translation exercise ... how would a spaniard say "my grandfather has gone to see a man about a dog" ?

more stuff from a monastery where photography is discouraged ...

http://www.extremaduramente.com/2009/11/nuevo-museo-de-bordados-y-casullas-de-guadalupe/

http://www.hoy.es/multimedia/fotos/ultimos/46628-monasterio-guadalupe-rehabilita-organo-museo-0.html

build your house upon a rock ...

jarandilla de la vera ... los escobazos 2009 ... they're all completely bonkers !!!

collinson bwana ... the exemplary and paradigmatic epitome of anglo-hispanic super-hero-izm

there will be a short intermission ...

as if it weren't cold enough ... i'm going to snowy spain for a few days with my daughter

once i'm safely back in the arms of the loved one, the blog will start again on thursday

finished work an hour early and dashed in to the V&A

sloane street ... has anyone mentioned christmas yet ?

http://www.gucci.com/uk/uk-english/uk/cruise-10/unicef/#0-1097671-189895FN0XG8653

Crazy Golf near Raynes Park

http://www.jurassicencounter.com/

Animatronic dinosaurs ... green waterfalls ... perfect playing surface ... high fidelity music ... they were playing Shane McGowan and Kirsty McColl's Fairy Tale of New York loud enough to drown out six lanes of passing traffic ... the overhead nets deter the predatory pterodactyls which roost in nearby Richmond Park

where one goes to sigh and to re-assess the thinness of one's wallet after buying a winter waterproof in peter jones

i could murder a fabulously fresh cabbage ...

laines organic vegetables at cuckfield

unavoidable pleasures

tales of the unexpected

driving through a dark rainy street in south london at five in the morning ...


a woman who could well be as old as me is waiting at a poorly lit bus stop ...


... and is doing a little twirl whilst she jives with an imaginary partner

arthur and i heading down the wandsworth road for a check-up at the vet's

foxy's social life ... she'll talk to anyone

what i was reading whilst brewing our tea at six this morning

on the side of an office building in wandsworth that must have employed a lot of telephone operators when it was built

now where did i leave my hat and coat ?

Bluebell Railway outbuildings ( auxiliary ticket office )

waiting for a bus in the Kings Road

i went to meet my sister V at an exhibition of weegee photos at michael hoppen's ...

http://www.timeout.com/london/around-town/event/165343/weegee-its-a-crime-to-take-photographs-this-good

.... then we went for coffee and cakes

i caught the bus home from Duke of York's Square on The King's Road

the Saatchi Gallery was all lit up but was just closing, although two stalls had been set up in the square selling coffee and cakes

i was too stuffed to buy any, and anyway, my sister had baked us a LARDIE CAKE the size of a small dog ... but i can't show you a picture because some of it has disappeared

a few of these fly over each day ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A380

... and then i wondered ezzackerly how big they are ?

and as far as i can tell ...

the fuselage is about ten or fifteen metres longer than this tenement block

and the tail is about the same height, maybe a little more

and the wingtip will spread from there to cast a shadow over the car in front of us !

and here's a film about assembling the beast ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvKFYKsB7Jw&feature=related

Ho ho ho !

The Emotional Blackmailer’s Handbook. Chapter 99. Projecting your anxieties and insecurities.

Dog-walking on the Common this morning, I found myself talking aloud to her.

“As a loyal friend, you sometimes seem less than adequate. When, for example, was the last time you ever stopped me from setting the whiskey-soaked bed on fire ? Warned me that bad men with guns were approaching on horseback under cover of darkness ? Or brought help from a distant farm in the nick of time as I sank deeper in to the quicksand ?”

The old dog didn't even shrug, just gave me a look that clearly suggested quiet contempt.

lost and found on clapham common, then handed in at battersea nick

listen !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eg4T3imFyqI

wild horses couldn't drag me away

... just as the eleventh hour on the eleventh day of the eleventh month was approaching ...

dull sublunary lovers

i like this clifford harper drawing in today's guardian

http://www.agraphia.co.uk/bin/agraphia.html

there but for fortune go you or i ...

returning from last night's concert and crossing the thames reminded me of a famous verse ...

The Embankment

( The fantasia of a Fallen Gentleman on a Cold, Bitter Night)

Once, in finesse of fiddles found I ecstasy,

In a flash of gold heels on the hard pavement.

Now see I

That warmth`s the very stuff of poesy.

Oh, God, make small

The old star-eaten blanket of the sky,

That I may fold it round me and in comfort lie.

T. E. Hulme (1883 - 1917)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._E._Hulme

the picture is picture from ... http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap091001.html

waiting for the girls to play us a bit of corelli in the norfolk room