trains and buses and swimming pools with cocktail bars

After taking the Cornish Riviera Express back to London, my route to the airport was via the Paddington Express. I didn't have any luggage; for complicated social engagement reasons it had all been taken on ahead and I'd be re-united with it at the airport.

I've driven to LHR thousands of times, but today I was using the public route, so that we didn't end up with two cars to park around the airport.

Perfectly fine, after a 15 minute train ride to the airport, I came out into the sometimes invisible terminal 2.

I navigated the subterranean world of Heathrow to the bus station. I could get a London red bus (in the free Heathrow zone) for the 10 minute ride to the hotel where our other car was parked. I have to admit that this particular end-to-end route was faster than if I'd driven.

Our room had a pretty good view of part of the aircraft taxi-ing area and unsurprisingly the double glazing had around a 15 cm air gap to remove plane noise. Oh yes, and the swimming pool had the essential swim-up cocktail bar.

why does rain after a dry spell create big bubbles on the ground?

Rainfall today, so the grass may start to look less yellow.

After a dry spell, it was a classic day to spot the big surface bubbles that form after a period without much rainfall.

I looked on some nearby asphalt, which, whilst flat, contains plenty of air. When the rain falls the water wants to displace the air, but accumulated oil from cars, soaps and other sources affect the rainwater's surface tension.

So as the water tries to displace the air, it reaches the oily surface water creating the big bubbles.

Ok, for now I smell the rain and it's heading my way.

Ramble On.

Time to enjoy the bass riff and the Les Paul gear changes.

viola cover up until bee bombs surface

When I obtained the bee bombs (which are to start some wild flowers attractive to bees), I originally planted them in these little tin pots, along with a solitary flower.

With green-fingered specialist dead-heading of the expired flowers, there's now a superabundance of bright violas in the pots, although I can also see early signs of the bee bomb plants beginning to fight through.

We shall see.

And if that progress is tentative, around the other side of the house the deliberately wild area seems to be coming along nicely.

overnight spider web

We moved a plant from a windowsill to the kitchen counter top last night. By the morning an enterprising spider had worked out the best angle to fabricate a new web.

I lured the spider from hiding by flicking some water onto the web.

Caught in the act.

a quick stop at the chip shop

Time to get another new windscreen for the car. This is the second replacement. The glass was hit by something small but high velocity a few days ago and made that horrible plink noise that told me there was some proper damage.

When I looked, there was a smallish half moon chip out of the central driver's zone, which made me suspect I'd need a whole replacement glass.

Again.

The last time this happened my car was off the road for about three weeks because the technicians didn't recalibrate all the wizardry of the sensors. There was an endless scrolling of dashboard error messages, bleeps and alarming red lights. The main dealer had to put it right whilst I drove around in a loan car.

This time they rightly said the car would need to go to somewhere that could do the ADAS calibration. Oh yes, that's the Advanced Driver Assist Systems calibrations.

My challenge was finding the special place they told me to visit for this refit. It wasn't at the main dealership and they certainly couldn't do it from home.

It turned out that the map address, Google and other guides all pointed to different places. The special phone number had been replaced as well.

Eventually I managed to get the mobile phone number of the technician who would do the work and he guided me in.

It was one of those industrial areas where there was every make of car showroom from Ferrari to Ford as well as Halfords, KwikFit, and onward to the units that replace gearboxes.

I eventually found the quite smart looking windscreen place. They estimated 90 minutes and I set off on foot to find a coffee shop. When I returned they had one of their mobile repair vans backstage as well as a bunch of other equipment to realign everything.

Sure enough, after around 90 minutes the new structurally significant windscreen was in place and all the sensors were behaving. And I can see through the windscreen in chip-free High Definition again.

a waive of tier haze

Next select the seats on the plane. Travelling business class you'd expect the seats to be selectable from the start? Not any more.

I've dropped from the once heady BA Gold such that nowadays even booking business class requires a surcharge for seat selection. So let's recap.

The descending tiers are Black (Premier), Gold Guest List, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Blue. Different cards and different coloured screens on the iPhone App.

However, does Blue/Bronze require just a few quid extra to pay for reserved seats?

Hardly.

Two outbound seats pre-selected more than 24 hours before the flight in each direction costs a total of how much?

Not £20. Not £50. Not £100.

No, it was £300 on top of the Business ticketing. It could have been even more if I'd gone for the £87 each way seats.

I realised how much I'd been protected with my Executive Club cards, but it still seems a lot to pay on top of premium tickets. Fortunately I still have some of those Avios points and was therefore able to waive the charge. I predict that Norwegian Airlines will take over as my airline of preference.

preparing the travel cubes

Trial packing the suitcase ready for the next trip. I've decided to take the 'big' case instead of my usual smaller rollers.

My usual go-to roller has plenty of compartments and I've pretty much got a system for packing it, and indeed for my even smaller carry-on version. I use Travelpro Crew which has an industrial quality and lasts for years, including many, many flights.

My secret when I use the biggest case is to use packing cubes. It's a similar idea to packing a backpack with inner bags, but for suitcases.

Travelpro even sell them, although I use generic ones which are just as good. My original ones came in a set of 'car luggage' but to be truthful the size and weight of the pieces outweighed their effectiveness. Useful for a business shirt and tie but long ago ditched - even the original shirt folder.

I kept the idea, but replaced the original cubes with something altogether lighter.

And these latest varied sized cubes work well to ensure that everything gets packed and can easily be unloaded as individual blocks into the next hotel room without a muddle. I wouldn't bother with this for a single destination, but as I'll be back on the road these cubes along with a couple of Travelpro inserts create instant organisation.

Om.

insecure wine and a yellow sticker

We could tell we were in a well-heeled part of town when the local supermarket's grab and go wine racks had significant double digit pricing.

Actually some of the free range bottles were up into the hundreds. The behind glass doors seemed to start at around £300.

Although, to be fair, some of the store's ice cream and cous-cous had regular supermarket pricing.

Last night's bottle of Voignier had an altogether different origin, as well as a security sticker applied from the possibly transport-related point of purchase.

Really riled about the Rill?

There's never a dull moment walking around the streets of London. Like some sort of Schroedinger experiment, it's both the same and different at the same time. This time I'm just across Tower Bridge, noticing the rate of change of the landmarks.

It wouldn't be so long ago that the most noticeable landmark in my vista above would have been the Tower of London. Then later it became the adjacent skyline, which includes the Gherkin.

Even that has been supplanted by the range of newer buildings and construction sites.

Across the bridge, on foot a little further along the south bank, there's been the well-known cut into the pavement, known as the Rill.

At least it was until a few days ago. I took some pictures when it was still there in May, although the water that used to run through it had already stopped, as had the water attraction at the river bank end.

Since my picture above it has gone completely, bricked up with slightly uneven stones similar to the ones either side of it.

The reason that has been given is that it constituted a walking hazard, particularly to smartphone users. Regular users of the area are not amused.

Curiously, the Planning Application was only issued on 17 May 2018, and the work was completed even ahead of the approval.

Waved through, without making a splash, one might speculate.

I'm guessing that as a water feature on a busy public realm, it was probably expensive to maintain, so the private landowners of this part of the Thames bank decided to make it go away.

Maybe that More London Riverside needs to be changed.

"Less"?

smashed avocados vs whipped broad bean hummus?

Sometimes its the small things that make a difference.

I know that most of hipsterville is still deciding the best ways to smash avocados and whether toasted sesame mochi ice cream tastes better after a helping of dango, andango and hamami on a stick.

But around here it's the simpler pleasures of whipped broad bean hummus with melba slice and marinated octopus with pickled red pepper and coriander.

To Go?

cats and the fiddle

With my travelling to-and-fro along the river Thames there's plenty of well-known landmarks to pass.

One of the more famous is the Palace of Westminster, although a couple of tourists sitting close to me almost didn't notice it because of the way that the clock tower housing Big Ben is scaffolded at the moment.

The river view makes it easy to see the pleasant revelry of the House of Commons. At around one o'clock there was a bustling set of MPs and visitors enjoying the sunshine and refreshments adjacent to the green side of the terrace. The red terrace of the Lords was less busy and I couldn't help wondering if it was still a trifle early for them?

This riverside view gives an altogether more carefree view than the squabbling that goes on inside the chamber where the latest Brexit pedantry is debated. The rest of Europe seems to have grown tired of Brexit now and the responses from the EU wranglers are increasingly staccato and uncompromising, whilst they worry about their own next big thing.

It seems to be the same now for many of the British public. The debate has moved ever closer to reductio-ad-absurdum tactics and boringly unchanged sound-bites. I can only assume that by the time Brexit finally occurs there will need to be a re-kindling of popular interest in some way.

The 0.7% of public spending used for EU matters may become partially repatriated, but it will still take at least 5 years to offset the termination payments. Not forgetting an ongoing payment to participate in what finally gets agreed.

Recent Maysian statements about NHS budget uplift are far more likely to be paid for by taxation than by some mystical refund from Europe. Although I suppose we'll hear another version by tomorrow, if everyone can tear themselves away from the bars.

Battersea

Around Battersea and time for another update on the Power Station. It is still very much a work in progress, although there's a large chunk of the West Circus open for business now. Plus the Thames Clipper link, which can whisk us into the centre in a few minutes. It's about 2-3 stops to get to Westminster, although care should be taken to catch an R2 when returning, or to risk a turn-around at The Eye.

And theres a walkway at the Power Station end. From the top its possible to see into more of the site as well as along the river towards the new American Embassy.