Dear J

Your life sounds kinda weird.

I'm sorry I didn't write back sooner, but I've been stuck in the back of beyond. By which I mean Somerset. (sorry, residents of Somerset, but it's true). I was in a very picturesque cottage with views of sheep and hills, next to a proper country pub that served proper somerrrrrrrrset ciiiider. It had the views and the cider, but no internet. Or even phone signal. It's kind of weird, isn't it, that it's harder to get in touch with people from Somerset than it is from Taipei?

This is what the proper English seaside looks like

We went to Minehead, which is where my mum and dad met in 1971, when they were both working at Butlins for the summer. They met each other, quit their jobs and hitch hiked to Great Yarmouth to live in a caravan and work in an ice cream van. Until they got kicked out of the caravan for being too noisy, at which point they lived in a hole. As in, an actual hole dug in the sand on the beach, not just accommodation so shit it could metaphorically be described as 'a hole'. Before the end of the summer, they upgraded to a tent and my dad tried and failed to get a job as a stuntman. At this point I think they decided the adventure was over, and headed to Wales, but that's another story.

The reason for the holiday destination wasn't just nostalgia, but because our entire lives now have to be planned around The Dog. The Dog is actually normally referred to as 'the baby'. I'm not even kidding. My parents finally have escaped the tyranny of school holidays and young children, and so they could travel pretty much anywhere they want. Until they got an excitable puppy called Alfie who can't be left on his own, so they're stuck in the UK. They've both gone nuts: they talk to The Dog in baby-talk and buy him way more toys than I ever got as a kid. Life isn't fair.

My dad and 'the Baby'. Don't you think they look alike? The blur at the bottom is the Baby's brother.

But anyway, on Monday I had to get back to civilisation so I traded the rolling hills for the dreaming spires. I mean, I did have to tour the entire south west of England by train before I got home, there being absolutely no sensible routes from Taunton to Oxford, but I got there eventually. And since then I've been chilling. Well, by chilling, I mean hiding in the house nursing my sunburn.  Oops.

Still missing you lots. Have discovered more of your possessions: all of your DVDs, 30p in change and a pearl earring. I've nicked the 30p. You really are terrible at packing.

love,

C

Dear J,

I just found one of your bras in the bathroom, and it made me miss you.

You also left a few presents for me in the kitchen: four mouldy pink yoghurts, some fermenting strawberries and a packet of ready-meal pasta that expired months ago, but looks like it could have been bought yesterday. I'm not sure which is more gross.

I don't judge you too much for getting a posh room and a massage; some luxuries are allowed. But while you've been living it up in Shanghai, I've been getting my head down and joining the world of work. My job for this week consists of photocopying. Endless photocopying. And not just standard photocopying either - now I can do duplex photocopying, and A3 photocopying, and the photocopying of hundreds of pages all at once.

Photocopiers are evil machines, just like printers. And scanning at the publisher I'm working at is fiendishly complex. I have a twenty-point list of instructions on how to scan proofs, and I still can't do it right. Today I had to scan in this 300 page proof, and the photocopier would wait till I did about 140 pages, then jam and crash, so I had to delete the whole job and start again. Four times. I then tried splitting the job into three 100 page chunks to solve the problem. So of course, it scanned them all to the same file, overwriting the first two sections in the process. I made this face. The job ended up taking me about three hours. I think I'm a bad temp. No, photocopiers are bad machines.

Miss you, love you

C

xxx

Dear J,

Thank you for setting up such a beautiful blog for me. This is my slightly rubbish attempt at a response. I don't have your mad design skills, but I'll try my best to create something worthy of you. It's a work in progress right now, but I promise I'll make it better.

We went punting. With Alec. It was lol.

Oxford isn't the same either. Everyone is gone from college, and the weather is hotter and more sultry. Your beloved wife is as hot and sultry as ever, of course.

Miss you too!

love,

C

xxx