LONDON: Autumn, Hoxton Street and Pie and Mash

Diary Entry 19th/20th August 2011: There is an Autumn air approaching early this year. Leaves are falling already and the air has a nice chill to it. Conker leaves are almost ready to drop.

I have been thinking of Brighton and Chichester during Autumn whilst polishing frames at Paintworks - I remember walking to work at New Park cinema and a day after moving to York Villas, Brighton. That day, I walked to the Hove Tesco to buy something for the new house and I walked through St Anne Well's Gardens and I had a moment of clarity whilst watching a squirrel. This would have been in 2008 - three years ago now.

I have recently been in the habit of going to Hoxton St for my lunch breaks. Today I sat outside a greasy spoon with an 85p tea. I really like Hoxton St - it seems relatively unaffected by the Shoreditch invasion and fulfills the traditional East End stereotype of gossiping community nattering.

I sat and eavesdropped over a conversation of women of various ages and weights with the East End dialect. One of them fed her children with her friend's chips. "Can I take one fa 'er?" she said as she transported a bright red ketchup soaked chip into the baby's mouth who sat in a pram. She did this several times - it did not look like the baby really cared if she ate chips or not.

Then an old lady in a nice black trouser suit sat next to me and kept swapping chairs until she was faced to me. "Funny weather - it will rain..." she mumbled quietly to start a conversation. These East Enders love to chat.

The lady had a crooked thumb like older people sometimes do, and she had a nice grey perm, clearly looking after her self. She then told me how she had bought an umbrella from Harrods. "I like to go to 'errods as me friend lives near it, but it 'ad bleddy 'oles innit!" And so she went on to say she tried to return it weeks later. "I told 'em I ain't used it and I 'ad the receipt but they only tried to exchange it for an umbrella with 'errods written on it. I said 'I don't want that with bleedin' 'errods on it!'" She then told me a similar story about buying fish in their food hall. "It went downhill after Al Feyad or whatisname left it - I liked 'im, he knew how to make a good Christmas."

I had to leave to go to back work and I said, "Stay out of the rain and avoid Harrod's," to her - she laughed, and seemed a little sad to lose someone to talk to. I really liked her.

The other day I had gone to the Pie and Mash shop on Hoxton Street for lunch, and I experienced another scene of East End life, whilst dipping into a green sauce covered dish over a saw dust covered floor. "Alright Young Man?" - "Sugar in the tea?" - "Sit down darlin'!" - "Oi Trevor want suga in ya tea?" - "Jack, come ge' ya knives" - "Large or small?" - "Suga' in ya tea?" - the place became full of locals with haircuts from their youth, "Oi Tash gerrus a tea?", whilst the fat male shop owner climbed a ladder to meet the lady shop owner at the top of her ladder behind the tall till where she tried to put up an old clock, "Wot's the time Trev?! Oi leave me to it - if you are coming up 'ere tell me how to do it for Christ's sake!".

As I left, I said thank you and wished them luck with the clock - the man said "Thank you young man." It felt like they were putting on a show just for me until the next innocent 'young man' walked in.