Shibboleth is a crack in the floor of the turbine hall at the Tate Modern. It runs the length of the great room, it splits off into hairline cracks as it passes through many of the finely polished concret slabs that make up the walking surface. I wondered what people might think of it, do most them think of it at all and if not what are they thinking about. In my case I thought briefly but rather shallowly, its a manmade crack, its a photo opportunity, am I bothered how they created it, and whats for lunch. We had walked from Covent Garden and my blood sugar levels were counting the cost. I love walking round London, it is a grand place to visit, every corner has a story embedded in our common history. The National Portrait Gallery called me, I love portraits, but it was crack we came to see, so we passed history by in the desire to see Doris Salacedo’s cultural canyon. With little regard to the instructions from the Tate I like almost everyone else couldn’t resist reaching into the crack, small children were slipping down into it, pushing feet and tiny hands into the dark crevices. I dangled the camera down to get a view that satisfed me. I remarked that I wanted to shout ‘Oh God! theres a rat down there’ to see how quickly the hall could empty but my internal Health and Safety officer took over and I had a vision of hoards of small children trampled by mad adults.

Part B-movie, part speculative fiction, this is apocolyptic last-man-on-Earth stuff. It is staged in burnt out Manhatten populated only by one man and his dog, Sam, and a million banshee howling, blood schlurping, dark dwelling, viral mutants. The story lurks in the twilight zone, is it really a vampire shocker or is it a Hollywood action thriller?, surprizingly it teeters with skill in this dangerous retro-cum-contempory zone. It pays respectful homage to its 1954 origins in the pages Richard Matheson’s SciFi novel intergrating the period vampire theme with the newly trendy end of days theory in the world of CGI. Essentially Emma Thompson as Dr Krippen manages to cure cancer but wipe out mankind in one overly smug scienctist-does-good moment and from then on, in a suspicious air of Judeo-Christian whisperings a good American tranforms into a global saviour… hmmm. I enjoyed every moment, although I had to re-adjust my heart rate by distracting myself with feeding the cat [reality check] and a short period looking out of the window [checking it wasn't getting dark]. Apparently this script, in some previous incarnation, was planned for a Arnie Schwarzenegger/Ridley Scott project, I am really pleased Arnie wasn’t the main man and sadly can only try to imagine how Ridley Scott might have walked the line between retro SciFi and CGI.

This chap saw me drawing him, not sure if I made him grumpy or not but grumpy he certainly was, and just a little bit scarey.

I have heard the mention of Union Square Cafe by both Nigella ‘nibbles’ Lawson and the Barefoot Contessa, they have both prep’d the Union Square Cashew nuts without deviation or hesitation and so what is good enough for them might be worthy of mention in this blog.
Using a generous hand and a loose wallet purchase 500g of raw shelled cashews, heat up your oven and gently roast the little beasts until a faint hint of toasting drifts aroma-orously [hmmm] around your kitchen. Meanwhile chop vigerously and if in Nigella mood, flirtatiously, a hand full of fresh [it has to be fresh] Rosemary. Add to the Rosemary 1.5tsp of dark sugar, a tsp of seasalt and a tsp of Paprika. Melt an ounce of butter and pour over the seasoning, take the warm nuts and anoint them with the seasoning, turn until all are coated. Best warm but can be eaten cold, if they survive long enough to cool down.

I think that when neatly wrapped up in a warm scalf and feet slipped into fleecy boots a mooch around a winter market on a fresh blue skied day is lovely, no plans to buy, just wander, look and chat. Unfortunately sharing this experience with ‘the man that lives on the sofa’ isn’t always an easy process, he can blur into a mass of boredom, who could blame him, following in the shadow of a seasoned wanderer must be frustrating. Therefore my personal suggestion is that if company is a must for you choose the appropriate companion for a shopping drift. I cannot claim to be a professional or serial shopper, infact on a scale of 1-10 I am, to put it seasonally, bearly out of the pear tree, with the occasional turtle dove moment. A few weeks ago I spent a whole day with a friend who is clearly a far more experienced and accomplished purchaser, I was impressed with her understanding of shopping protocol, the way she drifted with easy, rarely faltering, in awe I realised my natural position as the personal shopper. Could this be the perfect job for me?. I like to drift, I like to look, I like to spend but after that there is rarely any residual pleasure, the process of finding far outweights the ownership. So if the money I spent was someone elses and I got paid for doing it how perfect is that?.

Click to get to Linotype.

I am of the school of thought that change is only good when it brings improvement. When I see old houses in a state of delapidation I worry that soon the developers like locusts will decend and tranform the once singular dwelling into a mass of over priced, undersized boxes. In the case of the house above that was a concern, I passed it on many occasions over a large number of years, possibly dating back well before we shackled ourselves with a morgage, and likely before my feelings of mortality had manifest themselves so comfortably in my waking and sleeping thoughts. The boarded up windows were a sign of imminent danger, of greedy, sticky fingered capitalism eeking its grimy way into vision, of the sweaty palmed money makers wiping out the past and replacing it with the short-term future and then slinking back off to Metropolis with bags full of dirty money. Enter the photographer… who thought she would record the inevitable attrocity and make public the eyesore, a bit of a slapping on the web. I first spent a while surveying the old house, its view of the Cathedral, its proximity to the river and rural charm, the ease with which it sat in the landscape and the rich colours that with age had softened like the hands of a field worker, the beauty of its frailty a comment on our finely balance existence. I waited and soon in its footprint began the new building, slowly it has risen out of the Fen, looking out to the river, to the towers of the Cathedral and across the uninterupted flatness to the North. This morning I stopped alongside the scaffold covered shell of the basic form. I wanted to be able to bleet, to complain and to hiss about the horror I felt, but no, I can’t, I like the damn thing. It excites me, I love the wood cladding, the sharp cut of the roof and its self confidence. Blast!. I will post more as my love grows.