Harrods and Harvey Nichols in Christmas splendour!

Lots of pictures from Knightsbridge in Christmas glory to add soon!

However, let's get into the right mood first:

 Another well established pub is closing...

My friend snatched this item, saying it would make a perfect present for someone she knows!

I've seen that before. Have you?:-)

And a picture of Cinderella book written and illustrated by a lady who lives in Chelsea and who gave the heroine her daughter's face!

A slight detour on the way back home brought me to Knigthsbridge. Like many others, I tried to capture the Christmas decorations.

At Harrods:

And at Harvey Nichols:

Plus a few snaps between the two:

From Ada to Madeleine

Mr Google told me it's Lord Byron's daughter, Ada Lovelace's birthday today! She is often perceived as the world's first computer programmer. Her parents separated early and since she was a few months old when it happened, she didn't see her dad as he went to live abroad and died when she was eight. Not much of a consolation that they are buried at the same cemetery by a small church in which a painting of Christ with an adulterous woman by Daniel Maclise can be found. One day I'll go to see that place. Daniel Maclise was quite a prolific painter and some of his works can briefly be seen at The Houses of Parliament during a speedy guided tour. I was interested to through this set: http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/daniel-maclise. I can appreciate his talent and attention to details, but there is something in his works that I do not find that appealing.

Anyway, I thought I'd share a link which shows Ada Lovelace's connections with The Borough of Ealing, where my home is for now:

http://www.caraealing.org/index_htm_files/Inaugural%20CARA%20Lecture%20by%20Dr%20Jonathan%20Oates%20-%20Final.pdf
....
Here is a selection of Ealing pictures taken on that day, 10.12.2012, the first two from the top seat on a double-decker. That's a great way of seeing London!

Florist shop in Hanwell, Ealing

The Brent River and Wharncliffe Viaduct, Ealing

Art for Art's Sake Gallery, Ealing Green

Ealing Green

Bond Street, Ealing Broadway

Do- Little Sunday

The most important achievement of the first part of the day was to get rid of a nasty headache and the evening was dominated by a traditional activity: writing Christmas cards, mostly to those who still use snail-mail. OK, I also went through the pile of papers-to-look-at-later and unearthed a few bits I thought I'd share.

- Scribbled on a piece of paper, long time ago: THE URBAN VOODOO MACHINE; I remember talking to the guy from this band at a Fulham Road shop and remember listening to some of the band's music. Try this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4gNorKKaAU or that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTB0oU3GjNU.

- Someone else, can't remember who, shared their favourite song with me: 'LIKE A FIRE' by Solomon Burke

- 'THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY' by Michael Chabon is a must -read, I was told

- 'You must listen to THE BEST OF THE DRIFTERS', I heard
I went through a few of their songs. They reminded me of the summers in Ireland. Our host had a big collection of vinyl records from the 50s and 60s and when it rained (which was often, of course) we would play them. On a rare occasion, we would persuade him to bring his old percussion downstairs, put it together and play for us. Luckily, the nearest houses were at a sensible distance! :-)
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Hugely delayed, 09.12.2012 snaps are being added:

 This poster has gone to a friend in Poland. He is a big fan of Eric Clapton. I took him (my friend, not Eric) to the guitarists' 'mecca' in Denmark Street and at one shop he gave a pretty good 'mini-recital'.

 This band member came to look for some props when I was at a Fulham Rd Octavia Foundation shop:

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Please let me know if I had added this picture somewhere else. I may have also mentioned that I youtubed them and found a song that I played my son for his birthday in 2012! :-)

Whimsical Saturday

Hello! Cloudless morning in London! I've spent most of it trying to make use of the Journey Planner and got exasperated. The idea is great: you key in the departure point and the destination, you can select various options and often you get the most bizarre result. If you are not that familiar with London, you follow the recommendations and ... happily waste time and money not knowing about it.

Asked by a met in London Polish friend who is currently working in Switzerland, from now on,  I'm going to include more pictures of Christmassy  London. Here is South Kensington Xmas tree near Ismaili Centre:

This area, out of South Ken Station was pedestrianised, along with Exhibition Road between Cromwell Road and Hyde Park before the Olympics, so I was totally surprised, when one afternoon I was nearly run over by a speeding car that emerged behind me!

My Saturday isn't going according to plans. Morning visit to POSK to see the collection has been postponed to the next weekend, fingers crossed. Let's see what happens with the rest of the day.

Instead of going on an exhibition tour at Pitshanger House Gallery, I joined friends for lunch, but made up for 'the cultural intake' by going to see "Love's Comedy" at The Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond. I was panic stricken on the bus when it had to go on diversion, would hate to be late. However, I just made it in time, before my friend left me a ticket at the office. If you'd like to know more about the play, see this: http://exeuntmagazine.com/features/staging-loves-comedy/2/ .

Here is the world seen from the bus on the way back:

Good night! :-)

Alley Cat, winter clad dogs and V&A treasures!

Hello! There was a lot of rain last night, then the sun turned up at dawn and now back to more rain. I'll have to brave it! Googled 'Lanzarote beaches' to feast the eyes before facing all the grey hues (not referring to Mr Grey!!!!) and wetness. Tonight's dreams took me on a several-day trip with my college students. Lots of travelling, by coach, plane and boat! Hiking, sightseeing, long campfire evenings....

The evening has turned into the night and I'm relaxing after a busy day with a surprise lunch invitation from a friend to while working in South Ken, lots of picture taking at The V&A, when the free evening concert didn't please my ears and a chat about funky rock and old vinyls with a young man who let me photograph this album cover:

Now I'm listening to You tube 'Alley Cat', would it be the one????

To keep the balance right, let me add  a snap of 'exceptionally elegant, winter clad dogs'!

There was some shy sunshine around lunchtime and I had to 'immortalise' the rare moment:

I didn't have the time to inspect the contents of the black box, it could have been a candle or soap, but looked pretty to me when put next to a flower-shape purse

 After 6 pm I wandered into the darkness and made my way to The V&A!
Natural History Museum was in its usual Christmas galore, with the lights on, ice rink and merry-go-round.

I was going to remember something about this cute bird. Regretfully, I don't. Well, maybe you'd like to know that I had a pet hen when I was little.

A contemporary artist used most distinguishing chair designs from the V&A collection to create this bench. What can you notice about the chairs' 'tops' and 'bottoms'? :-)

 Frank Lloyd Wright's office chair had to be included in my collection. There was no other option after I visited his house and studio in Oak Park, Chicago. I went to Oak Park a few times, actually. Once, my sister-in law was giving me a lift and as she started the car, the take away tea landed on my lap. Another time, I was biking with a friend and braked at the traffic lights so abruptly, that I nearly jumped ahead of the bike...

You can rotate in this chair, if you like:

 THat's an ornament on a wardrobe from Austria.

 And that's the ice rink across the street. It only got much busier a good hour later:

The ice rink was photographed through the window in the china gallery:

Chairs from Orkney:

The S-chair impressed me:

 The blue 'chair' is called  'tutti frutti', fancy that!:-)

Surrealism inspired wardrobe:

There was no throne to much this stool on display:

However, I snapped two thrones in the Chinese section:

And, when on the throne topic, if you are in Richmond and go to look at what little is left of the royal residence, Richmond Palace, there, by the Green, you may like to remember the fact that Queen Elisabeth I had the first water closet installed there. It was designed by Sir John Harington (1561–1612). He ' published A New Discourse of a Stale Subject, Called the Metamorphosis of Ajax, describing a forerunner to the modern flush toilet installed at his house at Kelston.^[7] The design had a flush valve to let water out of the tank, and a wash-down design to empty the bowl. He installed one for his godmother Queen Elizabeth I at Richmond Palace, although she refused to use it because it made too much noise.^{[citation needed]} The Ajax was not taken up on a wide scale in England, but was adopted in France under the name Angrez.', according to Wikipedia.:-)

Sleepy I am!

Good night!:-)

Santa Claus morning!

I can't say I'm most alert yet. Anyway, GOOD MORNING, WORLD! It was so jolly nice to wake up and find Santa's presents near or under the pillow when I was a child...

'Martyrdom of St Cecilia' was my discovery on Thursday:

In a nutshell: it was made in India for a Mogul during some Jesuit mission.

As to Saint Cecilia herself, she is the patroness of musicians and church music, because, as she was dying, she sang to God; the legend has it. I remember a beautiful stained glass window depicting her in a Chicago church, south of Downtown. The pictures I took then got lost in 2004 or 5, along with my stolen computer. I still have memories.


:-)

Snow was here at night

I could still see tiny bits of snow melt on the garden wall this morning. I think it was snow, anyway. Must dash now!
Till later! :-)

Later has come!
It's 8 pm, very cold, I'm back home, less hungry after some hot Thai style soup and determined to write about my today's encounters in Turnham Green.

There was another Chinese lady from Beijing, buying a suit for her son who felt really embarrassed because chatting to me, she didn't notice that I put both pieces of the suit into the bag and wanted to grab another black garment from the till. She kept apologising, but in the end we both laughed at it.

Two young women were trying on a lot of garments and finally bought a few. They turned out to be from Israel, one of them studying here in London, the other visiting her, I believe. That one told me she and her family originally were from somewhere in Russia, then lived for a time in Moldova before making it to Israel. I wish we'd had more time to talk.

Then, there came an elegant and beautiful black lady who, I learnt, always buys vintage clothes and then customises them, as she's known how to make a good use of a needle and thread since her parents taught her when she was 14! How useful! (Mind you! My maternal grandmother was a dressmaker, but I had to steer clear from her magical machine and other equipment, as it had to be in pristine condition. Maybe I should have insisted more... ) We had good fun with this lady when she tried on different clothes delighted with my recommendations. However, her much older husband (she told me that) was getting impatient waiting for her in the car, so she decided to cut the shopping spree short and, promising to come back soon, left with a lovely dress, coat and an embroidered skirt.

Finally, I need to mention the two lovely ladies from Madrid, a mother and daughter. They were looking for a jacket to match a gorgeous evening dress and I managed to help them find the right one, so they left convinced that 'I'm always right' and 'If in doubt, refer to point one.' :-) The mother said next time she would take a trip to London to do the shopping, not just for a visit. The girl is studying Philosophy and came to London on ERASMUS, EU students' exchange programme. I was impressed how well both of them spoke English!

Good night!