A fortnight in pictures

Exhausted, horribly hungover and deliberating some big decisions today.

Therefore I give you a short picture update, an apology for my recent absence and a promise to do better.

Book shelf below seen at Terence Conrad shop - I just adore it.

Other than that a sample of what I have been consuming over the last few days, including a meal at my beloved Grand Bazaar.

Sweet London

Quite pleased with how this picture of the Coliseum taken late night a few weeks ago came out. I was headed towards the fourth plinth at the time to see a woman parading about on a toy horse (I didn't know this before I got there...and if I had may have resisted my detour)

Must remember to take more pictures of the classic London buildings which I resist doing as so many beautiful images are in existence. But they are not mine, and I admit it is quite nice to have an image all of my own.

Preparing

The past week and weekend has been spent preparing for my 2 week trip to Rimini. As such I have spent it:

• Twittering the Rimini tourist board for a daily weather report (the BBC says rain for the next 5 days - not happy at all)
• Purchasing excessive amount of sun cream (25 for day 1, 15 for first week and 10 for second week). So far I have spent £35 on sun cream. Perhaps someone should suggest to our Health Secretary that it may be advisable to subsidise the price of sun cream and as such decrease the colossal amount the NHS pay every year to treat those with skin cancer.
• Spending a hot Sunday inside the Westfield centre buying sandals and satin shirts and white shorts with floral detail.
• Catching up with friends I haven't seen for a while. This included: eating and drinking at Andrew Edmunds on Lexington St, getting snap happy as my friend danced the Lambada, having a delicious salad and wine from a Starbucks plastic cup in Queen's Park, sitting outside the Sun in Splendour in Notting Hill and drinking white wine spritzers.

I saw these 3 cats prowling outside a flat opposite mine as I stumbled home the other night. I love how their eyes glow as they watch me pass.

A quiet weekend

So far this weekend has consisted of; muggy heat, recipe reading, lemonade, cooking new things, an enormous storm, catching up on sleep, having my favourite bag pummelled by hail stones (as I stupidly left my window open in the storm), cleaning, washing, ironing and replacing thick, heavy duvets with thin, cool sheets and a lot of dancing around the Michael Jackson songs in tribute to the great man.

We also had one of those amazing experiences you hope for in a city as big as London. Wandering through Liberty on Thursday evening we met two of the most charming and stylish Parisians. They ran a section of the shop where there are 3 large canisters, big enough to stand in, which are actually tunnels to sample perfume. The company is called Editions de Parfums, and my basic understanding is that they invited the top Perfumers in the world and asked them to make their dream perfume regardless of cost or restrictions or others peoples opinion or ideas. To sample the perfume they put a couple of spritzes in a canister and you put your head in, close your eyes and are giving a rundown of what you are smelling by one of the staff. They both have the most beautiful voices, and it is more pleasurable than I imagined being lulled into an almost hypnotised state by the dulcit tones of a beautiful Parisian man running you through what your senses are experiencing.

We spent a while talking to the store manager Peggy and her colleague and got a recommendation for a place in Soho we had never heard of. Unbelievable for us all knowing Londoners. The place is called Bob Bob Ricard and in a strange coincidence Susie Bubble also mentioned it on her blog yesterday. Apparently it is wonderfully French, and it was recommended as somewhere to go to wile away a few hours without the pressure to drink. Both of them commented on how shocked they were to come to London and realise there really were not many places you could go in the evening in London where drinking was not the main activity. I agree with them, and I am looking forward to visiting Bob Bob Ricard soon.

The real London

On my 2 hour walk home from work this week I headed to Regent's Canal, and walked from City Road in East London all the way along heading North through Islington, on to King's Cross and then ending up in Camden. I could have headed on to Warwick Avenue and home to Maida Vale, but I met the boy and hopped on the bus to meet friends for dinner, by that point by feet were aching due to fairly impractical shoes.

I am going to try and do this walk more often as I find the tube is so hot and uncomfortable in summer and I am too much of a wimp to cycle.

I had never explored the East end of the canal, and I was so amazed when I reached it to find the City Road basin where kids were canoeing and swimming, workers had gathered with cold beers in ice buckets and a group of barges gathered to enjoy the evening sun. I walked on to Islington where I made a detour to the high street and found the amazing pound store where I discovered the incredible knick knacks pictured above. 

I then returned to the canal where I snapped the couple standing, in what seemed like Victorian dress, on a bridge over a lock. You will notice the Eurostar going past, a nice little moment of old meets new I felt! It turned out the couple were street performers, and there were a group of people following them along the path as they played out their scenes. There was a violinist playing woeful music to accompany their sad tale. I wanted to follow too, but I had to get to dinner as quickly as I could.

On to Camden, and a gathering of punks and goths in a large gathering by the canal. Everyone I saw was just lapping up the sun, enjoying the warm evening and loving the free outside space. It felt like one of those insider secrets, while everyone else was heading to the beer gardens of London early, and desperately scouring the place for a seat, those in the know headed to the best outside space in London.

 

Hot hot heat

This weekend the temperature in London rose to 25c. So for now it is goodbye to 40 denier tights and thick cotton leggings and hello to sandals, bikinis and sarongs.

It was finally hot enough to wear my new Insight panda print dress and on Saturday morning I sat on the balcony and devoured half of The Amber Spyglass, (although I am now dreading the end as it means saying goodbye to Lyra and Iorek and Serafina and Will and Lee forever).

Saturday afternoon was spent on my dear friend Katy's roof terrace in Covent Garden where we barbecued burgers and forgot to brainstorm business ideas.

Saturday night was the BIG FINAL and although I was bitterly disappointed that my much loved Stavros Flatley (a father and son dance team who made mum and I laugh until we cried) didn't win, I was most impressed by the dancers who did.

Sunday; more barbecue, more sun and the growth of a deep sense of relaxation which caused me much distress when the alarm went off at 7am this morning.

Oh, to be beside the seaside

These pictures were taken in Whistand Bay, Cornwall, one of my favourite places in the world. The beach is reached by driving along steep cliffs and along windy Cornish roads and then by an almost diagonal slope down to the sand. 

If you're lucky enough to have grown up near to this beach then you will also know about the amazing path that creeps along beside the hidden beach huts - some of the only residential beach huts in the UK. They are like something about of a dream, or the lovely shire of the Hobbits in the Lord of the Rings.  

When I was working as a researcher for a TV company, I had to hunt out some of the owners of these huts for a feature on waterside living. One day I knocked on the door of a couple who had just come home with their day old baby. They welcomed me with open arms (we'd never met!) and we all sat shellshocked, chatting together and watching the sun setting over the sea. I made tea, heating water in a black pot on top of their little stove and drinking sweet tea out of white tin mugs. 

I dream of living in one of these huts, waking with the rising sun and spending my day tending to the fuchsias and sweet williams in the garden. 

Yet I would miss the busy pulse of London..the traffic of Old St, the smells of the market on Whitecross St, the aggressive elbows that greet me on Oxford Circus, the rainbow of colours on Colombia Rd, the coffee on Monmouth St, the luscious greens and community of strangers in Queens Park and most of all the friends who have foolishly chosen to allow me to adopt them as my surrogate family in this foreign city.