In the first week of June, I broke three needles in the sewing machine that Miriam, Esther and Silas gave me for Christmas, and I stripped and rebuilt my bike. So I ordered more needles from the venerable haberdasher’s William Gee of Dalston, got on my clean bike and went to get them. I tweeted through the day and this is the thread. And this is where I went.

I stripped the bike to the bearings yesterday and now it’s cleaned and rebuilt; so today I’m out in the sunshine. New stickers courtesy @UGClimbing and @hgskate with thanks.

First stop, haberdashery: the brilliant @williamgeeUK in Dalston, for sewing supplies. Thanks for your help.

I headed east from Dalston and meandered south across London Fields for some of the best plane tress in the whole city.

And then north, to the Hackney Empire. I worked here in Taking Liberties, directed by Sara Sugarman and Jack Shepherd in about 1993.

After that I went south again, and further east, via the olive tree on Well Street Common, across Victoria Park, past the Burdett-Coutts fountain and down to Mile End Park, where Rachel Whiteread’s House stood and the first flying bomb hit.

St Paul’s Bow Common had the door open to air the church, so I took a look inside to see Charles Lutyens’ mosaics in Maguire and Murray’s amazing building. Thank you so much to Mother Bernadette and Julian the Churchwarden for making me welcome.

After that it was a bit of a race. Past Dod Street, where I worked at the DHHS Poplar ILO in the 80s; St Luke’s Victoria Dock, like a great upturned ship, across the Royal Docks and past Tate & Lyle’s Silvertown refinery.

The last leg was crossing the river at the Woolwich Ferry, which is a treat if you do it on a bike once in a while but a nightmare if you have to queue every day in a van. After that, Greenwich and a welcome drink.

Then home. It was good. The bike was lovely and London was excellent. Here’s a rose to finish.

This was partly at least a journey into my own past, in a similar way to the ride of May 16th. The show at the Hackney Empire and the Dod Street DHSS loomed out of my working life; St Luke’s Victoria Dock, where my Banns of Marriage were read; Tate & Lyle, for whom my Dad worked. I visited Rachel Whiteread’s House, in Mile End during the 80 days it stood in late 1993. At the time, other than occasional acting jobs and a spell as a parliamentary researcher for Edward Heath (another story), I was working as a decorator and I was intrigued by the traces of paint left on the cast after the house itself had been removed. Whilst looking, I fell into conversation with another man, who asked me why I was interested in the thing and we walked and talked together for half an hour or so. He introduced himself before we parted as John McEwen, then the art critic of the Sunday Telegraph. It was the first time I’d ever come across someone who looked at and wrote about art for a living.