Sat 1: The rail replacement coach from Heathrow to Hammersmith - a very rare TfL service along the M4 - includes a handful of freshly-arrived passengers sporting facemasks. Looks like a vast over-reaction. There are currently only 9700 coronavirus cases, 99% of them in China. Sun 2: Riverside Barking, as opposed to Barking Riverside, manages to be simultaneously smartly cosmopolitan and undesirably dispiriting. Maybe a few thousand new flats will change that, one way or the other.
Mon 3: Need to collect 6 pre-booked rail tickets. Use ticket machine at Paddington. Pick 6 tickets out of the machine. Leave station. Check tickets and realise one is missing. Damn, forgot to include receipt when counting. Return to station. Check machine. No sign of missing ticket. Sigh, now I can't go to Swindon on Thursday. Enquire at ticket desk. Clerk is politely non-committal, but goes to check with colleague at information desk. Turns out a member of the public found my missing ticket in the machine and handed it in. Copious thanks. Swindon is back on! Always count your tickets, folks (and always hand in any leftovers). Tue 4: This week I'm binge-watching the rerun of This Life on BBC4. Outstanding. 1996 didn't get much better. Wed 5: Enjoyed the Play Well exhibition at the Wellcome Collection, with its emphasis on the social history of recreation. Less enamoured by the new Being Human gallery upstairs, which a passing suit described as 'flagship' but I thought was sparse. Thu 6: While in Swindon I picked up a brochure for the Great West Way, which at first glance looked like a 125 mile trail between Bristol and London, but on closer inspection is more a vague envelope of road/rail routes designed to attract long-term tourists, coupled with some painfully expensive GWR/bus rover tickets. Worth a look, but more for inspiration than onboarding. Fri 7: Yesterday's travels inspire me to spend the day listening to XTC, particularly the album with the chalkhorse on the cover. Sat 8: Bow Road's former Nat West bank is now home to a traditional East End funeral parlour, of the kind that'll despatch you behind a pair of plumed horses. What with the old police station across the road already being home to a funeral directors, this is now the dead centre of Bow.
Sun 9: Went out for a battering walk during Storm Ciara. Made the mistake of being out during the torrential squally bit. Found half of the undertakers' new sign smashed beside a pillar box. Mon 10:The book I'm reading at the moment: The Long Cosmos, by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter. I've arrived at this sci-fi quintet late, but what a stunningly-realised parallel worlds concept (and what a shame the later books don't quite hit the exploratory wow of the first couple). Tue 11: Spotted the official 'Crossrail isn't ready yet' roundel on view outside Woolwich station.
Wed 12: Walked for four hours in an approximate straight line to see how far from home I could get. Crossed London Bridge, Lambeth Bridge and Chelsea Bridge. Got as far as Wandsworth town centre. Now I need never answer that question again. Thu 13: Just noticed that part of the 'East Bank' at the Olympic Park is on the west bank. Fri 14: a) Had a power cut at 6am, which somehow woke me up. b) Heard BestMate's 747 fly over on its approach to Heathrow. c) Still haven't reset all the clocks. Sat 15: Amazing how, in two months flat, politics has pretty much disappeared from the top of the news. It seems the best way to stay popular is to say hardly anything for as long as possible. Sun 16: Went out for a battering walk during Storm Dennis. Drenched and sodden even before I'd got halfway. Squidged onto the tube to ride home. My apologies if I sat next to you. Mon 17: The pocket park near Lewisham station, where the Quaggy meets the Ravensbourne, has now opened. It's a bit bijou, and already half-surrounded by identikit towers, but nicer than the apologetic confluence that was here before.
Tue 18: Ha, the BBC were supposed to have withdrawn the iPlayer service from my smart TV yesterday, but they didn't. Catch up on Only Connect, grinning. Wed 19: Damn, the BBC have indeed withdrawn the iPlayer service from my smart TV. Dash to Argos and buy a Roku box (thanks for the advice, readers), then successfully reconnect to the world of on-demand apps. Better still my old TV never could cope with accessing ITV Hub or All4, and now I have both. Thu 20: It's raining again, so I thought I'd make a cunningly dry journey to the Museums in Exhibition Road. Unfortunately thousands of parents and children had had the same idea, it being half term, so South Kensington station was in crowd control lockdown and the subway was closed and the museums were at capacity and all I got was very wet. Again. Fri 21: The amount of full-on cherry blossom and flowering magnolia is absolutely exceptional this early in the year. This is what happens when January and February are both 2½ degrees milder than average.
Sat 22: I don't think I've ever experienced quite so many London tube lines simultaneously closed by weekend engineering works, which coupled with strike action and a person on the tracks meant getting home from Ealing Broadway took a phenomenal number of changes. Sun 23: Approach the ticket barriers at Shadwell (Overground). Pause to allow a lady to go ahead of me. She walks through. I swipe my card to follow. She suddenly halts, deliberately, barring my exit. When I try to get past she glares and accuses me of tailgating, having not seen that I didn't. I try explaining/apologising, but feel inch-high all the way home. Mon 24: Went to the cinema to see the Oscar-winning Parasite, and it was indeed excellent, and culturally eye-opening. Then went in search of all the spoileryreviews you only go in search of after you've seen a film. Tue 25: Some days you have a great idea for a blog post at 9am so find yourself in Waddon at noon, Arnos Grove at 2pm, Regents Park at 4pm and North Greenwich at 5pm, and the whole thing's written up by bedtime. Quite a late bedtime, though.
Wed 26: The layout of my kitchen meant I needed my new kettle to have a window on the right-hand side, and it's amazing how many only have them on the left. Thu 27: Just when we'd nearly got through the winter without seeing any snow, hey presto, an hour of chunky non-settling flakes right at the end. Makes a change from rain, though. Fri 28: I jumped when I heard a sudden popping noise in the living room, but it was only a bunch of daffodils opening. Sat 29: Went for a ride on a rail replacement steam train.
