From Belmont, my Hereford home, to The Blogger’s Retreat, central London, is 145 miles. Lunch is at 12.30 so I rise at 06.40 rather than 09.00. I’m angry I didn’t prepare things and thus avoid disrupting Mrs BB who may or may not be asleep. Picking up keys noiselessly from the table is impossible.
A cold dawn. I snap the 75 bus but, worried the driver might think I’m a time and motion spy, or a copper’s nark, I explain the camera. More shots in Hereford’s deserted centre because of the stillness. Time for a warming Americano at the station buffet where I’m asked if I want milk. Wouldn’t be an Americano.
Low-level winter sun hinders reading The Guardian on the two-carriage diesel out of Hereford in which the loudspeakers pronounce Cymbran with Welsh punctilio. At Newport a moment of uncertainty boarding the London Paddington train (ie, going east) minutes after a Manchester Piccadilly train (ie, going north) has left from the same platform.
A socially disdavantaged man at Didcot Parkway is taking train numbers. In my extreme youth I did that.
The last leg, by bus, is about three miles and I’ve ninety minutes in hand. But it isn’t enough. Students are revolting. I leave the bus in Regent Street, cut through Soho, cross Leicester Square, pass St Martins-in-the-Fields and jog along The Strand. Five minutes late! But then there’s champagne, chicken korma and a world of talk.
ANTHEM
Tune: Onward Christian Soldiers
Linked by broadband magic
Oz to Prague and back
Famous for erratic
Service, curries, craic*
As to conversation
It’s the tops my dears
Nation speaks to nation
Drenched in Asian beers
Bloggers seeking respite
Join in the elite
Exercise your blog-right
Lunch at The Retreat.
*Craic is Irish - a state of happy stimulation
A cold dawn. I snap the 75 bus but, worried the driver might think I’m a time and motion spy, or a copper’s nark, I explain the camera. More shots in Hereford’s deserted centre because of the stillness. Time for a warming Americano at the station buffet where I’m asked if I want milk. Wouldn’t be an Americano.
Low-level winter sun hinders reading The Guardian on the two-carriage diesel out of Hereford in which the loudspeakers pronounce Cymbran with Welsh punctilio. At Newport a moment of uncertainty boarding the London Paddington train (ie, going east) minutes after a Manchester Piccadilly train (ie, going north) has left from the same platform.
A socially disdavantaged man at Didcot Parkway is taking train numbers. In my extreme youth I did that.
The last leg, by bus, is about three miles and I’ve ninety minutes in hand. But it isn’t enough. Students are revolting. I leave the bus in Regent Street, cut through Soho, cross Leicester Square, pass St Martins-in-the-Fields and jog along The Strand. Five minutes late! But then there’s champagne, chicken korma and a world of talk.
ANTHEM
Tune: Onward Christian Soldiers
Linked by broadband magic
Oz to Prague and back
Famous for erratic
Service, curries, craic*
As to conversation
It’s the tops my dears
Nation speaks to nation
Drenched in Asian beers
Bloggers seeking respite
Join in the elite
Exercise your blog-right
Lunch at The Retreat.
*Craic is Irish - a state of happy stimulation
