Thursday, March 13, 2008

Around the block

There were signs of spring in the village this week:

Daffs at the Hall (thanks, Kate and family for planting those; they're really cheery for everyone walking past, and you can't see them from the house...)

Across the road, blossom on the tree by the church:

And some forsythia.

And here's some more forsythia on the same day, in a slightly different setting: the pods at the top aren't seed-pods - they're the topmost people-pods of the London Eye.


Wandering along the South Bank, you do see some strange things: yes, it is indeed a "living statue" in Charlie Chaplin/Hitler make-up, a policeman's uniform, a tutu and a truncheon...



Or Big Ben seen through the legs of a semi-skeletal Dali elephant...




And a photo I've been wanting to take for a long while - Boudicca, implausibly dressed in diaphanous robes, by Westminster Bridge and Portcullis House.



She looks great - three storeys high... Until you see her from a distance, and realise her relative size in the landscape. Which is, I guess, why the Iceni never stood much of a chance.

There's an urban myth that Boudicca is buried at Kings Cross; it's a nice metaphor for the hopelessness of trying to get from East Anglia to London on mornings like last Monday, when the process took 5 hours... A chariot with knives on the wheels would have been seriously welcome; and quite possibly quicker...

3 comments:

Daisy said...

FIVE hours?!?! Eeeek, that's scary. I really hope you had some knitting with you...

Barbara-Kay said...

Thanks for the spring pictures. Your sense of photo framing is quite good...as is your sense of humor. Enjoyed them!

Rosie said...

Wish I'd seen your pics of the South Bank before I went there on sunday and found it so very changed (last went there 21 years ago). There were extra brdiges, new piers and that ferris wheel (I notice that knitting needles are banned...but the chopsticks from Wagamama's nearby measure 5mm...)