GETTING CHRISTMASSY

We went to our second roller derby yesterday, but unfortunately it was not as fun as the first. It was absolutely packed - which was weird, as there had been hardly anyone there the first time we went - so the atmosphere was good, but we discovered that the fun of the bout depends entirely on the quality of the MC.

Without a fast-talking, funny person on the microphone, keeping things exciting and whipping the crowd into a frenzy, the roller derby is a kind of lame spectacle of girls whizzing around a track on roller skates.

There were small mercies for which to be grateful for, though - this time we didn't see David and boring Jackie. But we did have to move seats because a kid was having great fun kicking my back incessantly. Aaahh.

There were two bouts - one with a visiting team from Philadelphia(?) - but we left halfway through the second one, in time to see 'Four Christmasses' in Chinatown. We'd been really looking forward to the movie - Witherspoon! Vaughn! Favreau! Chenoweth! - but unfortunately it was a little disappointing. Put it this way - it ain't no 'Role Models'. I wonder if anything ever could be...

I helped out at Sunday School this morning and was then grumpy to find that the church service marking the beginning of Advent was in the Taizé style. I don't much enjoy kooky ways of worshipping, but this ended up being a revelation. The mode of worship takes its name from a region of France where the tradition first started and is the most beautiful combination of stunningly simple chants and silence that is very moving and conducive to reflection. The form of worship evolved in WWII, as a way of bridging the divides between faiths and uniting religious people with a simple, lowest-common-denomiator kind of approach. It was a really amazing service.

I spent most of this afternoon toiling away on our Christmas cards, suddenly feeling an affinity with small children forced to do fiddly manual labour that is seemingly endless. Fie on you, PaperSource!

The memory of 'Four Christmasses' was roundly dispelled this evening, when we watched the wonderful 'Sabrina', which I've never seen before but absolutely loved. I'd never 'got' Humphrey Bogart before, having only seen him in 'Casablanca', but he was so great in this movie! And obviously Audrey Hepburn is incredible. It's a very close-run race for my favourite director ever: Frank Capra or Billy Wilder...

PHOTOS: THANKSGIVING

Click HERE for photos of our week in LA

THANKSGIVING

I'm not really sure we're meant to celebrate Thanksgiving - aren't people giving thanks for finally escaping from tyrannical British rule, back in the day?

Ah well, as a big fan of all things American, the offer to experience a proper family Thanksgiving was too good to pass up, so after I made some sticky parsnips this morning and then locked Tom's keys in the boot of his car, along with the many other dishes and gifts Bambi has been slaving over (whoops), we headed to Orange County - the OC! - to spend the day with the husband of Bambi's deceased aunt.

Turns out - and to be fair, I had been warned - that Orange County is nothing like the fancypants paradise depicted in 'The OC' on TV. The area we went to was kind of weird and suburban and we got lost in a maze of streets for quite some time.

Eventually we found the house and were very warmly welcomed by the masses of Bam's relatives who were there. Bambi had warned us that most people there would be pretty right wing and that we'd probably be better off avoiding politics as a subject and she wasn't wrong!

Most of the people were very conservative and Bam's uncle-by-marriage converted to Mormonism after the death of his wife and his family are very religious, with one of his daughters heading off to be a missionary in Florida for two years.

There were a couple of cute kids running around and a bunch of old people I didn't really talk to. It was nice to see Bambi's family and to chat to her Dad and brother and her Mum even joined me, jumping up and down on the huge trampoline we spotted in the back garden!

Everyone was terribly friendly and we felt very welcome as we worked our way down the seemingly endless line of dishes of meat, yams (yeay!), creamed corn (euch) and other Thanksgiving staples. Conversation did meander into politics over lunch, which revealed some interesting points of view, but it was all very amicable.

I didn't much warm to the husband of Bam's cousin, who repossesses cars for a living and likes it, or the husband of another of her cousins who asked us what we're going to do about the Muslim problem in London, referred to DC as 'a very dark city' and proudly talked about his love of guns and cars. But hey, it was all part of the experience!

Max and I had a nice time - probably more in an anthropological way than anything else - but I think Bam and Tom were relieved to leave. We watched the awesome 'Johnny Guitar' (top of their list of movies we should see) when we got home and then watched another film, too, but I fell asleep, as befits one who's gorged themselves on festive food all day.

This morning, we cruised down the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) to a lovely beach called Paradise Cove, stopping off at Malibu Pier on the way. It was far too cold to lounge about at the beach, so we wandered up and down for a while and then had a deliciously enormous lunch that would keep Max and me going on the flight home. *sniff*

One consolation for leaving our fun friends/family was that 'Wall-E' was shown on the plane, once more managing to reduce Max and me to tears, despite being on one of those tiny communal screens (it's SO good!). And we also watched 'Journey To The Centre Of The Earth' which was in no way good, though we did chuckle when Brendan Fraser said, "Ladies and gentlemen [there are only two other people with him], I give you... the centre of the earth".

It was really late by the time we landed and the SuperShuttle ride home took FOREVER, adding insult to the injury of our fun (but cold) holiday being over.

BRRRR

SECOND EVER LA CELEB SPOT: I saw 'Simpsons' creator Matt Groening waiting to cross the road this afternoon!

It's soooo cooold in LA at the moment. And today, it rained! I packed entirely inappropriately for such a climate and am wearing the warmest outfit I have, which is unfortunately shorts and a t-shirt. Brrrr. Unfortunate for me, because I'm not warm, unfortunate for those around me because I've been wearing the same thing for days.

It's awesome, hanging out with Tom and Bambi - they're both excellent company and it's a real treat for me to hang with them and Maxy all together.

Tom had to work yesterday, at the frame-making workshop, so Bam kindly drove Max and I around the area. Again, we did lots that I did when I was here in the summer, but I didn't mind at all, because I really like LA now and it was nice to show familiar things to Max. So we hit Venice pier and Abbott Kinney, the cool street of shops that's like a fancy Chiswick High Street.

We swung by Tom's workshop to see where he worked and meet his crazy colleague who's covered in tattoos of monkeys. I made the mistake of making a 'get the monkey off your back' joke, only to have him say that he did that few years ago, when he got clean from heroin. Whoops.

We whisked Tom off for lunch at a nearby Chinese, before dropping him back at work and heading to the lovely Landmark cinema (with ushers! and sofas!) to see 'Slumdog Millionaire', to escape the pouring rain.

I really loved the movie. It was a great story and the child actors were adorable. And I thought Danny Boyle did a great job, making Mumbai larger-than-life, such that I could almost feel the heat and smell the smells of the streets and slums the camera was dashing through. The soundtrack was awesome, too.

Max and I were a bit on edge throughout, because the actor playing the lead - Dev Patel - is easily the worst and most wooden thing in 'Skins' - a Channel 4 series - and we weren't looking forward to watching him carry a film. But fortunately he didn't have much to do, so didn't spoil it for us. The guy playing the host of 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire' was hilarious - who wants to be... a millinaaaire?!

Last night, Tom and Bam treated us to Mexican at El Cholo - a restaurant they took me to in the summer and whose prawn fajitas I'd been dreaming about ever since. Mmmmm, SO good!

Over dinner, Tom and Bam compiled a list for us of cool old movies featuring women with moxie, that they think we'd enjoy. It was really fun, hearing all the crazy plots and watching them debate which films were worth putting on the list and I can't wait to start ordering them from NetFlix.

The whole conversation got me to thinking - the gift of knowledge really shouldn't be underestimated - that list that Tom and Bam have given us is going to last much longer than any Christmas present they could give us. I wonder if I could persuade my family that we should just give each other the gift of knowledge this year...!

Tom took today off work and the four of us spent this morning on a hazardous adventure, into the Projects of Watts, to see the Watts Towers. Bambi was not on board with this whole endeavour from the outset: she's lived here her whole life and there's a reason that she's never been to that part of town.

Tom resisted the temptation to put the roof of his car down and blast out gangsta rap, but we were very excited to see real life crack whores and 'street hoppers' on the corner of one street, just like in 'The Wire'! We also saw a huge funeral parade crawling down the other side of the road, and a man zooming along the street in a wheelchair, which Bam said was most probably because he'd been shot.

I thought the Watts Towers were going to be gigantic, and perhaps two big tower blocks in the middle of an estate that were now considered cool, like the Trellick Tower in London. But they're kind of small (and once was in scaffolding). They were built over 33 years by a crazy guy, who decorated them with 'found objects' like bits of bottles and plates. There are all sorts of sad stories surrouding them, like neighbours vandalising them, the local authorities trying to tear them down and someone pay $3 or something for them. But now they're officially a National Historical Landmark.

As such, if Watts is really that bad, the bad people are really missing a trick by not hanging out nearby to steal nice cameras from tourists! Perhaps they're out when the weather's nicer, because it was really bleak and wet this morning.

Bam was very happy when we finally beat a hasty retreat out of the 'hood and the four of us went our separate ways this afternoon: Bambi and I sat in static traffic to get to the Valley to go for lunch with Bam's best friend Julia and her little girl Zola, while Tom and Maxy went record shopping at Amoeba.

On our way back to the flat, Bambi needed to pick up a pie for Thanksgiving tomorrow, so swung by the bakery she'd put an order in with, only to find a huge queue stretching all the way around the block! So we sped off and got an apple pie from the supermarket instead!

For supper, we met another friend of Bambi's - Patty - for deliiiicious Korean barbecue. Mmm, it was a feast of meat! Patty is Korean, so ordered us all the best stuff and I was stuffed by the time we left. I hope I have room for some yams and turkey tomorrow!

JOSHUA TREE

Turns out some people have jobs to do, and Tom is one of those people, so he wasn't around during the day today and Nina left for Thanksgiving with her Mum first thing this morning, so Max and I took ourselves off to the desert for an adventure.

Nina very generously lent us her sweet sweet ride, and we drove off in the sunny sunshine to the Joshua Tree National Park, about two hours' drive from Tom and Nina's home.

It was lovely weather this morning and Nina's car has the facility for playing an ipod through the speakers, so we put the top down, put the Beach Boys on the stereo and headed off on our adventure.

It felt really good to be doing something proper with our day, rather than mooching about the streets of West Hollywood, or whatever, and I'm so pleased we made the effort.

En route, we passed a gigantic wind farm. My Dad hates energy windmills and is campaigning against them popping up all over Dorset, but I think there's something quite cool and beautiful about lots of them in a big open space. Perhaps it's just the landscape of the future and something we have to get used to.

As well as the cool cacti there, Joshua Tree is famous for being the place that Gram Parsons (one of my all-time favourite singer/songwriters) would go and get very high, eventually dying of an overdose in room 8 of the Joshua Tree Inn, aged 26. Unfortunately, we whizzed past the motel before really registering what it was, which is a shame.

Also a shame was our inability to resist the cliche of playing U2's album 'Joshua Tree' as we entered the park. I can only apologise.

The park is so cool. It's vast, with one road going through it, passing quite distinct phases. The first phase was of cool, spindly cacti, a bit like something from Dr Seuss:

The second phase was of cool yellow rocks that had been weathered and kind of rounded by centuries of erosion:

The aptly named 'Skull Rock'

We would get out of the car from time to time, to wander around and clamber over rocks. We encountered a couple of families at Arch Rock, where the two Dads were taking the very young children up onto the huge stone arch.

Harking back to my days on walks in Dorset, trying to keep up with Tom and his impetuous rock-climbing ways, I decided to clamber up onto the arch, figuring if 6-year olds could do it, it could surely be no match for me.

Oh. My. Goodness. It was freakin' terrifying. I really very nearly had a panic attack when I got up there, because it was higher than any photo could really relate and really narrow, too. Plus, it didn't help that there was a gale-force wind/slight breeze (probably the latter) threatening to blow me off onto the unforgiving rocks below. Hddrdrdrdrr.

As much as I would've liked to've hung out up there, contemplating my navel, maybe doing a bit of yoga, I waited long enough for Maxy to take a photo, then gingerly climbed back down, mostly on my ass.

We went exploring for some caves nearby, but didn't find them and frankly I'd spent all my adventurousness chips and wanted to get back in the car and hit the road!

The final phase of the park was full of cholla cacti, which apparently hop! Though I didn't see that happen:

We left the park with plenty of time before we had to be back in town for tonight's bowling extravaganza and handover to Tom and Bambi, so we decided to take the long way back and check out Palm Springs.

Big mistake.

Firstly, it was much further away than we thought and, still reeling from my New Hampshire speeding ticket and encounter with the Angriest State Trooper Ever, I wasn't too keen to whizz along the freeway in a way that I might've done in the days before my $250 fine. So it took ages to get there and I was getting really stressed about not being back in LA in time for this evening's arrangements. Plus, the weather had really clouded over, so the roof was back up on the car and the Beach Boys were no longer on the stereo.

But worst of all, Palm Springs is just a real hole. We thought it'd be a cool, art deco kind of 50s playtown for wealthy and old people, but - certainly along the main drag - it was just a weird, soulless linear town with no defining or pleasant features at all.

Fortunately we made it back in time to meet Tom and head off to a bowling alley near Tom and Bambi's flat, where we busied ourselves shooting both aliens and hoops in the arcade bit, until Tom and Bam arrived and we had a fun evening of bowling. I love to bowl. It was really sad that Nina wasn't there and I think everyone was pretty pooped after a long day at work/in the desert, but it was fun to all hang out together and I threw a few rocks before Tom officially handed Max and me off to Tom and Bambi and we adjourned to Mar Vista for the second half of our LA visit.

GUITAR HERO WIDOW

FIRST EVER LA CELEB SPOT: Adam Levine, lead singer of Maroon 5 (and a bit of a tool), was mooching around the same supermarket where we bought dinner on Saturday night!

We're in LA! We flew in on Saturday (on the very pleasant Alaskan Air) and go home on Friday. We spent the weekend with Tommy and Nina and, as ever, it was wonderful to see them, as natural as if we hang out all the time, rather than only see each other once or twice a year, and lots of fun.

Our arrival in LA was somewhat marred by Max leaving my phone on the plane (ok, I guess I'm not allowed to be cross, if I wasn't prepared to look after it myself), so I had to dash back through security and all over LAX back to the gate, to pick it up. At least it was there!

It was quite important that I get my phone back (apart from for obvious reasons), because I was a little unclear as to whether Tom and Nina were picking us up or not. They offered but, because they live on the other side of LA from the airport, I insisted we take the SuperShuttle and just meet them at their house.

Tom's kindness is only matched by the strength of his will, and I've never known him to back down in a situation like this. So although we left it that we would get the bus, I kind of expected to see them at the airport and, when we didn't, had to call him to check he wasn't on his way or whatever.

Even when I was reunited with my phone, I couldn't reach Tom, so we got the SuperShuttle anyway, keeping an eye out for his car, in case we passed him coming into the airport. But we didn't. Instead, we found both Tom and Nina happily at home, waiting for us.

Maxy wasn't with me when I visited in the summer, so it was really nice for him to see Tom and Nina and their gorgeous home, and nice for me to be able to share the fun with Max. We headed straight out to get some lunch, then took Maxy up to the Griffith Observatory, which is one of the few things he hasn't done in LA but wanted to. Despite having been there on my last visit, I was so happy to go again, as we saw the most gorgeous sunset over the city:

We were all pretty snoozy by the time we left the observatory, so just headed to the supermarket, bought some food and then Maxy and I made Tom and Nina supper before we settled down to watch a movie, which I fell asleep in front of.

This morning, Tom and Nina made the terrible mistake of introducing Maxy to Guitar Hero on their PlayStation. He's utterly hooked! One of the many things about Max for which I am grateful is that he's not into computer games at all, so I don't have to contend with a zombified husband frantically pressing buttons for hours at a time and leaving me to go to bed while he tries to get to the next level of some game.

I also thought he was safe from the gigantic Guitar Hero craze, because he can actually play guitar, so surely pressing buttons instead of sliding fingers up and down strings would be really unsatisfying? Mais non. He loves it! And he's pretty good at it too. Tom is AMAZING at it, and is discovering all these rock bands whose songs are on the game. I stumbled my way through Pat Benatar's 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot', but wasn't too sad when it was time to go to brunch. I'm fairly sure Max was, though...

We went back to Cliff's Edge, where we had brunch last time I visited, and which I really really like. Even more so since Tom and Nina saw none other than Veronica Mars herself - Kristen Bell - there a few weeks ago! Unfortunately we did not, but the food was still very tasty.

Afterwards, we went in search of the tar pits, which are right in the middle of LA and which I thought would be vast and cool, but actually consist of a little pool of tar with a fake mammoth next to it. It's still pretty cool to think of that whole area that's now so built up and populated, once being sprawling masses of tar, where mammoths roamed.

Leaving the tar pits a little underwhelmed, we spent this afternoon cruising around the city, which is one of my favourite things to do there, especially in Nina's sweet convertible. We went along Hollywood Blvd, up into Laurel Canyon and the Hollywood Hills and to the Hollywood sign overlooking the reservoir.

I should perhaps have put the top up on the car before we pulled up at the House of Blues - legendary live music venue - to investigate who on earth was playing that had attracted such a gigantic, round-several-blocks queue. On discovering that it was the Jonas Brothers, I did my best tween impression by squealing, 'aargh! It's the Jonas Brothers'! Only to be set upon by grumpy fans and having to speed off, for fear of being glittered to within an inch of my life.

As we were cruising down Sunset, you'll never guess what we saw - an Idaho numberplate!! In fact, two of them, parked next to each other! I squealed louder than a tween coming face to face with a Jo Bro, screeched over to the side of the road and took a photo, thereby finally completing our set. Oh, happy day!

And what better way to cap off such a kickass day, than watching a kickass movie on a gigantic screen? We were all very excited to go and see 'Quantum of Solace' at the ArcLight - a humungous cinema screen. But unfortunatley the movie really sucks. It's kind of offensively bad. I had no idea what was going on half the time and the director - Marc Forster - seemed to have no sense of montage, so that shots were put together in a way that didn't make sense. It was so disappointing, because I LOVE 'Casino Royale' and had high hopes for the second Daniel Craig Bond movie. It did look very good, though - the production design was excellent - and I thought Olga Kurylenko was good, too.

GIGS & JAZZ HANDS

ONLY BUMMER ABOUT OUR IMPENDING TRIP TO LA: we're missing a Vampire Weekend gig AND They Might Be Giants, performing the whole of 'Flood'!!

We haven't been to a proper gig since we got to DC, which is unusual for us, because we see quite a lot of live music in London. So I was really pleased when Emily emailed to suggest we go and see Dr Dog at the 9.30 Club, which is meant to be the best live music venue in town.

I don't know Dr Dog at all, but Emily said their harmonies are like the Beatles and Max has heard them compared to The Band, so I checked them out on You Tube and got us some tickets - I'm really looking forward to it!

After the excitement of the card-making class at PaperSource last month, I now have to put my money where my mouth is and get down to the serious business of making 60 handmade Christmas cards with all the gear I bought while high from the course. So much of this week has been spent painstakingly cutting out angels from cardboard. I'm not sure my sanity is going to make it - I've been way over-ambitious!

As a prize for doing so well during the election and working so hard these past few months, I got Maxy a massage at our gym, which he went for yesterday and said was looooovely. When he was in the shower afterwards, a foot came into his cubicle from the shower next door and tapped a couple of times! Max recognised this signal from the story of Larry Craig from last year, so kept his feet to himself!

While Maxy was getting cruised, I went to my first ever jazz funk class! It was pretty fun and there were bits of it that reminded me of ballet from when I was little - like prancing diagonally across the room - which was nice, but other bits reminded me why I don't like dance classes, when I couldn't grasp the really straightforward choreography and my body wouldn't work in the right way.

The instructor was a really fun little lady who was a ball of energy and talked at a rate of a million words a second and told us all about how she's just broken up with her boyfriend and how the metro was crazy and how she's annoyed that her class has been bumped from the bigger room (I was the only person in the class for the first 5 mins and only about 5 more people turned up, so I kind of get that decision by the gym).

It was quite fun and I could see how I could get fit from it, but I think I might stick to butts, guts and guns for now...

Today was a sad day, as I helped Anne move out of the flat next door. By the time we come back from LA next week, she'll be gone! She's found a flat up near Columbia Road, kind of north of Adams Morgan, so it's only about a 15 minute walk, but it's up a hill and - as already noted with a heavy heart - I have to wear shoes to go there.

It was great to see Megan, though - I haven't seen her since before we went to Costa Rica, as while we were away, she was headhunted to write speeches for Michelle Obama and moved to Chicago for the rest of the election.

It sounds like it was a really tough experience for her and not a wholly enjoyable one, beyond getting to be in the middle of everything: her boss sounds like a horrid nightmare and she didn't really get close to Michelle, so felt a bit at sea a lot of the time. Jonathan sounds adorable in his efforts to support her from here in DC, though - he would skype her on the webcam and read her 'Anne of Green Gables' (her favourite book) to calm her down!

We're going to LA for a week tomorrow, to see Tom and Nina and spend Thanksgiving with Tom and Bambi, so of COURSE I had to go and get a manicure, pedicure and legwax this evening, in preparation! I am now sunshine-ready...

SMELLY SNOW

FREAKIEST COINCIDENCE OF THE DAY: as I was cycling home this afternoon, it started snowing! From absolutely nowhere! The dude from Mount Vernon was completely right - it's the weirdest thing!

It's been unbelievably freezing here for a while now, so Max finally decided to get a winter coat and I met him in Macy's at lunchtime to consult. He found a really gorgeous cashmere one that was on sale and then the assistant told him a way of getting yet more money off, so he paid well under £100 for an amazing cashmere overcoat! And got a nice cashmere scarf and hat, to boot.

I'm desperate to follow suit, but all the ladies' winter coats have got belts and/or are short. I want a really nice black military-style cashmere overcoat with big buttons and a high collar, but it seems I'm not in step with this year's fashion, so have to make do with my weedy anorak.

Mark's speech went really well this morning, so tonight we went out to celebrate with him and his friend, once again basking in the cheap beer and awesome jukebox (I was able to listen to a Liz Phair song I haven't heard for yeeeears) at the Toledo Lounge.

Unfortunately I can't tell you what Mark's friend is called, because I only know him as the Orc. Mark made the mistake of mentioning to us that his friend is from the Orkney Isles and I latched onto this, gave the poor fellow a new moniker and am incapable of remembering his actual name.

Anyway, he was really fun and I hope he becomes a new DC friend, because it'd be good to hang out with him more. He works for the Treasury, I think, or maybe the Bank of England, so is based at the Embassy.

We had a heated discussion trying to name the five funniest films of all time and had real difficulty. I was at a particular disadvantage (and was shouted at a lot for it) because I automatically have to discount all those stupid 80s comedies like Airplane, because I don't find them very funny. And when those out-and-out comedies are out of the mix, there are very few true comedies left.

We all love the 'Zoolander's, 'Anchorman's and 'Old School's of this world, but together they make one really funny movie; none by itself qualifies for the top five.

We all like stuff like Ferris Beuller, Lebowski and Withnail, but those aren't pure comedies. When I sincerely put forward 'Role Models', Mark simply said he felt sorry for me. But it IS one of the top five comedies I've ever seen! It's brilliant! The only other definite contender for my top five was 'Monty Python & The Holy Grail', but the rest was a real struggle and I never managed five.

DEVO TOWERS

BIGGEST MISSED OPPORTUNITY OF THE WEEK: people in DC are letting their flats out for upwards of $1000 a night for the Inauguration! As sorely tempting as it is, we're quite sure it'd flout many BBC regulations to make money off an apartment they're paying for. *sigh*

Mum and Dad came to stay last week!

Their four day visit here was sandwiched between a 24-hr stay in New York and a 4-day visit to LA, so they're doing quite the whistlestop tour of the States!

It was so wonderful to see them, as I've never gone as long as 7+ months without seeing them. Unfortunately they brought the British weather with them and it was dreary and rainy for most of their stay, but we had a lovely time regardless (hopefully they did, too).

I went to meet them at Dulles airport on Thursday, which was quite the mission - Dulles is a nightmare to get to on public transport and if you ever come into DC on an internal flight, PLEASE fly to Reagan National Airport! I think it took longer for me, on foot, metro and bus to get to the airport than it did for them to fly down from NYC. And it didn't help that it was pouring with rain.

Anyway, I was (almost) too excited to notice, and met them with a big 'welcome to DC' sign, which they both managed to miss as they came out of the door, so I was reduced to yelling at them across the airport!

I won't blog too much about their visit, because I suspect that Mum and Dad account for at least 50% of the readers of this blog and the other 50% will've already heard about their visit from them or not be so interested.

it's Mum and Dad in DC!

Suffice to say, it was brilliant showing them our DC world and I even got to do some things I haven't done in the city before. For example, on their first night here, I took them to the National Cathedral for choral evensong, which was beautiful.

I hadn't been in the cathedral before and was amazed by how European it looks (though the lady on the information desk was at pains to tell us that it isn't based on any existing cathedral) - like a mix between Salisbury and Notre Dame.

Mum found it really moving that someone had built such a spectacular building to God so recently (it was finished in the early 90s) and I was moved too, but kind of thought - a bit like with the Lincoln Memorial appropriating a Grecian architectural style - that there's something a bit funny, almost fake, about transposing architectural styles from centuries ago to a different era. Hmm, I don't know. Still, the cathedral was amazing and the evensong was really beautiful - I'd like to go there for it more often.

While on a walk around the neighbourhood with Dad, I saw another Alaska numberplate but yet again didn't have my camera! Aaarrgghh.

On Friday, we 'did' the monuments (never before have I seen the top of the Washington Monument shrouded in mist!), then crawled around the National Gallery (actually I lurched from the sofa in one room to the sofa in the next, while Mum studied the paintings in close detail) before meeting up with Alison, Brewster, Patrick, Leanna and Emily for drinks, so that Mum and Dad could put faces to the names they hear often. They're all extremely parent-friendly and Mum came away with quite the crush on Brewster, while Dad was very impressed by how brainy our friends are. Well they're clever enough to be friends with us, so what do you expect?! Anne came over for dinner that night, which again was nice, to introduce Mum and Dad to someone who's a big part of our life here.

breakfast with Mum and Dad! Yeay!

It was beautifully sunny on Saturday so, because Mum was having trouble with her knee and couldn't walk too far, we put her in a taxi to go have a manicure in Georgetown, then Max and I took Dad to Georgetown the scenic route, through Dumbarton Oaks Park, which was lovely, if crazy-hot.

Our timing was perfect, and we met up with Mum just as she emerged from the beauty salon I got my manicure at that first time in Georgetown back in April, then pootled around Georgetown before having lunch at the trusty Nathans just as the heavens opened and it started pouring with rain.

I tried packing too much in yesterday, so it was a little stressful, especially with Mum's reluctance to walk very much. We were trying to get to Mount Vernon which, like Dulles airport, is quite tricky on public transport. However, it turned out to be a blessing when we missed our bus, because we nipped down to Alexandria instead, whizzed down the main street in a trolley, showed Mum and Dad the waterfront and then hopped back up the trolley, back to the metro just in time for the bus to Mount Vernon, a couple of stops along the metro line.

Mount Vernon was George Washington's home and is presented in the state it would've been in when he lived there. Unfortunately you can't just wander around the main house at your own pace - you have to queue up for a guided tour of each room. It was FREEZING in the queue, there was a really bitter wind, and the man in front of us even said he could smell snow - that he reckoned it'd snow on Tuesday (tomorrow), but I think that's a bit extreme.

When we finally got inside, the tour was really interesting and it was quite eery to see the bed where Washington died and stuff. It was also quite odd hearing an African American guide make frequent references to Washington's slaves.

We didn't spend too long wandering around the grounds, but it was quite cool to see the outhouses set up as they would've been back in the day.

Mum and Dad at Washington's pile

After a lishy but mildly fraught (air con and loud music issues) supper at Local 16, we went to the White House for a tour of the West Wing that Emily really kindly arranged, despite me saying she really didn't have to. It was Max's third visit! And the fourth tour Emily had done that night, so she was pooped, but it was fun to see it all again.

Mum and Dad at Obama's pile-to-be

Mum and Dad left early this morning to get to LA and it was so sad to see them go, because it felt so natural having them here and hanging out with them that I wish they could've stayed for longer. *sniff*

However, I didn't have the luxury of moping too much, as I had bedding to wash in time for our next visitor who arrived this evening! Our friend Mark is in town from New York, for a conference he's speaking at tomorrow, so he's staying for a couple of nights, which I thought might be a bit stressful, straight off the back of Mum and Dad's visit, but actually it's really nice to see him, especially as he expects nothing more of us than eating food and chilling out on the sofa!

NEW FRIENDS

CURRENT NETFLIX OBSESSION: 'Pushing Daisies'. We love it! Anna Friel wears pretty dresses, our West Wing pal, Kristen Chenoweth, is brilliant as the excellently-named Olive Snook, and it's really funny. I'm only sad it's been cancelled after two seasons.

While I toiled away at this blasted Lib Dem project, yesterday, Maxy got a herogram from the head of BBC World News! It was an email just to Maxy, with the head of Online cc-ed in, thanking Max for all his excellent work surrounding the election and signing off with the line, "You thoroughly justified our decision to give you the job"!! Yippeeeeee!

And while Maxy was excelling at work, I was enjoying my own bit of success on the domestic front, by having the carpets cleaned. Our sitting room and bedroom have a ridiculously pale cream carpet throughout and, I guess because this place is a rental, no-one appears to have been very bothered about spilling stuff on it. So it's an embarrassing and grody mess of red wine, sauce stains and messes that I don't want to give too much thought to what might have caused them.

It was particularly gauling to have Max's predecessor-but-one identify at our housewarming party back in May which stains his children were responsible for!

It just really grosses me out and it doesn't help that our hoover doesn't work, so I've been badgering Max for ages to get the BBC to agree to sort out a carpet cleaner and today he came! And it was AMAZING!! Some of the stains were really really dark and looked like they wouldn't go anywhere, but after an afternoon spent steaming and spraying and scraping, the magician that was the lovely carpet cleaner man got them all out and the carpet looks awesome! It was my very own transformation like in home improvement shows!

Unfortunately I somewhat hilariously hadn't factored in that the carpet would need to dry for some time when I invited Oliver over for dinner last night:

clean carpet - yeay!
Pre-dinner chats squished into the corner of an empty room - boo.

dinner in the entrance hall. Nice.

Today I ploughed on with Lib Dem man's stuff and then this evening, we went for drinks with a couple called Joe and Molly, who our friends Matt and Jilly met in Belize this summer. When Matt and Jilly heard that Joe and Molly were from DC, they put them in touch with us and it turns out they live literally just up the road!

So we met them in a really cool dive-bar on 18th St called the Toledo Lounge. It looks really scuzzy, but the beer's super-cheap and the jukebox is amazing. We purposefully planned to haveh supper at home, to give us an excuse to leave if we didn't hit it off with Joe and Molly, but it turned out we needn't have bothered - they are SO nice!

Joe's an architect and Molly's a middle school teacher who works in this really interesting experimental school in DC that puts a lot of emphasis on vocational and kind of 'real world' teaching, as much as the academic stuff.

They got married in the summer (Belize was their honeymoon) and are a really nice couple. We chatted nonstop for about 3 hours and then they mentioned in passing that they'd been in West Virginia at the weekend. I said the first thing that came into my head when I thought of West Virginia, which was had they been there on a retreat? Much to our mutual surprise, they both said yes. So I asked - expecting a bemused 'no' - whether they'd gone with Grace church and they said yes - becoming increasingly freaked out - and then Max and I were able to blow their minds, by reeling off all the people we know from Grace - that's the church that Alison, Emily, Brewster et al go to!!

Turns out Joe used to be in a study group with Brewster and Molly sat next to Emily at breakfast on Sunday and they all know the same people we know! It was really fun to freak them out, because it was such a crazy coincidence that we know all those folks and yet were introduced to Joe and Molly by our UK friends on holiday in Belize!

So, having rather reluctantly met up, with an escape strategy of needing to go home for supper, we left Joe and Molly at about 10.30pm, starving hungry but with two lovely new friends!

Joel McHale was on the 'Countdown with Keith Olbermann' repeat when we got home, inexplicably holding his baby boy during the interview!

SCAVENGING FOR FUN

NICEST GIFT OF THE WEEK: look at the lovely roses Maxy got me

Yesterday was awesome. In the morning, we watched 'Eagle vs. Shark', which was not awesome. It's a quirky indie film from New Zealand, with Jermaine from 'Flight of the Conchords' in it and it was kind of fun, but brilliant.

After lunch, we went to the National Gallery - somewhere I'm ashamed to say we have yet to visit - to do a scavenger hunt.

I get an email once a week, letting me know about events coming up in DC and offering cut-price tickets and stuff. That's how we went to the baseball in Baltimore and the basketball the other day. And the scavenger hunt yesterday.

On our way to the Gallery (we walked all the way!), we came across a game of hockey being played on rollerblades in front of the OEOB, just by the White House, which was pretty cool.

However, the scavenger hunt was SO much cooler! Maxy and I were a team of two, though there were lots of other teams, mostly of four (all adults). We were met by a representative of the scavenger hunt company who set the scene of a murder that had been committed in the gallery.

She wasn't very into it, but I was! Basically, a curator had been murdered and some random numbers had been found in his drawer, along with a diary with blanks in some of the sentences. We had to fill in the blanks in the sentences by solving clues found in paintings in the gallery.

We were given a time limit of two hours, and dashed off to solve the mystery. It was SO fun and a really good way to see the gallery for the first time, because you're running around everywhere, so get to see what is there to see, so that you can come back at your leisure and go straight to the bits of interest.

The hunt was really tricky and we found some of the clues quite difficult to solve, which we really liked. And you had to have a bit of outside knowledge to solve them, too - with some clues, it wasn't enough just to look at the painting and spot an object or whatever - so it was a real challenge.

The numbers left in the curator's drawer corresponded with the numbers of our answers, so when we had all our answers, we took the first letter from each of the numbered answers in question and that revealed the killer.

We were one of the first teams to finish and then, when all the answers were marked and points totted up - it was very tense - we were in joint first place! I thought the fact that we'd done it faster would mean we would win, but unfortunately the time limit seemed singularly spurious.

Instead, we had to go head-to-head with the - 3-person - team in a tie-break. The question was: In what year was the boardgame Clue created?

I love Clue(do) and was sure I'd seen an anniversary edition out recently, so we said 1958 and the other team said 1964, I think. The answer was 1948, so we won!!

the proud victors with their prizes

I so enjoyed the scavenger hunt and definitely want to do more. There's one in the Museum of American History, which I think would be awesome.

High on our great victory, we hopped and skipped just up the road to Chinatown, to see 'Role Models', which was every bit as brilliant as we'd hoped. It was just great.

This morning, I helped out at Sunday School and then we had a nice webcam chat with our friends Matt and Jilly, before watching 'Recount' - the HBO movie about how Al Gore lost the 2000 election.

It's a film we've been wanting to see for ages, but had to wait until the Democrats were back in power, before we could bear to watch how the Republicans basically stole the presidency for Bush. It was so depressing, but brilliant. The thing that interested me the most was how anti-democracy the Republicans were when there was a query about the result in Florida. According to the film (which was made from a liberal perspective but claims to be telling the truth), the Republicans didn't want any kind of re-vote or recount, even though there had been critical errors in the voting process, so the result was potentially wrong. Bunch of cowboys.

OBAMA WEATHER

Even the weather is better, now Obama has won the election! It was FREAKY warm tonight, with people sitting outside restaurants, eating on pavements as if it was a balmy evening on the French riviera, or something.

I got disastrous news today - Anne is moving out from next door! Her landlord has asked Megan and her to commit to a 12-month lease, but Megan is confident that she'll be moving in with Jonathan within the next year, so doesn't want to sign up for that long with Anne.

Meanwhile, Anne doesn't want to find another flatmate and can't afford to live next door by herself, so she's looking for a place to live by herself! Noooooooooo. Fortunately she's keen to stay in the immediate vicinity, as Hugh lives round the corner and I'm her new BFF. But still, it'll suck to have to put shoes on to go and see her. At the moment, we just nip in and out of each other's flats like dorms.

I spent today battling away at the online election stuff, which was dull and overwhelming, but needs to be done. Then this evening, we went to see Joel McHale live at the Warner Theatre.

Joel McHale is the host of one of our favourite shows on TV - 'The Soup' - which is a bit like a much more snarky version of 'Harry Hill's TV Burp': Joel McHale is an acerbic (and hot) comedian who takes the mickey out of ridiculous TV clips from stuff like 'The Hills' and anything involving Miley Cyrus. He's hilarious.

So we were very excited to get tickets to see him do standup here in DC, though a bit perturbed when his warmup man - and friend, apparently - appeared to be stuck in the 70s and just churned out terrible, terrible jokes about how rubbish his wife is and aren't women a pain in the ass and all this ridiculously unfunny stuff that hasn't been heard - or at least laughed at - since blackface was thought acceptable. He was awful. Never have I been so tempted to heckle, but that would probably have made his day, because I was a woman and would just be confirming his point. Ugh.

I wasn't feeling at all warmed up by the time the mighty (literally - he's ginormous. Though I appreciate you wouldn't get that from the photo) McHale came on stage and was looking forward to him redeeming the whole night. But, while he was kind of amusing, he never quite got beyond the level of humour dished out by your funniest mate in the pub. It was ok, but really not great and certainly not on a par with 'The Soup'.

A WHOLE NEW WORLD

ELECTION-ECLIPSING TRIUMPH OF THE DAY: I saw an Alaskan numberplate!! We're only missing Alaska and Idaho, then we'll have them all! Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me, though...

It's so nice, everyone seems so much happier now the election is over.

Since 94% of DC citizens voted for Obama, I should imagine it's because he won. And that would certainly account for the irrepressible jauntiness apparent in Jon Stewart, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow on the telly. However, I suspect even Republicans are at least relieved the whole shebang is over, if not pleased with the result.

Nate Silver of the website fivethirtyeight.com has emerged - with Rachel Maddow - as one of the liberal stars of the election, applying rules of statistics and predictions usually used in sports betting to politics. Turns out today that he called almost every single state race correctly. Max hearts him.

However, with Maine-gate from Tuesday night, Max proved himself to be no slouch in the stars-of-the-election stakes.

As you might imagine, after our day and night of excitement, we did very little yesterday but noodle. We watched the terrible 'Made of Honor' romcom, napped and eventually fell asleep at 7.30pm.

It was with a very heavy heart that I realised this morning that I could no longer put off the work on the online activity during the election that I've been given to do by Lib Dems man back home and so very reluctantly got down to work. It's been weeks since I did the half-a-day I was meant to be doing each week since June and so I'm going to spend the next couple of weeks making up for it and trying to wrangle the gigantic volume of information held in countless emails that I've received from Max and the Obama campaign over the past months, but filed away immediately, rather than processing. Ugh.

Max has been such a massive help with this project and it'd be either impossible or at least unbelievably time-consuming to do it without him, as he's reading all the political blogs every day anyway, so just pings things over when he thinks they might help me. It's so brilliant - both for this work and just generally in life - that I have my very own political whizz who I can just ask questions and get immediate and comprehensive summaries of what's going on in the world.

I'm very amused by the in-fighting that's going on regarding Palin, with some Republicans turning on their own and Palin retreating to Alaska. Can you imagine if she was now vice-president?!! I'm very excited for Amtrak Joe, getting to live just down the road from his office. Since being sworn in to the Senate (by the bedside of his critically ill son. *sigh*) over 30 years ago, he has kept his promise to return to Delaware every single night, to have supper with his family. As awesome as this is, he must not know what to do with all the time he has on his hands, now that his commute has been slashed from 90 mins to 20 mins, courtesy of a motorcade!

This evening we went over to Capitol Hill for our first curry since getting to the US, with Alison and Brewster. Apparently Alison really didn't have the most fun, watching the election results come in with Emily and Brewster - having been in two minds about who to vote for - reverted to kind and went for McCain, and doesn't seem too pleased with the result, even though he thinks Obama will do good things for the economy, with the people he's surrounding himself with.

Ah well, too bad! *grin*

PHOTOS: ELECTION DAY

Click HERE for photos of my election day experience

YES WE CAN!!!!

Holy moly. I can't believe it!! President Obama - COOL!!!

I'd like to say that I spent yesterday at the beating heart of the electoral process, participating in democracy and helping our new President to the White House by ferrying people to and from the polls in the minivan I specially hired.

However, I did not.

I was so excited when I woke up, singing the American national anthem in the shower and donning my spiffy Obama t-shirt with pride, ready to play my part in making history.

I felt very conspicuous in my Obama shirt, as if people were noting it when I walked past, and either silently poo-pooing me, or smiling in solidarity.

I rocked up at the car rental place to collect my minivan, with plenty of time to get to Obama HQ to start picking up the people I'd offered to give a lift to, having called the car rental place yesterday to confirm that they'd have a minivan for me and being snippily assured by the man that there would be a minivan there, implying I was in some way square and/or fussy to be checking.

Hmph. Turns out I was right to be dubious, because they didn't have a minivan for me. They helpfully suggested I take the metro to the airport, because that branch had one. Whatever happened to the famed American customer service?!

Cutting my losses, I dashed over to another car rental place I've used before, established that they did have a minivan and then waited AGES for them to bring it round for me. Eventually, I was on the road, but didn't get to Obama HQ until 10am, by which time everyone who needed a lift had been looked after! I was so sad. I was really looking forward to helping out, in lieu of actually voting.

I sheepishly came home, where Max was hanging out before going into work this afternoon and I picked him up and we cruised around the city, trying to catch a glimpse of the crazy-long queues at polling stations that we'd heard about on the news. We finally managed to find one, just off U St, but it took a while and seemed like the city was in pretty good shape for those hoping to vote.

By way of consolation for not being able to ferry voters to the polls, the Obama HQ people had asked me to drive some students out to Virginia to do some last-minute canvassing. This is exactly what I didn't want to do - I wanted to be in and around polling stations, not knocking on doors or harrassing people on the street, especially as my British accent would surely have made people wonder what business it is of mine who they vote for.

Anyways, I headed off to the DNC headquarters to report for duty, only to discover that they had loads of volunteers already! I had to sit in my minivan outside the DNC for over an hour, in driving rain, just waiting for enough people to need lifts to Virginia. This is not what I'd had in mind for my election day experience!

Eventually my minivan was full of eager and hilariously geeky boys from Georgetown University and we headed off through the rain, encroaching darkness and terrible traffic towards Virginia, as the politics students all argued about who made the best speech on the campaign trail, who was likely to be in the cabinet and other such pressing issues.

We finally found the office we were heading to, which was a hive of activity. We were put in a holding room and eventually given a task to do, after I dropped the bombshell that we only had two hours before we had to go back to DC (as per what the DNC had promised us. Plus, I had an election night party to host single-handed and the eager beavers had to get back for their Democrats Society party).

We were sent out into the darkness to knock on doors of registered Obama supporters, to make sure they'd voted. I had a grand total of 8 households to visit, 6 of whom weren't home and of the other two, one had already voted and the other was in the shower, but his housemate was going to tell him to vote. I'm fairly sure that house was either a crack den or a cult - there was the weirdest array of people there.

The weird estate me and my fellow volunteers were canvassing was in the middle of nowhere and kind of creepy in the pitch darkness, so I wasn't too sad to leave, though really disappointed that the sum total of my contribution to the Obama cause was talking to two people who'd already voted.

We got horribly lost on the way back in DC, so Max had to do the Kenneth Kendall bit for me that I'd done for him in Maine, and talk us through it. We eventually got back, just in time for me to start preparations for my election night party with Anne and Hugh, Jim and Cindy, Tim and Holly (J&C's friends we met at baseball - Tim's Mancunian and Holly works at NatGeo) and Cindy's sad friend who recently split up from his boyfriend.

Tim, Holly, sad man whose name I can't remember, Jim, Cindy, Hugh, Anne

I was really sad not to be able to watch the results come in with Maxy - I really wanted to share the whole experience with him, but he was at the Bureau, working on the results desk - he was one of three people calling the results for the entire BBC! And he'd text me secret inside info, which made the night all the more fun for us, as we ate pizza and watched with glee as the electoral map turned increasingly blue.

I kept track of which state went to whom with my hi-tech system that rivalled anything Peter Snow or Wolf Blitzer could manage. Sure, CNN had a weird and pointless hologram of Will.I.Am, but I had postits! And one column for Obama, the other for McCain. Foolproof!

Max texted very early - before 9pm - to say that it was game over, that Obama had won Ohio and was looking good in Virginia and Florida, which were crucial swing states.

Shortly afterwards, he texted to say that McCain was about to concede, but with the west coast polls yet to close, I knew that that was a bit premature.

Nevertheless, our sitting room was a-buzz with excitement and teary eyes and rank disbelief. Then, when CNN called it for Obama on the dot of 11pm (just as west coast polls closed), we all erupted and cried and whooped and cheered and hugged and texted loved ones, amazed it was all over so quickly and with such little effort (give or take the two solid years Obama spent on the campaign trail). Amazing!!!

I was so sad not to share the moment with Max, but so pleased it happened and that I was at home with friends. It felt like a 'where were you?' moment. And so exciting that Obama entirely re-wrote the electoral map and won so decisively, with none of the hanging chad-like shenanigans that allowed Bush to take power. What a dude.

I was amused to see McCain look so relieved during his concession speech, with Palin quietly crying next to him. It was so lame that some of the handful of people McCain was addressing booed when he paid tribute to Obama and so excellent that, although Obama addressed hundreds of thousands of people in Grant Park, Chicago, not one boo was audible when he praised McCain.

I didn't much like Michelle's weird dress she wore at Grant Park. She's looked so great all campaign, and then wore something that looked a bit like her insides were bursting out of her. But Sasha and Malia were adorable, and I loved Obama's line about them earning the puppy that would be coming with them to the White House.

Anne and Hugh and Cindy's friend had to leave after the speeches, but Cindy, Jim, Tim, Holly and I headed out onto U St to join crowds of people celebrating.

It was so emotional that U St had been the epicentre of race riots in 1968 and was now the site of jubilation at an African American becoming president. The atmosphere was just incredible, like nothing I've ever experienced. Everyone was just so happy and there was an amazing range of people just wandering around the streets, cheering, whooping, hi-5ing and grinning as cars crept past, honking their horns with people hanging out of the windows. There were young people, old people, a range of ethnicities and apparent backgrounds and everyone was united in this outpouring of euphoria - what an extraordinary thing, that politics managed to do this. And if anyone was in any doubt as to how important Obama's win was, they just had to look at the glee and relief on people's faces. I can't imagine McCain would've received the same reaction.

We walked around for a while, soaking up the atmosphere and marvelling at the manifest happiness of such a huge group of diverse people, then went our separate ways.

Max came home shortly afterwards, having suffered no mishaps at work, despite being under immense pressure. In fact, he saved the day! The BBC were getting their results from the wires and also had a deal with ABC that they'd tip the BBC off 15 mins in advance of calling a result for a particular candidate.

The Bureau Chief was the liaison with ABC and came into the results room at one point, to say that McCain had one three of Maine's four electoral votes, so they should call Maine for McCain. However, Max thought this sounded fishy and refused to post the result. And he turned out to be right! I'm not sure how the mistake was made, but Maxy spotted it and prevented poor David Dimbleby, who seemed to be coming under enough fire from Gore Vidal and Christopher Hitchens, from having to back-track and correct an erroneous result! What a clever fellow Max is.

I caught a repeat of the Daily Show's live election show and was so moved to see Jon Stewart, usually a picture of togetherness and never one to show any real emotion, get choked up as he announced Obama as the decisive winner of the election. What a night.

After a couple of hours sleep, Max and I drove round to pick up Susie and Louis just before 6am (I still had the minivan) and headed to the Lincoln Memorial, where we met Jim and Cindy again, to watch the sun come up on this bright new day, from the spot where MLK delivered his 'I Have A Dream' speech. Obviously to be in that spot was particularly poignant on the day when that dream took a massive step towards being realised.

The monument was deserted, but for some security guards and mental joggers dashing up and down the steps, and we were able to sit there as the thick cloud cover got gradually lighter (so much for a dramatic sunrise!), trying to get our heads around the enormity of what's just happened and what it means for the world, and babies like Louis.

the future's bright

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

With the aches and pains of butts, guts and guns finally a distant memory, I ventured back to the gym this morning for my first ever yoga class. And I loved it! It was so nice to just stretch and feel like my body was having good things done to it without having to sweat or feel on the verge of passing out. I feel much more limber and loose now and can't wait to go again.

NatGeo is just across the road from the gym and I had a nice lunch with Cindy after my class. She's started doing her Big Sister volunteering, which I think is amazing. Her little sister is from Central America - maybe El Salvador? - and is in 6th grade, so she's about 11.

Her living conditions sound awful - she and her sister sleep on the floor of their bedroom because her mother can't afford beds and her mother and two younger siblings sleep together on the sofa in the sitting room, while they rent out the second bedroom in the small flat.

Cindy's having quite a few problems with the mother, who keeps asking her to buy things for Catherine (Cindy's little sister) and the rest of the family, so Cindy's having to work out ways to say no and to empower the mother to find schemes to help her, rather than just giving her handouts that Cindy can't afford.

I'm so sad that Obama's grandmother, Toot, died today - on the eve of the election.

She sounds like an incredible woman, who helped bring up Barack and instill in him many of the values and qualities he's looking to bring to the White House.

It's so sad that she didn't get to see whether he won the election and I only hope that, when he suspended his campaign a while ago to go and visit her in Hawaii one last time, he was able to take down the guard he has up in public, when he remains cautious about believing the 100+ polls that say he's going to win the election, and told her that it's in the bag and that he is going to make history as the first African American president of the States.

It's SO exciting that the election is finally here and Maxy says there's no way Obama can lose, that it's generally thought that the Bradley Effect has been overstated and early voting numbers are looking good. But I think everyone's still incredibly nervous and tense, excited to see whether Obama can take as many swing states as the polls would have us believe he could, but worried that this is how everyone was feeling in 2000, before Bush 'beat' Gore.

I say everyone, but I didn't follow the 2000 election. Or the 2004 one, really - this is the first time I've really been excited by politics and invested in a candidate because I believe in their policies and ways of doing things and I think it's the same for a lot of people this year, which is testament to the sheer force of Obama's excellence: it can't be ignored.

FLAT WOES

WHOOPS! We totally forgot the clocks went back today.

Ugh. The boiler in our flat in London, which our friend Adrian is living in at the moment is apparently not creating any central heating and Adrian and his girlfriend are freezing. What's worse is, when we got the boiler serviced when we bought the moneypit - I mean flat - we were warned that it was past it's 'expiry' date and that if anything went wrong with it, it'd make more sense to replace it than repair it.

So I spent most of yesterday on the phone with Adrian and with our lovely gasman, who happens to live upstairs from our flat and was kind enough to check out what the problem was. I'm still unclear of what's wrong, mainly because I'm blinded by the £1600 it's going to take to replace the boiler.

Max and I are lucky to be living rent-free over here, and having our mortgage covered back in London, but with me not working, there's not piles of extra cash sloshing around. However, we have been able to save a little bit each month for a while and guess how much we've squirreled away? Almost exactly £1600. Byyeeeee!

Ugh. We're actually massively lucky, because Luli (our gasman) is really busy, but is fitting us in in the evenings and weekend next week and has now calculated it'll actually cost over £2000, but is standing by his original quote. What a legend. But what a pain in the butt. Being a grown up sucks!

The news obviously posed as something of a downer on our weekend, but we did have a great webcam chat with our friends Matt and Jilly yesterday, and then Max went to work and I walked into Georgetown, where I raided the place for supplies I'd been turned onto by the card-making course. I'm going to make our Christmas cards this year!

We were meant to be going to a Halloween party with Anne tonight (yes, it's still going!), but didn't feel like it, so stayed home and had Anne over for drinks beforehand instead, which was lovely. Anne had worked out what she wanted to go as to the party, but now how to do it, so we put together her whole entire costume for her, based around a pair of pink trousers that she had. Can you guess what it is yet?

She's a pig in lipstick! That's Maxy's pink shirt and my pink duvet shoes (a staple for any supernoodle). I made her hair look like ears and created an ingenious nose from the base of a plastic cup, then coloured it pink, cut out black tape in the shape of nostrils, tied elastic to it and bingo bango!

'Blue Peter's loss is Anne's gain...

Despite our boiler drama funk, I wish we had gone to the party now, because we stayed in and watched the TERRIBLE 'Heartbreak Kid' on DVD, instead. Ugh, it's SO bad! I don't really know where to begin in explaining why, so will just leave it at: never watch this movie, even on a plane - it's awful! We haven't been doing very well lately... (apart from 'This Is England').

We watched a bit of 'Saturday Night Live' afterwards, and saw Ben Affleck do a HILARIOUS impression of Keith Olbermann, who's one of our favourite political pundits and is famous for his righteous indignation and directly addressing someone who's offended him (John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Bill O'Reilly...) with a 'special comment', delivered straight down the camera. He gets very hett-up - I worry for Keith. But Ben Affleck did him so well! Actually, he didn't sound at all like him - he affected a weird quasi-British accent - but his spluttering and outrage were spot on, despite the 'special comment' being aimed at the head of the residents committee in his building who wouldn't allow him to keep his cat, Mrs Precious Perfect, in his flat.

Boiler? What boiler!