I went to Saoirse’s dad’s funeral yesterday. It’s not really my place to talk much about it, but it was deeply moving and I hope it did him proud. At the same time, it was good to see Emily and Sophia again and I even managed to discuss the meaning of history on the way back to the station with a friendly SWP member. (I can’t seem to avoid doing this.) So, thank you to Saoirse for wanting us there, doing the least we could do.

Yesterday was really strange overall, with Lucy arriving in the evening so that she could see a Jack Milroy exhibition this morning. I couldn’t come to that, having a prior engagement with the annual Self Christmas decoration routine (our tree is satisfyingly fat this year!), but I made up for it later by dashing back on the Tube to go out for lunch and then visit the National Gallery. There was an amusing moment where I noticed a Cezanne piece which was beautiful if remarkably familiar, before Lucy pointed out it was familiar because we have it on our wall just above the telephone in the hall. Oh yeah

SantaCon

Back outside in Trafalgar Square we ran into the delightful surprise of SantaCon: a large rowdy collection of Santas on Nelson’s Column drinking, singing and distributing presents and\or brussel sprouts. Quite wonderful!

This put me in a good mood, and so I was doubly annoyed on the Metropolitan line on the way back home to see a National Front sticker slapped over a Metropolitan line map. Excuse me: that’s not just racism, encroaching into my city on my Tube and appropriating my national flag, but that’s also defacing the simple, smart design of the London Underground! I managed to rip most of it off, which felt good and reminded me of the friendly SWP member again, who laughed when I pointed out that – whatever your politics – you can always have a good chat with the far left, but never the far right. So that act was for you, anonymous man who led me through the dark to the train station. Peace.

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