Letty

Letty is my sunshine friend

Shadows shift upon the sight of her

Scents of summer waft in

Her smile is light

Set in face round, bright

Warming the coldest day

And she is generous with it

Backpack on

She braves Bristol

Its hills, its tunes, its pints, its colour, its green

And all its crazy and broken and creative and beautiful people

Breathes it all in hard

Trailing light rivers from bicycle wheels

Changing the map

Love letter to London

I wrote this last year, in the back of my journal, scribbled in green pen.

A friend happened to read it and said I should share it, so here it is. Not too polished, but it's honest.

I almost don't want to say this out loud. But London, I feel a little disappointed. In you? By you?

You and me, we've been ever so slowly moving towards each other all these years. An inevitable trajectory - we knew one day we'd be together.

In the meantime, it was all quick dates and brief flings. Exciting, exhilarating, a guilty pleasure. Rough around the edges you were - and that's what I loved. The mix of grime and colour. The unexpected cosy corner. Majesty, mystery, misery all rocking side by side.

You were fresh air in my lungs, a raw kick after the sleepiness of Oxford; energetic honesty after the surrealism of Brighton. You were ideas and positivity peeking up out of the grey. Basements and breakdancing, Brixton, Brick Lane, the last train back to Brighton all danced out and satisfied.

New York: the places we ate

So we did pretty well food-wise in New York, which is cool, because food is probably the quickest way to the hearts of Mr and Mrs Quinn.

Before we went Mr Q said his priorities were pizza and hot dogs.

We basically failed in that respect, I didn't even have a pretzel. BUT I think we more than made up for it with other delights.

So, here we go, our New York food diary:

TUESDAY

Hot dog: Hot dog stand outside Central Park
This was probably the most disappointing food purchase. Maybe I just chose the wrong stand, won over by its proclamations of selling hot dogs for 100 years (or something like that) – susceptible tourist that I was. But it filled a gap when I only had $4 dollars on me – although I could only afford saurkraut with it. Maybe that's what let it down? Not really sure what I was expecting though, how good can a frankfurter sausage be? Tell me if I'm missing something here!

Smoothie (kale, mango, peach, lemon & ginger): Jamba Juice
The unremarkable hot dog was made up for later that evening by a smoothie from Jamba Juice. I was drawn in by the stacks of fresh fruit and vegetables, and needed something to sustain me through a writing class. I definitely (accidentally) picked the right place: probably the best smoothie I've ever had, thick and cold and 'zinging'.