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DEAR DIARY

09.03.2026

House has been invaded by rats and their rat shit and their little rat illnesses and possibly their decaying little rat bodies -- ratropolis! ratcropolis! rat city! rat rat rat city, bitch !

I try to love all cyclical livingness but struggle with this display. Have visions of my vector-pierced body lying in sickbed, pulsing with buboes and resentment. Have visions of landlord charging survivors cleaning fees for the stains left on mattress + beige wall-to-wall carpet by my pus/blood/splattered viscera/carbuncular drainage. (note to self: rhyme "carbuncular" with "avuncular" -- Maybe "carbuncular bleeding" with "avuncular greeting" ? -- Or - "carbuncular infection" with "avuncular affection" -- ?? Workshop this. Shoehorn into something, somewhere.)

So I got on out of the rat house and bought a macchiato from V-- (despite having expensive ground coffee at home) and walked into every Pret I passed and picked up/set down a sandwich in each and did not buy a sandwich in any and instead wandered into M&S and walked down every aisle, peering/considering/browsing, and in the end panicked and bought the £4 beetroot/feta/grain bowl marketed as "nutritionally dense." (boys, we are proteinmaxxing! girls, we are fibermaxxing! everyone, we are maxxxed out! that's three xxx's there, one for each aspect of the Trinity! everyone, we are all going to kiss each other! right now!! we will excrete regularly, lift heavy weights daily, grow increasingly sleek & taut until we are physically fit enough to climb Jacob's Ladder and ascend, not in death but in life, propelled by omega-3 fatty acids & ambrosia & Herculean vitality!! !)

So I wandered around looking for a place to eat M&S salad with sad, free, likely pre-groped wooden forkette from near self-check. Perched on little churchyard bench between G&D and Pembroke, across from Old Tom Tower. Grass dead. Middle-aged addict occasionally yelling at passers-by, occasionally chatting friendly with female companion.

And then and then! I was sitting there eating when a strikingly attractive man entered the churchyard and walked right up to me. I found myself thinking -- he chose you to approach because you washed your hair last night and put anti-frizz oil in it this morning and are wearing makeup and tight jeans. But mostly because you chose a NUTRITIONALLY DENSE SALAD for lunch and it has already kicked in and you are radiating health + beauty.

"Excuse me. I'm guessing you know your way around here better than I do. Is there any library nearby (or something like that) where I might be able to work?"

"I'm guessing you don't have university access?"

"No, I just have a couple hours to kill and need somewhere to kill them."

I directed him to the local public library.

"I notice you have an American accent -- so are you a student here?"

"YEahhhhhHh."

As he walked away I realized there was a little confetti of shredded spinach, julienned beet, and heritage grains in my lap. Today I am wearing men's jeans. When I am standing, they flatter my ass with Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants miraculousness. When I sit, the crotch fabric mounds as if anticipating the whims of external genitalia. I stood up and brushed salad off my lap and smoothed my fly. I wiped beet hummus off my lips.

I looked around and he was gone.

I walked to and through the Westgate to replace my earpods at John Lewis. They were sold out. I walked back out of the Westgate and booked a Pret Too Good To Go so that hopefully I don't have to use the rat kitchen for the next couple days. I wandered to the RadCam, which is where I am now. I haven't been here in ages. It is quiet and pretty empty. I am quiet and pretty empty within it.

There is something about the modern consumer landscape that turns so many days into an Odyssean sprawl of errands run, errands delayed, errands denied. I drift from Pret to Pret unable to buy the sandwich, knowing there will be another Pret soon where I can buy the sandwich. I spend £7 here and £2.70 there. I float. I drift.

I went to London Tuesday and trickled from Marylebone to Barbican. I had dinner at Dishoom with A-- and went back to spend the night at hers so I could have a second day in the Big City. On Wednesday it was drizzling. I walked from Golder's Green to the V&A. In Camden Town, I stopped and got my ears pierced. In Marble Arch I bought a Pret protein pot. In Kensington I bought a cookie. The Northern Line was severly delayed & sickly congested, so I took the bus back to A--'s to pick up my stuff (1+ hours), then to Notting Hill (45 mins), then back to Ox (2 hrs).

Sing to me o m[o]use!!!! Of a complex* [translator's note: in original greek, could have connotation of: complicated; nuanced; relatably flawed; lived-in; messy; just a girl!!; uwu] female protagonist who wandered, and was lost......

(To revisit-- rhyme "carbuncles carbuncular" / "our uncles avuncular" ? alternately- with "are uncles avuncular?" (are they??) Or -- "carbuncular oozing" / "avuncular schmoozing" ? Again-- workshop)