When the sun came out for a day or two last week, there was (unlike today's grey cold and damp) every encouragement to go for a stroll down the river to the Island Gardens and its café. 

It used to be a utilitarian brick shed, so utilitarian as to be easily mistaken, from a distance, for a disused air raid shelter or public lavatory, although it was apparently built in 1980. Eventually the construcrion turned out to be failing, and someone in the Town Hall decided it needed a complete rebuild. Quite some time and the best part of a million pounds later (from the money property developers elsewhere in tbe borough have to pay up for local improvements), we have a very smart Rotunda, with wrap-around windows - essential for giving customers the best panoramic view of the historic buildings of maritime Greenwich.

7227!

Saturday morning, and all organised (for once), computer set up and open at the Albert Hall booking page, ready for opening time to buy tickets for BBC Proms concerts. The clock ticked down the minutes and seconds to 9am - and as it ticked over, up came my position in the queue, randomly allocated (as to everyone else sitting waiting) - yes, it did say 7227.

How many people might be allocated spaces further back, who knows, but when I stupidly managed to open another site in the same window, I'd slipped to 7905 by the time I got back again. That'll teach me.

The people ahead of me were getting through at quite a rate, but even so, an hour or more's wait.... Still, better than queueing on the day for the standing tickets - those days are well behind me now. And I suppose it's worse for the fans of many a big pop performer.

Another day, another museum

 
On my list of places to visit for some years - Strawberry Hill House, a Gothic fantasy of Horace Walpole, politician (his father was our first and longest-serving Prime Minister), writer (he wrote the first Gothic novel and invented the word "serendipity"), connoisseur and collector. 

Surrounded now by the affluent commuter suburb of Strawberry Hill and its comfortable villas from the later 19th and early 20th century, and a university, the house when built was a summer rural retreat from London, with open views down to the Thames. 

Its design and decoration draw on mediaeval inspiration, but it has a lighter feel than the later idea of hefty Victorian Gothic we're much more familiar with, such as St Pancras station: painted wood, plaster and papier maché rather than solid stone and brick.

Starting in the hallway and stair case:

with its skylight drawing the eye to Tudor-style chimneys:

and its stained glass - some re-created as part of more recent restorations, but this Dutch picture of the prodigal son looks convincingly old:

the stairs take one up to the library (plenty of papier maché finials here):

and on to the gallery - Walpole's original collections were largely dispersed over subsequent generations, but suitable copies and replacements give the idea:

The vaulting is of course purely decorative:

Moving on and up, the more private rooms come next - a room intended to give the feel of a mediaeval chapel, though decorated with kings and queens and their heraldic badges, rather than saints and Bible stories:

and on up to Walpole's own bedroom, with windows designed to make the most of the then river view and plenty of fresh air:

And one last domestic item - this bowl was used to keep goldfish in, but sadly proved too tempting to Walpole's cat - it fell in and drowned.

Those election results

In a London-wide election for a single post, where the winner ends up with a personal mandate of nearly two million votes, even the tiny percentages for the also-rans look like respectable totals. So the various independents and groupuscules ended up with votes in the tens of thousands. 

But at least the (let's be tactful) farthest right candidate came second to bottom, some 3700 votes short of Count Binface.

Seen around town

Spitalfields

 

Soho

From the Department of Wouldn't You Just Know It

It appears that our not-so-Beloved Former Mayor and Prime Minister turned up to vote without photoID, the requirement for which was put through Parliament by his own government

This must be my week for being prompted by other people's blogs. Way back in January, Urspo referred to the idea floating around the internet about men's thoughts on the Roman Empire. I can't say I have many, although I went to the kind of grammar school that gave you plenty of Latin (and a low tolerance level for bloody Caesar throwing yet another bridge across yet another river), but seeing that the British Museum had an exhibition on life in the Roman army, it would be foolish not to see it.

Another daunting queue to get up to the security check, though having a timed ticket for the special exhibition got me priority (and when I came out - around noon - there was no queue at all, for whatever that tells you). Once inside, though there was plenty of room for everyone, and separate children's activities which kept the visiting primary school party busy away from the rest of us. 

 There were a few items I have actusally seen before on a visit to Vindolanda - leather shoes and sandals, and some writing tablets (what sounded like the equivalent of the "Colonel's lady" inviting a friend to a birthday party, and a list of supplies to be ordered) but so much more, about recruitment (pretty selective, and it helped to have contacts: also, soldiers had to provide their own arms and armour), training (tough), living conditions (also pretty tough if you were on campaign), health (tricky - disease and poor food were all too common), leisure, and the prospects of survival into retirement rewards (citizenship and pensions). Some of that might not be too different from almost any military, though presumably the Romams were the first that we can see how they systematised it all.

Not the kind of shield the ordinary soldier could afford

Not Mussolini but a military standard featuring the Emperor Galba -
until he met the same fate as Il Duce

Another standard - the "dragon" which also made what was supposed to be a fearsome sound

On campaign: constantly pitching and striking camp with tents made of goatskin and wooden tent pegs

On campaign, poor hygiene and disease were a recurrent problem - here's a portable medicine box

No qualms about enslaving their prisoners (if they took any), or about glorying in booty

Leisure time - gambling (of course) but to prevent cheating the black box is designed to randomise the casting of dice

Opportunities for fun for kids of all ages

It only takes a day or two of warmth and sunshine and suddenly all the trees in the neighbourhood seem to have woken up together. This ceanothus has been there as long as I can remember, and has obviously had a tidy-up there used to be branches hanging down a lot lower.

Always something new to look at up at Canary Wharf - currently a promotion for Guide Dogs for the Blind

Spring keeps on springing

As ever, the naturalised bulbs in St Anne's churchyard, in Limehouse, put out a brave display.

Comeback

Most of the developments round here have plenty of hardy shrubs along the street frontage. One was getting particularly overgrown, and had a radical, even brutal haircut in the autumn (on the principle, no doubt, that managing plants means sometimes being cruel to be kind). Most of them are rather dull, but this one has bounced back with one of the earliest spring flowers (already!):

Meanwhile, a few streets away, on an equally blank spot that gets full sun (when there is any), there's a snowdrop out. Spring is on its way.

Not so enthusiastic

 Random street art pops up just about anywhere

Now, there's enthusiasm...

 

En route to an appointment at the Palace (all right, a visit to the new exhibition at the Queen's Gallery), one doesn't expect this sort of wildlife in Green Park:

Further on, there was a large herd:

and they appeared to be heading towards the Palace:

The head of the herd was calling, far far away, so Nellie and her chums plodded on:

It turns out that this is only one of several such herds across London, promoting an elephant conservation charity. Close up, one can see that each has been made of plant stems, an immense amount of skilled craftsmanship. 

As indeed was the Queen's Gallery exhibition - paintings usually seen (if you get to visit the State Rooms in the Palace) hung close together in several ranks, as used to be the show-off fashion. Refurbishing the Picture Gallery provided the opportunity to spread them out through three rooms, hung at eye level, and with time-slot admission allowing plenty of space for everyone to spend some time looking at close detail, helped along by the audio guide pointing out various technical details I wouldn't have known to look for.

Jolly jaunts far afield still being off the agenda for the foreseeable, it's a nice change* to have something different in the area to look at - in this case, Canary Wharf's set of winter light installations:

*It's the first time I've been out after dark in I can't remember how long.

It's on its way

It's sleeting outside today, but yesterday , the muddy grass in the park was brightened up by the first spring flowers.

Autumn on the way

 Temperatures down from over 30C a couple of weeks ago to under 20, rain and wind, and bright orange hips on the wild roses on the Mudchute. It all points one way. 

Mystery with a cherry on top

Not for the first time, a cycle ride home was interrupted by something going on in Trafalgar Square. The new commission for the Fourth Plinth has been installed, but until the unveiling the wrapping invites some speculation. Until you bother to look it up, in which case all is explained here.

To save the bother of clicking:

This sculpture attempts to address the specific physical context of the square, whilst considering a broader ideological one. How do we negotiate congregation, the intimacy of personal experience, broadcast and surveillance in one space? THE END represents exuberance and unease. Topped with a giant, unstable load, the plinth becomes a monument to hubris and impending collapse. The surrounding architecture and its population are participants in a mis-scaled landscape, one that magnifies the banal, and our cohabitation with other lifeforms, to apocalyptic proportions.

Well. if you say so.

And what will be revealed when all that fabric is removed? 

Hair today

..and gone today as well. It really was getting to be a nuisance trying to keep it all tidy (and that bald spot was a bit of a surprise).

It all felt rather adventurous to be going back to the mundane habits of months ago: a bike ride up to central London, a haircut, coffee and a bun sitting down at a café and lunch sitting down in another, and reading the paper over a pint in a pub. All suitably distanced, of course: waiting to be seated in solitary state, ordering up via a phone app, and registering the location (just in case someone else who was there bothered both to do likewise and to report symptoms of You Know What). And just to underline the occasion, there were a fair few reporters and cameramen recording reactions as some streets were pedestrianised to allow the restaurants to take over the roadway as well as the pavement.

But it wasn't all self-indulgence. Biking into a headwind that wasn't tempered to this shorn lamb must have worked off a few calories,

Permitted exercise

Before the "stay at home" instructions I was just starting to put together a list of places to visit, up and down the country: the lockdown put that on hold, though it hasn't meant staying entirely behind locked doors. Fortunately there are places on the doorstep to walk to and around - along the riverside path, or through the local parks. Entering Millwall Park from the south, it looks like a mixture of conventional city park and playing field, though the areas of play equipment for children and outdoor gym for adults is fenced off. But on the other side of the playing fields, there's a rising slope covered in trees and bushes.

That rising ground and greenery has the unglamorous name of the Mudchute - because that's what it is. The built-up berms or embankments formed settling ponds for the mud pumped out when the dock just the other side of the road and railway line was dredged out. Through the gate and up on to the pathways, and with a little imagination, that industrial beginning has now almost become countryside. With the near-disappearance of road and air traffic in the lockdown, it's certainly quiet enough. 

Apparently it took decades for the sludge to settle safely enough to be walked on, but settle it did, though there are clearly enough reserves of water to keep the trees and bushes green in the long dry sunny spell we've been having.

It looks as though someone has been setting up their home office here while the good weather was on - and the bees never stop working, of course:

Back in the First World War, allotments were set up here for local people to grown their own fruit and veg, and are still in productive use:

But allotments and open space are not the whole story, nor are bees the only livestock, for most of the space is devoted to the city farm, and those open spaces would normally have a range of animals out in the fields. With the lockdown making riding lessons and school group visits impossible,  most of the large animals seem to have been moved elsewhere, or confined to pens inaccessible to visitors, even from a pathway,  though there are sheep, goats and llamas in their usual pens (and the sheep put to work to replace expensive human mowers in different fields), and a pair of donkeys in the stables. The signs of the farm's educational mission are still everywhere, with plenty of warning notices about what to do and not do around or near the animals.

The café is of course closed, and one can only admire the roses from outside. The pigs don't much seem to care.

The pens for the pigs and some of the other animals are concrete structures that appear to be old emplacements for anti-aircraft guns from the World War II, and some years ago one was restored and an example of the original guns brought in as a historical display. This part of London was badly battered, though you wouldn't think it now.