"London's last defences"

Seeing as I got home at a reasonable time lastnight, and DrAbi did too, and see as we were both at a bit of a loose end after voting — horrendously insecure, this voting system we've got — she suggested a walk up along the Hog's Back. Apparently this ridge (part of the North Downs) was considered London's last line of defences against German invasion from the South Coast. And walking up it, you can see why, as well as see the top bits of London. Got some really nice pictures with the phone camera, soon to be up.

But the really cool — albeit in a slightly geeky way — bit was on the way back towards the path down. DrAbi mentioned that her mate Paul had a really powerful Maglite torch (six cells... is that good??). So we thought we'd try and see if we could see if from three miles away! So we rang him up, and then he rang back to say he was in his garden shining the torch. Getting a bit twilighty at this stage, things had all gone quite grey and hard to differentiate. But eventually, to the left of a pylon and a crane (spotted by me... *shines knuckles on shirt*) Abi saw the light, and eventually managed to guide my colourblind eyes towards it. I just got a kick out of that! Being able to talk to someone three miles away and see them. Or their six-cell maglite, anyway :o)

So, I suggested a wee pint in the Astolat (aka the Slaughtered Lamb), by way of a psot-walk refresher, and to grab H&F to join us, on account of not actually having seen them for ages. They both eventually rang back, from another pub and Londinium, so we joined H in her old work joint. Just for the one, y'understand...

Three pints — the critical number — later, we've met three of her mates who've just moved to the Gilferd, and they were all very nice people (although from across the river, so we'll have to think carefully about associating with them again...). So we walk on up towards the Hog's Back again to watch a dull election while rooting for our valuable votes to get a mention! But a glass of wi'wine helped the proceedings to an early close for me. (Having got up at 6:20, I felt justified in throwing in the towel at 3:10 the next morning.)

Now back to the mill. Was all going swimmingly til I got a phoner from Germany. Drat....