Category Archives: Uncategorized

Alex Catto is my chiropodist and podiatrist who came up with a new form of insole, which he learned about while attending a conference in Italy.  It was lucky for me that he was my chiropodist. I had tried orthotic insoles from the hospital but they hadn’t helped the pain in my feet.  I only […]

I recently read a short paragraph on a YouGov survey mentioned in the newspaper, which said of the 15,000 people questioned, 60% would have liked to make their living as a writer and the second most popular choice (53%) was being a librarian, followed by being an academic.  I wondered how the sample of people […]

We had a rendezvous planned with a friend in Kew Gardens on the 2nd January.  Waiting for the North London Overground train to arrive at Kew Gardens station, we explored the triangular enclave of interesting shops.  A bookshop, a guitar and music shop, a butcher, greengrocer and hairdresser.  Inviting looking cafés, restaurants and the inevitable […]

Welcome to my Lycian coast travelogue.  Unlike most of my ‘blogs’ to date it has over 13,000 words and almost 300 photographs.  So it’s a bit longer than usual …  but with computers you can just skate through it at top speed.  I’ve really enjoyed putting it together and I hope you will like looking […]

This was an historic event, since it’s taken us many months to make our invitation to Forest Row happen.  The sun was shining after a miserable week of damp weather and I felt a flush of excitement and relief to leave the incessant routine of city life.  We don’t have satnav but I love maps […]

It was still dark when I left the house. As I turned the corner a young fox, looking like a two dimensional angular cartoon character, leaped out in a wide arc from behind a car and melted into the shadows. I had been tempted to take a taxi to the Eurostar but as I walked […]

Tonight it was supper for one. There were a few new potatoes left over from dinner last night. I fried two red onions with garlic and a courgette, chopped fine, with the potatoes. Then I cut up half a large cabbage to steam it. Supper for oneself means not having to worry about anyone elses’s […]

The mellow warmth of a late September sun, which somehow illuminates everything in such sharp detail. There’s the feeling of time slowing down, encouraging a companionable silence. We made our way through the spinney, then down past the small pond, before climbing up the bracken covered slope towards Pen Ponds. In the long grass we […]

The new complex of Kings Cross, St. Pancras and the Eurostar is a marvellous transformation. Industrial Victoriana heralded a new, wealthy age for Britain but also one where pollution belched from chimneys, covering buildings in coal fired black grime and contributing to poor health, as people were drawn to cities for work. Beautiful, high quality […]

Butterflies have been few and far between in our London garden this year. A few cabbage whites, which have the disadvantage of ruining your cabbages but otherwise, only a small blue one from time to time. They are too fast to photograph. Just a flash against the blue of the sky and they’re gone. We […]