My mp3 player's battery ran out during my journey to work yesterday, so I was forced to listen to my fellow commuters instead... • [Bow Road → Mile End] The train grinds to an unexpected halt inbetween stations. The all-enveloping silence in the carriage is suddenly punctuated by a loud snore. Sprawled across two seats is a well-fed bloke in oversized overalls, his head tipped back and his eyes firmly closed. His boots are splattered with dirty white paint, and his lunch dangles from one arm in a blue plastic bag. A second disturbingly loud snort fills the air, causing several nearby passengers to peer up from their newspapers. Intermittent snoring continue, reverberating in all directions as the train goes nowhere. The assembled audience begin to smile and glance at one another in guilty pleasure, relieved not to be the snoozing sideshow themselves. This unintended entertainment continues for three increasingly uncomfortable minutes. And then the train starts forward with a jolt, and one pair of heavy eyelids flick open. The semi-conscious traveller gathers his belongings and prepares to disembark at the next station, blissfully unaware of all the embarrassment he never felt. • [Liverpool Street → Bank] The carriage is rammed. Desperate commuters barge aboard from the platform. An off-duty London Underground employee in bulging blue uniform pushes past me to stake his claim to two square feet of spare floorspace. His over-thick head of grey speckled hair is somewhat unconvincing. A bulky laptop bag packed with official paperwork grazes my leg. As the doors clang shut, the newly-arrived tube worker taps the dreadlocked gentleman beside me on the shoulder. "Can you turn that down?" A hand emerges and pulls half a Sony headphone from one ear. No sound whatsoever can be heard. "Can you turn that down please?" Humiliated, the tapped man fiddles with an unseen volume knob and plugs himself back in. Tubebloke smiles, and looks to the rest of the carriage for implicit approval. Only one lady returns his gaze and smiles back. I feel a sudden urge to bash this sycophantic self-satisfied jobsworth over the head with a rolled up copy of the Daily Express for his totally unnecessary public intrusion, but I resist. The train screeches on through the noisiest tunnel on the entire tube network, far louder than any headphone bassbeat. Nobody utters another word.
threelinks • The London 2012 team have started up their own 2012 Olympic project blog. It's a bit serious, because official blogs have to be, and relentlessly upbeat, because official blogs have to be. But it's also surprisingly comprehensive, refreshingly broad-ranging, revealingly in-depth and unexpectedly interesting. Go read it now, before some of the more depressingly-negative political bloggers discover it and start leaving smug comments. • Do you have The Knowledge to become a London taxi driver? Test yourself out in a series of online tests at the WizAnn website. In what street is Birkbeck College? What route would you take from Hackney Downs to Finsbury Circus? Where on a roadmap is the Trellick Tower? I failed miserably. (Be warned that the final 'map' section of the test works in IE but not Firefox) • The Met Office has just relaunched its website, with increased access to detailed weather data. You can now type in your postcode to see a local five day forecast. You can view local weather observations over the last 24 hours in graphicalformat. You can watch the British Isles rainfall radar. Plus lots of other meteorological nuggets.
I've never liked the way I look in photographs. My smile's twisted, my eyes are vacant and my face looks all wrong. I often look startled, usually look uncomfortable, and always look plain unnatural. I hate my work mugshot and I despise my holiday snaps. In short, photographs of me don't look like me at all. Or so I think. Everybody else, however, always comments on how lifelike my photographs look ("Cor, that's such a good likeness.") ("Oooh, that's very you!") as if they think I really do look like the inane boggle-eyed gimp in the picture. Because (and this is the hard part to come to terms with), I really do look like that.
Every day since I was small I've looked in the mirror whilst cleaning my teeth or brushing my hair and assumed I was looking at an image of myself. I've grown used to every blemish on my skin, every curve of my face and every slightly wayward eyelash. My entire self-image has been generated from this daily reflection, because it makes sense to think that I look like what I see. But, of course, I've been deluding myself. The face I see in the mirror is a reflected fake, reversed from reality. What I see as my left eye is really my right, and that mole on my right cheek is really on my left. My face is truly asymmetrical, and I'm viewing it the wrong way round. However hard I try, I am not who I think I am.
I'm sure I'm not alone in this. You don't look like your photographs either, neither do you appear to others as you appear to yourself in a mirror. And you all know this, deep down, but it's a hard thought to shift.
Here, as an example, are two images of Prince Charles. One of these is the real Prince Charles, as printed in photographs and as seen by Camilla when she wakes up each morning. And the other is the reflected Prince Charles, as seen by His Royal Highness as he peers into the mirror above the royal sink. One's real, one's an illusion. Is it the left Charlie, or the right Charlie? I bet you've already spotted which is which, because one image somehow looks 'right' and the other doesn't. Unless of course you're Prince Charles himself, in which case Sir will instinctively have plumped for the incorrect image because it's the image with which Sir is most familiar.
Annoyingly, I prefer my reflection to the view everyone else sees. I may be wrong, but I think my mirror image looks slightly more handsome than reality. Not by much, you understand - I'm not being smug here - but to my mind I look better through the looking-glass. Maybe I've become conditioned over the years to tolerate the view I see every day, or maybe I genuinely have been asymmetrically unfortunate. Whatever the case, it's probably no bad thing that I'm comfortable with my looks, even if they are merely a visual deception.
And don't get me started on what I sound like to other people. Recordings of my voice always sound completely wrong, and nothing at all like the voice that I hear in my head. Again I know I'm wrong, deceived by vibrations travelling along my jawbone, but that doesn't make listening to my true voice any easier to bear. I mean, did you hear me talking on the video podcast yesterday. Sounded nothing like me, honest. (damn)
Words are dead. The future lies instead in sound and pictures. And that's bad news for blogs like mine which rely on words. People can't be bothered to read words any more, not when they can be spoonfed moving images with an accompanying soundtrack instead. Could be a music video, could be a film trailer, could be a TV snippet, could be two spotty teenagers shouting into a webcam in their bedroom. Whatever the content, sitting back and soaking in a visual experience requires far less effort than having to decode a long string of written sentences. Words are dead.
If I want to survive in the cut-throat online world, I need to evolve. I need to follow the herd and abandon verbal content in favour of embedded YouTube videos. Because, like, you know, they're hilarious, and they're what the public really wants.
So I've had a go at making my very own diamond geezer video podcast. That's me you can hear in the audio, and that's me you can see in the video. I'm a bit new to this, so please forgive me if it's a bit amateur. Until last night I'd never tried recording either sound or vision on my laptop, let alone marrying the two together in a perfectly crafted simultaneous broadcast. I'm not sure I did very well. But it's a start. Because the future's audio-visual. And the written word is dead.
Although, actually, sound and pictures aren't that great, are they? You can read words online much quicker than you can listen to them. You can skim a written post in seconds whereas you might end up wasting five minutes of your life watching rubbish. And if you don't have audio enabled, or if there's too much ambient noise and you can't hear anything, then what good is a post where all the meaning comes from sound? Maybe the written word has a future after all. I hope so. I don't think I'm cut out for video.
I was forced to travel on public transport recently because my car was in for a service. Little did I know that my journey would soon become the bus ride from hell! As I sat on my slightly soiled seat I could feel the squalor of the working classes assaulting my senses on all fronts, but I stared manfully out of the window and tried hard to blot it out. Oh how I longed for a heavily pregnant woman to board the bus so that I could offer her my seat and then stand smugly for the rest of the journey, but no such luck.
As I flicked through your excellent headline article about the continuing mystery surrounding Princess Diana's suspicious death, my ears were suddenly assaulted by the tinny drone of what passes for music these days. It was most off-putting, and I found myself looking over to see which teenage asbo whore might be responsible for this cacophony. Imagine my surprise to see instead a pigtailed blond girl, no more than ten years old, clutching an offensive pink mobile phone from which some cheap digital tune was now blaring. And there beside her sat her disinterested mother, blissfully unaware of the aural damage her daughter was wreaking.
I was not just disgusted, I was appalled. This miserable child was unable to survive a short bus journey without the need for anti-social entertainment. My fellow passengers and I were being forced to endure some blaring R&B nonsense so that this poor little moppet didn't get bored during her ten minute bus journey. Worse still, this council estate urchin had clearly been brought up to have total disregard for her elders and betters by a thoughtless mother. I wanted to beat some sense into this woman's tiny head with my rolled up copy of the Daily Express. I'll give her good manners, traditional values and good clean fun. Somehow I resisted.
This is not the Britain my grandparents fought for. This is a nightmare society where discourtesy and insolence are commonplace. What our young people need is a bit of respect drummed into them, and fast. So I'd like to suggest the return of the death penalty for people who play music out loud on public transport. It's the very least they deserve. And life imprisonment for anyone who has the volume on their headphones up so loud that the person sitting next to them can hear it. That'd show 'em.
What we need is a gibbet on every bus and a gallows on every train. Let's stand up for law and order and good old fashioned morality. I'm not afraid to say what I think. I'm crusading for a better Britain. That's why I read the Daily Express.
Yours enraged, Mr Silent Majority (retd)
P.S. And let's bring back flogging for children who forget to say please and thank you, and teenagers who drop litter in the streets, and company managers who relocate their call centres to India, and neighbours whose bonfire smoke blows across your washing line, and people who let their dogs foul the footpath, and illegal asylum seekers, and gum chewers, and freeloaders, and shop assistants who look at you in a funny way, and...
Most Londoners probably think that their nearest beach is in Southend, or maybe Brighton, but they'd be wrong. There are several beaches (or at least bits of foreshore masquerading as beaches) along the Thames, even through the middle of Central London. When the tide's high you can't see them at all, and many tourists probably never even realise that they exist. But as the river level falls, up to 6½m every twelve hours, so the river ebbs away to reveal long stretches of rock and mud. It may not be golden Mediterranean sand, but if you fancy a bit of beachcombing it's a darned sight more convenient to get to. • watch the Thames rise and fall
This is the beach at Bankside [photo], just below the Tate Modern [photo]. It's one of the longer stretches and, if you time it right, also one of the widest. With a bit of luck somebody will have unlocked the gate in the railings along the river's edge [map] and you can make your way down the low stone steps onto the sand. Yes, that's definitely sand at the top of the beach, although it soon gives way to rock and muddy shingle further down. Eroded half-bricks and pebbles litter the exposed river bed, some dark and jagged, others bleached white and smooth. Decaying wooden stumps stick up from the ground, the remnants of some old wall or Tudor jetty. Dark brown rusty pipes snake half-covered beneath the shingle, thankfully no longer dribbling ooze into the river. There's not as much washed-up litter and glass as you might fear, nor as much green slime as you might expect.
Best of all, you've probably got the whole quarter mile of beach to yourself, all the way from Blackfriars Bridge [photo] to Bankside Pier [photo]. Well, just you and a ragbag collection of feral pigeons, swooping seagulls and big black crows. Try picking your way across the rocks directly underneath the non-wobbly Millennium Bridge and looking across the river towards St Paul's Cathedral on the opposite bank [photo]. You might even spot some fragments of pottery or an old sailor's clay pipe in the mud, although I suspect that most of these were spotted and nabbed long ago. Don't stand too near the water's edge, or the backwash from a passing speedboat or Thames cruiser might overflow your boots. And ignore the funny looks you're getting from tourists wandering along the South Bank above you. Perhaps they can't work out how you got down there, or maybe they simply can't imagine why anyone would want to slum it on a low rocky shelf. But they're the ones missing out. Just make sure you get back up the steps before the beach disappears from view beneath the rising tide.
You can tell an awful lot about the history of London from its maps. Not that there were many London maps to begin with, because they weren't needed. But the British Library has amassed an enormous collection of London maps from the last 500 years or so, and their new cartographic exhibition makes for fascinating viewing. I thought I'd better visit on the first day before it gets too popular, because it surely will.
The exhibition is divided into eight sections, from the old walled City to postwar suburban sprawl. Inbetween you get to watch the capital expand, gradually at first, then with increasing speed towards the docks in the east and the prestigious estates to the west. See how quickly ye olde London was wiped from the map by the Great Fire, only to be rebuilt in ten years flat. Watch the fields north of Piccadilly sprout streets and squares and mansions. You can even track the River Fleet as it evolves from stream to ditch to underground sewer... or maybe that was just me. Some of the maps are bloody huge, which is great because it means you can get up close and inspect the really small detail. Many of the earlier maps are more pictorial than planar, but they're all equally beautiful and intricate in their own way.
What many visitors seem to do (and I'll confess to being no exception) is to pay extra special attention to the place where they live. It helps if you live somewhere fairly central, of course, and I'm fortunate that Bow often crept onto the very easternmost edge of certain maps. I was able to trace Bow first as a medieval village on the banks of the Lea, then a tiny 'town' surrounded by grassy meadowland, and finally a suburb swallowed whole by expanding London. If you'd have been wandering around the exhibition with me I'd probably have bored you silly by pointing out every time I spotted precisely where my house now stands, and you'd probably have done the same.
It's just my sort of exhibition, filled with frame after frame of cartographic porn to salivate over. I'm sure I'll be back for another visit at a later date, just so I can stare again at the million and one details I overlooked the first time. But in the meantime there's plenty to view from home. The free exhibition guide folds out to reveal a high quality print of Richard Newcourt's pre-Fire London map of 1658, which is gorgeous. I was also inspired to buy a copy of the book accompanying the exhibition, as did a surprisingly high proportion of departing visitors. At £15 a time (£25 hardback) the British Library have a worthwhile moneyspinner here, and very lovely the book is too. And if you can't get to the exhibition yourself, or can't get there yet, there's an excellent website to explore complete with images of several of the maps. It's based on a virtual Google map, of course, and there are some real gems tucked away on there. You've got three months to get your A-Z out and find your way to the British Library to see for yourself.
ninelinks (and one repeat from last Saturday just in case you missed it) • Ever needed an email address to sign up for something but not wanted to give your real one? Now you can get a temporary email address from Spambox, which lasts just long enough for you to get your registration email through and then disappears. I've just used Spambox to sign up for 12 free Krispy Kreme doughnuts, safe in the knowledge that a "Buy 12 get 12 free" voucher is the only email they'll ever send me. Fab. • Hurrah, Smoke #9 is just about to hit the shops. Just £2.50 will buy you this highly engaging "London peculiar" crammed with words and images inspired by the city. Probably the only quarterly magazine to be published sort-of every five months-ish. [4pm update: I've managed to track down a copy, and yes it's as good as ever] • Ever wondered what tube drivers see as they chug around beneath London? Wonder no more, because the latest fad on YouTube is tube driver's cab videos. How do you fancy a journeyround theCircle line, or a trip out from Paddington to Hammersmithand back, or even Moor Park to Croxley? • You may not have splashed out on the latest NOW 65 album, but I bet you've bought at least one from the Now That's What I Call Music series. TV Cream has a special nostalgic page remembering NOWs 1 to 20, back in the 80s. • Check out Flickr's latest London photos in more than 100 different categories at Pimp My London Group. I'm sure you'll want to keep up with The Feral Children of Bermondsey and London Graffiti groups, for example. Or add your own. • Is your secondary school in Wikipedia? I had a look via the Schools in England page, and mine's included. Can you beat a wealthy porn baron as an ex-pupil? • If there was a General Election tomorrow, who would win? (Answer: The Conservatives would be just ahead in a hung parliament). It's all based on the latest opinion polls, of course, and don't forget it's just a bit of fun... • Share your memories of the capital with Map My London. See where Mrs M took her favourite greyhound for a walk and where tamsin found a lost mattress. Satisfyingly mundane. [via ian and rashbre] • Did you know that one pound 500 years ago had the same purchasing power as £447.11 today? Or that our cash has halved in value over the last 20 years? Check out the Purchasing Power of British Pounds from 1264 to 2005. • If the programs on your Windows Taskbar aren't in the right order, Taskbar Shuffle is a tiny program which allows you to rearrange them. Very useful if, like me, you prefer everything set out 'just so'. Why doesn't Windows do this by default?
A very happy Thanksgiving to all of my readers in the United States. As every Briton knows, Thanksgiving is that special day of the year when Americans eat turkey and pretend they're all descended from pilgrims. Or is it the day when you eat pumpkin pie and dress up in traditional native American headgear? Or is it the day when you fly long distances to eat pecan pie with their families? Or is it the day when you eat cranberries and start their Christmas shopping. See, nobody in Britain really knows, or cares. We've all got to go to work today, and your traditional family celebrations pass us by unnoticed. It's not bitterness, you understand. We don't care that in 1620 a few joyless Britons sailed across the Atlantic to found a nation who would later subjugate us in global influence (honestly, we don't). Your quaint day of Thanksgiving is just another Americanism which plays no part whatsoever in our lives.
Except on television. We watch a lot of your television, partly because you make so much of it. And your television series often feature aspects of American culture which are relatively alien to the rest of the world. Like, for example, those annual Thanksgiving episodes of Friends packed with unintelligible turkey-based nuances. Here are some other bewildering slices of American life which, to us Brits at least, exist only on screen:
• "The Prom": Every American teenage TV series must, by law, contain one "Prom" episode. On their last day at school, all the characters dress up in posh suits and elegant ballgowns and then spend the evening dancing and trying not to kiss each other. Surely it would be more fun to dress down and get pissed on lager instead, and a lot cheaper? • "Little League": To the best of my knowledge, all tousle-haired American ten-year-old boys spend their weekends being whipped into line playing a version of institutionalised rounders. If I'm wrong, sorry, but that's how it always looks on children's TV. • "Vietnam": I know our film industry made far too many films about 'plucky valiant Brits' battling through World War Two, but Hollywood's still churning out far too many films about the agonies of Vietnam. We lost interest after the first fifty, OK? • "Football": But, but, but, that game on the screen's not football! That's lots of burger-fed teenagers dressing up in padded clothing and helmets and standing around in the middle of a big field occasionally running three yards before being jumped on. But there again, we invented cricket, so we're not much better. • "The First Amendment": There are lots of amendments, apparently, on such diverse topics as having to be nice to slaves, giving women the vote and being allowed to gun people down in cold blood. But the First is the most important one... whatever in God's name it is (and I believe I have the freedom to say that). • "Junior High": Sorry American scriptwriters, but when you set a TV series in a 'Junior High', I have no idea how old the children are supposed to be. 7? 12? 15? It's not easy to tell from the actors' faces anyway, because they all look 23. • "The Pledge of Allegiance": Usually seen as a mawkish conclusion to a particularly moral-filled half hour, with rows of gap-toothed kids chanting in reverence beneath a big stripy flag. It might tug at the heartstrings in the States, but it lacks all emotional punch outside the homeland. • "Yearbooks": In every college, so TV tells us, a bunch of do-gooding senior students go round taking photographs of everybody else and pasting them into expensive scrapbooks which they then distribute at the end of the year. I'm so pleased nobody tried that at my secondary school - my 1982 haircut is not something I want to relive.
Friday update: You've also suggested... "the World Series", "Spring Break", having a "den" at home, "Varsity", "Fraternities", "Sororities", "Semesters", "the Super Bowl", "Homecoming Queen", "The DA's Office", "NASCAR", "Cheerleaders", "Restrooms", "Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwiches", "Ballparks", "Summer camp", "Condos", "the backyard", "going to the Drive-in" and "taking out the trash". Any more?
Post a post on your blog and, if you're lucky, comments will appear. There might be a lot, or there might not. But what seems to be the case is that most of these comments will appear fairly soon, and then there'll be fewer and fewer new comments as time goes by. The older a post is, the fewer comments it attracts. OK, that's not rocket science. But the drop-off seems to be quite dramatic, and yesterday's comments on this blog were no exception. So I thought I'd do some research to investigate my rate of comment decline. I've selected 10 typical posts, and then I've looked at your comments and the time at which you made them. Results follow.
[For analytical purposes I've only considered posts posted on this blog at 7am on a weekday, and I've selected the ten most recent of these. That's more than 250 of your comments under consideration altogether. I'm aware that I'm very fortunate to have this many comments, so thank you. I'm aware that most bloggers don't post a new post every day, instantly demoting yesterday's post to obscurity. And I'm aware that most bloggers don't post at the same time every day, with readers expecting a fresh post every morning. In fact I'm aware that my blog isn't typical in any way. But I still think the data's interesting.]
elapsed time
comments
the first 6 hours
50%
the first 12 hours
75%
the first 24 hours
90%
Half of the comments on my blog are posted within 6 hours of a post appearing, while it's still fresh and new. Three out of four comments are made in the first 12 hours, by which time most regular readers have checked out the page to see what today's post is. And all but 10% of comments are made during the first day, while the post is at the top of the page. After that I stick another daily post on top, and the old post is relegated down the page, and the comments dry up. All of which suggests that if you lot have anything to say, you say it quickly. Here are the results in more detail:
time comment made
comments
7am → 9am
17%
9am → 12 noon
28%
12 noon → 3pm
15%
3pm → 6pm
13%
6pm → 9pm
10%
9pm → midnight
4%
day 2
8%
days 3 and 4
5%
later than day 4
1%
When I post a new post at 7am, most UK blog readers are still asleep (or otherwise occupied). But some of you are very quick off the mark and get in with an early comment. My busiest hour for comments is usually 8:30-9:30am, presumably just after many of you have arrived in the office for work, and while the post is still fresh. The rest of the morning is also relatively busy, comments-wise, but by lunchtime this interactive activity is already starting to fade. There's another slight peak at the end of the working day, around 5pm, and then commenting drops off fairly sharply after 8pm as the evening progresses. Presumably you're all busy being sociable by then and have no time to comment, or maybe everything's already been said. During the early hours, UK time, I receive only a handful of occasional comments (usually from either nightowls or Antipodeans). Then there's barely a flicker of interest as the second day dawns, and passes, because now there's something more recent to comment on. And very few people stumble across an 'old' post after more than four days and feel they have to add to the debate. Conversation by then is essentially dead and buried, and even if you do write a comment it's unlikely that anybody else is still going to be around to read it.
So, there you have it. If today's post is typical I'll get a quarter of my total comments by 10am, half of my comments by 1pm, three quarters of my comments by 7pm and nigh all of them by 7am tomorrow morning. But I bet you prove me wrong deliberately.
I just wondered, because some people do, and some people don't. I don't mean whiffy body odour smells like that unwashed bloke with stinky armpits who insists on standing next to you on the train in the summer. I mean perfume and and cologne and aftershave and stuff. Some people sprinkle themselves with it, and some don't. So, which are you?
Yes, I smell: No, I don't smell:
Some people smell. They have bottles of aromatic stuff littering their bathrooms, and they splash it on all over every morning. It might be some subtle fragrance, or it might be a volatile chemical which reeks from a distance of fifty yards. It might smell of lemon, it might smell of rose petals or it might smell of some other exotic bouquet, but the whole point is that it smells of something because there's no point in wearing it otherwise. Some people smell a little, but some people smell a lot. It's as if they somehow need to be noticed, striding through their everyday lives in clouds of wafting whiff. Still, at least it's easy to buy these people a Christmas present. One well-wrapped bottle of their favourite scent and they're happy. Be it something expensive from the grinning girls at the front of Debenhams or just the latest from the Avon catalogue, you can't go wrong with a smelly bottle. Even if it is tiny, and holds only a few thimblefuls, and costs a fortune, its contents will still be appreciated. By smelly people.
I’ve never been a smelly person. I never quite saw the advantage of dousing my body in musk or citrus or whatever. But there was a time back in my teens when I dabbled. I won a squeezy green tube of Brut 33 talcum powder in a local town hall raffle, and brought it home excitedly to experiment with. A few squirts and I smelt like the proverbial tart's boudoir, all stinky and sickly sweet. So the Brut sat unused on my shelf, where it was eventually joined by some Old Spice, Hai Karate and Drakkar Noir which well-meaning relatives had bought as unwanted gifts. And now I'm more than happy to drift through life untainted. Sure I mask my natural odour with a lightly-perfumed anti-perspirant, but nothing you'd notice from more than three inches away. I don't want you to smell me before you see me. I have no need to reek of ambergris, ylang-ylang and sandalwood. I'm not a smelly person.
As of yesterday, if you travel on the tube using a pay-as-you-go Oyster card and fail to touch in or touch out, you'll now be charged a "maximum cash fare". To assist you in understanding the new penalty system, Transport for London have helpfully provided a detailed online FAQ explaining all the changes. It's only 2600 words long, and is therefore easily assimilated by any Londoner. Come on, this is important, because if you don't know these rules inside out you might end up paying extra for your ignorance. Just in case you can't spare the time to read the full rules in depth, allow me to present my own simplified Oyster FAQ below:
Q: How much is the new "maximum cash fare"? A: It's £4 per journey. Which is a bit sneaky, because the maximum Oyster fare for the longest possible Zone 1-6 journey is only £3.50.
Q: Is it always £4? A: No, it's £5 if you're using National Rail from certain mainline stations (Blackfriars, City Thameslink, Elephant & Castle, Euston, Fenchurch Street, Liverpool Street, London Bridge and Marylebone). Apparently £5 is the "average fare" from these stations, so you deserve to be charged more. Here's a map showing the (not many) National Rail routes where use of Oyster is permitted.
Q: Surely this "maximum penalty fare" only affects miscreants and barrier jumpers? A: Not at all. Life would be simple if all Oyster journeys started and finished at a ticket barrier, but they don't. Exit the tube at Finsbury Park without swiping and you'll be fined. Start your journey on the DLR without swiping and you'll be fined. Change onto National Rail at Farringdon without swiping and you'll be fined. It's all too easy to forget, and to end up paying for your mistake.
Q: How does this new system penalise you for not touching in? A: If you didn't touch in, then when you eventually touch out at the other end the system assumes you've made the longest possible journey (eg from Heathrow Airport) and slaps down a maximum fare Exit Charge of £4.
Q: How does the system penalise you for not touching out? A: Every time you touch in at the start of a journey, an Entry Charge of £4 is automatically applied to your Oyster. If you don't touch out at the end of your journey, then this £4 is automatically deducted. If you do later touch out, like you're meant to, then the correct fare is charged instead.
Q: So, pay-as-you-go travellers are assumed to be "guilty until proven innocent"? A: Yes, although the £4 Entry Charge is never actually deducted while you're travelling, so you can have less than £4 pay-as-you-go and still be able to travel.
Q: How does the system know that I haven't touched out? A: You're allowed up to two hours to complete your journey, but take any longer and a penalty fare applies. Even a tube journey from Epping to Chesham on a Sunday evening allegedly only takes 1 hour 58 minutes, so anybody taking longer than two hours is clearly a criminal.
Q: What if my journey is delayed? A: If your journey exceeds two hours because of service disruption, you should seek assistance from a helpful member of staff or call the Oyster helpline. Calls cost only 3½p per minute, unless you're calling from your mobile (which, given the circumstances, you probably will be).
Q: And what if I don't touch in and I don't touch out? Do I get to travel for free? A: Yes, you do. Unless an inspector catches you along the way, in which case you'll be charged £4. Or maybe prosecuted.
Q: Is it ever cheaper not to touch out? A: Yes, but only for Metropolitan line passengers travelling beyond Rickmansworth. For example, if you travel from Baker Street to Chorleywood and exit through the car park on the westbound platform, then you'll pay a fare of £4.50 if you touch out but a penalty of only £4 if you don't.
Q: Are there any special rules about Wimbledon station? A: Funny you should ask. Yes, Wimbledon is an Oyster-user's tram/train/tube charging nightmare. Please read this scarily complicated list of extra instructions.
Q: I have a season ticket on my Oyster card, not pay-as-you-go, so I'm OK aren't I? A: Not if you venture outside your paid-for zones. If you touch in at a station outside your chosen zones but fail to touch in later, then you'll be charged an extension fare of either £1 or £1.50. But if you touch in at a station inside your chosen zones and later fail to touch out at a station outside your chosen zones, then the system won't notice and you won't be charged extra.
Q: What if there's major disruption and I get turfed off my usual tube route onto a bus? A: In these circumstances you shouldn't touch out when leaving the station, but you must touch in on the bus, but only if you've been told that buses are accepting tube tickets, otherwise you might be overcharged. Simple.
Q: What if there's an accident or something and I get carted off the tube network on a stretcher without touching out? A: No problem, they'll refund your £4 Entry charge later, so long as you don't go catching a bus before you get back on the tube again in which case the £4 won't have been refunded yet and you might be refused entry until you top your card up again. Honest.
Q: The Oyster system is full of over-complex badly thought-out inconsistencies, isn't it? A: Yes, but please try not to mention them because it frightens people.
Q: So, to summarise, please? A: Expect to be charged £4 at the start of your journey for not touching out, or £4 at the end of your journey for not touching in.
Q: I am new to London and my English it is poor. Can you please be explaining these rule again? A: No, sorry. Just pay up.
Q: I don't understand what an Oyster card is. A: My apologies for wasting your time.
Bow Creek: The most impressive meander in London isn't the wiggle on the Thames around Docklands, although that is close by. It's the final meander on the River Lea, which twists and turns right back on itself (twice) before exiting into the Thames immediately opposite the Millennium Dome. This lower part of the Lea is called Bow Creek, and the area around the mouth of the Lea is called (with typical medieval originality) Leamouth. The best views of curving Bow Creek can be seen from a train, looking down from the DLR viaduct between East India and Canning Town. But if you're willing to explore on foot, these strangely remote riverside lands are well worth a wander.
Bow Creek Ecology Park The meandering Lea sandwiches two very long and very thin interlocking tongues of land. The easternmost of these is a sprawl of rundown industrial units, and will remain so until property developers move in and build scores of new apartments instead. But the western peninsula is something more natural, and rather more special. 150 years ago there was a coal wharf here, supplying the nearby Thames Iron Works (they built ships, and founded West Ham football club). In 1960s the docks closed down and the site fell into disrepair, along with much of the surrounding area. And then the Docklands Light Railway came along, and engineers spotted that this thin strip of land was the perfect route for new tracks to Canning Town. A viaduct was built straight up the middle, and the land beneath tidied up to form an ecology park. But health and safety issues got in the way, and the park was only finally opened to the public this summer, 10 years late.
You enter Bow CreekEcology Park over a modern footbridge, along an expensive unused road, through some arty gates. There's just one main path down to the tip of the peninsula, and another up the other side, with the DLR rumbling away through the centre. Passing passengers are probably the only people you'll see here, and they're no doubt looking out wondering what on earth you're doing in this isolated spot. Well, you'll be enjoying such delights as the artificial water meadow, the squelchy reedbeds and the tree-lined pond in this brand new nature reserve. There are several rare plant species on site, and some elusive otters, and even some relocated lizards (although I didn't spot any). There's also a large wooden platform where schoolkids can try their hand at pond-dipping, plus a special outdoor classroom tucked beneath the railway. For a bit of peace, sit down on one of the twisty metal benches and take in the view across the river (or, if the tide's out, across the mud). You can easily see Canary Wharf and the Dome in the near distance, but at the same time it's rather hard to ignore the vegetable oil refinery and building works in the foreground. It may not be truly beautiful looking out, but it's quite charming looking in.
East India Dock Basin The EastIndiaDocks were opened exactly 200 years ago in 1806 by (who else) The East India Company. The docks were extremely successful, with an entrance wide enough to accommodate the larger tea clippers and merchant ships which plied the Far Eastern trade routes. Spices, silks and Persian carpets were unladen here, as well as millions of pounds of imported tea. But trade declined steadily during the 20th century and, in 1967, these were the first London docks to be closed. Today only the entrance basin remains, surrounded by new residential and office developments, and redesignated as a bird and wildlife sanctuary. Big black waterfowl flap and glide across the water, retiring (if disturbed) to perch on wooden rafts in the middle of the mud. Around the perimeter of the basin are patches of reed bed, woodland and meadow, as well as one of the big black beacons erected by British Gas to celebrate the Millennium. The dock gates have been refurbished and can be walked across, while from the riverfront there's a perfect view of the Dome on the opposite side of the Thames. Barges and speedboats chug by, planes from City Airport swoop overhead and in the distance the DLR rattles by. It's a lovely spot, and yet every time I've visited I've had the whole place to myself. Well, just me and a bunch of birds. • aerial view / map
fivelinks • Picto is a very simple game where 100 coloured shapes appear, one at a time, and you have to spot the latest one each time. I spotted 40 before I blew it by clicking on an old one. Beat that. [via in4mador] • Britain's male youth seem to have taken to gelled spiky haystack hair in a big way. Jacks Style Guide lets you see the latest sculpted designs and rate them out of 5. I found the results quite depressing, but then I'm not target audience. • If the programs on your Windows Taskbar aren't in the right order, Taskbar Shuffle is a tiny program which allows you to rearrange them. Very useful if, like me, you prefer everything set out 'just so'. Why doesn't Windows do this by default? [via lifehacker] • The Map of Early Modern London is a late 16th century visualisation of the capital with hundreds of places, buildings and locations marked. Not technologically cutting-edge, but agreeable simple. [via things magazine] • Rob Smith has created an online 'artwork' entitled Stopped Clocks which displays a photograph of a stopped clock for one minute at the appropriate time each day. But finding 1440 different clocks is proving quite challenging, so at the moment it only works for 32 minutes a day (and don't bother looking after 1pm).
You know how it is when you build something new. A new kitchen, or a new conservatory, or a new extension, or something. You get a quote in from the builders and they give you a reasonably tolerable estimate. But when the project's finally completed it always ends up having cost you far more. There were all those unforeseen extras and unexpected delays and sudden price hikes, and the final total is always unpleasantly astronomical. But the new kitchen's a great improvement on the old, and the new conservatory becomes a much-loved place to sit, and the new extension is well worth the effort in the end. If we never built anything because it might cost more than we expected, we'd never build anything. Even if it sometimes does turn out a bit rubbish and leaves us in debt, it's always worth a try.
The increasing cost of the London Olympics £3.4bn Original cost outlined in Olympic Bid £0.3bn Unexpected VAT bill courtesy of EU regulation £1.3bn Big number added by UK media to bring original total up to a scarily round five billion £3bn Installation of ten million extra CCTV cameras throughout south-east England to prevent unexpected terrorist attack £0.7bn Erection of electric security barricade around fifty acres of duck-infested marshland £1bn 'Cash-for-Olympic-honours' slush fund £0.036bn Ken Livingstone's holiday fund £1.2bn Cost of redesigning the stadium after David Cameron refuses to sanction Gordon Brown's chosen design £0.4bn Projected losses after government Obesity Tsar Jamie Oliver enforces "healthy-only" Olympic refreshment policy £0.2bn Bureaucratic uplift created by over-excessive health and safety legislation £0.2bn Bureaucratic uplift created by over-excessive quality assurance procedures £1bn Accumulated losses when 24992 spectators' seats are left empty once Leyton Orient take over the main stadium in 2013 £0.9bn Erection of 20-foot tall gold statue of Tony Blair in Stratford High Street £0.8bn Contingency fund for construction of extra arena in case the IOC suddenly decide to reintroduce naked mud wrestling as an Olympic sport £0.5bn Spurious Daily Mail addition attributed to "migrant workers" £1.4bn Cost of building 5000 affordable homes throughout the Thames Gateway £1.3bn Cost of building 50000 affordable homes in marginal constituencies elsewhere throughout the UK, renamed "Thames Gateway Gateway" £0.08bn Cost of sending Tessa Jowell on monthly roadtrips to try to persuade northerners that the Olympics really will be beneficial for them, honest £1.50 Six-pack of green glowsticks to liven up the Olympic opening ceremony 27p Box of matches to light Olympic torch £0.5bn Amount of working time lost over the next five years by Olympic pessimists ringing up talk radio and shouting "You know how many NHS nurses we could get for this money, don't you?" £0.5bn Amount of working time lost over the next five years by Olympic pessimists leaving comments on internet talkboards reading "And who will be paying for this fiasco, eh? The British taxpayer, that's who!" £–20bn Long-term regeneration benefits to some of Britain'spoorestboroughs
Silver discs(November 1981) A monthly look back at the top singles of 25 years ago
The three best records from the Top 10 (10th November 1981) Police - Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic: There are some song titles you can't read without humming, albeit subconsciously, and this is one of them. Gordon Sumner wrote more than his fair share. A jolly bright melody with a Caribbean feel, and a fourth chart topper for the blond tousled ones. The rest of the Ghost In The Machine album was rather darker, but this bittersweet tale of not-yet-requited love (actually written five years earlier) still bubbles beautifully. [video] "Though I've tried before to tell her of the feelings I have for her in my heart. Every time that I come near her I just lose my nerve as I've done from the start" Altered Images - Happy Birthday: You go 20 years without a single single named Happy Birthday, and then in 1981 two come along at once. And how much better than Stevie Wonder's version was this? A breathless nursery rhyme, quirky and fresh, which introduced the nation to Clare Grogan's impish grin. John Peel, of course, had known about Glasgow's finest musical talent for several months (ahh, the quirky delights of Dead Pop Stars). But only now did Clare find herself pinned across many an adolescent bedroom wall, and all this shortly before celluloid immortality in Gregory's Girl. As for Happy Birthday, it's taken me 25 years to finally decipher the lyrics and, erm, maybe it's just as well I never made them out at the time. [video] "Happy, happy birthday, in a hot bath to those nice nice nights. I remember always, always, I got such a fright. Seeing them in my dark cupboard with my great big cake." Haircut 100 - Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl): The most successful chart hit ever written about shirts, from a bunch of clean cut guys in chunky Arran sweaters. Girls longed to go out with one of the Hundred, while mums hoped their daughters might bring one home. Few boys, however, modelled themselves on lead singer Nick Heyward's cheese-grin couture. At least Haircut 100 wrote their own stuff, putting them head and shoulders above most modern pre-packaged boybands, and this track wasn't half bad. Like many of their early 80s contemporaries they've recently been tempted back for a one-off reunion concert, but photos suggest that their favourite shirts have aged somewhat. [video] "Time can't afford no time, can't afford the rhyme, nevermind, someday maybe. Boy meets girl and love, love is on it's way."
My favourite record from November 1981 (at the time) Animal Magnet - Welcome To The Monkey House: Here's a rarity - a criminally overlooked record which later became a cult underground favourite. It's a sort of tribal synthpop anthem, with a driving guitar pulse and wildly energetic vocals, and perfect for going ape on the dancefloor. If webcams and YouTube had been around in the early 80s, teenagers would no doubt have stripped to the waist and filmed themselves leaping around their living room to this song like a blurry crazed beast. Oh look, somebody's actually done that, rather more recently [YouTube monkeyboy]. As for band member Paul Caplin, he soon left the music business (after a brief spell with Haysi Fantayzee) in favour of the swiftly developing 80s computer industry. 25 years on Paul now runs his own hugely successful City company providing the financial software keeping Reuters and the New York Stock Exchange afloat. Who are the monkeys now, I wonder? "Here we are in the monkey house, we've taken all our clothes off. Here we are in a soundproof room, making all the noise we want to here."
Who was on Topof thePops 25 years ago this week? (hosted by DLT) Kool and the Gang - Steppin Out: The show kicked off with falsetto voices, false horns, and hateful false soul of the blandest kind. Here's the actual TotP performance for you to relive, if you dare. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - Joan of Arc: Not to be confused with Maid of Orleans, which would be released in the new year. Olivia Newton John - Physical: Olivia didn't fly over from America to make an appearance in the TotP studio, they only showed her sweaty gym video with leotards. Quite racy for the time, though. The Fureys featuring Davey Arthur - When She Was Sweet 16: Frighteningly laid-back Irish folk tune from Westlife's grandparents. Haircut 100 - Favourite Shirts: An off-the-cuff performance from Nick & Co. • Jonathan King then counted down the American Top 20, because he assumed we were interested. We weren't. How are the mighty fallen. Ultravox - The Voice: Great semi-choral track... but, oh Midge, was that dead caterpillar 'tache ever fashionable? Earth Wind and Fire - Let's Groove: Maybe not the summit of 80s disco, but a mighty high peak all the same. Dance group Zoo, in only their second week on TotP, interpreted this song rather more suggestively than Legs & Co would ever have done. Rod Stewart - Tonight I'm Yours: No thanks Rod, if you don't mind. Police - Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic: And now here's this week's new number one! (cue rabid applause from an audience of startled teens in stripy sweaters and party dresses) Altered Images - Happy Birthday: (but just a verse and a chorus to play out to and run the credits over)
10 other hits from 25 years ago: Labelled With Love (Squeeze), My Girl (Four Tops), Tears Are Not Enough (ABC), Hold Me (BA Robertson and Maggie Bell), Keep It Dark (Genesis), Why Do Fools Fall In Love (Diana Ross), Visions of China (Japan), The Lunatics Have Taken Over The Asylum (Funboy Three), Paint Me Down (Spandau Ballet), Me and Mr Sanchez (Blue Rondo A La Turk) ...which hit's your favourite? ...which one would you pick?
I'm sure this sort of thing never happens where you work
On 15/11/06 @ 11:59, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: *** Chris is out of the office at the moment - and might be back from lunch by half past two ***
On 15/11/06 @ 11:59, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: see you down at the sandwich bar in five, i've got so much to tell you
On 15/11/06 @ 11:56, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: what do you think of the new office temp? i think he's well fit. i'd do him
On 15/11/06 @ 11:54, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: that is well good!! i'm going to play it all afternoon instead of writing reports
On 15/11/06 @ 11:43, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: sorry, the boss just walked past and i had to pretend i was looking at a spreadsheet
On 15/11/06 @ 11:36, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: yeah, it's Mike from Finance. did you not see she arrived one minute behind him this morning, it was SO obvious. apparently they spent the weekend in a motel somewhere outside Basingstoke, and they never left the room, and he's well tiny, and SHE ended up paying
On 15/11/06 @ 11:33, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: is she seeing someone? ohmigod ohmigod gimme the goss now!!!!
On 15/11/06 @ 11:31, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: her new boyfriend bought it - he thinks it's nice. i think it's a pair of curtains with a zip
On 15/11/06 @ 11:29, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: what's Nikki got on? is she wearing that for a bet?
On 15/11/06 @ 11:26, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: yeah, i've got nothing to do either, my next deadline is in January
On 15/11/06 @ 11:24, Kelly <kjones@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: i can't at the moment, i'm pretending to be busy
On 15/11/06 @ 11:21, Chris <csmith@youroffice.co.uk> wrote: i'm bored, do you fancy a coffee?
As environmental concerns push increasingly to the fore of global consciousness, so we've all started taking a much greater responsibility for the effects of our own actions. It's amazing how recently and rapidly this tipping point of public opinion has been reached. Not so long ago people like Prince Charles were being ridiculed as eco-fruitcakes and lunatic obsessives, but not any more. Activities we used to consider as normal, proper and even desirable have suddenly been deemed unacceptable. And not a moment too soon. But with this shift of opinion comes an unwelcome new breed of eco-bully. These self-righteous neo-environmentalists enjoy nothing better than showering accusations on others whose lives they now judge to be anything less than 100% ethical. How dare other people fly/shop/drive/eat/exhale in a globally detrimental manner. And nothing can stop their sanctimonious tirades of smug verbal abuse. Have you been bashed by the Big Green Stick recently?
"We're flying to Australia on holiday next week." "You selfish uncaring bastards. How dare you fly abroad and see the world when every aeroplane flight hastens the end of civilisation as we know it? I think everyone should be banned from flying abroad purely for pleasure, even if that means our children and grandchildren never travel any further afield than Blackpool or maybe Paris. OK, so, I've already been to the Great Barrier Reef and the Grand Canyon and Rio de Janeiro and the Pyramids myself, but I don't see why anybody else should get the chance."
"We've just bought a brand new car." "You selfish uncaring bastards. I don't care that you've got four children, you should cram them all into the back of an electric smart vehicle instead, or buy them all bicycles. Do you not realise that every car journey you make hastens the flooding of south east England by a few minutes and causes a small child in Africa to drop dead of carbon monoxide poisoning. And yes I know that I still drive a Landrover myself, but that's because there are a lot of steep hills in Croydon, and Waitrose is too far away to walk."
"We're having a dinner party on Saturday." "You selfish uncaring bastards. Do you not realise how far the food you'll be serving up has travelled? Those out-of-season courgettes were all grown in South Africa and those sundried tomatoes have been flown in from Mexico. You should serve up a nice simple potato soup instead using spuds dug up from your own garden, maybe with some knobbly home-grown carrots and using milk from your own cow. Just don't expect me to come round for dinner myself, I'm allergic to anything organic so I'm staying in with a microwaved curry."
"We're buying a new fridge." "You selfish uncaring bastards. How dare you artificially lower the temperature of your food by artificially increasing the temperature of the rest of the world? And I bet that's an import from a developing country too. We should be demanding that these emerging nations forgo industrialisation and economic progress for the greater good of the planet. And yes, I know that I live in a country which has been polluting the atmosphere for the last 200 years and is largely responsible for the ecological mess we find ourselves in today, but we didn't find out until it was too late so I reckon we might as well carry on."
"We're planning a lovely family Christmas." "You selfish uncaring bastards. Those wholly unnecessary presents you purchase will end up in landfill, those illuminations on your roof will devour the Earth's fossil fuels minute by minute, and those sprouts on your Christmas dinnerplate could punch a hole in the ozone layer all by themselves. Baby Jesus didn't have much of a carbon footprint did he, although yours is the size of a Norwegian pine forest. And yes, I know that I'm planning to party from the start of December until Twelfth Night, but I'll not notice the damage my conspicuous consumption is doing to the planet because I'll be permanently drunk."
"We're expecting twins." "You selfish uncaring bastards. Not satisfied with polluting the planet with one greedy resource-hungry baby, you're inflicting double the environmental damage on the world. Think of all the nappies they'll use, and all the petrol they'll burn, and all the mobile phone chargers they'll leave on stand-by, and all the carbon dioxide they'll breathe out. And yes, I know I have three children myself, but I'll need them to look after me when I'm older. And anyway, if the rest of you all stop breeding wasteful offspring, my handful of kids have got a great future ahead of them."
Cultural update(books/film/photography/design/pie)
• A book to give to somebody else for Christmas, but well worth buying now so that you can read it before you wrap it up: Office Politics (How Work Really Works) by Guy Browning (£9.99) If you work in an office, you'll recognise the characters and situations in this humourous little volume. Every aspect of office life from how to keep the boss happy to how to keep the pot plants alive has been wittily condensed into its own mini-chapter, and they're all brilliantly observed. You might only read it once, but you'll smile knowingly all the way through. • A book to get somebody else to buy you for Christmas, or to buy now for yourself if you can't wait until then: Chambers London Gazetteer by Russ Wiley (£25) There's always room for another book about London on your bookshelf, particularly one as comprehensive as this. Most city guides concentrate on the central tourist locations, whereas this thick volume affords each square mile of the capital equal importance. The author's taken every minor London neighbourhood, from Abbey Mills to Yiewsley, and written a detailed pen-portrait of each. There's a bit of history, a bit of geography, a bit about who lives there and usually a quirky fact or two for good measure. You've probably never been to Tokyngton, Bridgen and Temple Fortune, for example, let alone known they even existed, but these and 1300 other locations are all included here. There are several refreshingly non-landmark photographs too, in full colour, from all around the capital. For a taster of the book visit the author's splendid "Hidden London" website (via which you can also get £10 off the cover price). • A book that might be quite good but I don't write reviews on request: Thanks for the email David, good try.
• The media's full of the new Bond film at the moment, but I'm happy to wait until Christmas 2009 to watch it on the telly. Instead I've been to see Starter for 10, almost certainly the first film ever to revolve around Granada TV quiz show University Challenge. And it's a little charmer. It may be a "romantic comedy" but don't worry, it's never unduly soppy or sugary, and Hugh Grant never makes an appearance. The year is 1985, and misfit Brian is off to Bristol University to study English, girls and general knowledge. Every effort has been made to give the film that proper mid-80s authenticity (ahh, patterned knitted jumpers, mixtapes, Echo and the Bunnymen and those tall glass tumblers with the all-over rippled effect just like we used to have at home). The shared student digs look scarily realistic, and it's evident throughout that the author was once such a gauche student himself. The plot weaves its way to a satisfying on-screen climax in front of the legendary Bamber Gascoigne, mimicked here to perfection by Mark Gatiss. And Brian's Mum is played by Catherine Tate, which should be enough of a recommendation to go see this film all by itself.
• The Pet Shop Boys are almost as well-known for their ever-changing image as for their music. On one album Neil and Chris may be staring deadpan into the camera and on the next hiding beneath ridiculous pointy hats, but there's always a certain inimitable PSB style. This autumn the boys have bought out a retrospective coffee-table book, called Catalogue, as a scrapbook of every video, every record sleeve and every behind-the-scenes photoshoot from their 20 year career. If you don't have £30 to spare, a small selection of appropriately inventive images are now on display at the National Portrait Gallery, admission free. Head downstairs to the 'bookshop gallery' and enjoy reacquainting yourself with 26 carefully selected examples of the iconic and the ironic. Don't expect to be looking around for more than ten minutes, but if you're in the Trafalgar Square area between now and the beginning of March (and you probably are) then it's worth a look.
• The Geffrye Museum on the Kingsland Road reopens its newly renovated17th and 18th century galleries tomorrow. There'll be four new rooms, each recreating a different period of domestic interior design and each based on a typical London middle class home of the time. If you've visited the museum before then you'll know it's well worth going back, and if not then you're in for an unexpected treat. Yes, in the middle of Hackney, who'd have thought?
• Goddard's Pie Shop in Greenwich closed down for good last night. Owner Jeff Goddard left a comment here last week saying "I just wanted to let you know that the "family circumstances" are that my brother and I have small children who, at the moment, we see very little of as the shop is so busy 7 days per week. Hopefully people will understand. Thanks to everyone who has eaten at our Pie Shop over the years." Which was sweet of him. Now I learn that the shop is being sold off to a burger chain called Gourmet Burger Kitchen. Their "innovative and exotic" cuisine will feature Chorizo Burgers, Falafel and Garlic Mayo Sauce, which is presumably just what Greenwich's tourist hordes deserve. But pie and mash it ain't. My stomach feels somehow cheated. [7:30pm update: another message from Jeff in the comments box]
Why do we have to endure the two minute silence twice? I have no problem with respecting it once. It's right and proper, and appropriate and necessary, to remember our wartime dead once a year. But twice, and on two consecutive days, that's just wrong.
The first two minute silence was held at 11am on November 11th 1919, one year to the minute after the signing of the Armistice which ended World War One. King George V proclaimed to the nation that "all locomotion should cease, so that, in perfect stillness, the thoughts of everyone may be concentrated on reverent remembrance of the glorious dead." And Britons duly paused, and united, and reflected, on the atrocities that had killed so many millions of people so very recently. The following year the two minute silence was observed again, at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, now with its epicentre at the newly constructed Cenotaph in Whitehall. Traffic stopped, factory production was suspended and the nation remembered. And so it was on every subsequent November 11th until 1945, after which things changed.
In 1946 the UK's official two minute silence switched to RemembranceSunday - the second Sunday in November. The national hiatus was better suited to the traditional day of rest, so it was thought, even if this coincided with the proper Armistice anniversary in only one year out of seven. But some people continued to commemorate on the 'proper' day, because it seemed wrong to forget. A campaign grew to reinstate the two minute silence on November 11th, whipped up by the British Legion and some of our more 'loyal' tabloids. And so for the last ten years there have been two nationally-observed two minute silences, one on the 11th and another on the Sunday closest to it. Because nobody can quite decide which day is more appropriate, and because it would be politically incorrect to ditch either one of them. What a mess.
Two minutes of silence on a Sunday feels very different to two minutes of silence on any other day of the week. If you're at home, and you probably are, then the 11 o'clock silence is a very easy occasion to miss. It's even possible to sleep through the whole thing after a heavy night out, or to be otherwise occupied in the bedroom at the appropriate moment. You'll notice the silence if you're inside a church, or on a village green, or if you've tuned in for John Craven's Country File only to find it's been cancelled this week. But elsewhere no car boot sale pauses, no queue at IKEA halts, no rail replacement bus service grinds to a halt and no frozen food aisle falls silent. Sunday ought to be the best day of the week for commemoration because the day is already fairly laid back. On a Sunday the service at the Cenotaph always has the appropriate gravitas, at the heart of a silent city, at the heart of the nation. But if it's not the 11th, as this year, then it's the wrong day.
Two minutes of silence on a weekday feels very different to two minutes of silence on a Sunday. You're probably at work for a start, or out travelling, or doing something relatively sociable. A two minute intermission is going to interrupt your day, intrude into your routine and generally make itself noticed. Which is how it should be - a positive act of remembrance and not a passive weekend interlude. But I truly dislike the shared communal silence enforced upon Britons in the workplace on November 11th. Phones continue to ring, email continues to arrive and office juniors continue to gossip by the drinks machine. There's nowhere to stare, nowhere to focus, and an uneasy atmosphere as people attempt to look reverent whereas in fact they're thinking about what to have for lunch. Plus nobody ever sets their watch accurately beforehand so nobody knows precisely when the two minutes begins. Mike in Finance might check his premature mobile and start his silence 90 seconds early, while Val from Accounts is trying to judge when the minute hand on her designer watch passes a point which isn't marked and so ends up starting after she should have finished. Workplace silences are always an embarrassing uncoordinated mess, never ever respectful enough.
And this year we get two minutes of silence on a Saturday. It's the worst of both worlds. Everybody's busy, everybody's rushing around, everybody's self-absorbed, and nobody notices. So this year the British Legion have made an extra effort and organised a special 'event' in Trafalgar Square. Its official title is "Silence in the Square", and it's being 'hosted' by GMTV's Ben Sheppard. There'll be a proper bugler, and lots of poppies dropped into the fountains, and a flypast at 11:02 by four thundering Typhoons. No thought whatsoever for anybody living beneath the flypath who'll have their two minute silence drowned out prematurely by the heavy drone of a passing bomber squadron, but never mind them. And after the flypast, so the Legion inform us, there'll also be "a live performance by Christmas number 1 hopefuls, the all–girl Classical group, All Angels" (who just happen to be releasing a new album on Monday). There's a fine line between making Remembrance relevant and blatant commercialisation, and I fear the Legion have just crossed it.
What the hell has happened to our Remembrance Day? Why are we diluting its effect by commemorating it twice? Can somebody official please decide whether our two minute silence should be held on the Sunday or on the 11th? And then stick to it, either one or the other, but not both. There's no need for an instant decision because next year the two dates coincide perfectly and we'll only have to remember once. But for 2008 and beyond, can we please make up our minds which day we want? Two minutes a year is right and proper, but two minutes twice is just disrespectful.
Why do we have to endure the two minute silence twice? I have no problem with respecting it once. It's right and proper, and appropriate and necessary, to remember our wartime dead once a year. But twice, and on two consecutive days, that's just wrong.
The first two minute silence was held at 11am on November 11th 1919, one year to the minute after the signing of the Armistice which ended World War One. King George V proclaimed to the nation that "all locomotion should cease, so that, in perfect stillness, the thoughts of everyone may be concentrated on reverent remembrance of the glorious dead." And Britons duly paused, and united, and reflected, on the atrocities that had killed so many millions of people so very recently. The following year the two minute silence was observed again, at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, now with its epicentre at the newly constructed Cenotaph in Whitehall. Traffic stopped, factory production was suspended and the nation remembered. And so it was on every subsequent November 11th until 1945, after which things changed.
In 1946 the UK's official two minute silence switched to RemembranceSunday - the second Sunday in November. The national hiatus was better suited to the traditional day of rest, so it was thought, even if this coincided with the proper Armistice anniversary in only one year out of seven. But some people continued to commemorate on the 'proper' day, because it seemed wrong to forget. A campaign grew to reinstate the two minute silence on November 11th, whipped up by the British Legion and some of our more 'loyal' tabloids. And so for the last ten years there have been two nationally-observed two minute silences, one on the 11th and another on the Sunday closest to it. Because nobody can quite decide which day is more appropriate, and because it would be politically incorrect to ditch either one of them. What a mess.
Two minutes of silence on a Sunday feels very different to two minutes of silence on any other day of the week. If you're at home, and you probably are, then the 11 o'clock silence is a very easy occasion to miss. It's even possible to sleep through the whole thing after a heavy night out, or to be otherwise occupied in the bedroom at the appropriate moment. You'll notice the silence if you're inside a church, or on a village green, or if you've tuned in for John Craven's Country File only to find it's been cancelled this week. But elsewhere no car boot sale pauses, no queue at IKEA halts, no rail replacement bus service grinds to a halt and no frozen food aisle falls silent. Sunday ought to be the best day of the week for commemoration because the day is already fairly laid back. On a Sunday the service at the Cenotaph always has the appropriate gravitas, at the heart of a silent city, at the heart of the nation. But if it's not the 11th, as this year, then it's the wrong day.
Two minutes of silence on a weekday feels very different to two minutes of silence on a Sunday. You're probably at work for a start, or out travelling, or doing something relatively sociable. A two minute intermission is going to interrupt your day, intrude into your routine and generally make itself noticed. Which is how it should be - a positive act of remembrance and not a passive weekend interlude. But I truly dislike the shared communal silence enforced upon Britons in the workplace on November 11th. Phones continue to ring, email continues to arrive and office juniors continue to gossip by the drinks machine. There's nowhere to stare, nowhere to focus, and an uneasy atmosphere as people attempt to look reverent whereas in fact they're thinking about what to have for lunch. Plus nobody ever sets their watch accurately beforehand so nobody knows precisely when the two minutes begins. Mike in Finance might check his premature mobile and start his silence 90 seconds early, while Val from Accounts is trying to judge when the minute hand on her designer watch passes a point which isn't marked and so ends up starting after she should have finished. Workplace silences are always an embarrassing uncoordinated mess, never ever respectful enough.
And this year we get two minutes of silence on a Saturday. It's the worst of both worlds. Everybody's busy, everybody's rushing around, everybody's self-absorbed, and nobody notices. So this year the British Legion have made an extra effort and organised a special 'event' in Trafalgar Square. Its official title is "Silence in the Square", and it's being 'hosted' by GMTV's Ben Sheppard. There'll be a proper bugler, and lots of poppies dropped into the fountains, and a flypast at 11:02 by four thundering Typhoons. No thought whatsoever for anybody living beneath the flypath who'll have their two minute silence drowned out prematurely by the heavy drone of a passing bomber squadron, but never mind them. And after the flypast, so the Legion inform us, there'll also be "a live performance by Christmas number 1 hopefuls, the all–girl Classical group, All Angels" (who just happen to be releasing a new album on Monday). There's a fine line between making Remembrance relevant and blatant commercialisation, and I fear the Legion have just crossed it.
What the hell has happened to our Remembrance Day? Why are we diluting its effect by commemorating it twice? Can somebody official please decide whether our two minute silence should be held on the Sunday or on the 11th? And then stick to it, either one or the other, but not both. There's no need for an instant decision because next year the two dates coincide perfectly and we'll only have to remember once. But for 2008 and beyond, can we please make up our minds which day we want? Two minutes a year is right and proper, but two minutes twice is just disrespectful.
Since 1970, a total of twelve famous people have graced the back of the banknotes issued by the Bank of England. Over the last week I've written about each of them and their many connections to the city of London. Phew. It was a much bigger task than I first thought, and I've only scratched the surface of some of their famous lives. But you can find out more, if you like, by clicking on the various links scattered throughout each post. And maybe next time you spend a fiver, or a tenner, or something rather bigger, you'll have a better understanding of why that strange historical character on the back is truly noteworthy.
Londoners of note £50: Christopher Wren(1632-1723) In the spring of 1666 a young architect named Christopher Wren returned from Europe with plans for the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral. And then, only a few months later, the entire medieval cathedral burnt to the ground in the Great Fire of London. But this was no suspicious coincidence, it was just precisely the right man in precisely the right place at precisely the right time. The wholesale destruction of two-thirds of the City by fire gave Wren his big chance, and earned him an everlasting reputation. Wren's initial plans for regeneration were grand and geometric, based on the ordered elegance of Renaissance European cities. But landowners were reluctant to sell up their blaze-gutted plots, so the roads of post-Fire London retained the original medieval street pattern. In 1669 Wren was appointed the King's Surveyor of Works and took control of the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral. Several designs were proposed, and refused, and it was nearly 40 years before the great building we see today was complete. When Wren died he was buried in a vault in the cathedral's crypt, inscribed with the epitaph (in Latin) "Reader, if you seek his monument,look around you". The crypt's cafe, gift shop and toilets are, today, thankfully tucked just out of sight.
Wren'sdome is truly one of the iconic sights of London. Stump up nine quid to enter the cathedral and you too can climb up inside to admire the views both within and without. It's 259 steps up to the WhisperingGallery, although the legendary acoustics didn't work for me when I visited. Another 119 steps are needed to reach the Stone Gallery, this time on the exterior of the building immediately beneath the dome. And then, good grief, the last 152 steps ascend a succession of spiralmetal staircases inside the hollow void between inner and outer domes. If that doesn't give you vertigo, the view from the Golden Gallery probably will. You're on the tip of St Paul's nipple here, with just enough space to shuffle precariously round a narrow parapet and look down across the city. It used to be possible to ascend even further, right up inside the golden ball (holds 10), but health and safety rules put paid to this particular treat several years ago.
St Paul's is only one of Wren's great London buildings. The eastern wing of Hampton Court Palace, that's one of his, and the Monument, and Temple Bar, and the Royal Naval Hospital and Royal Observatory at Greenwich. He was also the architect responsible for the rebuilding of more than 50 ofthe City's churches. Few of these have survived intact to the modern day, although both St Clement Dane's in the Strand and St Clement's (of Oranges & Lemons fame) are welcome exceptions. Several of today's other 'Wren' churches are really post-WW2 rebuilds, damaged by a second City firestorm, including St Bride's in Fleet Street and St Mary-le-Bow in Cheapside. But several more of Wren's mini masterpieces have been wiped away by later redevelopment. The church at St Christopher-le-Stocks in Threadneedle Street, for example, was sacrificed in 1781 to make way for an expanding financial institution. Courtesy of the other fifty quid bloke...
Londoners of note £50: John Houblon(1632-1712) John who? He's a nobody in comparison to the other 11 notables on my list, but the Bank of England thought him important enough to slap on the back of their highest value banknote. And that's because JohnHoublon was their very first governor, back in 1694, and because the Bank cared about him 300 years later even if we didn't. John was a rich merchant from a rich family of merchants, although they'd started out a century earlier as a bunch of persecuted Belgian immigrants. He was one of a group of City gentlemen whose ready cash helped to establish London's first public bank in temporary accommodation in Lincoln's Inn Fields. John got to be Lord Mayor, and he was MP for Bodmin, and he was a friend of Samuel Pepys, and sorry, he really wasn't a terribly interesting chap. But he had a nice house in Threadneedle Street which the Bank bought after his death to use as their new permanent headquarters. As the Bank grew in importance they also grew in size, gradually buying up all the surrounding land. In 1791 they knocked down the church nextdoor, this being St Christopher-le-Stocks, in whose grounds Sir John had been buried. Today a seven storey economic fortress covers the entire block, and the first Governor's remains lay somewhere beneath the world-renowned financial institution he helped to create.
If you've ever wanted to see inside the Bank of England for yourself, they organise free public tours twice a year. I can highly recommend the experience, especially if you fancy standing in Merv the Governor's office or the octagonal room where the Monetary Policy Committee met yesterday to raise interest rates to 5%. Your next opportunity is in July as part of the City of London Festival, or else you can wait for Open House in September. But the bank also contains a permanent museum, open every weekday (and specially tomorrow for the Lord Mayor's Show), and entrance is free. The exhibits will tell you a bit more about Sir John Houblon and a lot more about the history of the nation's banknotes. Assuming you're still interested, that is.
Londoners of note £20: William Shakespeare(1564-1616) Like many an ambitious twenty-something, William Shakespeare was strangely drawn from the shire counties to the bright lights of London. Nobody's quite certain when he arrived, but by 1592 he had a career of sorts as an actor and emerging playwright. Will joined up with a company of players called The Lord Chamberlain's Men and helped establish a theatre (called, originally enough, The Theatre) just outside the City boundaries in Shoreditch. Tax records catalogue a succession of London lodgings beginning in nearby Bishopsgate, later crossing the river to Bankside and then back again closer to St Paul's. In 1599 the increasingly successful Mr Shakespeare became a one-eighth shareholder in the Globe Theatre. Such classic plays as Julius Caesar, Macbeth and Hamlet were first performed here (to packed crowds of appreciative Londoners and not to bored field-trip GCSE students). A second winter-only theatre opened rather later at Blackfriars, where William bought up the old monastery gatehouse as his final London residence. The Blackfriars Theatre lingers on only as a streetname (Playhouse Yard), but the reconstructed Globe lives again as a thatched tourist magnet very close to its original site. Those who flock to Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford are somehow missing the point.
Londoners of note £20: Michael Faraday(1791-1867) At long last in this series of banknote characters, a Londoner born and bred. MichaelFaraday grew up in Newington Butts (better known today as "just south of Elephant and Castle"). At the age of 14 he was apprenticed to a bookseller and bookbinder in Blandford Street, just off Baker Street, and started to take an interest in matters scientific. A customer's chance gift of four Royal Institution lecture tickets drew young Michael to the attention of Sir Humphrey Davy, who promptly took him on as his laboratory assistant. Faraday rose through the ranks at the RI to become a Professor of Chemistry, discovering electrolysis and inventing the Bunsen burner along the way. But it's for his pioneering work on electricity that he's best remembered. Ooh look, moving this wire through that magnetic field creates an electric current, as does moving the magnet instead of the wire. Hey presto - the electric motor, the dynamo and the entire modern science of electromagnetism. The fulllist of Faraday's accomplishments is astonishing, and all this from a very humble, religious man.
Unfortunately the Royal Institution in Albermarle Street is closed for major refurbishment at the moment, so the Faraday Museum inside is closed too. But Michael spent his entire life based in London, so there's a lot more elsewhere still to track down. Southwark council have erected a blue plaque on a library in Walworth Road close to the site of his birth (although Southwark council are renowned for slapping a blue plaque on anything for almost anyone). More impressive, though less well-known, is this striking steel-box sculpture in the middle of the Elephant & Castle roundabout. Most passers-by probably think it's an electricity substation (which, in fact, it is, for the Northern line below), but it's also the official MichaelFaradayMemorial. It beats the usual bog-standard statue, although there are a couple of those around the town as well. The bookshop in Marylebone where Michael served his apprenticeship is marked by a brown 'blue plaque', and the building is currently occupied by an estate agents named Faradays. Over in the East End, beside the mouth to Bow Creek, is TrinityBuoyWharf lighthouse where Faraday experimented at great length to improve offshore illumination. At Hampton Court is the grace and favour house where he lived out the last two decades of his life. And to see his grave you'll have to travel to the evocative Highgate Cemetery. Faraday's current legacy is everywhere.
Londoners of note £20: Edward Elgar(1857-1934) Elgar was born, and lived out most of his life, in the idyllic surroundings of rural Worcestershire. He was a man who found even the hustle and bustle of a market town like Malvern too distracting and preferred to compose his work in rented country cottages. So it's perhaps surprising to discover that, of the 25-or-so different residences in which he lived during his life, four were in London. Elgar's need to move to the capital was forced after works such as the Enigma Variations and the Pomp and Circumstance marches caused his fame to grow. In 1912 he moved into an expensive Queen Anne mansion in Netherhall Gardens, Hampstead, and named it Severn House. But a stream of visitors, and the onset of the First World War, led to a marked decline in his creative output and eventually a return to the Worcestershire countryside beckoned. Elgar's Hampstead home has long since been demolished, and only one of his London residences remains standing. It's this five storey townhouse in Avonmore Road, close to the Olympia exhibition centre, and now converted into flats. Edward lived here for just one year during an early abortive attempt to establish himself in the capital. But I bet he wouldn't have left overflowing binbags, a roll of manky carpet and an old TV set out on the steps in front of his house. A blue plaque is no longer a guarantee of class.
Londoners of note £20: Adam Smith(1723-1790) Next year's new addition to the banknote hall of fame may be a Scot, but even DrAdamSmith spent a couple of years of his life in London hobnobbing with the literary hoi polloi. Today his political and economic outlook lives on in the capital in the form of the Adam Smith Institute, currently housed in temporary accommodation round the back of Westminster Abbey above an obscure timbered shop selling ecclesiastical vestments. As Adam's not yet officially noteworthy, I shan't say any more... but his libertarian disciples blog regularly on his behalf, if you're interested to dig deeper.
Londoners of note £10: Florence Nightingale(1820-1910) You probably know Florence Nightingale as "the Lady with the lamp", or "that brave nurse from the Crimea". You might even associate her with the famous anagram "Flit on, cheering angel". But there's a lot more to Florence than her talent with bandages, and all is explained in one of London's least known museums hidden away beside the Thames in Lambeth.
The Florence Nightingale Museum is tucked beneath St Thomas's Hospital at the eastern end of Westminster Bridge [map]. No tourist is ever going to stumble upon it by mistake, so I was pleasantly surprised not to be the only visitor wandering around inside last weekend. It costs about half a tenner to get in, and for that you get a fairly traditional "cases and displays" walkround which leads you through the 90 years of Ms Nightingale's life. Florence was born in a certain north Italian city (you can guess which) while her well-travelled parents were on extended honeymoon. She had a privileged academic upbringing in Hampshire, but secretly hankered after an unfashionable career in nursing. The museum showcases many of her early belongings, as well as her pet owl Athena (now stuffed) who died of neglect when Flo rushed abroad to assist in the Crimean War. She wasn't so much a nurse as an administrator, and her in-depth background knowledge and logistical skills were precisely what was required to improve the horrific conditions for thousands of battleworn British soldiers. On her return to England Florence was rightly hailed as a national hero, but she shunned all such adulation in favour of continuing her reforming crusade. Her story is well told in the museum, and in the obligatory 20 minute audio-visual presentation, although (from what I saw) adults may want to linger inside rather longer than any accompanying children.
For the last half of her life Florence resided at 10 South Street, just off Park Lane, and spent her days meeting with the great, the good and the medically important. I attempted to track down her terraced townhouse by hunting for a blue plaque somewhere along the street. A tall Georgian cornerhouse looked a likely candidate, but the plaque beside the front door revealed that the famous occupant here was only "Skittles, the last Victorian Courtesan". Florence's plaque was on the opposite side of the street, high on a very ordinary concrete wall beside a suspiciously modern office entrance. The original house was long gone - her drawing room, her parlour, and the bedroom in which the frail, blind and bedridden Ms Nightingale spent her final decade. But the modern nursing profession still stands in testament to her achievements to this day.
Londoners of note £10: Charles Dickens(1812-1870) £10: Charles Darwin(1809-1882) And then there are the two Charlies. One an acclaimed novelist, the other a renowned naturalist. One turned his spotlight on the human character, the other on the nature of man himself. And what do you know, I visited both of their London houses lastmonth, so there's no need for me to go into detail here again. Hurrah! Charles Dickens in particular spent so much time living in and writing about the capital that I could easily write a full week of posts about his literary London. Maybe I will one day. In the meantime you can investigate Dickens' London on this interactive map, or pay a virtual visit to Darwin's study.
Londoners of note £5: Duke of Wellington(1769-1852) Poor old Arthur Wellesley didn't even get his name on the back of the old blue fiver, just his title. Arthur earned his fame stomping round Spain and Portugal during the Peninsular War, first becoming Viscount Wellington (because the name sounded a bit like Wellesley) and later the Duke. Only then did he cap a successful military career by defeating Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo, with the resultant adulation eventually propelling him to the giddy heights of Prime Minister. And in 1817 he moved into a grand town house on the edge of Hyde Park, where his successor lives to this day in private apartments on the third floor.
You've probably seen Apsley House, at least in passing, because it looks out over the six-lane gyratory system at Hyde Park Corner. But you may never have taken the time to go inside, which would be a pity because this is a top class stately home slap bang in the centre of London. I ventured inside "No. 1 London" for the first time last weekend, and was impressed to discover a bubble of grandeur and opulence in the traffic-choked heart of the West End. There's drawing room after drawing room after drawing room, as well as a huge dining room and the lavish Waterloo Gallery. Here the Duke held famed candlelit soirées, and here still hangs his impressive collection of European art. One room on the ground floor is given over to gifts of plate and china given by the crowned heads of Europe - far more impressive than any modern collection of Oscars or Nobel Prizes. But the most unexpected original feature of the house, and the most striking, is the 11 foot tall nude statue of Napoleon which stands at the foot of the main stairwell. Wellington had a grudging respect for his greatest adversary, and was pleased to accept the statue following the Battle of Waterloo when the French decided they no longer wanted it. But it's still a very odd experience to discover the mighty emperor, his dignity covered only by a figleaf, scaring old lady tourists at the foot of the main staircase.
Across the (very busy) road stands the WellingtonArch, upon which once stood a vastly oversized statue of the Duke. Now there's a magnificent winged statue of "The Angel of Peace Descending on the Chariot of War" on top instead, to which you can get right up close by paying a bit more money and taking the lift to the third floor [photo]. The suite of rooms inside the arch once housed London's second smallest police station with a staff of 10 constables, two sergeants and a cat. Now there's just a bit of an exhibition to see, but the visit's really only worthwhile for the view. You can stare across into Hyde Park, you can look down at the traffic circling Hyde Park Corner, and best of all you can peer high over the walls into the back garden of Buckingham Palace. Just the bottom of the garden, mind, but I can exclusively reveal that the Queen wasn't out at the weekend playing tennis or doing the gardening in her wellingtons.
Londoners of note £5: George Stephenson(1781-1848) Here's the one banknote bloke who never lived in London. The father of railways was born in Northumberland and spent his working life linking the northern industrial heartlands. He never lived anywhere further south than Chesterfield, but today his greatest invention resides in the capital. In 1825 George engineered the world's first steam passenger railway between Stockton and Darlington, but fame came only with his next commission building the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. A competition was held to design the line's new locomotives, and Stephenson entered a revolutionary engine named Rocket. It had a top speed of 30mph, but easily beat the other entries when they all failed to work. At the opening of the railway in 1830, Rocket had the dubious honour of knocking down and killing the local MP who thereby became the world's first railway casualty. It's a lot safer to stand in front of Rocket today, down at the Science Museum in South Kensington, although you still have to watch out for rampaging crowds of schoolchildren running amok with clipboards. The shape is instantly recognisable, with a long thin chimney perched high above a stocky iron boiler. At the rear is a narrow footplate below a hinged door concealing the coal-fired furnace, and above one of the wooden-spoked wheels is affixed an understated brass nameplate. The modern train which brought you to the museum may look nothing like it, but your journey owes everything to Stephenson's Rocket.
Londoners of note £5: Elizabeth Fry(1780-1845) Elizabeth would no doubt have been mortified to imagine that her portrait would one day appear on several million English banknotes. She was a modest Quaker who grew up in a religious community in Norwich, but her life changed in 1799 when she met wealthy East End merchant Joseph Fry. On marriage she moved to the Fry family home in Plashet (now East Ham) where she eventually decided that there was more to life than giving birth eleven times over. She started to visit the women inmates in Newgate Prison, bringing warm clothing for them and their babies, and eventually persuaded the governors to let her start up a prison school. Her influence grew and spread to other penal institutions across the country, with her undaunting emphasis always on respect and reform for female prisoners. After a pious and illustrious life she was buried in the Quaker cemetery in Barking, although no gravestone now marks the spot. And Newgate Prison, which she fought so long to reform, has also long gone - replaced by the Central Criminal Court of the Old Bailey(pictured). Justice at last.
Since 1970, a total of twelve famous people have graced the back of the banknotes issued by the Bank of England. It's a very exclusive list. And, with one exception, each of these people lived in London for at least some of their life. So I've been out to track down these noteworthy celebrities, to see where they lived, worked and/or died. Join me this week on the trail of twelve Londoners of note.
You have to be a bit special to be celebrated on an Englishbanknote. It's not everybody whose portrait is deemed worthy of being stuffed into millions of wallets, purses and piggy banks. You have to be British, you have to be dead, you have to be fairly non-controversial, and apparently it helps if you have a beard because that makes your portrait harder to counterfeit. Several potential candidates are considered, but it's down to the Bank of England's Governor to make the final decisions. Here are the twelve who've made the grade so far, distributed across three separate series of banknotes.
Series D £1 Isaac Newton (1978-1988) £5 Duke of Wellington (1971-1991) £10 Florence Nightingale (1975-1994) £20 William Shakespeare (1970-1993) £50 Christopher Wren (1981-1996)
Series E £5 George Stephenson (1990-2003) £10 Charles Dickens (1992-2003) £20 Michael Faraday (1991-2001) £50 John Houblon (1994-)
Series E(revised) £5 Elizabeth Fry (2002-) £10 Charles Darwin (2000-) £20 Edward Elgar (1999-)
So far that's ten men and only two women. So far that's four from the arts (two writers, a composer and an architect) and four from the sciences (three scientists and an engineer). So far that's ten properly famous and two just 'worthy'. And so far everyone has been English (although the surprise choice of Scottish economist Adam Smith for the £20 note from next spring breaks the pattern). With 'Series F' now on its way, I wonder who'll be next. Apparently the Bank already have a female shortlist including novelist Jane Austen, poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Octavia Hill, founder of the National Trust. I reckon Isambard Kingdom Brunel must be a prime candidate, and perhaps William Wilberforce. But who would you choose?
Londoners of note £1: Isaac Newton(1643-1727) Let's start with possibly the greatest genius England ever produced. The discoverer of gravity, the inventor of calculus, the father of optics and the founder of mechanics. Any one of these achievements would be sufficient for IsaacNewton's scientific immortality, let alone the complete set. But they all happened either at home in Lincolnshire or at university in Cambridge, and not in London, so I'm going to ignore them. But in 1696 Newton finally moved from Cambridge to the capital to take up a job with the Royal Mint. Newton took his role as Master of the Mint very seriously, and it was for his financial achievements rather than as a scientist that he later received his knighthood. He became president of the Royal Society in 1703, and ruled this scientific organisation through a mixture of fear and intimidation until his death in 1727. And between 1696 and 1709 Newton lived here at 87 Jermyn Street, just south of Piccadilly.
Jermyn Street today is a backwater of timewarp tailoring, with fusty shops selling outfits and accessories to moneyed gentlemen from the shire counties. Here they can still buy a decent pair of brogues, or be fitted for a pinstripe blazer, or get their balding locks tended by a traditional wet-shave barber. The street is especially famous for shirts - distinctive shirts which scream class, breeding and colour-blindness. So perhaps it's not surprising that there's a tailor's, of sorts, on the site of Newton's old house. Disappointingly it's only a Hackett, catering for the upwardly mobile who can't quite afford a polo pony but can stretch to an overpriced jersey. An ornate plaque on the wall outside appears to be the best tribute to Sir Isaac's scientific genius that London can muster.
Remember Remember - a guide to Bonfire Night for young people
Hey youth! Did you know there used to be a British autumn tradition even bigger than Hallowe'en. Yes really. Back when your parents were kids nobody went trick or treating, nobody at all. Nobody carved out pumpkins, nobody dressed up as a skeleton and nobody went round throwing eggs at neighbour's windows. It's true. Instead we had our own festival of darkness and we called it BonfireNight. It was plain simple fun, and we didn't have to spend all our pocket money down at Woolworths if we wanted to join in. Ah, those were the days. So this November 5th why don't you ask a responsible adult to recreate all the excitement of a traditional Bonfire Night? See what you've been missing out on. Who knows, you might even enjoy it.
Step 1: Make yourself a guy Before the big day it's important to be able to extort money from the local population. For this purpose you'll need to create a big rag doll which looks like a bearded religious terrorist. But don't just copy the bloke on the front cover of The Sun, think 17th century Catholic instead. Because this festival is all about shameless religious persecution. Nothing changes.
Step 2: Take your guy out in public Find an old soapbox and attach some wheels to it (or, failing that, go out onto your estate and borrow a pushchair from one of the teenage mums). Then wheel your bundle of rags down to the local shops and hang around outside the library haranguing passers-by. The official cry used to be "Penny for the Guy", but you might want to update that to "A quid or we'll kick your head in".
Step 3: Buy a selection of fireworks Believe it or not, in the old days it was the children who bought the fireworks, not the adults. Shopkeepers thought nothing of selling bangers and jumping jacks to schoolkids with an evil glint in their eye, without a thought for whose eye they might end up in later. Try buying underage explosives today and you'll probably land yourself an instant Asbo and the phrase "irresponsible pyromaniac" on your criminal record. For the authentic retro experience you'll have to send Dad down to the shops instead of you. Not that he'll be able to buy much for ten shillings these days.
Step 4: Build yourself a bonfire In the less enlightened days before global warming, it was every good citizen's duty to tear down a few trees and send dark clouds of carbon emissions wafting high into the sky each Bonfire Night. All this so that Britons could risk setting their gardens alight and then end up smelling of smoke and roast hedgehog for the rest of the week.
Step 5: Pick the right evening There's only one correct date to let off fireworks, and that's November 5th. Just as nobody would ever go trick or treating a day early, so fireworks used to be restricted to one night only. Even if Bonfire Night fell on a wet Tuesday, bad luck, a wet Tuesday it was. This may have been a bit strict, but at least it confined all those dog-scaring bangs to a single six hour period.
Step 6: Stand in your garden Do not, repeat do not, go down to the council organised display in the park. Bonfire Night was never about joining in with your local community, it was about showing off in front of your neighbours in glorious isolation. Your amateur Dad would never merit a pyrotechnics safety certificate, but he was once fully entitled to detonate dangerous rockets in the dark from the middle of your back lawn. Blinding.
Step 7: Wait patiently while nothing happens Back garden firework displays are always a disappointment. One Dad can't set off ten rockets simultaneously, not like the professionals down at the park. He can stick one rocket in a milk bottle, but that'll probably fall over and fire horizontally towards nextdoor's cat. He can nail a Catherine Wheel into the shed, but a couple of revolutions later it'll probably fall onto the lawn with a muted splutter. And he can light the blue touchpaper on a Roman Candle, but it may be impossible to tell whether the ensuing two second fizzing is the intended special effect or a product malfunction.
Step 8: Get interactive Never mind, there's always the sparklers to look forward to. Just the one sparkler each, mind, because these used to be an expensive treat. Plus you were always a bit scared they might burn you because that nice presenter on Blue Peter had drummed the fear of God into you earlier in the evening. Look, I can spell my name in letters of fire... oh damn, it's gone out.
Step 9: Make your own entertainment Look, Mum's filled a bucket with water so everyone can try their hand at apple bobbing. Look, she's burnt some sausages under the grill in the kitchen and slipped them into a cheap white roll with some Heinz ketchup. Look, the whole family's standing out in the back garden, wrapped up warm in the dark, watching everybody else's fireworks exploding all around and having a whale of a time. That's how Bonfire Night used to be. Magic.
Step 10: Never waste your time and money doing Hallowe'en again
The great switch-off: A trip to see the London Christmas lights used to be a winter highlight for many a child. In December. But Christmas creeps earlier every year, and in 2006 the lights in Oxford Street and Regent Street will be switched on next week (sigh). They're up and strung across the road already, so I've been to take a look. And here's why you shouldn't bother making a special effort to come and see them yourself.
Regent Street lights Switch on: Tuesday 7th November I think these could be the most inappropriate Christmas lights anywhere, ever. Not the big snowflakey shapes, because they look like they could be quite impressive. No, I refer instead to the large cutout of a slug, labelled 'Slug', which you can see here displayed high above Regent Street. Further down there's a cartoon mouse called 'Roddy', as well as a giant rat and the odd toad, and various other characters never seen in the official nativity story. Because, yet again, Regent Street has succumbed to the allure of commercial sponsorship and has splashed wholly inappropriate illuminated cartoon characters along its length. Think Christmas, think 'animated family movie'. In this case it's the latest from Aardman Animations about a mouse flushed down into the sewers, which is about as unfestive as you can get. If you want to see 'toad' Sir Ian McKellen and 'rat' Shane Richie switch on the lights, get down here on Tuesday. If you have taste, stay at home. • Selected Regent Street switcher-onners: 2003 Daniel Bedingfield; 2000 Billie Piper; 1996 John Major; 1995 Rolf Harris and Lionel Blair; 1993 Sylvester Stallone; 1989 Kylie Minogue; 1985 Joan Collins; 1981 HRH Princess Diana; 1980 David Essex • Lots of photos of past Regent Street switch-ons
Oxford Street lights Switch on: Thursday 9th November Mmm, big shimmery silver candelabras dripping with gold bling baubles. There's tasteful for you. Are we in Liberace's ballroom, or have we perhaps stepped into Disney's Beauty and the Beast? It's not perhaps the Christmassiest of themes, but I suppose it'll look sparkly enough above the heads of late night shoppers over the next seven weeks. But hang on, aren't these exactly the same lights as last year, so you've probably seen them already! The date of the 2006 grand switch-on is a whole week earlier than in 2005, which I find particularly disturbing. And the ceremony sounds like it'll be the usual wholly forgettable exercise in middle-of-the-road promotional mediocrity. Heading the celebrity C-list are pop group All Saints (new album released this month), duetting couple Peter Andre and Jordan (new album released this month) and X Factor losers G4 (new album released this month). All this and Jamie Theakston too. I risked the Oxford Street switch-on two years ago (the Christmas with the swooshing laser beams) and was wholly underwhelmed [report]. Keep away and buy everything on Amazon instead. • Selected Oxford Street switcher-onners: 2005 Westlife; 2001 S Club 7; 1998 Zoe Ball; 1996 Spice Girls; 1993 Richard Branson; 1990 Cliff Richard; 1987 Derek Jameson; 1986 Den and Angie Watts; 1984 Esther Rantzen • Lots of photos of past Oxford Street switch-ons
Also to avoid this week • Spirit of Christmas Fair(Olympia, until Sunday): "A stylish and inspirational shopping event bringing together the most desirable and original gifts, decorations, gourmet food and wine". Or, from what I saw outside earlier in the week, a lot of well-scrubbed Kensington women spending their husband's property income on hampers, baubles and pashminas. Avoid at all costs. • Christmas Parade(Harrods, 8:30am today): Father Christmas arrives prematurely at the world's most ostentatious department store, then sets up home in his 4th floor grotto and asks little rich kids what share options they want for Christmas.
If it's quarter past seven on the morning of the third of November then I've been single for exactly seven years. (Yes, I know I post this particular post at the sametimeeveryyear, but I have updated it a bit, and I intend to keep posting it every year on this date until my situation changes. Not that I care if it doesn't, you understand.) And there are a lot of us single people about. Some might say that we're missing out on the joys of coupledom, and maybe we are, but I'm convinced that there are equally many positive points to being single:
Single: You get the whole duvet to yourself. Coupled: You don't need a hot water bottle.
Single: There's half as much ironing to do. Coupled: There's twice as much ironing to do but somebody else might do it.
Single: You can hoover the carpet when you think it needs doing. Coupled: Somebody else hoovers the carpet before you think it needs doing.
Single: Nobody ever tells you that the kitchen must be repainted and the bathroom must be retiled. Coupled: Two people can repaint the kitchen or retile the bathroom far more quickly than one.
Single: You can watch whatever TV channel you like, without arguments. Coupled: There's somebody to talk to about the programme you're watching.
Single: Nobody complains when you burp, belch or fart. Coupled: Somebody points out when you have ketchup on your chin.
Single: You never come home to a blazing row. Coupled: You sometimes come home to a cooked meal.
Single: You get to eat the whole ready meal for two yourself. Coupled: It takes just as long to cook for two as it does for one.
Single: You can always go on holiday somewhere you find interesting. Coupled: Hotel rooms cost less per person, and there's somebody to talk to at breakfast.
Single: You can spend all your money on yourself. Coupled: There are two salaries coming in and only one set of bills.
Single: You can walk away from a flatshare, any time. Coupled: You can afford a mortgage, together.
Single: There are no important birthdays or anniversaries to accidentally forget. Coupled: Somebody actually remembers your birthday.
Single: You never have to buy useless presents for your partner, just for the sake of it. Coupled: Somebody buys you presents occasionally, and it's the thought that counts.
Single: You're allowed to flirt with people in the street. Coupled: You don't need to flirt with people in the street.
Single: You like the idea of being coupled. Coupled: You like the idea of being single.
Single: You can still have a riotous social life in your 30s. Coupled: You can still have a riotous social life in your 60s.
Single: You can always get a double seat to yourself on public transport. Coupled: You can never find a double seat because they're all being hogged by single people.
Single: You have no friends to go out with because they've all partnered off and are staying in. Coupled: You don't have to go out with those annoying friends you had while you were single.
Single: You already know which set of parents you'll be spending Christmas with this year. Coupled: The family sometimes chooses to spend Christmas at your house.
Single: You don't catch every sniffle, cold and flu bug off your partner. Coupled: When you suffer a major cardiac arrest, somebody actually notices and dials 999.
Single: You never get left alone and desolate because your life partner's just passed away. Coupled: When you get old and infirm, you don't end up in a care home because there's nobody to look after you.
Single: Being coupled is restrictive, stifling and a sign of personal weakness. Coupled: Being single is unnatural, lonely and a sign of personal failure.
Single: The bathroom is always free. Coupled: The bedroom is always full.
Single: You can lie in bed in the morning for as long as you like. Coupled: There's a very good reason for lying in bed in the morning.
Single: Nobody sees what you look like first thing in the morning. Coupled: Somebody loves you despite what they see first thing in the morning.
Single: You never pack your bags and walk out on a relationship only for your partner to move a carefully-planned replacement bloke into the house six hours later. Not that I'm in any way bitter, you understand...
Of course you're not. You might be a little bit overweight, or slightly plump, or maybe even stocky, but you're definitely not fat are you? Nobody likes to think that they are anyway, although the truth is often a little harder to swallow. Latest figures suggest that a quarter of UK men are obese and nearly half are overweight. For women, it's one in five obese and one in three overweight. We're an overfednation, and we're getting larger.
The government definition of obesity is based on the Body Mass Index, or BMI. And the government definition matters, because if they think you're fat then you may face increased insurance premiums or restricted access to certain services. The BMI is an unforgiving measure which takes no account whatsoever of other factors such as muscle weight or waist size, but it's still the official statistic.
You can calculate your BMI by dividing your weight (in kilograms) by the square of your height (in metres). If you prefer pounds and inches, that's BMI=703×weight÷height². And here's what the outcome of that formula means:
BMI less than 18½: underweight BMI between 18½ and 25: 'normal' BMI between 25 and 30: overweight BMI over 30: obese
There are onlinecalculators for working all this out with minimum fuss, but these merely tell you what your BMI is. And what you really want to know is "How much would I have to slim down before I'm normal?" and "How heavy do I have to get before I'm obese?" So that's what today's table tells you, with absolutely no mathematics required whatsoever.
For example, if you're six foot one tall and weigh less than 10 stone, then you're officially underweight. If you're five foot six tall, then you need to slim down to 11 stone before you're considered officially normal. And if you're five foot nine and weigh 14½ stone or more, then you're officially obese.
I'm concerned, because it turns out that I'm only a couple of packets of crisps away from official chubbiness. But I'm sure you're not worried. Because there's no way you'd ever be obese, is there?
• The minimum cost of making a phone call from a BT telephone box rises this month to 40p. It used to be 30p in 2004, 20p in 2000, 10p in 1984, sixpence in 1966, threepence in 1959 and tuppence in 1925. • In 2001 there were 150000 BT callboxes. Now there are just 63500. BT are keen to point out that only 23000 of these make money, just so that you feel sorry for them for having to maintain a public service. • "Eee, when I were a child we never had these mobile phone things what kiddies have today. I always walked to school with a tuppenny coin for the payphone in my pocket, just in case I ever had to make a phone call home. We all did in them days. But I didn't usually need to use it. There was always a couple of seconds of free talktime before the pips butted in, and that was long enough to signal to my parents that I was ready to be picked up. None of this modern £1-a-minute ringtone rubbish."
• The first UK payphones had a Button A (to deposit the coins and make the connection) and a Button B (to return coins if the operator couldn't connect you). These started to be replaced in 1959 by new 'pay-on-answer' callboxes. • Ever wondered how an old 1960s payphone works? ("When the called subscriber answers, the line polarity reverses...")
• This photograph shows a K2 kiosk(right, introduced 1927) next to the slightly smaller but more common K6 kiosk(left, introduced 1935). • Kiosk K2 was designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, who was also the architect behind Battersea Power Station. He based the kiosk's distinctive dome on the roof of the John Soane Mausoleum in St Pancras cemetery. • When phone boxes were first introduced, many people felt that red was rather too obtrusive. Other colours considered, but rejected, include Deep Brunswick Green, Black, Light Battleship Grey and Dark Battleship Grey. • "The standard colour for the Kiosk No. 6 is Post Office Red. The approximate quantities of paint which will be required for one kiosk are:- Paint, Kiosk Primer 1½pints; Paint, P.O. Red 3½pints; Varnish, Weatherproof 2½pints". • Other kiosks in the 'K' series included the spike-topped K1(1921), the white concrete K3(1929), the 'Vermillion Giant' K4(1930) and the glass-doored K8(1968).
What's on this weekend? Christmas Past Tue 24 Nov - Sun 3 Jan 2010
Annual exhibition at the Geffrye Museum where all the period rooms are decked in authentic festive style. Luvvit.
Here, as an example, are two images of Prince Charles. One of these is the real Prince Charles, as printed in photographs and as seen by Camilla when she wakes up each morning. And the other is the reflected Prince Charles, as seen by His Royal Highness as he peers into the mirror above the royal sink. One's real, one's an illusion. Is it the left Charlie, or the right Charlie? I bet you've already spotted which is which, because one image somehow looks 'right' and the other doesn't. Unless of course you're Prince Charles himself, in which case Sir will instinctively have plumped for the incorrect image because it's the image with which Sir is most familiar.
Low tide London
This is the beach at Bankside [photo], just below the Tate Modern [photo]. It's one of the longer stretches and, if you time it right, also one of the widest. With a bit of luck somebody will have unlocked the gate in the railings along the river's edge [map] and you can make your way down the low stone steps onto the sand. Yes, that's definitely sand at the top of the beach, although it soon gives way to rock and muddy shingle further down. Eroded half-bricks and pebbles litter the exposed river bed, some dark and jagged, others bleached white and smooth. Decaying wooden stumps stick up from the ground, the remnants of some old wall or Tudor jetty. Dark brown rusty pipes snake half-covered beneath the shingle, thankfully no longer dribbling ooze into the river. There's not as much washed-up litter and glass as you might fear, nor as much green slime as you might expect.
Best of all, you've probably got the whole quarter mile of beach to yourself, all the way from Blackfriars Bridge [photo] to Bankside Pier [photo]. Well, just you and a ragbag collection of feral pigeons, swooping seagulls and big black crows. Try picking your way across the rocks directly underneath the non-wobbly Millennium Bridge and looking across the river towards St Paul's Cathedral on the opposite bank [photo]. You might even spot some fragments of pottery or an old sailor's clay pipe in the mud, although I suspect that most of these were spotted and nabbed long ago. Don't stand too near the water's edge, or the backwash from a passing speedboat or Thames cruiser might overflow your boots. And ignore the funny looks you're getting from tourists wandering along the South Bank above you. Perhaps they can't work out how you got down there, or maybe they simply can't imagine why anyone would want to slum it on a low rocky shelf. But they're the ones missing out. Just make sure you get back up the steps before the beach disappears from view beneath the rising tide.
What many visitors seem to do (and I'll confess to being no exception) is to pay extra special attention to the place where they live. It helps if you live somewhere fairly central, of course, and I'm fortunate that Bow often crept onto the very easternmost edge of certain maps. I was able to trace Bow first as a medieval village on the banks of the Lea, then a tiny 'town' surrounded by grassy meadowland, and finally a suburb swallowed whole by expanding London. If you'd have been wandering around the exhibition with me I'd probably have bored you silly by pointing out every time I spotted precisely where my house now stands, and you'd probably have done the same.
• Hurrah, Smoke #9 is just about to hit the shops. Just £2.50 will buy you this highly engaging "London peculiar" crammed with words and images inspired by the city. Probably the only quarterly magazine to be published sort-of every five months-ish. [4pm update: I've managed to track down a copy, and yes it's as good as ever]
Bow Creek: The most impressive meander in London isn't the wiggle on the Thames around Docklands, although that is close by. It's the final meander on the River Lea, which twists and turns right back on itself (twice) before exiting into the Thames immediately opposite the Millennium Dome. This lower part of the Lea is called Bow Creek, and the area around the mouth of the Lea is called (with typical medieval originality) Leamouth. The best views of curving Bow Creek can be seen from a train, looking down from the DLR viaduct between East India and Canning Town. But if you're willing to explore on foot, these strangely remote riverside lands are well worth a wander.
The meandering Lea sandwiches two very long and very thin interlocking tongues of land. The easternmost of these is a sprawl of rundown industrial units, and will remain so until property developers move in and build scores of new apartments instead. But the western peninsula is something more natural, and rather more special. 150 years ago there was a coal wharf here, supplying the nearby Thames Iron Works (they built ships, and founded West Ham football club). In 1960s the docks closed down and the site fell into disrepair, along with much of the surrounding area. And then the Docklands Light Railway came along, and engineers spotted that this thin strip of land was the perfect route for new tracks to Canning Town. A viaduct was built straight up the middle, and the land beneath tidied up to form an ecology park. But health and safety issues got in the way, and the park was only finally opened to the public this summer, 10 years late.
You enter Bow Creek Ecology Park over a modern footbridge, along an expensive unused road, through some arty gates. There's just one main path down to the tip of the peninsula, and another up the other side, with the DLR rumbling away through the centre. Passing passengers are probably the only people you'll see here, and they're no doubt looking out wondering what on earth you're doing in this isolated spot. Well, you'll be enjoying such delights as the artificial water meadow, the squelchy reedbeds and the tree-lined pond in this brand new nature reserve. There are several rare plant species on site, and some elusive otters, and even some relocated lizards (although I didn't spot any). There's also a large wooden platform where schoolkids can try their hand at pond-dipping, plus a special outdoor classroom tucked beneath the railway. For a bit of peace, sit down on one of the twisty metal benches and take in the view across the river (or, if the tide's out, across the mud). You can easily see Canary Wharf and the Dome in the near distance, but at the same time it's rather hard to ignore the vegetable oil refinery and building works in the foreground. It may not be truly beautiful looking out, but it's quite charming looking in.
The East India Docks were opened exactly 200 years ago in 1806 by (who else) The East India Company. The docks were extremely successful, with an entrance wide enough to accommodate the larger tea clippers and merchant ships which plied the Far Eastern trade routes. Spices, silks and Persian carpets were unladen here, as well as millions of pounds of imported tea. But trade declined steadily during the 20th century and, in 1967, these were the first London docks to be closed. Today only the entrance basin remains, surrounded by new residential and office developments, and redesignated as a bird and wildlife sanctuary. Big black waterfowl flap and glide across the water, retiring (if disturbed) to perch on wooden rafts in the middle of the mud. Around the perimeter of the basin are patches of reed bed, woodland and meadow, as well as one of the big black beacons erected by British Gas to celebrate the Millennium. The dock gates have been refurbished and can be walked across, while from the riverfront there's a perfect view of the Dome on the opposite side of the Thames. Barges and speedboats chug by, planes from City Airport swoop overhead and in the distance the DLR rattles by. It's a lovely spot, and yet every time I've visited I've had the whole place to myself. Well, just me and a bunch of birds.
The 2012 Olympics will cost money
£3.4bn Original cost outlined in Olympic Bid
Silver discs (November 1981)
Police - Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic: There are some song titles you can't read without humming, albeit subconsciously, and this is one of them. Gordon Sumner wrote more than his fair share. A jolly bright melody with a Caribbean feel, and a fourth chart topper for the blond tousled ones. The rest of the Ghost In The Machine album was rather darker, but this bittersweet tale of not-yet-requited love (actually written five years earlier) still bubbles beautifully. [video]
Bashing away with the Big Green Stick
The first two minute silence was held at 11am on November 11th 1919, one year to the minute after the signing of the Armistice which ended World War One. King George V proclaimed to the nation that "all locomotion should cease, so that, in perfect stillness, the thoughts of everyone may be concentrated on reverent remembrance of the glorious dead." And Britons duly paused, and united, and reflected, on the atrocities that had killed so many millions of people so very recently. The following year the two minute silence was observed again, at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, now with its epicentre at the newly constructed Cenotaph in Whitehall. Traffic stopped, factory production was suspended and the nation remembered. And so it was on every subsequent November 11th until 1945, after which things changed.
Two minutes of silence on a Sunday feels very different to two minutes of silence on any other day of the week. If you're at home, and you probably are, then the 11 o'clock silence is a very easy occasion to miss. It's even possible to sleep through the whole thing after a heavy night out, or to be otherwise occupied in the bedroom at the appropriate moment. You'll notice the silence if you're inside a church, or on a village green, or if you've tuned in for John Craven's Country File only to find it's been cancelled this week. But elsewhere no car boot sale pauses, no queue at IKEA halts, no rail replacement bus service grinds to a halt and no frozen food aisle falls silent. Sunday ought to be the best day of the week for commemoration because the day is already fairly laid back. On a Sunday the service at the Cenotaph always has the appropriate gravitas, at the heart of a silent city, at the heart of the nation. But if it's not the 11th, as this year, then it's the wrong day.
And this year we get two minutes of silence on a Saturday. It's the worst of both worlds. Everybody's busy, everybody's rushing around, everybody's self-absorbed, and nobody notices. So this year the British Legion have made an extra effort and organised a special 'event' in Trafalgar Square. Its official title is "Silence in the Square", and it's being 'hosted' by GMTV's Ben Sheppard. There'll be a proper bugler, and lots of poppies dropped into the fountains, and a flypast at 11:02 by four thundering Typhoons. No thought whatsoever for anybody living beneath the flypath who'll have their two minute silence drowned out prematurely by the heavy drone of a passing bomber squadron, but never mind them. And after the flypast, so the Legion inform us, there'll also be "a live performance by Christmas number 1 hopefuls, the all–girl Classical group, All Angels" (who just happen to be releasing a new album on Monday). There's a fine line between making Remembrance relevant and blatant commercialisation, and I fear the Legion have just crossed it.
Londoners of note
Londoners of note
In the spring of 1666 a young architect named Christopher Wren returned from Europe with plans for the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral. And then, only a few months later, the entire medieval cathedral burnt to the ground in the Great Fire of London. But this was no suspicious coincidence, it was just precisely the right man in precisely the right place at precisely the right time. The wholesale destruction of two-thirds of the City by fire gave Wren his big chance, and earned him an everlasting reputation. Wren's initial plans for regeneration were grand and geometric, based on the ordered elegance of Renaissance European cities. But landowners were reluctant to sell up their blaze-gutted plots, so the roads of post-Fire London retained the original medieval street pattern. In 1669 Wren was appointed the King's Surveyor of Works and took control of the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral. Several designs were proposed, and refused, and it was nearly 40 years before the great building we see today was complete. When Wren died he was buried in a vault in the cathedral's crypt, inscribed with the epitaph (in Latin) "Reader, if you seek his monument, look around you". The crypt's cafe, gift shop and toilets are, today, thankfully tucked just out of sight.
Wren's dome is truly one of the iconic sights of London. Stump up nine quid to enter the cathedral and you too can climb up inside to admire the views both within and without. It's 259 steps up to the Whispering Gallery, although the legendary acoustics didn't work for me when I visited. Another 119 steps are needed to reach the Stone Gallery, this time on the exterior of the building immediately beneath the dome. And then, good grief, the last 152 steps ascend a succession of spiral metal staircases inside the hollow void between inner and outer domes. If that doesn't give you vertigo, the view from the Golden Gallery probably will. You're on the tip of St Paul's nipple here, with just enough space to shuffle precariously round a narrow parapet and look down across the city. It used to be possible to ascend even further, right up inside the golden ball (holds 10), but health and safety rules put paid to this particular treat several years ago.
John who? He's a nobody in comparison to the other 11 notables on my list, but the Bank of England thought him important enough to slap on the back of their highest value banknote. And that's because John Houblon was their very first governor, back in 1694, and because the Bank cared about him 300 years later even if we didn't. John was a rich merchant from a rich family of merchants, although they'd started out a century earlier as a bunch of persecuted Belgian immigrants. He was one of a group of City gentlemen whose ready cash helped to establish London's first public bank in temporary accommodation in Lincoln's Inn Fields. John got to be Lord Mayor, and he was MP for Bodmin, and he was a friend of Samuel Pepys, and sorry, he really wasn't a terribly interesting chap. But he had a nice house in Threadneedle Street which the Bank bought after his death to use as their new permanent headquarters. As the Bank grew in importance they also grew in size, gradually buying up all the surrounding land. In 1791 they knocked down the church nextdoor, this being St Christopher-le-Stocks, in whose grounds Sir John had been buried. Today a seven storey economic fortress covers the entire block, and the first Governor's remains lay somewhere beneath the world-renowned financial institution he helped to create.
Like many an ambitious twenty-something, William Shakespeare was strangely drawn from the shire counties to the bright lights of London. Nobody's quite certain when he arrived, but by 1592 he had a career of sorts as an actor and emerging playwright. Will joined up with a company of players called The Lord Chamberlain's Men and helped establish a theatre (called, originally enough, The Theatre) just outside the City boundaries in Shoreditch. Tax records catalogue a succession of London lodgings beginning in nearby Bishopsgate, later crossing the river to Bankside and then back again closer to St Paul's. In 1599 the increasingly successful Mr Shakespeare became a one-eighth shareholder in the Globe Theatre. Such classic plays as Julius Caesar, Macbeth and Hamlet were first performed here (to packed crowds of appreciative Londoners and not to bored field-trip GCSE students). A second winter-only theatre opened rather later at Blackfriars, where William bought up the old monastery gatehouse as his final London residence. The Blackfriars Theatre lingers on only as a streetname (Playhouse Yard), but the reconstructed Globe lives again as a thatched tourist magnet very close to its original site. Those who flock to Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford are somehow missing the point.
At long last in this series of banknote characters, a Londoner born and bred. Michael Faraday grew up in Newington Butts (better known today as "just south of Elephant and Castle"). At the age of 14 he was apprenticed to a bookseller and bookbinder in Blandford Street, just off Baker Street, and started to take an interest in matters scientific. A customer's chance gift of four Royal Institution lecture tickets drew young Michael to the attention of Sir Humphrey Davy, who promptly took him on as his laboratory assistant. Faraday rose through the ranks at the RI to become a Professor of Chemistry, discovering electrolysis and inventing the Bunsen burner along the way. But it's for his pioneering work on electricity that he's best remembered. Ooh look, moving this wire through that magnetic field creates an electric current, as does moving the magnet instead of the wire. Hey presto - the electric motor, the dynamo and the entire modern science of electromagnetism. The full list of Faraday's accomplishments is astonishing, and all this from a very humble, religious man.
Unfortunately the Royal Institution in Albermarle Street is closed for major refurbishment at the moment, so the Faraday Museum inside is closed too. But Michael spent his entire life based in London, so there's a lot more elsewhere still to track down. Southwark council have erected a blue plaque on a library in Walworth Road close to the site of his birth (although Southwark council are renowned for slapping a blue plaque on anything for almost anyone). More impressive, though less well-known, is this striking steel-box sculpture in the middle of the Elephant & Castle roundabout. Most passers-by probably think it's an electricity substation (which, in fact, it is, for the Northern line below), but it's also the official Michael Faraday Memorial. It beats the usual bog-standard statue, although there are a couple of those around the town as well. The bookshop in Marylebone where Michael served his apprenticeship is marked by a brown 'blue plaque', and the building is currently occupied by an estate agents named Faradays. Over in the East End, beside the mouth to Bow Creek, is Trinity Buoy Wharf lighthouse where Faraday experimented at great length to improve offshore illumination. At Hampton Court is the grace and favour house where he lived out the last two decades of his life. And to see his grave you'll have to travel to the evocative Highgate Cemetery. Faraday's current legacy is everywhere.
Elgar was born, and lived out most of his life, in the idyllic surroundings of rural Worcestershire. He was a man who found even the hustle and bustle of a market town like Malvern too distracting and preferred to compose his work in rented country cottages. So it's perhaps surprising to discover that, of the 25-or-so different residences in which he lived during his life, four were in London. Elgar's need to move to the capital was forced after works such as the Enigma Variations and the Pomp and Circumstance marches caused his fame to grow. In 1912 he moved into an expensive Queen Anne mansion in Netherhall Gardens, Hampstead, and named it Severn House. But a stream of visitors, and the onset of the First World War, led to a marked decline in his creative output and eventually a return to the Worcestershire countryside beckoned. Elgar's Hampstead home has long since been demolished, and only one of his London residences remains standing. It's this five storey townhouse in Avonmore Road, close to the Olympia exhibition centre, and now converted into flats. Edward lived here for just one year during an early abortive attempt to establish himself in the capital. But I bet he wouldn't have left overflowing binbags, a roll of manky carpet and an old TV set out on the steps in front of his house. A blue plaque is no longer a guarantee of class.
The Florence Nightingale Museum is tucked beneath St Thomas's Hospital at the eastern end of Westminster Bridge [map]. No tourist is ever going to stumble upon it by mistake, so I was pleasantly surprised not to be the only visitor wandering around inside last weekend. It costs about half a tenner to get in, and for that you get a fairly traditional "cases and displays" walkround which leads you through the 90 years of Ms Nightingale's life. Florence was born in a certain north Italian city (you can guess which) while her well-travelled parents were on extended honeymoon. She had a privileged academic upbringing in Hampshire, but secretly hankered after an unfashionable career in nursing. The museum showcases many of her early belongings, as well as her pet owl Athena (now stuffed) who died of neglect when Flo rushed abroad to assist in the Crimean War. She wasn't so much a nurse as an administrator, and her in-depth background knowledge and logistical skills were precisely what was required to improve the horrific conditions for thousands of battleworn British soldiers. On her return to England Florence was rightly hailed as a national hero, but she shunned all such adulation in favour of continuing her reforming crusade. Her story is well told in the museum, and in the obligatory 20 minute audio-visual presentation, although (from what I saw) adults may want to linger inside rather longer than any accompanying children.
For the last half of her life Florence resided at 10 South Street, just off Park Lane, and spent her days meeting with the great, the good and the medically important. I attempted to track down her terraced townhouse by hunting for a blue plaque somewhere along the street. A tall Georgian cornerhouse looked a likely candidate, but the plaque beside the front door revealed that the famous occupant here was only "Skittles, the last Victorian Courtesan". Florence's plaque was on the opposite side of the street, high on a very ordinary concrete wall beside a suspiciously modern office entrance. The original house was long gone - her drawing room, her parlour, and the bedroom in which the frail, blind and bedridden Ms Nightingale spent her final decade. But the modern nursing profession still stands in testament to her achievements to this day.
You've probably seen Apsley House, at least in passing, because it looks out over the six-lane gyratory system at Hyde Park Corner. But you may never have taken the time to go inside, which would be a pity because this is a top class stately home slap bang in the centre of London. I ventured inside "No. 1 London" for the first time last weekend, and was impressed to discover a bubble of grandeur and opulence in the traffic-choked heart of the West End. There's drawing room after drawing room after drawing room, as well as a huge dining room and the lavish Waterloo Gallery. Here the Duke held famed candlelit soirées, and here still hangs his impressive collection of European art. One room on the ground floor is given over to gifts of plate and china given by the crowned heads of Europe - far more impressive than any modern collection of Oscars or Nobel Prizes. But the most unexpected original feature of the house, and the most striking, is the 11 foot tall nude statue of Napoleon which stands at the foot of the main stairwell. Wellington had a grudging respect for his greatest adversary, and was pleased to accept the statue following the Battle of Waterloo when the French decided they no longer wanted it. But it's still a very odd experience to discover the mighty emperor, his dignity covered only by a figleaf, scaring old lady tourists at the foot of the main staircase.
Across the (very busy) road stands the Wellington Arch, upon which once stood a vastly oversized statue of the Duke. Now there's a magnificent winged statue of "The Angel of Peace Descending on the Chariot of War" on top instead, to which you can get right up close by paying a bit more money and taking the lift to the third floor [photo]. The suite of rooms inside the arch once housed London's second smallest police station with a staff of 10 constables, two sergeants and a cat. Now there's just a bit of an exhibition to see, but the visit's really only worthwhile for the view. You can stare across into Hyde Park, you can look down at the traffic circling Hyde Park Corner, and best of all you can peer high over the walls into the back garden of Buckingham Palace. Just the bottom of the garden, mind, but I can exclusively reveal that the Queen wasn't out at the weekend playing tennis or doing the gardening in her wellingtons.
The father of railways was born in Northumberland and spent his working life linking the northern industrial heartlands. He never lived anywhere further south than Chesterfield, but today his greatest invention resides in the capital. In 1825 George engineered the world's first steam passenger railway between Stockton and Darlington, but fame came only with his next commission building the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. A competition was held to design the line's new locomotives, and Stephenson entered a revolutionary engine named Rocket. It had a top speed of 30mph, but easily beat the other entries when they all failed to work. At the opening of the railway in 1830, Rocket had the dubious honour of knocking down and killing the local MP who thereby became the world's first railway casualty. It's a lot safer to stand in front of Rocket today, down at the Science Museum in South Kensington, although you still have to watch out for rampaging crowds of schoolchildren running amok with clipboards. The shape is instantly recognisable, with a long thin chimney perched high above a stocky iron boiler. At the rear is a narrow footplate below a hinged door concealing the coal-fired furnace, and above one of the wooden-spoked wheels is affixed an understated brass nameplate. The modern train which brought you to the museum may look nothing like it, but your journey owes everything to Stephenson's Rocket.
Elizabeth would no doubt have been mortified to imagine that her portrait would one day appear on several million English banknotes. She was a modest Quaker who grew up in a religious community in Norwich, but her life changed in 1799 when she met wealthy East End merchant Joseph Fry. On marriage she moved to the Fry family home in Plashet (now East Ham) where she eventually decided that there was more to life than giving birth eleven times over. She started to visit the women inmates in Newgate Prison, bringing warm clothing for them and their babies, and eventually persuaded the governors to let her start up a prison school. Her influence grew and spread to other penal institutions across the country, with her undaunting emphasis always on respect and reform for female prisoners. After a pious and illustrious life she was buried in the Quaker cemetery in Barking, although no gravestone now marks the spot. And Newgate Prison, which she fought so long to reform, has also long gone - replaced by the Central Criminal Court of the Old Bailey (pictured). Justice at last.
Let's start with possibly the greatest genius England ever produced. The discoverer of gravity, the inventor of calculus, the father of optics and the founder of mechanics. Any one of these achievements would be sufficient for Isaac Newton's scientific immortality, let alone the complete set. But they all happened either at home in Lincolnshire or at university in Cambridge, and not in London, so I'm going to ignore them. But in 1696 Newton finally moved from Cambridge to the capital to take up a job with the Royal Mint. Newton took his role as Master of the Mint very seriously, and it was for his financial achievements rather than as a scientist that he later received his knighthood. He became president of the Royal Society in 1703, and ruled this scientific organisation through a mixture of fear and intimidation until his death in 1727. And between 1696 and 1709 Newton lived here at 87 Jermyn Street, just south of Piccadilly.
Step 1: Make yourself a guy
The great switch-off: A trip to see the London Christmas lights used to be a winter highlight for many a child. In December. But Christmas creeps earlier every year, and in 2006 the lights in Oxford Street and Regent Street will be switched on next week (sigh). They're up and strung across the road already, so I've been to take a look. And here's why you shouldn't bother making a special effort to come and see them yourself.
I think these could be the most inappropriate Christmas lights anywhere, ever. Not the big snowflakey shapes, because they look like they could be quite impressive. No, I refer instead to the large cutout of a slug, labelled 'Slug', which you can see here displayed high above Regent Street. Further down there's a cartoon mouse called 'Roddy', as well as a giant rat and the odd toad, and various other characters never seen in the official nativity story. Because, yet again, Regent Street has succumbed to the allure of commercial sponsorship and has splashed wholly inappropriate illuminated cartoon characters along its length. Think Christmas, think 'animated family movie'. In this case it's the latest from Aardman Animations about a mouse flushed down into the sewers, which is about as unfestive as you can get. If you want to see 'toad' Sir Ian McKellen and 'rat' Shane Richie switch on the lights, get down here on Tuesday. If you have taste, stay at home.
Mmm, big shimmery silver candelabras dripping with gold bling baubles. There's tasteful for you. Are we in Liberace's ballroom, or have we perhaps stepped into Disney's Beauty and the Beast? It's not perhaps the Christmassiest of themes, but I suppose it'll look sparkly enough above the heads of late night shoppers over the next seven weeks. But hang on, aren't these exactly the same lights as last year, so you've probably seen them already! The date of the 2006 grand switch-on is a whole week earlier than in 2005, which I find particularly disturbing. And the ceremony sounds like it'll be the usual wholly forgettable exercise in middle-of-the-road promotional mediocrity. Heading the celebrity C-list are pop group All Saints (new album released this month), duetting couple Peter Andre and Jordan (new album released this month) and X Factor losers G4 (new album released this month). All this and Jamie Theakston too. I risked the Oxford Street switch-on two years ago (the Christmas with the swooshing laser beams) and was wholly underwhelmed [report]. Keep away and buy everything on Amazon instead.
• This photograph shows a K2 kiosk (right, introduced 1927) next to the slightly smaller but more common K6 kiosk (left, introduced 1935).
