A Brief London

I don't know a lot about fulfillment, but I do know that I love to leave the country. The city. That is no longer what it was. 

The world seemed more promising elsewhere (a state of mind which, once entered, will never leave you in peace). 

- Ian Buruma, Churchill's Cigar 

:A redolent memory that burned in because, young, I must have thought he was entirely petulant, and it was curious. Why hold the memory of a sullen supposition?
:My father, saying, in 00's - this town has changed.  And here I am, too, thinking it. It's not so simple as change is the only constant; it's jaundiced.

LB drove us to Burien, and then Mr. Williams fresh from Retirement, with gleaming teeth and a budding sense of "you need to see Churchill's war room," took us to the airport. LB & Mck had acquired the superior status of TSA Pre & Global entry, so they strolled in streetwise, whereas I, who had her TSA interview cancelled last minute, waited for 2 hours while a singular agent checked out us long line of cogs. 

We had gone the super saver route, no bags, no seat selection, and so it was with deep gid that each of us acquired an entire row for the International 10-hour flight. But, lest we'd get too excited, please add in an aisle where none of the armrests go up, and the passenger behind in a constant kicking, and someone wringing the life out of a plastic water bottle in a 10-hour anxiety, and shame on you for pre-ordering a vegetarian meal, there's simply not enough of them. I'm a maximalist in somethings, especially when it comes to maximizing the parameters of my international saver fare (i.e. alcoholic drinks) and though I'd been off of it, I had allotted a brief interim for London. So we ordered plastic cups of wine and took our sip & did not enjoy it & with a brief sort of curious farewell let it go. 

People who come to London also bring it with them in their minds. They have a feeling of how the city should be before they meet it...a swollen, imaginary London, larger in the mind than in reality. 

- Ian Jack, Editor of GRANTA 65, Spring 1999

THURSDAY, APRIL 20

The flight was ok, which is a welcome gift in this gouged-for-more-but-given-less-transport-moratorium. And, deposited at Heathrow, trying to parse out the English as it glid down in a puddle from the lips of an impervious station agent. We made our way to Euston Station, the few blocks' walk to the Hilton Euston off Upper Woburn Place, which plops itself a half-block thick across and near the Crypt & St. Pancras. The Crypt was gated, something I stumbled upon, as if it was out of place, so to find it a burial ground from 1822-54, when all the crypts of all the London churches were closed to burials, and it being an air raid shelter in both World Wars, and here I was walking by surprised, wearing crocs, felt ignorant.

The Hilton Euston is a symmetrical terrace of 5 house-bays made of yellow stock brick, stucco, pilaster-jambs, cornice-heads & slated mansard roofs with dormers. The entrance's central bay has four Corinthian columns flanked by bays. We dropped our bags and walked to find something to eat, past Tavistock Square, to Fork Deli Patisserie - for cheddar with pear & ale chutney & cheddar with marmite toasties & flat whites. A greasy readying for a run to/within Regent's Park before dinner in Clapham. Under squint of rain, the sport pitches and thick-thighed cricketers felt a novelty. Regent's Park - after the playboy Prince Regent vis a King George IV. 12,000 lank roses, unbudded, a boating lake, a heronry. A run around the outer ring. 

In the car to Clapham we crossed the Thames for the first time. To Minnow, the sky sere & draining. Minnow is kitsch, fake-floraled in a burst that makes the gray feel otherly, a transportation into false gaiety. It is narrow & cramped, but in a comfortable way, you just have to get in the mood; what they call "romantic, with plenty of cosy corners." Something moves beneath our feet. We catch glimpse of an elderly waddle of some thick caramel colored dog that looks like a sack of uncut sourdough. It walks with the authority of restaurant proprietor. An aperol spritz sounds nice, and it looks nice with its striped straw, but it's perhaps the worst aperol spritz we've ever had. We toil & practice what we'll say if we were to have the balls to request a different drink. It is awful being someone who complains, ungrateful, wasteful, but awful to spend your money on something unexpectedly sad. How do you make a bad aperol? Flat bubbles? Not enough of the red thick? Soapy ice? My, with our American accents, did it seem like we'd never had aperol before? The social drama. And I tell myself I will drink every drop, I will not complain, but it's not just me, it's her too, so he asks if everything is ok, & I say, "I'm sorry, this doesn't taste exactly right, could we order something different? Perhaps just a glass of the Spumante?" And, "Of course!" And that's that. 

The menu is seasonal modern euro. There are: nocellara olives, croquettes, burrata, pickled courgettes, moules mariniere, pan-fried squid, lamb rump, potato dauphinoise. We order bread rolls with herb butter; several rounds as they are the size of fingers. I have the sea bream with soy, chili, spring onion & ginger - something I'd selected mentally, in the US, in my investigations, and, now following the aperol crisis I've somehow set myself up with a halved-thin, skin-thick, bone-filled, minisculy-meated sparidae in a bowlful of brown broth. The flavors mimicked the description, but it was meager, and perhaps I'm an idiot. 

We decided we needed something more. Something to root and enliven us. And as we walked to hunt the place, we stopped at an empty gelato shop called Nardulli's. The Italian behind the counter was pure. I had fig gelato in a cone ("fresh fig fruits from the south of Italy"). LB & Mck had black cherry, cookies ("pure oreo yummy cookies and fresh milk"), stracciatella (fresh milk and chocolate cream). We gorged these en route to No. 32 The Old Town, which was proceeded over by two prodigious suits. They have bottomless drinks and happiness hours. The menu is a book. We found a spot at a large family table by the door and ordered glasses of wine: Lilith Primitivo (smoky, dark, lashings), Bagoas Leda Albarino (crisp, spicy, salty, lick-finish) & Luigi Baudana 'Dragon' Bianco (stylish, top end Piemontese). They had pudding wines, juicy & fulsomes, vedrines and tipples. It was busy & good for observing. 

FRIDAY, APRIL 21

Snuck out for a run to/along the "once mercantile artery" - the Thames, before they woke. 

"This is the first time I have ever been on the river and I'm besotted by its khaki smell which so precisely matches the water's colour. The smell is compounded of freshwater mud as well as of sour tidal flats mixed with oil and bilges. It is both melancholy and bracing...'we call this rolling butter.'" And, "That peculiar symbiosis at town and waterfront often seems to densify the national character even as it lends people a faint air of being in transit." - James Hamilton-Paterson

To the Neoclassical complex Somerset House, along Charing Cross, among Jubilee Gardens with its Sweet Gum & Beech. The Eye. Outside St. Thomas', the Covid-19 Memorial, 1-kilometer long, haunting in vibrant heart - a visual representation of every UK life lost. 

Back at the hotel, another lost art appreciated - the free continental. I had crumpets & croissants with nutella, chocolate filled pastries, a fried egg, black pudding, sausage, runny baked beans, coffee, grapefruit juice. 

We went to the London Marathon expo; LB acquired her bib & finisher's jacket. Took a car across Tower Bridge, the bascule & suspensive curious blue, to South Kensington for brunch at Farm Girl: flat white, farm bowl (turmeric & preserved lemon, hummus, roasted sweet potato, kimchi, broccoli, greens, cous cous, kalamata olives, herbs, pumpkin seeds, pomegranate). Bagged to go for our walk to the Natural History Museum: an Anzac Cookie larger than a head, a lemon cake with rapeseed oil, lemon zest, a chunk of ginger & poppy. 

I'm surprised by my feelings of the Natural History Museum. An attitude/judgment I didn't expect to possess. It wasn't as if I went in with any grand notion save for an interest in seeing the scaffolding of Hope. And yet, 

upon entering the large terracotta Victorian-Romanesque symmetrizing building, which is a joy, I was surprised, I guess, that there wasn't a scanning of the bodies, metal detection, or masks worn; it took me a long time to remember that we weren't in the US. I couldn't help but feel incredulous about the sheer privilege (maybe just positivity) it is to trust a building, to trust people. What a perfect site for chaos, I thought. And perhaps because I felt haunted by the Covid-19 Memorial, that physical-visual representation of loss, it was curious to experience a claustrophobic space of indoor breath, in juxtaposition, in mind. So that's where I began, and then, to the left, to the Dinosaur exhibit. I think one of my fundamental problems is that I don't like crowds. So I wasn't doing myself any favors. 

Dinosaurs - pregnant plesiosaur, sub-adult rex. Much of it felt plastic, enhanced by robotic rex's. I enjoyed the encouragement Mck placed on us having our photos taken against green screen in mimicry of being nearly attacked & the subsequent 30-minute wait to get our photo printed and compiled in a booklet. Honestly, it tipped the scale into that fun gimmick from the cringe gimmick. 

Up the stairs to the Minerals exhibit, which felt more rooting: polished, raw, meteorites, carats, asbestos with muscovite, butterscotch, full of ites and obes. 

It could be that I need more time in there. It felt full of replica. And I've read - "Mostly, you'll encounter the wildest creatures of all: lurching, wailing, scampering children in all their varieties, because everything here, down to the simplified signage and touchable replicas, is pitched to kids." - Jason Cochran. I appreciate its opportunity to teach, that it welcomes classes. 

"...put the Natural History Museum back to the way it was before they started dicking around with it (in particular, they must restore the display case showing insects infesting household products from the 1950s)..." - Bill Bryson, Notes from a Small Island

Note: I thought Bryson's Notes from a Small Island was really lame. And though likely in jest, this sentiment speaks a bit to my feeling that something wasn't exactly right. 

From the Museum, through Knightsbridge, along & through Hyde, observing the sleeping & head-dunkery of tagged swans in the Serpentine. To the corner of Kensington Gardens and on to Notting Hill. I like Notting. With past descriptions of, "It was a place to party, to hang out at late-night speakeasy bars, to buy music and fruit. Afghan coats and dodgy antiques from the Portabello Road and the odd illicit substance from the All Saints Road, when it was lined with bobbies..." That's what it was & likely what it is no longer, but there's still the feeling of was. 

I was sweating over the Clothing Exchange off Pembridge. LB & Mck graciously following as I fingered all fabrics, and I had to say Please Go Enjoy Yourselves Out There in the Notting, as I Am Entirely High and Need to Feel Everything. The splurge I had gone into London committed to make (only to be known when seen), was on an emerald green vintage Rochas. 

:Founded in 1925 by French designer Marcel Rochas (apparently the first designer of 2/3-length coats and skirts with pockets & alongside Schiaparelli, launched padded shoulders in 1931); known primarily for perfume, it wasn't until 1990 that clothing became their focus. French-influenced, "demicouture" (special pieces too costly to mass-produce but which may not meet strict couture rules regarding hand-stitching and numbers of fitting), which evolved from made-to-measure to closure to reopening to new creative directors/ection. 

In this separation they purchased me a Harry Styles coaster.  

We had reservations at The Shed in Notting Hill. Created by the Gladwin Brothers incl. Chef Patron Oliver, Restauranteur Richard, and Gregory, a West-Sussex-based farmer, the restaurant brings the Sussez countryside to West London. Their English wines come from the vineyard Nutboarne. Items of interest: the 'Daily Loosener,' the 'Green Fingered Gardener,' Chateau L'Etampe Saint-Emilion Gran Cru, wild yeast breads, mushroom marmite eclair, egg confit, caraway crispbread, Hampshire chalk stream trout pate cornetto, Exmoor caviar, brick pastry, homemade Sussex chorizo, hung yogurt, broad beans & garden pea hummus, Ticehurst celeriac schnitzel, Hackney burrata, Chichester beetroot puree, cornish scallop, south coast sea bass, devon crab, red wine jus, cheeseboard (blue vinny, soft bath, cornish smuggler, house chutney), chantilly cream blueberry. It was my favorite place. Our server, a copy of Cam Stewart. Ordered a bottle of '14 B Debiac Chateau Cadillac Bordeaux, the mushroom marmite eclair with egg confit & cornichon, garlic & rosemary wild yeast bread with wild garlic butter, chargrilled broccoli tenderstems with creme fraiche & sweet chili jam, the south coast salmon & cod fishcake with truffled cheddar fondue, red chili & spring onion, the Hackney burrata with heritage tomato, wild garlic pesto & broken walnut, rosemary salted crispy potatoes & the cheeseboard. The wine we had left was shoved with a stopper and saran wrapped by Cam-alike. 

With reservations at St. Pancras Champagne Bar by Searcy's - we were excited for the gimmick of a "Press for Champagne" button at Europe's Longest Champagne Bar (98 mtrs), and the Victorian Gothic architecture of St. Pancras International on the Grand Terrace, with its "sumptuous leathers" & velvet booths & oysters & caviar and Emin's "I want my time with you" aglow in pink script - it all seemed exuberant. So big were our pupils in the possibility of it, that we walked right past it. Because, it was near-dead, sleepy, dark, and the long bar in our mind was curtate, and the gold Press For's were greasy in fingerprints & the server advised against a tasting, as it wasn't as profitable as a glass pour, and to hurry & order as they'd be closing soon, though the hours listed included hours more. A semi-uncomfortable not the Vibe. Instead, to GA KINGSX, for a bottle of prosecco Collalto extra dry from Milan. The air felt very sexual in there. They had 50 separate gin listings. ("London went through a period called 'the Gin Craze' between 1720-1751; during its peak, the average consumption of gin was 2 pints/wk for every person, including children.")

SATURDAY, APRIL 22

Saturday held a fat run for me. Initially & thoroughly I'd committed to pacing LB in the marathon (to the point of hand-crafting fake bibs), but after research on arrests made on bandits, and of a fundamental desire not to overstimulate her on her big day, I, sadly, forewent. Instead I was given a 20-mile workout/LR, to be done in Hyde Park. The run from our place to Hyde was salubrious: past the University of London, Goodge, the shops on A5204, Oxford, until - Marble Arch & Cumberland Gate - the state entrance to the cour-d'honneur (as well as a historical site for public executions). I liked how barren, or rather, unpeopled the gate was. All I recall is a child chasing a pigeon. As the hours grew, so did the flux. Large swathes. Between broad stone pathways and dirt lanes, among the exercising of horses on Rotten Row, past limes & maples & sweet chestnuts & beech & bedding plants, past hunting dogs in red sweaters, past, even, Sifan Hissan, whose eyes I met. 

I was toasted but in love with Hyde. Ended at the Hilton just as Mck finished her own workout; the sudden intercourse felt serendipitous. Gorged on free English breakfast. Packed pocketfuls of croissants. Today was reserved for Camden Town. 

Trained to. Deposited into a mouth of movement. Took a fast right into the stacked containers of Philippe Conticini off Buck for iced coffee. I photographed every pastry: Paris-Brest Amande Noisettes, Tarte Saint-Honore & Tarte Citron Sarrasin, Gran Cru Vanille, Eclairs & Flans, Pain au Chocolats, Macarons, Millefeuilles, Calin Gourmands. 

I think I'd like Camden best without the people, hungry people like me, in it. Only the originals. Only the hard-earned. I appreciated that even amidst the mass, I could photograph the textured walls of shopfronts; it helped to look up. And I loved the canals. The culverted, Regent's, a little Venice, Maida Vale, kayak classes, boozy sports chants, weepy trees tickling & obscuring, the graffiti, the buskers, the artists. With no lunch plan & a need for a sit, we lucked out on a table at Mildred's, the host himself surprised he could seat us. And by the window. Right off I ordered a fresh lemon & ginger teapot. 

They had: cardamom porridge with compote, harissa v'egg bap, chilaquiles with cheez, banana biscoff pancakes with cookie crumbs & speculoos caramel, a classic, an almuerzo, a thali brunch. Lamely, or simply, I had the avocado green chilli toast with crispy kale & seeded crumb & sampled from Mck's Classic. 

After brunch we walked around the Primrose Hill district, where trees pulse fat through iron bars & Chalcot Square & well-kept pastels. To the top of Primrose Hill, which feels a mound but reveals a panorama. "'Splendid to be on Primrose Hill/At evening when the world is still' wrote W.H. Auden in a poem in 1922...Sylvia Plath lived in a house nearby, one that was inhabited by W.B. Yeats almost a century earlier...engraved in stone at the edge of the summit are William Blake's famous words: 'I have conversed with the spiritual Sun. I saw him on Primrose Hill.'"

We crossed over the Grand Union Canal and in a brief moment of bliss caught a small gray boat whose entire center was a table spread of prosciutto, dips, crackers, pringle cans, bottles of wine and stems filled, sat round by a family & led by a man in a flat cap and a young sailor, suited. 

Regent's Road is littered with places we would like to return to. I regret encouraging us away from it, instead of stopping to sample something from the outdoor terrace of something the likes of L'Absinthe or Lemonia or Odette's or on the corner which seduces you like a nose, The Queen's, with its "dinky terrace." 

After our long gallivant, it was time for LB to rest, the race being the next morning. Mck and I went for a walk along Euston, past Saint Pancras Renaissance Hotel in an almost fictitious curve & King's Cross & Platform 9 3/4, back across Grand Union Canal, Camley Street Natural Park, past a most haunting Gasholders No 10,11,12 -"An ever-changing facade that appears alive & responsive to passers-by," with folding, perforated screens. We enjoyed the dance classes in Coal Drops Yard, the vision of two women eating from a bowl of olives against a wide window, and of those feasting on seafood grilled on their own bespoke mini-grills at Parillan's terrace on the viaduct level of the former Victorian coal store. Later - pre-race dinner res at Via Emilia in Fitzrovia. Fitzrovia is a playful word. 

All of Via Emilia's menu comes from Emilia-Romagna. A must-eat declared the Gnocco Fritto. We had 3, with a bowl full of green olives, and 2 rounds of Lambrusco served in the traditional ceramic bowl & small vinegary salads & to share - spaghit a l 'ai, oli e pavronzin, taiulen cun furmaj ad pigura cun e pevar, tajadel bulgnaisi col rago, spaghet' cun e sug ed pundor and reginetti aj fonz. It all felt like it was supposed to be transportive, but left us for want. The service was poor, but the lambrusco was lappable, and though I wanted to taste the mortadella, the formaj and end with the chocolate salame, we were quite ready to get out of there. It's slightly uncomfortable to be underwhelmed, edged up against the reflex to be grateful, to own ones privilege, and it being a more bulbous, anticipated moment in one's life - the pre-race meal - you want to walk away from that meal like it's an additional piece to the month-to-years-long study in Running. Too much importance placed, I understand, but can be achieved.

We found a long line of people outside of Amorino, and, considering it a good sign, ordered ourselves rose buds of l'inimitabile, arabica utz & litchi raspberry rose. Took an uber back with a guy who didn't know his lights were off in the dark, took corners at 50mph & careened into opposite traffic to park us across from our hotel, in front of an oncoming bus. The bus driver shook their head and gave us a "W" symbol. We're not sure what this means.

SUNDAY, APRIL 23

London Marathon morning, 7:15 am - we saw LB off on her bus to the start line. We had a few hours before we'd need to take the train out to the halfway point, where we'd see her for the first time. 

I ran to, along and up Primrose Hill, past the London Zoo, pursuing more of Regent's Park. Between the Outer Circle & Grand Union Canal, there was this dirt track, its infield of thick grass, and a forlorn long jump pit: jejuneness, a redolent 90s. The boating lake, baby greylags & ansers. Queen Mary's Gardens. Marylebone Green. It felt a gift, to be able to lope around in that quiet of a big city when the city itself is pulled away because of the marathon. 

At the buffet - sliced white bloomers, brie, peppered mackerel. Mck & I got ready in rain gear, packing portraits of LB, her head on sticks. What started quiet turned to pissing. We navigated with a symbiosis. Deposited at Shadwell in East London on the north bank of the Thames, timely catching the lead wheelchairs. This section (specifically the area around Mile 13ish & it's circling back at 22ish, Butcher Row in Limehouse) was chosen for its ease to get us back to the finish in time (and away from the more popular Tower Bridge area), but we didn't know it constituted Rainbow Row, and were joyful in finding it. Drag Queens in 7" heels & immaculate makeup, a Priest shimmying as he walked by, colorful streamers that brought bright contrast to the leaden sky. We saw the male leads, the throngs thereafter, the female leads across the way, ahead at 22. My eyes grew weary from scanning the crowd of runners looking for LB. The world tilted, and so I leaned into voice & started calling her name, hoping that if I couldn't see her, she'd hear me. And then, all too quickly, she was there, smiling, and saying something indiscernible, and our moment there was over. Everything and everyone was wet. 

Mck & I took the train back towards the finish, to Westminster so we could see Big Ben & Buckingham before walking the last mile of the race. Quick coffees from a coffee cart in the park. I liked the bodies lined on concrete walls in relaxed cheer of the race. 

LB finished in 3:06:44; got to catch a glimpse of her at the finish between the far-off fencing & troves. Made our way to the big "O" to meet her. Grew worried after a while, until she popped through, ambling in a way rare to see her. I feel like the next 30 minutes was a sample of: capacity, connate, consummation, comity. The changing of shoes, the bracing of shoulder, the dry bra, the mental noting. Perhaps, simply, Presence & reverence. She didn't have the race she wanted, or was apt to have, but it was close & the power of her felt voluminous. 

I was growing miserable, so how LB managed I'm not sure. We walked to & through Piccadilly, decorated in celebration of Ramadan (piccadills/piccadillies - term used for various forms of collars). "Piccadilly, the great thoroughfare leading from Haymarket & Regent St. westward to Hyde Park-corner, is the nearest approach to the Parisian boulevard of which London can boast." - Charles Dickens Jr., 1879. Moodily wanting to take it in but soggy-boned & hungry. Coffees & sandwiches at Amelia's on Bedford. A train back to the Hilton Euston to warm & shower. Grabbed tickets for the London Eye. 

I managed to sneak in a bottle of bubbles, despite bag check & body scan, with the intention of us pop & sipping it with view of London on high, but the vibes in the egg weren't right. From up there & to the south - the Crystal Palace, St. Thomas' Hospital, Lambeth Palace, MI6, Vauxhall & Nine Elms, Houses of Parliament, Battersea Power Station, Elizabeth Tower/Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Westminster Bridge, County Hall. To the west - Windsor Castle, the Natural History Museum, Buckingham Palace, the Royal Parks, Wembley Stadium, Scotland Yard, the Ministry of Defence, House Guards Palance, Whitehall Court, Trafalgar Square, Oxford Street, Charing Cross Station, To the north - the London Zoo, Madame Tussauds, BT Tower, Covent Garden, the British Museum, Hungerford Bridge & Golden Jubilee Bridges, the Savoy Hotel, Somerset House, Waterloo Bridge, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, the National Theatre, Royal Festival Hall, St. Paul's Cathedral & Tate Modern. And to the east - Shakespeare's Globe, One Blackfriars, the Walkie Talkie, Tower of London, Tower Bridge, the Shard, Canary Wharf, the Old Vic Theatre, O2 Arena, Royal Greenwich Observatory, Waterloo Station, Strata SE1 & the Imperial War Museum. So, basically, a list of all that anyone could know, But, a view lifted. 

A late reservation at Morso off Abbey in St. John's Wood: Negroni, focaccia charred, coarse salted, with halved green olives, a little gem salad with micro cress, lemon & mustard dressing, antipasti board with prosciutto San Daniele DOP, pancetta arrotolata IGP, aged balsamic vinegar of Modena DOP, pane carasau, parmigiano reggiano DOP, cornichons, Italian mixed olives, Rigatoni Pistachio & Burrata with pistachio & basil pesto, parmigiano, homemade buffalo burrata & toasted pistachio crumb, a bottle of Cool Boy prosecco from Veneto and a Potted Tiramisu to share (their signature; enriched with dark chocolate crumbs & sweet marsala wine). 

*Bookmark for Mamma Santissima (could have been the Negronis, but the place looked like I needed to be in it): it hearkens back to "La Vecchia Napoli," inspired by Sofia Loren. 

Our last ambition - Abbey Road Crosswalk. It was black, wet, and I'd been carrying that bottle of warm bubbles (reserved for the London Eye & not yet enjoyed) in my purse all day. We outdoor-girl-crouch-peed en route, past the Studios, wondered if it was it, decided it was, and I pulsed that cork from the tight crowning across the infamous zebra. Imagine a day where you race the London Marathon, walk Piccadilly, eat a tiramisu en potted plant imitation and end with drinking bubbles from a bottle as you take large steps to stay on the whites where the Beatles walked. 

MONDAY, APRIL 24

We needed more time. I hadn't done all of the literary detours I'd set out to. Not near enough walking about markets, looking into bookstores, or being quiet at a cafe, sketching. We did what we could with 3 full days in London. I forewent a run, and we packed & walked with heave to a cafe for a last cup of coffee before the train back to Heathrow. 

The London in my mind is more developed, tainted now by reality, and I like to think on sweet words surmounting, like cream tea, high tea, Belisha Beacon, serviettes, ice cream cornet, pasty, and hardy words like towcester, slough, milk floats, scotch eggs, streaky bacon, fry ups, meat fruit, tipsy cake, eton mess & slang like all-to-pot, sod off, chuffed, innit?, chunder, damp squib, grockel.