Lunch with Ben, Pimlico, Tate Britain

The building Ben works in, on City Road, is one of those renovated contemporary industrial design buildings.

Tau runs the reception area, and of course by the time I got there, he said, oh you're Ben's mom

just a fun picture to take

Church in Clerkenwell, the area with the food lane where everyone goes for lunch. Lots of people sit in the churchyard to eat.

After lunch we walked over to nearby Shoreditch for coffee at a place Ben likes alot

pretty coffee

The day was sunny, and from our coffeebar stools we had a view onto this passage area with nice tree shadows

took the Tube over to Pimlico, in the west end, to the Tate Britain

view from the Tate stairs

I love the way the trees along the embankment bent over the low wall and dipped their weeping branches into the river

shoes in trees

Where the money lives

Vauxhall Bridge

Sunday at the Columbia Flower Market

While in the market we were drawn to this enchanting performer. Ben already knows her from some of the local clubs. Brooke Sharkey.

The Savoy and Covent Garden Market

The legendary Savoy Hotel on the Strand

After visiting the Courtauld I walked over to the Covent Garden Market.

A bold opera student (the Royal Opera House is next door to Covent Garden) was busking with great success

Pollock's, inside the market, is a toy store stocked only with old fashioned toys and I bought a box of jacks identical to the ones I played with as a kid

Then into Soho for lunch...and another leap back in time, this time a 1950's diner with a functioning jukebox. When All Shook Up played I realized I was the only person in the diner who had heard it when it was first released (guess that deserves an oy veh)

Soho Park where Paul McCartney has his "office", in fact a whole four storey townhouse

Vaudeville on the Strand

Spring day on the Embankment

Lucky day, I got one of those front seats upstairs on the bus, on my way to the Embankment and the Tate Modern.

Fleet Street

Victoria herself

more signs of spring
View of the Embankment from Waterloo Bridge

Golden Jubilee Bridge with the London Eye in the background

The river is as busy as it was in the time of Elizabeth I

Millenium Bridge and the Gherkin in the background

The front of Ben's building, Bevin Court, taken from the walkway to his apartment