Another morning spent frowning and worrying over a pile of inscrutable books. This is a challenge.

By lunchtime I had thrown in the towel, and noticing it was enticingly sunny outside, I woke Jude from her daytime slumber and off we galloped along the Thames path and through the foot tunnel to Greenwich Park. Jude chased squirrels like an absolute loon for an hour, with me following behind as we traversed the royal park in an entirely random fashion.

Exhausted, we hurried home in time for me to dash out again to The Kings Arms in Waterloo to meet B&H (a satisfying smoke) for a Christmas catch up and reminiscences of past glories. All very jolly, although the pub was so packed you could hear the original wooden beams creaking, and it was possible to lift your feet off the ground and maintain a vertical attitude. Found some car keys on the tube, and drove home in a Ferrari.

Confused? I am.

Actually, this essay really is a bugger. I can’t seem to get a foothold. I’m reading all this stuff and I’m not sure it’s linking together in my mind, which it needs to do before I can start writing. I’m becoming aware of the passing of time and a rather ominous deadline lumbering across the horizon.

John came in out of the cold and through sheer technical wizardry (involving a large amount of wires, gizmos and gadgetry), made me all wireless. I can now blog in the bog and surf in the bath. It’s a boon. Piles of pizza for tea.

Kids in the fire and logs in the tree

Monday. Ah, Monday, and little to do except walk the dog, get the weekly shopping in, and start work on my essay. Got all Christmassy during the evening and trimmed the tree to the strains of Wham and Mud.

Wild party

Off to West Hampstead for a Christmas lunch. Met J at Waterloo and journeyed on the Jubilee Line, pausing for a swift coffee en route. The champagne was flowing, and we were soon feasting on a superb selection of antipasti, roast chicken and a fine tarte aux poires, all washed down with an ample sufficiency of robust and ebullient wines. After many hours a table we stumbled out into the dark night air. A nightcap at Waterloo and then home…as they say in Spain, where’s the day go?

Old before I die

After last night’s shenanigans I felt weary all day. Managed to summon up the energy to get up and walk Jude first thing, then spent the day generally pottering about, filing away all my course notes and putting off working on my essay. Mmm, I feel a bout of procrastination coming on.

Student shenanigans

It would be really useful if I spoke German. It appears that most of the theory I need to read for my next essay is written in German, so what chance have I got? Nine.

Ever hopeful, I struggled into the library, stopping in the madly busy Canary Wharf mall for a tiny bit of Christmas shopping, loathe as I am to indulge in this mad commercially-dictated consumerist activity of waste, greed and gluttony. Yet, we all blindly buy into it year after year...learning nuffink. Charles Dickens has a lot to answer for, if he wasn't so busy doing the twist in his grave.

Anyway, who's not listening to Sufjan Stevens? I've been addicted since 2004, and I really need to discuss this with somebody...namechecked by Snow Patrol, but still generally quite obscure. Perhaps it's better this way. So, I make it to the library at Senate House, and settle myself behind a desk somewhere in the artificially-lit claustrophobia-inducing confines of the 6th floor - that's the tower in the photo - intimidating innit? I find loads of relevant books - happy with my haul I try to read them - mmm, not so successful. There may be trouble ahead. Please would somebody explain Reception Theory to me between now and the New Year? And it's nothing to do with hotel lobbies.

This evening's lecture featured a guest speaker to discuss sexuality in Victorian London as portrayed in the novels of Sarah Waters. Bold. Lesbians all over the shop. Let's talk about queer London, oh and Happy Christmas. Afterwards we all trooped along to the bar at the Tavistock Hotel and stayed too long, which meant an interesting journey home in the company of many drunken office party revellers. I got chatted up on the DLR by a posse of drink-sodden women of a certain age...they said I looked like Jon Bon Jovi - that's how well their beer goggles were functioning - 'Perhaps you mean Catweazel?', I suggested helpfully. As I made to get off the train two of them grabbed me tried to stop me from leaving, but being on the wobbly side of well-balanced, they lost their footing and ended up in a writhing heap of bingo-winged limbs on the vommit-smudged floor. I carefully disentangled myself from their grasping hands and disembarked as quickly as I could without looking back. The stuff of nightmares!

Catching flies

I headed off to the British Library to begin researching for my next essay. I learnt the meaning of words like wirkungsgeschichte and rezeptionsasthetik which I now intend to throw into everyday conversation.

While I was in the library, I became aware of a bit of a kerfuffle at the information desk. A terribly posh elderly woman was demanding various things in a very loud voice, and disturbing the whole of the vast reading room. Eventually she sat down, presumably waiting for her books, and promptly fell asleep with her mouth hanging open. That was about 1pm, and she was still there in the same position when I left at 4.30pm. Perhaps she had died there.

I scurried around Birkbeck library, scooping up books with all the gusto of a contestant on Supermarket Sweep and then made my way to the lecture on Interdisciplinarity - oh dear! This time it was me who was catching flies. A cure for insomnia has finally been located in Bloomsbury. Dull as ditch water. Nothing that a few pints of the barman's finest over at the SU couldn't put right, including a lively debate on Mahler. It all happens dunnit?

Reception theory

And so it goes. One down, one to go. I began research on my essay based on Reception Theory. All good stuff I'll have you know.

By the end of the day, my brain was that fuzzy with the reading of all this critical theorising, that The Royal Variety Performance was a welcome no-brainer. Barry Manilow, Ken Dodd and Rod Stewart - it's cutting edge stuff. Who needs Spitting Image with grotesques such as these?

Signed, sealed, delivered...well, almost!

The good news is, it's all done. The essay that is. Written, annotated, bibliographied, and tomorrow it will be printed and bound, and I shall hand it in on Wednesday, two days early. Unless I decide to change it again - doh! The bad news is I've only got three and a half weeks until my next essay is due...gulp! So, apart from finishing an incredibly long essay on the changing patterns of patronage in the 19th century, and having a complete spac-attack (can I say that?) when my laptop decided to shut-down and none of the changes I'd made in 5 hours working on it had been saved - I cried - but I carried on and it's done.

I won't mention it again. Well, I might.

Here's a picture of Jude hunting bush tucker in Greenwich Park. Those pesky squirrels!

Daaaaarn in Margate

I was up with the lark to walk Jude before dashing off to Victoria and taking the train to Margate, meeting up with Juliette and Trent on the way. Di met us at the station and we trooped back to her fabulous house for a delicious lunch. By the time we got out for a walk along the seafront it was already dark, and it was pretty cold and windy too, so we just paused briefly to stare into the inky blackness relieved only by the occasional line of white water as the waves broke beneath the promenade. We found a cosy pub, ideal for a couple of aperitifs and then went back to the house to make dinner. Juliette and I excelled with a parsnip and sweet potato mash, and a butternut squash flan. Washed down with plenty of vino, it was a superb evening. Di and I sat up late discussing our various cod-philosophies, which thank goodness my brain decided not to store.

Sunday was beautifully sunny, and we headed back down for a blow along the front. The obligatory fish and chips lunch was partaken overlooking the harbour, and it wasn't long before we were embarking back upon the rather arduous journey home, which involved a bus to Faversham and a train which stopped at every pillar and gatepost after that. Nevermind, I was home in time for the Antiques Roadshow (!), a soak in the bath and The Producers on DVD which was a hoot.

Soanes

Today, me and some of my fellow-studentinos were treated to a private tour of Sir John Soanes Museum. I've been there before, so I knew we were in for a bit of a treat. It was great to be shown around, and I still got that tingly-sensation when the curator in the picture room opened up the flaps to reveal what is hidden behind. One of the top places to visit in London I reckon. Next time I go it's going to be a drawing class I am told - yikes!

We retired for lunch in a nearby pub (which served an excellent pint of Bombardier I must say) before heading off to college, stopping for a coffee and muffin along the way. The evening was spent discussing Victorian sexual morality and porn, which is always a nice way to round off a Friday. I was knackered and headed home for Simon Schama's fantastic Rothko episode.

Monday through Thursday

OK, so I'm crap at keeping this up, as it were. But I've been under a bit of pressure writing my first proper, MA standard essay. When you haven't done anything like it for 15 years, it becomes quite a challenge. Not only that, but I find myself questioning everything - is this good enough? What are they looking for? Who ate the last chocolate digestive?

While I was worrying away at my essay on Monday, I received a phonecall from a very good friend who's a violinist in the Royal Opera House orchestra, asking if I wanted to go and see the final dress rehearsal of Carmen the following morning. I considered it for a nanosecond and then accepted. So, on Tuesday morning, there's me standing in the pissing rain outside the ROH stage door in Floral Street waiting for my ticket, watching the horse and donkey being delivered ready for their stage debut. I ended up in the coffee shop supping americanos with members of the cast in full costume and make-up, before being ushered to my seat in the orchestra stalls. The house was full and the opera was stunning all the way. This is how the other half live. It was only 11 o'clock in the morning, and there I was, jobless and skint enjoying some of the very best in artistic performance London has to offer. Mustn't grumble, can't complain.

Just enough time to rush home and walk Jude and get myself back into town to meet H for dinner before making our way to the New Ambassadors theatre to see Love Song, the new comedy by John Kolvenbach. Starring Cillian Murphy and Neve Campbell, it was an excellent play, although I'm not sure if it was comedy or drama. Great performances though. Not a bad day all round!

On Wednesday I spent most of the afternoon in the library at Birkbeck, before meeting up with my personal tutor (oh yes) to discuss and agree the title of my research project for the spring term. We finally agreed on...wait for it: Investigating public spectatorship via technology and materiality. It's a corker isn't it! Don't ask me what it means - I've only got to do it!

Thursday was spent in the British Library, with an evening lecture on Convergence and Music in Art History which was interesting, followed by our little Christmas party. Everybody brought in drinks and nibbles which we proceeded to consume in the lecture room until the security guard kicked us out at some ungodly hour.

Picture gallery

Well now things appear to be working again, I can start using pictures like in the olden days and stuff.

Not much to say, because after a smashing evening in Wimbledon, which made it three in a row, I spent Sunday in the recovery position.

This is a sketch by Lord Leighton, by the way.

A week is a long time in art history

Oh bother. A whole week seems to have slipped by like a knob of butter across a hot frying pan. And what have I got to show for it? A bottle of whisky and a pain behind my eyes? Well, yes and no, but I have been a busy bee. In fact I'm busier now than I've ever been. How did that happen?

The week started off sedately enough. Monday and Tuesday I was incredibly st-st-studious and spent the entire time working on my essay. It's meant to be 5000 words but I'm already well over 6000 - better to edit down than to pad out is what I think. By Wednesday, the walls were coming in at me, and as I gazed in a boss-eyed fashion at my laptop screen, dazzled by the sun reflecting off it, I thought bollocks to this. I need to get out of here. So I grabbed Jude (who up until that point was gently napping on the sofa and was slightly puzzled as to what was going on) and we headed along the riverside to the Greenwich foot tunnel, emerging by the Cutty Sark and than spending the next two hours larking about in the right-royal park. There was an abundance of squirrels and Jude was in her element. Unfortunatley the little icon which enables me to post pictures here seems to have disappeared - hopefully temporarily - cos I've got some loverly snaps so I have.

Anyway, I'm giving away the plot. But it's all done in the best possible taste. Thursday I packed my satchel and spent the day in the British Library doing research for my essay. The British Library is just brilliant - I love it. You just look up books on the internet database, request them, turn up and there they are. If you order more a little sign lights up on your desk when they're ready - how cool is that? And it's free.

The evening lecture was about gothic architecture, based around Prague and Prague Cathedral and Charles IV. Most interesting - as was the discussion in the bar afterwards. Stayed too long, which led to...

...bleary eyes on Friday. But I was up with the lark and off to the Chola Sacred Bronzes exhibition at the Royal Academy which is fascinating, although I would have liked to have had a bit more information (6.5/10), then on to Kensington and Leighton House. What an intriguing place - not what I was expecting, although I'm not sure what I was expecting. Not a fountain and a stuffed peacock in the hall that's for certain. Amazing decor, and amongst other things, stuffed full of Burne-Jones paintings, and of course Leighton masterpieces. The exhibition of drawings (A Victorian Master) is well worth a visit.

Afterwards I returned, after a five year absence, to my old stomping ground: Local Government House in Smith Square for my successor's leaving drinks. Great to catch up with everyone again - before I knew what had happened it was 11pm...and I had had too much Kronenberg. Doh!