Studies of flashbulb memories – your memories of hearing about major news events – show that even though people remain very confident that their memories are accurate, their actual stories change dramatically as they get further and further from the event. So, as an experiment, I want to put in writing that confirmation of Queen Elizabeth II’s death on Thursday came to me as a BBC Breaking News alert – as I was midway through writing a message in one of our family WhatsApp groups – while crossing the car park area between the Waterlink Way and Catford’s two railway stations on a post-work evening walk. There – done – and now we can revisit this in a decade and see if I’m still sticking to the same story.
Back in March we were thwarted in our attempt to visit Katie in Glasgow, but on the August Bank Holiday weekend we succeeded on our second spin of the Wheel of Fortune (Scottish Cities Edition) and had a lovely long weekend with her and James in Edinburgh. Hurray!
Obviously everyone else visiting Edinburgh that weekend was there for the final days of the Fringe, and we did go see a handful of shows – more on those in a bit. However, given that the weather was so nice, our priority during the daytime was to go on some mini-hikes, admire the city from suitably high-up and (at least for me and Katie) distract ourselves from the climbing with lots of hypothetical would-you-rather-style questions, although I’m not sure that James or Randi were as enthused as we were.
But yes, alongside the hiking, the dodging of uncollected rubbish during the city’s bin strike (which, to be honest, only added to a festival atmosphere) and a failed attempt to acquire khachapuri, we loved the atmosphere of the Fringe and we especially loved the first show which Katie had booked tickets for us in advance: Shamilton, an improvised Hamilton-esque hip-hop musical about a public figure nominated by the audience at the start of the show. This was an extremely similar vibe to the Improv Shakespeare which was our favourite thing to take people to in Chicago, and the all-American cast did a superb job after the audience landed them with the life story of Nicola Sturgeon. I felt very sorry for them at the beginning as they tried to read the room, quickly realising that this was potentially dangerous political terrain, and still pulled together an amazing performance which (I think!) everyone enjoyed. As Randi says, it’s just so rewarding to watch people on stage being both incredible at what they’re doing and clearly enjoying themselves too. I will go see this again whenever I get the chance.
The next day, Randi, Katie and I saw another improvised show – this time with a Doctor Who theme! – which had a more gentle, family-friendly vibe. More silly, less sharp, but still very enjoyable to see the first (and last) performance of The Last Turnip set in the thrilling confines of Killington Lake Services on the M6. Afterwards, the three of us felt we had one last Fringe outing in us and blindly picked Jolly Boat’s 10 Songs for Geeks on the basis that it was (a) free, and (b) starting in a few minutes nearby in the basement of a bar. This was the perfect way to wrap up our brief Edinburgh experience and felt very authentically Fringe: a pair of brothers singing about D&D, Game of Thrones and Harry Potter to a happy, drunken crowd of nerds. Bonus laughs came from the unplanned comedy callback of the “battery low” and later “battery critically low” warning messages on the laptop they were using to project until for the final few songs it gave up the ghost altogether.
Even though Randi and I are supposed to be planning a wedding in, ooh, less than two weeks, the following weekend we still took time out to travel all the way to Amersham in order to ride part of the way home on a 1938 stock Tube train. (Sadly this sub-genre of nerdiness did not make it into Jolly Boat’s Fringe show, but maybe next time.) Promoted by the London Transport Museum as the ‘art deco’ Tube train, it is just quite charming to ride along in something which is obviously antique (just look at these delightful wooden panels) but also still immediately recognisable as the Tube. We also had a good wander around Amersham beforehand, which boasts many great lunch spots and (unrelatedly) also the world’s most aggressive anti dog-fouling signs.
And yes, of course we have also been busy on the final wedding preparations – as Tash knows from having lunch with us amongst the dinosaurs at Crystal Palace Park on Saturday – with perhaps the strangest part being the collection of 38 paper tickets for the train to Hereford. As a reward for our productivity, however, today we treated ourselves to the opening section on a fresh rewalk of the London Loop (carrying a guidebook this time, like real walking pros) followed by the season two finale of Succession once we made it home again from Bexley. The first part of the Loop is certainly not the prettiest, but we’ve missed our long Zone 6 walks.
Last weekend we spent a gorgeously sunny weekend in Cardiff – a place which Randi has now totally fallen in love with and is angling to move to, despite my warnings that the weather might not always be so spectacular. Still, nothing beats the Friday evening feeling of catching a train out of London to begin a weekend adventure, and although I’d been to Cardiff once before my main/only memory of the city was hanging out at the Torchwood fountain. This time, we stayed in an Airbnb in the trendy Pontcanna area, and we were both impressed by the massive expanse of rolling parks which surround the banks of the River Taff nearby.
Our primary purpose for visiting was to spend time with Randi’s former colleague, Tom, and his family. After meeting up near the castle, we caught a boat/bus down to Cardiff Bay, walked along the coast, stared enviously at people with tickets to the Aqua Park (basically a bigger and better version of the infamous WoahZone on Lake Michigan which we also failed to get into) before making up for it with ice cream sundaes. Finally, Tom, Demelza and Ralph invited us back to their house for a highly impressive barbecue production, over which- since we’re basically all transport nerds – we all swapped notes on Geoff Marshall videos. Thanks, guys!
The other surprising thing to note about Cardiff was that somehow we fell into eating delicious Mexican American food – not once, but twice! Not only did we enjoy the “unauthentic” (but still delicious) tacos at La Pantera, but for breakfast on Sunday morning Randi scouted out the American diner-themed Hard Lines café, complete with breakfast burritos and by far the best huevos rancheros Randi has found this side of the Atlantic.
All the talk of buckling steel on the railways made us question whether we’d actually be able to get home on Sunday, but thankfully (or regretfully) we did make it home before the extremes of the heatwave on Monday and Tuesday this week. It wasn’t unbearable (thanks to our fan) but we still celebrated Tuesday evening’s rainfall with a bottle of white wine on Blythe Hill. Today we were back to pleasantly-sunny-but-not-absurd temperatures, prompting Randi and I to lie and read in Hampstead Heath for a bit before moseying down to the other exciting part of this post: this afternoon’s escape room adventure, Underground 2099, set in the abandoned South Kentish Town tube station!
An escape room in a disguised Underground station was my extremely well-targeted birthday present from mum, Tash and Cormac this year, and as a group we were in boisterous enough spirits during the orientation that our game master seemed a little taken back. (“I’ve never seen a group start arguing about Tube facts before the game has actually started… I don’t know whether I love you or hate you.”) However, once the game got going we settled down into some excellent teamwork to defeat the radioactive King Rat in a time-travelling trip to a post-apocalyptic 2099. It was a lot of fun, and I’m thrilled that we actually succeeded in our quest with barely a minute and a half spare, although I’m not ashamed to say that I jumped more than once as the mutant hordes advanced. London Supper Club 1, Rats 0.
Over the weekend, Randi and I had a really lovely time in… spins the UK minibreak wheel of fortune… Chester! This was actually our second eviivo-sponsored stay following Box Hill in August, and here we were hosted by Dave and Kirsty at the faultless Stone Villa guest house. As anyone working in software will attest – especially in the era of working from home – talking to actual customers is incredibly rewarding and I’m very grateful for all of the time they volunteered to show me how they use the product. Plus, the breakfasts were delicious!
We also really, really liked Chester itself – starting with the picturesque walk into town along the canal. (This walk was also memorable for us being stopped while crossing a bridge by an elderly driver, who wound down her window and asked plaintively if we knew of any petrol stations with fuel. But this doesn’t feel like a Chester-specific anecdote.) Once we reached the centre, we were delighted to find that Wikipedia wasn’t exaggerating when it describes Chester’s “extensive Roman walls”. You really can just go up and take a 2 mile circular self-guided tour around the whole city, which is a really awesome way to get to know somewhere and a terrific bonus from past generations attempting to keep out the Welsh / Danes / Normans (delete as applicable).
In fact, we were so enthused about the walls that when Randi’s friend Becca arrived on Saturday afternoon we made her walk around too just so we could do it all over again. Becca was in town to run the Chester marathon on Sunday – sadly without Randi as originally planned due to injuries, but I have a feeling we’ll be back. In the meantime, Becca ran an amazing race and after cheering her on at the finish line we spent the rest of the day relaxing in the pub. (I am so, so glad that pubs are back – and back properly – with bar service and that laid-back, unhurried feel which can’t be matched elsewhere.)
Other highlights of Chester included fancy cocktails, Northern friendliness (I think Randi might be looking to move already) and some very tasty pierogies. Honestly, if you haven’t been yet you should consider visiting for the pierogies alone.
Back in the cold, unfeeling South it’s been a busy but productive couple of weeks. I ventured back into the office for a single afternoon and confirmed to myself that I am quite astoundingly less useful to the company when the alternative to working from home is “wandering around people’s desks to catch-up and and popping out to Pret every so often for tea because there’s no milk here anymore”. (To be honest, this was mostly just a set-up to go to the pub afterwards with Steve, Lee, James and new-starter Kris.)
Randi and I also walked Capital Ring Section 6 – from Wimbledon Park to Richmond Bridge – which I’m pretty sure is universally regarded as ‘the prettiest one’. I was particularly pleased to encounter Beverley Brook at the very point explicitly referenced in the Rivers of London installment I’m currently reading. Hi, Beverley! After the walk we stumbled across German food at Stein’s by the river and celebrated the completion of the southern half of the Capital Ring with sausages and schnitzel and the first gluhwein of the season. Prost!
(Talking of German, a quick side-note into my current YouTube obsession: Prof. Dr. Frank Erik Pointner and his Historical Linguistics. Come for the history of how the English language became so messy and weird, stay for the calm German tones and occasional shade thrown in the direction of rival linguistic professors who don’t study enough German. I genuinely love it.)
Also in the last few weeks: we’re now less than a year away from the re-wedding (!) so naturally we celebrated our -1 year anniversary at an excellent local Italian. We’ve also made progress on planning for the wedding itself, although sadly I was forced to conclude that hiring a 90s disco tribute band would not be the correct decision to maximise the happiness of the majority. Still, please enjoy this cover of Doctor Jones and think about the alternative universe where you’d get to experience this live in 2022. Katie approved when I showed it to her, at least, before our regular Doctor Who Night session took us to 1988’s unsubtly political The Happiness Patrol. I wonder if a young Chris Chibnall was taking notes.
Oh, and Bake Off’s back!
There was no 2020 office Christmas party, for obvious reasons, so instead my company generously paid for all of its employees to enjoy a night away at any of our customers’ hotels or B&Bs. Randi and I decided to use this opportunity to pick something a little different to where we might normally choose and enjoyed a weekend at Denbies Vineyard Hotel – a boutique hotel on the grounds of Denbies Wine Estate right next to Box Hill in Surrey.
There’s something charmingly British about Denbies. It might be the largest vineyard in the country but it’s still not that big, and is criss-crossed with public footpaths for local residents wanting to walk their dogs, run a ParkRun or simply get from Dorking to Westhumble. We opted for the ‘Secret Vineyard Trail’ walking tour to learn more and then had a brief moment of panic when we re-read the online description and realised it never actually mentioned any wine tasting.
Thankfully, our fears were quickly eased and plenty of wine of all varieties were provided by our friendly and super-knowledgeable tour guide, who (very 2021) recommended one bottle as the perfect pick-me-up to “a hard Zoom meeting at work”. The weather has made this a miserable year for wine production, apparently, although in the long run French winemakers continue to buy up land in England as climate change pushes optimum temperatures further north.
Away from all the wine, we did (of course!) also find time to walk up Box Hill, admire the views over the countryside and cross back over the River Mole via the well-advertised stepping stone crossing. (Weirdly, I don’t remember these at all from our many childhood trips to Box Hill… but perhaps we never came this way.) We also explored Dorking and its amusing over-provision of railway stations, plus potentially went accidentally trespassing through the secluded grounds of insurance company Unum and/or Hank Scorpio’s global HQ.
Back in London, we’ve also had the pleasure of hosting Sophie and Naomi for a Friday night dinner of Randi’s famous enchiladas, as well as virtual catch-ups with both Toggolyn and Catherine and AJ in the latter’s very shiny new apartment. We’ve now tried to plan a return trip to Chicago so many times that “not jinxing it” feels completely redundant, but nonetheless we are – in principle – very very excited about finally making it back there in November. Fingers crossed…!
Hello, blog! It’s been almost a month since my last post, but I have a decent excuse as for most of that time – and after a really lovely evening at the pub with Clark in Leytonstone which just missed the last blogging window but deserves a mention – Randi’s parents have been visiting us from California.
For obvious reasons it’s been over a year and a half since we were all together in person, so Randi and I organised a trio of small trips around the UK to catch them up with our exciting plans for 2022. More on that shortly! First, though, when they arrived they had to consent to six days of quarantining in our flat – punctuated only by persistent calls from Test & Trace and bittersweet glimpses of freedom whilst shuttling to and from the PCR testing centre in glamorous West Croydon. (To be honest, I think we’re all quite fond of West Croydon now. It treated us well.)
Fortunately, some of this period coincided with the Tokyo Olympics, and despite the awkward scheduling and lack of spectators we still really enjoyed watching the huge variety of sport on show. Special shout-outs for Stu’s newfound love of Rugby Sevens and the usual awesomeness of the canoe/kayak slaloms, but I think my favourite thing to watch was the new rock climbing format with its crazy, escape-room-esque bouldering puzzles and slightly wacky scoring system. Looking forward to seeing more in 2024!
Not wanting to let a good quarantine go to waste, we also put Randi’s parents to work on our long list of house and garden tasks which we had neglected since moving in. So now, a drill has been purchased! A mirror has been hung! We have a coat rack! And, after an awful lot of parental hard labour in the garden, the lawn has now been reclaimed from weeds in preparation for grass yet-to-come, we’ve planted our first flowers and even managed to excavate a number of giant concrete slabs lying under the surface. (As we levered up the first one with a garden fork, it looking and sounding remarkably like the lid of a coffin, I think we had all prepared ourselves for pet graves… or worse.)
Once Beth and Stu had cleared their ‘Test to Release’ Covid test we were free to venture a little more widely, and in addition to our out-of-London trips we packed in a lot of capital adventures too. As you’d expect we took Randi’s parents to all of our favourite parks, cafés, restaurants and Waterlink Ways – other highlights included Pimms and delicious Indian food with Josh, Anna and Cora in their always-beautiful garden, a long-awaited dinner with my mum at Sanzio in Willesden Green, another trip up the Shard and an incredible meal at The Mayflower with Tash and Cormac (who I now feel empowered to start calling Tarmac).
Katie has also been visiting from Glasgow at the same time, and although sometimes it started to feel like every plan we made was doomed to be scuppered by a combination of flash flooding, Covid isolations and non-Covid medical emergencies (don’t worry, everyone’s fine) we did finally manage to all have dinner together at Cubana near Waterloo. Katie and I also managed to sneak in another Doctor Who night last night with 1971’s The Dæmons.
Trip #1: Brighton
Our first trip was a day trip to the seaside, principally to pick up Randi’s ring which we ordered after a whimsical adventure deep in The Lanes back in June.
A ring? OK, let’s back up. In 2017, wearing matching Settlers of Catan t-shirts, Randi and I got married in a Chicago courtroom and celebrated with Catherine and AJ over a lovely brunch and gorgeous gifts of giant meeple which now adorn our living room. But neither of us wanted to try and stage a wedding yet – not until we had the time, space and money for a wedding we’d both be really excited to have. Fast-forward to now, and it’s finally on the cards for (fingers crossed) September 2022 in Hereford. Many more details to come, obviously, although we’ve already started posting out some very attractive Save The Date fridge magnets emblazoned with our faces – you lucky things – to select countries.
Anyway – back to Brighton – where we collected Randi’s ring (which, very fittingly, includes all the colours of the sea) and then hung out in Brighton’s Pavilion Gardens, the beach and the pier.
The pier, incidentally, was the scene of the crime wherein a mercenary seagull swooped down behind me and stole a full two scoops of ice cream directly from the cone in its claws. Never trust a seagull.
Trip #2: Hereford & Church Stretton
Trip two, as should now make sense, was to Hereford to give Randi’s parents a peek at the wedding venue itself. Also notable on this trip was Beth’s enthusiastic, whole-hearted embrace of rhubarb and apple flavoured gin at an excellent tapas restaurant – I think we’re now on first-name terms with the owners – plus a day trip-within-a-trip down the Welsh Marches line to Church Stretton.
If that name sounds familiar, it’s because Church Stretton was the location of our first escape from London after Covid back in August 2020, and for that I think it will always have a special place in our hearts. It also helps that The King’s Arms has an amazing beer garden and pots of irresistible blue cheese sauce.
Trip #3: Cambridge
Last but definitely not least, this summer was a golden opportunity for me to correct the poor impression of Cambridge which Randi was left with back in 2015 when we shuffled about in the rain with ponchos and heavy backpacks. This time the sun shone, our backpacks were safely stowed away in a fancy hotel overlooking Parker’s Piece (very weird) and we could properly enjoy this indisputably lovely city. (I knew my work was done when Randi suggested it was prettier than Oxford.)
The highlight, of course, was hiring a punt and heading out towards Grantchester Meadows (which we very nearly made it to). As a group, I would say we had the perfect blend of hilarious ineptitude with enough determination and fast learning to actually make it somewhere.
I was also very happy, despite my last-minute organisation, to be able to grab a coffee with Peter Mandler the next morning before we headed home. As always, I learnt a lot, especially about some of the positive and long-overdue updates to the Cambridge experience which are coming out of the pandemic.
Linda Moffitt on Colombia: “Such a sweet memory of the four of you meeting up in Colombia!” Dec 2, 07:42
