Loafinstick

Driving North Wales in an Overboiled Potato

2010-08-14T00:33:00.135-04:00

It was a cosy Sarkozy-sized farmhouse about halfway between Betws-y-Coed and Llanwrst in that land where consonants travel in packs and you never know whether vowels are going to speak up or just stare back expectantly, daring you to make the first squeak. Every door frame was a headbanger for us Schwarzeneggers over 5'6". The owner was a lively Welsh lady of at least 70 years who had spent a lifetime among the sheep. She shouted when she whispered, shouted when she spoke, and, fingers to ears please, SHOUTED when she shouted. It's not that Welsh sheep are harder of hearing than the other varieties, it's just that they're not very bright. Especially those that give directions at the roadside.

Late the first evening, I was sitting in the lounge watching TV when I heard something that sounded like a bit of a row, a barney, or possibly a rumble starting up in the other side of the house between the landlady and a visitor. As it reached a fever pitch I felt uncomfortable enough to start edging towards the safety of my room. Suddenly, a volcano of laughter erupted. Titters ricocheted off the ceiling. Guffaws gushed out from under the kitchen door. So it wasn't "Murder At The Dew Flock Inn" after all. It was just another neighbourly Friday-night sheep-shout. Welsh at eleven, turned up to eleven.

A house in Llanwrst needing a shave more than I do

The sun rose.

I rose.

The sheep that the landlady called "Rose" had been complaining about the sun for hours. I was sure that once I stuck my head out, Rose would start complaining about me.

There's nothing quite as invigorating early on a Welsh countryside morning as a loud breakfast. It has little of that quiet elegance found in the better English B&Bs, and fortunately none of the barely disguised impatience of the others. But it still has all the carbs, fat, and full frontal trouser stains of the royal consort's favorite way to start the day.

As I chewed, I reflected on the night before. The barkeep at the Albion in Llanwrst (Welsh name: Allion) explained to me that "shouting another round" originated with a Welsh shepherd ordering a second pancake. Given that "It's my shout" on the Allion side of the bar seemed to correspond to "Can I have a quiet word in your ear?" on the Albion side I was inclined to believe him. At least until the great roar of laughter from both sides of the bar as I left.

Stained and sated, I set out cross country going west through Snowdonia, past the great, though indiscernible, peak itself and on to the coast and Caernarvon.

Snowdon: Totally Obscured by Cloud

Later that day, with toes up in front of the gas fire, I learned from one of the two English language TV channels in the eight channel universe of North Wales that eleven souls had become lost on a hiking trip on Mount Snowdon. Fortunately they were later found, wet, cold and, with teeth chattering, arguing about whether or not this was worse than that time when they ended up in a snowstorm on Burleigh St. Mungo. Of the other six channels, four are Welsh and two looked like they only had shows about sheep and the occasional goat. The sheep channels had little interest in the story, favouring instead the recent revelations about pork prices in Llandudno. The Welsh announcers generally seemed to be suppressing snickers when reporting the story - the hikers were from Birmingham. It might have had something to do with how Birmingham is pronounced in Welsh.

Being a rough and tough Canadian, I know how to dress for Snowdonia. I was wearing a 4 cylinder Nissan Note - a fashion choice that Top Gear calls "Not quite as thrilling as an over boiled potato". Well Jeremy, think about that next time you're freezing your veg off on top of Snowdon and I'm motoring by in my spud listening to the Ovine Hour at near-room temperature.

You may have noticed that English, like most other languages, distinguishes between things of considerable dimension that are parallel to the earth's surface and those that are perpendicular to the earth's surface. You may not have thought of it in exactly those terms, but most of us think that a ten metre pole (or a similar pole measured in feet) is "long" when it's lying down, but "tall" when it's standing on end. However, things that are lacking in dimension such as long weekends, last orders, loose change, and Ronnie Corbett, are short no matter how you orient them.

As I found at a small cafe where I stopped to decaffeinate, recaffienate and explore the local environs, the British have gone to great lengths to take this distinction to new heights.

The parking lot of the cafe was a muster point for a trail up yet another peak. To my surprise, the length of the hiking route was given in imperial measure while the height of the route was given in metric units. Yes it was. The placard outlining the route stated that the distance was 1.7 miles and the climb was 600 metres and that since weather conditions were unpredictable, outerwear of four cylinders or greater was recommended. I brought this miles vs. metres inconsistency to the attention of a local who informed me that the difference would be obvious to a native. Airspace is a European thing and the soil we stand on is a British thing. I was tempted to pound him with a kilo of sheep droppings and then thrash him to within an inch of his life with a metre stick.

Caernarvon - Always just 'round the next bend

Imagine a length of yarn that kitty has wrapped around all the furniture in your living room. As long as kitty has included the tops of furniture as well as the legs, and you imagine this as the width of a back alley, you've got a reasonable representation of driving through the heart of North Wales to the coast. There are long straight stretches that you can fly along, but you'll end up paying for them by swirling down one side of a valley with your ears popping and then shortly thereafter climbing up the other to the sound of the engine begging forgiveness.

Caernarvon is a splendid place. Although restored, it hasn't been museumized. I spent at least an hour and a half wandering the castle and then a couple of hours in a cafe doing email. Then back to the farm!

That night the landlady hollered that I should go up the hill to the pub in Capel Garmon to enjoy one of her sheep. Before I could protest my marital status, my species preference, or even that it was a rental car, she recommended that I order the stew or the pie instead of the usual chops or rack. "They do it right up there!" she shouted. So, with Rose stowed safely in the barn, I made my way up to the pub through a truly mystical magical tunnel in the Welsh woods, praying that none of the local farm equipment would be coming the other way.

Without incident, I was soon safely in the wrong part of the pub. I've always been confused by that saloon bar vs. public bar thing. I thought that if you went to a public school you went in the public bar, but if you were born in a barn you went to the saloon. Apparently it's a common North American misconception that only gets worse with the conflicting definitions of "public school". And they also tell me in the UK that there's something called a saloon car. How reserved. I'm sure that's what we call a party wagon on my home continent.

However, in this case I was in the wrong side of the pub simply because the waitress only visited this side on odd-numbered days. At the suggestion of the landlord, I shuffled over to the place where the dart boards were suffering impressively accurate slings and arrows, and where the waitress, evidently on a work term from majoring in "Applied Welsh Stoicism", took my order. I decided to check out the Shepherd's Pie, which in the UK will contain the fruit of a shepherd's labour, as opposed to the other side of the Atlantic where it will usually contain the mechanically deboned fruits of a robotic cowherd's labours.

Then came the usually inevitable but in this case unexpected query: "And what kind of potatoes would you like with that?"

You get potatoes with everything in Britain.

Lasagna and fresh veg - and what kind of potatoes would you like with that?

Greek salad with grilled chicken - and what kind of potatoes would you like with that?

Deux quails, asparagus spears, pate de fois gras - and how would Monsieur like his pommes-de-terre with that?

But potatoes with shepherd's pie?

How would you like your potatoes with your mashed potatoes?

Mashed to match, or French Fried for a bit of that "who gives a damn" joie de vivre?

Perhaps "Oven Roast" would provide a subtle intellectual before-and-after illustration of the "Art of the Mash".

Or over-boiled befitting the four cylinder motoring enthusiast that you are.

So baby new potatoes it was. It was an excellent pie and an even more dramatic ride back to the farm through the darkening bush as the sun went down. Tomorrow - off to Llandudno to see what all the fuss is about.

A sheep pleading to be served without potatoes

Corbridge to CastleRigg via Hadrian's Wall

2009-06-06T10:02:00.138-04:00

All along the way I'd kept one eye on the road and another on the lookout for a steam rally, any steam rally. Finally, as I arrived in Corbridge just east of Newcastle along Hadrian's wall, I spotted a poster announcing the Corbridge Steam Gala. And more importantly, it announced that today was the opening day. Equipped with locally sourced directions, a locally sourced biscuit, and a coffee from a far distant, but guaranteed equally pleasant and equally fair traded, village, I proceeded directly to the Tyndale Rugby Grounds. Miss Fortune being my guiding angel of the day, I arrived early enough to get an excellent seat in the bleachers.

"Directly" in my driving lexicon means simply that I don't "intend" to go anywhere else, although on most days, I do. On good days I always do. On some very good days I don't even reach my intended destination. On this particular Thursday morning I crossed the latest edition of the original "Cor Bridge" over the Tyne ("Cor! Tha's a bridge, 'en it?"), inspected the roundabout twice and then veered off as instructed toward the train station. A kilometre or so down the road I passed a particularly nattily dressed pensioner with driving cap and walking stick. "A pair of bicycle clips," I thought, "And he'd be ready to perambulate in any mode".

Priding myself on that thought, I drove on, somehow missing the train station that I was to look for to know that I'd already missed the laneway to the rugby pitches. This method of giving directions - "When you see this particular landmark, you've missed the one you're looking for" is a definitely a "small country" navigation technique. They don't use it in Saskatchewan, the Sahara, or, I suspect, Death Valley.

Several kilometres further along on the delightfully named road - Tinkler's Bank - I was ruminating on a visit to that esteemed establishment.

"Welcome Sir. Now just how can Tinkler's Bank help You?"

"I'd like to make a deposit."

"You understand that we only accept liquid assets."

"Well, how about this?"

"That's a rather piddling amount, but it is our favourite currency."

This reverie faded fitfully into that slightly hungover feeling of having forgotten something that only identifies itself by its absence. Then I realized that I'd seen a railway station sign on a rise some time ago, but had never seen the station itself. So I made a six-point turn (the road had narrowed considerably) and started back. A few minutes later I was momentarily distracted by signage to Tinkler's Yard and Little Tinkler's Nursery (So that's where the leaky little buggers come from) and didn't notice that I was in fact passing over the tracks, and that the entrance to the train station was a small steel staircase down from the overpass. This was definitely overstretching the term "landmark". There, now off to the right on a parallel lane, was the fellow with driving cap but with nowt to drive. So once more round the roundabout and back to that unmarked exit to the rugby pitches ("Why would you need a sign? Everyone knows where it is.") I successfully negotiated the long anticipated but seldom seen corner and went down the leafy laneway past the now reassuringly familiar sight of the gent with no bicycle clips and into the parking lot.

After soaking up the atmosphere for a few minutes, my now favorite cap and walking stick hove into view. A short time later he arrived beside me at the bleacher. As we looked out over the empty field together, he ventured, "I'd say we're a little early, wouldn't you?". The only evidence for the possibility of an event here was the notices announcing that the Car Boot Sale had been moved to another field due to the Steam Gala. Upon reflection I concluded that the dear old soul in the front office once again put the booking dates for the field on the poster as the show dates, still not cluing in to the length of time it takes to herd a pack of thirteen ton tractors, traction engines, steam powered trucks and their attendant caravans and chip wagons into public-ready formation.

I offered my new aquaintance a lift back to town. He politely declined, assuring me that he now had to find something to fill the hours he would have spent at the gala, and the two kilometer walk should just about fit the bill. I passed him again on the way out of the parking lot. As I waved, it struck me that he probably just wasn't interested in a drive down Tinkler's Bank in the wrong direction or several tours of the roundabout. I suspected that he suspected that he'd be eating lunch sooner if he walked.

Undeterred, I proceeded to the car boot sale that had been bumped from the rugby field by the missing Steam Gala but, sadly, came away empty. I was going to say that it's the same trash everywhere, but I'd never seen a large suitcase piled high with remote controls before. But then I don't go to flea markets in Canada. I could have gotten a copy of "The Goon Show Book" but we already have two copies in the house. There was a porcelain statue of an aggressively happy but frighteningly large lady in a very small bathtub with a clearly delirious scrub brush. Not having the necessary pair of wherewithals to take a picture, you'll have to imagine it for yourself.

I drove away from the Car Boot Sale towards the bridge and town, passing my chum who waved and smiled knowing he'd made the right decision. I smiled as well, knowing that if he was going this way, I too was heading in the right direction.

Vicar's Pele, Corbridge

Corbridge is a beautiful little town near one of the Roman sites and a great place to wander about. There's a splendid AngloSaxon-Norman-Medieval church - St. Andrews, which has the first "fortified vicarage" that I'd ever seen. In case you're looking at the picture and asking "Why didn't you show the side with the windows?", this IS the side with the windows.

I'd like to think that the vicar needed the extra firm support because of the "Primitive Methodists" who moved in across the street, but they arrived over 500 years later. No, the irritating neighbour that caused the vicar to found his house within a rock wasn't a Methodist, but a Scot of the Looterin' persuasion - William Wallace, who burnt and sacked Corbridge, twice. Then Robert the Bruce did it and, among others, so did David I.

Leaving Corbridge, I drove east along Hadrian's Wall, south through the Lake District, north through the West Dales, several times around the compass west of Manchester, and finally north, west, south and west into North Wales.

Found at the Roman Site of Chesters

One of the great things about going along Hadrian's wall is driving past the Roman forts. That's not to say that you should skip the forts entirely, though there is a certain amount of sameness to them. They're a bit like archaeological digs of McDonald's restaurants a few millennia on from now. They're really a lot the same - deliberately. They didn't bring in a hot new designer for each one.

Phil: Stone the crows! Three fryers! Just what do you make of that?
Mick: Could very well be a high status McDonald's.
Francis: Looks like "ritual" to me. The middle one's definitely ceremonial...

For me, seeing the remnants of the forts is really a backgrounder for history and stories encountered elsewhere. Unlike sites from later ages, it's hard work to evoke the time and life from the "floorplan" remains, but it can be quite inspiring to look over some of the views and see a landscape that's very similar to that seen by the Romans.

In any case, driving by the forts, you have an experience that is almost as unusual in Britain today as it was when the Romans set up housekeeping and road maintenance. The road is straight. Straight like an Ontario concession road. Straight like, shall we say, a Roman road. It's the B6318 and it's called the Roman Military Road. After driving down from Glasgow, and subsequently driving to London, I believe that this was not only the straightest road that I drove on in the UK, it was the only straight road I drove on in the UK.

Castlerigg Stone Circle (Click photo for more)

Castlerigg is to the north of the Lake District in the Cumbrian highlands. This Stone Circle is described in my English Heritage Guide as the most spectacularly located circle in England and it certainly seems so to me. There's only a hundred or so other circles to check out before I can commit definitively. The site was swarming with twelve year olds with measuring gear on a school outing with math teacher (orange jacket) bellowing from time to time - "Come on boys - get the job done!" I think he was enjoying it. I know the kids and I were.

When you look at a stone circle like Castlerigg it really makes you realize how great the human race is. Countless visits by aliens to earth and the most they have to show for it is a few short-lived crop circles and hazy memories of anal probes. Now those beaker people built things that still say "I was here", "I had really big biceps" and "Time for another bevvy".

Along the dales

Some places are hard to find, even hard to find out about. On the other hand, some call out to you. At least they call out to me.

Giggleswick and Wigglesworth

I used to think the Yorkshire building society pairing of Bradford and Bingley was slightly silly with Bradford being the sober and moderating influence on irrepressible Bingley. Imagine a prudent successful financial institution called Giggleswick and Wigglesworth (they're less than five miles apart). You can't. Can you?

Having married into a gang of Brass Bandidos, I'd hoped to stop and catch part of the Saddleworth Whit Friday Band Competitions which happened on the Friday (June 5). My plan was to arrive at noon spend a few hours shakin' booty to the tunes and then hit the road to lay down with the lambs in North Wales by early evening (in the farm-stay B&B sense, not the biblical sense). Prior to checking the updated website on Thursday, I thought that the competitions started in the afternoon, after the Whit Walks in the morning. In fact, they start about 4:30pm and finish about 11:00pm. The competition sites are spread out through a rabbit warren of hilltop and valley towns in Saddleworth. Forty-five minutes of getting lost among the road diversions and parking restrictions convinced me that the only way to see any of the competition would be to book into a hotel long prior to the start of things. Must do that some time.

Sadly, it appeared that I just missed the end of the Whit Walk because of an ongoing abusive relationship I had with two roundabouts in Oldham. No matter how badly they treated me, I went back. But no matter how often I went back, neither of them would ever show me any favour. I must have spent at least 45 minutes in a town I was direly warned not to enter in the first place.

So on to Wales.

Cult of the Pepperpot

2009-05-17T16:02:00.036-04:00

First - An admission.

At some point in the mid sixties, I'd rush home to watch Dr. Who with William Hartnell as The Doctor - that is Dr#1. I distinctly recall watching what I now know to be the very first episode - "An Unearthly Child - Why does Susan Foreman live in a Police Box in a junkyard?".

Then I left those childish things behind (Hey, it was the seventies, man).

At the beginning of the eighties, we'd sit down and watch Tom Baker (Dr#4) as Dr. Who for the wit and silliness. Of course, I also read Playboy for the interviews.

Some Baker era Doctoring from "City of the Dead" scripted by Douglas Adams:

Other than that, I've had little interest in the perpetually resurrected program. However, I clearly stand alone in this country. When it needs something to restore its manhood, England seems to close its eyes and think of the Doctor. How long it can keep this up is open to debate. I remember from the Tom Baker era that the Doctor can only regenerate 12 times. Or is it regenerate 11 times for 12 existences? I don't recall, but given that next season introduces Dr#11, they're either on or approaching thin ice.

Now you've paid your admission, let's get on with it.

Just a few weeks I was telling a friend "J." about the performance of "Enjoy" a play by Alan Bennett that I'd just seen in London, when I pulled out a bit of previously-believed-to-be-useless trivia. David Troughton, who played the male lead in "Enjoy" was the son of Patrick Troughton, the second Dr. Who. I trumped myself by recalling that I'd first seen David in "A Very Peculiar Practice" - a particularly offbeat dark comedy about life at a university. Peculiar Practice starred Peter Davison who is perhaps best known as Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small, but is also known as the fifth Dr. Who. This prompted J. to recall "I was at school with David's brother Michael (yet another actor...)." "Aha," I thought, "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon? How about Three Degrees of Dr. Who" Probably nobody in the UK is more than three degrees away from one of the (so far) 11 Dr. Whos. I mentioned this idea to J. who smiled and said "I guess so, David Tennant (Dr. Who #10) lives around the corner and is a regular at the cafe where my daughter works after school".

Finally. A contest everyone can win.

However, far sillier than Tom Baker ever was are the Daleks. I'll wager that the Daleks are the worst designed robots ever. I'll give the designers credit that they didn't just build another tin man. And given that they were introduced in episode 2 of the first season their design may have been driven by a budget limiting them to using whatever was already in the workshop or available from the cleaning staff and could be assembled with PVC glue. (Fingertips difficulty of 3.).

So, given a robot that could be neutralized by a rubber mat, a flight of steps, or a can of string cheese, you'd think they'd have been finished years ago. Ten Doctors later they are still here. Kind of like Fidel Castro. Ten US presidents later and he's still there.

So far, in less then five weeks in England, I've encountered Daleks three or possibly four times. And, to be honest, I hadn't expected to see even one until the Dr Who Museum in Land's End.

Daleks at the Shrewsbury Cartoon Festival

Daleks at Meccanuity

A Dalek in Waterstone Book Store, Lincoln

Victorian Era Steam Driven Dalek at Coalbrookdale

Police Call Box at Land's End

We didn't go in. Daleks are only fun when you come across them unexpectedly. (Besides, "tacky" is to Land's End as "wet" is to the Atlantic Ocean that it sits on.)

Why are the Daleks such darlings? Well the obvious answer is that they are silly. But I think it goes deeper than that, and I don't mean deeply silly. Daleks are genetically, developmentally and temperamentally the eternal underdogs. These are not the American style of underdogs that whip the pants off the arrogant overdog in the third period, fourth quarter, or ninth inning. Daleks appeal to that English love of the hopeless underdog that needs to be taken home, given a warm cup of tea, wrapped up in a blanket and returned to the shelter of the protected copse when they've recovered. Daleks are just overgrown mechanical hedgehogs in need of a St. Tiggywinkles hospital.

Whereas the Borg could rule the galaxy but for some singular flaw in their design, the Daleks couldn't fetch a tray of sandwiches if the floors had just been waxed.

It'll all end unhappily should James Dysan design the next aluminum (or is that aluminium?) and rubber pepperpot for the Doctor. I'm sure that when they suck, they'll suck like a black hole. When they exterminate, everything'll check in and nothing'll check out. And more than with any Borg, Cyberman, or Vogon, resistance will indeed be futile. They'll get the job done but they won't be nearly as endearing as the poor klutzes of yesteryear.

Shrop 'til you Drop - Ironbridge

2009-05-17T11:58:00.015-04:00

Coalbrookdale, as you may not have known and I certainly didn't, was the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution and as such is now a UNESCO heritage site. The painting to the right is by William Williams - makes you wonder if his patrons paid the bill twice. In 2009 it's celebrating the 300th anniversary of that blessed event when one Abraham Darby realized that iron ore and coke smelt brilliant together. This process dominated the area's industry until the discovery of rum.

In 1777, one Darby's grandsons, known as "Aye, aye, aye, Sir" to his employees, "Old Three Eyes Abe" to his friends, and Abraham Darby III to history, started work on the first iron bridge over what is now known as Ironbridge Gorge in Coalbrookdale.
The iron business is pretty much gone from Coalbrookdale but it has been replaced with a cornucopia of museums, including the Museum of Iron, a Victorian town, a tile museum, a china museum and a teddy bear museum. The last one seemed to me to be a little peripheral and somewhat opportunistic. However, I was put in my place when I read in the brochure that it has examples of early coal fired teddy bears and a rare prototype cast iron bear given to A. A. Milne. According to the insurance claim, the prototype's maiden voyage bump, bump, bump down the stairs on the back of its head did £7/4/5¹/₂d damage to the stair treads and balustrade and left Christopher Robin with a permanent limp and the inability to say "Pooh" without producing some of the same.

But the reason I went to Coalbrookdale wasn't to visit the museums, although I'd certainly like to go back and pump iron there some day (intellectually speaking). I went to see went to see a boffo show of engineering know how, enthusiasm and wit - "Meccanuity 2009". This annual Meccanno fest is held in a hands-on kids museum called Enginuity. It was a gas...

A few more pictures from the area:

Coalbrookdale and Ironbridge

Shrop 'till You Drop - Much Wenlock

2009-05-11T05:17:00.013-04:00

Much Wenlock - so named to distinguish it from Little Wenlock. So, much ado about little.
It's a pretty little town nestled in the hills south east of Shrewsbury. All the pretty ones nestle, don't they?

"Much More Books" is in the high street. I wonder if that's Abraham Znaimer's - the uncle Moses snitched and modernized his idea from. (Thas a Canadian joke)

Shown above is the guildhall - a particularly fine building. The lower level is the market place, and upstairs is a courtroom (now a visitor center) and the council chambers. The chambers are still in use and feel like they were designed by people who wanted to make a serious impression with a double dose of gravitas, but didn't want to be seen as ostentatious. The result is a room that is peculiarly grand and cosy at the same time.

Before heading to the ruined Cluniac priory, I stopped in to a deli, and lined up at the counter. When my turn came, I got the lowdown on what was on, what was off, and what all the local terms meant. After a few minutes pleasant discussion with the counter lady, I settled on a cheese and onion soup, field mushroom salad with fresh locally made compote and , warmed multigrain bread.

"Oh, and a coffee. White." I said, completing the order and feeling as proud as if I'd just ordered a particularly challenging rijsttafel in Swahili.
"Is that to eat in or takeaway?"
"Eat in."
"Please take a seat and I'll come over and take your order".

Fortunately we didn't have to do the entire rigamorole again, but I was taught my lesson.

The Priory had an unexpected treat, as this video shows:

More of my pictures of the town and the Priory at:

Much Wenlock

Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival

2009-05-08T05:36:00.013-04:00

There were two reasons for the timing of my visit to Shrewbury - to see Steeleye Span on May 1st and to attend the Cartoon Festival the weekend before.

Not surprising at all is that the theme this year's Cartoon Festival was "Science and Darwin". An open air studio was set up on the Market Square where the public could watch artists at work and see cartoons take shape. Click here for a couple of picture sets following the progress of individual cartoons in the studio area.

There were workshops for kids and adults in cartoonery which I didn't participate in. Instead, I attended three very different talks by cartoonists.

Robert Penwill : The Origin of Spaces. Roger was an architect for the better part of three decades, and now cartoons full time. Among many other gigs, he's resident cartoonist for Cadalyst (AutoCAD) magazine. His was a scripted talk with cartoons illustrating the development of architecture. Although he was reading from a script, the talk was a delight as he journeyed from becoming an architect during the days of Brutalism (60s/70s concrete) through cave dwellings and up to the possibly very silly future. The cartoon at the left was his illustration for the introduction of Computer Aided Design. Check out his website here.

Bill Stott: The Science and Philosophy of Serious Ranting – illustrated This was another fish altogether. Something like: "Improvisational standup cartooning." To get a flavour of his performance, check out his blog for April 20th, just before the festival: Bill's Blog. He riffed on lots of subjects, and in less that a minute (often less than 30 seconds) he whipped off an illustration of his current rant. In the picture album here, Bill is seen in the last sequence drawing his Darwin cartoon. See entry How Do You Pronounce Shrewsbury? for one of his rants.

A Bill Stott story (read it to yourself in a Lancashire accent):
Rabbit comes into a butcher shop (Bill pauses to tell and illustrate how bad he is at drawing rabbits. They always come out as kangaroos).
Butcher: May I help you?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher: No this is a butcher shop, you want the green grocer's next door.
Rabbit leaves. Next day, Rabbit enters the butcher shop again.
Butcher: May I help you?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher: No, I told you yesterday, this is a butcher's shop. You want the green grocer's next door.
Rabbit exits. Next day, Rabbit comes in and stands in front of the counter. Butcher stares at him.
Butcher (slowly): What do you want?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher (steaming): Look I've told you twice before and I'm telling you for the last time. This is a butcher's shop. The green grocer's is next door. If you come in here again looking for lettuce, I'll nail your ears to the counter.
Rabbit exits. Next day, Rabbit enters Butcher shop and stands in front of counter. Butcher stares at him fiercely.
Butcher: "What?"
Rabbit: Got any nails?
Butcher: Nails? No.
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?

At the end of the talk, Bill offered to sign any drawings from the easels (there was one on each side of the stage) if attendees wanted to take them away. I got his drawing of a woodworking teacher from the 50s (ex WWII RAF he says) with brown shop coat and "magic pocket" that could hold 47 metal rulers and a mallet.
Steve Bell:[such a superstar that his talk didn't need a title]. Steve Bell has been the resident political cartoonist at the Guardian for decades. Unlike Penwill and Stott, he gave up his first career after a year rather than almost three decades. That career was teaching, and he explained his departure by saying "They know when you don't want to be there".

Steve Bell has created many iconic caricatures of political celebrities such as Maggie Thatcher, John Major (Major Underpants) and George Bush (as a progressively weirder chimpanzee). His talk was fascinating because he described the process of coming up with these caricatures. All of them evolved. Things would happen in one drawing (Bush's long arms) and then get incorporated into the ongoing development of the character. At some point Bell realized 'Oh, he's a chimp' as opposed to the way one might expect it to appear "I think I'll draw Bush as a chimp".

He covered a really satisfying spread of topic on the creative and political aspects of cartooning. All in all, a splendid time.

Where is the Land of Lost Content?

2009-05-05T14:32:00.022-04:00

(and why don't they answer the door?)

Shrop 'til you Drop - Craven Arms

Whenever I meet locals and we get talking, they're almost always interested in what places I was going to visit.

"Ludlow" I'd say.
"Ahh, Ludlow. Lovely place, you'll enjoy Ludlow, where else?"
"Much Wenlock".
"Ahh, Much Wenlock. Lovely place, you'll enjoy Much Wenlock, where else?"
"IronBridge."
"Ahh, IronBridge. Lovely place, you'll enjoy IronBridge, where else?"

This would continue until I got to "Craven Arms", to which I received three different, but not very different, responses:

Where else?
Why would you want to go there?
You don't want to go to Craven Arms. They're all inbred down there.

Whoa! Yes. Somebody really said that.

I stepped off the bus in Craven Arms. "I know that tune," I said to myself pausing. It was "Dueling Banjos". It took a few moments to register because it was being played on hurdy gurdies. Across the Market Square I could see a pair of nasty looking Morris dancers in Doc Martins with itchy hankie fingers. They pulled on their cans of scrumpy and leered at me ominously....

No one ever stopped to explain the disdain for Craven Arms. I'm sure there's a back story like "Didn't you hear what happened there in 1792?!! It's all true you know! The family still live in that house!". The place certainly wasn't large enough to have a football club to challenge "Shrewsbury Town", which would have explained at least some of the denigration.

The reason I wanted to go to Craven Arms was twofold. Just on the outskirts was a Stokesay Castle, a fortified Manor House, and in the town was a curious sounding private museum called "The Land of Lost Content".

The town wouldn't make the top of a "pretty town" list, but it certainly didn't look particularly unpleasant. The main oddity in town was the "Craven Centre" which was a very low rise tin warehouse that would look much more at home as a Co-Op store in a small Saskatchewan town. I tried to take a picture, put the camera refused. The anchor tenant was "Harry Tuffins Supermarket". I had "Harry Tuffins" once, but the doctor gave me a lotion for it.

The only other unusual feature was a sizable deposit of manure on the sidewalk at the bus stop. Perhaps that's a good sign. Maybe they're training the horses not to do it in the street.

I had a nice tea and sandwich in a little cafe and everyone was pleasant in the usual Shropshire way. Five fingers on each hand. No webbing between the fingers. Nothing unusual here.

After lunch I trundled over to the "The Land of Lost Content" which had an "OPEN" sign in the window. Inside at the admission booth however, was a handwritten note "Back in a moment".

I stood outside and took a picture.
Checked the time.
Checked the booth.
Took a picture.
It started to rain.
Perhaps they're upstairs inbreeding.
Checked the time.
Ten minutes and it was getting seriously wet.
Caved and started hoofing it to Stokesay Castle.

Stokesay is a great place. The architecture is largely complete and you can really go to almost every space in the major buildings that would have been in use in its heyday. It's on a human scale rather that the large corporate scale of most "proper" castles. So it's much easier in the rooms of Stokesay to imagine life going on there two hundred or more years ago.

Mere days after my visit, there was outrage in the broadsheets, raised eyebrows in the house and snickers in Craven Arms over the filming of an advertisement for Stratford-upon-Avon at Stokesay Castle - which, as this London Telegraph article points out, is 66 miles and two counties away from the bard's birthplace.

More pics at:

Stokesay Castle

Charles Darwin, Michael Palin & The Selected Salopians Shortlist

2009-05-05T14:26:00.012-04:00

Salop: Old name for Shropshire.
Salopian: Still used as adjective for Shropshire and Shrewsbury.

Did you know Shrewsbury School is the Alma Mater to not only Charles Darwin but Michael Palin as well?

As you walk by the old school even now, you can hear the headmaster, "Michael! Why can't you apply yourself a little more like young Charlie here. He's evolving like a fine young Salopian should and he'll graduate this spring. If you keep on gooning around like Bloodnock and Bluebottle you won't graduate for another 150 years!"

And, you know, he was right.

Here's Clive of India - leading the sailboats to safety... (Salop Saloops?)

And Mad Jack Mytton...

I first ran across the name Mytton on the Mytton and Mermaid pub-hotel just outside of Shrewsbury.
Then I passed the Mytton Arms on the way out of Shrewsbury on the bus.
And passed the Jack Mytton pub on the way into Oswestry on the bus.
Then the Mytton Arms showed up on the front page of the Shropshire Star.
Then a closer look at the slightly swanky Mad Jack's Restaurant in town revealed that it honoured "Mad Jack Mytton".

Obviously this could be worth a little research. Which promptly fell open in my lap. Chapter nine "The Aristocratic Eccentric" of my current reading "In Search of the English Eccentric" (Henry Hemming) revealed that Mad Jack Mitton was a Shropshire gent nominated by the author as "...by far the most eccentric toff of the Regency period". He was known for riding into a dinner party in hunting gear calling "Tally Ho", "pulling off a staggering number of stunts involving a gig, an obstacle, and speed...", and, my favorite, having a trapdoor built in the dining room so that his giraffe could join him for meals. The fun ended at age 38 when he died of delerium tremens in debtors' prison.

Hemming immediately followed Mitton with an item on Hew Kennedy, a modern Salopian known for, among many other things, building a trebuchet for tossing cars, pianos and dead livestock (Fetchez la vache!) . The machine has gone to Stratford upon Avon although there's a bigger one in the works....

A longer Youtube of Hew's Trebuchet

Shrop 'til you Drop - Ludlow

2009-05-04T12:43:00.011-04:00

The Feathers, Ludlow

Ludlow was high on my list of Shropshire towns to visit because:

It has a great castle
It is Britain's first official "Slow City".
May 1st is the start of the Ludlow MayDay Fair.

Slow City is a concept that started in Italy and follows on the concept of Slow Food. Great food fabulously prepared from local produce and a whole way of town life oriented to the same principles.

So, start with beautiful Ludlow, a cafe on the Market square and the traditional May Day Fair. What could go wrong? Write your answers down and seal them in the envelopes now before you read any further.

The May Day Fair turned out to be an itinerant carny caravan of voluntary-vomit-trauma whirlygigs and matching food wagons (In Nova Scotia it used to be "Bill Lynch Shows"). The Market Square was packed with tractor trailers, neon, machinery and the smell of food that was far, far too slow in getting to Ludlow and not nearly fast enough getting out.

So "Slow Day in Ludlow" ended up being "Quick Retreat to the Castle" followed hastily by "Any Bus to Craven Arms".

Ludlow Castle has a typical square Norman keep, which it makes up for with a really different and unique circular chapel. Catch it at the end of the video below.

Here's a link to some photos.

Ludlow Castle

And here's a little run down the Keep Steps (100% natural nausea induction):

Shrewsbury - A lovely place for a Medieval Grope.

2009-05-04T08:43:00.009-04:00

More pictures and comments at Shrewsbury Pics

I first passed through Shrewsbury in 1977 when I had a two hour layover waiting for a bus and have planned to return ever since. It's a great place that is (according to its tourist bumph) one of England's finest medieval towns. The geography alone makes it fascinating. This view is pinched from Webb Aviation . Check them out for more.

The town is packed with all that stuff you want in a proper olde Englishe towne - great piles of interestingly arranged stones and bricks, half timbered houses and narrow passage ways. And is remarkably free of the things you really don't want in an olde Englishe towne - lots of signs with supurflous "e"s on the ends of words like "Olde Englishe Towne". This is at least in part because the town is not dominated by tourism. It feels like it is just a long running show that works, and so it keeps on going on the way it did before.

I have to contrast Shrewsbury with York. The City of York is a wonderful place. Let me qualify that. York is a splendidly wonderful place. But, York is so successful at being York, that, if tourism failed, the Shambles ( a great warren of old shops) would have to find a new purpose, the Minster would not be able to fund its almost continuous cloak of scaffolding and Richard III (who was several parts a Shropshire lad having spent a stretch of his youth in Ludlow) might have to close his tawdry museum there. Shrewsbury, on the other hand, would definitely be hit by a loss of tourism, but I really don't think the town would change much.

Instead of being "preserved" or "restored" it feels like it's just evolved. That'll be qualified later.

I'm pleased to have worked in a reference to evolution because Shrewsbury is the birthplace of Darwin and 2009 is his 200th birthday. This year it's All Darwin, All the Time here. (Click poster to enlarge)

Anyway, to get a little feel for the place, here's my first go at a video [predates the Coleham video] - Down Bear Steps and Grope Lane...

And yes, Grope Lane is so named because of the activity that once took place there. The nice lady at the Civic Society referred to it as 'The little lane at the bottom of Bear Steps" and a modest guide book said it was so named because 'it was so dark that you had to grope your way along it'. Sorry mate, I been down a bunch of these passages and this'n ain't no darker than the others. You may be familiar with a similar but more explicitly named lane in London. Shrewsbury's Grope Lane also had a similiar name early on. You may well ask: "And what is that name?" Not in my blog you don't.

These narrow passages crisscross the town between the streets and are known also as "shuts". Like a lot of the terminology particular to this area, the origins of 'shut' are obscure. One attempt attached it to a particular family name, but I'd tend toward some origin related to the word chute - going down some of these "shuts" many of these places feel like going down a chute.

More pictures and comments at Shrewsbury Pics

Where's my toothpaste?

2009-05-03T13:29:00.012-04:00

Last night, I'd discovered a local ASDA - the WalMart subsidiary in the UK - not 10 minutes from my B&B. Being veggie (and toothpaste) deprived I picked up a good load of peppers, tomatoes and other garden veggies at about Canadian or better prices. And a tube of toothpaste. When I got to the room, shown below, I unloaded the loot on the bed and sorted the stuff out. Toothpaste, veggies, knife, all accounted for. Gorged myself on a great Greek salad without the Feta, olives, olive oil or balsamic vinegar

But now, I can't find my toothpaste. Can you?

(In case you think this is a case of "Who Moved my Cheese" I guarantee you that I can find the cheese - old cheddar with chives and onion. It's stashed with the veggies. If I don't finish tonight, by tomorrow everyone will be able to find it)

I had hoped to come back from my tripping about today to find the toothpaste on the sink or the desk thanks to the landlady cleaning the room. But just to be on the safe side I decided to stop at the Spar (7/11) and pick up another tube.

On coming up Monkmoor from the Abbey to the Spar, I was passed by a someone riding a wheelchair-scooter at what appeared to be full tilt. When I got to the shop, the scooter was parked outside. I took a look around but couldn't see any one hobbling about. There was a gangly looking fellow paying for his purchase with masses of pennies, another man with some bread and, behind of me in line, a young woman on her mobile. The cell phone is such a wonderful invention, especially when you're travelling. You don't have to sidle up to a couple of people to surreptitiously tune in to their conversation in order to get a taste of local life, with cellphones, it's broadcast to you. "Yeahs", she said, "Ahh've boooked ous a table at the Kay Eff See for tonight". Booked a table at the KFC? Now I know we're not in Canada anymore, Toto.

At this point the gangly fellow finished piling up his coins, took his goods, and, making like Steve McQueen, jumped on the wheelchair scooter and took off down Monkmoor.

Welfare Fraud? or just just a case of
"Dad? can I take the car tonight?"
"Only if you promise not to burn rubber in the high street again."

The first tube of toothpaste didn't show up. But I think it was worth it to pay twice for entertainment like this.

Coleham Pumping Station - A Jewel Box Victorian Steam Plant

2009-04-27T05:35:00.011-04:00

Coleham Pumping Station is a great Victorian steam powered sewage pumping station. Saved from the void by enthusiasts (steam enthusiasts, not sewage enthusiasts) who formed the Shrewbury Steam Trust in 1992 after Coleham closed down in the seventies, it's maintained purely by volunteer effort.

The folk who maintain it are that species of mechanical devotee that unfortunately only seem to breed profusely in Britain.

I was fortunate to be there on one of the six Open Days that they hold each year. The following video pretty much covers it all. It was shot from the hip using my Nikon Coolpix 6000 in movie mode.

Shrewsbury Abbey - Cadfael Slept Here

2009-04-26T16:33:00.012-04:00

Shrewbury Abbey (Abbey of St Peter and St Paul) is not just ABC (Another Bloody Cathedral/Church/Castle/etc). It's the other end of the spectrum - one of the great Abbeys that became a parish church. One great honkin' parish church, mind you, but has this local feel wrapped all around by masses of history.

It's a bit of a Rodney Dangerfield as in "I don't get no respect". It was picked away at and downsized after the dissolution of the monasteries, ending with Telford knocking down the remaining cloisters to push a road through to Holyhead. The Refectory pulpit remains forlornly abandoned in the carpark across the road. The church now sits on what is essentially a traffic island.

Even the clock that was added to the front was an insult to the design.

"Well Vicar, that's a lovely bit of brickwork in the middle and we wouldn't want to touch that, now would we? Tell you what we'll do. We'll put it up just to the left and the when you can scrape together a few more pounds, we'll put a barometer on the right hand side to balance it out like."

I can hear the church sighing like Marvin the Robot in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

The top picture is taken from the Wildlife Heritage Trust, situated in the old Infirmary across the street. Up until 2000 this was the site of "Shrewsbury Quest" a tourist thingy that milked the fame of the Cadfael mystery novels by Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter). If you're not familiar with Cadfael - he's a 12th century Benedictine monk-detective, not to be confused with the 21st century detective named Monk on TV. Shrewsbury Quest went under in, some say, suspicious circumstances. So there's no Cadfael tourist business around now, except that you can purchase a Cadfael novel at the Abbey and have is stamped "Purchased from Shrewsbury Abbey".

The Cadfael TV series starring Derek Jacoby presented the Abbey and the monk in cliches of pale smooth stone buildings and an elegant and smoothly moving reverent but worldly character. In fact the books portray Cadfael as a stocky, bandy legged ex-sea captain and reality protrays the abbey with a darker variegated rough stone. Something pleasingly symetrical in that.

Inside, the church is at once small and local and large and impressive. The nave used to be over 300 feet long but has been shortened after bits of it fell in. In the picture here the four massive round columns and arches above them are the only remains of the original 11th century Norman church.

And there's a great sense of community. Here a retired Knight mucks in with washing up.

Click here for more Shrewsbury Abbey pictures

How do you pronounce Shrewsbury?

2009-04-25T18:37:00.051-04:00

In my youth someone said "Well, they spell it ShREWsbury and pronounce it ShROEsbury. Now guess how they pronounce Worcester and Cholmondeley".

I thought that was the last word on it until I started listening to Genevieve Tudor's Folk from Shrewsbury on BBC via the internet. Genevieve and many on her show pronounce it ShREWsbury. The waiter at the curry house last night (born and bred in Telford, just down the road) pronounced it so "Shreeoodly" that it sounded like he was straining it though a couple of umlauts on the way out. On the other hand, in the train arrival announcements it was consistently pronounced "ShROEsbury".

The author of the walking guide to Shrewsbury that I picked up simply answers the question with "I don't rightly know" but goes on to recommend "Let's just stick with Scrobbsbyrig (its Anglo Saxon name). It's got a certain ring to it. " Clever answer, but given that this is the land which gave us the pronunciation "Fanshawe" for the spelling "Featherstonehaugh", I don't feel much further ahead.

Yesterday morning, I attended a talk at the Shrewsbury Cartoon Festival by Bill Stott called "The Science and Philosophy of Serious Ranting" at which he opened with a warm-up rant about whether it's ShREWsbury or ShROEsbury. His exasperated conclusion was "Why can't you just call it Blackburn? Everyone knows how to pronounce 'Blackburn'". He's from Lancashire and pronounces it "ShREWsbury" which ties in with the tour guide's comments (he's from Northumberland) that northerners tend towards "ShREWsbury".

So that settled it nice and tidily for a couple of hours. The north says 'REW' and the south says 'ROE' and the midlands are the battlefield between them. I mentioned this North-South pronounciation split to the barman at the Loggerheads pub and he said that it was the posh folk what say "ShROEsbury" and the fibblenarders what say "ShREWsbury". He didn't actually say fibblenarders but some other word so totally unfamiliar to me that it roared in my one good ear and, despite no possible exit out the other side, failed to leave even the slightest impression. I should swallow my pride and become a much better listener by asking people to repeat things like that. Perhaps if I got a big brass ear trumpet and shouted "What?" frequently I'd become a much more well-informed uni-auriculoid. Anyway, he then qualified this by saying that posh folk who want to be cool have now taken to saying "ShREWsbury".

The barmaid piped in that it depends on which bridge you came over. She was undoubtedly referring to the English Bridge or the Welsh Bridge - the two main and ancient bridges over the Severn into Shrewsbury. One can only presume that if you took one of the other four bridges into town, your pronunciation would be unpredictable, possibly unintelligible, and a source of mirth, consternation, or both when asking directions. This bridge hypothesis fits a tasty chunk of the empirical data and sounds like a neat and tidy thing to tell the tourists. In other words, there is a grain of something in this. ShREWsbury does seem like a reasonable Welsh pronounciation of English ShROEsbury.

Then I went to a reader's theatre performance of "Better than a Dog - The relationship of Charles and Emma Darwin dramatically revealed through their letters and journals." Charles consistently was a ROEer while Emma was a REWer. "Aha!", I thought "There's a gender split as well". The glow of this discovery wore off quickly as I realised that the actors were speaking more or less modern English without a trace of Charles' and Emma's undoubtedly Victorian Midland dialect. While the director may well have had great respect for "The Origin of Species", he or she didn't give the slightest lip service to "The Origin of Speakers". So this was possibly just a red herring. But it might still be a split between the red herring and the blue himming.

Warning: Diachronic Linguistic Banter Ahead!

We'll start with the Anglo Saxon name for the area - Scrobbs. I understand that it sounds much sexier when pronounced by a real Anglo Saxon.
The town was known as Scrobbs-Byrig and the administrative region around it was known as Scrobbs-Scir.
If we take both Scrobbs-Byrig and Scrobbs-Scir and apply the common "Anglo Saxon to English" sound change "Sk becomes Sh" as in "Anglo Saxon 'Scip' -> English 'Ship'" we get Shrobbs-Byrig and Shrobbs-Shir.
So far so good. '-byrig' evolved to modern '-bury' in most place names in England. Sceftesbyrig -> Shaftesbury. and '-shir' is simply the modern '-shire'. So now we're up to Shrobbsbury and Shrobbsshire.
Next we get some simplification of the consonant cluster "bbsb" in Shrobbsbury. Sound unlikely? Take an otherwise easy to pronounce word, put "bbsb" into the middle of it and over time something will give. Come back in few hundred years and folks will have found an easier way to say it. Remember the example of Featherstonehaugh above.
Driven by the anticipation of the unvoiced "s" the voiced "b" unvoices over time and becomes a "p" and presto! Shrobbsbury has become Shropsbury. Much easier for a modern English speaker to say now, isn't it?
And by the same process, the anticipation of the unvoiced "sh" changes Shrobbshire to Shropshire centuries before Shakespeare, just two counties away in Warwickshire, has taken his wit out to sharpen.
And if it hasn't done so by then, give it another few generations, (pages fly off the calendar) and the still somewhat cumbersome "psb" in Shropsbury will simplify by dropping the leading plosive ("p", in this case). So we're up to something like Shrawsbury. Yet even easier to say, isn't it?
Which the Welsh would be happy to pronounce "ShREWsbury".
And the English will pronounce ShROEsbury for reasons known only to themselves.
Now before we're off to the pub, let's pause and think of the wonder of linguistics. Although Shrewsbury and Shropshire are from the same root, and the Welsh may have re-tuned ShROEsbury to ShREWsbury, ShROPhire never became ShREWPshire. Because, I'm sure you'll agree, ShROPhire is much easier to pronounce than ShREWPshire, though still a little trickier than Blackburn.

Given the North/South, Welsh/English, Male/Female, Posh/Common conflicts, and the fact that it is spelled Shrewsbury, leads me to speculate that ShREWsbury is in the ascendant and that ShROEsbury will soon be nothing but an archaic affectation. Check back in ten years locally, twenty years in London and maybe fifty years around the world.

Does that answer your question?

Backstage Tour at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane

2009-04-22T17:14:00.009-04:00

My guide book warned that the Drury Lane Backstage tour was a bit light on the beef and heavy on the confection, presumably in part because it had to be puffed up since it was unlikely that we'd go to the really interesting places like the booth, the flys, the trap room, etc. So I dialed down my expectations to settle for hams in tights, corn in powdered wigs and lots of cheese over everything.

However, it seems like Padre Patrone NoPatrones, the patron saint of poor patronage was smiling on me that day. Only four customers showed up so they sent the chorus line home and we were given a much more informal (and probably more nutritious) tour.

The current Drury Lane is the fourth on or near the site. The history of the theatre buildings not unlike the scene between Herbert and his Father in Monty Python and the Holy Grail:

FATHER: Listen, lad. I built this kingdom up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was swamp. Other kings said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show 'em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So, I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp, but the fourth one... stayed up!

At Drury lane, the first theatre was build in 1663. Unfortunately the Great Fire of London was due shortly, in 1666. Fortunately, the theatre survived the fire unscathed while the rest of the city was destroyed. Unfortunately, six years later, it burnt down.

In 1674 the second theatre went up and lasted for 120 years without burning down, so they pulled it down to build what was called "The Fireproof Theatre". It had all the fireproofing money could buy including the first Fire Curtain to separate the audience from the stage and huge tanks of water on the roof to be unleashed if fire broke out.

Like most safety systems that are never used or tested, maintenance gets sloppy.

After 15 years, the long expected fire arrived just when no one expected it.

The fire curtain came down.
The valves opened.
A little cartoon puff of dust came out of the water spigots.
The tanks were empty and probably had been for years.

So the third theatre burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp.

But the fourth one... the fourth one stayed up!

We couldn't go onstage (Health and safety, don't you know), we couldn't take pictures of the stage because the set for Oliver was just standing there naked and Fagan would sue us for copyright infringement, so the tour was mainly through the Royal boxes, the Royal Circle, a small (but interesting) stretch of corridors backstage and the trap room. And this isn't your mouse-trap room or even your bear-trap room. This is a serious Elephant Trap Room.

A great late victorian collection of massive pistons that can run independently. In a show in the twenties they had a set of the Titanic heaving and tossing using these.

Really cool...

Getting the Full Marx in Highgate Cemetery

2009-04-21T18:11:00.039-04:00

I trotted up to Highgate today.

And "up" is the operative word.

At the Highgate tube station, I looked at the "Local Area" map and saw that Highgate Cemetery was at the bottom of the map and thought to myself - Great! "Put the horses in the wagon - it's all downhill from here". In fact it was at least two thirds uphill. Shortly I began to feel like the grand Old Duke of York. I honestly didn't know there was a hill like that in London.

Finally at the top I found Highgate, and half of the reason it was called that - I never found the gate. A very wonderful place worthy of a good bit of snuffling around. But I headed straight down the other side to Highgate Cemetary.

Highgate Cemetery is known to most tourists as the final resting place of one of the Marx brothers, but even without that distinction it would be worth the effort to see.

Bloomsbury for the Dead.

A community of quiet distinction.

Row Homes to die for where you know your neighbours.Or if you don't, it doesn't matter.

A place where you can put down roots. And if you're not into gardening, something else will put them down for you.

Where all your neighbours - artists, writers and bon vivants - are inclined in quietly interesting ways. Just not in the same direction...

And the locals sing mournful dirges on the corner outside the pub on Friday nights. They've been together for years.

Of course, that's what the advertising says, but the reality is that all you have to get is one of the "Nouveaux Socialistes" to move in and put up a monstrosity grossly out of proportion with the community around them and, well, there goes the neighbourhood.

Here's a tomb that could accomodate at least 100 souls occupied by a single stiff that declared he had no soul. You know he's really only here to annoy the Church of England folk around him.

All the same, it was sad that the four brothers couldn't be laid side by side, despite the claims of Marya Rutkowski (reputedly the inventor of pole dancing) that she did just that in 1903.

Zippo who was inspired by his brother, Gusto to invent the disposable lighter, moved to Edinburgh for a better light. Sadly he was unexpectedly cremated during Beltane in 1938. "Accidentally", they say. The coroner concluded that it was "Death by Mispronounciation", "Beltane" sounding dangerously close to "Butane" in the Edinburgh accent, especially after several whiskies.

Oxo, whom his most famous brother claimed crumpled under the yoke of capitalist oppression, died in 1953 as probably one of the first victims of steroid abuse.

But, at last account, Gusto still has the wind behind him and is as going as strong as ever. As recent as 2006 he was making an enviable living as a dance partner at Florida retirement homes. This gives credence to the idea that, once you're over 100, flatulence doesn't matter.

Coda

Heading back to town, I saw posters for a "Kenneth Williams Extravaganza" called "Stop Messing About!". That sounds interesting, said I, for the time being putting aside my first reaction which was "I thought he was dead". I caught the tube to Leicester Square to check out the theatre where it was playing called "Leicester Square Theatre" and to check out cheap tickets at the classic cheap ticket outlet. I couldn't find the theatre - it wasn't in my guide and wasn't on the theatre map in the square. The cheap ticket vendor said the theatre was at the top of the square, just behind the Hagen Daz Ice Cream shop. I eventually found the place and it turned out to be a cabaret style theatre. The poster at the theatre also named Kenneth Horne, whom I was more certain was dead than I was alive.

I realized that it was a classic big-city scam. They'd seen me pay three pounds to see a bunch of dead people in Highgate, none of whom was remotely as funny as Williams or Horne (at least not any more) and figured they could take me for twenty pounds to see a performance "in the manner of..." two guys who were, by comparison, hardly dead at all.

Proud of my cleverness, I went back to my coop in the hotel.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere There's Signs...

2009-04-21T14:31:00.024-04:00

May I suggest a 1968 Chardonnay Heston?

Get Down!

...and it does tricks too. So much better than the flash-frozen ones we get in Canada...

A school for those who get stressed by the idea of perfection...

As they say here, a T(ea) can make all the difference...

A food shop called "Late Bland". Modesty or under- statement over- kill?

"Yes Guv'nor. You can see from the bruising just there under the gills that we really take the gloves off to bring you the best for your dining pleasure..."

Canada House on the Move

2009-04-21T12:52:00.008-04:00

In keeping with the Harper Government's announcement to sell off federal properties in Canada, Ottawa announced today that they've downsized the grand Canada House on Trafalgar square shown here:

...to the back of a Spar Convenience store in the HayMarket, shown below:

Clearly visible in the window is the Tim Hortons logo, to whom the Government has sold the UK franchise for the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Rumour has it the Ottawa is trying to entice several recently retired Canadian show business icons back to operate the information booth at the back of the shop:

Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah...

From Arrival to Beavers in the Moonlight

2009-04-17T10:15:00.016-04:00

So it looks like the jetlag prep works. I've always suffered horribly from jetlag - usually walking around London in a stunned haze for two to three days until I adjust. This time I started rolling the clock back by getting up at 4:00 am and going to bed early. I also,somewhat less successfully tried to roll back my meal times, which new research has indicated is as much an issue as the actual wake up time - two different body clocks that could end up fighting it out. The third tact was to use a daylight lamp when I woke up at 4:00am so that instead of falling back to sleep with a coffee in my hand I convinced the somewhat dim brightness part of my brain that the sun really was up.

Of course - the Transat flight was on an aged A320 or the like where one must shift one's butt every twenty minutes or so to avoid blood starvation to the nether regions so the planned six hours sleep amounted to considerably less...

I peeled away from the hotel on my travelcard and got to the Wallace collection by 1:00pm when the lecture on a fascinating exhibit - "Treasures of the Black Death" was to start. The Wallace collection is one of the London Museums that I will never see in it's entirety. Not be cause it's big (and it is fairly so) but because it's stacked to the ceiling with that over stuffed, over glittered, and over done rich folk junk that gave gilt, naked ladies and upholstery a bad name. And let's not start on the cherubs. The "Treasures" exhibit consists of several hoardes buried in Europe during the Black Plague - almost certainly by Jews trying to escape the latest reason for a pogrom - they were being held responsible for the plague. The exhibit was mostly incredibly small gold and silver items like jewellery and coins. Magnifying glasses were provided to see items such as a lock and key about a quarter inch long. There were over three thousand coins - but a few were pulled out as representational. The exhibit provided the only distinctly Jewish pieces were a three wedding rings that were phenomenal(That's one in the pic). Each represented a house (of the couple) or the Jerusalem Temple. These were crafted in amazing detail.

I'd planned to see this exhibit since reading about it before leaving and only learned about the lecture/tour when I picked up Time Out magazine at Gatwick - the mandatory first purchase for anyone in a London Airport, even before coffee. Imagine my horror when I paused for another coffee later in the day and found that the next item in the Wallace Collection agenda that immediately followed the lecture I had attended was "500 Years Ago... An armour handling and making workshop". In America they say "DOH!". Here they say "Stupid Wanker". I've convinced myself that the workshop was sold out. That's the only way I'll sleep. Yet another reinforcement of the dictum - read the instructions right though to the end before commencing assembly.

So I wandered out of the Wallace Collection and straight up the backside of Selfridges. Grand as it is, the stories of Selfidges these days mainly seems to concentrate on how Mr. Selfridge (an American) built up his magnificent emporium with diligent Wisconsin hard work and, in mid life, looked at what he'd created and suddenly decided that girls were more interesting. From the accountancy point of view, it all went downhill from there. The general sentiment seems to be that it's sad that that he is now remembered for blowing all his cash on the good times and on the Dolly twins in particular (Exactly as illustrated), and finally ending his life poverty stricken in a bedsit instead of continuing to build up an empire that he could have left to someone else. On the other hand, to misquote Bill Bryson (in detail, not in spirit) "He got to shag a pair of twins which is what it's all about, en it?". To assume that Mr. Selfridge had any regrets could possibly be a bit presumptuous.

Then on to my old stomping ground - the Picadilly end of Soho. Like so many English villages and grand old structures, the tawdry porn of Soho seems to have become a national treasure - possibly propped up with grants and tax breaks. It's curious (and to some maybe even heartening) to see that, in the days of plain brown digital wrappers, there is still such a streetside boom in inflatable thingies that, if they were not inflatable facsimiles they would invoke the joint wrath of the RSPCA and the lifeboat service. There's a porn theatre promising the "good old stuff" (Ye Good Olde Stuffe?) from the sixties, seventies and eighties. It reminded me of one of Spike Milligan's memoirs wherein he takes his ancient uncle to the beach in the sixties. Despite the women being almost naked by his formative Edwardian standards, Spike's uncle only comments 'Gad, what a trim ankle'. Ahhh! What turned you on in the good old days...

Soho from Berwick down to Shaftsbury has (at least for me) a certain "Harry Potter" weirdness to it. You can leave a given place and walk forward, take 4 ninety degree turns and be walking away from your starting point by sixty or seventy degrees. On the map that part of Soho looks reasonably rectilinear. But like all of London, I'm sure that each of those turns is off by a bit. On a bigger scale, London never works on right angles. But I've been amused again and again (actually three times today) why I try to the obvious thing and always end up in front of a Yogurt shop called "Snog" next to an operation called "Thai Massage". Which, before I return to the geography, requires some attention. Snog - a great Englishism. But it's not a contraction like "smog". It sounds more like onomatopoeia. It reminds me of that other Englishism - "Laughs like a drain". Snog sounds a little more like "Locks lips like a clogged fuel pump". Only in England you say. Pity. On the other hand, "Thai Massage" raises the question: "When I'm finished, where do I go to get the hips and knees done?"

Anyway, I was killing time going in non-rectilinear circles waiting for the stage doorman to arrive for work at the theatre in which I worked briefly at in 77/78 as an electrician. (Stars and shows come and go, but stage doormen never die.) Being possibly the only saxophone playing board operator in the west end, I had thought my future was secure. However, during my tenure, the Chief Electrician left never to return, and the front door fell off the theatre. That didn't discourage me, but when the constable testified regarding my 'alleged saxophone playing' I knew the jig was up. Mind you, over the years, I realized that 'alleged' was the greatest compliment ever paid to my playing and I now consider it my time in the sun...

At the appointed time, Allan showed up. His name isn't actually Allan, but that's what I called him for twenty years before being corrected. Anyway we had a lovely chat clearing out a few of the cobwebs in our brains...

Next: The Cartoon Museum. Not really a disappointment, just not a surprise. Now, how's that for putting expectations on someone? The museum part is what it obviously is, and there were some brilliant pieces. One ridiculing the male response to the feminist movement in England around 1905 particularly struck me given the current situation in Afghanistan. Many other pieces will have resonance with any viewer. The idea is right, but unlike comparing a miniature painting to, say, a twelve by eight foot Turner where size and original medium conveys a lot of the reason for the work, in a cartoon the content is key, regardless of size. Which brings up the question - what does seeing it "live" beat seeing it in a book or on the net? There is one exception in the museum which a Heath Robinson machine has been recreated in physical form. But you get to watch a video of it in operation. which puts us back to "what is the value of a 'live' cartoon?". In short, I wouldn't discourage anyone from the museum, but for me it raises interesting and creative challenges about how a cartoon museum could best work.

I said "The museum part" earlier because there is more. They provide a space and activities to promote the art of cartoons. I was taken with the workshop in which were posted some of the kids' work. In fact, tomorrow there's a workshop for 12-16 year olds on Manga. I pleaded for them to let me in for twice the admission charge for the kids. Pound for pound (sterling no less) I thought this was extremely fair but they pointed out it was based on age not weight. So I went for four-for-one with big puppy dog eyes but they still refused me. So next week I may go back and look at the class's work...

Heading back to the Hotel, I passed a Solicitor's office. Unlike Soho where I was solicited from doorways and continued on, this time I stopped.

The brass sign said: 'Moon Beever- Solicitors'.

There's nothing like a brass Beever to stop you dead in your tracks and a shiney Moon to keep you there. I thought about it and, after a grappling with a little internal angst, the eternal thirteen year old in me won out. I pulled out the camera, swung round and took a picture of the sign. At which point I saw the coffee swigging solicitor with his sleeves rolled up staring steely eyed at me through the window. I'm good at this non-verbal communication thing and could clearly read his mind. He was saying "Go ahead you puerile git. Take your sophomoric picture and snigger all the way back to your Touristico Americano Battery Farm Hotel and titter over your cheap American beer with all your economy class friends from Indianapolis." Redfaced, I was about to run off when I saw a little bit of sadness in his eyes as he turned away that said "Oh, for god's sake. Four years at Oxford. Three years at the Gray's Inn. Why did I have to end up at 'Moon Beever'? Don't I deserve the cushy life of 'Davenport, Chesterfield and Couch'?" In spite of the lousy photo I got on the first try, I thought it best to leave the poor fellow to his misery and not rub it any further by trying to get a higher quality laugh out of it.

Sufficiently satisfied, I trundled back to my coop at the hotel with Andy Williams crooning "Moon Beever" in my head...