Arts
The Conques Tympanum Decoded
Introduction Back in the 1990s while returning from a jaunt into Cathar Country in our VW camper, quite by chance we made an overnight stop in the ancient village of Conques in the Aveyron region [more…]
Travel
America
Where the Surf Meets the Turf
In their 1963 hit single, the Beach Boys sang that if everybody had an ocean (across the USA) then they’d all be surfing, like in Cal-if-orn-i-a. In the first line of the chorus, they went [more…]
Arts
Family Holiday Torture
Following on from Novak and Goode’s excellent postcard from Vilnius, I thought I’d share some photos of our trip there in October last year. I’ve been before as my mate married a Lithuanian girl and [more…]
America
Why is Portland Like Portland?
If Chicago is “The Windy City”, New York, “The Big Apple”, New Orleans, “The Big Easy” and Reno, Nevada, “The Biggest Little City in the World”, then Portland, Oregon, is “A Big Retirement Home for [more…]
Arts
Postkarte aus Bochum (Woanders ist auch Scheiße)
Herbert Grönemeyer made this town a whole lot more famous with his 1984 album “4630 Bochum”. More of Herr G later, but where, I hear some of you ask, is this magical place of which [more…]
20th Century
An early airman’s tragic adventure
Early 1930: It had been a depressing English winter – cold, dark and wet for weeks on end. In West Wickham, a young man who had left Australia five years earlier and settled here in [more…]
Hobbies
Always Worth Saying’s Volkswagen Golf 7 GTI Car Review
This is a review of the Golf 7 GTI, not the new Golf 8. Ominously, the Golf 8 is advertised as being “all digital”, as though that were a good thing. However, the car reviewed [more…]
Arts
The Great Escape, Part Two
A sickening, plastic sounding, crunch. Check self – fine. Look around for any obvious danger – none. Smell for petrol – none. The area wasn’t notably busy, some people across the road were looking over [more…]
Engineering
Le Château de Guédelon
Introduction I suppose it is only natural when confronted by an ancient architectural marvel such as a Roman aqueduct or a mediæval cathedral to stare in wonder and to ask oneself, ‘How on earth did [more…]