The archive

This fragment was nothing more than a placeholder. It spoke of intentions, expectations and sadly, presumptions which would be unfulfilled. The memory of it is stronger now, not least because of the intense aerial coverage of the Royal Family on…

By the middle of 2021, life felt like it was returning to normal. At least, a strangely attenuated existence which we were encouraged to regard as the 'new normal'. We took the opportunity to get away to London, to stay in a nice hotel which was…

When I walked dejectedly out of my office on 12th March 2020, I didn't realise that both personal and global change was afoot. We were approaching the end of a two-week-long regulatory inspection which hadn't gone well - there was a sense of…

I ventured out into the wider world in August 2020 for the first time in four months. It felt daring, a little foolish and somewhat risky - but after months of watching the numbers, managing expectations and trying to bolster my flagging mental well-being, the balance felt right.

I calculated I had until about midday... The forecast wasn't good, and as I sped eastwards under steely, unrelentingly grey skies, I doubted my calculations. I was eager to get walking too and I felt anxious to cross London swiftly, emerging on its eastern edge in a silvery gloom.

London has an enviable reputation as a resilient city. It has been burned and flooded, bombed and relentlessly attacked from within - yet it stands. Its people, in particular, are regarded as stoic and resolute - defiant against all the odds.

Once again it was a privilege to be out early. A privilege too to descend from the former Great Eastern Hotel to the platforms at Liverpool Street for an early train - an experience I've long coveted and was glad to finally manage.

Growing up in the relatively rural westcountry, there have been few enough occasions where I could open an entry here with a Ballardian broadside. But today I woke up on the tenth floor of the Premier Inn which towers over Westfield.

My discipline in planning these excursions had slipped I thought, as I looked at the locked gates of the Hammersmith and City line platforms at Paddington. I thought it again as I stood at the bus stop a few minutes later, realising the 205 wasn't…