JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

Various people told me that London gets only one or two weeks of real sunshine during the summer; the rest of the season it is gray and rainy. Naturally I landed on the week of relentless sunshine. I imagined ultraviolet rays attacking my cells and slathered on a bulwark of SPF 70 sunblock.

Strangely enough I hardly ever use sunblock in Manila, and we get way more sunshine than London does. This is because we are only exposed to direct sunlight while crossing the street, getting into cars, or moving from one air-conditioned biosphere to another.

On a brilliant Sunday afternoon we walked down Regent’s Canal then up the winding path to Primrose Hill.

“Tell me again why we’re going up this hill in the blinding sunshine?” I asked my friend.

“For the view,” was the reply.

The distant view was of tall buildings; the view below was of the natives soaking up the sun. I mean people stripping off most of their clothing and hurling themselves at a patch of sunlight.

Parang ngayon lang sila nakakita ng araw, dahil ngayon nga lang sila nakakita ng araw.

I could hear the melanomas sprouting.

Meanwhile those of us who have natural defenses against solar rays cling to the shade. Many of us want to be whiter; they want to be browner. Trade.

Very pleased at my self-control (due in large part to fear of overweight baggage): bought only four books in London. The Penguin Decades reissue of Hawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd with the cover by John Squire of The Stone Roses,

The Rehearsal by Eleanor Catton, Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd, and The Glass Room by Simon Mawer, bought in a 3-for-2 promo at Waterstone’s.

I am still reading David Mitchell’s wonderful new book Jacob de Zoet, which I lugged everywhere but somehow never managed to read. It was supposed to be my airplane book but I slept through most of the 12-hour flight and when I was half-conscious I watched The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski, slick, slumming), A Single Man (directed by Tom Ford as a series of Gucci ads), The Last Station (basically waiting for Leo Tolstoy to croak), and best of all, episodes of Family Guy and American Dad (I’d already seen their 30 Rocks).

This is what my reading backlog looks like at the moment. I thought it would be much worse. The Russian novels:

That project is not zipping along. I blame life for getting in the way of my reading.

The contemporary novels and recent biographies:

That’s not so bad. Manageable. As long as I don’t buy any books for the next two months.

Got home just in time to avert a full-scale reenactment of Lord of the Flies.

Every time I go on a trip my three cats are left in my apartment. Cat psychologists say they would be more comfortable in familiar surroundings than in someone else’s house. (I know this to be true: when Koosi was our only cat we left her with a friend for a couple of weeks and she tore up his place and attacked him.) When I’m away my sister or my brother-in-law drops by the apartment every other day to put fresh water in the cats’ bowls and top up the kibble dish.

This time I was out longer than usual. When I opened the door I immediately sensed chaos. The air was thick with fur, and someone had peed on the kitchen floor. Books had been pushed off the shelves and used as scratching posts. There were holes in the curtains which had been used for rappelling. My cats were going feral.

Then the three perps ran out of the bedroom—I had the impression they had been running around the house making war cries—saw me at the door with my luggage, and froze in their tracks. Immediately they reverted to their usual bored, blasé expressions.

Koosi: Oh, are you back?

Saffy: When did you leave? I hardly noticed.

Mat: I would like a treat, please.

Home.

Want to win the futbol World Cup? Get a cat. Victory by toxoplasmosis!

Science magazine cover, 22 December 2006. To prove the Poincaré Conjecture, Grigori Perelman used the equations for Ricci flow—a procedure for transforming irregular spaces into uniform ones. In this two-dimensional example, the equations prescribe that negatively curved regions (blue) must expand while positively curved regions (red) contract. Over time, the original dumbbell-shaped surface evolves into a sphere. Image: Cameron Slayden/cosmocyte.com, based on data provided by Robert Sinclair

A Math Problem Solver Declines a $1 Million Prize
By Dennis Overbye

“I have refused,” Interfax, a Russian news agency, quoted him as saying. “You know, I had quite a lot of reasons both for and against. That is why I took so long to make up my mind.”

Read the full article in the NYT.

Bert: I like Kellan Lutz in those Calvin Klein ads.

Me: You should watch those Twilight movies then.

Bert: He’s in the Twilight movies?!

Me: Yeah, he’s a vampire.

Bert: Why didn’t you tell me Twilight was excellent! You said it was garbage!

Ernie: I saw Eclipse. I know the secret of their success: the girl is the boy and the vampire is the girl. He can’t even react when she kisses the topless werewolf.

Bert: He’s. . .topless?

Ernie: All the time. It’s the werewolves’ uniform: topless with cutoff denims.

Bert: Why didn’t you tell me Eclipse was a five-star movie!?

My review of Twilight Saga: Eclipse: Dating A Vampire vs. Dating A Werewolf

1. A vampire is literally cool (to the touch). A werewolf is literally hot. You should date the vampire in the summer and the werewolf in winter. We don’t have winter in the tropics so you can sneak around with your werewolf during typhoons and cold snaps.

2. Vampires look great in velvet, silk, capes and vintage fashions, and are totally into couture. Werewolves look great in cutoff denims and no shirt, but this limits your dining options to fast food joints, outdoor BBQs and seafood markets. And forget about dining al fresco on the full moon.

2.a. You and the vampire can go to the opera, the symphony, the ballet every night, but try getting the werewolf in the door. Whether or not this is an advantage depends on your feelings about the opera, the symphony, and the ballet.

3. Vampires have more money. They’re immortal, so even the most financially-illiterate vampire will get rich if he opens a savings account and leaves it alone for 200 years (But not with Philippine interest rates ha ha ha). Werewolves have fewer economic opportunities because it’s hard to get a good business manager if you’re essentially a very big dog. Unless you go into showbiz.

4. Every time you get a paper cut your vampire will be all over you, which might be charming at first but you’ll have to get a taser. On the other hand, every time you throw something your werewolf will fetch it and bring it back to you. Your choice.

5. Vampires have no smell, but werewolves have that wet dog scent.

6. With a vampire you’ll never have to compete for use of the bathroom mirror. With a werewolf you’ll have to carry a lint brush at all times.

7. Vampires don’t age so if you don’t want to look like his grandmother you’ll need botox and surgery eventually. Of course if he turns you into a vampire you’ll never have to worry about wrinkles, crow’s feet, and sun spots again. Werewolves don’t care how old you look as long as you smell like bacon.

8. Vampires have been around for ages so they tend to be jaded and indifferent to your interests. Werewolves are half-man, half-man’s best friend so they tend to be too enthusiastic about your interests. Bottom line: Are you a cat person, or a dog person?

Strawberries and cream. And an espresso for those who woke up at 4am to queue up for tickets. (Not today, last week.)

It’s painful to watch Tomas Berdych lumbering around the court totally bereft of ideas (You cannot serve your way out of this, you are not Goran), so I’m going to stop right here at the end of the second set. Rafael Nadal wins his second Wimbledon title!

Boboy says Rafa reminds him of a matador. Na-ah. While we’d all like to see him in toreador pants, Rafa is the bull.

Photograph: Ian Kington/AFP/Getty Images

Why do I suddenly want two scoops of ice cream?