The Burlington Arcade wasn’t far down the road; and Bell & Ross was selling ‘The Aviation Collection watches’, Mou had impressive slippers in the window, and a jewellery shop called Azza Family seemed to originate in Egypt. There was a shoe shine service; Sermoneta gloves; and a shop called Code 8 offering a make your own perfume service. At 2.50pm in Fortnum & Masons, I noticed I’d broken a thumbnail; chocolate lobsters and clams were on sale…
The Tasting Room had a man playing the piano in it; and the third floor was The Food Hall – where Blak Eldur, sriracha cha-cha-cha, kampot pepper, flora de sal, The Bloody Mary gift box, Japanese knives that could be personalised, and fifty millilitres of 100 year old balsamic vinegar (in a box) costing £200 were my observations. The second floor had masses of perfume, things that may’ve been pyjamas costing £675, and £425 wispy scarves; the first floor was covered in plates, cups, tea strainers, and crockery, and I noticed a plate with Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, and a small child doing something to Eeyores tail on it (with the quote ‘Who found Eeyore’s tail? I, said Pooh. What a clever thing to do’).
The Parlour was almost entirely ice cream; and down a couple more staircases was a lot of alcohol, cake stands with honey and hazelnut pralines, massive meat joints available to be sliced, granola (costing £9.95 for 500g), porridge sourdough amongst the bread, Battenberg, cheese straws, cinnamon buns, snickerdoodles, and pumperknickel bagels; and we eventually left the store at 3.37pm.
Hatchards, K. Minamoto (selling Japanese confectionery), Cafe Concerto (with biscofflotus buns in the window), and a ‘toot bus’ were passed on the way back to the underground; and down there again I spotted a defibrillator, and an advert advising people to adopt a giant panda, I grabbed an London Standard; and then a Bakerloo line train with very squeaky wheels was boarded at 3.48pm.
A girl on there had false eyelashes on (that were at least one inch long) (and incredibly furry boots), the robot repeated the ‘see it, say it, sort it’ motto over the loud speakers, a Clapham Common moon walk (on 17th May 2025) had a small advert inside the train; then we got off at Marylebone and I forgot when, because tickets got confusing, Mum started getting agitated, a woman in a fluorescent jacket said a lot of stuff I forgot, and it appeared our type of ticket meant we couldn’t go anywhere until after 7pm.
It was freezing, we found somewhere reasonably indoors to sit, and Mum started trying to lose consciousness in a chair there. My blood sugar was going a bit low, so I ate a croissant I found in my bag (and couldn’t remember where we’d got it); she was twitching by 4.40pm; 10 minutes later she woke up and said she was going to get some sweet things – and returned with several little cupcakes, I got the book she’d bought earlier out of my bag and she started looking through it.
I had a look through my notes and photos from today, my thumb hurt, a man sat nearby briefly got a box of something called pregnacare out of his pocket, it was getting colder, a City Of Westminster rubbish truck went past in darkness outside, as well as a bus with a big advert for Disney’s Mufasa the Lion King on the side, and I forgot when we moved.
Out by the departures board it was freezing, and the platform number for the train took a while to pop up; we made it on to the nice warm train by 6.45pm, and it got more and more packed. A woman across the aisle had a book titled ‘As We Rise – Photography from the Black Atlantic’ under her phone and some sort of Mark’s and Spencer food substance, a man gave up his seat to a woman with a Dachshund, and a Metropolitan Line train that ours whizzed along next to looked stuffed; Wembley Stadium was passed (visible only due to its lights) at 7.13pm, Beaconsfield 18 minutes after that (and by then the Dachshund had gone flop and was limp on top of his or her owner); and it was pointed out to me that the little electric board in the carriage had on it ‘this is London Marylebone. This train terminates here. All change please.’ There was a massive DHL warehouse just outside of Bicester; and Kings Sutton, and Banbury (where a lot of people got off) at 8.13pm, came before our stop and we disembarked at 8.31pm – in the pitch black.
My teeth started chattering due to the cold, the car windows were frosty and had to be scraped, and my teeth continued to chatter all the way home in the dark; I forgot when we made it, things were mostly frozen in the garden; Soot the cat greeted us, then supper was made available, I put my pyjamas on, and gave him another bowl top up before bed (when it had reached 11pm – and I was getting a bit sleepy).
