Following Tuesday’s trip to London’s Docklands area my contribution for today’s Thing-a-Day is a haiku:
high-rise finance
in London Docklands
lashing rain
Category Archives: topographical
Thing-a-Day #16 : Boys on the Tube
Thing-a-Day #16 : Boys on the Tube, originally uploaded by kcm76.
Today we took our friend Sue and her two boys Sam (with book on head) and Harry to the Museum in (London) Docklands. Here’s a montage of two frames I made of the three of them on the London Underground – with Sam and Harry wrecking their copies of Keri Smith’s This is Not a Book.
The Museum in Docklands is well worth visiting; there was much more to see than I’d expected and it was almost all interesting. It charts the history of the Port of London from Roman times to the present and currently has an exhibition on “London, Sugar and Slavery”. Admission is £5 for adults (which entitles you to free entry for a year!); free for under 16s. Follow the link for museum details.
They also have a good café (called 1802) where we had coffee, lunch and afternoon tea with the boys devouring copious quantities of chocolate brownie. And the café does hand-cut, really chunky chips to die for. We all enjoyed the food and I doubt any of us need to eat again this week!
The downside? The Underground ride home was horrible: unstable, wet (it was pouring with rain all day), stuffy, humid, crowded, hot. Yeuch! It was a good reminder of why I hate the Underground and why I used to have panic attacks when I had to use it regularly. But I got to go on the DLR, which somehow I’ve avoided up to now.
But otherwise a good day!
Thing-a-Day #13 : Red Wine
Today I made a bottle of red wine empty, pleasingly with no assistance. 🙂
Thing-a-Day # 10 : Sunrise
Sunrise on Tuesday 9 February taken through my study window. Composite panorama of two shots. For those who know the area this is looking east towards Horsenden Hill (the trees on the horizon at right).
Magnificent Maps
Image by courtesy of The Guardian.
Thanks to IanVisits I’ve just spotted what looks to be a fascinating exhibition at the British Library, from April 2010.
Maps can be works of art, propaganda pieces, expressions of local pride, tools of indoctrination … Opening in April 2010, Magnificent Maps showcases the British Library’s unique collection of large-scale display maps, many of which have never been exhibited before, and demonstrates why maps are about far more than geography.
And it’s free! Has to be worth a visit.
Green Woodpecker
This Green Woodpecker was visiting my west London suburban garden earlier today. I certainly don’t see them regularly, maybe just 2 or 3 times a year, and they are always a delight especially when they stay for a few minutes to feed, as this one did.
It’s not a brilliant photo as I was trying to hand-hold my biggest telephoto lens, in poor winter afternoon light, while leaning out of the window.
Lowestoft Tiles
This is a mosaic of shots I took when Noreen and I were in Lowestoft for the day in September 2008. Round the edge is a selection of tiles used as part of the paving in London Road, Lowestoft. There is a line of tiles each side of the street (which is pedestrianised) some 10 feet from the shop fronts and spaced a few yards apart. Some were extremely dull; these caught my eye. The local planners, despite all the other dire things they’ve done to an interesting Edwardian seaside resort and port, should have credit for these tiles as they certainly are an unusual and interesting touch to an otherwise boring shopping street. All the tiles appear to have local themes: Lowestoft pottery, fishing industry, holiday resort, marshland, boating, etc. These are just round the corner from the decaying railway station (shown centre). It’s original buildings are approximating to semi-derelict (although still in use) but they retain some of the old decorative arcading and the original 1950s(?) BR station sign overlooking the “town square”.
You’ll get a better idea of the tiles if you follow the links to the individual images:
1. Tile 1, 2. Tile 4, 3. Tile 7, 4. Tile 6, 5. Lowestoft Central Station, 6. Tile 8, 7. Tile 2, 8. Tile 5, 9. Tile 3
Created with fd’s Flickr Toys
Megalopoda vitreum
Enormous and weird glass sculpture hanging like the sword of Damocles over the Information Desk in the entrace hall of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. No I don’t know either!
It was a swine to photograph. It’s quite interesting viewed on a black background too.
Tick … Tock … F***
Aarrrgggghhhhh!!!!!!
It’s flaming clock change day again!
I get really fed up with continually changing the clocks … forward an hour … backward an hour … forward an hour … ad nauseam.
Why? It isn’t necessary. It isn’t as if are at war now. And the myth that summer time saves lives has been exploded as just that: a myth. All it does is create an irritation and cost industry money. FFS why can’t we stay on GMT. We need to start a campaign:
Save GMT. It’s our cultural heritage.
Family Grave
David Masey Grave, originally uploaded by kcm76.
This is the grave in churchyard of St Nicholas, New Romney, Kent of David Masey (b 1807, d 1882) who was my great-great-grandfather and his wife. Also commemorated are a number of his family members (none in my direct line). I’ve been told that David Masey was variously a fisherman, greengrocer, fishmonger, boatman and a lifeboatman at Littlestone.
I was there, rather fortuitously on Saturday afternoon but had only a few minutes to find and photograph the headstone. Had I had more time I was hoping to be able to scour the churchyard for other Masey graves – although sadly very many of the headstones are so weathered as to be unreadable; hardly surprising just a mile or so from the sea. I must check if New Romney have yet catalogued all the graves in their churchyard. More research for one of these fine days when I no longer have to worry about working for a crust!