Pension lawyer meets world: Venturing out - Titian, the office, Milton Jones, Ally Pally

So I have now done a few trips out, either on foot or taking trains off peak when there is plenty of space.

One was Sunday lunch at Alexandra Palace with my neighbours. Very hot day - our September mini-heatwave. The park itself was very full. The terrace less so. Maybe the novelty of booking has gone. Anyway, it was the last day the Palace was doing this. That is the "beer garden" closed for winter now.

I also went to see Milton Jones one evening, again on the Terrace at the Palace. It is a good idea to use the space to put on stand up comedy. But it also showed the limitations. It was such a poor summer's evening. Not wet enough to move us indoors, but damp, and had rained much of the day. It was also windy and as the sun went down got chillier and chillier.

As ever it was interesting to see the bill. MC was the very decent Matt Richardson. Young comic who nicely warmed up the slightly chilled sell out crowd. But they hadn't fully worked out the limitations of the venue. In particular, since this was neither a pub nor theatre venue, there was a larger distance to the first tables. So the usual banter with the tables in front took a bit more hollering. Intimate venue this is not. But he did it pretty well. And I liked the bit where he went back to one lady having had a little chat, saying "You thought you had escaped hadn't you? But no I am talking to you again. Remember I haven't had a conversation with anyone in 5 months"

Now of course we have ventured into an ever more "diverse" and "PC" world. What does this mean in reality? Well what it actually means in this context is you have while males to hold the show together and attract the punters. And then you need tpo add your diversity in which means put on people who are frankly very weak and clearly only get a slot because they get the token diverse slot. In this case this was a black woman called Sikisa. She was just one step up from being actually so awful as embarrassing, but it really was a very unfunny routine largely based around being black. What made for a particularly bad start was trying to banter with the front of the audience, but clearly not having listened to the MC just before her. So she asked the same questions of the same people as Matt had done. Just not suited to this as a career. Apparently her day job is an immigration lawyer. I wouldn't give it up.

Main support was Lily Philips. She was much better. Actual funny jokes. Bit gynecological which normally I am less keen in, but fine if it is funny and it was. Also just a really laid back style.

And finally Milton Jones, who is obviously what made the night a sell out. Now you either like or hate his style. Described as one liners, but actually it is mostly two line jokes - one set up and then a usually bad (but so bad as to be good) punning punch line.Some of my friends were a bit wary of him in the sense they knew the style and liked him, but couldn't quite imagine a whole set of this sort of material. But it works well in practice, and the crowd loved him.

BUT, by this time it was seriously cold. And the picnic tables are ok for sitting on in the first hour while we consumed our burgers, and tolerable for the second, but beyond that I was getting really sore. So sadly as funny as it was I was actually glad when it finished.

Now partly due to Elaine (who was in our little group for Milton) I decided to tke the risk of coming into London to see an exhibition. She said how nice and empty the National Gallery was now. SO I thought I would give it a go, as I hadn't seen an exhibition since before lockdown. And I was coming in anyway I thought I would pop into the office to see the set up and chat to my colleagues who were actually coming in.

The office is nothing like it was before lockdown. Made worse by reception giving me desk on the other side of the building from my usual spot in the pensions department. I was extremely socially distanced.

I had booked a 3:30 slot at the National Gallery so walked across from the City. It was a lovely day

I was bit disappointed to find that one had to queue.

And even more disappointed at the quality of the exhibition, or rather not the quality but the size. Which is probably my fault in not reading up o it. But essentially there were only two galleries, the second of which just consisted of NG works by Titian or others around his time which one can see any day. The real exhibition works were a series of very large, but fairly few, canvasses, part of one commission for the King of Spain.

There should also have been a film to watch to go with the exhibition, but that was not shown because of distancing rules. So I didn't get the intended experience.

The one painting I photographed below is ironically a canvass that should have been much larger. It was cut down in size a couple of centuries ago, presumably to fit in wherever it was to hang. Sacrilege!

And while the galleries were not very busy, I have been in more deserted places. Notably places where I might be the only person in the room, rather than waiting for someone to move away. And on top of that I didn't enjoy having to wear a mask throughout.