Elvis found in London shop window!

Long before hippies, the hips of Elvis. How they swivelled. My dad, in his old-age, would enjoy listening to Elvis, particularly his love songs. Love me tender, love me true. When Dad died the priest asked what music we’d like at the funeral. I said, ‘Elvis.’ The priest laughed and, sorry to say, I joined in with his laughter. We resorted to the usual plaintiff hymns. And, now years later, I regret it. Should have gone with the mellifluous voice of  the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll and not the strangled rendition of a tired old hymn. 

Despite all

Phew! We made it through 2011. Through the madness of collapsing systems, institutions and hope. And, yet, we’re still here and so is hope. It regenerates like new skin on old wounds. So, what will 2012 bring? Well, there’s the promise that nurses will speak with patients; that the grammar school system will be revived for them as can afford private tuition for their children; that the financial world will be regulated sometime quite soon (honest!); that fat bonuses will be, ahem, poked a bit, and that, according to Polly Toynbee, half a million families in Britain with children under 5 will fall into absolute (not relative) poverty. Ah, hope. And charity? Where she?

Photo shows a part of the Berlin Wall which stands outside the Imperial War Museum. The museum has a stunning exhibition of Don McCullin‘s photography: Shaped By War. You may, like me, be amazed by the number of wars there have been since the end of World War II: the war to end all wars. http://www.iwm.org.uk/exhibitions/shaped-by-war-photographs-by-don-mccullin

Loopy lips

Lips: without which we could not smile, eat, pout, speak or kiss. So, hoping you’ll forgive the distortion of the language, Merry Kissmas. xx

Double Happiness!

Occasionally, the camera and I venture beyond Peckham.  This is a young man employed in the kitchen of a restaurant or hotel near London’s Carnaby Street (an assumption based on his clothes).  He’s taking a break and by squatting and shielding his face, he has created privacy out on the street. He reads a book… nearly at the end now.  He's also holding a lighter and pack of Double Happiness cigarettes, a Chinese brand, for times when single happiness is not enough.