To the North

"What's a heath?"
"No idea. Let's check it out!" So we set the coordinates for Hampstead Heath on my bro's nifty sat nav and off we went to places unexplored. One of my bros was down for the weekend and since he had a car, we thought it would be nice for the Fantastic Four a.k.a moi and my trois freres to drive out somewhere, especially with the sun making a very rare appearance. Hampstead Heath is in the leafy borough of Haringey in North London. The houses here are red-bricked and big, with wooden window frames and pretty gardens. We parked on Sheldon Avenue where sizeable detached houses had architecturally distinct and modern front porches (and most definitely not according to borough regulations where I live). Except for one house, which looked like a 70s ski lodge. I wish I'd brought my camera. I considered knocking the door of one of the porches that I liked and ask if I could take a closer look. But then I noticed the cctv cameras that some of the houses had in the area. And then I looked at the four of us. We were a motley dressed crew: a hoodie with bigass kicks, a semi-hoodie with sparkly sandals, a hobo-uni student-needs a haircut, and one normally dressed guy. Maybe another day.

The heath turns out to be a park sort of thing. We decided to follow the unmade path route which took us through yellow meadows that looked stark and barren under the overcast sky. 10 minutes later it got cold and windy. 5 minutes later it started raining. Sigh.... So we turned back after our vigorous 15 minute stroll. So.... cinema? Shrug. Yeah. Guess so. The closest was a Phoenix Picturehouse, a small independent chain that shows mainly alternative and foreign cinema with occassional blockbusters. The earliest show was at 9pm. It was only 6:45pm. So we headed to Odeon in Muswell Hill.

"This must be where the yuppies live?" remarks my bro. "What's a yuppy?" asks another. I can see what he means, with the well tended streets, numerous well-established trees lining the pavements, redbricked semi-detacheds and redbricked terraced flats with private fire escapes. "No, I don't think yuppies exactly but definitely well to do people. Like Notting Hill." I wouldn't mind living in a neighbourhood like this one day. We passed 3 independent bookstores, an independent toystore, another independent store of some sort. Yep, mostly indie stores with the exception of Sainsbury's opposite the Odeon. We had 3 options: the latest Harry Potter, Bruno, and Public Enemies. It was an easy desicion made by two of us. Public Enemies turned out to be a way-too-long overdramatic piece of melodrama with gag-inducing lines and epic pieces of soundtrack that made you cringe. Michael Mann. What did you do?