Can't resist a grin at the way
Londoners
panic when the sun shines.
There's a huge mad rush to get outside and burn yourself as quickly as possible,
before the sun goes in - after all, this could be all the summer we get,
wouldn't want to miss it. Even here on this quiet street people are packing
surfboards and
canoes into cars, or lounging on their steps and roofgardens.
The
Polish couple opposite have had a permanent party on their doorstep for
the last couple of days: fearsomely white-shirted old boy and his wife enthroned
in state on canvas chairs outside at all hours, calling greetings to neighbours
passing by. The
Greek guy next door and his
Bengali wife have been eating,
working and more or less living in their cool little yard. I wave at them
all from the roofgarden, where I have been comfortably gazing out at the blue,
watching the glittering city from under a green striped sunshade for the
last couple of days, dozing in the breeze, and reading
The Code Book. My legs,
which were not in the shade, are a fierce boiled-lobster red.
Can't write when it's sunny: fidget too much. Today there's a thick milky
layer of cloud over the city, so I'm back at the grindstone. 71045 words. Slow,
slow progress. There's a burning triangle in the sky: Canary Wharf Tower's
glass pyramid top, almost buried in cloud but still picking up the odd flash of
sun. Maybe it will rain, and I can get some sleep, get these fidgets out of my
system. A storm would be good: storms here are amazing. The view is always
fairly spectacular, but in a big storm, the lightning makes a display better
than any fireworks, and the rain hammers down on this little wooden roofbox so
hard it seems it will flatten it. The drumming of the rain blurs into white
noise, comforting, sleep-making. Time for a rain-dance, maybe - sleep has been
far too elusive lately. For the last few weeks I have been woken around 3am by
strange noises above my head, stompings too heavy to be a squirrel or bird. My
housemate has heard them too: he says it is the Highgate Roof Yeti. We did a lot
of drawings of what he might look like, and plan to sneak out and catch him one
night, so we can ask him what's up.
No luck so far. But last night, there were weird cries around 5am. I got up
and went to the window, and saw the strangest thing: a big white bird with a
long pouched beak on the roof, surrounded by a gang of smaller, ordinary birds,
attacking him. He fought bravely for a while and then flapped noisily off,
yarking. Next door says it may have been a pelican from the zoo, which is a mile
or so away from here, and often loses birds, apparently. I remembered how, when
I was small, I wanted to let out all the zoo animals and let them take over the
city. Maybe it's happening. Maybe the pelican and the yeti are the vanguard of a
mass breakout. I keep looking hopefully out of the window, waiting for
giraffes. Set 'em all free, burn down the offices, blow up the flood barriers
and let the sea in.
Et sous les pavés, la plage..
Raining now. Must remember the steps of that rain dance.