As most people are doubtless aware, today is the 1st. anniversary of the London bus and tube bombings. There was a two-minute silence at midday, and I was in Russell Square at the time, so was able to join many other mourners (including representatives of the community such as the Mayor of Camden) round an oak sapling which had been planted in memory of the dead.
 People had placed white roses round it in a semicircle - it was really moving, I felt rather tearful.

The death of opera singer Lorraine Hunt Lieberson has been announced. Really tragic - she died of cancer at the age of 52.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=ayHyDEQkfCvM&refer=home

I hesitate to put this image on my page, since it consists of a photo of Winifred Wagner with Hitler, but - that's the title page of the book. The author is Brigitte Haman, and I got it for two quid at the local newsagents!
It makes for very depressing reading...I knew the outlines, how close the Wagner family were to Hitler, but I wasn't aware of the details...that they (especially Winifred) were close to him and involved in the Nazi Party FROM THE BEGINNING. And Siegfried wasn't the good-natured bumbling idiot that he is sometimes portrayed as, he shared and even promoted the anti-Semitic views of the Bayreuth circle.
What a horrible set of characters!!