The Mop-Head

Olga and I went to Kilburn Grange Park yesterday, and the weather being what it was (cold and misty) there weren't many people out. We had the park pretty much to ourselves, which was fantastic until a little white mop-head of a dog ran up and started yapping and running in circles around us. It would charge toward me, bark and retreat, charge, bark and retreat, over and over.

The owner, meanwhile, was standing on a sidewalk about 30 feet away, looking down at her phone.

I tried to walk away from the mop-head, but it followed us. This went on for about five minutes, and seemingly an eternity. Olga finally stood stock-still, her ball in her mouth, looking at me as if to say, "Get this thing away from me."

So I called over to the owner, "Would you control your dog, please?"

She trudged over and grudgingly leashed up the mop-head, grumbling about how its behavior was "normal in a park." I said nothing, but I disagree. Allowing a dog to charge people and follow them around while barking is not normal, especially when the owner can't be troubled to look up from her phone.

It occurred to me that the last time we went to this park, we also had an uncomfortable experience. Maybe we should stick to the cemetery.

I found this button while walking on the high street. It appears to show an egg tobogganing on a strip of bacon. I wondered if it was a "piece of flair" from some waiter's apron, but I reverse-Googled the image and apparently these buttons are for sale on Threadless. In fact, you can also buy it on a t-shirt, a mug or a skateboard. Just FYI.

I called our broadband provider yesterday and got them to drop part of our package that gave us television content, because we never used it. In fact, we never even unpacked the receiver. We stream all our TV these days, but we don't need a dedicated receiver, and getting rid of that and our landline (which we apparently no longer need to maintain internet service) will save us about £150 a year. Not too shabby.

This broadband account has a ridiculous history. It used to belong to our former landlord in Notting Hill, and when we moved into his flat in 2011 we simply started paying the bills. When we left that apartment in 2014, we took the account with us (with his permission), and I tried to put it in my name, but bills continued to arrive addressed to "Tong Xia." (Which isn't quite our former landlord's name, but it's close.) It became kind of a joke -- Tong Xia, our phantom roommate -- but yesterday I finally managed to get Tong taken off the account.

Of course I expect that all these changes will somehow result in our internet being disconnected. Stay tuned.