November 2009 – a spark in your veins

28th November 2009

Too Sloe

Back in October when the sweet chestnut season was in full swing, I mentioned that I was looking forward to the first frost of the year, the seasonal cue to make sloe gin… however climate chaos (or cyclical warming as some would have it) appears to have put a kibosh on my plans, as whilst I patiently waited for jack frost to turn up and ice those berries near the duck pond, someone or something came along and snaffled the lot!

My first thoughts were that some human(s) had picked them all, but considering how high up some had been, I began to wonder if perhaps those pesky parakeets had been at them?

Anyway, today I was out testing the unofficial shortcut from Dot Hill to Cheriton Drive (very muddy), and I stumbled upon a whole load of blackthorns at the entrance to the old allotments! Luckily enough I still had a bit of gin left (which I’d been drowning my sorrows in after the loss of the other sloes), so I grabbed about 40 or so, plus a thorn, leaving plenty enough for any other foragers/birds in the area. There’s also a load of rosehips there too, at least that’s what I think they are.

The home made recipe is totally straightforward, but superior to the shop-bought version, which apparently gets made with rough spirits and cordial. Essentially, you just use the sloes to double the amount of drink, and it makes a very pleasant winter warmer:

Ingredients:

enough sloes to fill bottle of gin

one empty bottle of gin

one full bottle of gin

one thorn

Method:

prick the berries with the thorn

drop them into the bottles with gin

shake gently every now and then

the colour and flavour is optimal after three months, but it rarely remains in the bottle that long

decant carefully for clarity

25th November 2009

Falconwood is on the TfL Map

Part x in an occasional series on maps. This little beauty came via the mighty 853, who reported on the forthcoming oysterisation of overground train fares in this neck of the woods. Local stations are now included on arguably one of the all time classic maps, the present day version of the London Underground map, a.k.a the integrated TfL map. As you can see we have the blue line (charing x and canon st), and the green line (victoria) – I would have preferred primary colours myself, but they were all spoken for… I’m not mad on the parallel lines either, as they look a bit hollow, but I’m guessing the designers were trying to differentiate the overground services by tapping in to how people visualise train tracks.

In Mr 853’s post, the title of which contains the phrase the “great train robbery”, he also notes that fares are set to rise, let’s have a look:

Currently: A so called anytime single to London Terminals from zone 4 stations is £3.70, with peak/off-peak returns at £6.20/£4.70 respectively, (for all the confusing details about zone 1 connections, daily cap changes, changes to peak times etc see his pricing post) or the full proposed pricing document.
Presently: Comparative trips using oyster fares will cost £3.10/£2.30 (peak/off-peak) single, this is already significantly cheaper than £3.70!). Return prices will vary a bit depending on the time of travel (e.g. the dreaded afternoon peak from 4-7pm), but let’s consider a pleasant scenario for the sake of optimism: a nice little day trip to trafalgar square on a sunny weekend in january, with no onward connections from charing x: this will cost someone over 16 £4.60, which is actually cheaper than current fares by 10 pence.

There are various catches that even out the price differences, such as the premium train users pay if they connect with other TfL services in Zone 1, and apparently season ticket holders are going to pay extra, and there are further criticisms of south eastern trains in particular for not going above and beyond the call of duty by making eco-friendly travel to bluewater more accessible (as has been done for lakeside), but overall, it’s good to welcome in these long overdue changes.

23rd November 2009

Winter Family Activities at Woodlands Farm

The farm’s educational activities are becoming increasingly popular, with thousands of school children visiting each year – and so it’s nice to see that they are putting on some after school activities too. It’s been quite busy there of late, with various new faces moving in, including some ducks, and some sheep from cumbria (via heathrow).

Do Your kids have lots of creative energy to burn?

Join in the fun at our new:

Drop-in family activity workshops

* Explore Nature
* Listen to Stories
* Create Animal Art Masterpieces

WHEN? First Wednesday each month – 3.30-5.30pm
WHERE? Woodlands Farm, 331 Shooters Hill. DA1G 3RP
WHO? Primary and pre-school aged children and families
BOOKINGS: No need to book. just turn up (places are limited)
HOW MUCH? free!

They also have their Christmas Fair coming up next Sunday from 11-3.

21st November 2009

New Photo Up

Oxleas Meadow 20/9/2006

At last, rather than appropriating (well, cloning) pictures by other people, I’ve finally managed to use one of my own as a site header. This one is a panorama taken in september 2006 using a sony phone, which is brilliant mainly because it can make panoramas on the fly, has a torch, and has outlasted several phones that I’ve bought since – many of them exhibiting suspicious signs of inbuilt obsolescence such as falling apart when being dropped, or konking out after a sledging trip… Yes I know, that’s ridiculous, but in my defence, when the technician at the local sony repair shop wrote off my phone on grounds of water damage, I reasoned they might have been right on account of all the snow that got into my pockets, however, on closer inspection of the phone, the water marker (a little white sticker on the battery that goes red when it comes into contact with water) was as dry as the corbett estate, and furthermore, the technician’s comment that the circuit board was rusty also set alarm bells ringing as I don’t think there’s anything inside mobile phones that actually rusts. Needless to say I won’t be going back there.

Anyway, this is admittedly a bad photo, I did try to do something about the join marks, mainly by changing it into black and white, but then missed the greens, so reverted back to the patchy-but-verdant look, besides greyness didn’t help much. I quite like the lense flare beaming down on the two people though.

Incidentally, stumayhew one of my favourite local photographers and member of aperture, really does take good pictures, and recently had a photo featured in the guardian.

17th November 2009

A.H. Bagnold

In the previous post on notable hill dwellers, it did occur to me that one of the more interesting historical figures, or should I say historian figures was Colonel A.H. Bagnold, who lived in a nice big house in Oxleas Woods, and wrote the first local history in the Articles on Shooters Hill extracted from the parish magazine of Christ Church, Shooters Hill by A. H. Bagnold from 1936-38 which is still available at the local libraries – I hope to report on these at some point, but here are the locations in case it takes me a while to get round to it (as these things generally do):

Location	Section	Dewey Index
Greenwich Heritage Centre	Reference Library	942.61
Greenwich Heritage Centre	Reference Library/reserve	942.61
Woolwich Library	Reference Library/local	942.61

I did find a little excerpt of bagnold on the internet however on the greenwich-guide website for August the 5^th

Further experiments in the velocity of electricity, 1748 on Shooters Hill. Not being satisfied with earlier results (see: Aug 14) the experimenters arranged a circuit of two miles of wire [the Leyden Jar phial being in the middle of the circuit] . . . several discharges were made but the observer who held the two ends of the wire “always felt himself shocked at the very instant of making the explosion”, which was within his view. The conclusion was “that the velocity of electricity was instantaneous”. (Articles on Shooters Hill by Colonel A.H. Bagnold, Parish Magazine of Christ Church, Shooters Hill 1936/1938)

Actually colonel Bagnold was father to one of the hill’s most famous dwellers, Enid Bagnold, who’s first book Diary Without Dates was written in the turret of the old house, and was about her experiences volunteering at the Herbert Hospital around the first world war. She went on to write National Velvet, among other notable/notorious works, and in fact she really should join Boy George and Fanny Craddock in the list of notable residents. (Another thing that I could get round to doing).

17th November 2009

Shooters Hill The Comic

The fact that various (in)famous people have been residents of Shooters Hill has not really done much for the area, and so I haven’t really gone into it. Actually the Shooters Hill Hall of Fame is already partly documented on the hill’s Wikipedia entry, which is perhaps more useful for it’s discussion on the use of the apostrophe. Incidentally this issue was also taken up by a contributing editor at current archaeology.

Anyway, one of the more controversial hill dwellers is, perhaps not surprisingly, a fictional one from a comic book (well, graphic novel to give it a ‘grown up’ description) who becomes the apprentice of a ‘morally grey’ bomber loosely based on the character of guy fawkes… no wonder the illustrator was worried about getting his phone tapped!

v for vendetta — V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd

Well, it seems that the choice of Shooters Hill as a location was made so that they could realise a vision of London under water…