But first off to the All Bar One in Regent Street, to find it very quiet and without hot water, so we repaired to the Langham Hotel, an establishment with hot water, which is as it should be, with the place claiming to be a London icon, defining the art of the stay since 1865. The place had had a catering refresh since we were last there which meant a different brand of biscuits and no Riesling, at least not by the glass, but the white wine they could provide was perfectly acceptable.
From there to the Wigmore for a lunchtime concert given by the Kungsbacka Piano Trio, with the Schumann Op.80 trio followed by the Ravel A minor. I rather liked the platform manners of the violinist, and her smart red trousers, a style which in a man I might call dungarees, but I dare say that was not what she called them. Along the way we had one loud clank of bow against instrument, the cello falling off its perch on the floor and an Apple electrical score to support the piano part of the encore. An encore which no-one near us was able to pin down, despite various learned suggestions. All very good, a reminder that trios are good.
The only down point being, apart from a head blocking part of my view, that having seats about ten rows back in the right hand aisle meant that the cello was facing away from us, in fact more or less at right angles, which seemed to result in its contribution sometimes getting a bit lost.
Out to Ponti's for lunch in John Prince's Street. All perfectly fine, but we find that they have had a catering refresh too. The tiramisu, for example, was in cocktail glass format rather than in brick format on a plate. We wondered whether the couple who founded the place back in the 60's of the last century have now handed over to offspring, offspring who, like most of us when newly in the chair, want to flex their muscles a bit.
And so down Regent Street where we failed to find any watches of the sort noticed at reference 1, only being able to spend around £10,000 or so. Down to Pall Mall, to mourn the passing of Davidoff, only to realise that we were in the wrong street. Hopefully they are still up and running, should I ever fall for a cigar again.
Inspected the fashion art work (noticed at reference 2) outside Canada House and then pushed on inside to see a small exhibition of work by Rodney Graham, billed as a Canadian Impressionist. Quirky stuff, not high art, but clean, decent and sometimes funny. No dead animals, no blood and guts, no litter or other rubbish. Then today the Guardian features the picture illustrated, apparently showing the closure of a branch of Woolworths in 1947, complete with a portrait of himself reading the news pasted on the windows and his wife walking past.
139 bus back to Waterloo, a rather quicker journey than we expected as the bus was allowed to turn right out of the Strand onto Waterloo Bridge.
The outing closed with our wondering how on earth pilots land their jumbos into the setting sun, which seemed to be what was required towards the end of this March afternoon. Do they just shut their eyes and let the computers do their work?
Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/conspicuous-consumption.html.
Reference 2: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/cheese.html.
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