frog princess

I'm off to gay Paris for a few days to celebrate my birthday, which is on Monday. Mr Lux is treating me and I did all the arranging - the perfect holiday! It's sort of a joint birthday treat because, for reasons that do not need to be explored at this juncture, he sort of missed having a big do on his birthday. We're planning to do some shamelessly touristy stuff, plus a lot of sitting around in cafes eating and drinking. We want to go to Pere Lachaise, the Eiffel Tower, the catacombs, the museum of relief maps in Les Invalides, La Duree for cake eating, plus just wandering about this beautiful city. That kind of seems a lot for two days though. But we can try.

See you all on Wednesday!

Oh, Rog! 16 slams! But poor Mand. I felt for him.

There were tears again, not Roger's this time. What is it about the AO that makes everyone cry?



( behold my koala of win )

There's still time to bid on me for help_haiti, which was set up as way to help fans raise money for the Haiti earthquake disaster.

I've put up an offer of my fanfic services here, with the offer of a fanfic between 1-5k in the various fandoms I've written in.

Bidding ends today, 20 Jan at 5pm GMT or 12pm EST.

If you don't fancy something by me, snap up some of the awesome stuff on offer!

I cycled 5 miles today to collect a box of gourmet chocolates. Is that a fair deal? I don't know.

Apparently the unusually cold weather here (and the unusual mild weather in Newfoundland) is to do with something called the Arctic Oscillation, which is a mysterious weather system that no one understands properly. In any case, it's chucking down snow here and I can't get warm properly and now I properly understand the point of thermal undergarments.

Ps - I have a tumblr, here: Swiss Navy. It's mostly pictures of Rafa and Roger but will be for anything one pretty, I think.

Happy New Year everyone! Here's to health, happiness and even completed novels in 2010!

I got some amazing parcels and cards over the holiday period. Thanks so much to puddingcat and scribblemoose - I got your lovely cards this morning! Also thank you to kaoticwords, toscas_kiss, rose_gialle, snowballjane and chomiji for your beautiful cards. I opened each one of them with a mooky grin.

buckle_berry sent me haggis! And other edible Scottish things in a food parcel of wonder! Nearly everything is gone now apart from a couple of oatcakes and the actual haggis, which I think we are going to eat tomorrow. Thank you, Scottish person of wonder. <3

emungere sent me not only the COLOURING BOOK OF COCKS, yes, but also a Roger Federer hat in the classy white/pale blue colourway to wear while I am colouring in. Not only that, she also sent me an item that has become known as the 'warming cat' - a handmade cat-shaped bag with a removable inner that you can mircowave and then reinsert into the cat. She made it by hand and it's just a gorgeous thing. It has cymbals for eyes!

Here it is in all its glory, with the RF hat lurking in the background.

( Eli's cat )

Also, Roger and Rafa are enjoying New Year's Eve together in Abu Dhabi. Here they are warming up together on shiny space age tennis court!

( Roger & Rafa )

Am suffering from a massive calorie hangover this morning, after tarteaucitron's fantastic mince pie and eggnog party on Friday, then two consecutive days of lavish roast Christmas dinners. My life, so hard.

But despite all the time spent eating, the Yuletide fic of ever increasing length is DONE. *rejoices with tea*

Today, I'm making a book handbag for a friend, which is exciting! I'm also going to buy a-- proper, live-- Christmas tree, hang up fairy lights and maybe make that swag thing. I need to get a new fleecy jacket for my Dad. Write cards, buy presents, send presents, go to post office etc etc.

I'm sad to hear that Brittany Murphy has died. I never knew this at the time, but she was the voice of Luanne Platter in King of the Hill, a show that I loved with a fiery love.

We're finally giving in and getting cable tv with phone and broadband as a package. Virgin Media have quite a good deal. I was wondering if anyone is with Virgin Media, and are they okay?

I has a porridge. Yum.

I was late getting up this morning. I spent yesterday in headless chicken mode getting my craft show stall ready, then going along to set up and then staying in the evening for the opening. Someone bought a badge while I was there, so it was exciting! I failed to resist temptation and bought some brown woolly handwarmers. Fingers crossed my stuff will go over well.

I owe people emails and stuff - sorry if I haven't got back to you yet!

It's the tennis today - Rafa is playing Thomas Berdych at 3pm today GMT in the homoerotic love fest that is the Spanish Davis Cup!

ETA: stream here if you need it! http://www.fromsport.com/c-4.html

Also, an awesome Bradley/Colin vid that obsessively documents moments of eye contact, set to some particularly cheesy tinkly piano music.

Guess what happened to me today?

I went back to the O2 Arena to see Roger play. Right! But! I got there with minutes to spare after some interminable fucking around on tube trains that were broken all over London plus much walking. Anyway, I'm rushing up to level 4 where my seat is, high up in the highest gods, and an attendant hoikes me to one side and says: "Are you alone?"

"Uh, yeah?"

"Here." And she presses into my hand a new ticket that is for level 1, much better seat than the one I paid for!

"Um, what?" I said.

"We just have a few single seats spare. We like them to be used."

"Thank you. Wow. Thank you!" And she's laughing at the look on my face. Level 1! The fancy seats!

I stagger back down to Level 1, just in time for the match to begin. At first I can't find this strange row called 'GG'. It's clearly not row G. Finally, I ask an assistant. She takes me right down the steps to the front. It's the second row back, to one corner.

I sit down and Roger Federer is basically serving into my face.

I spend the next two hours alternately gaping, texting and taking photos. There was a moment when he leapt off the court into the air to reach a ball, and smashed it down. It was such a perfect display of athleticism that I, and the whole stadium, involuntarily cried out.

Afterwards, in some sort of karmic payback, all the trains at Paddington were delayed and then I got drenched cycling home. But essentially today was a day of amazingness.

The Empire of Bags has a rush wholesale order due by Friday, so I am a bit busy. HOWEVER, I just wanted to procrastinate by posting some Rafa and Roger pics that have caught my eye this week. I'm feeling simply desperate amounts of Fedal love since rewatching Wimbers 08 with buckle_berry at the weekend ans sighing at the unnecessary hair touching and stroking. Sigh sigh.

( Stubbly, freckley, smiley Rafa from today's Guardian interview )

Couldn't sleep last night, and the birds woke me up this morning by pecking at the insects on the window. I'm sitting here like a giant mole in my dressing gown, drinking tea and blinking at the light. Not that moles drink tea and wear dressing gowns. I know that. Imagine a more Wind in the Willows sort of scenario. Or maybe don't.

I have lots of post office things to today, and I need to do a lot of work on my empire of bags. Plus my installment of writing and going to the gym.

In the spirit of all that stuff to do, I'm going to post some pictures of Rafa. Because it's the tennis this week! Again! I say that like there isn't always tennis somewhere. It's the last Masters series tournament of the year, in Paris. Rafa has spent the preceding week picking up awards and wearing what look suspiciously like skinny jeans.

( rafafa pics )

There's a great interview with Rafa here, where he talks about a lot about Roger, life at home and how he copes with losing. I like how he touches his chest when he talks about Roger.

Two interviews with Roger: At the moment I’m into bergamot. And this one, which is better and quite revealing about how he copes with fame and attention.