Category Archives: History

Frankenpole

Due to a minor oversight, I had a double-booking last night. So attempted both.

Frankenstein, a Gothic Tale, a surprisingly good play, was in the fitting setting of the Great Hall, in the castle keep.

The play was pretty slow to begin with and I was really beginning to think I’d made a huge mistake, particularly since I’d persuaded my second in command and youngest daughter to come along.

But things had picked up before the intermission and, thankfully, the second half was great.

Straight after, we jumped in a cab to Gateshead Fell cricket club, to meet up with some mates at the beer festival.

Where we caught most of Ed Tudor-Pole’s set.

Then there were nightcaps in our local.

A pleasant evening.

Marley’s ghost

We also visited Kingston today. Where we went to the Bob Marley museum.

There’s just the one picture, because cameras weren’t allowed inside. But it was worth going. Essentially, it’s a Georgian house, largely as it was intended, apart from the 70s recording studio.

The shot room was a little strange, though. Best look it up.

I did learn something new about the bloke. He was a vegan. Which makes him cool. Forget the music, he was a vegan.

Coffee

We climbed a mountain today. A blue one, which didn’t look at all blue. And we learned that everything we (thought we) knew about coffee was completely wrong.

The coffee was nice though, as were the views.

The picture above was actually looking down onto a pretty scary road which zig-zagged up the mountain.

Belfast

As opposed to a day/evening in Belfast, we spent a couple of hours there yesterday morning.

A pub my second in command only saw from the outside.

So, while plans were a bit messed up, we kindof did still get to Belfast.

Rocket man

My second in command has been somewhat excited about this evening. She’d been looking forward to seeing the Rocket in the Discovery museum.

It’s been nice to do the history/culture thing, rather than spending the evening in bars.

Enough of that though, we’re now in our fourth bar.

Lost in Space III

Ok, I grew up with this stuff, so please let me run with it.

Robot B9, the robot, and Dr Smith.

And the new robot and Dr Smith.

Accepting that the second picture is in color, and Dr Smith is more than marginally less camp, (and the acting is a lot better in the new series) I still feel that the original robot is more appropriate when compared to the (second attempt at) the modern version.

I feel the need to join a club.

Lost in Space II

OK, let’s put this right. Robot B9 looks like this.

And this is the Jupiter 2.

And the chariot.

Lost in Space

Going in …

Dead men’s spectacles

While I always buy one or two regular pairs of glasses whenever I have an eye test, I tend to wear these only for work or around the house.

For my preferred glasses, though, I also buy frames from Dead Men’s Spex, a great site with lots of amazing frames. I tend to by rolled gold, small frames; mostly by Algha.

My current pair, from the late 1800s, are probably the best I’ve ever managed to find. They were ‘new old stock’, so unused despite being around 120 years old.

Sadly, they’re now getting a little creaky, so it was time to think about a new pair. There are a few pairs on the Dead Men’s Spex site, but none are unused.

So I’ve had to resort to a new pair of glasses. Fortunately, Algha are still in business, making glasses by hand in London. Ok, so they’re not quite the age I’d have liked, and they’re somewhat more expensive, but they do look very similar.

Pisa

After hearing from a few people that Pisa is something of a dump, I wasn’t particularly looking forward to seeing it. Even though it’s something that has to be done.

But it was well worth the visit.