Personal

  • A day in Shanghai

    I am currently on my way to the World Scout Conference, being held in Jeju, South Korea and have stopped off in Shanghai for the day. What an amazing city – full of unfamiliar smells and tastes; though the main shopping street, Nanjing Road, feels surprisingly familiar. This could have something to do with the…

  • Going to the dogs

    Apparently, there used to be 33 greyhound racing tracks in London. Now there are only four. And in August, arguably the most famous one will close, making way for a housing or retail development. The country is no longer going to the dogs, apparently. Tonight, however, I did. Ruth, Mona, Steve, Lynn and Stacy joined…

  • Those May ears

    I know baby photographs don’t necessarily travel well in cyberspace, but I do think this picture of my nephew with his mum and dad is lovely. He has, unfortunately, inherited his father’s ears. Which Joe, in turn, inherited from his dad. Luckily, mine are perfect…

  • Bathing in Bath

    A very traditional British public school education left me fairly averse to the hedonistic pleasures of the spa experience. Cold showers were more my sort of thing. But for the last couple of years I have enjoyed the Austrian spa experience after a day’s skiing in the mountains. Today, finding myself with a free evening…

  • Bupa London 10,000

    “If there’s one thing we can be sure of,” said the man on the public address system this morning, “God is not a runner.” This may have been a little unfair, and possibly mildly blasphemous, but he had a point. As I crossed Green Park to reach the starting pens of this morning’s 10k race…

  • St Albans 10k

    What a terrific course! It was described as ‘gently undulating’ and I suppose it was. There were no really difficult hills and most of the trail went along traffic free country lanes. The start was a bit narrow, being a pavement by a relatively major road, but otherwise it was a very jolly run, well…