Thu 1: I've just bought some new low energy light bulbs, so I checked the light bulb in my living room and was shocked to discover it was still a filament one, which I think I put in 'temporarily' when the last bulb blew and I didn't have any spares in the house. I hate to think how long ago that was. Fri 2: At King's Cross tube station I found a single ticket left in the exit slot at an exit gate. It had been purchased within the last half hour at Oxford Circus and it had cost someone £6.30, this being the going rate for paper ticket these days. What a waste of money, I thought, that's £2.10 per stop, what a rip-off. And I wondered whether this was a rich traveller who didn't give a damn or paranoid passenger who didn't want to be traced or a tourist confused by how London's ticket system worked and who thought you had to buy a ticket to travel. Probably the latter, but that's no excuse for shafting the ignorant.
Sat 3: Somebody doesn't like my Post-Its. Sun 4: No I didn't blog about the gravestone outside the church door because I have before, ditto the plaque down the road, but thank you for going to the effort of sending me an email to tell me you would have included them. Mon 5: This year I'm using up all my old definitive stamps to send my Christmas cards before they force us to use barcoded monstrosities from February. Although if you read the FAQ ("mail posted with non-barcoded Definitive will for the first 6 month be delivered as normal, no surcharge will be raised") it's actually August, so no rush. Tue 6: I forgot to walk down the cheesecake aisle in Tesco, which was such an oversight I walked all the way back later with a pound coin and bought myself one. Wed 7: I showed BestMate the cutting of me in the local paper published 50 years ago today and he didn't laugh at what I'd said about public transport, he just mocked my haircut, and I had to point out I had no say because I was only seven.
Thu 8: Walking up Herne Hill I spotted this plaque to John Ruskin on a post in the garden of number 26, seemingly an ordinary suburban home but built on the site of a Georgian semi where the great writer lived as a child. It used to have laburnums out front, a 200ft-long back garden and an attic with views of "the Norwood hills on one side, and the winter sunrise over them; and the valley of the Thames on the other, with Windsor telescopically clear in the distance, and Harrow, conspicuous always in fine weather to open vision against the summer sunset." Alas Ruskin's house was demolished in 1925, taking the LCC plaque on the front with it, hence the replacement post. Fri 9: OK, I submit, the heating's going on. Sat 10: What always baffles me about football, the national team in particular, is the blind faith many supporters have that their team will triumph in the next game despite ample past evidence that they don't always. And didn't this time. Sun 11: Battersea Power Station station usually looks underwhelmingly underused, but this afternoon it was packed with streams of people queueing to get out via two sets of escalators. It looks like the shopping-mall-cum-hospitality-experience has finally found a willing audience of MAFFDIs (Mainstream Aspirational Families and Friends with Disposable Income).
Mon 12: I see you can now only take A4 sized-bags into an event at the O2. They used to allow 35cm × 40cm × 19cm, indeed there's still a sign by the car park with these outdated measurements, but now even small stuff requires a trip to the Bag Drop. Their prerogative, but my god that's miserably cautious. Tue 13: By visiting a different Tower Hamlets library to usual I have finally found the book I've been waiting to read since 2020, and now I'm wondering what goodies I've been missing elsewhere. Wed 14: There is a reason why I asked for half a pint because look, we're all ready to move on and I'm just going to leave the leftover half of this full pint on the table as we head off. Thu 15: I've now finished watching series 5 of The Crown, courtesy of BestMate'sOtherHalf'sBrother's Netflix subscription, and it's not been as interesting as the previous four. This is either because embellishing recent history feels somewhat false or because Princess Di never was that interesting. Fri 16: The new Dangleway 'Experience' features a Teddy Workshop, Virtual Reality, an Engineer Workshop and Selfie Factory, and from what I saw before they covered the windows with vinyl you probably won't want to waste your money on it.
Sat 17: Today's the first time this month I've received any post! (and it was only a bank statement and a Sky advert). As yet I still haven't received any Christmas cards, which is unheard of. Sun 18: South Bermondsey may be the bleakest station in London, but I'd only know that for sure if I wrote a post called The Bleakest Station in London and nobody suggested a bleaker one. If not it's quite possibly the most exposed. Mon 19: My insurance company, who used to be based in a small independent shop in Croxley but got taken over by a company in Berkhamsted which got taken over by a company on the Isle of Wight who recently got taken over by a national company based in the City, have just sent me a letter saying my account will now be run from Irvine in Scotland. Tue 20: The Traitors has been cracking good TV - a pot of human foibles that essentially stirred itself. It was particularly astute of the producers to pick 22 ordinary citizens rather than following the lead of the Dutch original and casting a group of celebrities. Bad luck Amanda, good luck Wilf. Wed 21: BestMate lives just over a mile away and posted my Christmas card on 1st December. It was postmarked 8th December and finally reached me today along with the majority of my other Christmas cards, vastly delayed. That is one hell of an impact for a few days of strikes, and ridiculously poor value from an extortionate stamp. Thu 22: The empty retail unit under Pudding Mill Lane station, vacant since 2013, is now home to the ABBA Voyage official merchandise store. It's open for a couple of hours before performances and an hour after, should you want to pop in and buy some expensive colourful knitwear.
Fri 23: A new 'corner shop' has opened at the west end of Stratford High Street. It means the optimistic retail unit under the 34-storey Capital Towers finally has a tenant. It sells all the usual grocery stuff for the benefit of people who can't be bothered to walk eight minutes further to buy them cheaper at Tesco. It appears to be called "Vegetarian Nature Product Organic", but they also stock pork scratchings so that can't be the real name. The gold and black balloons on opening day were a nice touch. Outside on the pavement they've set up an immaculate display of fruit and veg, but given the particulates expelled by exhaust pipes around the Bow Flyover I can't say I'd want to eat any. Sat 24: The important question every Christmas Eve is "how difficult will the jumbo prize crossword be". This year's can't have been too bad because I've managed to complete two-thirds of it, but I'm stumped by 41 across which appears to be clueless. Sun 25: Things I'd never previously done on Christmas Day: had a shower, detoured to a recycling bin, sung along to Wombling Merry Christmas on a dual carriageway, been sniffed by a quadruped, opened three presents, watched the King's Speech, played Newmarket. Mon 26: The conversation turned to house prices so we ended up checking the current value of all the houses we'd ever lived in, which is a lot, and Zoopla reckons a 3-bed Metroland semi tops the lot just ahead of a two-up two-down Metroland terrace and a Norfolk 5-bedder. Tue 27: In words I never expected to type, I have spent Christmas in the same house as an enormous German shepherd with bone-crushing fangs. I checked back to my blogpost on Canine Interaction Indices to work out how this was possible and can confirm that, although indices 4, 7 and 8 were at maximum red level, indices 1, 2 and 5 were right down at the pink end.
Wed 28: Today I went axe throwing. It's a bit like archery but with axes instead of arrows, and you do it indoors at a hospitality venue near a bar, but you mustn't drink alcohol before you hurl anything, they make you sign a waiver beforehand. I made up a fake telephone number on the waiver which proved awkward when they asked us to identify ourselves via our mobile numbers. After the safety briefing we had a few practice throws and then got stuck into scoring for points. It's harder than it looks. Hitting the board is easy but making the axe stick is much trickier, you have to get the angle and the force right and usually it just bounces back. I turned out to be rubbish at axe throwing, I had 24 throws and I never scored any points whatsoever. I will not be selecting axe throwing as an activity for my next milestone birthday. Thu 29: A few weeks ago the @Crossrail Twitter account announced it would be closing, which it just has in the most dramatic manner... by deleting itself. This has wiped over 3000 tweets posted over the course of 12 years, an entire projectsworth, including more than 6000 images and videos. TfL don't believe in having more than one Twitter account - it keeps all their brand puff and customer response in one place - which is also why they deleted @elizabethline in September 2020. Pointless cultural vandalism.
