Simple Pleasures

Been a busy few days, what with magazine work and thrashing out a story idea for something I don't want to talk about just yet, for fear of cursing it - it's one of those jobs where nothing's certain until you sign a contract.

I know that this kind of Secret Squirrel approach to blogging annoys at least one of my regulars, but since you know who you are and you know what job I'm talking about, I don't feel so bad about it.

Meanwhile, there have been a couple of things that have put a smile on my face in amongst the grafting. I got a cold-call yesterday from the telecommunications company who made my life so miserable just under a year ago. Apparently they've noticed I've changed service providers and wanted to get me to change back, dangling a carrot of $200 credit for my renewed loyalty.

Words cannot adequately express the enjoyment I experienced from telling them that if they were the last telecom company on Earth, I'd switch to smoke signals rather than use them.

*Ahhhhhhh*.

I also derived no small amount of pleasure from seeing Spurs finish fifth in the Premier League for the second year running - making them 'Best of the Rest' again after the unassailable Top Four. Their change in fortune after a dud start to the season can be directly attributed to my stopping watching them play live - every time I sat down to a live broadcast from the UK they'd get thumped. Switched to the highlights shows and success duly followed.

[Commiserations to Ruby T, too, after last night's result].

And finally I was highly amused during a work assignment to read Patty Hearst's open letter regarding her supposed advice to Paris Hilton. Heiress-turned-jailbird Hearst would seem the obvious choice of mentor for heiress-turned-jailbird Hilton, but she's been quick to deny any doling out of tips. It was the second paragraph that did it for me ...