Listlessness

As regular readers might have noticed, I have been suffering rather from this condition for the past couple of weeks.

And so has the blog (for rather longer)!

So, in an absurd piece of superstitious japery, I will see if I can dispel the listlessness in my life by adding some LISTINESS to dear old Froogville today.

(Admission: This is a recycle of a comment I left on Leah's blog a few months back [I can't remember where]. I am far too listless to come up with an original list for you!)

Four jobs I've had:

1. Barman - at the 'Rose & Crown' pub, Oxford (many years ago, and not for very long!)

2. Waiter (and occasional microwaver of pre-cooked, salmonella-laced fare) at a very dodgy pizza restaurant whose name I now forget (similar era to 1. above)

3. Photographic model (you get some strange opportunities in this country where I now live!!)

4. Film actor (well, not quite: I was once offered a role as an evil, moustache-twirling Victorian colonialist, but turned it down.... the part just wasn't right for me at the time)

Four places I've lived:

1. Oxford
2. Sydney (only for a month, but it counts)
3. Toronto (best hot dogs in the world!)
4. Beijing


Four favourite foods:

1. pistachio ice cream
2. mango kulfi
3. baked beans on toast (English childhood 'comfort food')
4. crusty bread (surely an essential in anyone's list?)


Supplement - four favourite foods in China:

1. nang bao rou
2. jiaozi (or baozi)
3. rou jia mo
4. hu pi jian jiao

Four films I could watch over and over (Actually, these are just four favourites; on reflection, I think they're probably a bit too rich and serious – though all darkly funny - for frequent repeat viewing, but.... this'll do for now):

1. Dark Star
2. Harold & Maude
3. The Hairdresser's Husband
4. Being John Malkovich


Four TV shows I enjoy:

(Hmmm, I just don't watch TV any more. When visiting friends in the States last summer the answers would have been South Park, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and Vh1's Top 20 Countdown; but now..... only the dire local channel CCTV-9..... sad, sad, sad....)

1. Documentary
2. Culture Express
3. Dialogue
4. BizChina


Four places I've travelled (avoiding the obvious):

1. Jamaica
2. Greece
3. Fiji
4. North Korea


Four places I'd like to visit:

1. Cuba (preferably while Fidel is still around, although – more realistically – this looks like being another 'collect the set of embalmed former dictators' visit [not many people can claim to have ticked Kim-Il Sung!])
2. Qinghai/Tibet
3. South America, and especially Brazil (although Buenos Aires also appeals, for the tango...), and especially a town in the Matto Grosso called Araçatuba (my mother's birthplace)
4. Petra ("the rose-red city, half as old as time")


Four websites I go to daily (almost hourly!):

1. Yahoo Mail
2. Blogger
3. Wikipedia (mostly via proxy)
4. Google (and, when I'm feeling fancy, GoogleScholar)