graffiti – Page 2 – derrickjknight

It’s An Ill Wind…..

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Yesterday evening we dined with Helen, Bill, Shelly, and Ron at Tyrell’s Ford Country Inn and Hotel at Avon, near Christchurch. As the only group in the dining we enjoyed the attentions of a friendly waitress. My choice of meal was liver and bacon, mashed potato, carrots. swede, sugar snaps, green beans, and broccoli. My dessert was Dutch apple crumble and custard. Three of us shared a bottle of red, and three, white, wine.

Storm Doris, having vented all night, eased up enough for me to take a chance on keeping my lunch appointment at La Barca in Lower Marsh. To this end Jackie drove me to New Milton where the London Train arrived on time.

These gentlemen viewed from the waiting room awaiting their transport were no more disappointed than I was.

Soon after departure a tree was reported across the track outside Eastleigh. This afforded me the opportunity closely to examine the pastel shades of a line side block of flats.

After a while we were under way again, the train was only 35 minutes late, and I arrived at the restaurant before Norman had taken off his coat. We both chose artichoke soup for starters; my main course was swordfish steak in a piquant sauce served with sautéed potatoes, sugar snaps, green beans, and broccoli. We shared a bottle of the house Valpolicella. I needed no more sustenance in the evening.

The return journey was rather longer than the outward one. In addition to another tree on the track, there was a 50 m.p.h. speed limit ‘for health and safety reasons’.

Groups of assorted travellers stood on Waterloo Station, eyes glued to the departures board where they could read about delays and cancellations.

There had been many unfortunate travellers without seats on the outward journey. There were fewer of those on the way home, but they were even more discomforted when the food trolley or other passengers need to pass.

Once again I was able to study the trackside. There was graffiti between Waterloo and Vauxhall;

trees waving with the wind,

and an embankment somewhere near Basingstoke.

Jackie had been expecting to meet me at New Milton. This was not to be, because the railway company decided to decant passengers for intermediate stations at Brockenhurst, and send the train non-stop to Bournemouth. She therefore set off for the latter station. As I walked out into the car park I could see a very long traffic queue stretching a long way back in the direction from which I expected her to arrive. I decided to walk to the end of it in an effort to save her getting stuck in it. When I got there I phoned Jackie to let her know where I was. She was approaching from the opposite direction from which there was no tailback. This meant I had to walk on further in an effort to find a place where she could stop.

Sunset was now on its way. Thank goodness for mobile phones.

We chased the sunset to Milford on Sea,

where the spirited waves rushed towards the shingle.

I spent a very short time leaning into the wind. This family group who had come to watch the sea stayed out of their people carrier for an even shorter period.

Without Doris, I would not have enjoyed such line-side views, nor such moody sunsets. As they say, it’s an ill wind (that does nobody any good).

A Far Cry From Fitzrovia

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This morning I scanned another dozen colour slides from the Streets of London series. These were produced in July 2004.

On this corner of Riding House Street W1 stands the landmark Arts & Crafts home of T.J. Boulting & Sons, manufacturers of heating equipment. Adopting the name in 2011, a contemporary art gallery, T.J. Boulting, was established in the building.

The address of the Crown & Sceptre pub, seen here in Foley Street W1, is actually 88 Great Titchfield Street. They currently advertise watching the Six Nations rugby with specially chosen beers. Like many of our historic public lavatories, the one outside the building has been chained shut.

Zoopla currently quotes the average price of a property in Mansfield Mews W1 as £1,703,118. Note the tall chimneys and television aerials reflected in the upper window. What a pity that a splendid stained glass window has made way for an extractor fan.

A similar value is place on properties in Molyneux Street W1.

I was only beginning my photography of public places at this time. I do wish I had had the confidence to ask this group alongside Ossington Buildings W1 what they were up to. But, I didn’t. Now I have learned that most people are only to willing to talk, and often to pose.

This church seen from Crawford Street W1, is St Mary’s Bryanston Square, an active element of the evangelical wing of the Church of England. Designed by Robert Smirke, it dates from 1824. A young lady on a bench made herself comfortable in the sunshine.

In Wyndham Place opposite, the Duke of Wellington, tankard in hand, possibly wondering how long he would be there, gazes from a side window of his eponymous pub. Built in 1812 in Crawford Street this establishment closed last year.

Warrington Gardens W9 is in Little Venice, close to Warwick Avenue tube station. Does the little girl here have a brother or sister in the buggy pushed by her mother, and does she have a doll in her own? I guess I’ll never know.

Wikipedia tells us that

‘St Augustine’s Church of England High School is a Voluntary Aided Church of England comprehensive school in the West London borough of Westminster, Kilburn. The school is also a Science College and has a sixth form. St Augustine of Canterbury is the patron saint of the school. It is located adjacent to its affiliated primary school and parish church St Augustine’s Church.’ It dates from 1870, when it was opened with 7 pupils.

Garfield the Movie was released in 2004. It is a spin-off from the famous cartoons featuring Garfield the cat created by America’s Jim Davis in 1978. This style of telephone box is a more recent version of the iconic red telephone boxes. I wonder if it is still in use, especially as I doubt that there is a single pupil without a mobile phone.

For many years I ran or walked from Little Venice to lunch with Norman at his home in Harlesden. Ridley Road NW10 was on one of my routes. This corner pillar had obvious got in the way of a stray vehicle. Or maybe the young lady gave it a passing kick.

Oldfield Road NW10 has brought us into graffiti land. A far cry from where we began in Fitzrovia. Norman lived in this road, which was around the corner from

Ashdon Road NW1, the walls of which also suffered desecration, and where robbers and Dumpers were also warned off.

This afternoon I watched a very keen Six Nations rugby contest between France and Scotland in Paris, screened by the BBC.

The evening we dined on second helpings of yesterday’s tasty casserole, with potatoes sauteed with garlic and herbs, and carrots vying with curly Kale for brightness of colour and flavour. Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I drank Cimarosa Limited Edition Shiraz 2014.

Where To Eat?

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Today I lunched with Norman in Waterloo’s Lower Marsh. To facilitate this, Jackie drove me to New Milton station in the morning, and home from Brockenhurst this afternoon.

These trains are usually crowded, but this morning’s took the biscuit. Had you actually wanted to purchase a biscuit, or anything else for that matter, this would not have been possible, although there was an at-seat trolley on board. This rapidly became ‘a static buffet’. As we piled on board at New Milton, the young woman in charge of refreshments retreated into what cannot be described as anything other than a cubby hole. It was designed for just this purpose.

Although the announcements invited us to visit her it would have been very difficult to have fought one’s way through the assembled standing humanity. Even had this been achieved the attendant could not have pushed her charge back through the door in order to serve anyone.

The first photograph was taken fifteen minutes or so into the journey. This second about half an hour later. The bottom of the trolley is all that is visible. The young lady in charge was trapped in there all the way to Waterloo.

From the viewpoint of these images it will be apparent that I was seated. How was this possible? For ten minutes it wasn’t. I was standing with those in the pictures outside the tiny toilet cubicle. This small section of the train contained two seats, one labelled disabled. The special seat had a small table in front of it. Standing between seat and table was a little girl using the table to work her puzzle book. I asked the mother whether we could come to some arrangement whereby I could sit down. She happily gave up her own seat. Only when I suggested it did she move across to her daughter’s unused perch. By the end of the journey this mother was feeling very sick on account of the now airless nature of our conveyance.

I had agreed with Norman to check out the eating establishments in Lower Marsh so that we could try somewhere new to eat. I then met him at Cafe Nero in The Cut, and led him back to

our favoured choice.

I had entered Lower Marsh from the Taxi Approach road beside a graffiti adorned tunnel leading back under the station approach. The London Eye is visible in the background.

Other dining possibilities included cafe’s such as this one with an inviting menu board;

or the Olympic with a bar;

a Thai restaurant in the window of which I took a couple of selfies with one shot;

and a Cuban,

the windows of which offered intriguing reflective collages, tented food stalls across the road, and the juxtaposition of an exotic dancer with the Virgin Mary.

La Barca was rather upmarket for Lower Marsh. The ambience was plush, the service attentive, and the food excellent. Norman and I both chose superb broccoli soup and succulent duck in orange sauce, with roast potatoes and crisp vegetables. We shared a bottle of the house montepulciano d’Abruzzo.

Needless to say, I required no further sustenance this evening.

Lee Van Cleef

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Not only was today wet, but we experienced 40 m.p.h. winds, and it was cold.

The flowers were taking another battering. It was a day for beetles, not for bees.

Thinking that few people would visit the recycling centre today, we transported two bags of green waste there. We were so wrong. The queue was 45 minutes long. Still, we got rid of our clippings and came back with one terra cotta and two stone planters.

Here, therefore, is what Paul Clarke terms a rainy day post. I scanned the next batch of my Streets of London series of colour slides from May 2004.

I couldn’t make my mind up about whether this elegant house in Crane Grove N7 is Georgian or Victorian. Neither, it seems, can the Estate Agent who has it on the RightMove website priced at £1,500,000, and described as period. The period of the inside looks to me like last week.

We are told that Highbury Corner is within walking distance of this home. I zoomed in on the block of flats that had attracted my attention because Arsenal’s championship Year was being celebrated on the top floor.

Even nearer is Digswell Street with its gross graffiti. This lies off the Highbury end of Holloway Road, part of the A1 running North from Highbury Corner. It may, of course, have been cleaned up by now.

Upper Street is a continuation of this major thoroughfare running South.

From Islington we move back to West London in the form of Clifton Gardens W9, in Little Venice, which, I think, was being graced with new street lighting. That is a pretty mature plane tree in the front garden of the building behind the wall.

Clifton Gardens becomes the short stretch of Clifton Road before Maida Vale is reached.

In a basement at that corner Clifton’s restaurant struggled to survive in the 1990s, eventually making way for an Indian restaurant which didn’t last very long. Well, it wouldn’t, being diagonally across the road from the Akash.

I was an occasional visitor to this rather good subterranean eating place with normally excellent wines. John, the proprietor, was keen on the Daily Telegraph cryptic crossword. On learning of my sideline in such puzzles, he would sometimes seek my assistance.

This was in the time when people still smoked in restaurants. I smoked a pipe, but never in a restaurant. John had a ceiling extractor fan which he insisted had been installed for me to smoke my pipe. I did, occasionally when, as often, there were no other customers. The proprietor was prone to relate that Ringo Starr brought his family there on Sundays.

Observant readers will have noticed, the ‘normally’ in the description of the wines. The reason for this is that this is so far the only place where I had had to return a corked bottle. Poor John had to agree, and was rather upset at having served it.

On one memorable occasion a young gentleman behind me was introducing his lady companion to the joys of the spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone. This was the trio of low budget films bringing Clint Eastwood to fame as ‘The Man with no Name’. It just happened that I was a fan, and have been known to join in other people’s conversations. I couldn’t resist it. I just had to turn, politely ask if I could add my two pennyworth, and upon being welcomed, observe: ‘Forget Clint Eastwood. Lee Van Cleef is the man’. This made my interlocutor’s day. He agreed entirely. I hopefully thought that with any luck the young woman was amused. I was being rather tongue in cheek of course, but Van Cleef had the looks for the part.

On the opposite corner of Maida Vale, with Hall Road, stands one of the luxurious apartment blocks that line this part of the A5.

Vale Close, just North of this point, is a small private road. Who would place this within a mile of Marble Arch?

For dinner this evening, Jackie produced a wholesome heart casserole, with crunchy carrots, new potatoes and green beans, followed by scones. These latter were eaten like those in traditional West Country cream teas, that is, with clotted cream and strawberry jam. This gave us a problem. These cream teas are native to both Dorset and Devon. The trouble is in one county you put the cream on first, and in the other, the jam. We couldn’t remember which was which, but we did think we might Google it and follow the practice of the county which had supplied our West Country Clotted Cream.

The address of the distributor was in East Kilbride in Scotland.

I put my cream on first. I don’t know which way the Culinary Queen voted.

Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I finished the Carles.

Triangulation

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As the golden dawn crept across the rape field on the other side of Christchurch Road that greets Jackie when she opens the bedroom curtains, she commandeered my camera to good effect.

From one of the back bedrooms she looked down onto the lead planter fashioned by Lucille Scott in the form of a wide-brimmed hat.

A little later, I photographed the clouds over the front of the house.

Drawn by the beautiful morning we took an early drive into the forest, where

ponies enjoyed a crisp breakfast;

and commuter traffic was reflected in the roadside pools.

Having dropped me off for me to take the above picture, Jackie drove on to a turning space, back-tracked, and parked on the edge of the woodland I was now investigating.

Slanting shadows slid across tumbling terrain and plunging pools, and

in haze on the other side of the road, gorse conversed with fresh arboreal plumage.

Further on, a pair of donkeys dozed on Norleywood village green

whilst another couple availed themselves of the street furniture to have a good scratch.

As we approached Lymington we passed a bluebell wood. Given that there is a fear that the stronger, less delicate, yet lighter hued Spanish breed will subsume our native stock, an indigenous collection is a welcome sight.

On our recent trips to and from The First Gallery, we have several times passed a short man-made pillar in a stretch of moorland bearing a number of signs bearing the word Hilltop. Pooling our combined smatterings of knowledge we realised this was what would be marked ‘trig point’ on the Ordnance Survey maps and was something to do with measuring height, presumably above sea level.

Jackie decided to research this today, and discovered that, according to BBC News, on this very date ‘Ordnance Survey (OS) is celebrating the 80th anniversary of the triangulation pillar, most often known as a “trig pillar” or “trig point” and a welcome sight to many a walker as they reach the peak of their walk.’

That, in fact, was the real reason we dashed out to catch our little pillar in the morning sunshine. The pillar wasn’t going anywhere, but the light, we knew, would change. As will be seen on the link below, OS no longer use these markers for their original purpose, but they remain helpful landmarks. Many also now bear decoration from the general public. What this particular set of graffiti signifies I do not know.

Each pillar bears an identification number.

Most cameras have a tripod mount into which the steadying instrument is screwed. The theodolite, the measuring device used by these early surveyors was clipped to a fitting on the top of the pillar,

here seen in its setting.

For anyone wishing to explore this subject further, I can heartily recommend

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-36036561

which is lavishly illustrated by photographs, both historic and modern.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s succulent and spicy sausage casserole; creamy mashed potato; and crunchy carrots and Brussels sprouts. It is worthy of note that the sausages were Ferndene Farm Shop pork with chilli, which afforded a delicious piquancy. The Cook drank Blanche de Namur and I drank Reserve des Tuguets madiran 2012.

Another View Of Lower Marsh

Jackie drove me to and from New Milton today for my lunch date with Norman at Tas.

On reaching Waterloo, I walked along Station Approach Road, taking steps down to Lower Marsh and back along the lower road to The Cut and Tas. Lower Marsh has featured before, notably in ‘A Beautiful Setting‘, which tells of my earlier knowledge of this thriving little unpretentious London Street of market stalls and cheap eating places, the ethnic origins of which have changed so much since the early 1960s when I spent my Luncheon Vouchers in the cafes.

The approach road is on two levels, and it is possible to look down on one section from the wall in the first photograph above. The right hand section of this picture shows the backs of Lower Marsh buildings.

Others may be seen before descending the steps.

Graffiti is, of course, in evidence.

Inshoku and Steve’s, visible alongside the graffiti in this picture stand side by side, being examples of the indigenous and incoming cuisines. In the bottom right hand corner of the back view can be glimpsed the alley that is Granby Place,

running alongside the Camel & Artichoke,

whose ship of the desert rests high up on the later extension to the Victorian building. The nesting box on the wall is probably an optimistic gesture.

At the corner of Frazier Street lies Greensmiths ‘A local supermarket with a real difference’. Peering through the windows suggests the boast is not in vain.

A barbecue queue still forms in Waterloo Millennium Gardens, the ‘beautiful setting’ of the above linked post.

Norman and I enjoyed our lunch. My choice was a kalamar starter, followed by a tasty sea food casserole, and baklava. We shared a bottle of the house red wine. I needed nothing more after my return home.

It will be apparent from the above photographs that it was a drab morning in an un-beautiful part of London. It was therefore a positive idea of my Driver’s that we should have a look at the sunset at

Barton on Sea,

and across Roger’s field in Downton Lane.

History In The Streets

This morning Aaron continued work on decorating the bathroom. He was somewhat hampered by finding a section of the previous paintwork peeling off plaster that had not been sealed before the pigment was applied.

I scanned another dozen colour slides from the Streets of London series produced in April 2004.

Between Oxford Street and Soho Square in the heart of the West End lies Diadem Court W1. This building on the corner has been enhanced by graffiti. The bar looked closed.

A little further East, off Shaftesbury Avenue, we come to Grape Street, beside the Shaftesbury Theatre where the musical Thoroughly Modern Millie was showing.

Centre Point, the 33 storey office tower block in the background, stands almost directly above Tottenham Court Road tube station. Built for developer Harry Hyams, as a speculative project, the building remained empty from its completion in 1966 until 1975, following the weekend occupation the previous year by a Direct Action housing group. This successfully highlighted the fact that the potential accommodation was being deliberately kept unoccupied while thousands were homeless. It has passed through several ownerships since, and is now used for both offices and residential apartments.

In Holborn, South of Lincoln’s Inn Fields, we come to St Clement’s Lane. I was intrigued by the gentleman seated in the glazed bridge in the middle distance. Space is at a premium, but is that really where he keeps his office?

In Houghton Street, WC2 the paving outside the London School of Economics was being refurbished.

The figure in the niche above this doorway in Serle Street, between Lincoln’s Inn Fields and Temple, is the Catholic Saint, Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor, beheaded by King Henry VIII’s executioner for refusing to take the Act of Supremacy in order to facilitate the sovereign’s divorce from his wife, Catherine of Aragon. The painting is by Hans Holbein the Younger. A copy of this, and another of St John Fisher, hung on the walls of the refectory of Wimbledon College, my Jesuit grammar school.

Bell Yard, WC2 is a little further South.

The Evening Standard placard announcing the return of City Bonuses in Fleet Street, preceded the 2008 crash by four fat years. I’m not sure how the prisoners were treated. Some dogs, of course, are treated better than humans.

Crane Court is off Fleet Street. The All Day Breakfast is now ubiquitous in London, but I doubt if this one

matches that of one off Poppin’s Court. At one time the excellent value cafes in London were the province of Italians, the older generation speaking halting English and the second generation being bilingual in Cockney and Italian. The Eastern Europeans have picked up that particular baton. One such hid around this corner. I often patronised it after a session at Portugal Prints.

Whitefriars Street also runs into Fleet Street. Sir Christopher Wren’s famous St Paul’s Cathedral can be seen in each of these last two pictures. This is what Wikipedia tells us about it:

‘St Paul’s Cathedral, London, is an Anglican cathedral, the seat of the Bishop of London and the mother church of the Diocese of London. It sits on Ludgate Hill at the highest point of the City of London. Its dedication to Paul the Apostle dates back to the original church on this site, founded in AD 604. The present church, dating from the late 17th century, was designed in the English Baroque style by Sir Christopher Wren. Its construction, completed in Wren’s lifetime, was part of a major rebuilding programme in the City after the Great Fire of London.

The cathedral is one of the most famous and most recognisable sights of London. Its dome, framed by the spires of Wren’s City churches, dominated the skyline for 300 years.^[3] At 365 feet (111 m) high, it was the tallest building in London from 1710 to 1962. The dome is among the highest in the world. St Paul’s is the second largest church building in area in the United Kingdom after Liverpool Cathedral.

St Paul’s Cathedral occupies a significant place in the national identity. It is the central subject of much promotional material, as well as of images of the dome surrounded by the smoke and fire of the Blitz. Services held at St Paul’s have included the funerals of Lord Nelson, the Duke of Wellington and Sir Winston Churchill; Jubilee celebrations for Queen Victoria; peace services marking the end of the First and Second World Wars; the wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer, the launch of the Festival of Britain and the thanksgiving services for the Golden Jubilee, the 80th Birthday and the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II.’

Perhaps I should inform the website that it is also the cathedral in which my good friend, The Reverend Norman David Bird, was ordained almost thirty years ago.

Shoe and Bride Lanes, bring us nearer the River Thames. The latter features the transport of the modern London policeman. No set of London photographs should be devoid of scaffolding.

This evening we dined on chicken and bacon pasta bake; crisp carrots, green beans, and Brussels sprouts; and sautéed peppers and onions. I finished the malbec.

Succulent Graffiti

On another rainy day, with me not yet fully recovered, and Ian coming down with the cold, we had to postpone Becky’s birthday meal out. I scanned another batch of Barbados colour slides from May 2004, and Jackie stocked up on tissues and medications.

Cacti were flowering profusely.

I don’t know what this plant is (See Mostly Mondays’ comment below. It is calotropis),

but I do recognise hibiscus,

and bougainvillea which grows everywhere on the island.

Maybe these are breadfruit, (actually coconuts, see PS) but most of the Google images have dimpled skins.

A lone stork stands out from the long grass by the sea,

on the coast of which expensive holiday homes

contrast with the traditional wooden chattel houses.

I was surprised to see a horse lurking in the hedgerow, but have since learned that racing is a popular pastime, dating from the colonial years.

This is possibly a grackle, or a Barbadian Black Bird.

The iridescent blue tinge on the neck of the Zenaida dove is intriguing.

I expect there were plans for this rusting drum.

I have seen graffiti in many forms, but only on Barbados has it been carved into succulents.

This evening Jackie collected our meal from Hordle Chinese Take Away which was as good and as plentiful as usual. My drink was Kumala reserve shiraz 2012; Beccy’s, rose; Jackie’s, Hoegaarden; and Ian’s, Tiger beer.

PS. Following the comments of wolfberryknits and Mary Tang, I have corrected my text to show coconuts for breadfruit.

Stalking The Starling

Queuing to get on the blog this morning were:

This pink rambler that has come through the recent rains somewhat scathed;

the clematis Marie Boisselot;

more alliums, one with a sentinel spider, less than usually reluctant to be noticed. Click to spot it.

By popular request I have returned to the Streets of London Series. I scanned another dozen from April 2004, of which I offer:

Firstly Church Path, NW10, in the London Borough of Brent. St Mary’s Church, dating from 938, has featured in a number of posts, such as that of 15th February 2013, when I found its grounds ‘Surprisingly Picturesque’.

A younger, rather more splendid, church is Saint Pancras Parish Church on Euston Road, NW1. Its website describes what I have photographed, thus:

‘The church is a prominent landmark. Built by public subscription in 1818-22, it replaced the derelict Old St Pancras as Parish Church. Old St Pancras was rebuilt in Victorian times as one of the 17 subdivisions of the Ancient Parish of St Pancras. St Pancras Euston Road is Grade 1listed as a fine example of the Greek Revival style. Its external features, based on temples in ancient Athens, include an octagonal spire and an impressive front portico with 6 huge columns. On either side at the rear are our famous caryatids – statues of Greek women supporting the porches over the two entrances to the crypt. Traditional iron railings enclose the churchyard, where the annual parish picnic and other celebrations are held on the lawns.’

Midland Road NW1, was still closed at the time of the London bombings of 7th July 2005, my 63rd birthday. The whole of Euston Road, and many of the side streets around were cordoned off, and people were pouring out of the underground system, as I took my normal walk from Beauchamp Lodge in Little Venice to North Road, a mile or so behind Kings Cross station. Midland Road is now incorporated into the development area around that station. On the morning of the bombs, oblivious of what was happening, on a forced pedestrian diversion, I came across an assembled swarm of many hundreds of men in the yellow hard hats shown in this picture.

The building against which the construction workers are leaning is the British Library, at 96 Euston Road. Opened in June 1998, its Brutalist architecture, designed by Colin St John Wilson, can be seen to better effect from Ossulston Street, NW1.

The proprietors of M.S.Tyres on the corner of Roundwood Road NW10 find it necessary to batten down the hatches against the ubiquitous graffiti that decorates this area of North London. At least the windows are protected.

It doesn’t matter where you are in our capital city, it is very risky to leave your bicycle unattended. Virtually outside Baker Street tube station leans an example of the skeletal remains that litter many of our streets.

Either from familiarity with my presence, or from a desperation to feed its brood, I was able this afternoon successfully to stalk the parent starling squatting behind our kitchen facia board.. The bird, carrying sustenance, now lands on our roof, a speculative distance from the hidden nest; gingerly makes its way along the eaves; stands on the corner fidgeting and uttering sharp cries, either of warning or encouragement; then drops down and makes a dash for safety.

Watching the poor creature dithering, popping its head down, lifting it up for a quick shufti, and eventually taking the plunge, was fascinating.

The skies were overcast today, but, it seeming to be the season for awards, the sun popped into my e-mails. I have now been nominated for:

Thank you very much, rameshwarir at https://rameshwarir.wordpress.com/page/2/ for nominating me.

You have asked me these rather profound questions, which I answer as follows:

Do you believe that there is someone watching over you, someone you can just feel & not see? I do
What is the purpose of life? As best I can to make other people as happy as I would hope to be
What is the one thing that you would go to or do to relieve your heartaches? I have found it and have no more
What makes you happy? Refer to my answer at 2 above
What do dreams mean to you? Those we experience through sleep are a way of working through timeless issues. In another sense, dreams are what we wish for
What about Nature do you adore? Its constant variety
What is the one element, off the 5, that you would associate yourself with and why? Earth because I like to think I am pretty well grounded
What is your take on birth & death? Birth is an opportunity to begin a good life. Death is a time of reckoning
What have you learnt from Nature? That it is there to be admired; and that we can control none of it
What part of the tree would you associate yourself with? The trunk

In no particular order, my nominees for the award are:

Fox And Finch Antiques

The Contented Crafter

MaxReynolds: Sunrise, Sunset And Other Visions

I will not set you specific questions, but simply invite you to tell us something about yourself as you wish.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s scrumptious chicken jalfrezi with pilau rice topped off by an omelette. Kingfisher was our chosen beverage.

Up For Auction

Yesterday’s mystery print was of a brass steam dome reflecting the rest of its engine.

This morning I watched part of my least favourite television programme. There I was, minding my own business upstairs while Jackie was watching one of her choices, ‘Homes Under The Hammer’, when she called me to come and watch it. Some of my American and continental correspondents have commented about how crazy are the real estate prices in UK. One of the reasons for their escalation is the ‘Buy to Let’ practice which enables people to buy homes specifically for the purpose of renting them out. After the exposure of Peter Rachman’s exploitation of tenants in the 1950s and ’60s, various rent acts have protected tenants, and for a time it was not possible to obtain a mortgage on a property bought for the purpose of letting it. Since the late 1990s, however, the practice has burgeoned.

‘Homes Under The Hammer’, follows the progress of largely neglected dwellings through the auction houses to their refurbishment or demolition and redevelopment of the site. The programme focusses solely on profit, bringing in local estate agents to weigh up the benefits for developers of resale as against rental. Some people, of course, make the improvements to turn dilapidated houses into family homes for themselves. That is a different matter.

‘You’ll never guess what’s in ‘Homes Under The Hammer’, Jackie cried. She was right. I didn’t. But as soon as she told me, I was down the stairs like a shot, pausing only to grab my camera from my desk.

In several posts, including ‘Derelict’, during our time in Morden, I wrote about an uninhabited dwelling. This boarded up house suffered more and more graffiti and vandalism whilst we lived in Links Avenue. Today it featured in the programme, which, following the normal formula, began with the presenter investigating the property on offer.

Normally, the young woman would have toured the inside of the building, but access was denied her by the measures taken to prevent people from sleeping, or worse, in there.

Viewers are the taken to the auction rooms to watch the sale, hyping up the escalating bids and pointing out by how much the guide price has been exceeded. The packed Savills venue demonstrates both the popularity of this method of sale, and the multi-cultural nature of this part of London.

At the end of the proceedings the camera focusses on the successful bidders who are then congratulated by the presenter who discusses their plans with them on site.

The original intention had been to demolish the wreck and replace it by four new attached buildings. After two unsuccessful applications to the Council’s Planning Department, the buyers settled for one larger, more luxurious, dwelling. Letting this out was not in their minds, as they intended to sell what they built.

Allowing a reasonable amount of time to elapse, the film crew return to see what has been achieved. In this case, after two unsuccessful applications to the Council’s Planning Department, who had paid attention to neighbours’ objections, the developers had settled for one larger, more luxurious, dwelling.

Although not yet finished, it was now possible for the filming to take place inside.

This new build has been estimated by local estate agents on completion of the work to be valued at £800,000 – £850,000. I imagine, looking at what’s on offer, my readers from abroad may be rather shocked.

This evening Jackie produced a dinner of succulent Muscovy duck breasts roasted in redcurrant jelly, crisp roast potatoes, and crunchy carrots and cauliflower, with a tasty gravy. I began the excellent 2010 claret from Fortnum and Mason given to us in a hamper by Luci and Wolf for Christmas 2013.