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The week thus far: A modern day coffee-drinking flâneur


It's 11:54 am on Thursday 16th 2015. I have just watched a TED talk which has made me question everything about my career thus far, and I am now waiting for the plumber to arrive to fix the shower... ("Er, I should be at your house between 8am and 1pm. Or later. I'm not sure").

It's incredibly glamorous being a comedian. I'm effectively a Vampire, except my coffin is a flat in Zone 2 with unstable wifi.

The tasks today involve polishing off some erotica for Lolitics next week and putting the final touches on Being Barbarella, alongside the joys of paying off bills and being a functioning adult who needs to work out who to vote for in the elections. FUN FUN FUN. Also, 3 hours of Ping Pong in the evening, because a girl needs to exercise.

Glamour aside, I am trying to be healthy. I emphasise the word 'trying'. My major attempt so far is that I have swapped my normal vat of coffee in the morning for LEMON water. I know, how modern. Apparently Lemons are really 'in' at the moment, you can't be seen without one. If you read any womens' magazine you would not be wrong for thinking that the key to becoming any high flying female CEO in the UK is to devour the yellow stuff and eat lentils.

So, I bought ten, and for the last week I have decapitated one every morning very aggressivly in my pre-I-haven't-had-a-coffee-yet mental state and dropped one into a big jug of boiling water and watched it whimper. I drink it all at my desk and think "Well, I hope this is doing something".

Then, after half an hour (that's apprently the amount of time you need to leave yourself for the lemons to 'settle into your system and work on your toxins') I hurridly switch to my normal 4 espresso spoons of coffee and all is right with the world.

****

When my flatmates saw me make a vat of coffee the other day they looked shocked.

"How many vats of these do you drink a day?" Heidi asked.

"About three" I replied cheerily.

[pause]

"No wonder you never sleep" said Ollie.

****

When I served my friend Sam coffee he looked scared. Sat on the sofa he eyed the black liquid with the thickness of melted chocolate in his mug and then looked me in the eyes:

"Do you always drink this much coffee?"

"Yes"

"Riiiigght"

[pause]

"It's quuuiiitttee strong"

He then asked for a tap water.

He behaved in the same unnerved manner that Police Sergeant Neil Howie treated the inhabitants of Summerisle in 'The WIcker Man'. I think he was worried he was going to have a heart attack.

******

Clearly I have a problem when it comes to coffee, but it could be worse. It could be heroin.

So, second to eating tons of lemons I have also given up taking public transport during the day. This weather is too beautiful to be stuck underground, so instead I am walking from gig to gig, to meeting to meeting, job to job. I have become my own modern-day flaneur, rekindling the love for adventure that I picked up back in Australia. Walking is phenomonal for the writers mind, and the act of being in a constant state of slow calm motion is very meditiative - it is like I am completing my own mini-version of The Knowledge. The highlight being a walk from Oval to Dalston - which was a surprisingly simple yet intricate walk.

The result of this daily adventure on foot is that not only do I feel far more confident walking around the city, spending at least 2 hours of my day off my sodding-soul-destroying-iphone, but my map-reading skills are second to none and my legs have now Terminator-esque power to them. I feel like a superhero but with the calm mind of a jedi.

Also, for those two hours of daily walking, I can't hold a coffee, which means my heart rate gets a well deserved break.

Instead I just carry lots of lemons with me.

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