Plaques and smells

Hundreds of times. We do mundane things hundreds, thousands of times. Like this evening I scaled the BBC staff car-park to my usual space only to notice a brass plaque on one of the up ramps. So many times have I passed this, I find it hard to believe I have not noticed it until now.

The plaque itself said something about Blue Peter and a date, 1980. I am not sure what is stranger. The fact that I've not noticed it before or that a plaque has been erected on the concrete wall of a multi-storey car-park up ramp. A place where nobody could stand safely for long enough to read its inscription.
When there's a safe window of non motor traffic I will investigate further what the plaque is for. It bothers me that I don't know and I worry that I will forget that it is there and not find out. That is why I write this blog entry now, in the hope that it will remind me.

Of course now it occurs to me, that I may have had these thoughts before. I may have seen this plaque and promised myself that I would learn more. Only to forget. The brain letting go of this information only for me to rediscover it "as new" in the future. Is this old age attacking my memory? Twenty-four is our optimum brain age. It is when we are at our brightest, quickest, sharpest. After that it is down hill. I will find out. That plaque was important once and in my mind, it will be again.

Puzzled by my moderately boring car-park adventure, I went to Westfield to pick up some dinner. Westfield shopping centre, the biggest inner city complex in Europe, has its own unique smell. A scent that I have never experienced anywhere else in the world. It is not a bad, nor potent smell and not one that offers pleasure. It is there, in the air and it interests me enough to bore you with it here. I don't think it's that "new shopping complex" smell. Is it the smell of capitalism? More investigations are needed.

I realise there are more questions than answers here today. I never said I would have all the answers...

HDM