Londres

I made a flitting visit to London yesterday to see Kyli and stay overnight at her no-longer-very-newly-moved-into gaff in Hackney; and I met her flatmate and old uni pal Aelia for the first time. We were all late - Kyli's journey from the City, and my car journey along the A501, were both disrupted by the same overturned car; Aelia just missed her stop. Anyway the evening got foreshortened, but we went down to Cirrik's and had a nice meal featuring olives, aubergines and tempranillo, then back home, I went straight off to sleep at midnight and woke up five hours later to begin the journey back to Swindon in hefty rain.

So I was only really {in London and not driving and not asleep} for about four hours, but what a wealth of images: I feel like a camera whose shutter opened on the lunar surface, and has now come back to earth carrying one photo to be analyzed for months by scientists. Yes, there is that much caffeine still swilling around the system; mainly due to Heston's Costa. But this indeed marked the end of my different-planet experience, and the resumption of normality. London driving had necessarily involved switching off the car stereo, I needed all my concentration to take in my surroundings. Now, back on the M4, I could switch it on again, and complete yet another listen to Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, then a bit of country, and then some Kings of Leon (Because of the times - Xmas present from Kyli, who is my chief source of info about what's going on in modern music).