Short but French

Urban art

Featuring Bertnam Dixon a.k.a. "Angry Thin Ear".

AND that was before any drugs got involved in the evening.

It's wrong to be mean

But Sophie just suggested we'd start calling Shoreditch House "Whoreditch House" and I though it was quite funny.

Excuse my absence...

... but I've been working out.

Let me tell you how it all started. Well, as you're aware of, I've been spending large amounts of time drinking espressos martinis (v. nice: try it) by the pool up in Shoreditch House. As this was becoming slightly embarassing (barmen having proposed to create a "buy 10 espresso martinis get a complimentary prociutto ciabatta for free" loyalty scheme specially for me), I thought I needed to come up with a more noble reason to be spending time there.

And there it was: the GYM. I've had my induction last Sat, which I attended with a mix of disdain and light-headedness. But when I saw the look on John's face - he's my fitness coach- when I told him I did NOT have a fitness objective, it made me re-think my prejudices. It wasn't shock or incomprehension - but blatant sadness and empathy, leading me to realise how much I was probably missing out on life for NOT having a fitness objective.

So now I do have one: running an hour three times a week. It's not a very proper fitness objective (proper fitness objectives sound a lot more scientific, along the lines of "toning up oblique abs in order to achieve overall upper body firmness") but it suits my warrior nature. I'm not there yet, but I know I've got that strength inside of me.

Excitement! Weekly Competition!

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This isn't exactly sexy but it's VERY exciting. It is the first ever edition of the soon-to-be weekly ShortButFrench competition.

Thur, 12th of July question: what is the name of that ridiculous new building that the City of London just agreed to spend billions on? It's the big one on the left. The picture is computer-processed as you can see from the fact that it's sunny.

First one to come up with the correct answer wins a French kiss (worth £2)

London cruising

Yesterday, the TOUR DE FRANCE took off in London. Of course I had to do something anti-social about it, which is why I chose to dedicate this day to CARS.

For a start, I drove back all the way from Paris. Coping with the Tunnel was a little bit better than the first time as I knew what to expect but this is clearly still not my favourite. For those who've never done it, this is how it goes: you're stuck in a car, in a train, in a tunnel, under the sea. AND it's full of middle-aged Britts in beige trousers cleaning the front window of their open-roof sports cars (as featured in the pic).

Back home in Shoreditch, there was a phat Al-Qaida wedding going on in the City Hall right next to the house. With women in burqas and a 4-Wheeler limo. I hung out with them for a little while - what could be MORE anti-social than hanging out with Islamists in a 4-wheeler limo in East London on a Sunday afternoon? I was dragged away by my mother  though, who kept saying she wanted to go to Notting Hill.

I brought her to Brick Lane instead, as it was part of my plan, because of the yearly car-boot art fair. I particularly liked "the man who sold the world", an art performance consisting in selling countries to people in the streets for £2, under the form of little paper flags. Made me wonder why I didn't pick "contemporary artist" as a job rather than "strategic planner".

Numbers are scary

If you feel in a gloomy mood, I recommend you DON'T visit the death clock. It's a very funny little program that can predict the day of your death based on a couple of simple data (medical family history, lifestyle, age, gender and weight). As far as I'm concerned, it's actually good news (I'll live until the blessed age of 99 yrs, and quitting smoking would only allow to gain 2 years - fuck the ban)... But the little clock ticking down seconds to your death, however remote, still clearly triggers some sort of anxiety.

More terrifying again, is worldometers. Knowing that 95,033 people have already died today (and counting) might help you to feel better about your own fatal deadline. But just watch the number of hunger-related deaths today grow right next to the amount spent on dieting products in the US. What a wonderful world. I can't believe I have to spend an extra 74 years in this dump.