Thu 1: After seeing the bluebells BestMate drove us on to Maldon. We watched the tide coming in, visibly, admired the sailing boats and stood by the squidgy creek at the point where the annual Mud Race would be taking place at the weekend. It looked innocuously simple, and plainly isn't.
Fri 2: Reform winning control of ten English councils - ten! - is either a temporary electoral aberration or a staging post to a populist government in 2029 because "they can't be worse than the current lot", and of course they can. Sat 3: I picked up my first free prescription from the chemist, having passed my 60th birthday, and it felt very odd walking out without paying but in a good way. Sun 4:Pick of the Pops is back at 5pm on a Sunday, which feels appropriate. The second hour clashes with Now Playing on 6Music, but they'll solve that problem at the end of the month when Tom Robinson retires. Mon 5: I do not recommend lugging a large heavy suitcase to Dorset (required because it had to contain everything for a week away plus my wedding suit). The final half mile along an unmade country lane where wheelie suitcases simply don't function comes particularly unrecommended. Tue 6: If the cottage comes with a hot tub then obviously I'm going to use it, kitted out in my finest C&A bathing shorts.
Wed 7: As part of pre-wedding arrangements we met the new in-laws for the first time (not my new in-laws, but I'm not sure there's a specific term for the mother and father of a nephew's wife). They were of course lovely, with a fine line in fruit cake and the full set of railway branch line histories in the living room bookcase. Thu 8: One of the joys of being in Dorset is the opportunity to climb a hill before breakfast, then get on with the rest of the day. Fri 9: Radio 4's Open Country is in Dorset telling the tale of the Abbotsbury Swannery, and judging by what they said about cygnet-hatching they must have visited the day after we did. Sat 10: After a wonderful wedding day with bacon rolls, coach detours, rare bells, confetti tunnels, giant Jenga, marital crossword, big bunny anecdotes and heartfelt cheers, I climbed up to the balcony and looked down on the banqueting tables and dancefloor and thought "I guess I'm never having this, never mind, same again in August." Sun 11: Things that happen the day after a wedding: everyone says how lovely it was, slices of uneaten cake are consumed, those with work tomorrow drive home, a final treat of fish and chips.
Mon 12: There appears to be a resident cat at Dorchester South station because it was lounging on platform 2 both on my way down and my way back up. It was fun watching concerned passengers trying to lure her away from the very edge of the platform as a train approached, with zero success. I wonder if it was the legendarySusie. Tue 13: Bugger, I think I left my phone charger plug in Dorset, it's definitely not in my suitcase. Wed 14: I was casually watching the lunchtime news when someone I hadn't seen for over 30 years suddenly popped up talking about a key issue of the day. Ah, so that's what you're doing now. Sorry to hear your Dad died. Thu 15: Bought a replacement phone charger plug for £2 at Cex (second hand). The assistant only spotted it at the back of the bottom shelf because she was a foot shorter than me.
Fri 16: I have once again managed to ride all the TfL buses in the space of a calendar year, in this case 4½ months. My last three buses were the frustratingly rural R8, 464 and 146 because you always end up in Biggin Hill and Keston eventually. This is the fifth time I've achieved this feat, the quickest being 2023 when I had the whole lot ticked off by the end of January. Sat 17: Someone offered me a seat on the Northern line on Tuesday, then someone offered me a seat on the Central line today. This has only ever happened to me four times, three of them since my 60th birthday, and I really didn't think I'd visibly aged that much in two months. Sun 18: Found my lost phone charger plug. It had got caught up in the one pair of boxer shorts I brought back unworn. Mon 19: The shanty town under the Bow Flyover has expanded to a new cluster of grot on the roundabout, just behind the big Bow sign. It includes a couple of chairs, a small tent, a bathtub, a wall mirror, a chest of drawers, a carrycot, a clothes drier, several boxes and a grate for lighting a fire. I'm surprised nobody's made an attempt to clear it away.
Tue 20: Took a ride on the SL4 through the Silvertown Tunnel, early afternoon, and I was the only passenger. However I know you should never read too much into a single evidence point, even on a free bus. Wed 21: Walked the Grand Union towpath between Hanwell and Hayes via what appears to have been rebranded the Southall Wellbeing Way. Some of the watery and wooden interventions were nice but the best things were still the little ducklings, the stalking heron and the giant silver fish, and could someone please put the brand consultants back in their box. Thu 22: The stamp cost five times as much as the card, and even then it was probably late, sorry. Fri 23: Ten stations I used this week that I've never used before: Albany Park (sheesh that's some footbridge), Belmont (on its 160th birthday), Belvedere (I was sorry to hear about your lost cat), Eltham (unnecessarily big), Hackbridge (I handed in a lost Zip card), Plumstead, Strawberry Hill (ooh, that's off-piste), St Helier (love the wild flowers), Tolworth (so concretey) and Whitton.
Sat 24: When I wrote about the Bonesgate Stream I didn't mention these four lovely leafleted walks published by the Community Brain, an enabling organisation based at Tolworth station. The Malden Rushett and Tolworth to Chessington walks best shadow the river. Sun 25: Watched the aftermath of a rave along the River Lea as groups of twatted revellers emerged from the towpath by the Bow Roundabout. One was being pushed in a trolley, one stumbled into the local corner shop for an urgent banana, several appeared to be struggling with the concept of 'stairs', and one group were ejected from their Uber a minute after it arrived and waddled off to brave public transport. Mon 26: If I were ranking the 500-or-so bank holidays I've experienced, today would probably come in the mid 300s. Tue 27: I know you're unhappy with things as they currently stand but could you stop going on and on about them, negatively, relentlessly, as if we all feel as pissed off about everything as you do, it's so tedious, and now so are you. Wed 28: I had a dream about BestMateFromSchool, not an especially exciting one but congratulations to my subconscious because today is his 60th birthday. Thu 29: OK we've now watched the new season of Black Mirror. The first story (about medical subscription) was the most nightmarishly believable, and the rest were fun but too many stories relied on brain-transference gizmos so were more sci-fi than darkly plausible.
Fri 30: The latest cartographic online meme is an interactive map of the UK by programmer Sophie Stone, allowing users to mark areas as lived, stayed, visited, stopped, passed through or never been. Each county scores a maximum of 5 points and my total is 241 - can you beat that? Sat 31: Here's another website for you, Is the UK hot right now?, which uses the latest data to show temperature anomalies around the country on a colourful map. Pick a location to see even more anomaly data and specific local graphs.
Finally, let's see how my annual counts are going...
• Number of London boroughs visited: all 33 (at least ten times each)
• Number of London bus routes ridden: 547 (all)
• Number of Z1-3 stations used: all
• Number of Z4-6 stations used: 175 (70%)
