You take your car to work, I'll take my board

San's gone to Argentina. It's weird; I don't see her every day, I don't talk to her every day -- hell, I don't even want to talk to her every day. So why then does it feel lonely that she's gone? It reminds me a little of last year, when she went to university in Maryland -- London felt weird without her in it. Like somehow this living, breathing city of however-many thousand people was missing a vital part. I'd get on the tube, and it would feel so weird to just pass by Kings Cross -- sometimes I felt like asking her younger sister if she wanted to hang out. But I never got quite that weird about it. Now San's on holiday visiting one of her friends from when she was in Towson, it's just a short holiday even if she is technically now on the other side of the world.

Yesterday morning she called me from the airport while I was still in bed, I then spent the rest of the day thinking of her. Wondering where she was -- was she now changing planes in Barcelona, was she settling down on the plane, was she picking up her luggage in South America. I don't even know the time difference for Argentina. I woke this morning to a text message from her, she'd met her friend and they were going out to eat. I replied saying it was nice to know she was safe.

Back here at my desk in East London, it's a warm sunny morning and I'm calling a smoothie bought at the station my breakfast for the day. It's pretty good, and probably more fruit in one go than I have had in the last month. Instead of starting my work, and drafting out letters to celebrities, I'm checking my emails and longing for surf. Yesterday morning's Urban Junkies mail out detailed a company in the city that do weekend surf getaways -- you catch the bus Friday night after work, and they have you back in time before you start work again on Monday morning. I love the idea of that -- are you watching the football at the weekend, maybe having a barbecue, no you're going surfing straight from work.

I don't know why, because I suck at surfing. Seriously. I am perhaps the worst surfer to ever grace a long board, and barely made it to my feet during a whole week at a surf camp in Portugal last year. Though I blame the lack of swell for that. This morning Pure Vacations have sent me a surf update, describing another surf house in Portugal -- it does sound more organised than my experience last year, with everyone sitting down to a meal in the evening. Last year I felt left out since I was about the only non-German speaker, so this one sounds more inclusive -- and the place is in a slightly more urban setting.

But it's all by the by, until I get paid employment I have to think twice before I so much as go to the pub, let alone skip the country...