread I used to write for the Telegraph Magazine.

Click here Shoulders.doc

Dirty Dancing

To my sizzling joy I have recently taken up salsa dancing for the second time. I had forgotten how euphoric it makes you feel – mentally and physically. Mentally, it gives me that head space from a hard week’s work, and is better than any large glass of wine or absorbing film. I find it almost meditative; my mind can’t indulge in worries about the state of the back garden or if I left a semi-colon out of the recent piece I filed. The only thing whizzing is my body, which is already rewarding me for my commitment to a different kind of work out. Ole! I am also relishing this revolutionary kind of saturday night out (something which in any case I have long relinquished in favour of relaxed dinner parties with girlfriends). No, hitting the tiles on the weekend my steps are lighter and more certain. Because I know I am going to have a brilliant night and it won’t even matter if I don’t touch a gin and tonic. (Though maybe one or two won’t hurt….). 

Despite this, I am struggling with one major issue. Men.

Let’s get straight to the point. How is a girl to attend salsa classes in a bar, then stay behind to practise whilst it turns into a club, if she has a football-playing, salsa-phobic boyfriend back home? In the ten days since I have launched myself back into the underground Latino bars of London, I have twice been asked for my number after one dance and once had to dodge someone’s puckered lips; Sweaty man with goatee: “Will I see you later?”, moi: “Um, perhaps?”, man: “Can I have your number”, moi: “No, certainly not, I have a boyfriend!”. So there we have it, I find myself at a loss. I blame the nature of salsa dancing; intimate, undoubtedly sexy, reckless. But whereas I come to life through salsa, I am repulsed by any man who missreads my happiness for anything other than my romance with dance. I am as repulsed as Victoria Beckham would be if her PA gave her a Primark stiletto; get it off me!

Come saturday night, after I don my kitten-heel ballroom shoes, dress my hair in red-rose hairpins and skip off into the sunset towards Kennington tube I pray that this time I will meet a great dancer who has a fabulous, salsa-phobic girlfriend waiting for him back home. Sprawled across silk bed-sheets in agent provocateur lingerie, preferably.

Pret a not so pretty

First up; the decline of the metropolitan sandwich store Pret a Manger.

I never thought it would come to this. The snazzy 42 second lunch-stop – well known for its bulging sarnies and manhattan lattes – is finally losing its charm. Whereas I once regarded the maroon and chrome interior as stylish and comfortable, I now find myself resenting its relative confinity and lack of limb space. Struggling over a square-inch of dining support does not a relaxing 30-minute lunch break make. I am woeful. The space no longer inspires, the punchy New York jazz tunes and perky employees fail to lift me from my city ennui and the extra charge to sit in seems more and more like a cruel joke. But it doesn’t stop there. The biggest crime of all is quite simple, but bad. The food is getting stale.  

I had noticed this on various recent trips to Pret. At first, however, I was persuaded to be forgiving. Like an indulgent mother to her winsome child, I could allow the odd slip up, the odd flaw. The rocket and crayfish ensemble with lemoney mayonnaise was consistently virtuous and tantalising, even if the bread was not as soft as once I remembered. Still, this did not overly concern me at the time. More recently however, it got worse. Being a fan of seafood sandwiches (another reason why I favoured Pret in the first place, since it offered flavours other than tinned tuna and sweetcorn which makes me want to cry), I opted for a recently new addition: flaky salmon, sliced egg and a vinegary mayo with rocket.  This time not only was the bread equally as uninspiring, but the salmon flakes themselves were agonisingly dry. I crumpled into my stool as I forced down the tough remains. The final betrayal came when I opened my bag of sea salt crisps and took a hopeful bite – only to find myself chewing a crisp more flexible than Darcy Bussell. That’s right my friends, those crisps were oldy mouldy. And when you’ve paid a fiver for dry fish and bendy crisps, you ain’t a happy little worker.

 I think it may be a long time until I am once more forced to spend my hard earned pennies in Pret, but when you remember the chain is owned by the evil capitalist execs who inflict us with McDonalds, suddenly the revolt seems a whole lot easier to muster. In the meantime, anyone know where I can get a tasty panini?

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