It had all been going too well – turning up to Balham station, getting on the train – I even got a seat one morning. Last night coming back from Notting Hill the Circle Line was disrupted so I got the Central and then Northern, which stopped at Kennington, so I had to change… And then this morning the Northern Line was suspended so Balham overland station was crazy busy. Oh for the little city where I can walk to work and you can get anywhere in a cab for €20…
But then, I was in Notting Hill because I was at the closing night of our Common Language Film Festival and the star of the final film Il y a longtemps que je t’aime, the one and only Kristin Scott Thomas was there and did a Q&A afterwards. And as I was walking to Balham train station I bumped into my brother’s best friend and one of the people I’ve known longest in my life, so was able to travel in with him. Now, none of that happens in Brussels!
The admin of being in a new place is coming together – I’ve got my work mobile phone now, I can answer my colleagues’ phones and all the computer systems seem to work. Having said that, someone hasn’t flicked a switch somewhere in Brussels, so the people that do pay think I am still based in Brussels and so won’t pay me in my UK account yet…the wheels turn slowly sometimes, in any big organisation, and ours is no different.
Nothing big planned for today, except meeting my European Parliament colleague, but that’s the joy of press work – you just never know what’s going to come up!
This post originally appeared on my euonym blog which has now been merged into this site.