Paul in London

I have not often walked down this street before... * But there is less trash walking down the other side of the street where I live. * I don't bother looking into the dark alleyways Job on offer I can start next week. But there are a few others (that pay more £££) in the pipeline but they look like they are going to take a bit looooooonger to happen. A job in the hand I suppose is worth many more that could be out there... Touristy things... * After yesterday mornings interview I hit the internet cafe and then went to the National Portrait Gallery . There were quite a few things to fascinate and amuse there. The civil war section was interesting and so was the Victorian era and early 20th Century paintings. Incidentally on this day in 1658 the Lord Protector of England died trying to work out what sort of republic and system of government England should have. Silly git. By the time one got to the Andy Warhold silk screen print of Joan Collins, you couldn't hel

Welcome to the Jungle... It took a while to get going to move on Sunday afternoon. There was a lot of emailing and blogging to do for starters, and then when I got back to West Hampstead "The Way We Were" with Robert Redford and Barbara Streisand was on Channel Five. Since neither Skye nor I had seen it from beginning to end, that was an excuse to delay things as well. And then after the ending we both had to compose ourselves before heading out. Well actually, it wasn't that emotional for me as just as those chords started playing for the intro to the title song, the voice over for the upcoming programs started which sort of killed it for me. But I digress... It took under an hour for us to get to Manor House station, but there was a good 10 minute walk to go. A good 10 minute walk is more like a good 15 minute walk with luggage. Fortunately Skye was there to assist. As we walked up the street past Finsbury Park and smack bang into Haringey , Skye started

Please Hello... After being in London for less than a month, one of the striking things is how uncultured the mass of the city is. Starbucks is on every corner serving bland coffee and styrofoam food. Deep pan pizza buffets are on every other corner serving stuff that wouldn't rate at a Sizzler restaurant back home. Fosters is a popular drink here and they have a special tap to generate an "artificial head" on the beer so it lasts while you finish it off. Ben Elton has a hit show with his stringing together of Queen songs into what is purported to be a musical , and he is about to do the same to Rod Stewart songs with the show Tonight's the night . Fortunately amongst all the trash in London, there are quite a few bright spots. One being the Donmar Warehouse . On Friday I saw their latest production, Pacific Overtures (a co-production with the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre ) and it was a knockout. A small all-male cast, a theatre in the round, and Sondheim

As luck would have it... I read in today's papers that I was a few minutes away from being stranded underground on my tube ride to Hampstead Heath. Darn missing out on that adventure ... The best commentary was a cartoon in tonight's Evening Standard where the station billboards stating when the next trains arriving were instead displaying "Next passenger... Joe Blogs 2 minutes, Mary Rose 3 minutes" and you could see these dirty people trundling out of a tunnel. Spin to the end... In a city desperate for news Alastair Campbell's resignation has filled the gap for now. Tony Blairs right hand man of spin was going to go anyway so it was not really a surprise... but the media to make a story started writing about why he went today instead of tomorrow for instance. The PR was that he wanted to spend "more time with his family". Such are the times we live in when such a noble cause is trotted out as an excuse when one's job situation is untena

Dark and Damp After staring at government files all day trying to put them in order I decided that despite the light drizzle, I would go for a walk around Hampstead Heath again. It was nice to walk in open spaces and a light rain (the first rain that has occurred since I have been here). Little did I know that the Underground was shutting down as I walked around taking in the open space. Well New York had its outage, it was time for London I guess to follow suit... While it is possible to walk home from Hampstead Heath, by the time I wanted to the light rain became a little less light than I was hoping for. Still I had some sense of direction so I just headed in that way. I could have pulled out my London A-Z but I thought I would keep walking for a bit and not try and stuggle in the rain with silly things like where I was heading. About 20 minutes later I realised that I had walked to South Hampstead when I really needed to go west. Fortunately I spotted a tube station

Safe at work and play... Working at Whitehall isn't all that bad... once you get used to the security procedures. It reminded me that yesterday after I strolled from Hyde Park back in the city and stumbled onto Grosvenor Square where the American Embassy was behind two layers of temporary fencing and a concrete barricade on the street. It would have made for a wonderful photo but I didn't know whether the guards with automatic weapons would have understood I was merely a tourist. Well I was struggling to work out where I was with a map but I wasn't so sure. The other thing I have been travelling around with is my Diesel side bag. It is quite useful for storing an A-Z map of London book, a cd player and my pocket computer or camera. Of course when it is stocked full of these goodies it has caused some guards to be slightly alarmed at what I was carring to make it looked so packed. How could I explain it was just a few maps and Ute Lemper? I plan to get a more se

A holiday comes to an end... Just when I was enjoying myself at the Science Museum and wandering through Hyde Park I am back at work again for the rest of the week. In the meantime I have posted the photos from my first three weeks . Select the link "Paul is in London" and you will get there.

Bank Holiday Weekend Regarded as the last gasp of the summer holidays, people use it as an excuse to get the hell out of town. By Friday night convoys of caravans and cars were clogging up all routes out of London. I didn't think it would be the best of weekends to go touristing so I decided to take in the city with Skye. This weekend huge sections of the National Rail were going to be closed for repairs but you could still be creative After Hamstead Heath on Saturday, on Sunday I went back to the Theatre Museum for a jazz concert with Rosemary George. Well it was jazz versions of broadway music so it was very sensible. Legendary reed player JD Parran was also there to accompany her and did a solo version of "My Favourite Things". It was a pity such a jazzy show was in such a stately room full of pensioners (and me) but you get that. The show went late after ending with the song Ain't misbehavin' (which I thought was very sensibly appropriate for