A black notebook will make everything better

I feel like typing, feel like opening the stopper and letting the brain words come out, but it seems there are no brain words to come. Wait... maybe there are a few.

I got a Bras 'n Things voucher for Christmas, and today I bought an excessive amount of naughty knickers with it. The voucher was for $50, and the purchase came to around $60. Sixty dollars! In one knicker-buying spree! After suspiciously looking at the receipt to see how a few frilly things on sale could possibly come to such a figure, I discovered that one pair stood out from the crowd at $26.90. That's one hell of an ass-coverer. Lucky it was shiny. I had better receive some appreciative fondling while wearing that one.

Yesterday I gave blood, which went okay despite my apparently weeny veins. I think I had the most senior person, and I felt relieved when my nurse was the one that the other lady was asking for help. I also had to suppress a smile when, at the request for help, my nurse stopped her friendly chat with me and turned to face her colleague with a steel-faced glare. "You'll just have to wait your turn." Tension in the blood bank. Apparently in China, once you give blood three times, you're entitled to free transfusions for yourself and immediate family if you ever need it. As Brian pointed out, "If everybody in China give blood three times, that's a lot of blood." Damn straight.

Speaking of work, I had one of those moments this morning that I knew would have to happen some time - I was locked out, due to the door code being changed and nobody alerting me. Damn them! A lady in a tour bus was waiting outside for a guest and I could imagine her watching my progress as I tried the door code, looked confused, tried it again, looked it up in my phone, tried it again, then grumpily started calling everybody who might be able to help me. Nobody answered their phones, including the hostel phone, and I retreated into the bus. We both waited, a little tense and irritated, for a guest to emerge from the hostel door - Ms Tour Guide so she could leave and not miss the ferry, me so I could get inside my own workplace. I then called my boss, who was thankfully already up and awake, but didn't know the door code either. "I'll try to call them!" he offered. This amused me, because of the personal insult that the other staff members being willing to answer to him, but not me, would have implied (let's not tell her the door code, then deliberately ignore the phone when she calls from the chilly doorstep!). For all the shambles that that place can be, I don't think people are that horrible. Anyway, the late guest on the tour did emerge, I got inside, and hopefully they got to the ferry on time.

All right. Low battery, and that's enough word drip. And another early start tomorrow. Here's to the underachieving British kids on TV.