A Good Cleaning
The big Chinese rug in my living room, was one that C and myself bought in Hong Kong in probably 1985. I remember we imported it personally and I drove the horse box to the docks at Felixstowe to collect it.
In all the years we had it, it had never been cleaned.
Until now.
Cleaning A Carpet
The only real problem was that a basset hound, we used to own, had christened the carpet. But in the end, it came up fairly well.
The Finished Carpet
Obviously it needs to dry off completely. But I think Michael from The Beautiful Cleaning Company did a very good job. And the price was less than I’d budgeted for!
Jazz At the New Merlin’s Cave
I took a 38 bus this lunchtime to go and have lunch with a friend and passed along Rosebery Avenue from Saddlers Wells Theatre to the main sorting Office at Mount Pleasant.
When we lived in the Barbican in the 1970s, sometimes C and I would go for a drink with the children at a jazz pub called New Merlin’s Cave to see John Chilton’s Feetwarmers and sometimes George Melly at Sunday lunchtimes. The pub was to the north side of the bus route.
I looked up the pub on the Internet and found this history.
Did those who were children in the 1970s suffer from being in a jazz club with all that booze and cigarette smoke?
Sadly the New Merlin’s Cave is no more!
My Alternative to Alternative Vote
I don’t like the system of Alternative Vote, especially in countries, where voters have little political awareness. One of the reasons is that many just vote, by going 1, 2, 3 etc. from the top. Now that means that a lot of people with surnames beginning with A get elected. It is good for Balls, Brown, Blair, Clegg, Cameron and Cable, but worse for those like Milliband or Wanker.
I would prefer some form of elimination and runoff system, based on the principle that no-one can get elected unless they have got fifty percent of the votes. There would also be a none-of-the-above box. After the first round, if the one with most votes, got more than fifty percent, then they are elected. If the none-of-the-above box got over the magic fifty, then all candidates are banned and the election is rerun with new idiots. In all other cases, any who got less than say five percent would be eliminated and a simple rerun is performed.
The permutations are endless and it would clog parliament up for months deciding what should be done. At least this would stop pointless legislation being passed.
Labour Makes Voting More Appealing to Younger Votes
According to Seven Day Sunday on Radio 5, the Labour Party is thinking of calling the ballot box, the X-Box, to make voting more appealing to younger voters.
I know it’s a show you don’t take seriously, but I like the idea. The trouble is, it’s the sort of idea, you could believe had been thought up by a bunch of self-opinionated politicians.
Clearing Out the Phone
Over the years, all and sundry have been added to the memory in my mobile phone.
Today, whilst I was having lunch, I finally cleared out the detritus of my life in the country.
Sad in many ways, but it would have had to be done at some time.
Some were years old and some I hadn’t a clue who they were.
How Do You Make A New Threadbare Carpet?
You could ask why you need one too, but here’s the paragraph from Modern Railways describing the sumptuous interior of the new Midland Grand Hotel, that is soon to open at St. Pancras.
Here is the grand staircase, made famous in a score of films, with a sumptuous new carpet from Brintons of Kidderminster – but wait, the carpet does not look that new. No it has been specially woven to look a little threadbare, to be in keeping with the age of its surroundings.
The hotel must also be unique in that it will feature a Ladies Smoking Room, where smoking will not be allowed.
The Telegraph has an article here.
Will this become the best station hotel in the world? If it does, Sir John Betjeman will be chuckling out loud. It is certainly attached to a station that the head of French Railways, once said was the best station in the world.
Welcome to IKEA
I finally got the spice rack last night at IKEA in Croydon.
It’s quite an easy journey by public transport, as I just get the 21/141 bus to London Bridge, a train to East Croydon and then the Tramlink to Ampere Way.
In a strange way, the journey summed up one of the things I like about London; friendliness. I chatted about my troubles and travels to a pleasant guy called Duncan from the Bank of England and then as I waited for the tram, I talked to the tram driver, who was to take my tram to Wimbledon. Incidentally, Duncan doesn’t have a car, so like me he uses public transport everywhere. Perhaps, we’re ahead of our time and in a few years or so, non-driving will be the normal thing to do.
The only problem, I had on the journey down, was caused by a slight lack of signage at East Croydon, my uncertainty about how to use the tram and which one to get.
Duncan pointed me at this book; The Brain That Changes Itself. I shall check it out!
I was then presented to this at IKEA.
Welcome to IKEA
Just look at those concrete benches, that are ideally placed to bump the shins of people with limited vision. It wasn’t the easiest walk to and from the tram stop, with some roads controlled by pedestrian lights and others that worked on the cross-quickly-and-be-lucky principle.
Coming back was quite easy, in that I took the tram to West Croydon and then took the East London Line to Dalston Junction. But there is no signage at West Croydon to the Overground from the tram stop. Supposedly, plans are in place for a better connection. At Dalston, I was even lucky enough to avoid the five minute walk, by getting a convenient bus along the Balls Pond Road.
The spice rack is now on the wall.
The Last Bolts
Every time I go up the staircase these bolts annoy me.
Brass Painted Bolts on the Stairs
On the other side of the stairs, they have used Rawlbolts, but here they don’t have any identification on them. So I took one out to have a look.
Brass Painted Hexagonal Screw
This was not what I expected. But it will have to do for the moment.
The Boiler – Sorted
When nPower changed the gas meter, they told me to get the boiler serviced. Over the last few days, it has not been performing well and I’ve been cold, so yesterday I phoned a number on the boiler and the engineer rang me back this morning to say he could come round at 10:00.
He’s just left and the financial damage wasn’t too bad, considering that the boiler probably had never been serviced since it was installed. Nothimg else in this house has I suspect! And they’ve managed to lose all the manuals too!
I would certainly call Accurate Services on 020-8523-1121 or 020-8531-4411 again!
Ingrid Pitt
Ingrid Pitt, one of the stars of British horror films died a few months ago. So it is rather fitting that the Rio cinema in Dalston is showing some of her films.
Rio Cinema, Dalston
In some ways the biggest story about Ingrid Pitt, is that she survived a Nazi concentration camp. A documentary and perhaps a longer film is being made.
The Anonymous Widower 