dear diary ...

04.15 am - ish

am narrowly missed by three drivers in near collisions at succesive T-junctions as i cycle towards nine elms ... glad to be alive !

08.15 am

arriving in kent, slip while stepping out of cab and fall backwards from truck onto concrete but effortlessly achieve optimal landing on both buttocks and both shoulderblades simultaneously ... followed closely by back of skull

emit roar expressing mixture of shock, pain, and embarrasment ... energised with fear of permanent injury and inability to pay the rent

one second later realise that i am still lucid and nothing is broken

concrete apparently undamaged, kentish onlookers mildly amused, and i am mighty pleased to be alive

recovery fuelled by huge rush of adrenalin

11.00 am

as adrenalin rush subsides, buy bacon lettuce tomato and mayonnaise sandwich from a spotlessly clean road-side stall outside tonbridge

theatrically, whilst i wait, an inspector enters the stall uninvited, wearing a white coat and bearing a clipboard

watching the proceedings he enquires of the pretty lady with the "philadelphia cheese" accent, "have you washed that lettuce ?", to which she rarther candidly replies, "i've never washed a lettuce in my life ! ... i just trim off the outsides !"

17.00 pm

arriving home, discover that the girl at the supermarket checkout where i bought my spring onions has "generously" over-changed me by five pounds

18.00 pm

whilst reading today's wiltshire gazette on-line, discover that school-hating fourteen year old nephew tom has been sectioned after a foolhardy encounter with cheap drugs

my brother argues that young drug abusers shouldn't be protected and thus encouraged by confidentiality

there but for fortune go you or i


18.30 pm

check last night's national lottery results and am now a further ten pounds richer !

and so to bed ...

chocolate tears

we went to the airport and i bought a box of anthon berg strawberries in champagne chocolates before we flew to bilbao

there, in our hotel, whilst i lay staring at the trendy purple ceiling, she discovered a safe that could be programmed so that only her credit card would unlock it

and that was where SHE hid MY chocolates

there is no justice ...

173 years old ... 

... and complicated 

the jill windmill on the downs near brighton 

the bourgeoise spider 

solomon guggenheim meets ned kelly 

travellers' tales

who dares to say the basques have no humour ?

street furniture outside the bilbao fine arts museum 

typical bilbao shop window 

i said open the door, cloth ears ! 

pre-guggenheim 

bilbao viscaya

we'll be catching a bus to stansted airport in the early hours on monday and then flying to bilbao

will a deputation of swooning marxist feminists be waiting to greet me when we land ?

will our hotel be nearly posh enough ?

can there possibly be enough alcohol in the city for both of our thirsts ?

will they sell me a half-price ticket for the train to san sebastian if i shave and approach the ticket office on my knees ?

if you really really care, then watch this space ...

i was going for the last swim of the summer but the tide was out 

wooden ducks and fevvered ducks at the garage by the village pond at four elms in kent

in memoriam at mereworth, gor blimey ! 

too early for confession ...

mereworth church, clumsily ostentatious, proto-gothic-revival ?

the cheese man pauses at mereworth church in kent

1831 Topographical DictionaryMEREWORTH, a parish in the hundred of LITTLEFIELD, lathe of AYLESFORD, county of KENT, 5 miles (S.E.) from Wrotham, containing 711 inhabitants. The church, dedicated to St. Lawrence, was rebuilt by John, Earl of Westmorland: it is a very handsome structure, with a fine Corinthian portico, and surmounted by a lofty spire: the whole edifice is constructed of different sorts of stone, and the eastern window is of painted glass, collected for the purpose by that nobleman. The grazing land in this parish is supposed to breed the largest oxen in England, some of them having exceeded three hundred stone. This parish is bounded on the north by the Hurst woods.

chocolate cake with ganache icing and piping - a public announcement

it's no use begging; the cake in yesterdays blog has all gone !

boord street gas works in greenwich; the pillars are of uniform thickness, as are the concentric rings, but the diagonal ties or reinforcements get thinner towards the top ! weren't the engineers clever ?