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ventaI have been out this evening Doing My Bit For The Community - wholly un-riot-related, I have been helping paint a local hall.
The hall is on Pitshanger Lane, which is about ten minutes north of where I live. The Lane is a lovely shopping street of almost entirely independent traders; there is a Co-Op at either end, but other than that I think every shop is an independent. It's got a proper butcher, and greengrocer, and fishmonger, and so on, and a really good offy, and a deli which opens late at weekends and I like it a lot. At around 6 this evening, one of the painters knocked off and left. She phoned in when she got home: don't go down the Lane if you can help it.
Don't go down the Lane? Surely somewhere as pleasant and civilised and, let's be honest, massively middle-class as the Lane can't possibly be indulging in rioters? Apparently Helen had been tipped off by Tiff-from-the-butchers: all the traders who were still open were closing up due to crowds of youths gathering on the streets. Someone still in the hall very sensibly pointed out that, from inside, we could easily see a steady stream of double-decker E2s whizzing by. As long as the buses were still running, there clearly couldn't be that much going on along there.
And, it seems, she was right. I left half an hour or so ago, and the Lane seemed deserted. Presumably said youths had either dispersed, or turned out to be much exaggerated. Or were, in fact, revealed to be the local Brownie pack on a nature walk.
So yes, the Lane was quiet. My walk home was quiet. The roads are quiet. As I let myself into the block I live in, another resident anxiously enquired "what's it like out there?" Well, to be honest, pretty dead. There is a constant, low, background wail of sirens in the distance; I can't really make a sensible guess of how distant. Or, to be honest, what they're up to. Maybe the police are charging about all blues and twos to try and keep any potential troublemakers guessing. I can hear, but not see, what I think is a helicopter, somewhere in the direction of Perivale.
A friend locally reported that the shops in Ealing centre were all shutting up early this evening, and that there was a large and obvious police presence. I'm hoping we're in for a quiet evening.
Incidentally, if anyone wishes to keep abreast of events and hasn't discovered this blog, I commend it to you:
http://thewestlondoner.wordpress.com/
(Although it's becoming increasingly inaccurately named as it expands to cover a wider and wider area.)
The hall is on Pitshanger Lane, which is about ten minutes north of where I live. The Lane is a lovely shopping street of almost entirely independent traders; there is a Co-Op at either end, but other than that I think every shop is an independent. It's got a proper butcher, and greengrocer, and fishmonger, and so on, and a really good offy, and a deli which opens late at weekends and I like it a lot. At around 6 this evening, one of the painters knocked off and left. She phoned in when she got home: don't go down the Lane if you can help it.
Don't go down the Lane? Surely somewhere as pleasant and civilised and, let's be honest, massively middle-class as the Lane can't possibly be indulging in rioters? Apparently Helen had been tipped off by Tiff-from-the-butchers: all the traders who were still open were closing up due to crowds of youths gathering on the streets. Someone still in the hall very sensibly pointed out that, from inside, we could easily see a steady stream of double-decker E2s whizzing by. As long as the buses were still running, there clearly couldn't be that much going on along there.
And, it seems, she was right. I left half an hour or so ago, and the Lane seemed deserted. Presumably said youths had either dispersed, or turned out to be much exaggerated. Or were, in fact, revealed to be the local Brownie pack on a nature walk.
So yes, the Lane was quiet. My walk home was quiet. The roads are quiet. As I let myself into the block I live in, another resident anxiously enquired "what's it like out there?" Well, to be honest, pretty dead. There is a constant, low, background wail of sirens in the distance; I can't really make a sensible guess of how distant. Or, to be honest, what they're up to. Maybe the police are charging about all blues and twos to try and keep any potential troublemakers guessing. I can hear, but not see, what I think is a helicopter, somewhere in the direction of Perivale.
A friend locally reported that the shops in Ealing centre were all shutting up early this evening, and that there was a large and obvious police presence. I'm hoping we're in for a quiet evening.
Incidentally, if anyone wishes to keep abreast of events and hasn't discovered this blog, I commend it to you:
http://thewestlondoner.wordpress.com/
(Although it's becoming increasingly inaccurately named as it expands to cover a wider and wider area.)
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no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 08:34 pm (UTC)I'm working on the basis that not even hearing a helicopter round here is good news, given the rampant (and patently wrong) rumourmongering on Twitter.
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Date: 2011-08-09 08:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 09:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-10 09:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-10 10:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-10 02:32 pm (UTC)