I’ve just finished posting several auctions onto ebay on behalf of my brother. The items are all baby-related. As he was clearing out some of his cupboards recently, he came across loads of brand new baby clothes and other bits and pieces that his broody ex-girlfriend purchased while they were together. (Maybe her pregnancy scare wasn’t an accident? I remember her calling my mum and telling her that the condom had burst… we were all on tenterhooks until her period came again.)

Now my brother isn’t in contact with her anymore, and as he’s eager to raise some extra spending money for his trip to Las Vegas in a few weeks, he asked me to help him sell the stuff. I’m taking 10% for my trouble.

Click here to check out the merchandise if you want to buy a nice pressie for an expectant mother. I can find out about international postage if necessary. Email me if you’re interested in taking them off my hands, or have fun bidding!

My cousin Freddy is currently enjoying a two week break in Jamaica. He’s staying at the same hotel where I stayed in May. My friend who works at the hotel mentioned that he’d had a chat with my cousin and his girlfriend.

Later on I had the following conversation with my mum: (more…)

About a week ago my mum and I went to Brussels for the day on the Eurostar. It was a follow-up to the trip we took there last summer for my mum’s birthday. Last time I paid for us to stay at the Marriott hotel for a few days, but this time she paid as I’m rather financially-challenged at the moment.

I prefer taking the Eurostar to flying. I’ve been thinking about going to Rome by an overnight train from Paris. It sounds more romantic to me, like taking the Orient Express.

Anyway, we got the train to Brussels. Then instead of taking the taxi to the centre of town we decided to have an adventure and take the tram. After a few confusing minutes of trying to find the toilet in the station, then figuring out which tram to take we finally were on our way. The trams moved very quickly so we had to hold on very tight to keep from falling over.

So we arrived at Bourse Beurs and found the main shopping road, with lots of clothes shops. We looked around for a while and bought some bits and pieces.

After a while we stopped at a nearby hotel restaurant. We both ordered the 2nd most expensive item on the menu, the small t-bone steak for 16 euros each.

Then on to more shopping. We enjoyed a waffle, some ice cream while people-watching in the square.

Soon it was time to make our way back to the Eurostar station, and then back to London.

When we got to Clapham Junction we were delayed for a while due to a broken-down train. A young guy asked us for money while we were waiting for our train, saying that he was hungry.
“I’m hungry too,” said my mum, sending him packing.

It was nice spending some quality time with my mum. And my wanderlust is stirring again.

It’s my mother’s birthday on Saturday, so I thought that I’d do a Thursday 13 in her honour, as I did for my dad a few months ago. Here are 13 things about her.

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It hasn’t come completely out of the blue; my mum has mentioned her feelings on my lifestyle in the past few days, but an hour or so ago she decided to have it out with me.

She said that I am acting like my life is over, because I stay in the house a lot and don’t go out much. She said that she is worrying about me, and that I wasn’t like this a year ago. A year ago I used to go to the gym, go to the cinema, etc.

She said that my dad is also worried about me because I spend a lot of time in my room and I eat a lot of junk food and sleep a lot during the day when I’m not at work.

At my age I should be going out all the time…

What they are saying is true, but I feel okay about my life at the moment. I’m not going out a lot, but I am more of an introspective person and I appreciate having time alone to think about things and to read, etc. I’m not particularly unhappy, though I admit that I’m somewhat unfulfilled and directionless. The only thing that sometimes upsets me is my inability to pursue my creative goals, and to slim down.

I do take myself out sometimes, and I do exercise sometimes, so it’s not like I’ve completely “given up on life”.

I think that this is a phase that I’m going through, and in time I will probably want to go out more and be more active. I don’t want my parents to worry about me, but I guess it’s hard for them to understand my moods and needs.

Sometimes I tell my mum that she should be more supportive of me since I’m not causing her a lot of trouble; things could be worse, I say: I could be a drug addict or an alcoholic, etc. Sure it’s not ideal that I eat the odd packet of biscuits from time to time, but I’m not hurting anyone else.

I don’t have much of a social life; some of that is my own fault for being somewhat socially awkward, and some of it is just the way that things have worked out. I don’t have many friends, and the ones I have don’t ask me to meet up with them on a regular basis. I don’t have a group of friends who I meet up with at the weekends or in the evenings (like everyone else seems to have). Some of the friends I have only seem to contact me when they want something from me.

I’m not sure what to do at this stage. If I do anything.