London's deserted - it must be Xmas

It's almost Christmas which means hordes of Londoners desert the city like rats from a sinking ship. Having spent two New years eves in this city I can wholeheartedly say the best thing to do is to leave because no one else is here. So off I go once again to sunnier shores. A bit of sun, and more importantly seeing family. Is it just plain wrong to admit you havent seen your parents in a year? Or your brother in almost three years - having missed the moments of his life when he went from 17 to a 20 year old adult? It's because we are such a nomadic lot - parents travelling more than kids, we are dispersed across the continents like islands onto ourselves.
So bye to annoying neighbours - the crazy old insomniac lady who lives upstairs and despite it being winter opens her windows from midnight onwards and blares her TV as loud as it will go, or the Portugese couple downstairs who will never open their door to us even though we suspect our bathroom is leaking into their ceiling and are constantly cooking aromatic foods all day long every day - Good bye to the weather although really it hasn't gotten that cold - Goodbye to that you-suspect-you-maybe getting a cold feeling so keep shoving echinacea and vitamin C down your throat - Goodbye to isolation and sitting for hours infront of the computer willing yourself to write. Goodbye to Xmas parties - which is unusual for me but this year has bought quite a few invites and there you are at the Globe theatre watching old white people dance to a terrible house band playing Abba. Goodbye... for now. It all starts again in Jan.
Merry Xmas, Eid, Hannukah, whatever... And here's praying and hoping next year is a good one.

Thank God its not November

Wow November what a month! At one point I could've sworn I was about to have bits of brain come out of my ears - now that's a pleasant image. There was a play, radio scripts, short story launch, oh and this little novel thing I'm writing. Thank God a lot of it is over. When you look back at it, it all sounds glamourous having a play on at a theatre in Soho, and meeting your script editor at the members only Bafta bar, and meeting politicians and famous writers at the launch of this book in which your story is published in. But at the end of it, when the dust has settled you realise, what a load of rubbish. Really, at the end of it what are you left with? Just some small talk and cringey memories of you drinking too much because you were nervous. I know I shouldn't be like that. It's all good, it's all London.

So anyway this month is going to be about vacant, vacuous pursuits like - celebrity gossip blogs such as popsugar and dlisted. And ridiculous TV shows like Girls of the Playboy Mansion - which if you havent seen it, well how can I describe it but its basically a show about the 80 year-old Hugh Hefner cavorting with 20-something blonde fembots. There's nothing creepier than the sight of his quivering wet lips reaching out to them for a kiss. Ugggggh.
And to add a dose of reality see how rich you are on a global scale.