Trip To London

Friday, 23 September

I went up to London early this morning. I had some medical appointments - routine tests, nothing more. I’m very thankful for good medical insurance through work so that I can get a thorough MOT!! I also got jabbed numerous times, so both arms are going to be achy!  

I had to fast and ended up with no food all day, so when I was done I found this lovely little Scandinavian cafe a short walk away. I devoured 2 open faced sandwiches and then indulged in a delicious apple cake with coffee.

This ScandiKitchen is owned by a couple - she is Danish and he is Swedish, and she has written numerous Scandinavian cookbooks, mostly on the ‘Fika’ theme. When I saw the display of books I realised that I have one of them on my own bookshelf, given to me by my good blip-friend Mrs HCB!  Besides delicious sandwiches, cakes and some hot food, there is a Scandinavian grocery store downstairs. I could have filled up a whole basket but I limited myself to some Swedish ansjovis (which are not anchovies, but sprat fillets - baby herrings - used to make the traditional Christmas Swedish dish 'Jansson's Temptation'), and some Norwegian brown cheese. Any more would have been too much to carry! But I will be back!

I got on the tube at Oxford Circus and was mortified to find out that trains from Paddington to Reading were being cancelled because of problems with the overhead power cables. I hung around for an hour or so to see what was going to happen. This little guy - Benji - was next to me on the bench where I was sitting. He was 12 weeks old and had just been adopted by a lovely couple who were taking him home to meet his new dog-family. He was attracting quite a bit of attention, especially from children!

I was absolutely exhausted and feeling a bit rubbish after being poked and prodded all day, so I knew I couldn’t wait this out for hours, nor did I want to take a very slow alternative route via Waterloo, which they were encouraging people to do. Thankfully my niece and her family live in London so I called an Uber and made my way to their home near Wimbledon and pretty much crashed into bed when I got there finally at 9pm.