First cheese

About ten days ago saw the first cheese visit to London since the island break - which last had seen off my stock of Poacher. An overcast day but warm enough. And the first sight was the country end of the fairly new flats built over Epsom Station swathed in scaffolding and plastic sheeting. Which seemed a bit rum for fairly new flats. There was no one to ask but the work did seem to include cutting holes in the external brickwork. And the bearded indigent was missing. Had he gone on his holidays or had he been scooped up by what is left of our social services?

Snoozed a good part of the way to Waterloo, then a reasonably uneventful run up to Golden Lane to take a bacon sandwich. A clear run through the lights from Blackfriars Bridge southside to Charterhouse Street. Overtaken twice by young ladies.

Parked up at Golden Lane - known to the Bullingdon system as Roscoe Street, just about visible in gmaps - and made my way through to a busy street food scene in Whitecross Street. Market Restaurant quiet but the bacon sandwich was as good as ever.

Back to Golden Lane for my second ride of the day. Past a graduation scene outside the Barbican Halls. Ticked off by a young lady pedestrian for a mistake when turning at a busy junction into Moorgate. Which was to be fair to the pedestrian, was a no right turn turning. Traffic lights on the way to London Bridge from there a bit sketchy, but I arrived OK at a Borough Market which was busier than I have ever seen it. Mainly tourists and street foodies rather than serious shoppers.

First stop the cheese shop, where I added a piece of Gubbeen to the usual mix. From thence to the Ginger Pig for what turned out to be a thick slice of rolled shoulder of pork against chicken soup later in the day. And I am pleased to able to report that real shoppers could go straight in and did not have to join the long line of people queueing to buy sausage rolls and such like. Maybe like bakers and wine bars have found before them, there is more money to be made from office workers out of middle-of-the-road stuff like sandwiches and lager than expensive speciality items like meat.

Ginger Pig also sported what one might call a vivarium, a cold glass cupboard containing old beef, labelled according to breed of cow. Old beef, mostly ribbish, which looked rather white and fissured, which I have tried on occasion, but I think I prefer my beef a bit fresher. Hung for a few days yes, a few months no.

I nearly forgot that I was supposed to be buying bread and had to work my way back through the crowds to find the elusive stall for Olivier's Bakery (reference 1). But got there in the end and took a quarter rustic, a chewy variety of white bread which we have liked before.

The result of which was that my trusty London bag no longer fitted in the luggage place on a Bullingdon - with the cycle for the third leg being the same as that for the second leg - as can be confirmed by careful inspection of the first of the snaps above - and so the surplus had to be tied on, using the length of sisal twine which lives in the London bag against just such eventualities.

Thought about the White Hart, but opted for the ramp instead and headed home. Lots of sumac and buddleia to the west of the line, that is to say on the river side. Changed at Clapham Junction for a spot of aeroplane spotting at the town end of the Epsom platform - that is to say No.11 and No.12 - where I was mixing it with a small herd of train spotters. Two young, two old, one fat and in-between. All men. I suppose that ladies do not do train spotting; perhaps they settle for shoes and stuff like that.

Reached the platform to a more or less immediate two. Which almost became a three. Then there was something of a gap. Then a two. Then the second aeroplane of a two became the first aeroplane of another two. Then that two rolled over to become a three. Which rolled over to become another three. Some coming in from the east, some from the southeast. All line up on a handy lamp post as they dropped down onto Heathrow. Plus I had a sturdy plastic salt box on which I could sit. Not too much movement underneath to be uncomfortable. All this being around 14:15 BST on a weekday afternoon.

I pondered about a simple language to describe the sequence of aeroplanes.

Maybe 'two NEAR one GAP two ROLL two ROLL three ROLL three' would capture the sequence offered above. But more thought is needed.

The line into Heathrow being clearly visible in the screen scrape above. The second aeroplane in from the right is more or less over Battersea Park, that is to say very slightly to the north of the Clapham Junction from where I was observing the sport. 

Click on remove ads bottom right and you are invited to flash the plastic - which it not unreasonable. A fair amount of work must go into making such stuff so readily available, and I dare say that if I made more use of it I would not object to making a contribution.

References

Reference 1: https://www.oliviersbakery.com/.