England vs Australia (Day 4, 1st Test) - Lords, London - Sunday 24th July 2005

Quite possibly the worst way to spend £54 in the world! We joined the game with England at 156/5 in the 4th innings, with 2 days play to go, and England needing about 250 to win. Rain was a good hope, and we got it for most of the day, meaning that all we saw for most of the day was this:

Now, a day at the cricket that is totally rained off means that you get a full refund on your (not cheap) ticket. Less than 10 overs play in a day also gives you a full refund, unless it because the game actually finishes. Between 10 and 25 overs gives you a half refund.

Having waited for 5 hours after the scheduled 10:30am start, play did eventually start at 3:45pm. Australia promptly took the remaining 5 England wickets in 10.1 overs, at the cost of just 24 England runs. Because the game finished, there was no refund. So, the only cricket we saw came after 5 hours of waiting in the rain, lasted for about 40 minutes, and cost us something like 88p per ball.

The Ashes are rubbish!!

Super Furry Animals - Somerset House, London - Friday 8th July 2005

As if on cue, the day after some people tried to blow us all up, all of London went back to work as if nothing had happened. It took slightly longer to get there, and people were slightly twitchy, but life carried on almost as normal. People outside London couldn't believe this, so I spent most of the day replying to concerned contact from people overseas and in the rest of the UK.

Super Furry Animals were playing the courtyard at Somerset House, which looks like this, during a series of summer gigs.
A typically weird show, featuring gas masks, boiler suits, and strange voice effects.

Unfortunately, the singer chose to open his mouth about the London bombings, blaming people that declare war on other countries for what happened. I really wished he had just shut his mouth and refrained from making such a cheap (and irrelevant)political point, so soon after the event.

The band played much of their new album, then a good selection of greatest hits, for a very enjoyable set. They are one of the true innovators in music today, and amazingly manage to combine innovation with some commercial success in a way that few others can.

London Bombings - London - Thursday 7th July 2005

Several million words have been written about today already, so mine won't add much to them.

I was on a Piccadilly Line train when it all happened. I had just got on the train, after a long wait, at Arsenal station - the long wait because there had been earlier service problems on the line. The train moved off into the tunnel towards Holloway Road. Halfway there, it stopped, and stayed stopped. The driver talked to us after a couple of minutes, about power failures on the line. For the next 20 minutes or so, the announcements talked of ever more severe power failures (but only of power failures). It eventually became clear that we were going nowhere, fast.

After about half an hour, the driver announced that there was a train behind us, which was going to drive up behind us, we would all walk through, and the train would drive us back to Arsenal. An operation of about an hour then ensued, as Tube staff moved through trains, and shepherded us all onto the replacement train. I say us all, probably only about 2/3 of the train managed to get onto the new train. For about half an hour, we were stuck in limbo - Tube staff were trying to get everybody crushed up together on the new train, but nobody would get that intimate without some guarantee that we would be moving soon. In the end, the train moved off and drove 2/3 of us back up to Arsenal station.

During this, I did start to wonder about the power failure. How could a train drive right up behind us, and why could our train not move? I knew that the Tube use "power failure" as a codeword for many things, and started to think about what could be happening.

Eventually, we unloaded at Arsenal station.

When we surfaced, it started to become apparent that all was not well. I had about 10 text messages, all saying "Are you OK" (or variations on that theme). The mobile network was in total meltdown (by now it was almost 11am). I went home, and took a couple of fellow passengers with me, to use my landline to call work. We got in, put BBC News on, and it all started to hit us.

About 15 minutes later, I found out that my girlfriend had been on the train in front of me. It had blown up between Kings Cross and Russell Square stations, killing over 20 people. Luckily, and very unusually, she was in the carriage at the opposite end of the train. She was at that end because of the earlier service problems, which made the train very busy at the front. Its not often you are grateful for Tube service problems, but they saved my girlfriend's life on this occasion. She was one of the first to be rescued from the train, and so got back above ground by around 9:20. She had spent 90 minutes in complete shock, worrying about where I was, whilst I was underground in blissful ignorance.

When we eventually met up again, at about 2pm, we talked about what had happened, then went out for dinner, to toast the fact that we were still alive (and because we had no food in the house). Most of Islington seemed to be doing the same, its amazing how London reacts to something like this - by going out for dinner!!

I'm not going to go into the political stuff on this, but I was amazingly proud of London and its people today. Life just goes on in London, it is far too big and important a city to be halted by anything like this (even though, for a few hours, our day was disrupted). Those of us that live in London accept the ever present risk that this may happen. The fact that it happened today was not a surprise, or even anything very unexpected. In many ways, tomorrow in London will be just like yesterday.

In memory of the 52 that lost their lives.

Brendan Benson - Barfly, London - Monday 4th July 2005

A very lucky ticket, this one. A chance look on TicketWeb at the Barfly listings, revealed Brendan Benson playing in an amazingly small venue. This has happened before, and Jack White joined Brendan on stage that time - even without that, seeing him in such a small venue is a special occasion.

As is often the way at the Barfly, it was possible to have a chat with Brendan in the bar before the gig, during the support act, and even until about 5 minutes before he went on stage.

When he did eventually get on stage, it was a similar set to the previous week at the Wireless Festival - many of the previous singles, and some hidden gems from his new album. I had not previously thought much of the new album, but having heard much of it twice within a week, I became converted.

Live 8 - Hyde Park, London - Saturday 2nd July 2005

I won a ticket for this in the text lottery. I went to the O2 shop in Oxford Street to pick it up, and braved the hour long queue in the process. I went to the concert venue, twice in the last week, for the Wireless Festival. I saw the "once in a lifetime" line up. And I decided not to go to the gig.

Why? I saw the people in the queue for tickets, and didn't fancy the idea of spending the day with 150,000 of them - very few music fans, and even fewer gig goers, around at all. I didn't fancy spending hours to get anywhere around the venue on the day, even from 6am. I wasn't keen on the potential view, which from the back of the venue was not exactly good (as it wouldn't be with that many people there). Of the bands on the bill, I have seen the vast majority of those I have any time for already, and knew that the best bands would be playing early, or not for long (witness the scandal of the Killers, one of the best live bands there, being allowed a mammoth 6 minute set!), or would in other ways have their talent ignored for the commercial appeal of Robbie Williams et al. And, the whole gig was alcohol free - no bars at all, and no booze allowed in. The prospect of a sober day with attention seekers and 150,000 fools was not appealing at all.

So, I knocked it on the head, gave the ticket to a friend, and watched some of it on TV instead. I haven't regretted the decision for a second. It was hyped as an "I was there" event, but when so many people can say the same thing, and all you need to do to be there is win a text message lottery, the "achievement" involved is kind of downgraded slightly!! Mass market, lowest common denominator crap. I gave the £30 I would have spent that day to the Make Poverty History campaign instead.

Surrey vs Kent - The Oval, London - Friday 1st July 2005

The Oval for a 20/20 game, in the pouring rain. Kent have a very poor record in this competition so far, and Surrey have an excellent record. So, low expectations for the mighty Kent County Cricket Club. Getting the bus down from Victoria (and getting stuck in hideous traffic), it was teeming down with rain, and I couldn't imagine how play was happening. But, this is 20/20, so the show goes on. Absolutely no way that even a 1-day game would be played in weather like this, but that all adds to the fun.

Sitting in the rain for 2 and a half hours was not immense fun, but we were all reasonably entertained by beer, the prospect of the pub, and some amusing cricket. In the end, a comprehensive win for Surrey, which was what we all expected, and a thorough soaking for all concerned.