Pity Party

Well, I survived brunch last weekend, although I didn’t escape as lightly as planned. Instead of enjoying a single extra spicy Bloody Mary as strategized in advance I ended up drinking 3 glasses of sangria – what can I say, it was free and delicious, I'm amazed I didn't drink more - and a glass of red wine, which sounds like a good amount I know, but it was over the course of 10hours so not too bad considering, yup, a 10hour brunch, which is pretty much just a regular Sunday afternoon with Lola. I knew I’d get swept along despite the best of intentions. It was fun though; however I’ve turned her down for the next brunch this coming Sunday. For my liver’s sake brunches with Lola are a once a month treat

How did your St Valentine’s Day go? Did you have a good one? My Valentine’s Day was a non-event as you might imagine being the spinster of this parish. I stayed in with my best friend Sauvignon Blanc and regrettably ordered ‘Nights in Rodanthe’ on pay per view. A terrible movie, I don’t recommend it at all. I’m not really one for romantic movies, but for some reason it seemed appropriate for the day, but I wish I’d watched something more action oriented. I think that Taken movie with Liam Neeson might have been more up my street, but it's yet to arrive on cable and there was no way I was risking snuggling couples at the movies on my own. My good friend Melissa fared much better than me with her St Valentine's Day, she went and got herself engaged can you believe. Her boyfriend took her for a romantic dinner for two at the Four Seasons restaurant and proposed with the assistance of a waiter who brought over one of those big domed silver serving trays just before dessert…et voila…an engagement ring. She was thrilled and said she didn’t suspect a thing, but she said she stuffed it on her finger and hoped no-one else in the restaurant noticed. She’s like me that way, not so big on the public displays. I prefer relationship related events to be low key and intimate which is probably why Gobshite and I were destined to be a disaster, he was always wanting to show me off which is a move guaranteed to make me want to run away and hide, I detest being the center of attention. Even though she’s not so keen either Melissa deals with that sort of thing a lot more graciously than I do, but fortunately for her, her boyfriend didn’t get down on bended knee in a jammed restaurant, but instead proposed quietly and assured her that no-one else near their table had noticed a thing. They’d already discussed getting engaged a few months ago, but she said the timing was a surprise. She’s like the 4th person I know who got engaged on St. Valentine’s Day, which made me hold a mirror up to my own disastrous personal life and start assessing exactly what is wrong with me and why I’m so terminally single. Sigh!! Living in New York doesn’t help I can tell you that much. I read once that there are something like 100,000 more single women than men in this city, so you're always going to have at least 100,000 more single women. Maybe I'm just destined to be one of them. Sex and the City my arse!!

Admittedly I’m having a bit of a pity party at the moment (seasonal affective disorder?), although my state of mind isn’t helped by the fact that I have an awful cold, or perhaps it is a touch of the flu. I am not sure, but all my nerves seem to be stood to attention and I have the feverish thing going on. Even my hair hurts!! I swear I can feel it growing. I took one of my carry over vacation days on Friday – I carried over 3days and it’s a case of use ‘em or lose ‘em by the end of March which is only a few weeks away can you believe – to recuperate and with the exception of a low key night out with Melissa on Saturday – a lovely time was had by all at Gottino on Greenwich Avenue, where they have lovely wine, may I recommend the Nosiola and even lovelier young men behind the bar - I’ve pretty much laid on the sofa the entire weekend and watched the entire first season of Lost, which I never watched when it was on, even though I’ve watched every season since. Unfortunately despite my best efforts my health declined rapidly over the weekend - it didn't help that I was woken up at 5am on Sunday morning by drunkards stumbling down my street chanting "Eng-er-land, Eng-er-land, Eng-er-land" and then my neighbour above clattering home - and I felt so awful yesterday that I decided it would be wise to take the day off sick from work today. My calorie intake over the last few days has primarily been made up of soup, Halls Advanced Vapour Action cherry flavoured lozenges and Vicks Dayquil although the latter don’t seem to be helping much and I decided today I needed something which would dehydrate me a little bit and stop my eyes and nose from streaming, so I dragged myself over to the off license/liquor store and bought a couple of miniatures of whiskey and brewed myself a hot toddy with honey and lots of lemon for vitamin C. It was nice and soothing, but it didn’t really work as planned since now I just feel slightly drunk with watery eyes and a runny nose, but the drunkenness makes the symptoms that much easier to deal with. Anyway I am going to lie on the sofa some more and travel and eat vicariously via Anthony Bourdain!!