Day 22: Wet Kitten; Big Dog

St Albans to Acton - at the wrong time of day, a world of traffic pain.  However, at seven thirty on a Saturday morning, an effortless flight through deserted roads, like it's the 1920s and I am Lord Sebastian Flyte motoring up to London.  To Jude's and the first of many serendipitous parking spots.  And then to Muswell Hill with a laden boot.  Another spot on St James's Lane, unloading the car amongst the ghosts of my past - then coffee, homemade biscuits and full-throttle enthusiasm with Jude's cousin Ruth. 

Back to Acton (by eleven o'clock, definitely 2011 - no more 1920) to make a Plaster of Paris mould of my face.  Jude starts to apply  damp Mod Roc bandages to my forehead, but pauses to smear my hair unbecomingly flat with Vaseline and cling film.  It's difficult to laugh under a rapidly hardening mask, but at the words 'You know when you wet a kitten...' it's impossible not to.  The layers build, and I am covered, except for my nostrils.  My mouth and even my eyes - plaster pushed right into every contour.  There's something deeply relaxing about the process - surrendering your face to someone you trust, and then all your awareness reduced to the sensation of the heavy wet strips, warming and hardening to a protective camouflage carapace, as you hide underneath. 

Ealing, and fantastic cheap Chinese food - glossy black bean sauce, and loads of MSG casting its reliably bewitching spell over my taste buds.  More masks - a whole afternoon of them.  So satisfying to see a roomful of twitchy, slightly fractious people slowly yield to the calm and charm of clay, papier mache, and Jude's patient guidance.

To Tufnell Park and some fantastic dog rehabilitation, courtesy of Storm (see right) - a huge Rottweiler/French bull mastiff cross.  Terrifying to look at, but gentle, funny and obedient.  Undid years of dog-fear in one evening.