Pret A Mingie

Has anybody noticed that the baguettes in a well-known national sandwich chain seem to have shrunk?  I used to be a regular Pret customer but I begrudge it when they increase their prices and reduce the size of their sandwiches. Shame, because the food is always good quality.

The Cenotaph, Whitehall

Amongst other things, I collect postcards of The Cenotaph.  I determined last year to thin out my military postcard collection, sold most of these on eBay for a huge profit and then, promptly started adding to my cenotaph collection.  You can see some of them - along with the disappearing pram - HERE.

I was in Westminster the other day and as the sun was out, thought I'd take a walk along Whitehall.  I thought that whilst I was there I'd see if I could pick up a modern postcard of the cenotaph.  Could I find one?  No I could not.  There were plenty of postcards of Westminster, the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, the Millenium Wheel, Horse Guards, but nothing at all featuring the cenotaph.

I've always sought in particular, early photos of the cenotaph; the first temporary model and then the version which stands there today.  However, it occurred to me, on my fruitless searches for a modern day cenotaph postcard, that it might not be a bad idea to try and find the most recent image on a published card.  In other words, try and ascertain when it was that the cenotaph stopped being regarded with significance.

When the first temporary cenotaph was erected it quickly became a symbol for national mourning.  It was unveiled in 1919 (see image above) and then later replaced by the cenotaph we see today, unveiled for a second time in November 1920. Just look at the banks of flowers around the cenotaph in the November 1920 image below.

Postcards of the cenotaph which appeared over the coming years were presumably saleable because for many people who had lost sons, fathers, brothers and husbands (not forgetting wives, sisters, mothers and daughters of course), the monument meant something. It was a focus for national mourning.

Today, sadly, the cenotaph is not saleable.  The First World War has all but passed beyond living memory and the youngest veterans of World War Two are now all in their eighties.  Tourists presumably aren't interested in an unsightly obelisk in the middle of the road and publishers of postcards apparently even less so.

Harry's bad day

Poor old Sir Harry Pearce KBE had a shocker of a day yesterday.  It started off with him being stuffed into the boot of a car, got momentarily brighter when he was sprung by members of his team, and then fell apart completely within the space of - if the TV show running time was anything to go by - about half an hour.

First of all, his unconvincing Russian-ex revealed that she had been playing him along for thirty years.  Then she told him that their son Sasha wasn't actually his son at all.  Personally, I'd have been quite relieved to hear this as he's seemed a nasty piece of work from the start.  Finally, as if those two bombshells weren't enough, his Spooks belle, Ruth, was stabbed in the lung with a piece of broken glass by nasty Sasha and died dreaming about a grotty house in Suffolk with peeling green paint on the front door.  I wasn't actually sure whether Harry's distress was caused by Ruth dying or by the stupidity of her buying a property that needed a lot of work doing on it. In any event, we did see him visit the property later, check the peeling paint, check the kitchen and then leave.  It was all rather strange.

Yes, last night was the very last (allegedly) episode of Spooks on BBC1 and it went out with the most convoluted of plots and improbable events.  On the basis of that performance, the team's retirement, let alone Sir Harry's, seemed well overdue.

Spooks needed

Good advert placement in this morning's METRO newspaper with MI5 recruiting for Data Analysis and IT Security. I'm not surprised. Anyone who has been watching Spooks on BBC TV on Sunday evenings will know that the resident data analyst, Tariq Masood, was bumped off a couple of weeks ago by a CIA agent (we think) wielding a poison-tipped cucumber or similar. Tariq was a genius at analysing data and could always be called upon to come up with precise information about anyone, anywhere in the world. In fact, so good was he that you'd think the department would have been stuffed without him. Not so by all appearances, and last night they were still managing to trace very short phone calls to precise locations in double-quick time.

Whether the advertised role is to to get involved with similar work, or to check and chase-up outstanding invoices is unclear; perhaps that's a question to be asked at interview.

A little corner of India

We went to a birthday party at the weekend; a party hosted by an Indian couple and patronised by Indian and Sri Lankan guests. In fact I was the only non-Asian there and for a minute, with the sun blazing outside, and familiar aromas coming from the kitchen, I could have been back in Bangalore again.

What I also noticed was the familiar turn of phrase; the little idioms which are commonplace in India but sound odd in conversation here. "I'm Anil Kumar" said one chap, introducing himself to me; a common enough form of introduction in India, but we'd rarely introduce ourselves in this country by giving first and last names. [Note, since advised by David, our convivial host, that these were in fact both first names].

And for some reason this reminded me of a misheard-name when I was talking to a chap called Eugene at my old company in India. I got to know Eugene very well and when I left India he gave me a very nice wooden backgammon set, a family heirloom which I still treasure. When I first met him he was explaining to me that he was a twin and that his brother also worked at the same company. "He's all over" he said to me.

Well I suppose he must be," I replied, "I expect he's busy like you and has to visit different departments."

"No" replied Eugene, "he's Ol-iver".

A case of the runs

What do the retailers know that we don't know? Go into Sainsbury's right now and all the toilet rolls seem to be on offer at discounted prices. The first thing that greets you as you go through the doors at my local superstore is a massive pack of 18 Sainsbury's own brand toilet rolls for £6.50. So naturally, that was the first item in my trolley.

Not, mind you, that I am planning to suddenly adopt a high-fibre diet, or eat packets of prunes, or pop laxatives. But you know, I have three young children who spill drinks, spill food, wet themselves occasionally, have runny noses... Faced with any of those scenarios, thirty-odd-pence for a toilet roll doesn't seem like such a bad idea.

Dumping Indian elephant courtesy of deviantart.

A holiday in Cornwall

My memories of childhood holidays in Cornwall are vague to say the least but I think we went there at least twice, and stayed on the same farm on both occasions. I'm sure we had a good time but my memory is shocking and doesn't improve with age. I do recall the burly - and somewhat grubby - farmer we stayed with and I remember him squashing a bluebottle on his net curtains. We all posed for a photo and my sister stood on the back of a rather large sow. I'm sure my parents still have that photo tucked away somewhere.

We played on the farm, chased chickens, and went out and about in Cornwall with my parents, though where we went to is now lost in the mists of my grey matter. I do remember looking for the giant's heart in the cobbles of St Michael's Mount and I remember too, the dead mouse under the table in the cafe we stopped off at on one of those cold and wet days which, often characterise holidays in England during the summer. Now, some decades since I was last in Cornwall, I have just returned from a week there and, before I forget where we went, am going to record the places we visited and what we did. At least this way, if my kids inherit my same shocking powers of recall, there will be something in black and white (not to mention the hundreds of photos that my wife clicked whilst we were there).


Day One - Saturday
Set off on what turned out to be an eight hour journey from Essex to St Clether near Launceston. It should have been a six hour journey but an accident on the M5 put paid to that. Found our holiday home tucked away on one of those typically remote lanes and settled ourselves in.

Day Two - Sunday
Drove to Bude, spent time on the beach, dipped our toes in the icy waters and then explored the town, picking up ice creams, local jam and a throw for our settee made in Kerala. India is never far away in our lives.


Later on, had a pleasant afternoon at Tintagel exploring the dramatic Arthurian castle there. We would have explored more, but parts of that castle involve walks down precipitous steps (see below) which, with three young children and a push chair, didn't seem to be a particularly wise undertaking.


Day Three - Monday
We walked up to the farmhouse where the children fed the goats, chickens, ducks and lambs and stroked various cats, three dogs and a horse.


I then drove as far west in Cornwall as it is possible to travel - to Land's End (below) and then later to St Ives where I was mugged by a seagull which deftly plucked my Cornish vanilla ice cream out of my hand whilst my back was turned.


Day Four - Tuesday
A two-hour tour around our farm which was probably a little longer than it could have been. We sat in a trailer pulled by a farm buggy and then bumped across seemingly all of the 300-odd acres owned by our hosts. They farm sheep and cows and the highlight for me was watching the sheepdog do his stuff. Drove over to Looe and watched people catching crabs. Took a glass-bottomed boat-ride out to Looe island and saw a couple of seals and plenty of seabirds. The rocking of the boat unsettled Shilpi but sent both the boys fast asleep.


Day Five - Wednesday
The Eden Project. What a fantastic day out, and we were there for around eight hours. We all sweated like pigs in the rainforest biome and had a great lunch in the bakery. You pick what you want from the generous self-service counters and then, when you've eaten your fill, go up to the pay station and tell them what you've had. It all works on trust and I presume that the system works. I think our meal for five came to about thirty pounds which wasn't at all bad.



Day Six - Thursday
Newquay and the beach. This was where my parents came on their honeymoon. We were rained off the beach after less than ten minutes and all dived into an aquarium where we changed from beachwear into our clothes. By the time we'd mastered that, the sun had come out and so we went back to the beach. Twenty minutes later, another shower saw us back in the aquarium and this time paid the entrance fee and walked around looking at the fish. Back to the beach in the afternoon where we stayed for a couple of hours, this time without rain breaks.


Left at around five and then stopped off at Paulo's Circus Americano on the way home. This was a family-run circus where there performers doubled up as vendors before and after the show. The girl on the tightrope served us hot-dogs and chips during the interval and her sister, in all probability, sold me three candy-flosses before the show and was later swung around by her neck in the second half. Good fun, and it's been years since I've been to a circus.

Day Seven - Friday
A soaking wet day with the rain coming down in stair-rods. Popped into Launceston which must be one of the few towns left with a wool shop on the High Street.



Launceston has a castle and arguably the highest concentration of hairdressers' salons of any town in England. We stayed long enough to realise that this probably wasn't the best place to visit and so turned around and drove down to a shipwreck and maritime musuem in Charlestown near St Austell. Charlestown would be a good place to live: small and picturesque but close enough to St Austell to pick up the essentials for 21st Century living.


Day Eight - Saturday
Back to Essex and a shorter seven hour journey with a couple of breaks for food and leg-stretching.

Moving on in England

We're moving house in a couple of weeks' time. I'm paying just over 400 quid to move the contents of one house less than 500 yards into the new house; and that' a rock-bottom rate. If I'd been so inclined, I could have paid closer to a thousand pounds.

My old friend and colleague Steve O'Donoghue reminded me yesterday that now would have been a good time to be able to call on 30 wiry Indian men and a battered old lorry. I still recall having a heavy fridge-freezer delivered to the first flat I rented in Bangalore. A little chap, probably not much over five feet tall, somehow managed to carry it on his back up four flights of stairs and still, incredibly, managed to slip off his shoes before entering the house. Delivery charges? About 100 rupees I think.

Sat-nav take-away

Take-aways have gone hi-tech in the UK. These days they just ask you for a house-number and a postcode which takes the hassle out of explaining that your road is behind such-and-such, just left of so-and-so; past the brown stain on the wall. In India it's obligatory to quote a landmark when giving an address, even though sat-nav is very much in use in the country (and probably developed there as well).

I've been busy on other projects recently, hence the lack of posting on this blog. One of these projects has been a new Punch cartoons blog to showcase some old Punch covers that I have, and I've also been pre-occupied with other matters. I always have good intentions of posting when I get home from work but then domestic matters take over. God, do we miss our Indian servants.

Here's a nice take on sat-nav from Roy Nixon though. Fortunately our Chinese take-away wasn't using the same system last night, and our meal was delivered in pretty good time.