Two birthdays, two celebrations, Friday and Saturday, both at pubs along the rain-swelled Thames – though fifty miles apart. Thank you and happy birthday Paddy and Adrian.

The first was the the beautiful Trafalgar Tavern in Greenwich. It claims on a notice by the bar to feature in Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens – though I am on page 414 right at the moment and all his characters with the wonderful names of Boffin, Twemlow, Wilfur and the Veneerings have yet to find their way there.
The second was the Red Lion in Henley, snug alongside the riverbank, with the waters full but the stretch far more narrow then when the Thames closes towards Kent and the sea.


