Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Merry Old Execution-land


Tower Bridge, from where the heads of the executed would be mounted on pikes for display. That's just how they decorated things before they invented flowerpots.

Just got back from London, where we had an excellent time being shown around by Todd and Jane, looked at funny by their suspicious son Maarten (the kid literally backed into a corner, staring at me like I was the devil, when his mother stepped out of the room for a minute), catching up with Melania and Jaideep (who happened to be in town and who assures me that "everyone" reads this blog. I remain unconvinced) and hanging out with Amynah's cousins.

Anyway, we managed to get to the Tower of London, from where this picture is taken. The Tower itself isn't very towering - five stories, maybe, and full of all sorts of saguinary torture devices, the provenance of which was always blamed, disingenuously, on the Spanish. We were shown around by a Yeoman (Beefeater), who hollered at a volume attainable only by retired British Army sergeants, and who described for us with great relish the various Royal personages who had been separated from their heads at this location. He would go into great detail about how many hacks of the broadsword this sometimes took, causing me some concern for the delicate sensibilities of the young children on the tour. That is, until I saw one of them swinging an imaginary sword at the neck of his little sister, with accompanying sound effects I can only describe as a "wet thump."

Little monsters.

2 comments:

Victor Chisholm said...

But Mark, everyone really does read your blog - that is, everyone who is anyone.

julie said...

just for the record, i read your blog, and i think my mom might, too ;)