Walking in London

The teaching is over but the new job doesn't really start until September. However I have the odd day to do before then and yesterday was one such day. I had to go to London.

And there was no rush so I had time to walk.

Arriving at St Pancras is always such a joy - the refurbished new-old station is a pleasure to see, with its Derbyshire brick and soaring glass roof.



I was early so had time to drop into the British Museum - and another wonderful glass roof.

And then to Bedford Square to my meeting.

Imagine my delight to come round the corner and see this:



A sculpture named Driftwood Commissioned by the Architectural Association. More about it here.

On another corner there was 'driftwood' on a smaller scale.

A heavy downpour had washed material from the trees into pattern reminiscent of the beach.

And after the meeting a wander back through the streets, taking a different route and knowing I could 'tack' back to the station that I would end up somewhere along the Euston Road.
Taking an unfamiliar turn I came across this building, which looked like the Stasi might be behind the portcullis.


It is the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, so maybe I wasn't too wrong!

Back to the British Library, I always want to walk through the courtyard even if I don't have time to go inside. And here is Newton after Blake by Paolozzi.



And finally back to the wonders of St Pancras again.

More pictures on Flickr.

Tour de France - new challenges

So that's teaching over - finished 10 days ago actually. Still a couple of loose ends to tie off but will do those this week. Since the end of term I've done some long overdue visiting to my mum and to my daughter.

Alongside that I have been knitting of course.

My current focus is the Tour de France Knitalong - we're a weird lot we knitters and sometimes we have to find a justification for sitting on the sofa and knitting obsessively. This KAL is about knitting while watching the Tour.
We set ourselves a challenge - to go for the yellow jersey and knit something challenging that may take the three weeks to complete; the polka dot jersey - to climb all those peaks that are lying unfinished in your knitting basket; or the green jersey, short sharp sprints making lots of smaller items.
I have gone for the green jersey; I am aiming to make a blanket square everyday for the p/hop blanket. So far, in addition to a couple I made earlier I have made fourteen - the last two are currently blocking, but here are the rest.



The yarn has come from a number of very generous knitters who I don't knowpersonally, it is almost all the leftovers from knitting socks. There is a fantastic variety of sock yarn out there - as you can see - much of it is dyed in such a way that you get a pretty fair isle effect without having to change balls.