Sunday 29th March, 2020 Woke up unusually late, 7.30, feeling rather seedy. A surfeit of The King’s Ginger more likely than coronavirus. Unlike me, my iPad remembered the UK had changed to British Summer Time.
Category: Local
Coronavirus Chronicle
The Virus in Numbers
185,426 people live in Hammersmith and Fulham. We have 23 cases of Coronavirus; just 0.01%, so far. The BBC website has area by area data. It is also interesting to put the spread of the virus into an international context and Worldometers.info is the place to go. The data is updated daily at midnight UK… Continue reading The Virus in Numbers
Welcome to Dystopia
Rear Window
The story so far. Property developer, Dominvs Group, bought the old Magistrates’ Court on the Talgarth Road. They paid £50 million – nice money, if you have it. The site is between the Ark building to the west and a BP filling station to the east. On the south boundary are the Piccadilly and District… Continue reading Rear Window
Interesting Times
The impact of Storm Ciara in west London was minimal. Almost all the parks were closed on Sunday, one tree and some boughs were brought down in Margravine Cemetery and a tree fell across the towpath on the river. The willow tree threatened with felling in 2018 (see Wind in the Willows) did not shed… Continue reading Interesting Times
A Tale of Two Town Halls
This magnificent building was completed in 1897. It cost £28,000; considered extravagant by its opponents. It fronted onto Brook Green Road and Hammersmith Broadway. It was Hammersmith Town Hall. It was designed in the ornate Italian manner, a style that had been popular for metropolitan municipal architecture since at least the 1860s but which was… Continue reading A Tale of Two Town Halls
Build Bridges
You can call David Cholmondeley, or Rocksavage as his school friends probably still call him*, many things – but never Earl Marshal; not a mistake that Richard Dimbleby would have made. Unfortunately Huw Edwards spent so much time telling BBC TV viewers how Welsh he, Huw, is at the State Opening of Parliament that he… Continue reading Build Bridges
Hop, Skip and Jump
The seasons and the weather change; there’re always new things to see and the river has many moods. Now I talk, sometimes, to other dog owners. Recently I met a Dutch Shepherd puppy with his Swedish/Japanese owners. Overhearing other towpath walkers, I seldom hear English. London, at its best, is a cosmopolitan, civilised place to… Continue reading Hop, Skip and Jump
Ritz Crackers
Christmas Cracker This poem about Anthony Blunt, would have delighted John Julius Norwich; it surely would have been in his Christmas Cracker. Who’d have guessed it? Blunt a traitor And a homosexualist, Carrying on with tar and waiter – There’s a sight I’m glad I missed. It would earn its place because it comes from Harvest… Continue reading Ritz Crackers