1289 days ago, in a hotel in Singapore, the IOC selected "the city of... London" to host the 2012 Olympic Games. You may remember the occasion. You might be one of the Newham schoolchildren shamelessly flown over to appeal to international voting delegates. You might be a former Mayor of London now helplessly frozen out of the ongoing decision making process. Or, like me, you might have been standing in the middle of Trafalgar Square watching Denise Lewis's jaw drop on hearing the unexpected news.
And in 1289 days time, in the middle of a former industrial estate in the East End, the world's greatest athletes will troop into London's Olympic Stadium and wave flags. A global TV audience of two billion will watch a cut-price entertainment spectacle featuring tap-dancing Pearly Queens and the cast of Mamma Mia. Meanwhile, held back behind an extra-large security fence, several thousand Londoners will watch with eager anticipation as an avalanche of fireworks explode into the distant sky.
Which, if my calculations are correct, makes today precisely halfway to the Olympics. We found out it was us 184 weeks ago, and we have to deliver a flawless global spectacle in 184 weeks time. How time flies. So, how are we doing? Are the Olympic lands standing idle, or are we progressing with due diligence towards key project development milestones? Are we halfway there yet?
Head down to the Olympic Park and the signs look promising. Its previousindustrialexistence has been entirely eradicated, and now a small army of trucks and bulldozers swarm relentlessly across a landscape of lumpy earthworks. Where once the sky was filled with stalking pylons, now clusters of giant cranes spin to lower concrete chunks of future infrastructure into position. Former rivers have been scrubbed and sanitised, while much-loved allotments lie obliterated beneath caterpillar tracks ready to be replanted with airlifted saplings. Six hundred acres are abuzz with site offices, cement mixers and helmeted security guards. Far more people work here today than did 42 months ago, but the overlap of personnel between then and now must surely be minimal.
The most obvious sign of change is the appearance of the Olympic Stadium. You can't miss it, not from the Greenway, not from the East Cross Route, nor from a passing train. It's already standing at its full height, with a curved temporary grandstand perched high above the permanent bowl. Even the upper seating area has started to appear, the very terrace from which spectators will watch the athletics (and, presumably, purchase candy-floss, branded caps and souvenir programmes). Viewed close-up on the London 2012 official webcam it all looks terribly impressive. But only one tiny sliver of the stadium is yet this far advanced - the brief arc directly in front of the main site office (and webcam). Even the elevated steel raking stretches only a quarter of the way around the stadium circumference at present. It makes for an impressive looking flagship development, fully established only at foundation level, but the rest of the Olympic Park is nowhere near as advanced as this small chunk might suggest.
Never mind, London's still firmly on track to be ready for 2012. We can already pinpoint where the finishing line will be and where the medals will be awarded. The yachting venue in Weymouth was completed a few months ago, and could host an Olympic-scale regatta in 2009 if required. The beach volleyball in Whitehall's a doddle - it only needs a couple of grandstands moved into place - and the ExCel Centre in Newham was already there in the first place. OK, so it may take a while to finally confirm whether the shooting's going to end up in Woolwich or not, and there's still more shouting to come over the equestrian events in Greenwich Park. Plus there's still no cast-iron guarantee that the whole thing won't end up costing more than anticipated, with a post-Games legacy of empty apartment blocks surrounded by windswept parkland. But hey, there's still three and a half years to get it right. And, as we remember, a heck of a lot can be achieved in three and a half years.
Friday update: Hmmm. Seb Coe, the Prime Minister and the rest of London 2012 appear to be celebrating halfway one day late. Come on guys! If the original announcement was on a Wednesday, and the Opening Ceremony is on a Friday, then you'd expect halfway to be on a Thursday. For a project that relies so heavily on immaculate timing, I am not impressed.
"It's called a lightbulb, dear. They all used to look like that in my day. That's one of the old incandescent type, all round and bobbly. It was made of glass, and there was an electric filament in the middle which glowed and burnt heat or something. It was bulbs like this which provided us with light back in the old days. This one's 100 watts, which was one of the really big ones. It's much bigger than any of the low energy bulbs that followed, but then you probably don't remember those either. They were sort of twisty glass tube things which gave out a dim flickery light, and they took an age to warm up. Plus they had mercury in, far too dangerous to have hanging around, which is why world governments banned those outright too. We all have to make do with low-glow fluorescent panels everywhere these days, but they're just not the same."
"And what's that in the photo, Granny?"
"It's called a light switch, dear. Every room used to have one in my day. When we wanted illumination we flicked the switch and the light came on. We had complete control over it - on, off, on, off, on, off. If we wanted the light on before it got dark, that was fine. If we wanted the light on after midnight, that was fine too. If we left the light on in a room we weren't in, nobody sent the police round. Sometimes we just flicked the switch for a bit of mood lighting, just because it looked nice. Total independence it was, left completely to our own discretion. Of course it couldn't last, all that unnecessary unplanned wastage, which is why world governments stepped in and banned light switches outright too. We all have to make do with sensor-operated automatic motion detectors everywhere these days, but they're just not the same."
"And what's that in the photo, Granny?"
"It's called a television, dear. Every house used to have one in my day. In fact, as I remember, most houses had at least three. Televisions were big electronic screens that showed what was going on in the world using moving pictures. They used to be big hulking things with a vacuum tube inside, and those guzzled a lot of electricity. And then they got much thinner, and also much bigger, and we loved watching them even more, but of course they guzzled even more electricity. Sometimes people used their TV sets to play games on, sometimes people used them for playing background music, and sometimes people left them on for two hours to watch stories that weren't even true. Of course it couldn't last, what with all the extra electricity these plasma screens consumed, which is why world governments stepped in when the oil ran out and confiscated them all. We all have to make do with miniature communal viewpads these days, but it's just not the same."
"And what's that in the photo, Granny?"
"It's called a planet, dear. We all used to live on one in my day. It was a huge round ball in space with plenty of room for seven billion humans. We could go outside unprotected and walk around in the open air without the need for spacesuits. We had the freedom to live anywhere we liked, and to travel anywhere we wanted. The sky was blue, not black, and you could feel the radiation from the nearest star on your skin as it warmed the atmosphere. It was really beautiful, at least until we concreted most of it over. Of course it couldn't last, not after the flooding got worse and the skies got poisonous, which is why world governments stepped in and fired a few of us into space. We all have to make do with living in sub light-speed dormitories these days, but it's just not the same."
"And why didn't you think ahead and prevent all this from happening, Granny?"
"Sorry, dear. But it was a lot of fun while it lasted."
LONDON A-Z So the idea is this. This year I'm going to attempt to visit 26 London museum-yattraction-type places, one starting with each letter of the alphabet. And then I'm going to write about them. That's the idea. I intend to visit only attractions I've never visited before. Where possible I plan to concentrate on less well-known, peripheral museums. I'll probably have to stop at W, because X, Y and Z don't look promising. And if I manage to visit two museums a month, I should finish by December. So where first? After my weekend trip to Woolwich, there was only one choice for A...
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Arsenal Museum
Location: Drayton Park, London, N5 [map] Open: Daily from 10am (closes early on matchdays) Admission: £6 (or free as part of Stadium tour) Website:www.arsenal.com/emirates-stadium/arsenal-museum Time to set aside: up to an hour
Only a handfulofEnglishfootballclubs merit their own museum, and only one of these is worth visiting. Which one that is is a matter of personal choice. But if you don't choose the Arsenal Museum, obviously you're wrong.
The Arsenal Museum is located in a basement beneath Key Worker housing at the apex of the AshburtonTriangle. A less historic spot it would be hard to find. Handing over the entrance fee is also astonishingly difficult. The bloke on the door refused to take my £6, directing me instead to the Box Office (across a bridge, down some steps, wait). The bloke at the Box Office also refused to take my £6, directing me instead back to the Museum (up some steps, across a bridge, embarrassed return). The bloke on the door finally accepted my £6 only grudgingly, and even then solely on the understanding that I had the exact money in cash. It seems that 99% of the Museum's trade comes from fans who've been on the official Stadium tour and who get directed here at the end as a free afterthought, so my unexpected arrival proved unexpectedly challenging.
At last, down the stairs to the collection proper. This is a museum of two halves - the first half devoted to the people who made Arsenal great and the second given over to their finestachievements. Everything kicks off with a display about Woolwich. Look, there's a fibreglass DialSquare, as well as a listing of the very first team to play under the name of Royal Arsenal (a 6-1 home win against Erith, for what it's worth). If it's in-depth history you want, lift the telephone handset and soak in the details. I suspect most visitors don't bother, they just speed by to the interactive video exhibits further on. But I learnt plenty, not least that my favourite football club owes its early prominence to an evil conniving property developer chairman who schemed, manoeuvred and cheated his team across the Thames and into the top flight.
A brighter future was to be had at Highbury Stadium (look, the original plans), at least for as long as the place lasted (look, there's the centre spot, a rectangle of turf preserved forever inside a glass block). A central display case contains artefacts belonging to god-like chairman Herbert Chapman who guided the club to Thirties supremacy, while another contains such goodies as the Women's FA Cup and Will Copping's barometer. But who's looking there? Not when there are buttons to press and dials to spin and dream teams to select and a giant wall-length screen cycling the exploits of notable Arsenal legends.
Up the other end, reminders that Arsenal have won an awful lot of stuff over the years. International excellence, record-breaking unbeaten league records, FA Cup triumphs, it's all desperately impressive. And terribly selective, of course. No mention of the times Spurs have embarrassingly thrashed us, nothing about going out in the Cup in the first round, and not a word about the criminally lacklustre 2008/9 season. But some appropriate crowing about the three times we've won the Double, including the 10p programme for the 1971 Cup Final (which was the very day my footballing loyalties were first forged). Not that the nylon-suited tourists wandering to and fro are interested in the words. They just want to photograph each other next to Thierry Henry's shirt and extremely large pieces of silverware, and then get out. You may want to linger a little longer. Or maybe not. by tube: Arsenal (obviously)
And why is Woolwich station called Woolwich Arsenal? Because the nearby Royal Arsenal at Woolwich used to be UK's most important munitions factory, that's why. If you were once a subjugated citizen of the British Empire, it's quite likely you were subjugated using ammmunition from here.
King Henry VIII kicked things off in Woolwich nearly 500 years ago by establishing a royal dockyard. The isolated conditions alongside the Thames estuary were later thought perfect for the storage of gunpowder, so the Board of Ordnance moved in and snapped up 31 acres of Woolwich Warren. Facilities grew, the site expanded, and more and more factories were built (that Napoleon bloke, he took a lot of beating). The Royal Arsenal reached its peak during World War I, employing more than a hundred thousand workers and stretching more then four miles downriver to Crossness. Munitions aplenty were churned out during World War II, but then a steady decline set in. In the 1950s Woolwich was home to a top secret outpost of the Government's Atomic Weapons Establishment (but don't worry, people of SE18, because they only made the detonators here not the nuclear bits). Finally in 1967 virtually the whole site was shut down and sold to the GLC, who promptly nipped in and built Thamesmead instead.
A couple of Royal Arsenal sites lingered on in MoD use until the 1990s, one of which is at the heart of the latest redevelopment activity close to Woolwich Town Centre. It's so close to the town centre that the original Royal Arsenal Gatehouse now stands cut off in the middle of Beresford Square market, severed from its historic hinterland by an arterial road. Cross the A206 and you'll find what's left of Royal Arsenal West - several preserved military buildings and a lot of very new flats. At the moment the old outnumbers the new, and the old is mostly rather lovely. The Royal Brass Foundry and the Military Academy boast bold Georgian frontage bedecked with with painted coats of arms and gleaming clockfaces. The Paper Cartridge Factory and the Carpenters' Shop have been occupied by the Firepower Museum and the Greenwich Heritage Centre respectively. Walk down No 1 Street to the pierhead and you can still (almost) imagine this as unspoilt history.
Several of the old riverside munitions buildings have been converted to apartments, and highly desirable they look too. But also very exclusive, as you can tell by the series of metal entrance gates around the perimeter that swing automatically open and closed as residents come and go. This is fenced-off heritage, a residential fortress, with all the personalised numberplates on the inside and all the riffraff kept firmly out. Priorities for residents include their own first-floor parkland, their own deli (no mere corner shops here) and a gymnasium housed inside a marvellously ornate 18th century Shell Foundry (I've never seen anywhere quite so appropriate for pumping iron). If you've bought a flat in this part of the Royal Arsenal development, you'll rightly be rather smug about it.
But not all the flats are so appealing. Some rather more contemporary blocks have been erected as infill, of the kind that would look pleasant enough anywhere else, but whose architectural ordinariness here appears particularly out of place. Alas they're only the start. A whole new swathe of construction is underway between the river and the town, and this is going to be anything but historic. 1700 properties are promised, most of them apartments, courtesy of developers Berkeley Homes. They coughed up a small fortune to get Crossrail to stop in their half of Woolwich, and for that they get to create their own small town worth a rather larger fortune. The Armouries development will have eco-heating, brown-roof technology and a central lagoon - all fine and dandy I'm sure, but the sole link to the past will be its name. Even DialSquare, home to the founding fathers of Arsenal Football Club, is destined to be reborn as apartments. Precisely the same fate as the old Highbury Stadium, in fact.
If you can get yourself a mortgage and you fancy living somewhere relatively cheap yet swanky, maybe the new Royal Arsenal will suit you fine. There's a convenient DLR station, as well as a Thames Clippers pier on your very doorstep. But if it's history you want, I'm afraid your new flat may be partly responsible for wiping that out.
I was still eight stops from the newly-opened Woolwich Arsenal station when I realised something unfortunate had occurred. Something that's going to annoy me every time I travel eastbound on the DLR. Because the new line terminus has a name that's slightly too long for the infrastructure's existing systems. Sixteen characters - it's one too many to fit on the next train indicators on the platforms. Which has created a bit of a problem. And the chosen solution, a premature apostrophe, is very ugly indeed. W'wich Arsenal
Ooh that's nasty, and desperately unhelpful. Where the hell is W'wich? It sounds like it ought to be in Wales, probably deep in a valley somewhere. Or it could be a reference to that evil character from the Wizard of Oz. It certainly doesn't sound like the name of a well-known Thames-side settlement. And the destination's just as unreadable on the rolling display on the front of a train.
W'wich Arsenal[blip]v City Airport[blip]
The word Arsenal is clear as day, which conjures up images of football, Highbury and Islington. But no, all that's ten miles away. And so we get lumbered with W'wich instead. Sigh. The whole point of this new railway line is that it goes to Woolwich, not Arsenal, but Woolwich is the word the powers that be have chosen to abbreviate. Couldn't they have tried shortening the name another way?
Brilliant, just ignore the sixteenth character as if it doesn't exist. That's no good either, is it? But there is an obvious solution, one that would make sense to the vast majority of passengers, and it's this.
Woolwich
I know that the station isn't called Woolwich, it's called Woolwich Arsenal. And I know that there's another Woolwich station called Woolwich Dockyard, even if the DLR doesn't go there. But plain old 'Woolwich' would be so much better. Please, someone, bend the rules a bit and stick this simple eight letter word on the DLR's destination boards instead. Make it easy for everyone to tell where they're going. Because by slavishly following convention you've done something ugly, impractical and unhelpful to poor old Woolwich. Arse.
The view down Woolwich's main shopping street has changed. Just past Gregg's, at the very top of Powis Street, the new Woolwich Arsenal DLR station is open for business. Greenwich council are celebrating on the pavement outside with a roadshow. Free flags, free balloons, Brazilian samba dancers and advice on recycling. Two moustachioed jugglers cycle by, followed by a band of musical clowns. Local shoppers are curious, and some are inspired. A family of six heads off to experience their new rail service, buying a ticket to one stop up the line just so they can say they've been there and back again. Slightly too many police officers are standing by the ticket barriers, presumably for reassurance, but it doesn't quite feel that way. A brightly coloured mural sweeps round the walls at the top of the escalator, featuring giant everyday objects depicted simpler than life. An umbrella, a guitar, a watch - they make two elderly ladies laugh and smile. The station below is nothing so decorative, merely a featureless subterranean box with a central island platform. Trains to Bank depart alternately from either side, with another escalator at the far end leading up to mainline services and an alternative exit. A train arrives, opens its doors and disgorges its minor cargo. Not a lot of people yet want to travel here, and many of those who do today are carrying cameras. There's a civilised dash for the front four seats, because these are Woolwich's first driverless trains and everybody wants to see the view. As the train pulls off into the tunnel more spectators walk forward, anxious to miss nothing on their inaugural trip. Faster, faster beneath the Thames, around a gentle swooping curve through rings of glowing blue light. It's a three minute switchback, much faster than the ferry or foot tunnel, until finally the train emerges from the depths and pulls into King George V. The crowd retreats, or sits back down, or leaps off the train to take even more photos. It may all look dead ordinary tomorrow, but yesterday this cross-river lifeline was something special.
So, if you take advantage of the DLR's new link to Woolwich (available from 0521 this morning), what might you find there? Well worry not, because the DLR website features an extra-special tourist guide for the benefit of inbound visitors. Apparently "the station gives you the perfect opportunity to take advantage of what Woolwich and its surrounding area has to offer". Here's the website's list of suggested attractions. I wonder if you'll be as thrilled as I am?
• All major UK bank branches. No really, that's the first thing on the list. Apparently the most interesting thing about Woolwich is that it boasts all major UK bank branches. If there are no banks where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich? But there's no mention of the financial institution which put the town on the map. The Woolwich Permanent was one of the UK's first building societies, launched in 1847, and also one of the country's biggest. But when it demutualised in 1997 it aimed too high. The Woolwich was bought out lock stock and barrel by Barclays in 2000, and now exists only as a mortgaging brand name. Probably not worth the effort to come here especially for that.
• Reference, heritage and lending libraries. No really, that's the second thing on the list. Apparently the second most interesting thing about Woolwich is that it has libraries. If there are no libraries where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich, because it has three. Two of these are in the same building, with the poky single-room reference library on the floor above the cheerless lending library. Closed Wednesdays. This is no Woolwich highlight, this is 100% municipal ordinariness.
• A great variety of shops to suit everyone's taste including Marks and Spencer outlet, Sainsbury's and Primark. Woolwich is particularly noteworthy for its factory outlet and discount stores selling products at very low prices providing an outstanding opportunity for bargain hunters. Now if I've got this right, one of the best reasons to visit Woolwich is supposedly because the shops are cheap? Iceland, Peacocks, Chicken Cottage, McDonalds, that sort of thing. Charity shops galore. So if there are no pound shops where you live (maybe you live in Chelsea or something), why not take the DLR to Woolwich? It's the perfect credit-crunch retail destination.
• Beresford Square and Plumstead Road market is located in the heart of Woolwich town centre. The market is open Monday - Saturday selling food and goods at competitive prices. And there are two markets, one in the street and one undercover. That's hardly unique for London, isn't it? The market in Beresford Square sells specialist stuff like 29p dishcloths, bananas in plastic bowls and dodgy-looking puffa jackets, while the indoor hall echoes with badly-punctuated emptiness. Both markets are in "a fully accessible, vehicle-free environment", according to the Greenwich council website, which pulls no punches attempting to make the place sound appealing. There's also a big painted sign on stilts between the two to remind shoppers how historic the place is, royal charter and all. So hey, if there are no markets where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich?
• Firepower – the Royal Artillery Museum. The Museum, based in the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich, tells the story of the men and women who have served as Gunners in the Royal Regiment of Artillery since it was founded. Ooh, hang on, genuine tourist destination! Not just because North London's finest footballteam kicked off right here in 1886, but because Woolwich has a rich military history. The Royal Arsenal started off as Tudor dockside ordnance stores, and grew eventually into the UK's largest gun repository. Proper huge and important it was, until it closed in 1967 and evolved into an elite-ish housing development. And a museum, which is yours to enter for a fiver. They're doing some major shuffling around at the moment, so 2009 may not be the year to visit, but it's got to be worth doing one day.
• For another piece of local History, visit the Greenwich Heritage Centre. Bringing together the former Borough Museum and Local History Library it offers a wealth of information and fascinating displays about the history of the borough. And back to libraries again. That's the second time that the Heritage Library has been mentioned, which suggests it must be pretty damned exciting. Trust me, it isn't. A few local archives to look through, a humbly-stocked heritage shop and a transient art display. Plus a half-decent exhibition about Woolwich Arsenal, which rescues the place somewhat. But not quite enough.
• Thames barrier visitor centre. Completed in 1984 the Thames Barrier is over 1,700 feet in width with four 200 foot openings. The best view of the barrier is by boat- several of the Thames tours stop here. That's the most underwhelming description of the Thames Barrier I think I've ever read. The barrier's more than a mile from the new DLR station, and it's not a lovely walk either. But still the mostamazingthing in the area.
• Waterfront Leisure Center. A water park with 65 metre anaconda slide, a hot tub, a wave machine, a waterfall, water jets and five-lane multi-slide, there's something for here for everyone! There's nothing here for me, sorry. It's just a souped-up swimming pool, and they're ten a penny these days. But if you're bringing hyperactive children to Woolwich, don't take them anywhere else, take them here.
Not mentioned:
» The Woolwich Ferry(presumably because it's competition for the new DLR service)
» The Woolwich Foot Tunnel(presumably because it's competition for the new DLR service)
» The DLR Information Centre(a few chairs in a disused retail unit with free leaflets)
» Woolwich Arsenal DLR station(I bet this'll be the most popular tourist attraction in town today)
» Woolwich Barracks(it may, or may not, be home to the shooting at the 2012 Olympics. And it has the longestcontinuous facade of any building in the UK. You can't visit, not unless you enlist in the army or something. But it's possibly the most fascinating place in Woolwich, and it isn't even on the list. Beats the bank and the bloody library, that's for sure)
If everything goes to plan, tomorrow's the day that the DLR reaches Woolwich. Lucky Woolwich. Trains on the three-year-old City Airport branch will no longer have to terminate at the unlikely-named King George V, they'll continue down a brand new tunnel under the Thames and emerge beneath the heart of Woolwich Town Centre. Change here for services to Erith and Dartford (or, if you're a bit nervous, just stay on the train and head straight back to Newham).
It's an impressive little infrastructure project, this. Completed in 3½ years flat, it's a great example of the effective impact of a bit of well targeted funding. There may be only one additional station, but reaching it has involved some technically awkward underwater boring using a 540-tonne drilling machine. The new tunnel links the north and south banks of the Thames via public transport, the only such crossing for three miles upstream and ten miles down. And it yanks not-so-affluent Woolwich into the wealth-creating reach of Docklands and the City, literally overnight.
Attempt to cross the river here today and you have to use theferry. That's an experience in itself, and the passenger quarters below deck drip with an atmosphere of mid-fifties austerity. Or there's the foottunnel, the poorer cousin of its Greenwich neighbour, whose subterranean character was recently wrecked by the installation of architecturally insensitive cycle barriers. Neither journey is quick or easy. But from tomorrow you can sit in a nice comfortable train and be whisked beneath the waves in style, in only a couple of minutes. It's the 21st century way.
This is the Docklands Light Railway's first venture into Zone 4, which may also be why this is the first DLR station to be kitted out with ticket barriers. No coasting into town for free from here, nor sneaking onto a Southeastern train for nothing. And it's only the first of a slew of new DLR stations that Boris will have the privilege of opening (even though he had nothing to do with their creation). The line from Canning Town to Stratford International should open next year, and that'll make a damned fine Mayoral photo opportunity too. But sorry Dagenham, you can only watch the Woolwich opening with a jealous sense of what might have been, because Boris no longer has plans for the DLR to make tracks to you.
Oh lucky people of Woolwich, your life's just about to get a little better. And then, when Crossrail arrives in 2017, a lot lot better. Yet another tunnel under the river, plus trains to the West End and Heathrow, which might almost make the much-vaunted Thames Gateway an enticing place to live. But a word of advice to SE18's current residents. Don't get too carried away in a flush of opening excitement, because your existing rail service may still be the way to go. To the heart of the City via DLR will take you 27 minutes tomorrow. But it's only 20 minutes from Woolwich Arsenal to LondonBridge today. Way to go.
Seen your local crime map yet? Crime maps map crime. Crime maps pinpoint crime hotspots. Crime maps are smart and multi-coloured. Crime maps enhance national information capacity. Crime maps empower civilians through spatial dissemination of localised statistics. Crime maps make the populace feel safer.
Or perhaps not. Crime maps are actually statistical drivel, presented in a pretty way, to keep idiots happy. Let's see how.
As of this week, crime maps are now available for the whole of England and Wales. Not just Brixton, but Bristol, Bodmin and Bangor too. Enticing, isn't it? Quick, type <your local police force> and "crime map" into Google and see what's going down round your way. But don't expect little flags marking every burglary, knifing and embezzlement, because that would be an infringement of personal liberty and act like a magnet to potential criminals. Instead you'll notice that the map is shaded, and the shading tells you whether crime in an area is high, low or merely average. And it's probably average. Most things in life are roughly average, and crime statistics are nothing different. So expect to see a map coloured by indistinguishable mediocrity. Not terribly informative, sorry.
Beware of what average actually means. Average here means average for your particular police force, not average for the nation as a whole. So the western tip of Cornwall has average crime, and so does Tower Hamlets, at least according to the relevant crime maps. But Lands' End's crime rate is 2.8 crimes per 1000 people, which is average-ish for Devon and Cornwall, whereas Tower Hamlets' crime rate is 10.4 crimes per 1000 people, which is average for London. In truth living round my way is four times more crime-ridden than the Cornish fringe. But apparently not in mapland, where we're all averagely normal.
And beware the broad brush categorisation of averageness. On a crime map, "average" means "within one standard deviation of the mean". And this is where most of the data lies. On the latest Londoncrime map, this leads to a vast yellow sea around a tiny central island of darker colours. All but three London boroughs are categorised as average, even Hackney and Southwark, because their figures lie sort-of-close-ish to the London mean. This just leaves Westminster, Camden and Islington as central hotspots, with Westminster the only London borough whose crime is 'High'. Heavens it must be awful there, please stay away. Or maybe not.
Crime maps are compiled using monthly crime figures, despite the fact that months are desperately irregular units of time. Three extra days this month compared to next? Never mind. Five weekends this month but only four last month? Maybe it's not surprising that crimes related to drunken behaviour appear to be increasing. And it was pretty damned cold in December, bur rather warmer the month before. Should we expect decreases in temperature or reductions in daylight to have an effect on underlying crime statistics, or do we just conveniently ignore this and look at the headline figures instead?
Click on your map, be it Barnet or Berwick, and you can dig down to view the data at sub-district or tiny-ward level. But beware, because the further down you go the fewer the number of crimes being used to judge what colour the map should be. And statistics based on infrequent occurrences tend to be unreliable, insignificant and subject to random variation. Not that you'd guess this from the maps. There were only 76 reported crimes in Bromley-by-Bow in November, for example, down from 82 in October. Wow, an 8% decrease in crime in just one calendar month, how marvellous! Whereas in neighbouring Bow East the number of crimes rose 9% from 111 to 121. How terrible, how scandalous, how scary! Or more likely just a reflection of random fluctuation and entirely meaningless.
You can dig down even further to study different categories of crime. Take residential burglaries, for example. Now there's a crime to fear, and there's plenty of data here for the concerned Neighbourhood Watcher to get their teeth into. So what does the crime map tell me about my local area? In the ward to the south of Bow Church there was one residential burglary in November. Sounds good, but apparently one burglary is coloured "Average". And in the ward to the north of Bow Church there were no burglaries in November. Now I call that "Lucky", but the crime map colours it "Low". At this level the map's like a toddler's painting, covered with random-hued splotches, representing insignificance.
And beware the empty pointlessness of computer-generated statistics. You can play this game anywhere in the country. Violent crime in Rutland is up 40.2% on last year (it's almost one a day now). Anti-social behaviour in southern Peak District villages has increased 70% since 2007 (from very little to not much). And robbery in Bowness-on-Windermere has decreased by 100% since this time last year (down from one theft every three months to none at all). These are tales told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
And does your average UK citizen understand the underlying mathematics behind all this? Do they hell. Can they interpret these statistics with the caution they deserve? Not likely. Can they resist taking random percentage changes at face value? Of course not. Or do they just see a big red splodge on a map and go "Oh my God, it must be really scary to live round here, and it's getting worse, I shall never venture out again"? I fear so.
This is freedom of information in action. This is the new auto-statistics future. This is geospatial data churned out with invalid justification. This is the government producing online maps because they can, not because they're useful. This is tickbox social policy. This is meaningless statistical bollocks. And if there's any crime here, it's that anybody's taking these maps seriously.
No doubt about it, some photographs are better than others. Some are blurry, some are out of focus, some have too much glare, some are flat and lifeless, some have all the interesting bits chopped off, some are on the slant, some have badly positioned lampposts which look like they're sticking out of a small girl's head, and some are just plain dull. But others are fantastic. They capture the moment in a pitch-perfect exposure. They sparkle, they illuminate, they rock. And you can see examples of the best on the South Bank at the moment.
The winning entries in Take a View, the Landscape Photographer of the Year Award 2008, are on show in the foyer at the National Theatre until January 17th. They're epic photos on hulking great enlarged canvases, and they've been there for six weeks already (so thanks to Rob for pointing out they were they, else I might never have noticed). Stormy seasides, moody moorlands, frosty forests, that sort of thing. See the winning entries here. Ooh they're good. Respect is due.
A broad range of locations is covered, from the Channel Islands to the Highlands, and there's a refreshing lack of anything too southeast-centric. Some are places I've visited, and snappedphotosof, but where the magic never quite materialised for me. Shining marram at Luskentyre, moody swell at Shivering Sands, sunrise at Bamburgh, I'm jealous of all three. But some of the most impressive photos are nowhere amazing, just a back garden, or an ordinary field, or a seaside jetty (with a small dog, if you're the winning entry).
It's amazing what you can capture with a digital camera these days. Take 50 shots and maybe two will be good, take 5000 (click click click click click) and maybe one will be great. Some judicious use of a filter, maybe an astute bit of Photoshop, and you could just have a minor miracle on your hands. But, in the end, it all comes down to being in exactly the right place (over there, next to that tree, two steps further over) in the right orientation (watch the shadows, catch the reflection in that lake, and chop the pylon out) at the right time. By scrutinising the exhibited entries it's clear that timing is all important. You could stand on that headland for hours and capture nothing impressive, but catch the right glint of sunlight spearing a roll of angry clouds above a frothing sea and you've got yourself a winner. At least half of the photos appear to be taken at either sunrise (much easier at this time of year than midsummer) or sunset (quick, before the golden light fades). And cloudy definitely beats blue sky, but not quite so emphatically as sunlight beats gloom. It's all about judgement plus luck, and these photos have both.
This was no lightweight competition, more an expensive-to-enter affair with very strict quality-related admission criteria. There were lots of sponsors, most notably various British tourist boards, because you only get five figure prize money if there are sponsors. Valerie Singleton was one of the judges, which gives you some idea of the project's standing. There's a book of the best photos, naturally, although it costs £25 so it's only for the finer coffee table. And they'll probably do it all over again later this year, if you're interested. Frosty waterside at sunrise, that's my recommendation for a contest-winning photograph, based on what I saw. Ten past eight tomorrow morning, be there, well-wrapped, lens poised, ready to click.
On 5th November 1909, in Church StreetLiverpool, a certain Frank Winfield Woolworth opened the first British store to bear his name. There were fireworks, and an orchestra, and and circus acts, and even free cups of tea. The shop sold children's clothes and haberdashery and stationery and toys (just like its modern counterparts do today). Everything in the store cost only a few pence (so, erm, that's a bit like today too). And shoppers stripped the shelves bare, such was their desire to carry off a bargain (ditto).
Mr Woolworth's stores were based on three simple ideas: • fixed prices of three and five pence, with everything clearly priced Well, that was a good idea. It still works today in cheaper shops around the country, although the fixed price is now ninety-nine or one hundred. But that means Woolworths is no longer cheap enough. If you can buy a plastic bucket down the road in the pound shop, why pay more? • mass-produced, high quality items from the new factories And that was a good idea. Collectible glassware, fine-ish china, own brand clothing, its very own record label - all things that helped bring customers back time after time. But all the new factories are abroad now, where the workers are paid less and unit costs are lower. And nobody wants home-producedcrockery any more. • buying direct from manufacturers to keep prices down And that was a good idea too, way back then. But now we're all increasingly likely to buy direct from the manufacturer ourselves through their website, or else via some intermediate online presence with no High Street rent to pay. Cost cutting today means cutting out the shop. Bad luck shops.
I went to pay a centenary visit to my local Woolworths yesterday. According to closure lists issued before Christmas, the store in Roman Road was due to be trading to the bitter end. But I arrived to find the doors closed, the metal shutters half lowered and a metal lattice across the windows. Clearance complete. Emptied, dead, gone. No posters announcing "90% off", just a single sheet of paper from the staff thanking the people of Bow for shopping here over the years. That and a message to the shoplifters of Bow reading "Up yours, you thieving c***ts" (except with two fewer asterisks). Inside the lights were still burning brightly above a stripped-out interior, with just the record counter left intact in the middle of the right wall. A handful of male staff remained, taking the opportunity for a boisterous kickabout (maybe a CD case, maybe a shelf bracket) inside what was now a makeshift indoor football pitch. At least they were getting a few minutes enjoyment out of the demise of Roman Road's largest retail outlet. How things can change in just six weeks flat. Soon the shutters will hit the floor, the lights will go out and the store will await a new owner. It could be a long wait. [Friday update: Bow and Poplar Woolies bought out by Iceland. Oh joy]
From 1909 to 2009, Woolworths has survived onehundredyears of glorious retail service. Until today. It's been a damned long run, far longer than most UK stores will ever manage. But, alas, not an anniversary to celebrate.
Twelfth Night: Just the one Christmas decoration to put away. A string of fairy lights, unfurled along the hallway of my flat like multi-coloured runway landing lights. They've been there since the start of December, wiggling down the edge of the corridor and lighting up my midwinter darkness. Most impressively I didn't accidentally stand on them this year and smash one of the plastic bulb casings to smithereens like I normally do. But the lights have also been an unnecessary luxury. I've not been looking at them 99% of the time, they've just slunk along the carpet and glowed wastefully out of sight. Indeed not another living soul has seen them, not one, only me, which is quite selfish really. All that these lights have achieved is to add to my electricity bill for five weeks, and to hasten the onset of global flooding by a few milliseconds. And now they're back in their box (not quite tidily, which'll no doubt make unfurling them next Christmas unnecessarily difficult), and the flat looks bland and normal again. I'm almost tempted to leave them there all year round. Or maybe I should just line the hallway with Creme Eggs and be done with it.
Thanks for that. And now, from the suggestions you provided yesterday, here's my selection of 30 High Street stores that might go belly up before the end of the year. I've ordered the list by shock value, not likelihood (so, for example, I don't think M&S are going to go bust, but I do think they'd cause the greatest jaw-drop if they did). I've had to leave out some of your suggestions to keep the list manageable (and you can tell me "I told you so" if your choice collapses). Now I'm going to keep an eye on these 30 companies throughout the rest of the year to see who stumbles into administration, and who guessed correctly. Which of the following will be the first High Street casualty of 2009?
Blimey, what a bunch of vultures we are. As the credit crunch bites, we're happy to circle around the least healthy-looking businesses, spreading rumours and wishing them into the ground. Better not buy something from them, eh, because they might go bust before it arrives. And then we're surprised when public confidence falls, sales plummet and the store goes under. That's another empty shell in the High Street to be filled by some poundstore or charity shop, and that's several thousand more shopworkers and manufacturers out of work with no decent future to look forward to. Some of you lot won't be happy until entire town centres have closed down and everything arrives by delivery van, because it's cheaper that way isn't it? The future of shopping may well be via online monopolies, and I for one find that wholly depressing.
So I hope all 30 of these stores make it through to 2010. I hope we're all wrong. But I fear we're not.
You may be aware of Deathlist, the website that each year attempts to predict 50 famous people who won't see next year. They had a 28% success rate in 2008, while for 2009 their list runs from Ronnie Biggs to Clive Dunn (via Michael Foot and Margaret Thatcher).
So I'd like to set up something similar for the British High Street. I'd like you to nominate a UK retail business which you don't think will make it to 2010. It needs to have physical presence (no e-portals), it needs to be a vaguely national chain of stores, and it mustn't yet be in administration. You're allowed one nomination each, in the comments box. Which shops are doomed this year? You tell me. I'll then select the most promising of your insolvency nominations and place them in some sort of order, with precipitous superstores at the top and mere minor players at the bottom. And then over the next twelve months we'll see which of your predictions come true, and whose retail days are numbered.
For those of you who find winter's dark nights depressing, a note of optimism. The days are already getting longer, and today the number of daylight hours in London creeps back above 8 for the first time since early December. It won't be long before it's 9, and then things speed up through the spring until the glorious eight week spell in the summer when daily daylight exceeds 16 hours. Look to a brighter future with this useful table.
Daylight hours
Between these dates
More than 8 More than 9 More than 10 More than 11 More than 12 More than 13 More than 14 More than 15 More than 16
Jan 4 to Dec 7 Jan 29 to Nov 12 Feb 15 to Oct 26 Mar 3 to Oct 10 Mar 18 to Sep 25 Apr 2 to Sep 9 Apr 17 to Aug 25 May 4 to Aug 8 May 24 to Jul 18
1¼million: Sometime today, probably early this evening, diamond geezer will receive its million and a quarterth visitor. Actually that's not quite true, it'll just be the million and a quarterth time that my slightly ropey stats package has registered a unique visit, which isn't the same thing at all. And not in the slightest bit correct. Thanks to the relentless rise of RSS feed reading, it's now more commonplace than ever to read a blog without visiting it. Indeed I suspect that only about one in three of my current readers are actually visitors, which makes my blog's visitor numbers increasingly meaningless. But, all the same, wow.
So it's time once again for an update of my regular 'league table' of top linking blogs, ordered by volume of visitors clicking here from there. I've also included the 'highest climbers' since my last update (at 1 million) last April. Thank you all for linking. Go on, go check out a few of the following and return the favour...
The underlying figures hint at the steady demise of the blogroll. It used to be really important to be listed on as many blogrolls as possible, because people discovered other blogs by seeing what their friends were recommending. Not any more. Blogrolls are now increasingly irrelevant, progressively sidelined, rarely updated, and completely invisible to anybody reading via RSS. Everybody sees a blogpost, but only a fraction of you see a blogroll. Which is a shame, but that's how it is.
The underlying figures also hint at the steady demise of the linking blogpost. Bloggers used to link to one another far more frequently ("I see Camden Queen has something to say about that") and now they don't. They generate their own content, or they link to big news stories, or they rant about perceived political idiocy, or they recycle press releases, or they post pictures of their kittens, or else they've buggered off to Facebook. Blogging's now part of a wider aggregated social network, which makes blogs themselves increasingly isolated. To be honest it's a wonder anybody gets any visitors via anybody else any more. So I'm more than grateful for my million and a quarter, thanks. I wonder how things will have evolved by a million and a half.
2009 anniversary quiz
Here are 20 events celebrating an anniversary in 2009. How many can you identify? All the answers are now in the comments box (and all the anniversaries are clickable).
You don't have to cram onto the Embankment to see London's New Year fireworks. Anywhere with a decent view of the London Eye will do, be it a nearby bridge, a Lambeth rooftop or a BBC1 TV camera platform. So for the dawn of 2009 I decided to step three miles further back, to one of the best unobstructed views across the capital. To the dark northern slopes above Regent's Park. To Primrose Hill.
A swarm of onlookers covered the entire top of the hill, like an apocalyptic crowd watching the heavens waiting for the end of the world. I couldn't quite get through to the summit, so thick was the mass of people, but the natural amphitheatre afforded everyone a decent line of sight. The crowd was quite young, mostly twenty somethings in unintentionally comic woolly hats, plus a couple of police officers enjoying the easiest New Year shift in the capital. At the foot of the hill someone was setting off intermittent rockets, just to keep everyone entertained, while up top a series of hot-air-filled plastic bags rose slowly upwards into the overcast sky.
The midnight hour approached. We stood facing southwards, waiting for the distant ring of pulsing lights to explode into life. The bunch of friends to my right misjudged their timing somewhat and lit their sparklers 90 seconds early. Several false countdowns were started - not a chance of hearing Big Ben out here in the middle of nowhere. And then... And then... And then, finally, 2009 was heralded by a series of bright flashes on the banks of the Thames. The hilltop erupted with a yelping cheer, just in time for my neighbours' sparklers to splutter out. There was much indiscriminate hugging, and some slightly over-excited cuddling, plus the popping of several bottles of champagne. Happy New Year everybody!
In the distance the Eye erupted, puncturing London's sodium glare with flashes of red and white. From up here in NW3 they only filled a tiny portion of the horizon, but (unlike last year) every pyrotechnic flourish was clearly visible. A number of other unofficial firework displays could also be seen, randomly spluttering from Camden round to Hampstead, while the Primrose Hill rocket man provided further lofty explosions much closer at hand. There was much whooping, and plenty of drinking, and even a hug or two for the Metropolitan Police from some of the merrier youths on the hillside.
For ten minutes we watched, not always intently, as a million quid's worth of gunpowder burnt itself out. And then the main display was over, leaving just the lights of the BT Tower and a cluster of cranes twinkling away in the distance. Most of the crowd stayed put, enjoying the atmosphere and the opportunity to see in 2009 with friends and family. I had nobody to share a plastic beaker with, so I weaved my way slowly down the grassy slope and joined the steady exodus to the gates. My tube train home beckoned, which I reached far quicker than if I'd been stuck in the seething throng on the Embankment. The fireworks may not have looked so spectacular from atop Primrose Hill, but the elevated New Year experience was a whole lot more enjoyable.
May your 2009 be happy and prosperous. And remember... Lots of things will happen no matter what you do. But some things will only happen if you make them happen.
Olympic update
1289 days ago, in a hotel in Singapore, the IOC selected "the city of... London" to host the 2012 Olympic Games. You may remember the occasion. You might be one of the Newham schoolchildren shamelessly flown over to appeal to international voting delegates. You might be a former Mayor of London now helplessly frozen out of the ongoing decision making process. Or, like me, you might have been standing in the middle of Trafalgar Square watching Denise Lewis's jaw drop on hearing the unexpected news.
The most obvious sign of change is the appearance of the Olympic Stadium. You can't miss it, not from the Greenway, not from the East Cross Route, nor from a passing train. It's already standing at its full height, with a curved temporary grandstand perched high above the permanent bowl. Even the upper seating area has started to appear, the very terrace from which spectators will watch the athletics (and, presumably, purchase candy-floss, branded caps and souvenir programmes). Viewed close-up on the London 2012 official webcam it all looks terribly impressive. But only one tiny sliver of the stadium is yet this far advanced - the brief arc directly in front of the main site office (and webcam). Even the elevated steel raking stretches only a quarter of the way around the stadium circumference at present. It makes for an impressive looking flagship development, fully established only at foundation level, but the rest of the Olympic Park is nowhere near as advanced as this small chunk might suggest.
The Arsenal Museum is located in a basement beneath Key Worker housing at the apex of the Ashburton Triangle. A less historic spot it would be hard to find. Handing over the entrance fee is also astonishingly difficult. The bloke on the door refused to take my £6, directing me instead to the Box Office (across a bridge, down some steps, wait). The bloke at the Box Office also refused to take my £6, directing me instead back to the Museum (up some steps, across a bridge, embarrassed return). The bloke on the door finally accepted my £6 only grudgingly, and even then solely on the understanding that I had the exact money in cash. It seems that 99% of the Museum's trade comes from fans who've been on the official Stadium tour and who get directed here at the end as a free afterthought, so my unexpected arrival proved unexpectedly challenging.
A brighter future was to be had at Highbury Stadium (look, the original plans), at least for as long as the place lasted (look, there's the centre spot, a rectangle of turf preserved forever inside a glass block). A central display case contains artefacts belonging to god-like chairman Herbert Chapman who guided the club to Thirties supremacy, while another contains such goodies as the Women's FA Cup and Will Copping's barometer. But who's looking there? Not when there are buttons to press and dials to spin and dream teams to select and a giant wall-length screen cycling the exploits of notable Arsenal legends.
King Henry VIII kicked things off in Woolwich nearly 500 years ago by establishing a royal dockyard. The isolated conditions alongside the Thames estuary were later thought perfect for the storage of gunpowder, so the Board of Ordnance moved in and snapped up 31 acres of Woolwich Warren. Facilities grew, the site expanded, and more and more factories were built (that Napoleon bloke, he took a lot of beating). The Royal Arsenal reached its peak during World War I, employing more than a hundred thousand workers and stretching more then four miles downriver to Crossness. Munitions aplenty were churned out during World War II, but then a steady decline set in. In the 1950s Woolwich was home to a top secret outpost of the Government's Atomic Weapons Establishment (but don't worry, people of SE18, because they only made the detonators here not the nuclear bits). Finally in 1967 virtually the whole site was shut down and sold to the GLC, who promptly nipped in and built Thamesmead instead.
Several of the old riverside munitions buildings have been converted to apartments, and highly desirable they look too. But also very exclusive, as you can tell by the series of metal entrance gates around the perimeter that swing automatically open and closed as residents come and go. This is fenced-off heritage, a residential fortress, with all the personalised numberplates on the inside and all the riffraff kept firmly out. Priorities for residents include their own first-floor parkland, their own deli (no mere corner shops here) and a gymnasium housed inside a marvellously ornate 18th century Shell Foundry (I've never seen anywhere quite so appropriate for pumping iron). If you've bought a flat in this part of the Royal Arsenal development, you'll rightly be rather smug about it.
The view down Woolwich's main shopping street has changed. Just past Gregg's, at the very top of Powis Street, the new Woolwich Arsenal DLR station is open for business. Greenwich council are celebrating on the pavement outside with a roadshow. Free flags, free balloons, Brazilian samba dancers and advice on recycling. Two moustachioed jugglers cycle by, followed by a band of musical clowns. Local shoppers are curious, and some are inspired. A family of six heads off to experience their new rail service, buying a ticket to one stop up the line just so they can say they've been there and back again. Slightly too many police officers are standing by the ticket barriers, presumably for reassurance, but it doesn't quite feel that way. A brightly coloured mural sweeps round the walls at the top of the escalator, featuring giant everyday objects depicted simpler than life. An umbrella, a guitar, a watch - they make two elderly ladies laugh and smile. The station below is nothing so decorative, merely a featureless subterranean box with a central island platform. Trains to Bank depart alternately from either side, with another escalator at the far end leading up to mainline services and an alternative exit. A train arrives, opens its doors and disgorges its minor cargo. Not a lot of people yet want to travel here, and many of those who do today are carrying cameras. There's a civilised dash for the front four seats, because these are Woolwich's first driverless trains and everybody wants to see the view. As the train pulls off into the tunnel more spectators walk forward, anxious to miss nothing on their inaugural trip. Faster, faster beneath the Thames, around a gentle swooping curve through rings of glowing blue light. It's a three minute switchback, much faster than the ferry or foot tunnel, until finally the train emerges from the depths and pulls into King George V. The crowd retreats, or sits back down, or leaps off the train to take even more photos. It may all look dead ordinary tomorrow, but yesterday this cross-river lifeline was something special.
If everything goes to plan, tomorrow's the day that the DLR reaches Woolwich. Lucky Woolwich. Trains on the three-year-old City Airport branch will no longer have to terminate at the unlikely-named King George V, they'll continue down a brand new tunnel under the Thames and emerge beneath the heart of Woolwich Town Centre. Change here for services to Erith and Dartford (or, if you're a bit nervous, just stay on the train and head straight back to Newham).
On 5th November 1909, in Church Street Liverpool, a certain Frank Winfield Woolworth opened the first British store to bear his name. There were fireworks, and an orchestra, and and circus acts, and even free cups of tea. The shop sold children's clothes and haberdashery and stationery and toys (just like its modern counterparts do today). Everything in the store cost only a few pence (so, erm, that's a bit like today too). And shoppers stripped the shelves bare, such was their desire to carry off a bargain (ditto).
I went to pay a centenary visit to my local Woolworths yesterday. According to closure lists issued before Christmas, the store in Roman Road was due to be trading to the bitter end. But I arrived to find the doors closed, the metal shutters half lowered and a metal lattice across the windows. Clearance complete. Emptied, dead, gone. No posters announcing "90% off", just a single sheet of paper from the staff thanking the people of Bow for shopping here over the years. That and a message to the shoplifters of Bow reading "Up yours, you thieving c***ts" (except with two fewer asterisks). Inside the lights were still burning brightly above a stripped-out interior, with just the record counter left intact in the middle of the right wall. A handful of male staff remained, taking the opportunity for a boisterous kickabout (maybe a CD case, maybe a shelf bracket) inside what was now a makeshift indoor football pitch. At least they were getting a few minutes enjoyment out of the demise of Roman Road's largest retail outlet. How things can change in just six weeks flat. Soon the shutters will hit the floor, the lights will go out and the store will await a new owner. It could be a long wait. [Friday update: Bow and Poplar Woolies bought out by Iceland. Oh joy]
Twelfth Night: Just the one Christmas decoration to put away. A string of fairy lights, unfurled along the hallway of my flat like multi-coloured runway landing lights. They've been there since the start of December, wiggling down the edge of the corridor and lighting up my midwinter darkness. Most impressively I didn't accidentally stand on them this year and smash one of the plastic bulb casings to smithereens like I normally do. But the lights have also been an unnecessary luxury. I've not been looking at them 99% of the time, they've just slunk along the carpet and glowed wastefully out of sight. Indeed not another living soul has seen them, not one, only me, which is quite selfish really. All that these lights have achieved is to add to my electricity bill for five weeks, and to hasten the onset of global flooding by a few milliseconds. And now they're back in their box (not quite tidily, which'll no doubt make unfurling them next Christmas unnecessarily difficult), and the flat looks bland and normal again. I'm almost tempted to leave them there all year round. Or maybe I should just line the hallway with Creme Eggs and be done with it.
For those of you who find winter's dark nights depressing, a note of optimism. The days are already getting longer, and today the number of daylight hours in London creeps back above 8 for the first time since early December. It won't be long before it's 9, and then things speed up through the spring until the glorious eight week spell in the summer when daily daylight exceeds 16 hours. Look to a brighter future with this useful table.
2009 anniversary quiz
You don't have to cram onto the Embankment to see London's New Year fireworks. Anywhere with a decent view of the London Eye will do, be it a nearby bridge, a Lambeth rooftop or a BBC1 TV camera platform. So for the dawn of 2009 I decided to step three miles further back, to one of the best unobstructed views across the capital. To the dark northern slopes above Regent's Park. To Primrose Hill.
The midnight hour approached. We stood facing southwards, waiting for the distant ring of pulsing lights to explode into life. The bunch of friends to my right misjudged their timing somewhat and lit their sparklers 90 seconds early. Several false countdowns were started - not a chance of hearing Big Ben out here in the middle of nowhere. And then... And then... And then, finally, 2009 was heralded by a series of bright flashes on the banks of the Thames. The hilltop erupted with a yelping cheer, just in time for my neighbours' sparklers to splutter out. There was much indiscriminate hugging, and some slightly over-excited cuddling, plus the popping of several bottles of champagne. Happy New Year everybody!
May your 2009 be happy and prosperous.
1289 days ago, in a hotel in 
May your 2009 be happy and prosperous.