A near thing

A near thing in the sense that on a recent expedition to St. Luke's in Old Street, I came within 2 minutes and 28 seconds of having to pay a surcharge for exceeding the half hour free-loading limit on hire of a Bullingdon.

The record

A cold damp morning which started off with two trolleys - collected under the group search key listed below - and a visit to our GP surgery with an inquiry about health checks for the apparently healthy. The receptionist was concerned that I would not remember the answer and offered to write it all down. Better still, to make an appointment and get on with it. I declined both of these offers.

Adult's tricycle

The Ashmore passage also contained an adult's tricycle, not something one comes across very often - although from time to time I wonder about getting one for myself, for when I no longer feel confident on two wheels. Downsides including their being forbidden on suburban trains, their considerable price and the awkwardness of parking them. This morning's bet is that it is not going to happen.

The incident

The advertisement - from some distance and zoomed

There was some police flavoured incident in a Sussex part of the Southern network. Not affecting Southwestern Trains. On the other hand, having thought that I was exclusive, I was not best pleased to see that a poster advertising Westminster Abbey carried the same design as my members' card. Plus, it was a rather silly graphic, more obviously so in large than in small.

Having pulled a Bullingdon off the ramp, overtaken on the right on the roundabout by a car which then cut left in front of me and headed across Waterloo Bridge. At least he - I assume a he - gave me rather more room than the chap of the week before; not quite so scary. On the other hand, a young lady who stepped out in front of me somewhere in Farringdon Road was very apologetic when I shouted at her - which I find much quicker and more reliable than trying to ring the Bullingdon bell - which mostly don't work very well anyway.

Whitecross Street was busy with people buying street food, while the Market Café for people that preferred to sit down was quiet, at least when I arrived. Including an older chap with flat hat, scarf and a pound-note accent whom I was convinced was Lord Holm, that is to say Edward Petherbridge, from the death in a chocolate box episode of 'Midsomer Murders', an episode which Bing took perhaps thirty seconds to track down. But having tracked it down I am no longer so sure - with this thinking I recognise someone from ITV3 being something which seems to happen quite often these days. Bacon sandwich on top form.

The programme

Reasonable turn out at St. Luke's. The usual four microphones up and five microphones down. With Justin Taylor and the Consone Quartet giving us two harpsichord concertos (BWV.1052 and BWV.1058) and with Taylor giving us a solo toccata (BWV.912). All the musicians looked very young, particularly Taylor, although he turned out to be 23, having been something of a child prodigy.

Something like the harpsichord

The harpsichord was a new looking instrument, something like the one turned up by Bing above, with the lid rather getting in the way of the music - and very much in the way of a page turner, not present on this occasion. Perhaps the keyboard end of the lid folds over.

Apart from the cello, the quartet stood, with the two violins using bows of the sort noticed at reference 3, bowing, as it were, the wrong way. And somehow, we often had a sound very like that of an oboe. I thought the viola responsible.

In any event, quiet (which I rather liked) and well up to the standard of the previous two Bach concerts I had been to earlier in the month. An encore, something in F minor, which involved nothing but plucking from the strings. Bing suggests the largo from Bach's concerto No.5 in F minor for harpsichord and strings, but all the YouTube versions seem to involve pianos which rather drown the strings. Next stop my rarely opened box of Bach concertos from Archiv, possibly from the mid 1970's, where we have Karl Richter and the Münchener Bach-Orchester offer this concerto with a harpsichord which sounds more like it. So maybe. And while Richter may be an eminence, I think I liked the string quartet versions of the concertos better. We also had some presenter prompted thoughts from Taylor about improvisation, including something about our being a bit obsessive these days about the ur-text, about what the composer really wrote, perhaps forgetting that at the time he was writing, any particular piece might be a bit of a moveable feast.

I thought for a change to get to London Bridge via Tower Bridge, but I was quite taken aback by the amount of heavy traffic on the roads of this part of east London. Lots of interesting buildings, lots of old-style public houses and quite a few conversions of same. Clearly a place to be visited on foot.

And so to the cheese shop in Park Street, next to Borough Market. Some discussion about the ease with which some cheeses bruised, leaving unsightly and uneatable patches - too much of which means the shop grates the stuff and sells it to restaurants. I was also moved to try a bit of Wensleydale - in addition to my usual ration of proper, hard yellow cheese. Rather good, but not something that I would want to eat a lot of. Special occasion stuff.

And then called in the shop in the market run by the restaurant people, Brindisa. And yes they could sell me Presa Ibérica, albeit frozen, with a couple of frozen shoulders in a small fridge. Maybe £25 a go. Loaded down with cheese, I declined on this occasion, but I have the card to call should I ever want some for real - from which I learn that they have a branch in Hildreth Street, Balham of all places. See reference 4. Furthermore, according to the Waitrose website: 'Presa Ibérica Free Range Pork Shoulder ... The ultimate pork meat which delivers an intense flavour! This award winning free range Ibérico pork is from South West Spain. This ancient breed roams freely and forages for food. Ibérico is widely revered as one of the best meats in the world due to its rich delicious flavour. Ibérico Presa Roaming freely in the dehesas, sparsely wooded pasturelands of quercus trees that can only be found in the south-west of Spain, this ancient grazing breed is perfectly adapted to this environment. Ibérico pigs are able to store large amounts of fat which makes the meat especially succulent and tender. The constant exercise and natural source of feed also mean that the meat is delicious ...'. Quercus is probably marketing speak for oak.

Outside, I tried to extract some money from a Santander cash machine, but what with insensitive screen and strange user interface I had to settle for £20 rather than the £100 I wanted.

And so to Waterloo and on to Epsom. Arrival at which was enlivened by the presence of two young ladies in full war paint, despite the rather early hour. Has some night spot in Epsom broadened their appeal with thé dansants? While my taxi driver, of Spanish extraction, explained that the pigs ate acorns to give them their special flavour. He also tipped me off about the racing solecism of the new pub sign outside TB, previously noticed at reference 5.

The last visit to St. Luke's for a while, as the concerts continue but the programmes drift off into regions which do not interest me.

PS: the Chinook helicopter which had flown east and low over our house the day before did not reappear on this day. Not something that we see terribly often in Epsom and when we do it is more commonly south-north rather than east-west. Some new mission?

Reference 1: https://www.justintaylorharpsichord.com/home.

Reference 2: https://www.consonequartet.com/.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/01/ss-luke-cera.html.

Reference 4: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/01/no-spatburgunder.html.

Reference 5: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/01/herald-copse.html.

Group search key: lkc.