The rain came and loads and loads of tennis....

So, second week after leaving work and this week's highlights were: tennis, another street party, City of London Festival, Press Photographers exhibition and rain, rain, rain.

Wimbledon seemed to take up all of Sunday! It was compelling but also very hard to watch as a Roger fan, even from the sofa and goodness knows how exhausting it must have been to experience it in Centre Court. The rain added even more drama and gave us what must be one of the latest and darkest men's finals to date and what is officially the longest.

Another street party - well more of a square party but that sounds rather dull and it certainly was not. It was in one of those amazingly beautiful London squares - all railings, greenery and surrounded by white stucco fronted terraces. For a modest entry price there was free drink, nibbles brought round as we stood and a chance to grill our local council members and MP on what's happening with road closures, recycling, and other fascinating topics (!) to the sound of a jazz band. Some amount of drinking, meeting local residents and even nipping into the local pub after- good job it was only an 10 minute walk home and took place before the rain got set in.

A trip into the City for a friend's work do led to a lucky find. We followed our ears which picked up jazz at 6pm just off Cheapside, very unusual in the serious surrounding of all the money making, and we found a Balkan jazz band playing in the Guildhall yard as part of the City of London Festival. Never heard of it before but it has free music over the summer across the City including on the steps of St Paul's and at Liverpool Street Station to help out harassed commuters. Find more at http://www.colf.org/

The Press Photographers' Exhibition in the National Theatre was sobering and interesting - sobering because of the number of stills and a video from Iraq and photos from Pakistan around the return of Benazir Bhutto. But also some great sport shots and quirky items. See attached: www.thepressphotographersyear.com/content/exhibition

And finally, rain, rain, rain. Annoying and always seems to lead to the break down of transport so I found myself and a friend stuck in Camden on Saturday for ages waiting for a bus home at 3.30am . Still there were lots of guys enjoying Gay Pride day long into the small hours so it certainly wasn't dull. Inevitably decided on a taxi in the end and the sight of the little orange light was so welcome...

Sue