diamond geezer

 Saturday, January 31, 2004

BBC Radio 4: Tuesday 31st January 2006

05:43 Prayer For The Day "Oh God, please let public service broadcasting survive."
05:45 Farming Today Including a report from Andrew Gilligan's remote sheep farm in the Outer Hebrides.
06:00 Today The cautious investigative news programme, featuring...
    06:05 We ring Downing Street for permission to broadcast
    06:07 Pause for Thought
    06:40 Hard-hitting exposé of the Bolivian llama trade
    07:15 What The Papers Say - mostly provocative lies, but the government doesn't shut them down
    07:55 Commercial Break
    08:25 A Party Political Broadcast on behalf of the highest bidder
    08:30 Rupert Murdoch's Wholly Unbiased Editorial Half Hour
09:00 Kilroy
09:45 Book Of The Week Alistair Campbell reads from 'The Hutton Report' (part 37, repeat)
10:00 Woman's Hour Fern Britton brings you the latest showbiz gossip and make-up tips.
11:00 Any Questions? Apologies, but we're not allowed to answer them any more.
12:05 You And Yours Investigating the sell-off of the BBC proposed in Tessa Jowell's new BBC Charter.
12:30 I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue Still wondering where those weapons of mass destruction are.
13:00 The World At One Special report - is freedom of speech under global threat (or is it just here)?
13:30 Appeal on behalf of The Lost Licence Fee: please send your £116 to BBC TV Centre, The Office, Trading Estate, Slough.
14:00 The Archers (sponsored by McDonalds, where the beef comes from)
14:15 Afternoon Play "Auntie's Last Stand"
15:15 Desert Island Discs Greg Dyke is cast away.
16:00 Meet The Director General Tony Blair tells us how much he's enjoying his new job.
17:00 PM Gordon Brown, obviously.
18:00 Home Truths The BBC Governors apologise deeply for everything they may ever have done.
18:30 Just A Minute Because that's all the news we're allowed to broadcast these days.
18:31 Today In Parliament All those jolly good things that the Government announced this afternoon.
19:00 Shipping Forecast Tape-looped for a full hour, because it's terribly uncontroversial.
20:00 Sorry, we've run out of money for today, so time to join Talksport for an evening of phone-ins and betting updates.

 Friday, January 30, 2004

Theobald's Park

I'm just back from deepest Hertfordshire, my two days of 'team-building' complete. Thankfully what we got to do was quite useful - no trying to support bricks on towers constructed from newspaper for us - although other groups of delegates on site weren't quite so lucky. I've suffered from both overeating and overheating, so it's good to have escaped the corporate hotel lifestyle and to be back home again.

The old mansion at Theobald's Park looked delightful in the snow, looking out across the glistening Lea Valley, surrounded by deer-filled woodland. The original Theobalds was the favourite hunting lodge of James I, but fell into ruins after the king died here in 1625. The main part of the present building dates from the 18th century and has since been owned by an MP (1763), a rich London brewer (1820), the Admiral of the Fleet (1910), the Metropolitan Police riding school (1939), a local secondary school (1951), and finally a conference centre (1995). The latest owners have restored some of the old house to gilt-edged wood-panelled splendour, but I don't think that flipcharts, vending machines and Sky TV were part of the original Georgian decoration.

And yes, down at the end of the drive, within sight of the 'Lady Meux restaurant', lies Temple Bar (see yesterday). Or, at least, what's left of Temple Bar, which isn't much. Just a small section of the east wall remains, surrounded by towering scaffolding that gives some idea of the scale of the original structure. A handful of workmen were hiding in the portakabins for warmth, occasionally popping out to dismantle a little more of the remaining wall. Some of the large stones that made up the arch were lying around on pallets, covered by snow, ready to be transported back to London. It won't be long before there's nothing left here but a muddy clearing in the woods, and conference delegates will have to make do with a stroll in the Italian Garden, or just another dip in the spa bath.

You'll be able to see Temple Bar reborn later this year, back in London at Paternoster Square beside St Paul's Cathedral. Latest news here. This ancient gate to the City of London certainly deserves to be seen by more than a few corporate freeloaders, squirrels and delivery lorries, but I'm sure one corner of Hertfordshire will be sad to see it go.

 Thursday, January 29, 2004

Temple Bar

Work are sending me away, out of snow-splattered London, for two days. It's only for one night, but I can't say I'm delighted to be uprooted from my spiritual home merely for the sake of 'team-building'. I think that was the excuse they gave anyway. Still, things could be much worse. They're sticking us in a country-manor-cum-conference-centre within half a mile of the M25, which is barely outside London at all. And, lurking in the grounds, forgotten for decades, lies one of the City's most famous landmarks...

Temple Bar used to be located where the Strand meets Fleet Street, one of the ancient gateways into the City of London, named after the local Inns of Court. The first bar was just a chain across the road, the second a wooden structure with a prison on top, and the third (and final) a magnificent arch built from Portland stone. And yes, like everything else in this Fire-ravaged part of London it was built by Sir Christopher Wren - did this man ever rest? In the 18th century the heads of traitors were displayed on iron spikes across the top of the arch. Sorry, this is all sounding like a repeat of last week, isn't it?

By the late 19th century there was just one tiny problem - the gateways through the arch were rather narrow and therefore unsuited to ever-increasing amounts of road traffic. In 1878 the Corporation of London dismantled the arch, brick by brick, and hid it away in a yard off Farringdon Road. A pedestal with a large gold dragon was erected in its place, and the old bar was forgotten.

Salvation came from an unlikely source. Lady Meux was a banjo-playing barmaid who had married into high society but wanted desperately to prove her respectability. She had the bricks of Temple Bar shipped up to Hertfordshire on horse-drawn trolleys and reassembled in the grounds of her country house - Theobald's Park. Garden parties were held to celebrate its arrival, and such famous people as Edward VII and Winston Churchill were entertained in the arch's upper chamber. For a brief season, Temple Bar was back in the limelight. It didn't last. Before long the monument was lying fenced off and forgotten in overgrown woodland, slowly crumbling away.

Until recently, that is. Suddenly Temple Bar is on its way back to the City, not to its original location but to a new site in the shadow of St Paul's Cathedral. This is Paternoster Square (above left), a new piazza of questionable architectural merit, yet another swathe of office space and designer shops. The developers want to add a certain historical respectability to their new project, just like Lady Meux, so they're having Temple Bar shipped all the way back from Hertfordshire. Workmen started dismantling the arch at Theobalds last October and it appears I'm visiting only just in time before they take the last few bricks down for good. Meanwhile the scaffolding is going up in Paternoster Square (right) and Temple Bar should be reassembled here by the end of the year.

An excellent website charts the progress of the Temple Bar project, with daily photos of the stonemasons at work and all the latest news (they found a time capsule inside one brick a couple of weeks ago).

So, I may be out of general circulation until late tomorrow, but at least I'll have another slice of lost London to keep me company. Hopefully I'll have time to sneak out from the planned team-building activities to take a look at the team doing the unbuilding. Temple Bar, poor thing, has been trapped out of town for over a century. I'm only away for the one night, but I'm pleased we'll both be back home soon.

 Wednesday, January 28, 2004

10 things I can't be bothered to blog about

1) Tuition fees: Last night MPs were invited to vote for either 'a complete disaster' or 'a complete disaster'. Alas, the complete disaster won. Stilll, if 3 MPs had voted the other way, the other complete disaster would have happened instead.
2) US Presidential primaries: For heaven's sake, the election is still 40 weeks away. Whatever the outcome of these primaries, come November and US citizens will also be asked to vote for either 'a complete disaster' or 'a complete disaster', as usual. Britain's next election looks slightly further away this morning, but at least it'll all be over in a month.
3) The Hutton Inquiry: The finger of blame is about to be pointed. Someone will take the rap, probably someone with overall responsibilty rather than direct responsibility, and the feasting media vultures may then be satisfied. Me, I'd prefer to call an inquiry to find out who's responsible for the culture of blame developing in this country.
4) Leaky tabloids: So much for secrecy. The Sun (which worships the PM and despises the BBC) owned by Rupert Murdoch (who likes the PM and hates the BBC) has leaked the Hutton report (which apparently exonerates the PM and blames the BBC). One day, one day, this execrable rag might do something I don't shout back at.
5) I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here: Is Johnny Rotten selling out? Does Jordan have a three-dimensional character? Who's wearing a toupee? How do we tell which ones are the cockroaches and which aren't? And why are so many of us watching? Did you see last night's...?
6) The Mydoom email worm: I got home last night to discover my inbox filled by viral spam. I haven't opened any, but it appears that the worm has been taking my email address in vain. I'd like to apologise now to jose at cdwow, robert at amazon and anna at tesco - I didn't send those emails, honest.
7) The Oscar nominations: Some films will win. Most films won't. Everyone will argue that the films that didn't win should have done. Repeat over 460 different categories. Yawn. The only interesting thing about the 2004 Oscars is that this will be the first time they've been awarded on February 29th since 1940 (when Gone With The Wind won 8, by the way).
8) Fuel-cell buses: I finally saw one of those new pollution-free buses going past my house the other day. It looked like a normal single decker, but with clouds of non-stop steam gushing upwards into the air. I noticed they'd had to write 'no emissions' all over the bus in very big letters so that passers-by didn't get too worried.
9) Burberry scarves: Sorry, but the cold weather has brought this tasteless neckwear onto the streets in enormous numbers. Wool, as worn by sheep. However, I think I've discovered Britain's biggest Burberry fashion victim - here (from ChavScum - "a humorous guide to Britain's burgeoning peasant underclass")
10) Snow: It didn't, did it? Well, it did a bit a bit North, and a lot a lot North, but nothing of note here. If our weather forecasters cry wolf again, we're just not going to believe them next time are we? Same time next year then.

Drat... 10 things I could be bothered to blog about

 Tuesday, January 27, 2004

Government Snow Warning

Remember Winter? We used to have Winters once, before our industrial policies kick-started inexorable global warming. Well, our weather boffins tell us that a brief spell of proper Winter is on its way. There may even be snow. Don't be scared - many other countries survive Winter relatively unscathed each year. However, just in case you're worried by the threat of total whiteout, here are some top tips to help you through the imminent cold spell.

Do
• Wear a woolly hat to preserve body warmth, because everybody else will be and nobody will laugh at you, honest.
• Get out that sledge you've been meaning to use since 1987. You can put it away unused later.
• Pop round and check that an elderly neighbour isn't sitting in their back garden wearing only a dressing gown.
• Make sure that, in national news coverage, six snowflakes in London are given higher priority than six-foot drifts in Northumberland.
• Hunt down that free plastic ice scraper that Reader's Digest sent you last year.
• Make the most of all the free heating available in shopping malls, cinemas, trains and your neighbour's house.
• Zip up your parka really tight, and make that furry hood stick forward like a snorkel.
• Take time out to remind yourself how negative numbers work.
• Bore your grandchildren rigid by telling them that it always used to be like this when you were a kid.
• Add sugar to your birdbath to lower the temperature at which the water in it freezes.
• Stay indoors and wait for the entire UK transport network to suddenly grind to a halt.

Don't
• Stock up on tins of warming soup, because that means going out in the cold to buy them.
• Sleep with your windows open.
• Use the snow to make snowmen, unless you balance this by building an equivalent number of snowwomen.
• Run out of anti-freeze and end up joining the community of broken-down vehicles on the hard shoulder of your local motorway.
• Moan that you can't get to the airport to fly off on your skiing holiday.
• Wonder why that nice man who sells the Big Issue seems to have suddenly disappeared.
• Try to cross the road in the slipstream of one of our gritter lorries.
• Read tomorrow's newspapers - use them instead to protect your car's windscreen from frost.
• Go outside and lick the salt off the pavement.
• Be surprised if nothing much happens and the whole thing's a complete anti-climax.

 Monday, January 26, 2004

Are you Spatially Unaware?

I firmly believe that some people have no idea quite how much space they're taking up. This has nothing to do with weight, and everything to do with thoughtlessness. These people blunder through life oblivious to everyone but themselves, getting in everybody else's way, never once aware that they might be inconveniencing those around them. We've all met them, we've all been annoyed by them... but are you one yourself? Probably without noticing? Test yourself against this handy checklist. Score 5 points for each that applies to you.

Do you ever...
• Walk around in a busy public place completely engrossed in a book or newspaper?
• Walk three-abreast down a two-abreast pavement, forcing oncoming pedestrians into the road?
• Tip your plane seat back as far as it will go, from the moment your flight is airborne until just before it lands?
• Insist on using a pushchair the size of a wheelbarrow in the middle of a crowded department store?
• Stand on the left on an escalator or, even worse, stand in the middle carrying a lot of shopping?
• Pull your wheelie suitcase along behind you at an angle greater than 20 degrees to the vertical?
• Speed down the empty outside lane before some roadworks, then try to nudge your way back into the front of the queue?
• Allow your elbows to take up more than half of an armrest, digging into the ribs of the person beside you?
• Park your car in a space so small that nobody around you will ever get into their car afterwards?
• Use the middle urinal when there are three to choose from?
• Hold hands with your partner in public? (sweet, but you're completely blocking the pavement for us single people)
• Jump every red light because you refuse to believe that the Highway Code applies to cyclists?
• Fail to hold open a door because you didn't look behind you to see if anyone else was following?
• Take up more than two-thirds of a double bed, squeezing your partner into a small strip down the edge?
• Drive 20mph below the speed limit down a long winding single carriageway road, with or without a caravan?
• Leave your supermarket trolley blocking a whole aisle while you're busy hunting for something else?
• Insist on walking up an escalator but really slowly, gathering a seething queue behind you?
• Stop suddenly in the middle of a narrow passageway to take a call on your mobile?
• Barge into a train carriage to grab a seat before the rest of us have even started getting off?
• Wear particularly strong aftershave or perfume which lingers for minutes after you've passed by?

How did you score?
       0: You must be insufferable to live with.
  5-15: You are spatially aware, and the world is a happier place as a result.
20-35: Look around you a bit more, and see if you can't think of others a bit more often.
40-55: I meet people like you every day. You meet people like me every day. The difference is, I notice.
56-59: It's impossible to score 56-59. You might want to learn to add up first.
60-95: You are one of the great un-overtakeable, and the rest of us hate you.
   100: You are ideally suited to a career in politics, and the world is in big trouble.
I couldn't be bothered to do the test because I knew it wouldn't apply to me: I think you've just proved my point.

 Sunday, January 25, 2004

Oranges and lemons
can be read all on one page, here.

Here comes a chopper to chop off your head

Just to the northwest of Marble Arch, where the Edgware Road meets the end of Oxford Street, stands a cobbled triangular traffic island. It's all barriered off, and pretty difficult to reach without getting yourself mown down by passing vehicles. Nobody gives it a second look, but for centuries this was the site of the most watched entertainment in town. This is Tyburn, for six centuries home to London's public executions.

The River Tyburn ran (indeed still runs, somewhere underground) from Hampstead to the Thames, and the first public hangings took place from tree branches along its banks. In 1220 the first gallows was built, and in 1571 the infamous Tyburn Tree was constructed. This was a huge wooden tripod, 18 feet high with crossbeams 9 feet long. Prisoners suffered a slow agonising death from asphyxiation, which gave the waiting crowds a real spectacle to watch. If you liked that sort of thing, which tens of thousands of did.

Condemned prisoners started their last day at Newgate Prison, two miles away from Tyburn, just outside the old city walls. At noon they set off on a horse-drawn cart through the prison gates, with the bells of neighbouring St Sepulchre's church ringing out to mourn their passing. That's the bells of Old Bailey from the nursery rhyme - you knew there'd be a connection eventually. The procession stopped outside the church, where the prisoners received a nosegay of flowers, and stopped at a tavern or two later along the route so they could enjoy a final pint of ale. The phrase 'on the wagon' is reputed to derive from these pub stops - when the prisoners climbed back on the cart they would definitely never drink again.

Huge crowds lined Holborn and what-would-be Oxford Street, cheering and jeering the condemned. You can read more about the journey here, or perhaps relive most of the experience on board a modern number 8 bus. At Tyburn itself a grandstand was built and there was a real festival atmosphere - for all but a few present, that is. The prisoners' last speeches were drowned by the roar of the mob, then they were finally blindfolded and strung up. The cart beneath the prisoners was pulled away, and they were left to die. This could take nearly an hour. The crowd listened for their screams, and watched for the tell tale dribble of urine dripping from one leg that meant death had finally arrived.

The last public hanging at Tyburn took place in 1783, Executions then moved to a site immediately outside Newgate Prison, where crowd control was easier, with the last public hanging in the UK held here as late as 1868. The closure of Tyburn finally allowed respectable London to grow rapidly to the northwest. A convent (with flash webpage) was founded close by the site of the old gallows, and a small group of snooker-playing nuns still pray for the souls of the dead. Most Londoners may drive past Tyburn without noticing, but the capital's punishment has not been forgotten by everyone.

 Saturday, January 24, 2004

Here comes a candle to light you to bed

[Oranges and Lemons trivia: The City of London is divided into 25 wards for electoral and ceremonial purposes (map here). Both St Clements and St Martins lie inside the tiny ward of Candlewick (old map here, new map here, number of residents on the electoral roll - two). The ward is named after Candlewick Street, now much better known as Cannon Street.]

It's hard to imagine modern life without electric light. Flick a switch or walk out onto the street nowadays and the sun never sets. Go back just 200 years, however, and London was still lit only by candles and oil lamps. Richer folk lit their homes with candles made from beeswax or whale oil, whilst poorer folk had to make do with smelly, smoky tallow candles made from animal fat. In 1807 Pall Mall became the first street in the capital to be lit by gas, spreading to 213 streets by 1823, but indoors candlesticks and candelabra still ruled. In 1859 the Houses of Parliament were lit by gas for the first time and only then did gas lighting start to become fashionable inside the homes of London's wealthy. Electric light arrived on the streets in 1878, starting on Holborn Viaduct, but its use was not widespread indoors until after the First World War.

Today, London belches light out into the night sky. Street lamps, spotlights, illuminations, adverts, security lighting and three million houses, all contribute to the most severe light pollution in the UK, beaming light upwards where it isn't needed. This satellite photo (hi-res version here) taken from the International Space Station shows London lit up like a giant, luminous amoeba, with a dazzling central nucleus. The night sky over the capital has a dull orange glow and only a few of the brightest stars are ever visible - in fact the only star some London children will ever have seen is the Sun. And it's getting worse across the rest of the country too (check your region here) where sight of the Milky Way has become merely a distant memory. Join the campaign for better-designed street lighting and darker skies here. Maybe there was a lot to be said for candle-power after all.

 Friday, January 23, 2004

...says the great bell at Bow

To be a true Cockney you have to be born within the sound of Bow Bells. And, despite what most people think, Bow Bells aren't in Bow. They are in fact the bells of the church of St. Mary-Le-Bow, Cheapside, in the City of London. Recent research has suggested that, given the right atmospheric conditions and an absence of traffic noise, the sound of St. Mary-Le-Bow's bells could have been heard up to five miles away, even out as far as Bow itself. But no longer. Presumably there were a lot more genuine Cockneys around hundreds of years ago than there are now.

Back in the 14th century the bells of St Mary-le-Bow rang out a curfew across central London at 9 o'clock to warn the locals that it was time for bed. These are the bells that Dick Whittington heard in 1392 that made him 'turn again' (he was real, by the way). The bells were (you won't be surprised to hear) amongst the many destroyed in the Great Fire, but were also (you will be surprised to hear) silenced for two years in 1856 by an eccentric local woman who believed that the noise of their clanging might otherwise kill her. The BBC used the peal of Bow Bells at the start of every one of their broadcasts to occupied Europe during World War II, but that didn't stop the bells being destroyed yet again in the Blitz of 1941. A new peal of 12 bells was installed in 1956, each inscribed with a verse from a psalm, and the initial letters of those 12 psalms spell out the name 'D WHITTINGTON'. Ahhh, sweet.

As for the church, it's yet another of Sir Christopher Wren's, and one of his very finest. The classical steeple is topped by a golden ball on which sits a nine foot dragon, turning with the wind. The arched crypt dates from Norman times and is occupied in part now by a renowned vegetarian café. The church adjoins narrow cobbled alleyways to the south, but hideous seventies offices to east and west. And those bells they still ring out - every quarter hour, for the Lord Mayor's Show, and for four-hour peals several times a year.

I do not know

  1) Where is the 'Golf Sale'?
  2) Why doesn't the tube run throughout the night at weekends?
  3) Where is the true centre of London?
  4) Has anyone ever seen a Pearly King (or Queen)?
  5) Why doesn't London have a (paid-for) local morning newspaper?
  6) From where is the best view in London?
7a) Why would anybody want to live here?
7b) Why would anybody want to live anywhere else?
Answers in the comments box, or read most of them listed here.

 Thursday, January 22, 2004

...say the bells of Stepney

This is St Dunstan's church, Stepney, one of of only a handful of medieval buildings remaining in the East End of London. Looks gorgeous doesn't it, and it is. An ancient church set on a village green at the heart of its community - this photo could have been taken in deepest Suffolk. Except what you can't see in the picture are the faceless council estates all around, and you can't smell the pigs grunting on the city farm over the road. Somehow this church has survived a millennium of change, while the surrounding neighbourhood has risen and fallen. Especially fallen, lately.

There can't be many churches in the UK named after the saint who built them, but St Dunstan built this one in 952, just before he was made Archbishop of Canterbury. Stepney was the seat of the Bishop of London during medieval times, being the richest village to the east of the City at the time. By the 16th century this was a popular rural retreat for London's wealthy, but also increasingly attractive to ordinary people seeking work at the local docks. Stepney trebled in population in just 40 years as London expanded to the East. Some fine 17th century houses still exist on Stepney Green, an unfeasibly quiet thoroughfare close to the church, but prosperity in the area was soon replaced by poverty. The Blitz helped clear away the worst of the slums, but nothing very inspiring was built in their place. Stepney today is a mere shadow of its former self - poor, bland and forgotten. Only the church hints that it was ever otherwise.

When will that be?

2004: Election for London Mayor
2005: DLR extension to City Airport
2006: Wembley Stadium reopens; M25 widened near Heathrow; Tour de France (maybe)
2007: Channel Tunnel Rail Link; East London Transit (Ilford to Dagenham)
2008: Heathrow Terminal 5; London Bridge Tower (217m); DLR extension to Woolwich; Greenwich Waterfront Transit (Greenwich to Abbey Wood)
2009: East London Line extension
2010: Thames Gateway Bridge (Beckton to Thamesmead)
2011: West London Tram scheme (Uxbridge to Shepherds Bush); Cross River Transit (Camden & Kings Cross to Brixton & Peckham)
2012: Crossrail (optimistic view); London Olympics (maybe)
2013: Crossrail (pessimistic view)
2014: nothing planned
2015: Third runway at Heathrow (earliest date)
2016: London's population reaches 8 million
(Most dates subject to delay, cancellation or repeated postponement)

 Wednesday, January 21, 2004

... say the bells of Shoreditch

1st century: The Romans build Ermine Street from London to Lincoln, passing through what will one day be Shoreditch.
12th century: The area is still mostly fields. St Leonard's church is founded.
16th century: A prosperous village. Richard Burbage opens "The Theatre" in Shoreditch (because playhouses have been banned inside the City). One of the actors in his company is a young William Shakespeare, and Romeo and Juliet is first performed here.
17th century: Burbage is buried in St Leonard's, known as "the actors' church".
18th century: St Leonard's church is rebuilt (see photo). The spire is an imitation of Wren's steeple on St Mary-le-Bow in Cheapside.
19th century: Shoreditch descends into poverty, crime and prostitution.
1900: A huge area of slums to the east of the High Street is reborn as the magnificent Boundary Estate.
1940s: The area is heavily bombed in the Blitz, and later heavily redeveloped.
1990s: Artists move into Shoreditch seeking cheap studio space. The White Cube gallery opens in Hoxton Square, trendy bars, clubs and restaurants follow, and Shoreditch is suddenly the hip arty place to be and to be seen.
21st century. It's all a bit passé now, darling.

When I grow rich

The City of London must be the richest square mile on the planet. There's the Stock Exchange (home to thousands of sharp-suited gamblers), Lloyd's of London (home to thousands of sharp-suited gamblers), various non-high-street banks (ditto) and hordes of other esteemed financial institutions. Get the right job here and, providing you can stand the pace, you could soon be very rich indeed. Like the girl living in the room next to mine in my last year at university. She got a job in the City and, 18 months ago, received a £1.4 million payout through the courts because her company dared to insult her with a piddling £25000 bonus. Most Londoners would be thankful for a £25000 salary. There again, her male colleagues were getting bonuses of up to £650,000, so I can see her point. Different world, the City.

London may have wealth, but it's also a ridiculously expensive place to live. An average wage goes nowhere, unless you're willing to flatshare the best years of your life in a tumbledown apartment on the outskirts of some godforsaken borough. If you own property you're laughing - if you don't you're doomed. 40 years ago my parents bought a tiny terraced house in Watford (2 up, 2 down, outside toilet) for the princely sum of £3000. They've since climbed the property ladder far enough to reach a detached house in Norfolk, but that's 100 miles from town and the market in London has moved on. This month that old house in Watford is up for sale at 100 times the price my parents paid for it, and they could never afford to move back, not even to the bottom of the heap.

If the City were a nation state, it would be amongst the top 20 richest nation states in the world (just ahead of Belgium). However, London is also home to 13 of the poorest 20 local authorities in the UK. When those City workers go home at night, back to their overpriced terraced houses, an underclass of invisible workers move in from rundown council estates and clean for peanuts. Sure there's plenty of money to be made in the City but, it appears, there's not enough to share.

They say the streets of London are paved with gold. They're wrong. The streets of London are paved with cardboard boxes, inhabited by provincial dreamers lured to the capital to seek a fortune that isn't here. That's rich.

 Tuesday, January 20, 2004

...say the bells of Old Bailey

Except that the Old Bailey is a court building, not a church, and has no bells. The church referred to in the nursery rhyme is the one just across the road, the oddly-named St Sepulchre without Newgate (don't worry, it's a Crusades thing). You wouldn't guess from looking but this is the largest parish church in the City of London, described by Sir John Betjeman as "high, wide and handsome", and the tower contains a peal of twelve bells. Henry Wood, founder of the Promenade concerts, learnt to play the organ here and his ashes now lie in the Musicians' Chapel. The church is also the last resting place of Captain John Smith, unpaid star of the Disney cartoon Pocohontas, and one-time Governor of Virginia.

A glass case inside the church contains the handbell which used to be rung to wake condemned prisoners at Newgate Prison on execution mornings. This prison held those awaiting trial at the neighbouring Old Bailey, which has been London's most important criminal court since medieval times. In 1834 the court's jurisdiction spread to cover the most serious cases from the whole of the South East, including Oscar Wilde's infamous sodomy trial. One hundred years ago Newgate Prison and the old Old Bailey were demolished to make way for the current Central Criminal Court, judging the fate of evildoers including Dr Crippen, the Kray twins and Jeffrey Archer.

An absolutely brilliant website charts the history of the Old Bailey, including full details of all the trials there between 1714 and 1799. For example, 250 years ago this month there were 62 trials, mostly for theft, with many of the convicted subsequently transported to America. I wonder if any of your forefathers appear in the records.

When will you pay me?

The 'Old Lady' in the photograph is the Bank of England, sited close to the first two churches mentioned in the Oranges and Lemons rhyme. The bank was established in 1694, moving to its current site in Threadneedle Street in 1734. The present building is an austere fortress, as you might expect, with sheer windowless walls at ground level and just a couple of enormous wooden doors leading inside. There are no cashpoints, no big adverts for mortgages, and no long queues of punters standing around waiting and looking miserable every lunchtime. It's not that sort of bank, you see.

The Bank of England prints millions of banknotes each year, just out of town in Essex. Each of these banknotes is, essentially, a worthless scrap of paper, apart from the inscription "I promise to pay the bearer on demand..." which gives the note its value. This promise used to be backed up by gold reserves, so that for every banknote issued there was an equivalent amount of gold in the vaults. Not any more though, not since 1931, and now the Bank merely issues notional money. However, we're all still entitled to pop down and demand that they exchange our notes for the equivalent value in gold bullion, should we so wish. Current rates indicate that a £10 note would be exchanged for just under 1g of gold, £160 for 1cm³ and the average UK house for 20kg. Admittedly it would be difficult to buy our weekly groceries by paying with a gold ingot, but the principle is sound. Just so long as we don't all turn up at the Bank of England at the same time to ask for our money back, because it isn't all there. See you all down there tomorrow at noon then?

 Monday, January 19, 2004

...say the bells of St Martins

Not St Martin-in-the-Fields, which is that huge Baroque church overlooking the eastern side of Trafalgar Square. No, the church in the nursery rhyme is St Martin Orgar, another tiny church in the City of London, just down the hill from Starbucks and round the corner from Monument station. Except that this particular church has all but vanished. Just a tower remains, now occupied by a firm of solicitors, next to a surprisingly large overgrown garden that used to be the nave. St Martin's is one of London's abandoned churches.

Pudding Lane is only a couple of streets away, so it's not surprising that this church was burnt to the ground in 1666. There were 111 churches in the City before the Great Fire, 80 of which were destroyed. St Martins was one of the unlucky 28 not to get rebuilt, being rather too close to St Clements over the road, and so the two parishes were combined. A group of Huguenots (that's old French Protestants to you and me) took over what was left of St Martins, did it up a bit and held services there until 1820. The tower was converted to become St Clements rectory in 1851, at which time St Martin's old bell was rehung in a new clock projecting out over the street. It's all a bit lost and folorn now, but I bet redevelopment of the site would net any property developer considerably more than five farthings.

You owe me five farthings

Quick history lesson for those under the age of 35 or living outside the UK: There didn't used to be 100 pence in a pound. Before 1971 there were 240 pennies in a pound, 12 pennies in a shilling, and maths lessons were a lot more difficult. Then there was the small change, which wasn't all small - the silver sixpence, the chunky brass threepenny bit with twelve sides and the giant copper penny with a picture of Britannia on the reverse. And then, worth less but by no means worthless, the halfpenny and (go back far enough) the quarter penny too, commonly known as the farthing. Here's a picture of the full set. And I remember all of them, just, except the farthing.

Quick history lesson number two: Farthings were first minted in the 13th century, originally in silver, although in very small quantities because even then they cost more to make than they were worth. Later copper was used, then tin, and finally bronze. In the time of Samuel Pepys one farthing was worth roughly the same as a 10p coin would be today (you can compare monetary values since 1264 here). From the reign of George VI onwards this tiny coin depicted Britain's tiniest bird - the wren - right up until the farthing left circulation in 1960. Quarter of a penny just wasn't worth anything any more.

Quick history lesson number three: Five farthings made a penny farthing, one very big coin and one very small one. Two wheels on a bicycle, one very big and one very small, also made a penny farthing. In the late 19th century these were a popular means of transport, more comfortable than the old boneshakers but still very difficult to ride. The big wheel could be anything up to 60 inches in diameter, and if you leant too far over whilst riding you could take a nasty tumble. Nevertheless, these ridiculous-looking bicycles could reach a top speed of about 20mph.

 Sunday, January 18, 2004

...say the bells of St Clements

Two churches in London claim to be the St Clements named in the nursery rhyme. St Clement's church in Eastcheap is generally thought to be the correct one, not least because the second church in the rhyme is only 100 yards away. There's been a church on this site in the City since the 11th century, originally named after the patron saint of seamen. It's not far from here down to the Thames, and the river was even closer in days gone by. Legend has it that merchants used to unload citrus fruits at the nearby wharves and that the bells of St Clements rang out whenever a new shipment was delivered.

St Clement's is a small church down a very narrow lane close to Monument station, crammed into an unfeasibly tiny gap between office buildings. It's one of 50-odd City churches rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of London. I was expecting something rather more impressive, but the building is disappointingly plain and seriously overshadowed. There's a claustrophic courtyard round the back complete with a handful of well-tended gravestones, but not much else. The church has only one service a week, on a Wednesday not a Sunday, which sounds odd until you realise that most of the City is a ghost town at the weekend.

The other church with a claim to be the St Clements in the nursery rhyme is the much larger (and much more impressive) St Clement Danes, one mile to the west in the Strand. This is an even older church, established in the 10th century and reputedly frequented by William the Conqueror. St Clement Danes later became the only Wren-built church outside the City of London, but was mostly destroyed during the Blitz. The church was then rebuilt yet again, dedicated to the Royal Air Force in 1958, and now sits on a giant traffic island close to Aldwych.

St Clement Danes may not actually be the church featured in the rhyme but its carillion bells still play out the familiar tune four times a day. Also every year, somewhere around Easter, the church holds an 'Oranges and Lemons' service in which fruit is handed out to local schoolchildren. And, mistaken or not, it's an old engraving of St Clement Danes church in the book 1984 that brings Winston Smith's long-buried memories of London past back to life.

"The half-remembered rhyme kept running through Winston's head. It was curious, but when you said it to yourself you had the illusion of actually hearing bells, the bells of a lost London that still existed somewhere or other, disguised and forgotten... yet so far as he could remember he had never in real life heard church bells ringing."

Oranges and Lemons

The nursery rhyme "Oranges and lemons" has been sung by children in London for hundreds of years, probably since the 17th century. Several London churches are mentioned in the rhyme, and the original tune mimicked the peals of their bells. There have been many different versions of the rhyme over the years, including different words and a number of different churches, but the most common version features just six. I've been out and about in the City and the East End tracking down these six churches and some of the background to the rhyme, and now I'm ready to report back over the course of the next week. Here goes - chop chop.



In medieval times, before the advent of industry and traffic noise, the sound of London's church bells would have carried long distances, calling the population to prayer or warning them of curfew. Many of the famous bells mentioned in the rhyme Oranges and Lemons were struck at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, Britain's oldest surviving manufacturing company dating back to 1420. The foundry is a small brick-built workshop on the busy Whitechapel Road, responsible for the production of both Big Ben and the Liberty Bell. The foundry was fortunate not to be bombed during the Second World War, although St Mary's Church nextdoor (the 'white chapel' after which the area was named) took a direct hit and was destroyed. You can still visit the foundry and tour the workshops, and they have a quaint little shop too.

      Oranges and Lemons

      Oranges and lemons
        say the bells of St Clements
      You owe me five farthings
        say the bells of St Martins
      When will you pay me?
        say the bells of Old Bailey
      When I grow rich
        say the bells of Shoreditch
      When will that be?
        say the bells of Stepney
      I do not know
        says the great bell at Bow
      Here comes a candle to light you to bed
      Here comes a chopper to chop off your head

 Saturday, January 17, 2004

Leap for London

London's bid for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games has been launched. As expected, 500 acres of industrial wasteland in the Lower Lea Valley in East London are at the heart of the proposals. An Olympic stadium, village, aquatic centre and velodrome will be appearing on my run-down inner-city doorstep, fingers crossed. The Olympic bid, however, was launched five miles away at the Royal Opera House in the heart of swanky Covent Garden. A few local multi-ethnic schoolchildren were transplanted to wave ribbons and play judo in an inspirational manner, but the bid launch emphasised London's historic and cultural heritage instead. A wide range of additional tourist-friendly locations are being proposed for the Games, presumably so that visiting IOC members don't have to spend all their time standing on bleak building sites in hard hats and wellies.

So, if the Olympics come to London, where will the other events be held?
Beach Volleyball (Horse Guards Parade): Hordes of topless women shivering in light July drizzle, ogled by nearby civil servants.
Gymnastics (Millennium Dome): After 12 years of expensive nothingness, this white elephant will finally find a use. For a week.
Equestrian (Greenwich Park): Lots of horses and horsey women churning up the lawns beneath the Royal Observatory.
Triathlon (Hyde Park): The only safe place in London to go cycling, because there are no passing buses to fall underneath.
Archery (Lord's): Because cricket isn't an Olympic sport. Just as well, we've probably got better medal chances in archery.
Fencing (Alexandra Palace): Hopefully that's fencing the sport, not the sort of fencing that signifies unfinished building works.
Rowing (Eton College): This posh school is about as far away from East London as you can get, both in distance and in wealth.
Baseball (Regent's Park): Nobody over here will go watch, but at least all the American visitors' hotels will be right nextdoor.
Indoor Sports (ExCel Centre): International Boxing, Weightlifting and Taekwondo Exhibition opens July 2012.
Football (Wembley Stadium): Assuming they've finished rebuilding it by then. The one event we invented but never bother entering.
Tennis (Wimbledon): Another event we invented but should never bother entering. We're only good at selling the strawberries.
Sailing (Weymouth): Racing yachts down the Thames would be silly, and Southend just isn't glamorous, so ScaryDuckland it is.
Shooting (Bisley): Not East London? That's odd, because I'd have thought the streets of Hackney were already ideal for shooting.
Marathon (Champs Elysée): Alas, the 2012 Olympics will probably go to Paris or somewhere else instead. Pity, it won't be quite the same watching everything on television.

 Friday, January 16, 2004

Newspaper quiz
Can you identify 16 UK national newspapers from the following clues?
Answers in the comments box.

  1) Venus
  2) arts review
  3) multiplication
  4) global stories
  5) homo sapiens
  6) in loco parentis
  7) former journalist
  8) reflects the news
  9) sort of leather GP
10) tenpin ended reframed
11) what could be verboser?
12) born, played football, died
13) sounds like it's not for women
14) market opens 08:00, closes 16:30
15) where's this seen rising? horizon usually
16) this is only delivered just before Christmas

 Thursday, January 15, 2004

LUNAR GOVERNMENT ASTRO-IMMIGRATION CONTROL

Dear President Bush

Thank you for your interest in our homeworld. We in the Lunar Government are delighted to hear that you and your countrymen plan to visit our Moon in the near future. However, we would like to make you aware of our new LUNAR-VISIT immigration protocol. LUNAR-VISIT helps to secure our borders and expedite the entry/exit process while enhancing the integrity of our immigration system and respecting the privacy of our visitors. We will require that your astronauts comply with these updated security procedures on all future visits to our interplanetary moonspace.

All astronauts travelling visa-free to the Moon after 26 October 2004 must present a new macro-biological cellular passport on arrival at Lunar border controls. These passports contain biometric data including DNA samples, iris scans, tentacle prints and braincell holograms. We are aware that macro-biological passports are not yet available on your home world. To be honest, they're not available on ours yet either. However, agreed standards for biometric travel documents are universal and all appropriate documentation has been readily available on the sub-etherweb for the last 4.3 solar years.

Those travellers who use ordinary passports issued after 26 October 2004 that do not contain a biometric identifier will be required to obtain a Lunar visa. These visas cost ©25 (6 billion of your Earth dollars) and can only be obtained in person from a Lunar Embassy, such as that located conveniently on nearby Alpha Centauri. On arrival at the embassy your astronauts should expect to queue for up to three days, to be grilled in a decontamination cavern and to be ritually humiliated by our administrative staff.

When your next lunar mission is finally ready to embark, please ensure that no sharp implements are packed in your astronauts' hand luggage. We also ask that astronauts refrain from queueing by the anti-grav lavatories while in transit, no matter how desperate they might be after 72 hours in space. On arrival at 'Sea of Tranquility Interplanetary Spaceport' our admissibility personnel will check individual surnames against a list of known terrorists. Our most wanted list is headed by the notorious Apollo moonrock thieves 'Armstrong' and 'Aldrin'. Never doubt our unflinching resolve to avenge the unprovoked geological attacks of 1969.

The Lunar Government looks forward to greeting your future ambassadors, assuming that this latest announcement of yours isn't merely a cynical election year pipedream. However, we regret to inform you that Lunar citizens are no longer making plans to visit your nation. America's latest paranoid security arrangements have been the last straw for potential alien tourists, and we can't be bothered to come visiting any more. Shame, because we used to enjoy buzzing flying saucers over the more remote parts of your Arizona desert. Your ridiculous new border controls border on madness, and we refuse to demean ourselves by submitting to your arrogant, petty-minded demands. So George, sorry, but that's the way it is. It's lunar, see.

 Wednesday, January 14, 2004

Know your Freeview channels (an extremely-clickable guide)

[1] BBC1; [2] BBC2; [3] ITV1; [4] Channel 4; [5] five: All the usual terrestrial channels (but with rubbish teletext).
[6] ITV2: Kate Thornton goes behind the scenes of several dull non-events on ITV1.
[7] BBC3: Three almost-hit comedy shows on endless rotation.
[10] BBC4: Intelligent programmes they daren't put on BBC2 any more.
[11] Sky Travel; [17] TV Travel Shop: Package holidays you can share with (shudder) other common viewers.
[12] UK History; [19] UK Bright Ideas: UK Warfare and UK Gardening. But why can't I have UK Gold instead?
[16] QVC; [23] bid-up.tv; [24] price-drop.tv: Crap items nobody needs but that bored housewives buy.
[18] The Hits; [21] TMF: Safe and unchallenging pop videos repeated every hour.
[20] f tn: Cheap fillers lifted from Living TV, Bravo, Trouble and Challenge.
[30] CBBC; [31] CBeebies: Two advert-free primary-coloured babysitting services.
[40] News 24; [41] ITV News; [42] Sky News: The same news stories stretched out in three different orders.
[43] Sky Sports News: No actual sport, just pundits and scrolling football results.
[45] BBC Parliament: Well, you voted for them, now you're stuck watching them.
[46] Community Channel: Broadcasts to an audience of zero between 2:45am and 5:45am.
[9] Teletext; [50] Four text; [51] BBCi: As we established yesterday, under-interactive disappointment.
[53] F2P Games: Relive the thrills of 1979 technology by playing Solitaire and Tetris on your telly.
[70-91] 21 digital radio stations: Almost worth buying a box for BBC6 and BBC7 alone. Almost.
[701-703] Occasional interactive extra stuff: Or endless Fame Academy.

Local transport news (update)
Buses: The UK’s first fuel cell zero-emission buses go into service today on Route 25. Three new hydrogen-powered vehicles are on trial, steaming their way down Oxford Street, past my house and on to Ilford. Details here and here.
Tube: Has anyone started work on renovating Bow Road station yet? No, not a sign. The very first PPP-funded station upgrade appears to be behind schedule already. I shall be back there to stare at the puddles and peeling paint later.

 Tuesday, January 13, 2004

Why I still hate BBCi but now some other things are niggling me too

A number of you responded to yesterday's Ceefax/BBCi rant, and now I feel even worse. Here's why.

Andrew writes: "On the basis of your results, I presume you're using satellite for your timings, because on DTT (also known by the marketing term Freeview), BBCi is far far far faster on a recent box (ie not one from the ITV Digital era), and would probably give you close results to Ceefax even with the menu navigating."
No Andrew, I don't have satellite (I can't get satellite or cable where I live) so I'm watching on Freeview. And I do have one of those old ITV Digital boxes (grrr, I bought it during the six weeks when they weren't giving away a free Monkey) which probably explains why my BBCi takes forever to load. So, if I want faster BBCi I need to buy a new box - in which case it's hardly Free-view is it?

Vaughan adds: "For one year, not so long ago, I spent one working day of every week writing pages for it (the Learning pages on BBC2, since you ask - no, you'll never have seen them, because nobody ever visited them). And it drove me up the wall. That sodding great clunking antiquated system - it's even worse to write content for than it is to use. I still haven't recovered from the trauma and mental scarring. Oh God. Help. The pixels. The PIXELS!!!"
I used to be a dab hand on the BBC Microcomputer, which had its own special 'Mode 7' teletext graphics just like Ceefax. I even tried writing an interactive teletext program once, although that's now lying somewhere on an obsolete floppy disc deep in a packing crate in my spare room. And yes, the pixels were an absolute nightmare. I'd also like to apologise for not reading your BBC2 Ceefax pages, but that's because my terrestrial reception's isn't good enough to get decent BBC2 reception (for which I blame Canary Wharf). On my TV the BBC Learning Index features such incomplete textual gems as "W RKSKIL S   vice for starting wo k". Sigh, sorry.

Dr D asks: "Picking up on my campaign for dot matrix based media on this blog - have you considered a Geezerfax service?"
No, it would never work.

Scaryduck comments: "BBCi may be crap, but have you tried ITV's digital-text content? What little there is is a thinly veiled attempt to extract money from the punter. Crap."
He's right. ITV's digital text service Teletext also takes forever to load, plus there are annoying adverts tucked in all over the place (Press '0' for annoying pop-up spam). Looks like an online platform for selling home loans, horse racing and holidays, plus a very few useful bits tagged on as an afterthought. No Bamber Boozler, sadly. ITV/C4 teletext used not to be crap. It used to be called Oracle, and at the time (pre-1993) had much more interesting content than Ceefax. Reminisce here.

Annipink concludes: "My mother was addicted to teletext - it was the only way I managed to convince her to try the internet - like teletext, only faster, and more information."
I think you could have something there. Teletext is undoubtedly a medium of the past compared to the internet. Even flashy new BBCi has its roots firmly in the last century. See the screen shot on page 20 of this five-year-old BBC report as evidence. And BBC boffins confess to the heinous crime of "mapping Ceefax pages, accessed using a three digit number, into a menu-driven navigable hierarchy" as long ago as 1998 in this project initiation document. I fear the battle is lost. Maybe we should all stick to finding our information online and leave the red button alone. But I do wish there was something worth reading while I was sitting watching the television.

 Monday, January 12, 2004

Why I hate... BBCi

Remember Ceefax? All the latest news and TV listings in 13 lines of text with over-chunky graphics, all rendered using only 7 colours. It looks so old and out-of-date now, but this was state-of-the-art technology back in 1974. It was slow but simple, like a pixellated tortoise, and often you had time to make a cup of tea waiting for the subpage you wanted to come round. You can remind yourself just how BBC basic it all used to be by clicking here to view all 100 pages that were available one particular evening in 1983. And you can remind yourself how little has changed now by pressing the text button on your TV remote. Or, alas, maybe you can't.

With the advent of digital television, Ceefax is slowly being replaced. It's still available on terrestrial television, but most of us aren't watching that any more. We've switched to the clarity of cable, the choice of satellite and the convenience of Freeview, and thereby to BBCi - the new digital text service. BBCi lurks behind the red button on your remote, it's menu-driven, and I hate it. In fact if I see that TV ad in which Jenson Button tells me that BBCi "handles like a dream" one more time I may scream. Because BBCi handles like a Formula 1 car limping into the pits with four burst tyres.

Ceefax may have been slow, but all you had to do was type in a three-digit number and the page of your choice eventually appeared. Go on, try it. BBCi has replaced numbered pages by a series of sub-menus, a bit like using a website but without the ability to bookmark any of the pages you use regularly. You have to start at the top of a main menu every time and work your way down, often several levels deep, and each sub-menu seems to take an age to load. Instant access to information is a thing of the past.

So, I thought I'd carry out my own diamond geezer test drive to compare Ceefax with BBCi and see which was quicker at finding information. Each experiment started from a normal text-free television picture. All the BBCi times are fastest-possibles whereas the Ceefax times are averages (because sometimes the page you want comes up immediately, while other times you have to wait for the very last subpage). Here are the results:

Latest news headlines: Ceefax p101 - 8 seconds; BBCi - 21 seconds
Local news headlines: Ceefax p160 - 8 seconds; BBCi - 44 seconds
Ceefax thrashes BBCi here, and you can read more headlines on the page too. To find local London news on BBCi takes 14 different key presses, requires manoeuvring through four different menus, and the final page has no headlines and isn't even labelled 'London'. New news is bad news.

Current programme on Channel 4: Ceefax p606 - 8 seconds; BBCi - 30 seconds
Radio 4's evening schedule: Ceefax p644 - 40 seconds; BBCi - 50 seconds
Want to find out what's on the other side? Ceefax wins again. If you're stuck with BBCi, by far the quickest option is to switch channels, and that can't be good for BBC viewing figures.

Who's top of the Premiership?: Ceefax p324 - 16 seconds; BBCi - 35 seconds
Latest Lotto numbers: Ceefax p555 - 17 seconds; BBCi - 22 seconds
On Ceefax both of these are 2-subpage pages, but they still manage to arrive before BBCi. Football league tables are buried so far down the sport menu that the team at the top will probably have changed by the time you get there.

5-day weather forecast for Edinburgh: Ceefax p406 - 95 seconds; BBCi - 45 seconds
Latest Underground travel problems: Ceefax p436 - 78 seconds; BBCi - 45 seconds
Where Ceefax really falls down are screens with an awful lot of subpages. You might have to wait over 3 minutes for the Edinburgh forecast to come round, whereas with BBCi all the information loads at the same time. And BBCi always gives you page 1 first, which is probably the one you want to read. And the BBCi weather graphics are far far more impressive than Ceefax's basic service.

Digital transmitter information: Ceefax p698 - 130 seconds; BBCi - not available
Index: Ceefax p199 - 8 seconds; BBCi - not available
Information about digital TV reception is only available on terrestrial Ceefax and not on BBCi. Unbelievable. In fact BBCi has far less breadth than Ceefax. No recipes, no flight arrival times, no chess, no TV reviews, just a handful of tabloid-friendly categories. This is digital dumbing-down, and there isn't even an index to check what they've left out.

So, after all that, it's a thumping victory for good old Ceefax. BBCi looks a lot more impressive, and you can watch TV at the same time which is great, but it fails dismally on the easy-to-use test. On Ceefax all I have to do is memorise a simple 3-digit number and I can find anything. On BBCi I'm forced into a hellish tree of sub-menus and, to be honest, I just can't be bothered to look. Dear BBC - when 30-year-old technology beats your latest cutting-edge information service, it's time to rethink. Please.

 Sunday, January 11, 2004

The Doubler puzzle: I think of a number, double it, subtract one and then reverse the digits. My answer is the number I first thought of. What could my number be? (There are a number of possible answers, two of them less than 100)

Famous places within 5 minutes walk of my house - update
The Double R Club

Last August, as part of diamond geezer's local history month, I investigated various famous places within 5, 10 and 15 minutes walk of my house. One of these was the Kray Brothers' first club, which at the time I placed 15 minutes away down by Mile End staton. Not so. I've just discovered that the infamous 'Double R' club was in fact much closer to home, just up the road opposite Bow Church DLR station.

For a few years in the late Fifties the Double R club at 145 Bow Road was at the centre of the Kray brothers' semi-legitimate business empire. Reggie snapped up a cheap derelict shop here while his brother Ronnie was in prison, and furnished the premises with stolen goods. A gym was built on the first floor and Henry Cooper was invited to officially open the premises in 1957. It wasn't long before the club was attracting a crowd of sharp-suited businessmen, showbiz celebrities and scheming villains. Jackie Collins and Barbara Windsor were regular visitors, and entertainment was provided by cockney songstress (and soon-to-be actress) Queenie Watts. All went well at the Double R until Ronnie escaped from prison. He would turn up at the club uninvited, behaving violently and frightening the clientele. In 1960 Reggie was arrested, Ronnie turned his interest to bigger clubs in the West End, and the Double R closed down.

Sadly this notorious building no longer exists. A non-descript prefab now lies on the site, home to a car hire firm, while immediately nextdoor is a modern secondary school playground. I suppose I should be relieved that my area must be one of the few in London where the crime rate has actually gone down since the 1950s, but I think I may get a couple of extra door locks fitted just in case.

(Read the whole of local history month on one page on my london geezer site, now updated to place the Kray brothers in their rightful position.)

 Saturday, January 10, 2004

The five best records of (2004-10=)1994

Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm (Crash Test Dummies): Laid-back guitar weirdness from long-haired Canadian five-piece. The sweetest lilting tune coupled with tangential lyrics, taken from the Grammy-nominated album God Shuffled His Feet. Still making records, still touring, but never topped this. Mmmmmm.
"Once there was this kid who got into an accident and couldn't come to school, but when he finally came back his hair had turned from black into bright white, he said that it was from when the cars had smashed so hard."

Girls and Boys (Blur): This irresistible slice of thumping disco-pop finally catapulted Blur into the chart limelight. Essex boy Damon sang in praise of holiday slacking, and we all followed (even if we never could quite manage the entire chorus without stumbling). From the benchmark album Parklife, the Britpop classic.
"Girls who are boys who like boys to be girls who do boys like they?re girls who do girls like they?re boys, always should be someone you really love."

Hear Me Calling (2wo Third3): All boybands are of course rubbish. Except this one. A 90s threesome with an deliberately 80s sound, plus a very strange taste in clothes. This their first single limped to only number 48 in the charts, but it was synthesiser brilliance and I still adore it. Read more about 2wo Third3 here and here.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones - tell another lie - all sorts of names will cause me pain - I can hear you cry."

Hold That Sucker Down (Builds Like A Skyscraper Mix) (OT Quartet): 'OT' stood for 'Our Tribe', a DJ Rollo pseudonym. One of the most uplifting house records ever made, and still my favourite dance track of all time. It's an epic 6½ minute floor-filling symphony, with soaring female vocal and far more of a tune than your average anthem. It rocks.
"You can lift your man up, give him all that he wants, it don't mean a thing if you can't hold him down."

Renaissance (M People): First heard as the theme to the UK's first reality TV show - the BBC's doomed 'The Living Soap' - then released on the Mercury award-winning album Bizarre Fruit. M People recorded this shining gem just before Heather sold out and went all middle-of-the-road (alas, now decent only for car adverts).
"You can build it from bricks and stone but theres still no point in being alone, so unlock your door I`m coming through cos this heart's got a message for you."

 Friday, January 09, 2004

Local transport news (2) - Bow Road tube station

Last July I ranted about my local tube station being an under-resourced ruin, with not a penny spent on it for years. Until today, that is. Tube operating company Metronet is launching a multi-million pound five year programme to renovate more than 150 Underground stations, all part of the government's controversial public-private funded infrastructure programme. And, what do you know, the very first station to be renovated will be Bow Road, starting today. About time too. They haven't told us local passengers yet - I only uncovered the news in Metronet's in-house journal (check pdf pages 6-7 and 28-30) - but renovation is now imminent. Apparently Bow Road station is a Grade II listed building, and we have serious problems with 'water ingress behind a brick retaining wall'. That would explain the acres of peeling paint I get to stare at each morning. Hopefully not for too much longer though.

I wonder if workmen will finally get round to updating the sign outside the station, the one that says Bow Road is on the "District and Metropolitan lines". Bow Road's not been on the Metropolitan line since 1990 when the Hammersmith and City line took over the section east of Liverpool Street. But, I read, there are plans to change that back again. Tube bosses want Metropolitan line trains to run from northwest London right through to Barking again, hopefully by 2011. Meanwhile the Hammersmith and City and Circle lines will be sort-of-merged to provide what's being called a 'T-Cup' service. Trains will run from Hammersmith to Edgware Road, then continue all the way round what's now the Circle line before terminating at Edgware Road second time around. You heard it here first. I heard it here first. And no, I don't believe it'll happen either.

Meanwhile there are already moves afoot to upgrade all the District line trains that run through Bow Road. The 20-year old rolling stock is to be renovated, one train at a time, with the first new interiors due to come on track just after Easter. All upgraded by 2008, apparently. You can see what the new interiors will look like here. Lime-green cattle truck chic, I fear.

geeklink 1: District Dave's District Line page
geeklink 2: Antony's District line photographs
geeklink 3: cab-ride videos - into Bow Road and out again
geeklink 4: Clive's District Line line guide
geeklink 5: London Underground chat forum

 Thursday, January 08, 2004

The 7am puzzle: Words whose letters are in alphabetical order
(repeated letters are allowed, but words with no repeats are more impressive)
1) How many such words can you find with 5 letters or more? (5: affix, abbot, dirty, first, ghost, proxy) (6: abhors, accent, begins, bellow, chilly, chimps, effort, floppy, glossy, knotty) (7: billowy, beefily)
2) What's the longest such word you can find? (aegilops - a plant genus)
3) Can you find a) a number? (forty) b) a food? (chips) c) an animal? (adder, chimp) d) a material? (chintz) e) a character from The Sound Of Music? (Abbess)

Local transport news (1) - on the buses
(for all my local readers - and hi to Richard from over the road)

Route 8: I never tire of watching the big red Routemaster buses chugging away as they set off from Bow Church heading for central London. Alas, they won't be chugging for much longer. Routemasters may be historic (50 years old this year, in fact) but these classic buses are also chronic polluters and so they're all being replaced. It's been confirmed that Route 8 is being converted to normal dull double deckers on June 26th (the new buses will look like this, only with an 8 on the front). Expect me to be out with my camera on June 25th. [geeklink 1] [geeklink 2]

Route 25: Mayor Ken has taken delivery of three special hydrogen-powered zero-emission fuel cell buses. London's first green buses will be red, and they'll be running on Route 25 starting this month. The buses run on hydrogen gas, contained in six cylinders on the bus roof, and emit only pure water vapour. Apparently we're quite safe - hydrogen-powered vehicles don't catch fire and kill everyone on board any more. More information on these futuristic buses here and here. The golden age of steam is returning to Bow Road. Just not for very long...

Route 25 (again): The 25 is one of the most heavily-used routes in the capital - always busy and often seriously overcrowded. Transport for London have come up with what they hope will be a solution to this problem - bendy buses. On June 26th (it's that date again) all the double-deckers on Route 25 will be replaced by single-decker double-length buses, with less seats but more standing room. Great big lumbering articulated buses will be attempting to manoeuvre their way from Oxford Circus to Ilford, and I must say I have my doubts they'll manage. Expect me to be out with my camera on June 26th. (Bendy buses are also coming to routes 149 (April 24th), 73 (May 1st), 12 (July 31st) and 207 (November 13th). People really aren't happy about bendy 73s). [geeklink 1] [geeklink 2] [geeklink 3]

 Wednesday, January 07, 2004

is Channel 4's latest week-long attempt to attract viewers. It's a bedtime reality show that's not quite Big Brother, a 'scientific experiment' presided over by Professor Dermot O'Leary. Twelve human lab rats are attempting to go without sleep for a week in an attempt to win lots of money. Hopefully none of the twelve are taking part merely to become famous, because the rest of the media appear to be yawning almost as much as the contestants. Even the Sun newspaper appears disinterested, which is odd given that both the Sun and Shattered are both produced nextdoor to each other in the same street in East London.

Pennington Street is a dark oppressive road in Wapping, deep in the heart of the old London docks. A high 19th century brick wall runs for a quarter of a mile along most of one side of the road, blocking out the light. And behind this sheer wall lies
Rupert Murdoch's huge News International printing plant, dominating the entire length of the street. It's very big, it's very long, it's very modern, and it looks very out of place. Lorries sweep out of the building down futuristic tubes and journos patronise the nearby wine bars. Somewhere deep inside, presumably, tomorrow's Page 3 girl is being touched up.

The rest of Pennington Street is lined by tall ex-warehouses. One of these, at the eastern end of the street, was built in 1814 for the storage of imported tobacco. Local manufacturers turned these brown leaves into cigars, pipe tobacco, cigarettes and snuff for the gentlemen of 19th century London. The building is still most impressive, from the inside if not from the outside, blessed with bricklined vaults, great timber roof trusses and cast iron fittings. In 1992 the warehouse was renovated and re-opened as the exclusive Tobacco Dock shopping centre, complete with two full-size pirate ships. Unfortunately the shops were too far from the tourist trail, and too pricey for the locals, so Tobacco Dock soon closed down. The site has been vacant for years, but is still occasionally used as a venue for swish celeb parties (PR events for the launches of Harry Potter, Moulin Rouge and Lord of the Rings, for example).

But, this week, Tobacco Dock has awoken from its slumber to host the filming of Shattered. Or, as I discovered at 6pm yesterday, 'shuttered'. The whole place was locked up, with nothing to be seen but a laminated sign on the gate awaiting the arrival of tonight's studio audience. Despite an advert on a nearby bus stop urging the public to , nobody else was around. My audience of one slipped away into the night. I hope the programme is faring better.

 Tuesday, January 06, 2004

LNDN geezer

I've decided to set up another (sort-of-)blog, somewhere to stick all my posts about London. It's not got anything new on it, just all the old stuff I've written on this blog about London, without all the other posts getting in the way. You'll find the new blog (with old content) at www.lndn.blogspot.com, with its own London-centric list of links (and blogs) down the right-hand side. If I write something on diamond geezer about London then I'll post it in london geezer too, which might mean seven posts in a week or it might mean nothing new for a fortnight. The site's comment-free, and you can't (easily) link to individual posts, but that's because I wanted london geezer to be something to read rather than something to interact with.

But I have managed to do something I've wanted to do for ages, which is to give some of my London specials their own page. You'll find my entire Capital Numbers project in one list, all of my Cube Routes bus travelogue on one page, and the complete local history month in a single bandwidth-destroying download. Good old Blogger - so long as you don't mind pages having silly dates, you can set up anything. OK, so some of the links may still need a bit of tidying up, but most should work fine. I'm not (at the moment) planning anything exclusive for london geezer, but there's plenty there to read (or re-read) already. See what you think.

Three books about London (wot i got for xmas)

London history: London - the Biography (Peter Ackroyd) £12.99
A real epic of a book this, and so good that I got given a second copy this Christmas. It's a history of the capital in 79 non-chronological chapters, with the city's story told theme by theme. Brilliantly readable, Ackroyd intertwines scholarly detail with imaginative description. At just over a kilogram this is a heavyweight book in every way, and highly recommended.

London geography: London Revealed (Julian Shuckburgh) £25
You've probably seen the Millennium Map online, that complete aerial record of the UK used by various mapping websites. The Queen's a shareholder, you know. This atlas combines their modern overhead photography of the capital with diverse historical and geographical themes. See where Roman London used to be, pick out locations mentioned by Dickens, trace London's lost underground rivers and zoom in on where the Jack the Ripper's murders took place. Perfect for very small coffee tables.

London travelogue: London Orbital (Iain Sinclair) £7.99
On the eve of the Millennium, Iain went for a walk around the M25. Not on the road, you understand, but sort of nearby. And then he came home and wrote about his circuitous journey. Unfortunately he seems to have written more about the walk than the places, but his writing is inventive and beautifully constructed. Plus he spends 8 pages walking through Bow, heading from the Dome up along the river Lea out to the motorway ringroad, so I've got to let him off being a bit of a plodder.

 Monday, January 05, 2004

What's your Hoover Number?
Definition: The number of days you can comfortably live without wanting to vacuum your house.

Example: If you hoover your house today and then, next Monday, you want to hoover it again, your Hoover Number is 7.
Notation: HN=7
Hoover Number personality types:
HN<1: Cleaning obsessed, you just can't rest unless your carpets are spotless. Should anyone ever drop even a breadcrumb on your floor, you'll have the hoover plugged in before it hits the ground.
HN=1: Every day? Do you have a life?
1<HN<7: Ok, so you like a clean carpet and a clean floor. You probably wash up your dirty dishes (or fill the dishwasher) immediately after eating, and stick bleach down the toilet with every tenth flush. Aren't you good?
HN=7: You've got a regular cleaning routine, you have. Or a lady who comes in and does.
7<HN<=14: How clean is your house? Clean enough I reckon - those nice ladies from Channel 4 won't be coming round to yours.
14<HN<=28: Don't tell your mum. But you might just get away with it.
28<HN<=100: Hope you've got a dark-ish carpet.
100<HN<=365: Really? Even that mucky patch of carpet just inside the front door, the bit by the sofa where you spill your TV dinners and the shag pile along the side of the bed? Ugh.
HN>365: It's not just your carpet that's dirty is it? There's thick dust on every surface, your kitchen's caked in layers of fat, and the bathroom just doesn't bear thinking about.
HN=infinity: I have at least one regular reader whose HN is infinity. Hello. That's why, the first (and last) time I came round to your place, I sat very gingerly on the emptyish part of the sofa, I accepted only a canned drink and, when I went to use the toilet, I decided to wait and go later when I got home. Must be an awful lot worse there by now too.

Hoover Number relationship compatibility test:
My HN is a lot higher than my partner: They're obsessed, aren't they? I mean, the floor really doesn't need cleaning that often!
My HN is a bit higher than my partner: This is good. This means they've usually done all the hoovering before you get round to wanting to do it. Enjoy.
My HN is very similar to that of my partner: Perfect harmony. You two probably share the chores without any fuss.
My HN is a bit lower than my partner: They never pull their weight, do they? Can't they see that surface needs cleaning, now?
My HN is a lot lower than my partner: Useless bloody layabout. We'd be living in a tip if they had their way. I have to do everything!
Both of our HNs are infinite: Ever wondered why you two never have any visitors?

 Sunday, January 04, 2004

New Year Resolution update - number 3

I ate my last ever bowl of Toffee Frosties this weekend. Kellogg's stopped production of this fine cereal two years ago, but I stockpiled a number of boxes so that I could savour the taste for as long as possible. Sorry, but new Chocolate Frosties are so very inferior. However, yesterday I decided I really ought to finish off my final box of the toffee stuff before the contents became too out of date. 'Best before 1 June 2002'. I wondered if I'd left it too late to enjoy them but no, they still tasted crisp and delicious to the last spoonful. Phew.

And then I decided I should trawl through the rest of the food in my cupboard to see if there was anything else hiding in there that was well past its sell-by date. And there was. Here are my five worst offenders. I wonder if there's anything older lurking in your kitchen?



5) 100 Twinings Earl Grey teabags (best before end Feb 2002): I thought I really liked Earl Grey teabags, but it seems I'm not getting through my box of top quality bergamot as quickly as I thought. I still have more than half of these bags to get through - I could be still brewing them in 2006 at this rate.

4) 1 pint UHT milk (best before 8 Feb 2002): This is was my emergency pint of milk, just in case I ever ran out. I never used it, as you can see. When I bought it I must've still been thinking Suffolk (nearest shop selling milk a 10 minute drive away) rather than London (five shops selling milk less than 10 minutes walk away).

3) Rowntree's Lemon Jelly (best before end Sep 2001): Mmmm, I like lemon jelly (and Lemon Jelly - when are they going to release something new, eh?). Let me just do a quick taste test and see how this citric gelatinous slab tastes 28 months on... mmmm, still very mmmm.

2) Bird's Instant custard (best before end Mar 2001): Have you noticed how instant anything (instant custard, instant gravy, instant coffee, instant tea, especially instant tea) never tastes even half as good as the real thing. I've noticed, and that's why this jar is still virtually full.

1) Bird's Chocolate & Caramel flavour Trifle (best before end Aug 1996): Blimey, just how long has this been sitting in the back of my cupboard? Since last century, I'm afraid. Four packets of sugar packed in a cardboard box, very nice. By now you're probably sitting there thinking that my larder is stocked with nothing more than processed carbohydrate, and maybe that's part true, but surely it's a good sign that all this sugary stuff has been sitting there uneaten. Until today. I quite fancy making up the trifle now, maybe even using up that pint of UHT milk while I'm at it. On second thoughts, maybe I'll pop out and buy some real milk instead, because I can.

 Saturday, January 03, 2004

10 New Year Resolutions

1) To go somewhere I haven't been before.
Ah, so many places to choose from. Australia maybe, or the Grand Canyon, or Berlin, or Middle Earth or, if I'm especially lucky, Ealing Broadway.

2) To reduce my spam intake.
"You have mail". No I don't. I just have yet another unwanted e-advert advising me how to enlarge various parts of my anatomy, include some parts I don't even have. Just how many different ways are there to mis-spell V|@gra? And is it possible to bounce these emails back to the sender with a small thermonuclear device attached?

3) To keep my place tidy.
It's not bad, but it would be better if I dealt with stuff immediately, or filed it away, or even threw it away, rather than leaving everything in an 'I will deal with this eventually' pile. Or piles.

4) To go up to anyone I see wearing more than one item of Burberry clothing and call them a tosser.
Burberry, it's even more common than it was before Christmas. Looks like every would-be socialite in London was given a beige plaid scarf for Christmas and has been keenly awaiting this cold snap as an excuse to show off their latest expensive neckwear. Actually it's the fake Burberry that gets to me the most. Walking round Stratford shopping centre yesterday there were hordes of nasty imitation brown check scarves and bags everywhere, most likely shoplifted from market stalls rather than bought from New Bond Street. When any supposed 'fashion' item can be seen dangling from the arm of every granny in the post office pension queue, it's time to move on.

5) To go back to the cinema again.
I've not been since last year. Surely there must be something on that's actually worth seeing.

6) To shed pounds.
Not weight, you understand, but money. I remain the world's worst shopper, and it would be nice to spend some money on me for a change. I've managed to spend less than a tenner in the January sales this year, despite having traipsed round most of London's major retail centres. That's one half price book and 12 light bulbs. Pitiful. Must do better.

7) To search out new and exciting webpages and stuff for all my readers.
Like this and this and this and this, for example.

8) To drink at least one of the three bottles of complimentary champagne sitting in my kitchen.
But not all by myself. I just need something worth celebrating, and someone to share the bottle with. Hic.

9) To learn to count.

 Friday, January 02, 2004

2004 anniversary quiz
Can you identify these events celebrating an anniversary in 2004?
All answers now in the comments box, or by clicking on any of the dates below.

Jan 1st 1964: it really was 'All New' back then (40 years)
Feb 14th 1929: seven killed, no love lost (75 years)
Apr 1st 1974: the day Avon came calling (30 years)
Apr 8th 1904: translates as 'friendly agreement' (100 years)
May 4th 1979: where there was despair, did she bring hope? (25 years)
May 6th 1954: it was all over in less than 240 seconds (50 years)
Jun 6th 1944: Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword (60 years)
Jun 28th 1914: the first of more than 10 million deaths (90 years)
Sep 15th 1964: Fleet Street dawn (40 years)
Oct 25th 1854: six hundred went riding (150 years)
Oct 28th 1929: financial meltdown (75 years)
Nov 19th 1994: a lot of balls (10 years)
Dec 27th 1904: the play that never grew up (100 years)
Dec 28th 1879: an unabridged disaster (125 years)
Dec 31st 1999: a big wheel and a big tent (5 years)

 Thursday, January 01, 2004

New Year - Option 2: Stand by the River Thames

I nearly stayed in, but the thought of the Scottish TV Hogmanay special was just too hideous to contemplate. I headed (rather late) to central London, where the streets were full of drunkards and the pavements covered by puddles that definitely weren't rain. By half past eleven the vast expanse of Trafalgar Square was already full. The police had been busy blocking off most of the surrounding streets, leaving the rest of us to wander around blindly like lab rats in a giant maze. Eventually I found a path through to the Embankment, where Big Ben and the London Eye came into view.

The best vantage point for the night's firework display was Hungerford Bridge, but the police had already sealed that off and stolen the entire view for themselves. The crowds below the bridge were particularly thick, but I was still determined to push on upriver much closer to Westminster. London's legendary Hare Krishna procession came to my aid, clearing a joyful path through the crowds, and I was able to pass through in the slipstream.

Midnight approached, and I was perfectly located opposite the London Eye and within striking distance of Big Ben as the first chimes rang out. Unfortunately the less intelligent amongst the crowd took this as the signal that the New Year had begun, whereas in fact there were still twenty seconds to go until the first proper bong. A great cheer went up, drowning out the rest of the chimes and bongs, leaving us all merely celebrating approximately 2004-ish. Until Big Ben gets a second hand, the exact arrival of the New Year will be easier to spot in the Orkneys on the telly rather than in London from 200 metres away. Right on cue it started to drizzle.

All eyes then turned to the Eye, its pods lit up and starting to pulsate. We had a couple of minutes to wait before the first fireworks shot up from the river, and then the Eye itself erupted with coloured flame. And then some more sparkles, and mild whooshes, and fiery explosions, and a short sky-filling finale. The crowds waited in vain for an encore, not quite believing it was time to go home already. Mayor Ken was right that this was only going to be a brief display, no more than three minutes, but definitely wrong that it would look better on the television (I've rewound the video, and those Scottish TV producers cut the event to shreds).

Those revellers who'd brought their own champagne stood around and toasted 2004 in plastic beakers. Some who were rather more merry, or perhaps just friendly, addressed every passer-by with New Year greetings. The rest of us slowly streamed away, either back to rejoin the West End crowds or off on a long-distance trek to the nearest still-open tube station. It was raining more persistently by the time I finally got home, and my feet ached, but I was glad I'd made the effort to see in 2004 in real life. The year can only get better though.

2004

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