little pockets of affordable niceness

as faithful readers of the guardian there has probably not been a single day in the last eighteen years that this noble paper wasn't flying around the house but the VERY day they report on our neighborhood the unthinkable happens and husband and i both think the other got one. so it's down to our other faithful read, the rather brilliant brockley central that we now know what they think about us and the bc community, too.

and? well, it's actually quite fair but somebody should have told them a bit about the borders, and that catford and deptford are not really the same nor are they brockley, but do we care...

"little pockets of affordable niceness" might sound a tad cuter than the real thing but essentially they're right, green spaces, large gardens, and a great mix of people, artists, families, students, lecturers and not to forget at least 4 horses - one walking towards me on ashby road at 7 am last thursday. "if i wouldn't live in buckingham palace i'd move right into wickham road" queen victoria is reported to have said. trust the horses...

UPDATE----UPDATE----UPDATE-----UPDATE----UPDATE----

now we're even in the times!!! brockley - the hampstead of the south!!! love it!!!

mls meet

the bi-annual london meeting of the magic lantern society was a great success, husband reports, and as always he saw many of his mates and had a great time. being told at short notice and left behind with the mess that the household usually is on a saturday morning made me feel rather like the creature on the right...



(picture from mls website)

absolutely nothing...

absolutely nothing left of our wonderful christmas tree but a few needles in the carpet after we turned on the candles for one last time. outside it's freezing or snowing or both and also absolutely nothing left of our poor plants in the garden. the kittens complained loudly when they experienced their first cold paws a few days ago and at the stables today it was so garstly that the horses begged to go on a ride only to get warm a bit.

so, with the holidays over and absolutely nothing to look forward to other than work, work and work again we found this pic tonight in a catalogue from one of our alltime favourite art projects, the centre for land use interpretation and just by looking at it we thought it might actually be not that bleak at all and there are interesting things ahead. apart from their main los angeles base they have an office in troy, ny (thought i saw it years ago) but it is really their camp at the walter de maria installation that we want to see -  just to add a little sparkle to our january lives...

the rossell's new year's day party

it really is an entire year later and - unbelievable - already time for our traditional new year's day party again

a long line of fabulous people from our neighborhood and some friends from further afar including sixteen children

and interesting conversations from the arts to god (hi father alan!)

but as much as that counts in the end it all boiled down to deac's amazing cassoulet and boston chowder washed down with an ice cold hürlimann - happy new year again!

happy 2010!!!

dinner on new years eve is always a small affair

but rike is shocked when nothing but a few bangers arrives - leaving some space for tomorrow's feast is clearly not to her liking

what - no more chocolate under the tree?

but darling - mum and dad nicked it!

midnight approaches fast and we check on big ben

many, many people at the fire works

so a happy new year to you all!!!

(fireworks pics taken by rike)