This was going to be my post on 9th September, the day after this blog's 20th anniversary, but the Queen put paid to that. Better late than never.
20 years of blogging takes a lot of filling. Since 2002 I've published 9496 different posts, which is at least one a day for over 1000 weeks (bar a few Christmas breaks in the early days). That's acres of screenspace to pack with maybe six million words, several thousand photos and a ridiculously high number of weblinks. It's fortunate I live in London which is possibly the world's most interesting city, but filling the blog has required an eclectic spread of content, indeed a non-stop torrent of inspiration because an empty template doesn't fill itself.
Here then are 20 of my biggest content-fillers over the last 20 years, i.e. themed series that went on for ages or came back time after time, presented as a clickable index. Maybe bookmark it for a future rainy day.
1) Open House(2002-2022)
London's finest architectural showcase has appeared on this blog every September since 2002 because it's the ideal opportunity to look at, and more importantly inside, hundreds of fascinating buildings. I usually get several posts out of it - the total must be approaching 100 by now - although I've been less enamoured with it of late. The absence of a detailed printed guide and a revamped website with a search facility resembling a brantub has made it much harder to spot this year's bighitters and one-offs, not to mention trickier to knock up an itinerary, plus I've been to a lot of the good ones already and blimey they were great.
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2) Single Life(2002-2019)
This was my first 'hit', a paean to the pros and cons of being coupled up. I wrote it three years after jettisoning from a long-term relationship, and came back and posted a slightly longer version (with added misbehaviour) every year thereafter. I paused after 10 years, having healed a bit, and I post it a lot less often these days. But unless one of you finally gets it on with me in the near future expect to read it again in 2024 for my (sob) 25th anniversary.
3) Quizzes and puzzles(2003-2022)
A recurring theme on this blog is that I like to throw in a quiz or a puzzle every now and then, usually when you're least expecting it. I enjoy how my readership come together to generate a full solution, one guess at a time, sometimes in minutes and occasionally over several hours. There are far too many of these one-off posts to catalogue here, but you can always track them down by going to my annual index post (see sidebar →) where I list all those from each year.
4) The Count(2003-2022)
This was just me countingthings, nothing interesting, although by describing the final tally as 'The Mystery Count' I unintentionally unleashed a beast which continues to bemuse and baffle. It also elevated the humble bottle of Becks to cultural significance, and basically everyone should try counting things for a month every year otherwise how on earth do you discover how your life is evolving?
5) Local History Month(2003-2019)
This is possibly the longstanding series I'm most proud of. A new theme every summer in multiple parts involving a relentless focus on somewhere local, and all without trying to scare the audience away. I particularly enjoyed the long walks following boundaries or lines of latitude and the really long walks following certain rivers. One series which might have helped cement this blog's reputation was my travelogue along the River Fleet, especially because this was back in 2005 when historic internet content was hard to source so it was tricky to be definitive, but I still got a monthsworth out of it. Go local, go deep.
» August 2003:Where I live(famous places within 15 minutes of my house)
» August 2004:Piccadilly(a walk down Mayfair's most famous street)
» August 2005:the River Fleet(tracking the subterranean river)[photos]
» August 2006:Betjeman's Metro-land(Baker Street to Verney Junction)[photos]
» August 2007:Walk London(following bits of London's six strategic walks)[photos]
» August 2008:High Street 2012(the Olympic highway from Aldgate to Stratford)[photos]
» August 2009:Walking the Lea Valley(50 miles from Luton to Leamouth)[photos]
» August 2010:Not-London 2012(Exploring Olympic venues outside the capital)[photos]
» July/August 2012:The OlympicGames(at the end of my street)[photos]
» September 2013:Walking the New River(a 400th birthday stroll)[photos]
» August 2014:London Borough Tops(the highest point in 33 boroughs)[photos]
» August 2015:Round Tower(a walk round the edge of Tower Hamlets)[photos]
» August 2018:51½°N(crossing London on a line of latitude)[photos]
» August 2019:Ten false starts(a clutch of single-post series)
6) Tube Week(2003-2012)
Here's where I started letting my nerdy side run riot. A whole week of tube-related content including reportage, facts and a daily quiz, and then somehow the same again for nine more years. I threw in an Overground Week in 2017 but haven't been back to this feature since, and maybe I should given that some of you would simply salivate at the thought. There must be more alphabetical challenges, quirky gatelines and Next Train Indicators installed by cretins out there by now.
» 2003200420052006200720082009201020112012
7) Riding a bus route(2003-2022)
I spotted early that a great way to blog about London was to describe what you could see from a bus (and the characters aboard it too). I started with a week of Cube Routes (1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, N343), followed that up with Square Routes and Prime Movers, then tackled chains of buses across and around the capital. I've also featured an alphabetof buses, London's ten shortest routes, even a trek along the North Circular, but the really fun one is my 'birthday bus ride' which I started at 42 and most recently reached the 57 to Kingston. London's bus routes offer an endless stream of potential content that's nowhere near exhausted.
9) Bow Road Update(2004-2005)
When Metronet arrived to upgrade my local tube station I got somewhat obsessive in recording what they were doing. This soon turned into recording what they weren't doing, because Bow Road was a guinea pig station and Metronet proved to be an entirely incompetent infraco. So slow and substandard was their transformation that I blogged about if relentlessly and eventually Evening Standard journalist Andrew Gilligan rang me up to get the full story. His subsequent expose was dismissed by the Chairman of Metronet thus: "Articles which refer to an unnamed passenger's account having travelled through a station quite frankly are not worthy of any detailed examination", so that told me. But Metronet went bust shortly afterwards so I'm claiming the last laugh there.
10) My new Z470xi mobile (2007)
Oh this was fun. I suddenly accelerated my blogposts by a week, claiming I had a mysterious new phone, and then unfolded an increasingly-desperate tale of impending apocalypse on and under the streets of London. I never told you what I was doing, just left you to work out I'd gone full-on fictional, and at the very end of the month went totally silent as if the worst had come to pass. I'm not sure I could get away with anything like this again, but it was very enjoyable to write.
11) London Loop(2007-2017)/Capital Ring(2011)
I walked both of these walks in short bursts, not necessarily in order, and spread my rambles over a number of years. My reports on each section are therefore all over the place, and the older ones are also much less detailed than the newer ones because I've ramped up the amount I write over the years. What's been useful is that a lot of you have walked these paths too so mentioning 'London Loop section X' provides a useful hook on which to hang many blogposts from the suburbs. Hurry up Ramblers, I'm ready to walk your new routes.
12) AnorakCorner(2007-2022)
I first started taking an interest in Underground and National Rail passenger numbers in 2007, knocking up lists of most- and (more excitingly) least-used stations on each network. Back then these statistics often went unnoticed for days, even weeks, whereas now the release of the annual National Rail passenger count is a full-on bandwagon-rolling press jamboree. I'd like to think that interest in "the least used station in administrative area X" might have started here, but I may just be deluding myself. Latest versions are here (each with links back to all the older versions): [rail][tube][bus]
13) PR emails I have received(2009-2022)
Even though I don't reprocess press releases or pump out sponsored posts, marketing minions still send me emails hoping that I might. I then delight in summarising their weasel phrases, with all brand names withdrawn, and totally ripping the piss. I don't receive as many as I did, thank god, but even last week I received a missive from Gene which ended "Reply something if you're interested. We're humans and love to help each other, don't we?". No Gene, not when they're as lickspittly mercenary as you.
14) Lost Rivers(2010)/Unlost Rivers(2015-2019)
After I totally failed to write a book on lost rivers for Penguin Random House I went ahead and wrote it anyway, but published it in monthly chunks on this blog instead. "Look," I said to myself, "I could have researched and catalogued the Tyburn, Neckinger and Bollo Brook with full pictorial evidence after all." Since then I've also gone on to walk many an unlost unculverted river, from the Dollis Brook to the River Shuttle, and in good news I still have several more to go. London blogging doesn't get much more quintessentially psychogeographical than this.
15) Beyond London(2014-2017)
After I'd emptied my jamjar I went on to explore the 17 local authority areas immediately outside Greater London. I started in Dartford and ended in Thurrock, heading out on a Saturday to visit four sites of interest and then forcing myself to write about them. Travelling was sometimes hard because transport's less good beyond London, but my explorations really helped in knitting together a mental picture of what the inner Home Counties look like. Also I don't think I'd ever have thought to go to Lowewood Museum, Stoke Poges and Titsey Hall otherwise.
2014: Dartford, Sevenoaks, Tandridge, Reigate & Banstead, Epsom & Ewell
2015: Mole Valley, Elmbridge, Spelthorne, Slough, South Bucks
2016: Three Rivers, Hertsmere, Welwyn Hatfield, Broxbourne, Epping Forest
2017: Brentwood, Thurrock
16) Bus Stop M(2015-2017)
My local bus stop should never have reached legendary status, but a chain of muck-ups during the installation of a segregated cycle superhighway lane brought it to unexpected prominence. If only they hadn't closed a bus stop by moving its pole 200m up the road and then forgetting to update all the electronic data that went along with it, maybe 20% of the debacle could have been avoided. I'm pleased to say Bus Stop M's a lot more stable now - it even has its own Countdown display - although nobody's ever replaced the spider map someone removed in 2020, and I'd be much obliged if someone at TfL could print one out and slap it back up.
19) Unblogged(2018-2022)
I've now brought you four years of these snippety summary posts, one per month, listing one thing per day I never told you about at the time. Sometimes it's quite trivial, sometimes it's something that would never have deserved a post of its own and sometimes it's deliberately obtuse because I have no intention of telling you what it really is. A special hello to the misguided optimists who, having read the phrase "questions will not be answered", go ahead and ask one anyway. One day I will learn to write these unblogged posts as the month progresses, but I always seem to end up rushing it all at the end.
20) The Olympics(2002-2022)
I can't finish without mentioning the Olympics, an ultra-local project which tentativelyemerged at the start of my blog, peaked in the middle with the Gamesthemselves and is still reverberating through the Lower Lea Valley today. The 2012 Olympics has undoubtedly generated more column inches on this blog than any other single topic, thanks to the simple accident of me unintentionally living nextdoor, so brace yourself for a lot more. The five-ring circus never goes away.
Sometimes you just want to go for a nice walk, nothing too taxing, a bit of a stroll, lots to see, great views, plenty of history, a good all-weather surface, close to public transport, won't take long. So here's a gentle mile ascending a hill in Richmond, nowhere near enough to make a day of it but a nice walk all the same.
Let's start at Richmond Bridge, or as local residents may know it 'outside the Odeon'. We'll be sticking to the eastern side of the Thames and climbing approximately 50m to get a better view of it. Aim for Nando's and you'll find yourself in a road initially called Hill Rise, a tautology which nevertheless correctly hints at the upcoming contours. It's also the last hurrah of Richmond's retail offer and unapologetically aimed at harvesting surplus wealth, should you be in need of bridal gowns, antiques or the perfect shade of Farrow and Ball paint. The most middle class thing I saw was a small boy with a toy sword being dragged into the cheese shop because "granny wants to browse", although this is unlikely to be your precise experience.
You've now committed to a climb, although rest assured it's never anything too serious. The houses near the foot of Richmond Hill are tall and thin in an attempt to take advantage of increased elevation, and blue-plaque-watchers should note that actress Dame Celia Johnson was born at number 46. I marvelled at the street's unseasonably colourful hanging baskets and was disappointed to discover that the block which looks like a castle was merely a well-defended prep school. Eventually the pavement becomes a terrace, the view alas still blocked by trees, but eventually those trees break to reveal ooh look, Twickenham rugby stadium. Keep going, it gets a lot better.
Down below are Terrace Gardens, an immaculately-tended space created in 1887 by combining the gardens of two former hillside mansions. You could pop down for a look but bear in mind it's all height you'll have to regain later. And there's plenty to see up top, including a Nightwatchman's Hut in Anglo-Japanese style and an outbreak of benches. Richmond Hill is totally overrun with benches, so many benches, indeed 33 benches along the top of Terrace Gardens alone, all lined-up and facing Thamesward. All are in memory of somebody but not all of them have a view so pick carefully. Also don't feel you need to sit down yet because once you get up the steps there are still 70 more benches to go. So. Many. Benches.
The flank above Terrace Field has attracted daytrippers, artists and pleasureseekers for centuries. It looks out over a perfect panorama of trees and meadows and, most importantly, a proper scenic bend in the Thames. The eyot in the midst of that silver thread is Glover's Island, and the airport in the distance is plainly Heathrow. See how flat the Thames Valley is, and also how incredibly few tall buildings planners in Surrey permit. The stretch of promenade by The Roebuck is the sweet spot, and here human clustering and bench use are at their greatest. I was nudged out of prime position by a classful of children sketching the view and also by a coachful of wedding guests posing for a group photo while raising a glass of bubbly. Never attempt this walk in high heels unless you have a convenient vehicle to totter back to.
At the top of Richmond Hill is the Royal Star and Garter Home, a magnificent edifice built after WW1 to house 180 seriously injured servicemen, and which has recently completed its transition to 86 luxury apartments because of course it has. Out front is an astonishingly ornate cattle trough built by the local branch of the RSPCA in 1891 to reward animals reaching the summit, but which is now overflowing with bright flowers. And immediately ahead are the gates to Richmond Park, finest of all the Royal Parks, which explains the number of cars, bikes and dogwalkers feeding through. Pedestrians are relegated to a side gate and then have to cross a stream of traffic unaided, sorry.
The start of October is peak rutting season according to the monthly warnings inside the gate, but this is not the deeriest corner of the park so you shouldn't be troubled by antler action. You can go all sorts of ways from here but I've chosen to follow Terrace Walk south in search of a view. The trees to the right are impenetrable but a gap eventually opens up to the left which perfectly frames Docklands, then the Shard, then the City. Eventually you get to escape the park fringes into Pembroke Lodge Gardens (no bikes, no picnics, no garden games), a cultivated strip behind a deerproof fence. At this time of year the Poet's Corner pollination garden isn't buzzing and the John Beer Laburnum Walk is somewhat shrivelled, but that's the best carpet of autumn crocus I've seen this season.
Hurrah it's King Henry's Mound, a prehistoric burial hump set on the highest point of Richmond Hill. It's perhaps best known for its protected view of St Paul's Cathedral through a 'keyhole' gap in the trees, the dome unobstructed and perfectly framed despite being ten miles away. A telescope has been provided for those whose eyesight isn't owl-like, and I got lucky (for the first time ever) by having it to myself for a full five minutes. Alas the view of St Paul's has been permanently wrecked by Manhattan Loft Gardens, a 42 storey tower in Stratford whose boxy bulk now rises behind the entire right-hand curve of the dome. Protected view regulations didn't apply to the full corridor behind the dome so this misplaced abomination slippedthrough the planning process and, well, what a bloody shame.
That's where my nice walk ends, atop a peak that somehow is only a mile from the hubbub of Richmond Bridge. From here you could drop down the hill to Petersham, you could carry on across the heart of the park or you could just retreat to Pembroke Lodge for tea and a scone. Whichever way you go from here it's all downhill, so that's nice.
Thu 1: Life is pootling along quite normally. Boris Johnson is Prime Minister, the Queen's at Balmoral, the sun sets just before eight, the pound's at $1.15, Labour's at 42% in the polls, interest rates are under 2%, Russia's on the back foot in Ukraine and it's still short sleeve weather. How much could change in a month? Fri 2: A horde of teenage boys commandeered the front of the top deck of the 132 bus, surreptitiously vaping and discussing dubious sexual practices. Nearby passengers looked a little nervous, and were even more worried when the ringleader opened up a playlist on his phone and blared out... oh, Baggy Trousers by Madness. "I love this band," he said, and all his mates sang along, which I guess counts for wild behaviour in Eltham. Sat 3: I took the tube replacement coach to Heathrow Airport - a luxury ride along the M4 - and there were only four of us on board. We got stuck in some bad roadworks on the A4 but it wasn't too slow and it was still £10 cheaper than taking Crossrail. Sun 4: I finally visited [Redacted] because I was in the area and suddenly remembered it's open on Sundays. It's utterly atypically downmarket for zone 1, but it's not going to remain unblogged forever so I'd better not mention it now.
Mon 5: This photo shows the northernmost point in Greater London which is on the clockwise carriageway of the M25 about halfway between J24 and J25, just north of Crews Hill station. I would tell you more but we were driving home from Blenheim Palace at the time so quite tired, and nobody was keen to stop on the hard shoulder for a closer look. Tue 6: Nice to see the Queen smiling as she despatches Boris Johnson. I do like that photo of her by the Balmoral fireplace while she waits for new PM Liz Truss to turn up. A rock of stability in these turbulent times. Wed 7: I dropped into the Science Museum today which used to be easy, you just walked in. Instead when I said I hadn't pre-booked a ticket they sent me over to a single desk where a weary operative laboriously produced one, and after that I had the choice of eight self-service terminals to scan myself in. I hate to think how this ridiculous system copes at busy times. I gave them a fake name, it was the most contemptuous action I could think of.
Thu 8: Because it was chucking down with rain I came home before lunchtime, which is how I ended up watching all six hours of royal health updates from [12.30 The Queen's not well] to [6.30 The Queen has died]. It turns out she died halfway through, probably while Nicholas Witchell was wittering. Fri 9: It also turns out that if you head to the front gates of Buckingham Palace before 7am to see the floral tributes, Ian Visits has got there first. Sat 10: Something I didn't tell you about Open House: If you head really deep into the outer boroughs, sometimes there's only time to visit one venue. Sun 11: Something I didn't tell you about Open House: I was much happier looking in the cabinets on the first floor than those on the narrow second floor balcony. Mon 12: I bought some non-budget pate from the supermarket this week and ooh that's much nicer, but is it twice-the-price nicer? Tue 13: I wasn't sure where would be best to watch the Queen's cortege pass by, so I started at Hanger Lane and walked for an hour along the A40, past premature crowds who hadn't realised she hadn't landed at Northolt yet. I found a rare quiet slot between a group in grey trackies and a pair in pink jackets with giant flags to wave, and waited for an hour in increasing amounts of rain to watch a flag-draped-box pass by for a few brief seconds. Then I went home, rewound iPlayer and spotted myself in the helicopter shot.
Wed 14: It's 20 years since I bought a copy of first album by The Streets, so today I played all five albums back to back and wow, what a debut, but followed by a sequence of ever-diminishing returns. Thu 15: I never thought I'd get away with it for a year. Fri 16: In this month's BBC Sounds recommendations, obviously there's the new season of Mark Steel's in Town (Tring! The Scillies! Nottingham! Paris!), and I'll also chuck in Gideon Coe's eclectic three hour themed evenings on Thursdays on 6Music. Meanwhile over on the iPlayer I thought teen thriller Red Rose started brilliantly and properly embraced its Bolton location but it had unhooked me somewhat by the end. Sat 17: Something I didn't tell you about Open House: I didn't book but nobody checked and nobody cared. Sun 18: Something I didn't tell you about Open House: I doubt you want to hear any more about Open House to be honest. Mon 19: I headed into town very early to see arrangements for the state funeral, and every road around Westminster was already sealed off by big green panels so if you'd come up from the provinces you'd have seen precisely nothing and probably ended up watching a big screen in Hyde Park... which you could have done more comfortably back home, which is what I did.
Tue 20: In very local news, they've started knocking down the block of flats overlooking Stroudley Walk. The outer rooms are proving easier to smash than the inner stairwell. Wed 21: Today I received a text message and an email telling me I'm eligible for a further Covid vaccine this autumn and inviting me to book online. So I went online and entered my NHS number and answered their questions, but was told "You do not need to book any coronavirus vaccination appointments using this service" so I didn't, and I'm a bit confused now. Thu 22: I can confirm that a tube journey from Hatton Cross to any of the Heathrow terminals is now free, which it wasn't last month (but the free blue tickets don't work, you have to touch something in and out). Fri 23: You can tell it's autumn because Cup-a-Soups are finally back on special offer in the supermarket (but the price increase since this time last year is a whopping 25%).
Sat 24: I dropped into Shoreditch Fire Station's Open Day, an opportunity to see new and vintage fire engines, meet firefighters and stroke old helmets. They were also showcasing the London Fire Brigade's new typeface which looks splendid, and is available on a number of products in the LFB online shop, because even the emergency services are resorting to fundraising these days. Sun 25: I'm down to one functioning cassette recorder, and it's suddenly started playing tapes at muted volume making everything unlistenable, as if the 20th century is finally trying to eject me. Mon 26: A new footbridge is being added underneath Barnes Bridge on the north side of the Thames, which'll speed up walks along the riverbank by chopping off a five minute diversion under the railway. Looks good, but I got there prematurely. Tue 27: I was approached on the tram by a man from survey company Kantar asking where I'd been and where I was going so he could enter it into his tablet. But he didn't make it clear whether I was supposed to tell him where I was getting off (Reeves Corner), where I was leaving the tram network (Beckenham Road) or where I was ultimately heading (Bow Road), so my apologies if that messes up this year's figures. Wed 28: I stumbled upon a miniature railway in Ruislip (not the one round the Lido, the one beside Yeading Brook) where a volunteer was busy mowing the grass between the tracks. It turns out you can ride their trains round a big loop on Sunday afternoons for £1, and I suspect the Roxbourne Railway should be a lot better known.
Thu 29: I have new neighbours in the flat below mine, and whenever they come out onto their balcony to smoke I can swiftly tell whether it's tobacco or weed even while sitting on my sofa. I need better insulation. Fri 30: Life is pootling along quite abnormally. Liz Truss is Prime Minister, Charles III is King, the sun sets just after half past six, the pound bottomed out at $1.03, Labour's at 54% in the polls, interest rates are over 2%, Russia's annexed 15% of Ukraine and it's definitely jacket weather. How much can change in a month!
