On food

The male mind is said to be occupied for the majority of its time with thoughts of sex. I am not male and thus have no idea what that must be like. (Thank goodness.) But I do know that many female brains I have some knowledge of are predominantly filled with thoughts of FOOD. Making it, buying it, presenting it, eating it, watching others eat it... And as a cyclist, I am grateful that I don't need to give a penny to the cumbersome and maddening thing that is Transport For London, but I do give over half of my salary to Sainsbury's. I barely land at my desk every morning, after a bowl of muesli and a 45-minute ride to work, and my mind starts to riff on the beauty of bananas and how much fun you can have stuffing vast quantities of sunflower seeds into your face. Then my friend and colleague Bita (remind me to explain to you how cool she is at some point...) will reach for her box of sultana bran, or I'll see someone dip furtively into the biscuit jar and I'm off; I simply can't think for the drum beating in my head about how yummy porridge tastes when its raining outside on a Saturday morning, or how heavenly it is to plunge into the crust of freshly-baked bread and scoop out the fragrant soft insides. And a friend, whom I DO NOT thank, has recently introduced me to Amarino's, which is where you can select four flavours of ice cream from the colourful array and watch them mould the lucky winners into a petal-shaped concoction of oozing yumminess. And then you sit in sugary silence and watch Old Compton street roll by in all its trippy splendour. But stuck in an office in the East End, I have no option but to while away the hours with pumpkin seeds and yoghurt until its time to go for a run through the packed City streets at lunch hour and then dash into Tesco's to plunder the shelves of humous and oatcakes. My day is measured by snacks and meals and grazing and thinking about what I'm going to eat next. And on a rainy day, such as today, the inner call for carbs - preferably steaming hot - becomes too much to think above. If any more precipitation rolls down the window, I'll wish I were male, and preoccupied with anything other than thoughts of biscuits...or pizza...or chocolate...