I don't know if you've noticed but I'm on holiday this week. I don't normally go away on holiday so you might have got used to me always being around. But I'm not around at the moment, I am very much away from home, so what you've been reading recently are a number of posts I wrote before I left. As you can see from today's selection, they are now getting a bit brief. Copenhagen in 2019, and before that Cornwall in 2018. That is a long time not to have stayed away overnight. These days I am much more a fan of the extreme day trip where I head somewhere like Sunderland, Plymouth or Paris early in the morning, see everything I possibly can and am back in my own bed by nightfall. Why revel in buying a £20 train ticket if you then have shell out for a hotel room, dinner and breakfast? What's particularly unusual about this trip is that I'm away from home for a full week and I haven't done that for ages. A week is very much a normal period for many holidays but most of my recent jaunts have been long weekends, i.e. three- or maybe four-nighters. This is generally survivable blogwise, I only have to have two or three posts up my sleeve in advance and hopefully you never notice, as when I slipped away to Tyneside in 2017 or Berlin in 2015. A full week is however much more of a challenge, especially given I don't normally have a back-up stash of blogposts waiting in the wings. Northumberland in 2007. We travelled all over and ate out of an evening and I was essentially off-grid for seven days, text messages excepted. From a reader's point of view it meant the blog went quiet for a week, ditto total radio silence when I went to the Outer Hebrides in 2006, If you're the kind of reader who worries if my morning post is even an hour late you'd have hated that, maybe even lost the habit of checking in, it being ever so easy to lose a regular audience by failing to turn up. Which means that when this hiatus is finally over you can expect a slew of posts about my travels, maybe several days worth, just as I subjected you to lengthy travelogues in the aftermath of Copenhagen, Cornwall, Rome, Berlin etc. This merely extends the abnormal period to a week and a bit - a lot of nothing followed by a lot of sightseeing chat - but hey, you'll cope. Consider this a timely reminder that I'm not contracted to provide you with a lengthy post to read every morning, sometimes I go out instead and just occasionally I go away.

This would be a good street for an opticians.

The longest possible journey in a single zone  z1 29 stationsEdgware Road to PaddingtonCircle£2.80 z223 stationsStratford to Clapham JunctionMildmay£2.00 z315 stationsStratford International to BecktonDLR£2.00 z412 stationsLeytonstone to Woodford†Central£2.00 z55 stationsWaddon to CheamSouthern£2.70 z69 stationsPurley Oaks to Tattenham CornerSouthern£2.70 z74 stationsChorleywood to Watford‡Metropolitan£1.90 z82 stationsWatford High Street to BusheyLioness£1.90 z90 stations(no possible journey)-- † 1909 weekdays ‡ 0528 Mon-Sat

VE Day 1945-2025: eighty years of peace 1946 Greece civil war 1600001947 India independence 8000001948 Madagascar independence 150001949 China civil war 10000001950 Korea Korean War 3000000 1951 Malaysia civil war 130001952 Kenya independence 150001953 Tunisia independence 30001954 Vietnam independence 6000001955 Morocco independence 3000 1956 Hungary civil war 20000 1957 Cameroon independence 320001958 Cuba civil war 50001959 Kenya Mau Mau 150001960 Zaire civil war 100000 1961 Algeria independence 1000001962 Yemen civil war 15000 1963 Iraq civil war 1050001964 Guinea independence 150001965 Indonesia civil war 500000 1966 Vietnam US intervention 20000001967 Israel Six Day War 750001968 China Cultural revolution 5000001969 Uganda Idi Amin 3000001970 Nigeria civil war 1000000 1971 Bangladesh independence 10000001972 Burundi civil war 110000 1973 Israel Yom Kippur 160001974 Cyprus Turkish invasion 50001975 Cambodia Pol Pot 1000000 1976 Lebanon civil war 1000001977 East Timor massacre 1500001978 Afghanistan Russian invasion 15000001979 Laos civil war 1840001980 Iran v Iraq war 500000 1981 El Salvador US intervention 10000001982 Falklands invasion 10001983 Sudan civil war 15000001984 Sri Lanka civil war 500001985 Peru civil war 69000 1986 Mozambique civil war 9000001987 Angola civil war 7500001988 Somalia civil war 3500001989 Panama US intervention 10001990 Burundi civil war 170000 1991 Iraq US intervention 1000001992 Croatia civil war 250001993 Bosnia civil war 2600001994 Rwanda civil war 9000001995 Chechnya intervention 30000 1996 Guatemala civil war 2000001997 Algeria civil war 1500001998 Congo civil war 38000001999 Kurdistan independence 350002000 Ethiopia border dispute 75000 2001 Afghanistan civil war 250002002 Ivory Coast civil war 30002003 Iraq US/UK invasion 1500002004 Sudan civil war 1500002005 Chad civil war 7000 2006 Iraq civil war 700002007 Somalia civil war 700002008 Congo civil war 38000002009 Nigeria insurgency 3500002010 Chechnya insurgency 3500 2011 Libya civil war 300002012 Syria civil war 6500002013 C. A. Republic civil war 140002014 Ukraine invasion 150002015 Yemen civil war 370000 2016 Congo uprising 50002017 Chad insurgency 70002018 Iraq insurgency 90002019 Ethiopia civil war 160002020 Azerbeijan border dispute 6000 2021 Myanmar civil war 800002022 Ukraine invasion 2600002023 Gaza invasion 800002024 Lebanon invasion 40002025 VE Day + 80 (nb: death tolls are estimates for each war, not for each year)

The bluebell photo scale 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Score not awarded.