Et In Arcadia Ego

I've just got a great text from Friend 2 regarding today's protests. She's been watching along on the telly, but could not have expressed the afternoon better if she'd actually been there:

Good...[regarding the fact I would refuse to protest with that lot after dark] the atmosphere seemed a bit too...tense/expectant/charged on tv. Like they were all waiting for something. And there were too many police.
~24/11/2010 17:15

Because before the protest even started on the Strand, I could hear the three helicopters overhead, and saw riot vans crossing the city, and two policemen taking up post outside the uni.

I probably had better things to do that walk about in the cold with no gloves, with people I don't respect, put myself in possible mortal peril, and make no difference whatsoever - but then I get so pissed off at people who think that's a good enough excuse. I've probably got Blake to blame for that, and for the record unlike me, he is obviously a big fan of violent civil disobedience. He'd have thought Millbank was great, but would probably have been a little more efficient about trashing the place. (The Doctor doesn't need a political stance because he can bring down a government in six words or less.) And it's interesting, because I would argue Blake's stance is justified on the grounds that he has no other means of protesting. Freedom of speech, fair trial and rights to assembly - peaceful methods, in other words - are totally impossible for him, making his violence his only option. But then...isn't violence our only option? Working on the basis that the government were never going to reverse the cuts, no matter how many flower children designed witty banners and danced...

I'd been to the previous protest, which was a beautiful fun day ruined by mayhem I totally missed. I figured Protest #2 could go one of two ways - either the pacifists would come out in force to disassociate the student movement from the Millbank mess. Or, as appears to have happened, the troublemakers would redouble their prescence, and the disillusioned pacifists wouldn't bother to show up at all. I could tell at once this was not a protest I wanted to walk with - but I did have my camera with me (been trying to shoot an avant-garde movie, and my ideas require sunlight and Central London), so had a bash at documentary.

One of the things you'll note from the film is my interest not in the protestors, but the police prescence. I couldn't quite take in how darn many there were - somebody was overcompensating. That too bloodied the atmosphere. Being trailed by six riot vans is never going to make a crowd happy. I moved between being just at the back, in front of the police line, and just behind them. Met a guy dressed as the Joker, I guess - he had a bowler hat, clown face paint and a funny manner of speaking and walking, although he had not adopted the purples and greens

"Your card is the - Jack of hearts!" he guessed raspily on noticing my hat. I'm not kidding - to get ahead in the world, wear a splendid hat. Interesting, artistic, millinary-appreciating people feel the need to compliment it, and you can then have conversations with them. He was accompanied by a really pretty chap (I think; retrospectively, could have been female; really pretty in either case) dressed as Edward Scissorhands.

The protest came to a halt in Parliament Square, simply because those at the front stopped moving. I imagine, corralled by police vans at the other end. The atmosphere was not nice. Two separate groups had brought loudspeakers rigged up to dance music, but not the positive euphoric sort. The exciting, ugly sort which is fun if you're pretending to be a post-apocalyptic biopunk at a rave, but is a bit too appropriate to hordes of angry youth. A group had already climbed on top of a bus shelter, with one of the speakers, and a mini-rave had begun.

On the opposite side of the square, a line of people were standing on the sandbags, piled against a temporary railing that kept the protest off an open drain - I joined them for a better perspective, and made a classic mistake. A few minutes later, a sort of stampede toppeled the distant end of the railing, and that dragged the whole thing down section by section. My first instinct was to jump off the sandbags and get away from the trouble - retrospectively, my first instinct should have been to stay there and keep recording. Not a mistake I will make again!

In the middle, a police van was overrun by enemy forces - slogans had been sharpied all over it, an Anarchy banner erected on top, by three revellers who had scaled the sides. One wearing the iconic V mask. I love how the iconography of V for Vendetta has been adopted by real life - it's the kind of reality bending I really enjoy. The despair was new - I've never felt that at a protest before. I think a sense of severe disillusionment was what made it all so nasty, as if everyone were to say "Who cares if a few buildings get trashed? Or if I get jailed? You're not going to listen anyway - I'd rather take out my hate than petition for my hope". After the governmental double-cross, and the miserable end to the last demo, the only people who would bother protesting a third time would have to be the last stand mad-spitfires.

I didn't feel comfortable at all, so stayed to the outskirts where there was still quite a lot of space. I kept shooting until my battery ran out, then went to leave. No such luck - the three police lines were preventing exit on all sides. The chaps I spoke to were all very pleasant about it, suprisingly present considering they were paid today to stand and wait to be beaten up. I would have expected them to be more tense. The man I spoke to on each side helpfully redirected me to the next side, where maybe people were being allowed to leave. In fact, no one on any side could get out unless they had a pass proving - I couldn't work out what, but some businessmen and photographers managed. I found a quiet corner and grumpily ate my pasta - I was quite cold by this point, bereft of the fun of filming, and getting increasingly late for a meeting with people I wanted to impress. Rather stressed about the crowds too - I hung around the police line and watched a lot of people turned away, even though they were still letting people in through a one-person gap at the back.

It increasingly felt like a tragedy in waiting, as different smokes rose from the very front, and someone let off a firework. Moderate people of various sorts had apparently made the same decision as me - this was not a protest they wanted to be at any more, and they wanted to be out before trouble, but were being prevented from. This included many of the reasonably dressed older women, spooked teenage girls and several bands of young kids. This bothered me a lot, because if trouble was on the cards, then surely diffusing the crowds in a controlled manner before it started would have cut down on chaos.

I'll be interested to hear how the situation was resolved in Parliament Square, because it seemed the easiest way of causing a riot/stampede that could have been designed. I attempted exit by all three sides multiple times, and while doing so a huge surge of people swarmed into the quiet space. At the time, I thought "well this is it then!" - I'd known there was no exit for about 15 minutes at this point, well long enough for it to filter through the crowd. I made a break for one of the shops lining the route (poor proprietors! Poor holidaymakers trapped in the cafes!) and got chatting with an older woman from just inside, as we watched people continue to move outside. Nothing kicked off, it was just spontaneous movement. I tried the three sides again, and finally decided to try and break out in the corner where people were entering. There were apparently people trying to exit, and I could see some succeeding.

No. 2, my dad, has an oft-repeated anecdote about getting a great view of a Genesis concert by following a really fat chap all the way to the front - well, I found a pair of overweight older women. They were let through just ahead of me, and then the gap closed leaving me face to face with a brick of a cop. After a moment, he asked "Tourist?". I brandished mny camera, nodded innocently, and tried to look Welsh. It worked, so thank goodness for blonde hair and general panic, because if he'd stopped to think about it, he'd have noticed I was dressed like the studentiest student who had ever studied.

Tadah! Freedom! At which point I allowed myself to be really damned unhappy about how the morning had turned out. Adrenaline does wonders in the moment, but then life crashes. In the ghostly empty street behind the protest, I met a group of school kids who had broken out of their school - literally, headmistress tried to keep them in, they smashed down the gates, to get to the protest. They all praised my hat (see?) and warned me about the corral, and seemed to be warning other latecomers.

I struggled back to my meeting, rather late, and was afterwards so tired that I found an abandoned room in the Strand and napped on a sofa for two hours before I felt able to walk to the Tube. Good day. Depressing and desperate, but no experience is intrinsically worthless, especially one you walk away from, and I'm now going to edit everything together for you folks at home. Catch you later!

This must be the most intense smattering of blogs ever produced here! And I don't need to type a word.

Bevenita and I were going to go to a Squat Rave on Friday evening - I was busy, she fell asleep. But she woke me up at 7 the next morning, to squee that the rave was still on and would I like to come, right then.

Well, why not? She only has a bus pass, so we spent the morning travelling down - I bought breakfast from Tescos, and later in the day called my folks. Mum reminded me Not To Do Drugs and to Stay Safe. We ultimately arrived at a clapped out office block in the shadow of the Battersea powerstation. It didn't look like much, but when we got close the building seemed to pulse, like a cat bristling with anger.

We passed through the door saying "No Tresspassers". Inside felt rather like a school, although perhaps that was the old-school-disco decor. It had been transformed into a club; there were three "rooms", a foyer, a chillout zone, and other areas which groups had colonised - one I found with a television; under the stairs, I found a man sleeping in a pile of cushions. Hastily erected signs or graffiti on the walls pointed the way to toilets, cloakroom and the organiser's area.

I'll get this out of the way first: for a nominally illegal party in a dilapidated building covered in last night's drug paraphanalia, I have never felt safer. Certainly not in a club. It lacked the nastiness of Guernsey clubbing - sticky floors, small-minded-desperation reeking off every stranger, very dark shadows anywhere the lampposts forgot. For a small, "safe" island, I've never felt in more danger than St Peter Port on a Friday evening. Nor did it have the obnoxious, hip-hop-video-audition vibe of London clubs - with everyone trying to make an impression in the most anonymous manner possible.

The squat was populated by imperfect people, and I felt very comfortable exploring the building on my own. There was something genuinely joyous about this DIY party: free entry, bring your own booze (or whatever), no expectations just people who like music. The party had started on Saturday morning - we arrived at about 11o'clock on Sunday, and was to continue until sometime Monday.

We emerged from a series of grubby corridors into the "psy-trance" room, the only place where music was still going on. The party had been broken up by police at 3AM, so there were only about 20 or so people around. The "main stage" upstairs was huge and deserted, and even more incredible: it felt like being on a prog cover. The walls were all draped with paintings (fractals, Ganesh, things like that). All over the roofes, the floors, stretched between walls with holes cut were stretched brightly coloured sheets. Neon spiders weaving webs; rather like a cheap fairground ghost house. All told, just one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.

Time passed. I worked out how to dance - which is pretty easy to music designed for zombies to shuffle to. I also did some hooping and have some truly intimidating bruises to match my new, truly intimidating skillz - I can now walk, twirl, hop and in general, dance while keeping a hoop going, as well as transferring it between my midriff and above my head. This did not look very graceful, especially in comparison to Bevenita - who is almost certainly in the top 10 most beautiful things I've ever seen once let loose with a hoop. Ultimately, she went off in a bus to a festival, and I headed home for a doze...

I've an awful lot to say about this weekend; how mum and Friend 3 visited on Saturday, how mum and I blitzed the house and went to Highgate cemetary. And how Friend 3, Calypso and then stayed up until stupid o'clock watching Doctor Who. But it didn't matter, because it was only a weekend so I could catch up sleep on Monday. Neither did waking up at 9 AM, and meeting mum in Camden, then Friend 3 in Oxford Circus, and walking all day until 6 in the PM, because they'd be gone in the evening, I could grab an early night, and catch up sleep on Monday. Maybe one day I'll blog all that. I doubt it, as I'm always too drained after fun weekends with visitors to write it all down.

I resisted the urge to go to bed too early, and distracted myself with origami and The Sea Wolves - although I was drooping and didn't really enjoy either,

So when Bevenita tootled in and chirruped something about going to a fire show, then driving to Stonehenge for the solstice, I almost certainly meant to say no.



Part 1: To start with...

I don't know what's come over me recently. I'm just very bored of being me. I'm sick of Victorians, sick of violent movies and the classification system - sick of movies full stop - bored of drawing and writing and creating in general. It's left a black hole in my life quite difficult to fill. But this might explain why a combo of some of my least favourite things, like being away from London and ghastly late nights, suddenly seemed like a good idea.

No, let's go further back. Calypso and I were hooping one night in the garden, when Bevenita and Pluto chanced to return. I surrendered my hoop to her, hung up fairy lights on the washing lines, found outdoor speakers, produced chocolate and hey presto - we had a party! I also found a big metal bucket of water when Pluto produced his fire poi. I shouldn't have worried: he is excellent, and the show he put on was beautiful. Bevenita is a very watcheable hooper because of her infectious enthusiasm. Pluto, on the other hand, has this sombre meditative quality to his performance. Whoosh! I was reminded of it when reading through "The Lost Gods of England", a book detailing everything we can reconstruct of England's pre-Christian religion from information inadvertantly transmitted by Roman and Christian authors. Very little is known of the Midsummer celebration, except that there is one, and that it was a fire festival. Suddenly, I wanted my own coven, and my own solstice ritual decorated with fire performers.
So this came very close to my imagining, and despite my exhaution could not turn it down. I tried to nap on the Tube. Bevenita had no idea how we were going to get to Stonehenge ("Do you know where it is?"), but according to her, when she wants things like this, things tend to just turn out OK.

Part 2: Fire meet

The fire meet was in a park in Vauxhall. About ten of us, with various fun toys and a bucket of paraffin. I recognised some from other circus-y events I'd been to. I sat to one side, wielding a bottle of water just in case (and carefully making sure it wasn't the bottle of water which actually contained gin. That wouldn't be good.)

The first performer was obviously more of a beginner than the others, but had a go with fire nontheless. The back of her jacket caught, briefly, but all was well. Two of them used "snake poi" - instead of attatching a chain to a small burning ball, wick is a huge, thick tail. The patterns look a bit like flags, flame-flags. The fire was yellow and bright blue. Another used a staff, burning at both ends. Bevenita DJed throughout this, and I particularly enjoyed the use of the Animatrix soundtrack. She performed almost last, with her fire-hoop. It was only the second time she had used it, and it is heavier than her normal hoop, but I was still very impressed. The sense of danger and daring to it all made it all the more exciting, and I confess to basically watching with my mouth open.

Halfway through, we were interrupted by a police van which rolled up onto the grass. A cop got out and told us he could smell cannabis, and asked us if we were smoking drugs. We said no. He accepted this, explaining that it was a pretty dodgy area hence the patrols, and then got back into the van. It was a very, very bizzare occurrence. What sort of policeman takes the group of teens at their word when they claim to be drug free? And DOESN'T object to the fact they are obviously playing with paraffin in a public area?

We attracted a passer by, who was on his way home, and was an ex-spinner. We invited him to join us, and in fire-free moments he did some pretty impressive tricks with the glow-poi. It was a nice coincidence, as he offered the use of his toilet in his nearby house, thus saving me from the misery of a bush. He has Boris Johnson's signature in his upstairs loo.

I played with the hoop as everyone packed up - I'm not quite up to performing yet, with or without petrol. I can spin it on my hands a fair few ways, keep it going around my middle while walking, dancing, jumping or doing the splits and get it from above my head to my midriff; and if the music is sufficiently loud, I even manage to get a sort of groove going. I still don't have grace or rhythm to ever be very good at it - I think ultimately, Poi will be for me, as it calls for standing still - but it's still enjoyable. I think the difference between me and them is that they're having fun, and accidentally creating beauty; whereas creating beauty is my end goal, and along the way am having a bit of a laugh. But I could be wrong.

Part 3: The Journey (midnight-3 AM)
Bevenita's optimism was not misplaced; it turned out that A had two friends, D and P, who had brought a van and they would be driving to Stonehenge. It was midnight now, and the plain was 2 and a half hours away. I had met A and C last week, and liked them very much. A had spidery-dreadlocks, both were dressed like hippies and I think the whole bus was very, very vegan. They were both the right combination of serious and chilled-out. Before we set sail, we
popped to a corner shop, but in the beginning of definite trend, a no one had any cash. We jointly met the card limit - I contributed a boxs of weetoes and a packet of biscuits.

D, P and A sat up front - with A taking the first bash at driving. S also had a license, but had never driven a van before, so A decided he should at least get us out of London. So S, C and I piled into the back. It was a construction-man van (complete with ladders on the roof) so there was plenty of room for three. They voted me the cushion, on top of a pair of raised boxes just behind the driver's cab, and they used the assortment of bags and coats and it was altogether rather cosy.

The only real problem was the lack of windows, but this was in a way better: Bevenita gets motion sickness, and I get distracted. I sorely needed these two hours to sleep. I tried rigging my torch up on the broken roof lights using my sonic screwdriver to see by, but Bevenita worried I might electricute myself and suggested we just have it dark. At which point C made her jump. Luckily, he had an abundance of light-up poi and successfuly hung one up. It threw an eerie green-blue over the back, but it was a nice, diffused light compared to the harsh torch, and we were three of the happiest wannabie illegal immegrants.

I curled up with my coats and bags on top of the boxes, and tried to sleep. C and Bevenita were having that sort of Serious, Honest Late Night Discussion which tends to happen with people you don't know too well. It seemed bad taste to get involved in it, and when they moved on to swapping drug anecdotes I didn't have anything to add. The van was incredibly loud, and we could hardly hear the loud trance being played in the front.

One of the more entertaining events was our Blue Peter Answers The Call of Nature moment for Bevenita. We found an empty water-bottle and cut the top off as a recepticle. Meanwhile, C and I played shadow puppets on the back of the cab against the blue moon thrown by the screwdriver. C did a pretty good E.T. We then resealed the bottle with a plastic bag and an elastic band, and found somewhere to stand it up.

We stopped at a way-station after an hour, ironically soon after Bevenita had perfected the bottle trick. Everyone ambled around, buying coffees, browsing. C had been in Peru for the last year, so had missed the Twilight thing entirely. We discussed Stieg Larsson, and how his partner of 20 years isn't making anything off his books because they never married. There were an awful lot of top-shelf novels too, Torture Temptress and the rest.

It cold outside, even though I had had the foresight to wear hundreds of layers, and was only going to get worse. Luckily, WH Smith was selling rather natty double packs of fleece blankets. To pay C back for my cereal, I also sponsored his Boost bars. Outside, A produced a very special strawberry muffin. I made sure it was hash free, but it turned out that by "special" they meant vegan, organic and sugar-free.

Bevenita had had gin by this point, and the van's owner was very much asleep, so A drove again. It got incredibly cold, and I was greatful for the fleeces but they seemed very thin. Nevertheless, I slept on this lap - C meditated.

Part 4: Arrival (3AM-4AM)

I woke up in time to feel the van waddle up over the kerb and onto grass, and at last we were let out, to choruses of "We in Eng-ar-land, ya?". Being an illegal immigrant must be horrible, and in another chancy moment, it seemed like the door might not open. It was freezing outside, but I was totally swaddled in blankets. While everyone else got ready, I tried stargazing, but didn't recognise any of the summer constellations. We did find a planet, though, which I guessed was Jupiter because from my limited experience it seemed more or less the right height, size, direction and definitely wasn't Venus.

We were in a field-turned-car park. It was a full-scale operation, with Disneyland style numbered car-rows, and plenty of helpful stewards. We were in section 18. The artistes debated whether or not, and how, they would smuggle fire poi into the cordoned off area. Finally, they decided to take their most simple pair, and my water bottle became the paraffin recepticle. I didn't volunteer it, because my cold-sore (though I'm starting to wonder if that's what it is) demands I have my own bottle to drink from, but when they remembered it I didn't wholly mind either.

It took a few false starts to get going, and we were about a mile off from the stones themselves. It was still dark, although as we walked the first bright blues started streaking to the east and those 3AM birds started singing. Sillhouetted against that sky were a few statuesque cows, and distant hills with burning beacons.

At the top of the first slope, I risked the portaloos and we went through the first security barrier. They cheerfully checked us all for drugs and knives, and I think they mistook C's
long, carved, plastic glow-poi for some sort of interesting toy. Once we were through, it was a long trek across a field - an exodus of people walking in both directions - the sky getting bluer all the time. I had resisted texting Calypso for most of the evening: there's no schadenfreude-free way to explain that, while you are stuck at home, I am on my way to the solstice at Stonehenge. But now seemed appropriate, and we ended up chatting. She sounded very tired and told me a bit about her day. As I described it to her, the distant monument area now looked very much like movie-representations of Roswell - lots of huge bright lights, security guards and people milling around.

At the end of the field, we passed security barrier 2. This time, they discovered C's penknife - which he had forgotten to leave in the van - but they had a free-of-charge luggage area where he could leave it.

We passed a few food stands; nasty things like at fairgrounds. Over to our right was a huge statue - it looked a bit like a demon or monster. And then I saw the stones, dark grey against dark blue. We hung around a bit for Bevenita's friends and then plunged ahead. There were people everywhere - it was actually pretty unpleasant - and a lot of noise. Bevenita's friend seemed to be heading somewhere, but i was impatient
A said his tradition was to walk around the stones 3 times desoil (that's clockwise to people who use modern non-New-Age English), and a friend's tradition is as good as any in absence of my own. We tried this, but it was really too jam-packed to move. All the low stones were colonised by cheering hippies dancing to the drumming or watching and waiting. The center of the circle was solid. We could just about get through the outside, managed one circuit and then gave up. We met up to the north of the stones, which we had designated base-camp.

It was becoming rapidly lighter, and C and A decided it was time to whip out the fire poi. I followed them behind the crowd to prepare the kit which we then wrapped up in a blanket. We went back into outer band of people and found a suitably large space, getting the permission of bystanders who eagerly prepared cameras. Health and safety gremlins would have hated it, but having already seen him perform in Vauxhall he clearly knew what he was doing. So even though there was barely any space, it felt very safe and I'd have happily watched him poi in a wardrobe.

It was an absolutely magical minute, attracting the admiration of the entire area. Security shut us down very, very quickly (it's hard to miss the man with the fire, especially if everyone is watching him), but it was another one of those weird time-touching moments, because here was that fire celebration I had imagined.

As it became brighter, I went for a wander. Lots of people were in front, face on to the sun; the centre was still packed, and many were behind the monument waiting to see the sun come up between them. I spent about 10 minutes standing in every concieveable location - on rocks, behind them, on all corners, just to get a feel for the different views, and gave up on the idea of a "good spot". We were ultimately off to the side, able to see the stones and the hills and sun: perfect. The angle from which you would paint a trad watercolour.

Just before sunrise, the hill was crowded (youtube)

Ignoring the fact I'd spent all night in a gloomy van, London is packed with buildings so in contrast the green was overwhelming. Much like the dream-sequences in Brazil; the sky was huge, and absolutely beautiful. As the sky paled, we could see mist and yellow light on 360 deg of sage green hills. All Wind and Wuthering. The cloud cover was, on some level, pretty poor for the sunrise - I think everyone was waiting for a huge sizzling ball to hop over the horizon - but watching the clouds go purple and red was a treat. About seven minutes after it must have risen, it peeped out between two flat bands of cloud and a cheer went up across the camp.

Part 6: Sunrise (5AM)
For the first time, I noticed spontaneous religiosity going on instead of drunken revelling. The drumming picked up, and I saw people meditating, or doing yogic style exercises or devotions. For my part, I was thinking about spinning. There's the Wiccan concept of the "Wheel of the Year", and the Tarot "Wheel of Fortune", describing how all creatures live in natural, ancient cycles - and here we were, in loops and bands around England's sacred stone circle, repeating rituals repeated for generations, just as the return of day is always repeated - and the Sun rises because the Earth is turning on its axis, and in turn turning around the +Sun - two big space-hoops - with us celebrating by spinning around and around. Spinning and spinning and spinning, wheels within wheels. I love DIY spirituality.

There was much hugging strangers, and C smudged me with a Peruvian holy tree which smelt to Bevenita like sandalwood. I abandoned my coat in favour of a hoop, which was momentarily freezing but I soon warmed up. I ached everywhere, but it's easy to ignore something like that when you've just SEEN THE SUN RISE AT STONEHENGE FOR THE SOLSTICE. Between us and the horizon was an outlying rock, where people were taking it in turns to have photos. After they got bored, I nabbed it and our two poi professionals stood up there silhouetted against the dawn. That photo is of A.

As soon as the sun was up, the crowds evaporated, which was a shame for them because the afterparty was actually far nicer. We spotted some trouble near the stones, with the stewards wrestling someone to the ground and dragging them off, and it was the only real problem we saw all night. There were lots of people sleeping, and just hanging around in a bohemian manner. We made friends with three yoga-stretchers, and I drummed with one of them. Another explained
"Wherever you are, whoever you are, you are always right". I ignored the temptation to mention Hitler - I understood what he was trying to say. Not everyone was "feeling it" - a particularly angry, drugged-up girl missed the sunrise shouting at her friends down the phone. We offered her and her group cookies.

The morning was divided between hooping and exploring. I was strictly too tired to do any sort of activity, certainly too tired to "perform" - I could keep it going around my middle, but didn't want to move much more than necessary. But the practice did me good, and I can now on demand get the hoop up and down down from my waist to my hips. At other times, I just lay on the grass or stones and cloudgazed.

We attracted the attention of a rather nice looney, who was selling yellow felt wizard hats, a program listing all the summer festivals and caramel cakes. He taught us "Contact Improvisation", the bizzarest dance you have ever seen. You start by "feeling" the earth under your feet, and then you bumble around with your whole body a bit like on a deck in a storm, and trying to be aware of all your limbs. In large groups - he was showing C and S also - touching or dodging other people is part of the idea. Several times, I got lifted up. There are two basic movements. "1" is "rooted", when someone brushes or pushes you and you do not give way - or "0", where you go with their movement and flow wherever they direct you. There's probably some beautiful life truth in there somewhere. It was daft, but also enjoyable and not half as grope-y as it sounds.

When the other two were distracted, he invited me to an August festival of workshops, in which he teaches shaman skills. He explained how everything is connected, "like fractals" - dancing, and words, and music - and how he often percieves words as dance moves. "Everything is the same". While we spoke, I had another bash at poi - I can remember a few tricks. Ugly, but practice makes perfect. Earlier in the week, I recieved some fantastic instructions and I can't wait to get practicing with my sister's pair.

It was now clear enough to get close to the stones. There was a nub of people still solid in the center, dancing and drumming away. But there was easily enough room to walk around three times, desoil. I don't know what A's spiritual motivation was (if I had to guess, it'd be something like considering the past, the previous year, and resolutions to come as you walked), but it gave you a marvellous sense of space and location. The colours were beautiful and clean everywhere now; very fresh. I also closely inspected the stones themselves. They didn't give off any "vibes" as it were, but they were still awe-inspiring. Very large.

Hippies! Everywhar!

While hooping and walking around, I got glommed by someone who asked me to come perform for his friends. I did my apologetic best, and they were very nice. Like everyone else I'd spoken to, they lived fairly close in the area. I met up with my gang again in the stones, and we joined in the dancing. There was drumming, and a girl with an Aztec flute. Bevenita had managed to clear room to hoop-dance there, and at times, there was room for me to whirl a bit too although I often just hopped ineffectually from foot to foot. I'd been going since 9AM the previous morning, with only sparse uncomfortable sleep, and as much as I'd like to have boundless, Doctorish enthusiasm I do flag very quickly when tired. But at least the depression gremlins didn't get me, as they are wont to do. Now there was space, I climbed some of the emptier central stones, and watched the sun through some of the arches - yes, that would be a perfect angle to watch the rise from if you could be bothered to stand there for long enough, which I never could, and were lucky not to have people cramming your view.


I also had a look round for the Pandorica entrance. Despite the way my brain functions, and the huge impression that episode had made on me, I spent surprisingly little time thinking about DW. I think it's potentially the best episode so far. Other top contenders are Eleventh Hour, Amy's Choice (but that does have problems that might have irritated me if not for my Valeyard enthusiasm beating all complaints into the dust) and depending on my mood, maybe Vincent). And if the second half works (and I have perfect faith it will - when your setup is so daring and excellent, I don't think you can muff it up), possibly among the best ever. Calypso informed me earlier it had really been filmed there, but the atmosphere was a bit too bohemian to worry about television.

I hooped up on the rock, but by this point when I moved my feet the backs of my ankles cracked so it was all rather half-hearted. We did have one last epic dance, though, with everyone going at once. The police were clearing people out at 8, and it was now quarter to. We returned to the camp, and A took us to the other side of the stones to escape being forcably moved. Some of his friends had a singing circle, and I mumbled happily along to the more repetitive hippy anthems (something about love coming from love, and flowing like the river into the sea...). While there, it finally became hot enough to remove all the layers. Which seemed rather like the sun saying "well, you guys wanted me here..." Journos caught a snap of me on that rock, soon before we left, looking sleepy.

It was a nice end to a lovely few hours. There was just enough time to get a closer look at the statue, which turned out to be a huge iron man with his hands raised, surrounded by pictures of the summer constellations I had so spectacularly failed to identify earlier on. We had lunch in the car park while waiting for all six of our group to return. Bevenita drove, with D and C as her wingmen. Despite never having driven a van before, C claims he didn't fear for his life once. It just seemed as bumpy as normal to me, and I slept almost the whole way back to Hammersmith. Getting home from there was unecessarily nasty (cash problems + an hour-late bus, which was then very crowded.) Bevenita and I invited a chap from the bus home so we could Google directions for him. He was nice, for the ten minutes he stopped for a drink.

And then I blogged...

Videos and photos will doubtless be appearing more as the week goes on. Of what's already up,
C and I are three minutes into this. He is looking spectacular. I am in red, and looking bedraggled. A news video sums up what went on. Any new pictures will be at this link.

...and here I am. Catching up sleep on Monday.

In this issue: trip to a jumble sale; digression about cosplay; Mad Hatters Teaparty; good samaritans

I went on a quest to a jumble sale this morning. It was free, and somewhere to go: up in zone 3 in Tottenham. I've got rather bored of chain second hand shopping of late. Fair does to charities wanting to do the best for their causes, but if things are costing more than a pound, then it really takes the fun out of bargain hunting. Oxfam Books, I'm looking at you. In trying to appeal to a mainstream, most of the daft crap I'd treasure doesn't even reach the shelves.

The playground had been overtaken by about thirty car-boots and casual tables. Nothing seemed higher than a fiver, and it was like rifling through an attic. An electronic elephant graveyard, with boxes of broken DVD players; clothes, bizzare clothes; ugly jewellery; bad books; 8-track tapes. I loved it. Nothing was intrinsically valuable, but the enjoyment of shopping like that is the hunt: everything must have been the object of ardent desire to somebody, somewhere. Like the string of badly broken garden lights, tangled into knots with a mouse, a playstation and an old wire game. Bet no one ever thought that would be wanted by anyone.

It took me about 10 minutes to get the garden lights free, for one man's plastic tat is another's Liberator ray gun.

I've been building one for about a month now. I've got a really nice, cheap torch of the right proportions for a handle. I've a collection of five juice bottles in my room, all a little too big or small. I've been going down Asda corridors doing little Avon impressions to see if they "feel right"; I've even found the perfect shape in the Asda basics shampoo and conditioner, but alas those bottles are white, not see-thru.

I've no idea whether I should try and get the garden lamp bulb working with a switch, or dismantle it and slot the torch in, but I'm very happy with my purchase. At £2, it's actually cheaper than the Taste The Difference Lemonade experiment cost, and there are four lamps giving me three failed test runs. I also picked up a nice utility belt, and some curly black wire to attach it.

I still don't know where I'm going with all this. Cosplay being the inheritor of shamanistic ritual imitation, the vague plan is to have a bash at Blake. But he has an awful lot of things I don't have: not so much a gender-swap as Rugged Mega-Manly Man Masculinty; not so much size, as Serious Heroic Presence. I've a funny feeling the Robin Hood In Space aesthetic would translate to me as a thigh-slappin' pantomime pirate.

Calypso thinks it'll still work. Her theory is something like "If You Are More Attractive Than The Person You Are Cosplaying As, It Doesn't Matter". And I supposie that's why I make such a damn fine Sixth Doctor: because Colin Baker really didn't look good in his costume, whereas I rock it. When standing in a line of other Doctor cosplayers, they may be more accurate - but I'm still the hottest person in the room and the only one not going through a mid-life crisis. So I win.

That still leaves me in a bit of a spot, though. I'm easily more attractive than Colin Baker - but Gareth Thomas
is rather yummy in his own way, so here's a poll. If the internet thinks I'm hotter, than I will power ahead and buy tight trousers. If I lose my own poll on my own blog, then I'll go for one of the lady-characters (I don't know who this Soolin bird is - she hasn't turned up yet - but she would be instantly easier...)

So, there's the poll --------------> Vote! Vote now!

This may be academic, I don't know. I can't in good faith use a costume until I've got to the end, by which point I may no longer want to. And for now, I wouldn't pass up an opportunity to wear my fantastic coat.

As indeed I wasn't today, going to a Mad Hatter's Teaparty picnic purely as an excuse to legitimately wear all my outrageous gear at once. I took the bus back and established the route from Tottenham to London was one long retail strip with rubbish kebab shops on it. We had the angriest bus driver ever.

I stopped off at the Maughan library, for a little voluntary Latin and transform into my costume. Alas! No pictures, but I was wearing two different sorts of stripes (yellow and black + pink and white) plus the multicolour coat; a paisley cravat; the top hat complete with the Queen of Hearts, and I've developed a new style where I curl my hair over the brim of the hat and hold it there with the hatband. The result looks something between a mad powder wig and organic milinery. The tragic thing is, of course, that it didn't really feel like being in costume, as it's a combination I would have worn under most circumstances.

The picnic was in St James' Park, and consisted of caterpiller cake, cucumber sandwiches, mini mushrooms, and of course, tea marked "Drink Me". About 10 people ultimately attended - including Miss Liddell as Alice, Alzarius as the White Rabbit (he had pinched his mum's bathroom clock and attached it as a chain for a crazy huge pocket watch), and also Lady Gaga and the Black Corsair. Later, Ajax showed up. Time passed - from 4 until 9 - and for the whole time, the company kept up this appalling banter, somewhere between the language of the internet and Oscar Wilde dining room dialogue.

Perhaps it will turn out to be an expensive day after all? I got to play with the sonic screwdriver app on an iphone. It's a picture of a sonic screwdriver. You can make it move, and sounds work. That's about it - but it made me so very, very happy. It's a stupid reason to want one of the wretched things - especially because my poor mp3 player died earlier in the day, and my first thought was "Oh dear, that's a shame - but it has done three years good service, and one of those after being dunked in pineapple juice, so I can't complain". Not "I need an iphone as a replacement music player".

That would have been the end of the day's excitement, if not for some careless tourists and a little purple notebook at Westminster station. I like stationary, I like helping people, and I like being nosy - so I zeroed in on it very quickly and had a flick through. It contained very detailed plans of a holiday starting today in London, thenceforth to Paris, Frankfurt and Belsen - and had obviously just come from Korea because of the Korean hotel stationary, and had originated from Spain. Definitely an important notebook to return. For a moment, I thought their names might have been the two helpfully written in the back of the book. But I revised that estimate when I discovered a handy sheet of paper with the couple's full names, card numbers, expiry dates and security codes written on it. If not for that, I might have handed it into the station lost property box. But I always like returning things in person, as lost property boxes tend to be bottomless pits (especially if you're off in Central London and you can't remember where you dropped stuff), if there's enough information for me to do so - and I had enough information to bankrupt the pair of them then stalk them for the next month so yes, I had enough information. In a situation like that, you can only really trust yourself. I'm so glad it fell into the hands of someone absolutely morally unimpeachable...

...and I'm intrigued to discover how tricky being morally unimpeachable is when someone has handed their Mastercard, Visa and Paypal details to you. Even though I feel a sort of proxy fondness towards this pair, they are still pillocks.

Their hotel was on my route home - they had helpfully written down both the address of the apartment and the address of the check-in desk. I tried to make myself a little more presentable. By this point, I had long abandoned footware due to appalling blisters - because I made the mistake of buying ladyshoes and then trying to, y'know, walk in them. But I did my best to diminish the insanity of the Hatter costume, and arrived five minutes before the desk closed to discovered they had not yet arrived, so swapped details with the lady at the desk. I should really have left it with her, but that scrap of paper with the card information on really bothered me - besides, it was sort-of my responsibility by that point.

I worried for them a little bit on the way home - I mean, if you're on a journey that crazy you'd have lots of luggage, so why wouldn't they check in as soon as they arrived in London? I knew when that was as well...I wondered if their bizzare traveling was a once-in-a-lifetime megaholiday; or maybe they were rich folks on a run-of-the-mill jaunt, or perhaps international criminals?

I got a call from the hotel on exiting the Tube and arranged to drop it off the next day - she has a strange, hysterical voice. And quite a disappointing one too. I'm also a little crushed I won't be able to meet them; charity and voyeurism go hand in hand.

All in all, a busy, strange day.

Guerilla guardening is one of those fine-line illegal activites. It's not legal to plant on other people's land. But for a good cause, and on patches of scrub which no one really owns, it's a squishy area. A less contentious version of permitting graffiti on ugly buildings: the definition of nice graffiti or nasty building is a bit floppy, but no one can argue that flowers are not nice. Except perhaps hay-feverists.

I've joined the new Kings environmental society purely to get involved with it. I love caring for plants - they give you the warm fuzzy feeling that comes with taking care of a living creature, with none of the responsibility that comes with people or pets. I wish I was better at it, but so far the only plant that has survived our house is Leon - the "unkillable" cactus that Friend 1 got me a few years ago. If I don't water it, it just curls up dry until I remember at which point it flowers again. Unfortunately, Basil the mint plant was followed into plant oblivion by Sybil the mint plant (named after The Picture of Dorian Gray, not Faulty Towers. Although that's an interesting observation...). I have a low life expectation for Mr Erskine, my new pink plant, though I am now in the habit of checking it every day.

I met up with the rest of the society at the Library, in the rain, before heading forth to make the City pretty. It was a pretty damp exercise, especially because both my pairs of shoes now have holes, and I'm either too busy, too lazy or too cheap to replace them. Maybe all three. I mean, they are still basically functional...if it isn't raining.

We soon arrived at a long thin patch of earth next to a wall, filled with fag-ends and biro caps. We did a little weeding, and then set out planting. There were two trowels and two pairs of gloves between about 10 of us. I made my own shovel out of a metal box I had appropriated earlier in the day for storing my trading cards. Some people had brought actual plants to be transferred from pots - daffodils and grasses - while others had bags full of tulip bulbs.
I soon stopped noticing the rain. That area of London is beautiful when glowy and shiney anyway. The earth was pretty stoney, but I dunno, some plants like that (she said vaguely...). That was when the police drew up in a squad car.

"Is this some sort of political thing?" one asked. I feel like such an idiot hippy in retrospect, but we smiled and said we were merely planting. When put like that, it had the daft innocence of poking a flower into the barrel of a gun. "Because if it was something against the government," he qualified, "we'd have to stop you". You haven't been able to bring down a government with a bag of tulip bulbs since 68', and the cop turned out to be a friendly one - reminding us not to damage anything that wasn't ours before driving off.

"We're only planting". Add tamborine, harmonica and you've basically got a hippy hit.

I also got chatting with some fab folk, including a girl from Ireland with whom I inexplicably bonded over religion. Even though I'm open minded, religion is one of those topics that I wouldn't dare broach with a stranger, and feel rather timid talking about with even people I know well. Then a girl from Malaysia introduced herself, to which I said "?!?!??!?!??!?!?"

Flashback: some context. When I was about 10, I went on Girl Guide camp to Alderney. To celebrate the Commonwealth Games, each pack adopted a Commonwealth Country and had to do a presentation. We had Malaysia, and we wrote a little rap which I have never forgotten:

"Malaysia has 11 states
150 species of frog
the use the Malaysian ringit
and they export lots of logs.

Oh! Let's go fly a "wa"
instead of driving a car
And then lets go eat chicken satay
because it's better than pate!"

I know. Almost Swiftian in its wit, scope and incisive humanity. But the facts have stuck with me, and so I wittered my entire knowledge of Malaysian culture at her in excitement, and it didn't so much break the ice as subject it to disintigrator beam. Far from shrivelling in terror, she thought it was pretty cool that I had studied her country, even in such a superficial way.

You know, the Girl Guiding movement would be so proud of me.

So, this is what I now know about Malaysia. It is very warm, and the population a mix of Malay, Indian and Chinese - so as you might expect, the food is fab. It is predominantly Muslim, but there's religious freedom and diversity: my new friend is a Christian. As well as indigenous telly, they also get Western TV imported, including (bizzarely) Britain's got Talent; and don't really have their own film industry, though she's recommended me an epic that I intend to track down.

The damage? Well, my nice beige coat has assumed the Androzani look: it's covered in mud, but hopefully it'll brush off when dry. The same goes for my muddy rainbow poncho. I should probably wash my trousers though...I'm a little scared to submit them to the washing machine, because they're my only pair and because they're starting to fall to pieces too. Two friends. And it turned out to be an expensive evening - I've since joined the society, and now I want to do it again and properly: I want my own trowel, my own gloves, and I'm gonna go charity shop hunting this afternoon for a nasty cushion to kneel on.

Finally, thinking about trying:
http://heavypetal.ca/archives/2007/04/operation-moss-graffiti/

I have to tell you what's gone on with the househunt!

I'm now sitting at Guy's campus with the loveliest view, one of my favourites. A mix of huge modern buildings, 50s brick, 1880s grimey white tile, hundreds of windows, walkways, scaffolds and smoking chimneys intersecting with pipework and stairwells. Yes, it's ugly. But I'm not sure anyone quite understand how much this breed of London ugliness makes me happy. To cap it off, I can also see trees, and lights and shadows playing through it all, and a huge sky of clouds peppered by regular planes. I'm happy.

I'm at a strange campus because I've spent the last two days papering student-haunts, and this is the end of my toils. Today, because I have no shame, I have also been carrying about a placard reading "HOUSEMATE WANTED". Unfortunately, the only offer that has gleaned has been from a yellow foam pig, whom we established probably couldn't afford make rent every week.

Yesterday was a sort of special hell. We were going to sign up Segnor Espania and Miss Interpreter at 11.30AM, so I came home specially only to discover that they had flaked out on us that very morning. Calypso and I did some calming painting (she's doing, as she calls it, "Mucha Sci Fi Tarot") but finally resigned ourselves to tromping back to Central. It was a crushingly miserable moment, but my motto is if you can't feel fantastic, you can at least look fantastic.

So I got out the tub of "man gel" Oceanic had abandoned there - mum had got it for her by mistake, not being the brand she needed. I've been intending for some time to attempt Agent Cooper-style slicked-back hair, and my day wasn't going to get any worse. My hair is too long to do it properly - it's heavy, so it scrapes the style back flat instead of achieving the foppish "puff" short haired folk get - but I shoved it into a pony at the back. With a bit of practice, I might be able to get a little puff. Calypso noted it had rather a boyish effect, though I thought it was a bit more 80s power-dressing. Very much like the photo to the left. It certainly made my face look good, if artificially giving my hair the greasy-unwashed look. I then pushed it over the top with a fake cravat and the Sixth Doctor frock coat. Looked worse (probably), but felt better.

We hit Central like a plummeting lift. Calypso manned the internet machine, and shrapnelled the web with adverts. I photocopied adverts, then went and papered every student building I could find. We'd already done the Strand Campus. It was a lovely, dark evening - glowy lights of all colours, public transport, glittery shops. I walked up to Bloomsbury and hit every college in the area: UCL, SOAS, Royal College of Surgeons, Birkbeck. Guess what else I found up there?

RADA.

I snuck in nervously, avoiding the urge to attack the smug, irritating types I found scattered all over the place, and went to the reception desk. As I had at the other Colleges, I stumbled over a request that the receptionist take my poster and have it put up. He accepted it, and replied "I'll make sure it's put up, sir." I thanked him and left, and it was only once I'd left and shut the door that what he'd said sunk in.

Sir?!

Being mistaken for a man didn't actually upset me as much as you'd assume it should - in fact, I grinned for the next fifteen minutes. While "passing" for male wasn't exactly what I'd intended that morning, nevertheless I had consciously styled my appearance after my male fashion icons, so I suppose I was sort-of asking for it. And it made some sense - that coat broadens my shoulders, what shape I have was hidden under a baggy jumper and as per usual, I wasn't wearing make up. Plus, this was RADA: they must be used to ludicrously effete fellas.

But I wasn't upset. While I've no desire at all to be a man, there is a fairly significant chunk of my brain which operates in a stereotypically "male" manner; and part of me would love to be a proper Victorian gentleman, hence the cravats and pretentions to chivalry. On a shallow, purely aesthetic level, it's a torment that I can't wear suits. I mean, I have the right to, and do my best with cravats and top hats and the rest, but I will never have the ability to make it look good in the way I want it to. Rather like that dress my sister and I accidentally bought on the same day. We both kept it, and it looks marvellous on both of us - but it looks like two different dresses when we wear them together, because we've different shapes. To illustrate my point, I've peppered this post with some of my favourite suit-wearers: Doctor number ten; 30s actress Jessie Matthews in First a Girl; Agent Cooper from Twin Peaks; 30s actress Marlene Dietrich in Morocco and singer Janelle Monae, who I've never heard of before but the picture looked great. My point being, they all look very fine - but fine in different ways.

But avoiding the obvious biological differences, I've little time for the gender binary. I feel that dividing people into two categories which influence the way they behave, dress, speak, move, and are treated is a shame on so many levels, not to mention unfair. Why would anyone want to limit themselves like that?

Bizzarely, the whole experience left me very conscious of how feminine I am. Going back on the tube, it occured to me that no one could possibly mistake me for a man for longer than the 5 seconds I had talked with the receptionist. The way I was standing, sitting, walking, positioning my legs, moving my hands - even, I felt, my range of facial expression would be different had I been raised male. No space or time, or indeed point to going into nature vs. nurture here - I think it's predominantly the way we learn to behave. Properly paying attention to the way men and women move is actually an exercise I'd recommend to everyone.

All in all, it was a fascinating occurrence. My first instinct was "eeek, won't do that again" - but a moment after, I amended that to "I will be careful how I use this in future". After all, with great hair comes great responsibility. There are many situations in my life where appearing manly is not an advantage - i.e. most of them. I'm glad I've been warned, so I never give off this effect by accident.

But I'm tempted. Very, very tempted to have a go at it properly. Work out how to sit and stand, and (assuming, for a moment, that I am convincing) see how people treat me differently.

Of course, the main downside of this whole scenario is the fact I spent my entire evening walking about with dead animal fat smeared all over my head. It's now gone all crusty, and I somehow respect movie gangsters and the rest less for knowing how nasty it feels in the morning. I've washed it once now, and it's still pretty gooey - today, I've been sporting the cancer-outpatient look, with a hair-concealing hat so concealing that it makes obvious something nasty has happened up there...

I've got a plan, however, for what to do next. I'm going to get my hair to frizz, then slick down the very top. It works, in my head, with a flapper dress and pearls.

With luck, this is going to get published in one of the student magazines, which is why it's a tad more professional than usual. It's here for now, though, so you know what went on. Frustratingly, I can't watch the iplayer at uni - so can't actually see what went down on the show.

You've read enough pro- and anti- arguments in the past months to do without my justification for attending. I'm not without sympathy for the "freedom of speech" position, but allowing a racist organisation to abuse that freedom is the equivalent of a Hollywood Hero letting his Arch-Nemesis go. Noble, but stupid.

I arrived fashionably late at 6:30. Cordoned pickets had been abandoned in favour of clumping in the middle of the road in front of Wood Lane tube station - about 200 people, armed with banners, loudspeakers and copies of the Socialist Worker. A thin neon line stood in front of the wide gates to the BBC building; police dotted the area and attempted to look reasurring. We stood away from the crowd, and watched as they set off red flares then marched down the road from Wood Lane tube towards White City.

I'd been to protests before, notably against Proposition 8 - but that had been 20 terribly polite ex-pats standing outside a building which was closed for the weekend. With the increased scale, it was hard not to be moved by the sense of togetherness - all ages, all backgrounds - even when Stop the War leaflets and SWP banners revealed it was really 500 different shades of opinion which happened to overlap. The Fire Brigade Union and the Southall Black Sisters, SOAS and Goldsmiths, girls who looked like they'd lost their way to Glastonbury and a man in a Hitler costume. One woman carried a sign reading: "proud to have mixed race parents, proud of my mixed race child" - another, whose parents had died at Auschwitz, had an information board.

I made friends with some members of the crowd. One told me about when Diane Abbot went on Question Time - no one remembered what she said, only the symbolic value of a black woman being invited there for the first time. And by extention, that same boost will now be given to the BNP. Another, an Italian woman, compared the situation to the way fascism has crept back into the politics of her own country, and described how a heavily controlled media now prevented normal folk from engaging with serious problems.

Standing in that crowd was like being hardwired into Twitter. I missed the moment 25 protesters - including, I hear, some from my university - broke through into the building, but I'd got all the details within minutes of arriving. By the time it reached me, they hadn't just been removed by private security, but beaten up by Fascist Thugs and Establishment Tools. No one knew when the program was being filmed - I even heard a rumour it had been cancelled - nor when figures would be entering or leaving the building. Were I Nick Griffin, I'd have brought a sleeping bag and brought sandwiches (or the blood of babes, or whatever it is he eats) rather than face the crowds.

After marching down the street, I saw the crowd start to run, accompanied by a flurry of police activity. I stood back to see it vaulting over walls and onto buildings above White City tube station with their banners. Like breaking into the building, I personally thought this was unecessary behavior which did not help anyone's cause - but it highlighted how non-united any demonstration of this scale had to be. For the rest of the evening, a second thin neon line and two police vans barred that weak point also. The crowd calmed for a bit, then wheeled on the front gate again and charged straight at the waiting cops.

I got a constant sense of the infrastructure accompanying a protest, even one which I felt was still quite small. A helicopter buzzed overhead, while there was media everywhere - in vans, on rooftops. I talked to some students with cameras, a friend was interviewed for Canadian telly, and a man standing next to us was reporting into a mobile phone in his best journalistic accent. I couldn't help but feel sorry for the police. It can't be nice being paid to stand, and wait in expectation of being attacked. And despite blocking off the traffic, daily business continued - a queue of audience members waiting to see Piers Morgan ignored and were ignored by the crowd, while BBC employees watched the chaos from the roof of their building. Outside the Tube station, an entrpreneur was selling teas and coffees for 50p.

At around 6, a proper rally began with speakers from union representatives, members of Unite Against Fascism and other MPs. You can imagine exactly what they had to say - the predictable rhetoric - but I still couldn't help but think of my beautiful, multicultural London, and the England I love. The concept of what "English" means is at the heart of this whole nasty business, and it's so much bigger and more wonderful than the Anglo Saxon stereotype peddled by the BNP. To give them any credence, to allow them to profane what England stands for - well, it just wouldn't be cricket. I don't want to live in their "England".

During the speeches, a ripple went through the crowd that the police were about to start kettling the crowd. It was getting dark, and I could see several large clumps of them gearing up for a riot. I retreated to watch the protest from my living room - there's defending your democracy, and then there's getting clobbered. Final score? Eight hundred protesters, twenty-something breakins, six arrests, four ambulences. Increase in racist violence and BNP membership? Let's wait and see.

Must Have

Close transport links. A two minute walk to the Northern line is my top priority.

Four bedrooms, preferably all doubles. I can live in a single room, of course, but I'd rather there was space for all

A rent no larger than £400 a week. Because I'm stingy. That's £100 a week each, before you add TV, gas, electricity, water and the internet. I don't see any point in going more expensive - it is possible to find somewhere perfect for that much

Fully furnished. Makes sense. Otherwise I'll refuse to contribute to furniture beyond a huge telly (see: stingy), and the place will look like a squat.

A lounge. It's important to have space, or I'll go all One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Plus, I've this grand idea to live as a Victorian all next year. This will involve calling cards, a morning set aside as an at-home, dinner parties, and the foundation of an exclusive decadant club in our front room. This will require space.

Should Have

A piano. This is a tall order for everyone - my parents to help out on the transporting budget, my roomates when I declare Chopin can't be played any earlier than midnight. But I'm convinced that the alternative is worse - getting stuck with me, in an enclosed enviroment, sans piano can only be worse. By Holmes, I miss my piano when I go on holiday for longer than a few days. I was gonna use the house as an excuse to buy a new keyboard, but those damn things are even pricier than cheap pianos!

Positive Aura. I am a places person - even my favourite films and music stems from my atmospheric obsession. I don't strictly believe in ley lines, vibes, ghosts and the rest, but I know what I like, and a bad feeling will put me off a house quicker than anything else. Of course, estate agents are such a nuscense about such things. I've yet to see a house description thus:

• 4 spacious rooms
• garage, with easy transport links
• good vibrations

It'd Be Nice if It Had

A Catbus. Beat the traffic easy. My only worry is that it would require Mousebikes for dinner. A sketch of a Mousebike will doubtless follow soon.

Opium den. See: decadant den above. Though as we're students, we may have to substitute the opium with orange sherbert.

Kidnappy basement. We've already decided we need a Patrick Wolf and a Neil Gaiman all for ourselves. The lupine bard can borrow my piano, and his cellmate will be in charge of reading us bedtime stories.




A real absinthe fountain. Calypso has a desktop decanter, but I'm talking a marble-and-bronze structure rising out of the ground, an elegant cornucopia of tritons and dolphins. Think the Trevi fountain, with absinthe. Will also double as a milk fountain when I'm the only one in the house.

Good Names
Because home isn't a place - it's a state of mind.

Arkham
Like the Asylum. It conveys one of the possible atmospheres quite nicely.

The Garden of Earthly Delights
In case I get my decadant club after all. We will indulge in the most exquisite sins and follies, like dining on luxurious £2.50 Basics rhum and

Court of the Crimson King
Calypso and I thought this was a good idea at 2 in the morning, having listened to the album five or six times. We noted there were four "colour" characters in the lyrics. I was to be the purple piper; she claimed the black queen. Vapilla was an easy pick for the yellow jester, who does not play but gently pulls the strings (to summon back the Firewitch TO THE COURT OF THE CRIMSON KING), which left Spirita as the King himself. The advantages of this choice would be huge. My post, when it came, would read "Unmutual - Court of the Crimson King - Whitechapel - London". Plus, I envisage this sort of exchange happening on a daily basis:

"What are you gonna do now?"
"Heading home by secret paths TO THE COURT OF THE CRIMSON KIIIIIIING" *synths*

Belvedere
It's a pretty word. It's also the name of an Escher print, depicting an impossible house. Which is what this search is proving to be.

Now I am just fed up.

I adore squalour. I live in a mess, but I choose to live that way. I find imperfection charming - I like things which are broken, it gives them personality. You probably agree with me, to an extent: which of you does not wax romantic over well-loved books? But I take it very far indeed, and so we come to the hallowed halls of the Dude in Brown. The taps come out cloudy, one of the showers is screwed, the kitchen is an unholy mess and one side of the room is always out of electricity - but it tends to swop around so you can never guess. I've never minded these things, merely enjoy grumbling about them. No sense of smell makes the kitchen situation less pressing for me, and I enjoy the morning gamble as to which toaster might work. Even the two occasions on which faulty equipment almost caused fires - did cause a fire, in one case - well, it's just student living eh?

Something snapped about a week ago. To begin with, I'm actually noticing the mess in the kitchen where I never did before. It bothers me that I can't have a glass of water from the cold taps, and that when I make ice it's filled with flecks of tangled grit. And now this. I'm mucking around on the web, when suddenly, the screen appears to flicker at me. It's like a vicious optical illusion, and I have to look away. I assume I've been on the computer waaay too long and start switching it off. And then the ceiling light starts flashing - not going dim and pfut, but actually gold and black in quick succession. Had it been a horror movie, the ghosts would have appeared then and staggered towards me as I ran down the never-ending asylum corridor, and with every flash the ghosts got closer. Just like Blink in fact. I assumed it was about to stop, but it didn't, so I switched it off at the wall and stumbled out into the corridor. I assumed it was the whole building, but apparently just my room. I was both rationally and irrationally unnerved by this. It was about 7 in the evening and getting quite dark, and I was still unreasonably edgy about my bad dream. It felt awfully like A Sign Meaning Something Or Other. And rationally, because my ceiling light had just majorly malfunctioned. I gave it five minutes, and went back in to try the light - everything else in the building was fine after all. No, crazy mad horror-movie flashes again - and this time it was sparking, SPARKING folks, and very pretty it was too. Oh how I love student living, eh?

So I switched it off, looked out my torch - a life saver, that torch has always been. I think I will name it. I deliberately took my Sixth Doctor coat to go and complain at reception, and as an afterthought, grabbed Planet of Fire as well. If I'd seriously thought my room was about to burst into flames there are other possessions I'd have put hands on too - sentimental jewellrey, some of my sketches, Aurinko, my Dorian Gray. As it was, I was pretty sure it would be alright, but it's an indication of how much the physical video of Planet of Fire means to me that I refused to risk it. Felt a bit stupid carrying it all the way to reception, but oh well. Reception can't do anything till morning. Which is fair enough, but I was still pretty irritated. I took the oppertunity to complain that they'd never replaced my broken anglepoise either, and thus had no light, and he found me a new one. Twas sweet of him, but frankly, I'm not happy sleeping here. But what can I say? Student living!

Sweet dreams to all.

Today has been appalling.

Things started off bad when I spent the entire night running around on Androzani Minor. This didn't upset me so much as you'd expect, so much as just make me cross. It's just such an obviously cruel subject for a dream. If I keep having distressing, first-person dreams as the Doctor, I'll go insane within a few months. Especially if I don't get out of season 21 soon (I did Planet of Fire a couple of days ago...)

I woke up at 8, for my annoying film studies lecture at 10 - why they can't arrange the early ones for Stamford Street sods with a 10 minute commute I don't know. Went down for breakfast, already feeling pretty rough. Had cereal. Warned Actimel that I was about to hurl up said cereal, then proceeded to do so. Off milk, early wakeup, lactose intolerance and morning sickness have all been suggested.

Still, I hauled myself off to my lecture, and felt guilty for the entire tube ride in the knowledge that I was a ticking time bomb of spew. All was well. I started reading Grave Matter - Six and Peri - under some duress. It's setting up to be an average, ordinary work of Doctor Who literature. I feel I should read it, but it's not going anywhere exciting. It's so far been defiantly average. The Sixth Doctor is quite nicely captured, however.

Film Studies was quite fun, because I got into an argument about whether or not "realism" is a genre. The argument was that realism is anti-genre, because of it's unconvential characters and plot structures. I was arguing (and I was right...) that unconventional characters become a cliche in themselves - the alcholic father, single mother, unemployed layabout are as much predictable archetypes as the Sherrif, Bandit and Hooker with the Heart of Gold. And films are marketed as realism too - so why is it not a genre?

This was followed by Myths, which remains fascinating if unengaging. I had a careful lunch of ciabatta and cheese, and thence locked myself in the Maughan intent on doing work. I hate the 10 o'clock wake up because it leaves me tired for the rest of the day. I managed a very small amount of Latin, but gave up and had a nap instead. I deliberately leave my mobile on in the Maughan Library, just because of the sheer hating joy it gives me when my obnoxious Doctor Who ringtones go off in there. Calypso more or less woke me up, with the blessedly LOUD strains of the Trial of a Timelord theme tune.

We hung around in Chapters cafe for a bit, and arrived five minutes past closing at So-High Soho, a shop we'd discovered earlier in the week where Calypso had spotted something nice. She also managed to get me into a corset, which I can report is a painful but also bizzarely comfortable experience. It certainly does wonders for your posture - you have to move gracefully, there's no other way to do it. I'm thinking of one for Speech Day.

We then set off to see Lysisisisisisisisistrata, the Kings Greek play, and turned up 10 minutes too late. At which point, going back to a cashpoint to pay for tickets was superfluous as then we'd be 20 minutes late, et al.

I'd already gone off on yet another Ripper-inspired rumble about how wonderful London architecture was, because that particular area is packed with Victorian brickwork and stab-bety dark alleyways, which have aesthetic merit if nothing else. It's a gorgeous place, and I'd already rhapsodised at some length about the joys of Butler's Wharf, which was very nearby.

Butler's Wharf is a set of old, turn of the century warehouses which have recently been renovated quite classily. Yes, I first went there because they filmed Resurrection of the Daleks there, but I like it on its own merits too. Very atmospheric, and I'd always wanted to visit it in twilight or after dark. I suppose I'm obsessing about Jack the Ripper at the moment. This probably stems from an unsubstatiated rumour involving the Valeyard, which in turn probably inspired me to pick up From Hell, the Alan Moore Ripper masterpiece, and there's a great scene in that where a character takes another on a coach tour of London pointing out the layers. Ever since I can't help but think as I walk around "this is the London of Jack, and Mortimer, and Oscar Wilde, and King Charles I, all the way back to the Romans". There's history all over the place. Even the fact they filmed Doctor Who there is another layer of meaning.

There's a word Calypso uses about London, which I can't remember, which begins with p, and means "a text which has been overwritten by lots of other texts". She's right.*

*My father reminds me the word is "palimpsest", and that "this reminds me of Jack the Ripper" isn't necessarily a great reason to walk down a dark alley...

So we set off to walk to it, and never more has the principle been better demonstrated. We passed through massive, iron arches covering fruit markets which must have been there as long as they had been built. We passed a church chiming, surrounded by offices. We saw the Golden Hind and the HMS Britannia. We found a fake-tree, glowing neon beside real trees. We found some crazy modern architecture which Calypso determined was actually meant to represent a pot of bubble tea, pearl of tapioca and curly straw. This place never ceases to be beautiful.

Butlers Wharf was less exciting by night than I had anticipated, but I always love being there. It's a long, windy street with bridges joining the high windows, where dockworkers used to transport merchandise inland. We found a fountain entitled "Waterfall", which we decided was an blank excuse for seven, sculpted, naked women, with no nobler artistic merit. The whole experience was decidedly steampunk.

(PS, when I said the Doctor rugby tackles a Dalek out of the window...it's too late for me to actually post a photo, but this website has lots of screencaps including one of him after giving it a good shove.)

I had forgotten Tower Bridge was in this area, but the instant I saw it I had a mad crazy desire to walk across it - just to see what would happen. Because it was dark, because I had never done it before. Because it was there. I felt a little guilty about dragging Calypso across, with my ulterior motive already firmly in mind, as no one really deserves to have to deal with my curious neuroses - and as it turns out, I was as subtle as bagpipes, as she evidently worked it out within minutes, which made a lack of honesty from the start even worse. Yes, it's the site of one of Lord M's disasters. Perhaps, ultimately, his most defining disaster. One day I'll tell the story in full. Today, however, I'll leave it as "something bad".

I've spent about three years obsessively attempting to capture it all on paper, and then a few months ago I evidently succeeded. I haven't felt tempted to draw the scene again since: I consider the matter closed. So this was a final piece of catharsis. And it didn't matter that it wasn't built even remotely at the right time isn't the point, nor that the east footpath was closed and we could only approach from the west, nor that the sun was still going to rise in the wrong direction contrary to what I had written. Standing there did feel weird - as weird as Butler's Wharf. You've got a twin impression of alienation and familiarity - you've never been there before yet you recognise it so well. And then the weirdest things are different - things are out of proportion in the weirdest ways. But the blackness of the water was just right, as was the approach through the abandoned warehouses and dockland. Especially considering that during the regency, all that ambient London light would have been absent. We stayed a long time there, as the whole experience was quite moving - even discounting the fictional angst angle.

We went down off the bridge and had a look from lower down - the north end of the bridge has a series of steps and slopes beneath it. We attempted to find a way down, to no luck - which was a shame because there was something very atmospheric and creepy with this area in particular, in what I can only describe again as "Jack the Ripperly" - all alleyways, angles and gaslight. I've never felt comfortable with dark, inland water - though I'm not sure whether it's something I've always had, or just more recently. There was something tragic, sinister and very quiet in those massive iron girders, just the sense of something hidden beneath the bridge itself. And on coming back up, we discovered via a handy sign that this particularly emotive piece of architecture was where bodies fallen from the bridge would be fished out, and be stored in a morgue on that very site.

I slumped on the grate. It didn't suprise me - I'd already been struck standing under there by the image of a body washing up on the slope, and I suddenly realised that I'd never established whether this fictional corpse was found or not. "I bet Lord M's reeling", Calypso commented - to which my only response was "I'm reeling"!

Just as we were leaving, I took one last look over the edge, and to be honest, felt a bit sick - although whether that was concience, vertigo or just the cereal resurfacing, I couldn't say. A man passed on a bicycle and told me not to jump. In jest, I'm sure, but under the circumstances it was an interesting comment to make. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to kiss him or slap him.

So as evenings went, totally magical. Having not known what to expect, I took the bridge experience better than expected - the sense of walking across a place with such history, albeit a totally fictional one, was invigorating and I feel better for having done it. So the end of the day circles around to Androzani Minor again, because I walking across that bridge was something I didn't really think I'd ever do and emerge sane, and I felt extatic on reaching the other side. I am going to have to do it again, in appalling and dangerous weather, to get a proper feel for it. I'd also like to sit there and watch the sun rise. Just to establish, once and for all, which direction...

In this post: the educational merits of Doctor Who; your humble narrator falls into peril with the College Chaiplancy; an adventure to Aldwych abandoned tube station, Strand Roman Baths and the Temple Church.


I can't remember who it was, but one of the many, many interesting people I've met here claimed there was nothing which spanned all three catagories: entertaining, educational and on television. I instantly countered, perhaps predictably with Doctor Who, yet I do believe this to be true.

Doctor Who was at the very start concieved as an educational show - the Doctor was originally accompanied by his granddaughter, Susan, and her two nosy schoolteachers whom he refused to let leave after they saw the inside of the TARDIS. Ian Chesterton, as well as occupying the role of chief Hero (the Doctor was too old, Barbara and Susan too female), was a science teacher - which meant that every other week he could interject "look, it's electromagnetics! This means..." and explain it for the audience. Barbara on the other hand was, being a history teacher, was handy in episodes in the past.

Before you dismiss them as walking exposition, Ian and Barbara were also great companions in their own right. And even though Doctor Who lost the educational edge very quickly, the bredth of issues and topics addressed across a 45 year old show leave you with a wealth of useful, random trivia -histories, places, people, even words (recursion, Grand Guignol, adumbrate and apostate being four which spring to mind). Why, even Just War made me feel more genuine interest and outrage at the German Occupation of Guernsey than ever before - and this is a place I've lived in for some 16 years!!



And so to today - that digression on fiction's hottest physics teacher has a purpose, never you fear. The Adventuress of Henrietta Street by Lawrence Miles has the Doctor helping out a coven-cum-brothel in Regency-era England, but brilliantly is presented as a novel of that era also. Letters, weird spellings, citing sources and surmises for events when no one was present. It's practically set at my university - Henrietta Street itself adjoins Covent Garden (I visit it more often than I should, because the road sign still excites me), and events take place up and down the Strand.

Did you know there was once a menagerie on the Strand? A zoo for posh people in a second floor apartment? More importantly, for today's events, did you know that the Temple the whole area refers to was once a genuine Knights Templar temple built around here? Temple walk, Temple place, Middle Temple, Temple tube station - even the Knight's Templar pub where Geeksoc meet. I'm reminded of one chapter of From Hell, when one of the characters takes another on a tour around London and strips past the layers and layers of past. I could stay here forever, because the mess of architecture and history is just so appealing.


It all started when my Myths lesson went missing. It's always at 11, 3rd basement, along to the left - but I arrived late, and none of the class were there. In its place, another very settled lecturer who seemed suprised indeed at the suggestion that he shouldn't be there. I half heartedly went looking for the class, but the Strand Campus comprises the Norfolk, Kings, Chesham, Philosophy buildings not mentioning the Classics wing, all of which have their own staircase and floor labelling system, linked up in an irrational manner known only to Escher. I had in fact just the day before discovered a passage directly from Classics to Film - a long, sickly lit corridor made up of tiny doors, winding staircases which lead nowhere and doors surely containing professors long-forgotten by the college who haven't left their offices since 1943 and have no idea the war is over. You could certainly starve to death and it would be at least fifteen months before anyone discovered the body.


To digress, that little voyage of discovery brought me to the College Chaiplancy Common room - "please enter, open to all" ominously written on the door. In any case, I took a peep - I've been longing to find a place in the college I can nap when I get exausted during the day. Then I spotted a poster on the wall - advertising for singers to sing mass on a Sunday morning. Brilliant! I thought - I've been longing to join a choir, but it seems my voice is just a bit too classical for the pop/rock groups, yet not classical enough for the serious groups. So I went in to take down the details, and that's when the trouble started.

Religious people are like tigers. I love tigers, I'd hate it if they went extinct. Tigers have a very important role to play in the world's ecosystem - they're a vital part of the way it all works. And individually, they're some of the most incredible things in the world. It's just...you don't want to end up alone in a group of more than five tigers under any circumstance, especially not on their own territroy.

And indeed I did feel I was being checked out by everyone - oooh, a new person, I wonder if she's edible? Inexplicably - probably because of my previous blog about Remonstrances - I suddenly got Cousin Jasper's advice about avoiding Anglo-Catholics pounding through my head.

Eventually, one of the group came and asked if they could help - and it turned out they were all genuinely very nice people. I was made the best hot chocolate in the universe - cream, sprinkles and everything - and I'm sure a mounting sense of discomfort when I realised I was trapped between a shelf of Vatican Discources and a pile of Bibles was more from my own prejudices than anything which actually happened. I'll probably find it again sometime, if I have a sour day. Will I sing in the choir? A better question is, will I be able to get to Holborn before 11 on a Sunday morning?


In any case, looking for my Myths seminar was a courageous but foolish idea - and while poking around for it, I ran into Spirita who was using her height to balance precariously at the top of a staircase and to put up a "revoke Peres' honorary doctorate" poster so high it couldn't be removed. Typically, she did not object to putting up posters against Kings regulations - but objected strongly to me pinching blu-tack from a nearby noticeboard to back up her own poster. With a little help from my umbrella, we stuck down the corners she couldn't reach.

We're on the eighth day of the Kings Occupation - and the occupiers have got all their demands met bar one. Kings are going to give Palestinians scholarships and send surplus equipment (to explain, Palestine just got its university blown up), organise funding events and open up their books to clear up allegations of involvement in the arms trade. But they won't revoke Shimon Peres' Doctorate, so the occupation continues. My views? My view is I still don't know enough about the scenario to judge, it still hasn't been explained to me adequately and impartially enough. They have my thoughts, if not my physical presence.

In any case, we got chatting in a stairwell about the most random things - Abba, Celine Dion, the Sphynx without a Secret and the house we're all going to get next year, which probably deserves a post all of its own. Along the way, I tried explaining my theory of auras - that when something repetitve happens in an area, it does affect the area in some way. This arose because we had both visited Bodmin Gaol, one of the most evil places I've ever been - it just had uncomfortable scratched into the walls, and that was before they decorated the ex-Victorian prison with grotesque mannequins of the dead inmates. Ellis Island Immigration Centre was another - as if the terror and expectation and the weariness of thousands upon thousand travellers had got absorbed by the building. Almost like a sense that it was holding it's breath, waiting to exhale all its stories. I feel the same way about churches and libraries, as if the respect and silence of everyone who has passed through has somehow left a mark on the places themselves.

A bit new age spirital - and Spirita offered some rational suggestions, which may have been correct - but in those two places in particular did give me the spooks on a level other than the rational. Certainly Ellis island, which was open and spacious, redecorated and wasn't so obviously unsettling as Bodmin Gaol, made me feel physically sick, bizzare and just disquieted in a way I couldn't define. I would strongly object to returning to the latter; the former, I would if only to get a handle on what worried me so much about it.

I'm not necessarily claiming I feel a so-called "psychic connection" to any of those places. To my mind, it would be pretensious - and it would suggest firmer beliefs in new age spiritality than I actually hold. I'm interested, and a percieved personal reaction to these places is one of the things which spurs this interest - but still not wholly convinced. One thing I have always thought curious is that places where genuinely terrible things have happened - I have visited Sachsenhausen concentration camp, and I've been in the courtyard of Kilmainham Gaol where the Easter Rising leaders were executed - the places you would expect any "psychic sympathy" to just be unbearable are empty, completely emotionally empty. They're like completely blank areas, as if the events there have just rubbed the land raw.

As I said above, this doesn't necessarily prove anything one way or another. Maybe it's all real, maybe it's in my head. Maybe I really am a powerful psychic, maybe there's no such thing. In any case, even though Spirita was twice as sceptical as I was about this whole idea, we decided to go and see if we could get into Aldwych Tube Station and see what the "psychic vibrations" left by an abandoned tube station would be. Along the way, we bumped into fellow Geek Caterpillar who joined our quest.


Fans of Lara Croft will recognise this as a location from Tomb Raider 3 - the fact as a functional station it is no more will explain a quibble I always had with this level, namely "why are there armed men, angry dogs and absolutely no civilians on that branch of the Underground?" I've enjoyed delving into the history - did you know the station opened on my birthday, 1907? But it was hardly ever used, so it was more cost effective to just shut it in 1994 than pay for a replacement lift. Somewhat frustrating, because a tube straight from Kings to Holborn would make the Maughan trip far more appealing - as it is, the walk is unpleasant and it's impossible to reach on a sensible tube line. Yet it's been useful in its own way - as an air raid shelter during the war for both humans and British Museum treasures, and a testing space for innovations on functional tube lines.

In any case, I've longed to have a look around there - actually, I really want to have the best goth disco in the universe down there, but I suspect the hire would be more than Geeksoc could afford. Spirita had had a peep a few days ago when there were builders, and indeed there were people there when we visited - a man had popped out for a cigarette.

We tried to gain entry as politely as possible, but he revealed that the police were using it as part of a training simulation so naturally we couldn't go in. The policeman also pointed out, fairly enough, that it was the tube station we saw in every tube-station movie - Atonement, Prince Caspian and V for Vendetta to name three - and that it just looked like every other tube station. Here's Aldwych Tube station in action in the infamous "Firestarter" video by Progidy:

Great video, by the way. Disturbing as hell, but still great.

Seeing the Tube on video wasn't exactly the point, but we thanked him. Looks like, for now, I'll have to make do with the photos on Subterranea Britannica - which do seem to have a certain sickly karmic something to them. I've always felt abandoned places do have an energy.

This disappointment didn't deter our adventure, however, and we went off to see the Roman Baths. They are located under the King's building, right next door to the entrance - but my love of Classics has always been overcome by my hatred of small, dark pokey alleyways. The idea seemed much safer in company, however, and in that particular London rain which makes everything grey and gorgeous, we went looking for Architectural Treasure no. 2.


The alley itself was thoroughly Dickensian, and in it's own Jack the Ripper way, quite beautiful - vents, ducts, windows and mess, in that uniquely London manner of making architctural chaos appealing. From the bottom, we could see the whole belly of the university, and it's crazy-paving layout. The back of the chapel is only held up by two very determined columns, and we walked under several very high tunnels which we pass through without thinking every day. Aptly enough, the Classics department is actually right on top of the Roman Baths...

...which were being redecorated or something - in any case, two builders fixing doors ensured that we couldn't actually see them. At this point I saw a dead mouse and almost hurled. I hope I never see a real human dead body, because even though my mind can objectively cope with the idea, in actual fact I always react to animal corpses with far less dignity than I would like.

At this point, you'd think we would be deterred by our double failing. Yet I started rhapsodising about London history, including my much-quoted trivia lovingly ripped off from Henrietta Street as mentioned above. Which reminded Spirita, when I came to the Knight's Templar, that someone had told her there really was a very old chapel about somewhere. So we trotted down to Temple Tube to ask the man there for directions, and he helpfully pointed us right.

Which was weird in its own right, because I take the crossroads from the Strand to Temple every day but never go any further - it's as if the world just stops there. So walking down this new road was a particular treat. If I had a massive wall-map of London, I'd ink in the roads I'd visited and make a point of seeking out those I hadn't. Because I'm sure all my activity would clump around one or two areas, when there's just so much to discover all over the place.

Luckily, at this point Caterpillar suddenly realised where we were heading and lead us through the most brilliant maze of buildings - imagine Hogwarts, Oxford and a set of church cloister gardens crunched together and rearranged. Temple Court Chambers, as I understand, is a little isolated village of barristers and bores in suits - and it occured to me that the three of us all looked like undesireable delinquents. There were pathways with iron fences and stone flagstones, a fountain, lines of trees, columned arcades - and finally, after feeling like I'd accidentaly wandered into Florence, we came to the Temple Church, built by the Knight's Templar as already noted above and as used in The Da Vinci Code, and responsible for the naming of the whole area.

And in keeping with the theme of the trip, the church was closed until later in the afternoon.

History was everywhere, and I longed to go examine all the Latin (we found a Gurney on a tombstone) and go explore more winding streets - but the group voted for lunch, and we went on another trek of quite a different kind in which my desire for a peking duck wrap but refusal to pay coffee shop prices (£5 to eat in?! seriously?), our ethical aversion to the evil of chain brands, my friends' vegitarianism and Caterpillar's various allergies/intolerances made agreement of any sort completely impossible. Indeed, the lunch quest took longer than the architecture one and is far too tedious to recount. Except that Tango new brand lemonade is worth trying.

And that's that. We met Calypso later, and then all of a sudden it was 6 in the evening and time for tea. But a very exciting day, all in all, and I forsee more Random London Architecture rambles in the future.