When Londoners need to get from one place to another they have a variety of tools at their fingertips. A flick through the A-Z, perhaps, or a glance at the tube map. For more complicated journeys there's the Journey Planner website, a clever online tool (if a little on the dumb side). It may not always give you the quickest route but it'll give you times, connections, maps, fares and alternative options, and it's extremely useful if you ever want to know roughly how long it might take to reach somewhere unfamiliar on the other side of town.
Planning journeys further afield within the UK hasn't always been so easy. You've had to consult a roadatlas, request a route plan from the AA, pick up a local bus timetable, log into the ropey National Rail timetable site or use Google to try to uncover exactly which ferry operator it is that sails to the Scottish islands. Well, now all that information and more has been brought together on a new website called Transport Direct. Not only can you plan journeys across the whole of Great Britain but you can also see a map of where you're going and check out where the delays are likely to be along the way. I am impressed. Again it's not perfect, and it's only in beta-testing mode at the moment, but it's a fascinating tool that can help you to explore the country or just find the next bus down to the shops.
I thought I'd test the site out on a variety of journeys, all departing at 7am this morning: • Bow to Stonehenge: If I left now I could be admiring the stones before 11am (via the number 3 bus from Salisbury station)
• Northampton to Southampton: Either 3 hours by train or 2½ hours by car (47-stage road journey provided)
• Newcastle Upon Tyne to Newcastle Under Lyme: That's four trains and a bus, via York and Manchester, arriving by 11:15am
• My parents' house to the nearest library: Apparently this can't be done by public transport, which isn't true, so there's at least one Norfolk bus route that isn't in the database.
• St David's (Wales) to St Andrew's (Scotland): A bizarre (and impossible) route which involves walking across the Irish Sea in five minutes flat, twice.
(so, that's 3 passes and 2 fails)
And here's one ultimate end-to-end journey to test the system to breaking point: 07:00 Land's End: extremely long wait for next bus
14:20 Land's End: number 345 bus to Penzance, (arrives 15:30, plenty of time to go shopping)
17:30 Penzance: train to Bristol (arrives 21:32)
21:46 Bristol Temple Meads: train to Birmingham, (arrives 23:39)
00:10 (tomorrow) Birmingham New Street: train to Coventry (arrives 00:33)
01:05 Coventry: coach 240 to Sheffield (arrives 03:20, time for quick nap on bench)
05:29 Sheffield: train to Doncaster (arrives 06:07, followed by a very tight change)
06:15 Doncaster: train to Edinburgh (arrives 09:17)
09:30 Edinburgh: coach 997 to Inverness (arrives 13:50)
14:00 Inverness: coach 958 to Wick (arrives 16:55)
17:30 Wick: bus 73 to John O'Groats(arrives 18:10 Friday)
It's good to that know it's actually possible to get from the tip of Cornwall to the top of Scotland by public transport, even if it takes a day and a half to do so. However, the website doesn't seem to have chosen a very sensible route (the first half in particular) and I hate to think how much the whole journey would cost too. It's almost certainly cheaper (and 12 hours quicker) to buy a car and drive from Land's End to John O'Groats instead. Alas, it seems that computers still aren't very good at finding the perfect solution to an extremely complicated problem involving time and space. But they're getting there... and now so can you.
One of my favourite sections of Private Eye is Pseuds Corner, in which various choice titbits of textual over-importance are held up to national ridicule. There's clever writing and there's overblown tosh, and sometimes the border between the two can be very thin. I have a particular dislike of the people who write pompous notes to accompany classical music ("The flute melody is accompanied by gentle, unobtrusive semiquavers, retaining the tranquility of the movement while fleshing out the score with a particularly romantic view of sonority.") I loathe reviews of literature that pontificate in depth about themes which the authors almost certainly never put there in the first place. ("The abandonment of metaphysical foundations establishes the context of Murdoch's particular interest in existentialism, and the essential Nietzschean assertion that modern man is trapped by a process of imagined self-determination.") But I reserve my deepest hatred for the art critic.
(before continuing please click here to take a look at a piece of art, thankyou)
If you pick up a free London Underground map this autumn you'll see that the front cover features a specially-commissioned piece of art by EmmaKay entitled You Are in London. Essentially it's 12 concentric rings, each the colour of a different tube line. I like it, it's simple, clever and effective. However, Transport for London have let an art critic loose on reviewing it, and the result is pure bollocks.
(before continuing please click here to read a pile of crap, thankyou)
It takes particular skill, or bravado, to waffle so effusively about so little. It takes an unlikely leap of faith to suggest that the target motif "playfully combines the Tube line colours with art historical references, graphic design and our collective memory". And it takes a complete jerk to describe a few coloured rings as "compelling", "deceptive" or a "memory audit". When wandering around art galleries I often have to refrain from gasping out loud at the utter drivel that art critics have written about the works on display. Can't they just shut up and let us read what we want into the images that we see? "12 rings, nice." Much better. (I'm glad to see this morning that Annie agrees with me too).
Of course, there's a far better work of art to be found on the Underground map leaflet, and that's the map itself. For those of you who are interested (and I suspect that's most of you) the BBC are screening a 30 minute documentary tomorrow (BBC2, 7:30pm Thursday) about the history of the map and its creator, Harry Beck. His sublime topological distortion transformed society's mindscape to reduce London's amorphous physical environment to an interconnected psychogeographical clarity. It's bloody clever, too.
20 years ago computer games were very different to the slick violent action games we have today. Graphics, if there were any, were sparse and chunky. There were no handsets with special buttons to press, you just hammered your spacebar to jump and used Z and X for left and right. With only a few kilobytes of memory available, gamesdesigners were forced to concentrate on playability instead of special effects. This meant that many of the games were ten times better to play than they actually looked, which is the exact opposite of most of the £40 no-brainers released today. One particularly basic example of the genre was the text adventure, which normally went something like this:
YOU ARE STANDING OUTSIDE A SMALL CAVE.
ON THE GROUND IS A GOLD COIN.
THE SILENT KNIGHT BLOCKS YOUR WAY.
PATHS LEAD NORTH, SOUTH AND WEST.
>
The cursor would flash at you, expectantly, waiting for you to type your next instruction. Vocabulary was rather limited so it was important to type exactly the right words - for example take coin instead of pick coin (SORRY I DON'T KNOW HOW TO 'PICK'). You also had to try follow the twisted logic of the game designer, so it could ages to try to work out which of the many game objects you needed to use in a certain situation and precisely how to use it.
> enter cave
THE SILENT KNIGHT BLOCKS YOUR WAY
> talk to knight
THE SILENT KNIGHT BLOCKS YOUR WAY
> kick knight
THE SILENT KNIGHT BLOCKS YOUR WAY
> scream
THE SILENT KNIGHT BLOCKS YOUR WAY
> give obscure-artefact-I-picked-up-three-rooms-back
THE SILENT KNIGHT SAYS "THANK YOU" AND STANDS ASIDE
> enter cave
Sometimes the puzzles were so difficult that you'd get stuck in the second room and give up on the entire game, unable to proceed any further. There was no internet on which to look up the answers in those days, just playground gossip and various 'cheats' printed in monthly magazines, but it always felt good to complete even one part of the puzzle unaided without resorting to any of the above. Memorable text adventure games of the era included Zork, Philosopher's Quest, Granny's Garden (still selling well after 21 years) and the surprisingly good L - A Mathematical Adventure.
> follow abbot
And now one of the all-time greats has been resurrected to celebrate the launch of the third series of the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. The BBC website is playing host to a 21st century version of Douglas Adams' classic text adventure, a game which sold a third of a million copies back in 1984 (probably on ropey cassette tape) but which you can now play online for free. The plot is twisted (but always just-about logical) and it certainly helps to know something of the storyline of the original series. Douglas described the game as "user-mendacious", which means that you tend to die quite frequently, but at least in such circumstances you can restart and try again. Highly improbable, but not impossible.
> give sandwich to dog
The dog is deeply moved. With powerful sweeps of its tail it indicates that it regards this cheese sandwich as one of the great cheese sandwiches. Nine out of ten pet owners could happen by at this point expressing any preference they pleased, but this dog would spurn both them and all their tins. This is a dog which has met its main sandwich. It eats with passion, and ignores a passing microscopic space fleet.
The game is here, there are some hints here, and there's plenty of time to play while you wait for episode 2 of the latest series on Radio 4 tonight. You might even want to load my saved game to see if you can advance the position a bit... > restore > dgeezer
Have you seen what that has said now? I couldn't believe it when I it in my favourite . It's so ! How could anyone believe this ? The guy is ! I, however, am . I understand this particular issue better than everyone else. Everyone else is . How could anyone support this point of view? Well, apart from the usual crowd of . Our is clearly under very serious threat. I know that you agree with me, dear reader. No sane person could disagree, could they? Now read on, as I about this issue, just like I did ...
6 for Sunday • Touch Graph - see webpage connections in graphical form, and which other blogs are most associated to your own (via Blue Witch)
• The Number 1 Lyrics Site - lyrics to every one of the nearly-1000 Number 1 UK hit singles since 1952.
• Test your pop-up blocker - how many pop-up ads can your browser stop? (Firefox performs brilliantly)
• The Invisibility Game - can you weave your invisible cursor through each maze without touching the sides? (via Madness Temple)
• Wordcounter - a useful tool to help authors spot if, of course, basically, however, there are any words they use far too often.
• The Open Guide To London - an in-depth, and ever-growing, wiki guide to the capital.
Smoke#4 My favourite1 pocket-sized2 London magazine is out in the shops3 again and available for you to buy4. It's the usual5 eclectic mix of words6, photos7 and graphic art8. There are fine articles on South Bank skateboarding, Beckton Alp9, Brixton Market, secret tunnels under Holborn9, the bins of Pimlico, Zoffany Street9, cottaging and the Ruislip Lido railway10. Buy a copy now4.
1 Actually it's the only pocket-sized London magazine I can think of.
2 Depends on the size of your pocket, of course. Definitely handbag-sized.
3 Only certain shops though. You can find a list of stockists here.
4 But only if you live in London. Sorry, not much use to the rest of you.
5 If something can be 'usual' after just three previous editions.
6 Mostly great stuff, but some of it attempts to be too clever and fails.
7 Ah, it's amazing how good London looks close up in black and white.
8 Not a lot of graphic art though, but the photos more than make up for it.
9 I wrote about this first, you know.
10 And many many more.
I've been commuting from Bow Road to Holborn instead of Piccadilly for all of three weeks now. Already I appear to have the journey sorted, knowing where to go and where to stand in order to be first up the escalator at the end of the journey. I succeded by miles yesterday, with hundreds of other less able Holborn commuters trailing in my wake. So today I thought I'd offload everything I've learnt about the new tube journey in case any other Bow-to-Holborn commuter should one day find it useful.
London Commuter Handbook: no 6904: Bow Road to Holborn
1) Enter Bow Road station as before, but don't bother picking up a newspaper because you won't be able to read it in the ensuing crush.
2) Pass left along the platform. Don't bother looking at the 'next train' indicator because you can catch any train going eastbound, not just a District line train. Walk just over halfway along the platform, stopping beside the Fire exit sign posted on the door in the blue wall.
3) Enter the first train that arrives. Hang around close to the door you entered through, because you'll be getting off through it again at the next station.
4) When the train arrives at Mile End station, disembark. Cross the platform, which should take all of five seconds - this is the world's easiest interchange. Wait for the next Central line train. If you're really lucky a Central Line train will already be standing there waiting with its doors gaping open. It will also be absolutely jam-packed full of people
5) Squeeze into the rear half of the third carriage. Find a space. If possible try to head across the carriage to stand beside the doors opposite. Do not 'move right on down the carriage' into the narrow gap between the seats. Hold onto something. Breathe in.
6) Prepare for even more people to attempt to cram into the carriage, especially at Bethnal Green and Bank where the third carriage halts adjacent to the platform entrance. Prepare for some people to exit the carriage, especially at Bank, St Paul's and Chancery Lane where commuters head to work in the City above. Use all of these station stops to try to edge even closer to the doors on the left hand side of the train.
7) When the train stops at Holborn station (which is the first station where the doors open on the left) shoot out through the doors onto the platform and into the tunnel opposite marked Way Out and Piccadilly Line. Smile, because a huge scrum is about to develop behind you as commuters who weren't in the third carriage queue to reach this particular exit.
8) Turn right, then ascend the short flight of stairs ahead of you. In ten seconds' time this will be a real bottleneck as people jam into the narrow passageway to try to exit the platform behind you, but right now you should be at the head of the queue. Turn right at the top of the stairs and almost immediately you'll find yourself at the bottom of the main escalators.
9) There are four escalators, the right-hand three of which operate as 'up' escalators during the morning rush hour. It's quickest to take the nearest, right-hand 'up' escalator. Prepare for a long climb of approximately 60 steps, but be brave and walk straight on up to the ticket hall above. It's a great way of keeping fit, if nothing else.
10) At the top of the escalator turn right and exit the station through the underused set of ticket barriers in front of you directly into High Holborn. If you've followed all the instructions properly you should be the first person from your train to exit the station. Just like I was yesterday. Congratulations.
BowRoadupdate: Just one month to go until Bow Road station reopens after 10pm every night. Well, that's what it says on the tube website. Except that bugger all renovation has been happening at Bow Road station during the last month, not even the erection of a single safety notice, so a reopening date in October appears to be at least six months too optimistic. Instead I've turned to reporting daily in the comments box on the fall of conkers from the horse chestnut tree outside the station, a much more dynamic phenomenon. No safety notices or blue walls have been erected to prevent the public gaining access to this fine old tree, unlike in certain other nanny-state local councils I could mention. Nuts, the lot of them.
Premiership quiz: The following clues are anagrams of the names of the 20 Premiership football grounds (that's 19 current grounds and one ground-to-be). How many grounds (and teams) can you identify? (Answers in the comments box)
The BBC's pioneering interactive teletext service Ceefax began thirty years ago today. Engineers had worked out that they could piggyback extra data on top of the usual TV signal, and a very basic viewdata service was established on 23 September 1974. There were only 30 pages to begin with, and probably not many more viewers, but this really was the dawn of the interactive on-screen revolution. You pressed a button, typed in a three-digit code, waited a minute and you had the world at your fingertips. Well, 24 lines of up to 40 characters each, anyway.
It's sometimes hard to remember how little access we all had to information back in 1974. There was no 24 hour television, no internet and no mobile telephony. If you wanted to find out the result of a football match you had to try to catch the classified results on the radio, or else hope that the score was read out on the television news, or else wait until the morning to read it in a newspaper. With the advent of Ceefax you could find out the result minutes after the final whistle, and even watch the score update during the match. Gary Lineker once famously said that the best place to watch Wimbledon play was on Ceefax, and I for one agree.
My first interaction with Ceefax happened ten years after the launch at the home of a college friend whose family, even in 1984, were early adopters. I was so transfixed by the extra information being transmitted alongside the TV programmes that I almost forgot to join everyone else down the pub. My parents waited until 1987 to buy their first teletext-enabled set. It was the day of the Zeebrugge ferry disaster, at which time Ceefax should have come into its own, but we'd been supplied with the wrong remote control unit and so frustratingly could only access the index page all evening. I acquired my first Ceefax-able television in 1991 and, yes, it was worth the licence fee all by itself. Even today, should I ever find myself visiting some friend or relative living in an isolated non-broadband home, Ceefax still remains my best connection with the outside world.
Good old Ceefax - always there, always reliable... unless atmospheric interference has caused some pixellated gibberish to be broadcast instead. 20 million people still use Ceefax every week, despite its many limitations, attracted by a service that is comprehensive, easily accessible and regularly updated. It's still the first place many people turn for news, sport, weather, TV listings, travel information, lottery numbers, film reviews, share prices and even all the latest from the world of chess. Ceefax now contains as many as 600 pages, so you won't be surprised to hear that there's a special anniversary section included today (index: page 190), although you may be frustrated that you can't read it online.
But good old Ceefax now lives under sentence of death from the godawful service that is BBCi. I think we established back in January that, compared to Ceefax, this supposed technological advance is actually slower, less intuitive and generally more crap that its primitive ancestor. BBCi won't be worth using until engineers manage to introduce a method of accessing each individual page that isn't menu-driven... such as the three-digit code system introduced by Ceefax thirty years ago. Alas Ceefax will never reach its 40th birthday because the Government's analogue switch-off will have kicked in two years previously. I, for one, will lament its passing.
How many of the following do you remember? Page 150: the pop-up newsflash
Page 160: the pop-up Alarm Clock
Pages from Ceefax: sometimes the only thing BBC1 ever used to show in the morning
Subtitles on page 199: first introduced in 1975, later moved to page 888
Telesoftware: downloadable BASIC programs for your BBC Micro computer (1983-1989)
Using the reveal button: often for quizzes or particularly poor jokes
Big chunky graphics: actually they're still there, aren't they?
Does your name appear in any of these lists, and if so does it appear in the top 10 nearest to the year you were born? And are parents trying to give their children posher names these days, or is it all relative?
The Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy(tonight, 6:30pm, Radio 4): I remember listening to the last series of the Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy tucked up in bed after a hard day at school in the year before I took my O levels. I still have the souvenir Radio Times with a giant celestial thumb on the front cover (I must check eBay to see if it's worth anything), from which I note that evening I also enjoyed Blake's 7, the Goodies and a LyndaCarter Variety Special. But it was Douglas Adams' outstandingly original flight of fancy that captured my imagination, and I'm sure will again today after a hiatus of almost 25 years. That quarter-century gap has been plugged by a TV series, more books, a commemorative towel, an interactive adventure game, rumours of a film and the tragic death of the author, but it'll be great to have the third series back tonight along with most of the original cast. While we wait, here are some links to remind us all how good it used to be. 42 of them, of course.
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Last Routemaster to Bow: Did you see me on television last night? No, neither did I. I watched BBC London's eight minute Inside Out documentary on the last number 8 Routemaster to Bow with growing incredulity, in the way that you do when the media reports somewhat inaccurately on an event you actually attended. There's a summary of the report here, and you can even watch the whole thing online, though I wouldn't bother. The TV documentary included very little of the very final journey, choosing instead to concentrate on husband and wife team Len and Julie Mizen - he the final driver, she the final conductress. They were both taking retirement on the day that Bow's Routemasters finally bowed out, which provided a touching human angle to the story, although the bare facts beneath were rather shaky.
The last journey was not 'today', it was three months ago. The last journey was not 'from Bow to Victoria', it was from Victoria to Bow. That shot from the footplate supposedly heading eastwards was quite definitely taken travelling in the opposite direction. Routemasters are not being taken off the road because 'a law was passed in 1971 that every bus built had to have wheelchair facilities'. And it probably wasn't wise to say that Len and Julie will miss their 'relationships with the passengers', although it's just as well there were none of these on the final anorak-packed journey. To think that the BBC's so-called journalists were the only people to get to ride the last fifty yards into the garage, and then they went and wasted the opportunity on a 1 second tracking shot. Just goes to show that you should treat everything you see in the media as a work of fiction, until proved otherwise.
Sun Soup: A special hello to the 300 Arseblog readers who turned up here yesterday, which just goes to show that some people will click on anything. It's all because I've provided Arseblogger with a few cryptic clues to the names of famous Arsenal players, and he's running one a day for the rest of the week. It took three hours for yesterday's clue to be guessed so, if you're a Gooner and don't mind wading through a comments box knee-deep in four letter words, you might want to head over there today and see how everyone's coping with the latest puzzle.
gherk (verb): to queue for hours and hours in the hope that the final view will be worth the wait.
The centrepiece of London Open House weekend was the first public opening of the Swiss Re building, better known as the Gherkin. It's the right-hand building in this photo, lined up next to Tower 42 and Lloyd's, and was finally opened for business earlier this year. Thousands of people turned up over the weekend to visit this new London icon, hoping to look both inside and out, but the queues were horrendous and most of them went away disappointed. I was one of the lucky ones, eventually.
I'd heard stories of four hour queues on Saturday, and that more people had been turned away than actually got to look inside, so I was determined to arrive early on Sunday to stake my place in the line. I thought an hour early would be good enough, but I was wrong. I walked along the queue until I found the end, which took rather longer than I was expecting, and was unnerved to watch the queue lengthening at a rate of 5 metres a minute behind me. And then the waiting started. And then the waiting continued. We shuffled slowly forward in small irregular bursts, unable to see our target except reflected in the office blocks around us.
A fatalistic cameraderie developed amongst those in the queue. Some dashed off to nearby coffee shops to ease the boredom, while others found time to read the entire Sunday Times and all its supplements. After two hours we finally reached the foot of the Gherkin and could see the front of the queue, except that we still had one revolution of the building to go. One family gave up at this point and went off in search of alternative venues. The rest of us shivered slightly, gritted our teeth and continued our gradual progress clockwise.
I doubt that London has seen a queue this long since the Queen Mother snuffed it. There was one easy way to jump the queue, however, and that was to have signed up as an Open House volunteer. One flash of your special green badge and you were permitted to walk straight into the building without any wait whatsoever. And yes Elsie, I saw you swanning in through the side entrance just after 11 o'clock when I still had more than two hours to go.
At last, after 4½ hours, the long wait was finally over. We were ushered through security and into one of the high speed lifts that whisked us up to the 34th floor in 30 seconds flat. One more lift, a flight of stairs and we were on the 40th floor, the Gherkin's very top slice. Suddenly the wait was worthwhile. Elegant glass triangles rose to a peak in a ring above our heads. People were drawn magnetically to the windows, staring out at stupendous views in all directions. We were higher than the London Eye and I could see further across the capital (and beyond) than I have ever seen before. I was struck by how much green there was, and how beautiful the urban environment can be on a miniature scale. I joined the rest of the crowds in taking countless photographs and trying to pinpoint my house and various other landmarks. The white tablecloths that reflected up from the restaurant below spoiled the western view a little, but the whole experience was quite breathtaking.
And there was more. Lifts took us down to the 17th floor where we had the freedom to roam across 1600 square metres of as yet unoccupied office space. The views through the diamond windows were a little less spectacular than before, but easier to access and still most impressive. This was also a good opportunity to admire the internal architecture of Sir Norman Foster's signature building. There was a real feeling of light and space, as well as the illusion of curvature despite the fact that the only curved glass in the building was the lens we had seen at the very summit. Most of us also sampled the toilet facilities - welcome relief after five hours of abstinence. There was no rush, we were able to stay on the 17th floor for as long as we liked before finally descending contentedly to the ground.
A few hours later I was standing back outside my local tube station after a busy and successful Open House weekend. To the west, framed perfectly down Bow Road, stood the proud figure of the Gherkin. I smiled, knowing that three miles away on the top observation deck there were still people smiling back down at me.
Stop Press: Back in June I rode on the very last number 8 Routemaster bus back to Bow Garage. You must remember - I went on and on about it at the time. A BBC film crew were on board too and, if you're in the London area, you can watch their report tonight on Inside Out, BBC1, 7.30pm. You might even catch sight of me too. I'm the one not wearing an anorak.
My life is complete. I have stood in the Blue Peter Garden. Look, there's Petra's statue, and there's the pond full of goldfish in the Italian Sunken Garden which yobboes thoughtlessly trashed one tragic day in 1983. Oh how Janet Ellis cried, and oh how we laughed at school the following morning. The garden is a lot smaller in real life than it looks on screen delimited by a magic rectangle. But then everything on television is like that, and yesterday I went on a guided tour of the house of illusion.
My illusions are shattered. I have seen the Tardis and it is nothing but a wooden box on wheels. I did wonder whether what we were being shown wasn't the Tardis but just a Tardis, but our charming guide assured us that it was being used for filming the new series. I'm also a little jealous that the tour group behind us were allowed to go inside (not all at once, you understand, although had this been the real Tardis I'm sure that would have been possible).
I have stood in the central circular courtyard where Roy Castle broke the mass tap dancing world record. I have seen the world's first multi-storey cantilever staircase hidden inside the question-mark-shaped TV Centre building. And I have stood on the floor of Studio 8, once home to Fawlty Towers and currently being used to stage that rather more forgettable sitcom, The Crouches. But during the 50 minute tour it was the Blue Peter Garden that resonated most. Here was my childhood laid out over a few yards of turf, from the legendary Tree for the year 2000 to the more recent grave of George the tortoise. Youthful memories are always strong, and here were some I made earlier.
2) St Pancras International
The whole Kings Cross area looks like one giant building site, and yesterday I got to don a safety helmet and walk into the middle of it. A new international station is being created at St Pancras so that, in three years' time, quarter-mile-long Eurostar trains can pull right up to the buffers under the magnificent Victorian arched roof. An extraordinarily complex engineering operation is underway to enable this, whilst simultaneously keeping Midland Mainline, Thameslink and London Underground trains operational throughout the construction period.
From our vantage point high above the construction works we could see the platforms of the extended station taking shape and the concrete roof of the new subterranean Thameslink station being poured into place. In the distance we saw the original mainline station (the 'BarlowTrainShed') being gutted, and scaffolding being erected inside so that the roof can be restored and replaced. Today an extremely busy building site, but in 2007 the gateway to a nation. Let's hope the work stays on schedule.
3) Freemason's Hall
It's not every day that you're allowed to enter the headquarters of the United Grand Lodge of England without a rolled-up trouser leg, so yesterday I took the opportunity to investigate this imposing building. No expense has been spared on the internal decoration, and the central Grand Temple is an opulent mix of gold leaf and symbolism (rather like an Egyptian-themed 1930s cinema, I thought). There's a huge cloakroom with 600 coathooks where suited men can change into their Masonic regalia, and a shop in the basement that sells apron-clad teddy bears should you ever run out of Christmas present ideas. To me the whole thing looked like a lot of middle-aged men who've invented their own substitute for religion and like to dress up a lot. I was relieved that nobody attempted to shake my hand on the way out.
Brook Road, Neasden, is a very ordinary looking suburban road. There's some social housing, an old people's home, a bit of office space... and a small squat brick building lying innocuously in someone's front garden. But this is no ordinary building - it's the entrance to the Government's most secret World War Two bunker. Not that you'd guess from looking at the building today. There's no giant red arrow pointing down the steps towards the entrance in real life, oh no. Hush hush, careless talk costs lives.
It was in 1938 that the Government started to get panicky about the imminent outbreak of war and started asking the unthinkable. What would happen if the Cabinet War Offices in Whitehall were bombed? What if Hitler were to invade the country? The British Government had to be able to continue to try to run the country, but from where? Hurriedly they set about building a new secret underground control centre in Neasden, just in case. The bunker was designed to hold the entire war cabinet along with 200 support staff. Two floors were hollowed out of the hillside beneath the Post Office Research Station, protected beneath five feet of reinforced concrete so that the facility could withstand a direct hit from a German bomb. The bunker, codenamed 'Paddock', was ready for operations in 1940 and Churchill visited in October of that year.
"We held a Cabinet meeting at PADDOCK far from the light of day, and each Minister was requested to inspect and satisfy himself about his sleeping and working apartments. We celebrated this occasion by a vivacious luncheon, and then returned to Whitehall."
Me and Louise visited Paddock today. I nearly didn't make it in time, what with over-running tours at St Pancras and engineering works on the Jubilee Line, but eventually I puffed up the hill to the site entrance with just a couple of minutes to spare. It's always a pleasure to meet a blog reader, and even more so to descend with them into the bowels of the earth wearing a fetching yellow safety helmet. Hi Louise, thanks for coming along, and thanks for not laughing when it took me five attempts to put my helmet on correctly.
Our tour guide clearly relished his role as entertainer-in-chief. He led our group down to the first level where it was cool and most definitely damp, ushering us into a couple of dingy rooms filled with rusting machinery. We headed on down a corroded spiral staircase to the lowest level, 40 feet beneath the surface. Here another long corridor stretched off into the distance, tens of small rooms lying dark and forlorn to either side. We stood in the Map Room where Wrens would have pushed little model battleships around on a big chart, and we also stood in the War Cabinet Room where Churchill held that one cabinet meeting back in in 1940. Thin stalactites hung from the roof, dry rot covered the ceiling and the mulchy remains of rotten lino squelched underfoot. Back upstairs we saw the remains of a telephone exchange and the tiny kitchen where food was prepared, although apparently there was a planning oversight and the architects forgot to include toilets anywhere in the complex. We very tried hard not to imagine Winston straining over a small tin bucket.
After nearly an hour underground we returned to the surface, back to normality. A democratic self-governing reality which, had Paddock ever been used for real, might not be the norm today at all. Thank goodness it was only ever a standby facility, and that today it lies rotting and abandoned. The housing association who now own the land above are only contracted to open the bunker twice a year, but there is an excellent virtual tour that allows you to follow in our somewhat-damp footsteps. You may not have been there today, but you can still take a look into the hidden depths of what might have been, beneath the hills of Neasden.
Back in July the Government launched a booklet called 'Preparing for Emergencies', written to provide advice for civilians in the face of impending terrorist threat. The booklet was generally laughed at, and brilliantly spoofed, but they did promise to send us all a copy sometime during August. Here we are halfway into September and my copy has yet to arrive. You've probably received your copy. My parents, tucked away in a Norfolk village miles from any known terrorist target, have received their copy. But me, living and working in Osama's bullseye, I have received no copy at all. I know that the Royal Mail is useless, and getting uselesser, but their organisational incompetence is now endangering my life and those of my neighbours. And yes, I know I could look up the booklet on the internet but somehow, with information of this supposed importance, I don't see why I should have to make the effort.
So, there are a few potentially urgent questions I need to know the answer to, just in case. Would you mind taking a look in your copy of the booklet and telling me what the recommended government solution is to each of the following? Many thanks.
1) Bottled water - still or sparkling?
2) If I suspect that one of my neighbours may be a terrorist, do I have to call the police or can I shoot them myself?
3) If a bomb goes off on the Underground, what emergency telephone number should I call for immediate assistance?
4) If there's a major power cut, how do I send an email of complaint to the Prime Minister?
5) If my supply of drinking water is contaminated, tuning into which local radio station will make it better again?
6) If a chemical attack strikes at the heart of the capital, how many cans of baked beans will protect me from the effects?
7) If any of my elderly neighbours should die during the emergency, am I legally entitled to take possession of their supply of spare batteries?
8) If fire forces me to leave my place of refuge, must I leave immediately or can I go back in to rescue my tin-opener?
9) If my body is wracked by radioactive fallout, how many spare blankets do I need before I start to feel better?
10) If my lungs start frothing and I begin to cough up blood, how long will it be before the ambulance arrives?
Day trip to Neasden: I've had just two requests for tickets to join me underground in a concrete bunker in NW London as part of Open House weekend. Ah well, it makes picking the winner easier. I've flipped a coin and it's tails, so I'm inviting Louise along tomorrow. Email invite in your inbox, Louise. Hard hat and sensible waterproof footwear at the ready...
X-100 Seen in local supermarket: Ready-made Christmas cakes and Christmas puddings (plus all the ingredients for making the above).
(Bet you've seen worse...)
10 things to do in the countryside when you can nolonger go fox hunting
• Write endless patronising letters of complaint to the Daily Telegraph.
• Go for a ride on a horse without feeling the need to be chasing something at the same time.
• Invent a new sport where fat men in red costumes run across fields and leap fences before being set upon and ripped to shreds by a pack of small yappy dogs.
• Campaign for something more useful, like an end to world hunger or the immediate introduction of rural broadband.
• Climb into a pram and throw your toys out of it.
• Organise a Barbour Jacket & Green Welly fashion show.
• Train your hounds to be friendly, to beg, to fetch and to roll over.
• Join the police where you'll be allowed to shoot, maim and kill things legally.
• Get elected to Parliament and argue to reverse the ban on fox hunting, if you really think so many of the British population support your hare-brained, bloodthirsty, barbaric so-called sport.
• Find some creative hobby that doesn't involve killing small animals, rather like 99% of the inhabitants of the countryside manage to do already.
Special offer (update): On Tuesday I invited you to join me in a bunker beneath Neasden as part of London Open House weekend. So far only two people have said 'yes please', although seven have said 'sorry no'. I was rather hoping to invite someone who actually writes a blog, but apparently all bloggers are otherwise engaged this Saturday lunchtime. Just in case I'm wrong and you are available, I've decided to extend the deadline until midnight tonight. Hurry now, it's an offer not to be repeated. However, as things stand at the moment I'll be tossing a coin tonight to decide which of the two current applicants accompanies me down that deep damp hole. Anna and Louise... heads, or tails?
Good morning folks! A new newspaper hits Britain this morning. No doubt we'll have our knockers, but we're making a clean breast of it and hopefully we'll all soon be bosom buddies.
PM IN X-RATED SHOCKER Prime Minister Alec Douglas Home will today call a General Election. What a great Tory leader Al has been. He always stands firm and proud. Always rigid when it counts. He has the balls to tackle any hard situation. Never afraid of getting stuck in. Be sure to go to your local polling station next month and vote him back into power. Then go back to your cheap working class lives, job well done.
GIVING US THE WILLIES Leader of the Opposition Harold Wilson was seen yesterday parading the streets of London in a tiny Mini. Chimney sweep Larry Wright said "I was gobsmacked to see Wilson in a Mini. It came up well above his knees. Has this man no shame? I'll not be voting for him next month and no mistake."
ALSO INSIDE • Valerie Singleton - is she, you know? • Pélé to transfer to Preston North End • Enoch Powell tells it in black and white • Vietnam bloodbath - who cares? • Ken Dodd ate my hamster
CORONATION TREAT Soap starlet Hilda Ogden bares all inside
WE WANT MOORE We think Bobby Moore is a great footballer. He's young and he's fit. He's skilful and he's a bit hunky. We're going to write lots of articles praising him to the skies. Expect lots of pin-up pictures of Big Bobby. Then one day he's going to miss an open goal. All England will be shamed. On that day we will write an article slagging him off. And then we'll write lots more articles slagging him off. We build 'em up and then we knock 'em down. That's the way it's going to be from now on. Get used to it.
THE SUN SAYS A survey says new TV channel BBC2 has only 6 viewers. And they're all snobs. What a waste of money. End the evil licence fee now. We hate the BBC. One day we might set up our own TV company in competition. The Sky's the limit.
Dear Deirdre, I am a high ranking Government Minister. I have been caught being inappropriate with a showgirl. She has been caught being inappropriate with a Russian spy. My career is buggered. Please help me.
Dear Mr Profumo, Who's been a silly boy then? Your career is over. You may even have brought down the Government. You fool! By the way, can you send us Ms Keeler's telephone number? We're planning this new feature called 'Page 3'. We think she might be perfect for it...
Special offer: It's London Open House weekend this weekend, and they're opening up an even older secret government bunker for a few members of the public to visit. This one's in Neasden (you may remember it from my Silver Jubilee month) and it would have been where the Cabinet relocated had Whitehall ever been destroyed. Further details here and here. And I have tickets. Two tickets in fact, one of which is going spare. Anybody interested in joining me in a deep damp hole at the weekend?
Terms and conditions apply: • The ticket is for the 12 noon tour this Saturday, 18 September 2004.
• There is only one spare ticket, so only one of you can come.
• You have to make your own way to Brook Road, Neasden (map here).
• You need to wear sensible footwear (there's standing water in places).
• There's a lengthy 'health and safety' document to read too, so it helps to be mobile.
• Applications (including email address) to arrive by 11:59pm Wednesday, please.
• An extremely unfair method of selecting the lucky winner will operate.
Famous Secret places on under the street where I work Kingsway Telephone Exchange
I know I said I wouldn't go back to the history of buildings down the street where I now work, but I couldn't resist just one extra report. I wanted to take a more careful look at the door to number 32 High Holborn...
How ordinary this door looks. It's an unloved and unlabelled door, tucked anonymously between the newsagents at number 31 and the boarded up shop at number 33. If you were passing you wouldn't give this door a second look, which must have been the idea when they installed it. Even a closer look would reveal no more than a dirty brown door in a thick concrete frame, a small letterbox beneath, a small extractor fan overhead, and a doorbell and intercom set into the right-hand lintel. Peer through the dusty glass and you might catch sight of the two thick yellow metal doors behind, jammed tightly shut with no obvious opening mechanism. But you'd never guess what really lay behind.
During World War Two the Government constructed eight Deep Level Shelters at Underground stations across the capital. These were to give civilians a place of shelter during bombing raids, and one was built at Chancery Lane station. After the war the tunnels were taken over by the Post Office for the construction of a secret international telephone exchange. The Kingsway exchange was planned to be both bombproof and self sufficient, with a permanent staff of 150 and facilities including generators, an artesian well and storage for six weeks' food supply. Kingsway went into service 50 years ago next month, and was soon handling up to 2 million of the UK's long distance calls every week. Entrance was through the unassuming door at 32 High Holborn.
Unfortunately the secret bombproof Kingsway exchange wasn't particularly secret. In 1951 the Daily Express ran a series of front page articles revealing the existence of a 'secret network of tunnels' under London, much to the Government's embarrassment. Unfortunately, again, the secret bombproof Kingsway exchange wasn't particularly bombproof. In 1954 the Russians successfully developed their own atomic bomb, one direct hit from which could have wiped out the new complex. The Government decided to build another secret bunker elsewhere, this time beneath Horseguards Parade (a hideous and extremely obvious ivy-clad brick building at the top of the Mall). The Kingsway exchange continued to be used, its tunnels full of cables and switching equipment, before being sold off by BT in 1996. You can read more here, including photos from journalist Duncan Campbell's illicit subterranean bicycle ride in 1980. But, standing in High Holborn today, who'd ever imagine what was going on beneath the streets of London, behind the yellow door.
Fully booked: September is a very dangerous time of year to enter a bookshop because all the big publishing companies are wheeling out the books they hope will be top of the bestseller lists this Christmas. That means a huge pile of new books on the shelves, many of which are actually worth buying. What's dangerous is not the fact that so many of these books demand to be bought, but that if I buy them all now there'll be nothing left for people to buy me for Christmas. I can't wait more than 100 days, I need these books now. Well, some of them. I can live without Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary (a blatant ESL copycat), various big TVtie-ins and this year's Schott's rip-offs. But I couldn't resist Attention All Shipping, a geographical journey round the shipping forecast from North Utsire to German Bight. Haven't read it yet, but it looks fascinating. And I also was also pleased to spot One Stop Short Of Barking, the book based on Annie's Going Underground website, piled high in the front of Foyles in Charing Cross Road. Hmmm, quirkyUKtravel books and blog-based books by bloggers - am I missing out on a publishing bandwagon here?
There are easier ways to watch a film. You could go to the cinema, or you could stay in and watch one on DVD or on telly. But no, last night I went and stood in the middle of Trafalgar Square in the rain and watched a silent movie projected onto a giant flapping sheet. I was a bit worried to begin with. The Square was absolutely packed, the bells of St Martins were ringing out a never-ending peal and various umbrellas were blocking my view of the screen. But thankfully the rain eased, the bells stopped and I managed to find a line of sight not blocked by a six foot something smoker talking into a mobile phone.
Our evening's performance was preceded by what can best be described as a non-party political broadcast on behalf of revolution, recapping some of the protests seen in Trafalgar Square throughout its history. And then the Pet Shop Boys took to the stage, accompanied by the 26 piece Dresdner Sinfoniker. At least I think they did - I couldn't see because there were fifty heads and a fountain in the way. Neil and Chris had composed a new score to this seminal 1925 black and white film by Soviet producer Sergei Eisenstein. Brief summary: Sailors revolt over maggoty meat; Town rises up in support; Pram tumbles down steps; Boat faces destruction in one-sided sea battle.
I wasn't convinced by the score in the opening scenes, it felt artificial and anachronistic. Very Pet Shop Boys. But I was more impressed as the film continued, with driving military beats, soaring emotion and a few vocal interludes. Before long I forgot who the composers were and just got on with enjoying the complete work. That Odessa Steps scene is rightly legendary, and all the more impressive for being three quarters of a century old. And the Boys have come up with an accomplished score which, at 75 minutes long, happens to be exactly the right length to fit on a soundtrack CD. Better on the (very) big screen though, I suspect.
Pet Shop Boys quiz: Neil and Chris are performing live in TrafalgarSquare this evening in a Russian silent movie soundtrack extravaganza. To celebrate, here are clues to the names of 20 PetShopBoys singles (in fact, every one of their singles that reached the UK top ten). How many can you identify? (Answers in the comments box)
1) ticker
2) gluttony
3) my cranium
4) Wednesday
5) nothing left
6) E1, D2, C3, ?
7) Sloane Rangers
8) uncertain location
9) double blank tango
10) it could be Eva’s idea
11) heavy duty needlework
12) hotel on Mayfair, £2000
13) alcohol-induced affection
14) is Margaret Thatcher guilty?
15) Barnet, Brentford and Bromley
16) my computer is not network-enabled
17) turning water into wine, feeding 5000
18) list of charges read before sentencing
19) take the Central line from Oxford Circus
20) just before Mike Skinner titled his band (fixed stare)
9 terrorist atrocities 5 Nov 1605: Gunpowder Plot foiled, King James I survives.
16 Sep 1920: A horse-drawn wagon explodes on Wall Street, New York, leaving 40 dead.
22 June 1985: Air India Flight 182 explodes over the Atlantic killing all 329 on board.
21 Dec 1988: Pan Am Flight 103 explodes over Lockerbie killing all 259 aboard the plane and 11 on the ground.
19 Apr 1995: 168 killed in bomb attack on government building in Oklahoma City.
7 Aug 1998: Truck bombs kill 224 at the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar Es Salaam.
11Sep2001: More than 3000 die as hijacked planes strike the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon. A fourth plane is brought down before reaching its target.
12 Oct 2002: 202 dead in nightclub bombings in Bali, Indonesia.
11 Mar 2004: Ten bombs explode during the morning rush hour in Madrid, killing 191.
This week I've started to commute to work via the Central line. I've been learning how to stand in an extremely confined space, squashed up against an unnecessarily large number of people while the floor beneath my feet vibrates and shakes from one side to the other. All of which turned out to be extremely good practice for the Mylo gig I went to last night. I've been to the Barfly a number of times but never previously to a sold out gig, and the place was absolutely heaving. Having acquired a beer and a few square centimetres of floor space near the front it seemed wise not to risk another drink in case I never made it back from the bar again.
Mylo is the Isle of Skye's top dance act (not saying much I know), featuring 24 year-old Myles MacInnes and his synthy keyboard. Destroy Rock& Roll remains my album of the year to date, and I must say I wondered how he'd ever attempt to match its clear, sharp brilliance live on stage. But match it he did, and the secret was to add a couple of talented pals and a large slab of rocking guitar. Clever lad our Myles, just as at home with strings as with keys and knobs, and each song was elevated into a raw throbbing crowd-pleaser. We were treated to almost every track on the album, reinterpreted with added impurities but stonkingly good all the same.
I've been on a few disappointing dance floors this year, the type where the DJ thinks that all they have to do is segue some anonymous repetitive beats with the occasional wailing female vocal and the assembled mass will rise up as one in euphoric frenzy. No chance. But last night a self-effacing bloke in a sheepskin jacket from a small Scottish island managed to whip the crowd up to a wild climax of which any top DJ would be proud. 'Drop The Pressure' was a particular audience favourite, simple but so effective, and a sure fire top 10 dance anthem smash when it's released as a single next month (if only we lived in a fair and just world, which alas we don't). Last night I experienced dance-guitar crossover magic. I believe in Mylo, even if most of the world has yet to sit up and take notice.
... or rather I could be 40 years old today but I'm not, thanks to a quirk in the way mathematicians round measurements to the nearest whole number. Thankyou mathematicians. And here's why. A line which is 39½cm long, when rounded to the nearest whole number, rounds up to 40cm. Likewise every measurement from 39½cm up to (but not including) 40½cm also rounds to 40cm. That's the way measurements normally work. Normally, but not always. Time doesn't work like that at all.
I am exactly 39½ years old today. If this were any other type of measurement then my 39½ would round up to 40 and I would be 40 years old today. But 39½ is a time measurement and doesn't follow the normal rules, so I'm not 40 today I'm still 39. I have been 39 years old since my 39th birthday last March, and will continue to be 39 until the day before my 40th birthday next March. One's age in years never rounds up, it always rounds down. It's more flattering that way, and I'm certainly not complaining.
Clock times round down too. It's half past twelve all the way from half past twelve and 0 seconds to half past twelve and 59 seconds. The time may be only one second short of 12:31, but we still say it's 12:30. But not all time measurements round down... some round up. Tomorrow is always a day away, even if that's in a lot less than 24 hours time. Next week is currently only four days away, not seven, next month is only three weeks away, not four, and next year is only four months away, not twelve. It's bloody complicated, time, and desperately inconsistent too. So maybe, when next March comes around, I can pretend not to be 40 after all by rounding my age to the nearest 25, downwards.
Yesterday was one of the ten best ever days for visitors to this blog, and all because I didn't post anything. Not until very late anyway. Typical. Blogger refused to let me publish until the middle of the evening, by which time all you office workers had given up refreshing the page in vain and gone home. So, if today's mathematical post proves a bit much, do scroll down and read yesterday's special slightly-delayed anniversary post instead.
diamond geezer is two years old today. Who'd have thought? I'd certainly never have guessed that the site would turn out like this when I started two years ago. Then I had no comments, no photos, no links from other sites and no visitors. Now I have six thousand comments, three hundred photos, two hundred links from other websites and a sizeable audience. I've posted more posts than there are chapters in the Bible, written as many words as there are in half a Bible, and included eleven thousand more hypertext weblinks then the Bible ever had too.
Of course, there is a downside. I spend a suspiciously large proportion of my spare time blogging or, even worse, going out and doing things so that I can blog about them. And for what purpose? My daily audience is still small enough to cram onto just two bendy buses - even QVC has a larger audience than that at four in the morning. But it's not much of a downside. I'm not really blogging for an audience, I'm blogging for me, and the fact that people seem to want to read what I write and interact with it is just a bonus. A very pleasant bonus nonetheless, so thanks for being there.
Today I thought I'd celebrate my 2nd birthday by taking you back to a few of the highlights from the last 12 months of diamond geezer, just in case you're new here and missed them at the time. It's by no means a complete list, but then most of you have read everything already anyway. But hey, even I enjoy reading back through my archive sometimes, and I wrote the stuff in the first place.
You can expect more of the same but different over the next 12 months. I'm looking forward to it already. And, as a special anniversary treat for you me, I've revamped my A-Z of London webpage, (the link at top of my sidebar), based on material I wrote three years ago before diamond geezer was even conceived. Same content, updated format. Might be worth another look, even if only to see the first online seeds of how this all began.
What's the most common word in current English usage? That's right, it's 'the'. But what's thirtieth, what's six hundredth, and what's eighty thousandth? Now there's a great new website that can tell you the answer ( 'she', 'foreign' and 'autocrats', as it turns out). The site you need to visit is WordCount (via the Guardian weblog), where someone has analysed 100 million words representing "an accurate cross-section of current English usage" and fired the results into an elegant visual linear interface. Nearly 90000 words are listed altogether, and the top 10 reads "the of and to a in that it is was". Full details about the project are here, but I suspect you'll just want to leap in and play. Type(559) in(6) a(5) word(487) to(4) discover(2968) its(62) rank(3899). 559(Type) 6(in) 5(a) 171(number) 4(to) 2968(discover) 1(the) 487(word) 20(at) 7(that) 3899(rank). It's 1754 4906.
Wordcount is a great website for pottering around in and testing things out. So go on, guess which word in each of these pairs is the more common. Guess, then check (either on the site or by rolling your mouse over the blank text at the end of each row).
• boy or girl? girl(616) beats boy (735) • left or right? right(112) beats left(179) • London or England? London(242) beats England(398) • diamond or geezer? diamond(6420) easily beats geezer(26825) • Tesco or Sainsbury? Sainsbury(8216) beats Tesco(11015) • black or white? black(356) just beats white(363)
Why not test your vocabulary by thinking of a word, typing it in and seeing how near the end of the list you can get. Most words you choose tend to be fairly common and the red line barely moves along the scale. I managed to get almost to the end with 'onomatopoeia' (78635) but maybe you can do better (without cheating). Where does your name appear in the list? And your town? And what other quirks can you discover? I was particularly pleased to spot that word 1066 was 'eye' - King Harold would be proud.
The site owner is on the lookout for intriguing sequences of words lifted from the main list, for example "america ensure oil opportunity" (992-995) and "microsoft acquire salary tremendous" (4304-4307). I've managed to form the following poem relating the terrible decline in the British mining industry using consecutive words (2002-2014). Can you do better?
There's one last gem on the site which is a separate listing that ranks all of the words that people have searched for on the WordCount site. The QueryCount list is here, but it's not worksafe (which should give you a pretty good idea about the number 1 word in typed English).
I survived Day 1. The journey in was a breeze, all the crates that left the old offices turned up safely at the new one, there were free danish pastries for elevenses and the air conditioning system functioned adequately enough. However, the view from my desk is virtually non-existent, my email inbox didn't transfer properly, the tea in the drinks machine is completely undrinkable and the journey home was hellish. I smiled at the professionalism exhibited by my new colleagues, but I shuddered when someone from HR casually uttered the alien phrase "making the brand values come alive". About par for the course then.
Famous places down the street where I work High Holborn
So, I'm moving into my new offices this morning. More on that later. But one thing's for sure - it doesn't look quite so historic down this street as it did down Piccadilly. It should do because High Holborn is centuries older, but endless cycles of redevelopment have erased most of the old stuff and replaced it with featureless offices, shops and more offices. Still, if this is to be my new daytime home then I thought I ought to delve a little into its famous past. Don't worry, I'm not going to subject you to a month of historical analysis, just the list below. Although, actually, it is quite a long list isn't it? And some of the links below are absolutely fascinating. I'll get back to you on this one...
• City of London: The westernmost tip of the City grazes the easternmost end of High Holborn, where two dragons on pillars guard the entrance to London Within.
• Chancery Lane Station: There was that trainderailment here last year, remember?
• London Silver Vaults: Tucked a short distance down Chancery Lane, this secure underground treasure house is home to 37 expert silver traders.
• London Weather Centre: This building has the roof a snowflake has to hit for London to have a white Christmas.
• Gray's Inn: One of the four InnsofCourt to which barristers must belong, at least 500 years old and pretty much hidden from public view.
• Cittie of Yorke: A pub(pictured) dating from 1430 (that's the 15th century, not half past two) and including one of the longest bars in the country.
• Cold War bunker: This converted underground telephone exchange is entered through an unassuming steel door at number 32. In the 50s it was thought to be invulnerable to nuclear attack, but when atomic bombs got more powerful the government changed its mind and put the site up for sale.
• Royal Amphitheatre: Part equestrian arena, part circus, and also the very ring where boxing's Queensbury Rules were first established. The building no longer stands.
• Lincoln's Inn Fields: Set back behind High Holborn is the largest square in London (twelve acres), laid out by Inigo Jones in the 17th century. A popular resort of duellists, and of course lawyers.
• Holborn station: A disused branch of the Piccadilly line heads from here down to Aldwych, which closed 10 years ago.
• Kingsway Tram Underpass: Another disused tunnel - until 1952 this one used to carry trams underground as far as Waterloo Bridge. It's open for London Open House weekend, and I want tickets!
• Princess Louise: This ornate Victorian pub is famous for its real ale, and infamous as the pub in which murderer Dennis Nilsen picked up the second of his twelve victims.
• Site of British Museum station: Opened on the Central line in 1900, but closed in 1933 in favour of very nearby Holborn station.
• Drury Lane: The Theatre Royal here dates back to 1660, London's worst outbreak of the plague occured in this street in 1665, and the very firstSainsbury's opened at number 173 in 1869.
• Holborn Empire: Originally an old music hall, the first screening of a feature-length colour film in Britain took place in this cinema in 1914. The building no longer stands.
• Cuban Embassy: Where to come for your visa if you're planning on Havana trip.
• St Giles: Once the grimmest slum in London (really really grim), packed tight with thieves, prostitutes, immigrants, gin drinkers and the generally destitute.
• Oasis Sports Centre: When St Giles was demolished in the 1840s, the Victorians built a new washhouse and public baths on this site. 1879 prices: Swimming, 1st class 4d, 2nd 2d; Shower, warm, 1st class 6d, 2nd 4d; Shower, cold, 1st class 3d, 2nd 2d.
What happens if you eat at McDonalds for a month? Three things. Your body gets fat. Your liver gets fatty. And you have a big hit film on your hands. Independent producer Morgan Spurlock filmed this award-winning movie last year on a shoestring budget, restricting his diet only to foods served over the counter at McDonalds whilst his vegan girlfriend looked on in horror. His body weight increased by more than 10%, he started feeling sick and lethargic, and various health professionals were urging him to give up well before the end of the 30 day experiment. He survived, but it took him over a year to get back into shape afterwards. And you can read his blog here.
The film's not officially released until Friday (note to American readers: yes, I know you all saw it 4 months ago) but I went to a preview in Greenwich yesterday. Yesterday morning actually, there's dedication for you. It was almost a private screening, or at least it would have been for the other member of the audience had I not arrived. Super Size Me is an arresting film, mixing burger-munching with hard-hitting documentary. The message is really rammed home by a volley of statistics, computer generated graphic sequences and scary shots of obese American lardarses. All this makes for a surprisingly uncomfortable film that makes you question your own diet, particularly if you're sitting there feeding your face with a large hotdog, popcorn and cola combo.
Immediately outside the Filmworks cinema in Greenwich lies a very typical McDonalds restaurant. Yesterday lunchtime it was busy filling up with families who hadn't been to see the film, exposing their children to unsaturated fats and sugar. I resisted buying anything to eat or drink, which wasn't difficult, but I did go in and pick up the 40-page nutritional leaflet hidden at the rear near the toilets. It makes for interesting reading. For example, four Quarter Pounders contain more calories than the recommended daily intake for women. One slice of processed cheddar cheese contains six different E-numbered ingredients. Chicken McNuggets are only 53% chicken. One large serving of Coca Cola contains more than 50 grams of sugar. And, after detailed further analysis, I can bring you the diamond geezer guide to the McUnhealthiest of all:
Most fat-filled burger: Big Tasty (51g)
Most sugary burger: Big Mac (12g)
Most fat-filled breakfast: Double Sausage and Egg McMuffin (37g)
Most sugary breakfast: Pancakes and Sausage (58g)
Most fat-filled salad: Chicken Caesar Salad with Crispy Chicken, dressing & croutons (30g)
Most sugary salad: Crispy Chicken with dressing (11g)
Most fat-filled dessert: Cadbury Chocolate Donut (16g)
Most sugary dessert: McFlurry - Crunchie (43g)
Most fat-filled drink: Large chocolate milkshake (13g)
Most sugary drink: Large banana milkshake (81g)
BowRoadupdate: According to the tube website, Bow Road station is supposed to return to normal opening hours next month, rather than closing at 10pm every evening to allow renovation work to take place overnight. Judging by how little work appears to have been done on the station since they started early closing in March I can't see Bow Road reopening fully until at least next summer. In fact there's been so little visible evidence of any building work going on at the station over the last few weeks that I've decided, with regret, to stop my regular daily station updates. In their place I thought I'd write a daily report in the comments box on how the conkers are progressing on the giant horse chestnut tree outside the station, which should be much more interesting. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.
Today is my last my last day working down Piccadilly. On Monday my office is being relocated elsewhere. If you were following my website earlier in the year you'll remember we nearly got relocated to Slough, which would have been <insert very rude word here> but thankfully that never materialised so I shall at least still be working down another street in central London. Just not such a famous one. Now you see why I crammed in the last of my local history month earlier in the week.
Today is my last day working for an organisation of my choice. On Monday I start work for a new company that I didn't choose, but that my organisation has chosen for me. Call it rationalisation, call it realignment, call it any corporate buzzword you like, but my team no longer has a place into the new structure and so is being sold off. The team stays in one piece, the team carries on doing what it always did, but the team gets to do it somewhere else for someone else. Terms and conditions remain pretty much the same, as do pension rights because there are pretty strong safeguards in these circumstances, but I'm more than a little uncomfortable watching my livelihood being sold off to a new employer. Ask Geoff, something similar's happening to him in his (completely different) job at the moment:
Today is also my last day working in the public sector. It's been 17 years since I took my first job at the useful end of society and there I've stayed, out of choice, until today. Some might call the public sector boring, though I've never found it so. Some might call it unimaginative, though it's never been that for me either. And some would just call it safe, which is one of the reasons I always liked it. From Monday I'm working not for the country but for shareholders. I can sell my services, I can sign up for private health insurance and I can keep my fingers crossed that the company pension scheme is still going strong in 20 years time. It's one giant leap, this.
Yesterday I stood at my desk, surrounded by packing crates, and looked out of my window across London. Big Ben glinted in the evening sunshine. Birds swooped across the green canopy of Green Park. The London Eye turned, imperceptibly. St Paul's Cathedral and the Gherkin stood proud, old beside new. Aeroplanes soared over the chimneys of Battersea Power Station. South London rose up in the distance, bright and sharp. The view from my office window has been absolutely stunning for the last three years and I shall miss this historic panorama more than almost anything else. Somehow staring at a neighbour's brick wall isn't going to be quite the same.
I was late leaving the office last night having taken one final opportunity to stand at the window and soak in the view. I emerged onto the street just in time to watch a number9Routemaster chug by. We're both leaving Piccadilly this evening for the last time, both because we worked perfectly but some policy document decided we didn't fit any more. Shame. The replacement number 9 buses are hideous - nasty boxy double deckers with zero character. I hope my fate come Monday is somewhat better.
Tomorrow I'll be making my daily morning journey from Bow Road station to Green Park station for the last time. Over the last three years I've learned everything there is worth knowing about this journey, including where to stand, where to sit and how to be first up the escalator at the other end. After tomorrow all of this hard-earned knowledge will be wasted because I have a new journey to study and conquer (of which more tomorrow). So today I thought I'd offload everything I've ever learnt about the old tube journey in case any other Bow-to-Piccadilly commuter should one day find it useful.
London Commuter Handbook: no 2904: Bow Road to Green Park
1) Enter Bow Road tube station. If you need to pick up a Metro then you'll find them hidden just behind the door on your right, but for a journey of this length it's probably better to bring a serious newspaper with you instead. If the middle ticket barrier is green, use it - this avoids pushing past the ticket queues blocking the path to the left hand barrier. Once past the sleeping ticket attendant, turn left on the bridge then keep right down the stairs (it's slightly quicker than keeping left).
2) Pass left along the platform. Glance at the 'next train' indicator as you pass, because the curvature of the platform means you won't be able to read it from the far end of the station. If the indicator says that a 'METROPOLITAN LINE' train is due, this in fact means that a Hammersmith & City line train is due. You can slow down because you don't want to catch this one. If the indicator says that a 'DISTRICT LINE' train is due then hurry along the platform because you do want this one and it'll be here in under a minute. Pass almost as far along the platform as you can, but stop halfway between the fourth and fifth pillar from the end. Stand next to the storage licence posted on the blue wall, right behind the words 'MIND THE GAP' written at the platform edge.
3) When the first District Line train arrives, walk forward and enter the rear door of the first carriage. Expect to have to stand because the train is usually pretty full by the time it reaches Bow Road, but you'll find conditions much emptier in the front carriage than they would be in the rear carriage. Cross the carriage and lean against one of the glass partitions on the opposite side, preferably the one on the right. Try to take exactly one minute to read the front cover of your newspaper.
4) When the train arrives at Mile End station, expect at least half of those on board to move towards the doors ready to cross to the Central line platform opposite. This is good news because they will vacate a number of the twenty seats on either side of where you are standing. Politely stake your claim to one of these seats and sit down quickly before the commuters crossing from the Central line platform try to board your District line train. Given the choice, try to sit in one of the eight 'end' seats because then only one person will be able to sit next to you. Best of all are the two seats at the very rear of the carriage because they have an extra ten centimetres of space adjoining.
5) If you're reading the Guardian, open it cautiously to an angle of no more than 45 degrees. Try to finish the broadsheet section of the paper by the time the train pulls into Tower Hill station, because at this point the carriage is likely to fill up considerably with c2c commuters arriving from Southend and Basildon. Continue to read the tabloid G2 section, including any supplements, aiming to have reached the TV review and Doonesbury cartoon by the time the train leaves Embankment.
6) As the train enters Westminster station fold up your paper, stand up and move towards the door on the left hand side of the train. Listen for the scramble behind you as all the commuters who've been standing since Tower Hill rush for your newly vacated seat. Exit the train and walk forward towards the staircase in the back wall of the platform labelled 'Stairs to Jubilee line'. Do not divert via the escalator. Walk/run down the staircase, which you'll probably have to yourself because nobody else seems to use it.
7) Cross the first concourse to the top of the furthest escalator. If a westbound District line train has recently disgorged from the platform above, try to enter the slipstream of commuters by moving across to the left-hand side of the queue for the escalator. Walk down the left hand side of the escalator, overtaking the few lost souls who insist on reading their Metro between trains. Cross the second concourse, keeping left round the corner past the lift just in case you accidentally walk into a stream of commuters coming the other way. Walk down the left-hand escalator on your right, and at the bottom take the first passageway to your left onto the platform.
8) When you reach the westbound Jubilee line platform, turn right. The track is sealed off from the platform by a wall in which are a series of numbered doors. Look for doors 8 and 9, then stop and rest your backside against the seatrest on the wall opposite. When the next train pulls into the station keep back - do not approach the doors. Wait for all the passengers to disembark - there should be more of these than there are passengers waiting to board. Wait for all the other passengers to board, then walk casually up behind them, look apologetically in their direction, wait for them to edge forward and try to squeeze into the last remaining space just inside the train doors. If this doesn't work, rush down to door 10 and squeeze in there instead.
9) This is the squashed section of the journey. Breathe in and try not to stare into the face of the fellow passenger whose briefcase is pressed hard against your nether regions. Stare out of the window - it'll all be over in two minutes and 30 seconds. Smile, because if you were the last person in at the last station then you'll be the first person out at the next station.
10) When the train stops at the next station, which is Green Park, shoot out of the door into the tunnel opposite, avoiding any commuters hurtling through in the opposite direction trying to catch the train from which you have just exited. There are two 'up' escalators, both to the right of the one 'down' escalator. It's usually quicker to take the emptier, righthand 'up' escalator, unless it's full of passengers just emerged from the opposite eastbound Jubilee platform. Walk straight up to the landing above, then veer right towards the final escalator, avoiding any passengers cutting across to the Victoria line tunnels to your left. Walk up the final escalator, turn left into the main ticket hall and head straight across to the ticket barrier immediately in front of you. If you've followed all the instructions properly, you should be the first person from your train to exit the station. Congratulations.
The return journey from Green Park to Bow Road is rather more straight-forward. Full details are available by email to anyone who can forward proof of home and work addresses in the E3 and W1 areas.
The first nail in the coffin of the UK singles chart will be hammered in at 6pm tonight. The Official Charts Company (crap website, guys) are launching the Official Download Chart today, and Radio 1 will be broadcasting it every Wednesday to anyone who cares. The new chart counts only legal downloads costing at least 40p, no illicit freeloading and no old-school over-the-counter CD singles either. The problem isn't that people aren't buying singles any more - they are apparently - but that most of the people who buy singles have acne, croptops and braces on their teeth. Expect the new chart to include a few more adult records, and a bit less Busted, Rachel Stevens and the Fast Food Rockers. I fear this new chart may swing a bit too far the other way, a full house of Anastacia, Phil Collins and Dido, but hopefully it won't end up quite as bland as the album chart has become. Spare a thought for your local record shop though, because today sees the start of the inexorable rise of iTunes, Napster and even the ghastly mycokemusic.com to phonographic domination. In 20 years time I wonder if we'll remember when music was something we could touch, handle and admire? Start writing the obituaries today.
diamond geezer has obtained an exclusive peek at tonight's new download chart. Here's the top 10: 1) A single that's not officially released until next Monday.
2) A single that's not officially released until October, recorded off the radio in mono.
3) A single that's not officially released until November, recorded off the radio in mono with the DJ talking over the introduction.
4) An exclusive U2 track off their forthcoming album.
5) An exclusive U2 track that's so poor it doesn't even appear on the forthcoming album.
6) What was supposed to be a exclusive U2 track, except it turns out to be a mislabelled Cheeky Girls track instead.
7) Classic 70s record you thought you'd never own again but which has a nasty vinyl scratch all the way through it.
8) Classic 80s record you thought you'd never own again but which suddenly cuts off 3 seconds before the end.
9) Classic 90s record you thought you'd never own again but which turns out to be a really dire remix.
10) Nasty computer virus you appear to have downloaded by mistake.
Update: So, it turns out that Westlife have the very first Legal Download Number 1 with an exclusive live version of the execrable 'Flying Without Wings'. Maybe some of the tracks listed further down the Top 20 are a bit more refreshing but, with that schmaltz at the top of the pile and even more drivel from Blazin Squad at number two, I've lost interest already.
What's on this weekend? A.V. Roe Centenary Sunday 12 July, 2pm
A replica triplane celebrates one hundred years since Britain's first ever flight on Walthamstow Marshes.
Seen in local supermarket: Mince pies with a sell-by date of October 25th.
Smoke #4
1) Enter Bow Road station as before, but don't bother picking up a newspaper because you won't be able to read it in the ensuing crush.
Premiership quiz: The following clues are anagrams of the names of the 20 Premiership football grounds (that's 19 current grounds and one ground-to-be). How many grounds (and teams) can you identify? (Answers in the comments box)
The BBC's pioneering interactive teletext service Ceefax began thirty years ago today. Engineers had worked out that they could piggyback extra data on top of the usual TV signal, and a very basic viewdata service was established on 23 September 1974. There were only 30 pages to begin with, and probably not many more viewers, but this really was the dawn of the interactive on-screen revolution. You pressed a button, typed in a three-digit code, waited a minute and you had the world at your fingertips. Well, 24 lines of up to 40 characters each, anyway.
The centrepiece of London Open House weekend was the first public opening of the Swiss Re building, better known as the Gherkin. It's the right-hand building in this photo, lined up next to Tower 42 and Lloyd's, and was finally opened for business earlier this year. Thousands of people turned up over the weekend to visit this new London icon, hoping to look both inside and out, but the queues were horrendous and most of them went away disappointed. I was one of the lucky ones, eventually.
A fatalistic cameraderie developed amongst those in the queue. Some dashed off to nearby coffee shops to ease the boredom, while others found time to read the entire Sunday Times and all its supplements. After two hours we finally reached the foot of the Gherkin and could see the front of the queue, except that we still had one revolution of the building to go. One family gave up at this point and went off in search of alternative venues. The rest of us shivered slightly, gritted our teeth and continued our gradual progress clockwise.
At last, after 4½ hours, the long wait was finally over. We were ushered through security and into one of the high speed lifts that whisked us up to the 34th floor in 30 seconds flat. One more lift, a flight of stairs and we were on the 40th floor, the Gherkin's very top slice. Suddenly the wait was worthwhile. Elegant glass triangles rose to a peak in a ring above our heads. People were drawn magnetically to the windows, staring out at stupendous views in all directions. We were higher than the London Eye and I could see further across the capital (and beyond) than I have ever seen before. I was struck by how much green there was, and how beautiful the urban environment can be on a miniature scale. I joined the rest of the crowds in taking countless photographs and trying to pinpoint my house and various other landmarks. The white tablecloths that reflected up from the restaurant below spoiled the western view a little, but the whole experience was quite breathtaking.
And there was more. Lifts took us down to the 17th floor where we had the freedom to roam across 1600 square metres of as yet unoccupied office space. The views through the diamond windows were a little less spectacular than before, but easier to access and still most impressive. This was also a good opportunity to admire the internal architecture of Sir Norman Foster's signature building. There was a real feeling of light and space, as well as the illusion of curvature despite the fact that the only curved glass in the building was the lens we had seen at the very summit. Most of us also sampled the toilet facilities - welcome relief after five hours of abstinence. There was no rush, we were able to stay on the 17th floor for as long as we liked before finally descending contentedly to the ground.
My life is complete. I have stood in the Blue Peter Garden. Look, there's Petra's statue, and there's the pond full of goldfish in the Italian Sunken Garden which yobboes thoughtlessly trashed one tragic day in 1983. Oh how Janet Ellis cried, and oh how we laughed at school the following morning. The garden is a lot smaller in real life than it looks on screen delimited by a magic rectangle. But then everything on television is like that, and yesterday I went on a guided tour of the house of illusion.
My illusions are shattered. I have seen the Tardis and it is nothing but a wooden box on wheels. I did wonder whether what we were being shown wasn't the Tardis but just a Tardis, but our charming guide assured us that it was being used for filming the new series. I'm also a little jealous that the tour group behind us were allowed to go inside (not all at once, you understand, although had this been the real Tardis I'm sure that would have been possible).
I have stood in the central circular courtyard where Roy Castle broke the mass tap dancing world record. I have seen the world's first multi-storey cantilever staircase hidden inside the question-mark-shaped TV Centre building. And I have stood on the floor of Studio 8, once home to Fawlty Towers and currently being used to stage that rather more forgettable sitcom, The Crouches. But during the 50 minute tour it was the Blue Peter Garden that resonated most. Here was my childhood laid out over a few yards of turf, from the legendary Tree for the year 2000 to the more recent grave of George the tortoise. Youthful memories are always strong, and here were some I made earlier.
The whole Kings Cross area looks like one giant building site, and yesterday I got to don a safety helmet and walk into the middle of it. A new international station is being created at St Pancras so that, in three years' time, quarter-mile-long Eurostar trains can pull right up to the buffers under the magnificent Victorian arched roof. An extraordinarily complex engineering operation is underway to enable this, whilst simultaneously keeping Midland Mainline, Thameslink and London Underground trains operational throughout the construction period.
Brook Road, Neasden, is a very ordinary looking suburban road. There's some social housing, an old people's home, a bit of office space... and a small squat brick building lying innocuously in someone's front garden. But this is no ordinary building - it's the entrance to the Government's most secret World War Two bunker. Not that you'd guess from looking at the building today. There's no giant red arrow pointing down the steps towards the entrance in real life, oh no. Hush hush, careless talk costs lives.
FIRST EDITION threepence
How ordinary this door looks. It's an unloved and unlabelled door, tucked anonymously between the newsagents at number 31 and the boarded up shop at number 33. If you were passing you wouldn't give this door a second look, which must have been the idea when they installed it. Even a closer look would reveal no more than a dirty brown door in a thick concrete frame, a small letterbox beneath, a small extractor fan overhead, and a doorbell and intercom set into the right-hand lintel. Peer through the dusty glass and you might catch sight of the two thick yellow metal doors behind, jammed tightly shut with no obvious opening mechanism. But you'd never guess what really lay behind.
2 of diamonds
Famous places down the street where I work
• City of London: The westernmost tip of the City grazes the easternmost end of High Holborn, where two dragons on pillars guard the entrance to London Within.
1) A single that's not officially released until next Monday.
