You’re reading The Gist, a blog of troll markets and other underground magic bazaars.

Earlier this week, a stranger on Flickr wrote me to ask about using this photo of Borough Market, which I took during last year’s trip to London. She wanted to draw it for her art class and was looking for a version bigger than the default Flickr size. Of course I said yes — it’s nice just to know that a photo of mine has reverberated with a stranger somewhere. Hopefully she’ll send along her sketches or finished drawing when she’s done.

This is the second time someone has found a photo of mine on Flickr and asked to used it for a project. (The first time I was invited to be the album cover for a local band, but I couldn’t find a big enough version of the image for print.) In both cases, I’ve tried to say yes as happily and as quickly as possible, if only because it’s what I would want if I was in their shoes. It’s nice to know that someone actually is seeing and enjoying some of the material we leave behind us as we meander across the Internet, and that it’s not always being mocked or derided by mean-spirited anonymites.

I’m trying to put out what I want to get back, more and more. And, yes, I fail at it sometimes, but I’m trying to do more good than harm.

Thanks for tuning in this week.

Photo © Will Hindmarch

You’re reading the Gist, which I left just sitting out in the Internet’s rain and dust and snow for a few years.

Photo © Will Hindmarch

I wouldn’t say I’m an Angle, but I’m Anglish. Our Anglophile streak continued this past weekend with an attempt to create the kind of English breakfast we never got around to on this trip.

We ate on the run most mornings. Most of my breakfasts were coffee and WiFi at Starbucks followed by a sandwich from Pret A Manger — the All-Day Breakfast and Mature Cheddar and Pret Pickle were favorites of ours. (I love Pret A Manger to a stupid degree.)

So this is what I made the Saturday morning after we got back:

That’s fried eggs served on herb-garlic toast, vine-ripened tomatoes, fried mini sausage patties, baked beans with ginger and brown sugar, plus a dash of rocket (arugula). For the second plate I put the tomatoes through the still-warm frying pan, over no heat, just to snag some of the fried-egg flavors. They turned out great.

(There are a couple more pictures of these at Flickr, if you just can’t get enough.)

The night of the crisp party we made Coronation Chicken for everybody, starting from the original 1953 recipe, which uses mayo and whipping cream and no raisins. (Added the raisins anyway.) Now, listen: I’m not a fan of chicken salad. I’ve pretty much cut mayo out of my life and mixing it with the worst chicken in your sandwich shop isn’t going to change my mind about it. Coronation chicken, though, sings a siren song.

The day after this, I ritually returned us to the American South with a full chub’s worth of sausage for biscuits & gravy with red pepper and fennel. I had pictures, but I think I mistook them for more sausage and gravy and ate them.

When we walked through the whole Westminster/Parliament area on our way to the Tate Britain, it was full of tourists and rainy mist. On our way back, after dark, it was near empty. The soundtrack to this is the noise of traffic going by on rain-slick streets.

Borough Market, London.

Borough Market, London

We’re in London. Internet access is spotty, if only because we’re running out of money fast. I’ll be posting photos and videos throughout the next couple of days, though, as I’m able.

That 100-meter-long photograph of pedestrians in Berlin that you wanted? Here it is.

Photographer Simon Høgsberg, who I had never heard of before Craig sent me this picture, has some simply wonderful photo essays on his site. Its the shots of anonymous, uncertain folk moving their city and their lives, oblivious to the camera or looking back at it, that grabbed me. This giant gestalt photo, “We’re All Gonna Die – 100 Meters of Existence,” captures 178 travelers in Berlin over the course of 20 days, and is 100 meters wide. It’s fascinating.