August, the louche month

I love London in August. Not that I don't love it at other times of the year, but August is a louche, irresponsible month in my city. It's a time for long lunches, coffee drinking on park benches and reasons to start cocktail hour delightfully early in the afternoon. The streets are full of tourists, they block the train doors when you try to get off the tube, they crowd the galleries and the sightseeing spots. Standing around the statue of Eros, they look like a lost biblical tribe of all the world's ethnicities, identifiable only by the cameras.

I'm not dissing tourists here. Sometimes I am one, and it's great fun. In fact, they perform a valuable service to those Londoners who, like myself, try to avoid traveling in the peak season. In August they displace the dour faces of the commuters; instead of the businesslike rush of the city streets we get the appreciative ambling of the visitors enjoying the sight of the things we who live here no longer notice through bland familiarity. When the tourists take over I start noticing my city again.

And it makes me lazy and relaxed. I've learned to kiss deadlines goodbye, and not to worry about making plans - they'll probably get shot because someone's on holiday, or the trains aren't working, or there's a spontaneous traffic jam because half the roads have been dug up.

And that is just fine. I've given up on getting anything done in August - now I merely try to make plans that give me the option of going to a nice park when they fall apart.