SEPT 12th SEPT : LONDON UPDATE

When Bella handed me the keys this morning I tried to assure her that her and her husbands flat was in safe hands. She then said well you couldn’t really do anything worse than what the porno video you shot last time I stayed.

So…. She still hasn’t forgotten that has she, I thought to myself.

I have just moved into a flat for 2 weeks in Notting Hill. The start of this trip has been spent in Beckshell On Sea to see the folks. Potted about and managed to get my tooth crowned for £300 rather than the $1900 I was quoted in the US. Went and celebrated Davo and Mina’s engagement party and Anthea & Richard’s military organized wedding too.

London was a little bit of a shock at first. I found it a little pedestrian, despite the blue skies I longed for the heat and energy of New York. I was beginning to agree with Si’s comment that NY was an adventure playground for people in their 30s and London a theme park for people in their 40s.

Thank goodness I popped into Soho. Soho Saves Souls. Turn off the ever-nagging danger that is Oxford Street and you are suddenly hit with another city. Young people of all ages looking great. Soho of course is one of the creative districts of London: advertising, film making, music companies. Suddenly I was in love with London again. I spent my lunch on the steps of a building watching people walk past – you could have been in SoHo with all the clothing: Mexican wedding shirts, faded jeans, Ts declaring ‘New York City’!

Notting Hill where Bella and Dan lives saves souls too. They needed someone to sit their flat and feed the cat whilst they went on holiday. They live in the sort of square you’d expect Hugh Grant to live in. White regal mansion blocks surrounding a private garden with roses and lawn. What I do like about Notting Hilll is that it’s mixed with people of all different backgrounds. The place, by rights should be the haven of the affluent but because of WWII damage a lot of property is owned by the Notting Hill Housing Assoc that helps out lower waged souls.- i.e 'normal' people like Dan and Bella.

I’m not too sure why Bella worries about what I do in the flat to be honest. OK – the last time I stayed at their place – I think during their honeymoon - I shot this little film with some friends. I had been running one of the first viral marketing agencies in London. Our speciality was making emailable video clips. We were a little early to market and after some ads for Nissan business went dead.

The way to drum up business – my partners and I agreed – was a man, a woman and a bed. That would bring us the scent of success. OK, ok. Maybe we were all too excited about the fact the ‘actress’ was in fact a glamour model and she’d walk around without her clothes on for a couple of hundred quid. Maybe this excitement caused us not to Google her name until after the shoot when we found all those risqué images of her. So, yes we did bring a porn star round to Dan and Bella’s but who were we to know.

I wasn’t quite expecting Bella to find out about what we had done for a long while - the place was perfect when Dan and Bella came back from their honeymoon one Sunday evening - and I hoped that by the time she found out we could all sit back and laugh about it.

The call came in at 9.15am Monday morning. It would have been 9am but she had to look at some of her wedding photos. And one her baby cousin. Then she opened an email from a friend which included a saucy video attachment. This was our video. It was out and was already being passes around.

This was the first and only call that this campaign generated though.

When she watched it, Bella must have noted a woman strip off in her bedroom, climb onto her marital bed, shuffle over a naked man chained to the martial bed and then spin round and let a fart on the chap’s face. Maybe the ‘Let Loose with Set Loose Movies’ tag line gave away the originators. Maybe she took the words ‘Let Loose’ quite literally as my ear was red for days after that.

You can see the clip here: http://www.setloose.co.uk/movies/WindMedia.wmv . Quite innocent really.

I’m sure anyone could trust me with their apartment after that.