A Decent Haircut

If you are a man of mature years and rather tired of having hung-over teenager girls trying to cut your hair, this is the place for you. I was once a regular, but was inconvenient for the City unless one could factor in lunch at the Mirabelle opposite, which put the price up somewhat. Having been butchered once too often, I ventured back again and was treated to a timeless experience - a full cut-throat razor shave and a classic haircut with lots of 'I think I can manage to get it back into shape' from a sound chap with a steady hand. In response to my query 'should I be putting anything on my hair', the admirable fellow said ' nothing at all, sir', despite the shop being full of expensive ungents for just that purpose. The front of the shop has a beautiful 19th century facade (it's been going since 1875) and inside there's a counter laden with 'men's toiletries' of great style and no little expense and the smell of eau-de-cologne and bay rum hang in the air. I left feeling refreshed and pleased that it was still possible to find a hairdresser that does not expect to chat about their last holiday and doesn't play the cashier's favourite awful music at high volume while trying to give you a 'footballers' haircut'.

Favourite Music

Like many people, I have always loved Irish instrumental folk music. There is some wonderfully evocative stuff in 'Titanic' but otherwise good stuff is surprisingly hard to find. However, 'Ashokan Farewell', which was written in 1982 by an American to commemorate the flooding of a valley (the Ashoken) in Upstate New York, is a beautiful piece. It has subsequently become famous as the theme music for a series on The Civil War. This recording is not the best; that is one made by the Band of the Royal Marines, but it's not on YouTube (though you can download it from iTunes)

A Favourite Book - The Night Land

To the North-West I looked, and in the wide field of my glass, saw plain the bright glare of the fire from the Red Pit, shine upwards against the underside of the vast chin of the North-West Watcher--The Watching Thing of the North-West. . . . Beyond these, South and West of them, was the enormous bulk of the South-West Watcher, and from the ground rose what we named the Eye Beam--a single ray of grey light, which came up out of the ground, and lit the right eye of the monster. . . There rose the vast bulk of the South-East Watcher--The Watching Thing of the South-East. And to the right and to the left of the squat monster burned the Torches; maybe half-a-mile upon each side; yet sufficient light they threw to show the lumbered-forward head of the never-sleeping Brute. And, so to tell more about the South Watcher. A million years gone, as I have told, came it out from the blackness of the South, and grew steadily nearer through twenty thousand years; but so slow that in no one year could a man perceive that it had moved. Yet it had movement, and had come thus far upon its road to the Redoubt, when the Glowing Dome rose out of the ground before it--growing slowly. And this had stayed the way of the Monster; so that through an eternity it had looked towards the Pyramid across the pale glare of the Dome, and seeming to have no power to advance nearer. And, presently, I was come upward almost to the top of the hill, the which took me nigh three hours. And surely, when I was come that I could see the grimness of the Lesser Pyramid, going upward very desolate and silent into the night, lo! an utter shaking fear did take me; for the sweet cunning of my spirit did know that there abode no human in all that great and dark bulk; but that there did await me there, monstrous and horrid things that should bring destruction upon my soul. And I went downward of the hill, very quiet in the darkness; and so in the end, away from that place.

Spectacular April

Spring sunshine and showers in Hampshire
Click images for a full view

Favourite Views - Droxford and Old Winchester Hill

A perfect spring day in Hampshire. This is the view over Droxford towards Beacon Hill and Old Winchester Hill from Mayhill

Click on the photo for a better view

Drapers' Almshouses Teaparty 2008

The Drapers' Livery Company maintains three almshouses in London for almost 200 residents who live in wonderfully quiet and safe cottages built especially for the purpose. An annual teaparty is given at Drapers' Hall for them.

Snow in April

Spring weather is always unpredictable in England. Last Saturday it was a bright 17C in London, but by Sunday moning it was near freezing and the garden looked like this

Banksy

My daughter has introduced me to Banksy, an artist who loves to brighten up walls with clever and amusing images based usually on their defects.

Unfortunately, some local councils are putting legal niceties ahead
of the positive effect his work has on what are usually pretty run-down environments, and are trying to get his his work removed.

If you support keeping these images up, you can join the appropriate Group on Facebook. It's now too late to sign this official petition

Click on the heading for his website and lots more images

Favourite Places

Click on the photos for a better view

Japan constantly astonishes me. These two photos were taken in the northernmost part of the main island, Honshu, on the same day in March. In the village, people carry on their lives growing rice and vegetables as they have always done, while a few miles away, superb Japanese engineering is driving the 'shinkansen' or bullet train track through the mountains to bring the beautiful 300kph 'Nozomi' ('Hope') trains to Aomori City on the Mutsu Peninsular. The shinkansen system has been operating since 1964 and has never had a fatality.

NB: The first shinkansen ran between Tokyo and Aomori on 5th December 2010

The Tribulations of T5

Even the captain of the BA jumbo was apprehensive as we flew into T5 last night, but the system seemed to work reasonably well and we only waited 30 minutes for our baggage - though naturally without a word of explanation. But entering Britain from Japan always entails reverse culture shock and this is nowhere better experienced than at train stations and airports. In Japan everything works perfectly with a quiet silky smoothness, occasionally puntcuated by softly-spoken female announcements in precisely-modulated English. Everything is spotless and the staff well-dressed, alert and eager to help.

At T5, one sees self-important BA staff pushing their way in groups through throngs of confused passengers, while many of the BAA staff are scruffy, apparently dressed in whatever they like, except for over-intrusive fluorescent jackets. They also move about in somewhat threatening groups - apparently sightseeing - or standing with their hands in the pockets as though the terminal exists for them and not the passengers. No amout of high-priced architecture can make up for incivility of the staff and the feeling that you are being processed by a system, instead of being welcomed and helped by friendly and well-educated people.

Click the heading for some more photos of T5