The sky looked a bit threatening so took the folding umbrella and bought a one day travelcard against being rained off the Bullingdons. In the event both were unnecessary.
First hop, Waterloo Station 3 to the Hop Exchange and on into the cheese shop. While buying my Poacher, I asked them about the unexpectedly Comté flavour of the stuff I had bought from Totnes (see reference 1), and they gave me a story about different batches of cheese, possibly pasteurised cheese and the fact that they got first choice. Perhaps I ought to buy some real Comté to compare and contrast.
Second hop, from Hop Exchange to Baylis Road, where the Old Vic were very good about changing tickets and interval drinks. All set for the new fixture. See reference 2 for the old fixture.
Third hop, from Baylis Road to Kennington Rail Bridge, firstly to break the journey and secondly to take lunch. Rather than go into a proper place, maybe a touch more diverse, into the Pret under one of the St George Wharf towers, for soup and sandwich. Place pleasant and airy, not too busy for comfort, staff pleasant. Chicken soup not bad for a shop, but with too much flavouring - having been scared off the otherwise attractive pork and lentil ragu by the threat of too much flavouring in a ragu. Why could it not be called a soup? Tuna sandwich fresh, but otherwise ordinary. Too much tuna & goo and too little bread. Overall rating, cheap and cheerful.
Fourth hop, Vauxhall Cross to Falcon Road, without incident. Once again impressed by the arrangements made for cycles to get from the northeastern side of Vauxhall Cross to the south side of Nine Elms Lane. Very cyclist friendly. Certainly to the older cyclist, starting to lose his nerve in heavy traffic at big junctions.
Pleased to find that the Turkish people in Battersea Food & Wine could still do dried figs, Turkish Delight (round pink jobs, covered in what looked like desicated coconut) and flat bread, this last made by some commercial baker in Tottenham. Note that being English, I prefer dried figs to fresh figs, Walls (or Dairy Maid) ice cream to real ice cream and Bird's custard to baked custard. Give me the austerity food of the fifties, the stuff I grew up with!
Pleased also with my record breaking trip. It must be a while since I pulled four Bullingdons in one outing, although I don't suppose the TFL user interface would support an inquiry about that. I would have to flog through the record by hand, assuming that is, that the record remains available.
Did quite well for aeroplanes on the platform at Clapham Junction. A run of threes, then down to ones, then back to twos just before my train came in. Didn't notice any from British Airways, perhaps still in the throes of their power outage. In the course of all of which a platform attendant invited me to move back from the very end of the platform (to where I had moved for a better sky view) and stand closer to my bags, so that they could be sure they belonged to someone. A little officious, but fair enough in the circumstances.
PS 1: not clear either why the shops in Borough Market are still closed (at least that is what the Neal's Yard web site is saying), what forensic is still to be had from the market and the surrounding area, but we have to assume that the authorities know what they are doing. Perhaps it is a mark of respect as much as anything.
PS 2: the British Airways troubles reminded me of a story from the financial sector. Pressure on costs is such that back office functions are cut back to the bone and accidents are just waiting to happen. Accidents, in that case, of the Tesco supply chain accounting inflating their profits. In this case of power supply problems which should just not happen in this day and age, in a mission critical computer system, as this one clearly was for British Airways. The technology is there if you take the time and trouble to install it and, both very important and very tiresome, regularly test it. Perhaps back office middle management had been stretched too thin to attend to such matters. Let's hope that senior management there don't take the easy route of sacking a few more of said middle managers. It won't encourage those who are left!
PS 3: Park Street is a long street, wriggling all the way from London Bridge to Tate Modern. But why is it called Park? Not a bit of green anywhere - but for once our copy of Weinreb & Hibbert's 'London Encyclopaedia' earns its space on our shelves by telling me that Park Street is named for the deer park which was once attached to the Bishop of Winchester's Southwark palace. Bishops clearly did alright for themselves in the olden days, before the days of letting their palaces go for the indigent and the homeless.
Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/holiday-food.html.
Reference 2: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/not-woyzeck.html.
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