Thursday 18 July 2013

Kate Middleton about to birth an heir, a bad film, a bad and good culture, robot drones......


Only in London - A Sikh in an antique with female accessory photographing Elena photographing them!

The night air was warm enough to cook up a riot and we decided to take refuge in a film at The Coronet, on Notting Hill Gate. It was Tuesday, which is discount night, so we got in for seven pounds in total. It didn't matter what the film was, or so we thought, but it was so bad it did matter.
A film director should never bore the audience but Sophie Coppola managed to induce rigour mortice in us.
Superficial, over - privileged inarticulate American teenagers feeling sorry for themselves - not a pretty sight or sound. We were forced to listen to them speak: Cool, oh my God, check it out, I love it, like, so cool, shut the .........up bitch. And that's it, honestly, plus the names of their Gods, the brands of clothing they robbed the homes of celebrities for. Then we were forced to watch them break into one celebrity home after another and drool over the contents before they spirited them away in a cloud of cocaine and dope.

If there is hope for the world, it is not with these soft headed victims of consumer culture. Perhaps we should protect children from the dark arts of advertising and publicity? These kids didn't stand a chance against the endless bombardment of their empty heads and loveless hearts with brand propositions posing as a reliable route to the pursuit of happiness.

But America is not just a moronic inferno - Elon Musk, founder of PayPal and space entrepreneur is a dynamic refutation of everything the feckless and feral youth of this movie represent. He is determined to rescue the human species by making it possible to colonise Mars. He is already on the brink of supplying re-usable space rockets to get us there and has done what everybody thought was impossible by succeeding with private space travel.

The same culture encouraged both of these extremes. The worry is that Elon, or Steve Jobs and the other titans of computer code need this vast and vulnerable army of semi-conscious consumers to keep the system afloat while they prepare the rescue plan.

Meanwhile, the drone robots continue to practise as the policemen of the future in the skies of America. One of them went badly wrong yesterday, crashing as it landed in Florida. These are real robots. They are not flown by robotic humans from a basement somewhere. They fly themselves. and when they finally get the hang of it - watch out. The skies will be full of them, and some are bound to malfunction and missile you out. Game over.

Patriots patronise St Mary's Hospital as Kate labours to produce an heir. The Royals are allowed to spend more time in maternity wards than their subjects! A woman we spoke to wanted to know why Kate didn't go to her own hospital instead of filling up ours. Good point.

Back here in Britain, the nation is agog at the prospect of Kate Middleton's imminent birthing of an heir to the throne. It seems that most people though, want this unfortunate infant - you can't choose your parents - to get a proper job when it grows up.

This priceless image free from the internet. 

 Bad luck. Surely this marks the end of the line for the mystery that is monarchy. Behind all mystery and privilege lies mendacity and malfeasance. They don't want you to look in because if you do you'll find something unpleasant, like Prince Charles and his 'voluntary' tax contributions and non - payment of corporation tax on his 'Duchy Originals' - I don't like the sound of them myself. Organic underpants, no thanks!


Friday 5 July 2013

A sausage roll on another sunny London day, then a few pints and something strong to smoke......

For us, the day got off to a good start.

The sun blazed down from on high and we rolled and rattled along on the Hammersmith and City line to Hammersmith, on our way to Brentford, where way back in 1642, during the civil war, the parliamentary forces fought like devils against the royalist cavalry of Prince Rupert. Our boys - parliament - were eventually beaten back, but no matter, as the royalist fops were thrashed the next day at Turnham Green and democracy won in the end.

How different it all is now.

Back then, muskets, pikes, cannon and swords were weapons that mangled us at close quarter.

Now, the mighty US of A sends its Drones across the skies to search and destroy, firing their missiles down on houses far below in hapless Pakistan, without knowing who is within.

Yesterday it was reported that a Drone had killed seven ' suspected' militants in a house in Waziristan.

'Suspected' but not certain. Why is there no outcry from us, from Cameron or Clegg or Miliband?

Nobody cares that's why. There are no votes in it. These men are not statesmen. They are pastry chefs, serving up delicacies to their overweight people - it was Aristotle who characterised democratic politicians thus. We're beginning to think he had a point.

Meanwhile, and before the Drones from Iran or somewhere arrive over our usually cloudy skies, life must go on, and life is better with a good sausage roll, and there is none better than Patrice Lardon's.


Patrice is as French as French can be - straight out of central casting : jolly, happy and helpful, he makes the best sausage rolls in London, and a range of other pastry type delicacies. Check him out on Facebook under Lardon's Catering.

Later, we take refuge from Obama's foreign policy at The Star and Garter, the best pub in Soho, a fine and proper London boozer, no grub, no cocktails, no waitresses, just good beer and spirits.


Out friends let us smoke their unusual home made cigarettes.

We experience pleasant feelings of a vaguely out of body type and float home like a pair of drunken drones.


Monday 1 July 2013

Summer's here at last and London lives outdoors again..tattooed and talented


Elena's Mum enjoying her day out in the sun on the way to the Russian Orthodox Church nr Hyde Park

The sunlight streaked across the streets, instantly transforming every building, plant, tree, flower and face. Once there were frowns, now there were smiles. The leaves on the trees waved back at heaven saying thanks be to thee, to thee, and we felt ourselves just carried along on the running tide heading down to Hyde Park.

There, people were peopling, canoodling, cuddling and playing. Families were happy families, lonely people felt as if they belonged after all and children saw how young their parents were and how even younger were their grandparents.

It was impossible not to feel like the luckiest people in the luckiest place on earth, this demi-paradise, this sceptered city, this London of all the peoples.


And it was sad to think that in that other great city, Cairo, they are shaping up for a fight, unable to find a peaceful way of solving the endless argument : the ways of God or the ways of men. God seems to have left economics alone, but his spokesmen on earth have a plan anyway. It doesn't seem to be working, though, for the men that have to make it work, and they want to be listened to. We hope that skulls won't be cracked and that peace prevails. Come on God, intervene, don't just sit there!

The Russian Orthodox Church in Ennismore Gardens, Knightsbridge.


And then came Kamila.



Kamila Pavlova has a head turning tattoo on her back which tempted us to ask her about it, but we ended up discussing her business plan for her new career.

Kamila is a surgeon, from the Czech Republic, and she has been working in the great hospitals of London : Guys, St Thomas's and Bart's, putting ordinary mortals back together again with plastic surgery.


We bowed down with deep respect.

But alas, the labyrinthine structure of the NHS, its tortoise promotion scheme, it's Ariadne's thread that must be pulled through to get a promotion, has left Kamila frustrated and she will leave to go into private practise soon.

Check her out (no pun intended) as she is as charming as she is skilled and clever, and she will make you whole again, using all the arts of the plastic surgeon.