Eng-er-land!

We're through to the quarter-finals! In the World Cup baby!

...not very convincingly though - watched the game yesterday and the tension was unbearable - as my Dad put it, watching England play is heart attack material. Thank god for Becks and his unbelievable ball-bending abilities and also for little Ashley Cole, who ran like a man possessed to intercept what would have surely been an equalizer from Ecuador. Phew.

If my nerves can take it, we're against Portugal next Saturday...come on lads!

We've got a sweepstake in the office, but I didn't get England as one of my teams - I got Germany (host nation, they might pull it out of the bag and secure me the prize fund - a whopping £15, I'd have to be careful not to spend it all at once), Togo - there wasn't ever much hope there, USA - sorry, but likewise, Switzerland - they're playing today - though even if they win, I can't see them going all the way, and Czech Republic, who didn't get through. So I'm officially rooting for England (obviously), but secretly hopeful for Germany's chances. I have £15 riding on it after all.

p.s. Could David Beckham get any more attractive? I don't think so.

Hidden dangers of healthy eating

My hands smell of tuna. I've washed them several times, but the aroma of tuna lingers on. Before you all get smutty (oh don't deny it, I know what you guys are like), I decided to be all healthy this morning and fix myself a tuna salad to take to work for lunch. I prepared it at 8am, washed my hands, and then left the house. On the train, I realised with horror that my hands reeked of fish.

Comforted myself with the knowledge that I would be able to wash them (with what? Acid?) once I got to work. Of course, as soon as I walked into reception, of course I was introduced to a new member of staff, and of course we shook hands. Way to make a great impression - I'm the girl who smells like tuna. Excellent.

Over the course of the day, I've washed my hands a number of times in the manner of an OCD sufferer, and even now, even now I swear I can still smell a hint of tuna. See what happens when you make an effort and go all healthy? Had I bought myself a ridiculously over-priced hermetically sealed sandwich from M&S, none of this would have happened.

Scratch that

Turns out he has a girlfriend. Albeit one that lives in Sweden, and has been out of the counry for 6 months, but a girlfriend all the same. He didn't volunteer this information freely, oh no.
It was only revealed that he had a girlfriend following a chance question from me on an entirely unrelated topic. I had been invited up to the flat again, and we were chatting away, then we got on to the topic of football, what with the Wolrd Cup being on, and he said something about how he was disappointed with Sweden's performance. So I jokingly said, 'Why, do you have some connection to Sweden?' and then he said 'Yeah, my girlfriend's from Sweden.' Imagine the difficulty I had in maintaining a neutral facial expression as I heard this news. He then told me that she has been in Sweden for the past 6 months, I said that was a long time (for want of anything else to say) and then he looked straight at me and said that sometimes 'it gets lonely'. Sheesh.

Next stop: internet dating?

Man ahoy!

Yes, that's right, there is a man on the horizon. Just as I was about to resort to internet dating, I bumped into a guy who lives in the same building as me. I met him on the train home from seeing The Kooks a couple of weeks ago - what are the odds?

Anyway, despite the fact that he knocked on my door - twice - and I lost all power of speech and realised my inner flirt had gone on some sort of sabbatical without telling me, and neglected to invite him in - twice (the second time, it was raining outside - and I still couldn't engage my brain enough to invite him over the threshold - what was I thinking?), progress has been made. After I realised that he may not knock a third time without a modicum of encouragement, I suddenly galvanised myself into action and...wrote him a note. Lame, I know. LAME. Still, it had my name and number on it, and a subtle attempt at humour. It took me 8 drafts, and it was only two lines long. I put it through his door, and then tried to forget about it as I didn’t hear from him all week.

Then - you can all stop holding your breath - he knocked again on Saturday last, I finally managed to focus, and invited him in for drinks. Phew. So we had a nice evening, chatting away, and later on, we went up to his flat and I met his flatmate, and we all had more to drink and listened to some music and it was all very pleasant. At the end of the night, he walked me to the door and gave me a hug, and kissed me on the cheek.

So, I’m feeling quite hopeful. BUT - what to do, what to do? Should I be doing anything? Do I wait for him to call? I can hardly be casually passing by his flat as it is on the top floor, and I don’t have his number to send the traditional non-committal-friendly-non-threatening text message. See? I’m totally out of practice at this sort of thing. I know where he works, but does stopping by seem stalkerish, or friendly?

Feel like I need to go on some sort of refresher course....argh.