(no subject)

Happy birthday, commodorified and nineweaving!

Not sure if it's her or the reporting...

But I want to take a huge codfish, or possibly something spikier, to the concept of the the old-school glamour of -

the 1940s*

The fascination with vintage fashion and the 1940s, she explains, goes back to her teenage years.

"My English grandmother regaled me with tales of dancehalls and airmen. I fell in love with old-school glamour, with torch singers, especially Edith Piaf, and with flying.

This sorts extremely weirdly with the following:

Prone to wax lyrical about the Spitfire –"the machine that saved Britain from nazism" – Carr honours the RAF's Polish air aces in Motylek (Butterfly) on an album whose other subjects include partisan fighters, composer Frédéric Chopin and the millions deported to Siberia by the Soviets

Will cop to have spent yesterday evening watching a DVD of The Captive Heart (1946), which is as much about the sheer austerity and tedium of POW life as it is about the romantic arc described in the plot summary.

*After spending the morning queuing hither and yon to pick up the rations, I will pass the afternoon digging for victory, followed by a jolly evening in the blackout shelter, making do and mending by the light of a candle, or if I'm lucky, a hurricane lantern. Or if the light is inadequate for that purpose, relieving the excruciating boredom by playing the entertaining games from The Blackout Book, described in the latest Slightly Foxed.

100 London Things: 17

Some while ago I was snarking on a Time Out issue about 'Guilty Pleasures' and delivering myself of the opinion that the pleasures listed might possibly have marked the person indulging in them as terminally naff in the trendy Hoxton bars they frequented, but were hardly 'guilty' in any meaningful sense.

Among them were included Thames River Cruises.

My dearios, if time is no object, and if it is a nice day, this is absolutely the best way to get to Greenwich.

You will get a charming and instructive (though I do see that one might find the well-informed running commentary just a little tedious if one heard it very often) voyage from Westminster Pier past some major sights of London best observed from the river. It is a good thing to do with visitors whom you have no idea what to do with...

I would, however, discourage you from taking the trip to Hampton Court, though I'm not sure that one runs anymore, and maybe it is not quite so immensely looooong as I recall it being when I took it many years ago (though passing some very interesting sights on the way). The Hampton Court website indicates that it does run, but only in the summer months, and can take up to 4 hours (take lunch...)

One of the days off projects thing that partner and I have in mind is to take the boat all the way to the Thames Barrier, though I think this is something probably best deferred until well on into the New Year.

Culinary

Made a rather good sardegnera (with Salami Milano) for supper on Friday.

No Saturday rolls as I was working.

Today's lunch: monkfish fillet teriyaki, served with boiled Anya potatoes, hickory-smoked white asparagus, and round courgettes, which I cut into wedges and healthy grilled in olive oil, then splashed with wild pomegranate vinegar.

Thsi week's bread: the Psomi loaf from Greenstein's Secrets of a Jewish Baker, with (since Waitrose seem to have stopped doing their 5-seed mix, chiz) Rapunzel seed mix from the organic food shop (rather than just sesame seeds). In spite of taking rather a long time in proving (I had to use dried yeast, which I think may have exceeded its best-before) has turned out very tasty.