Margate Memories

 

Back in 2022 we took a trip down to the Kent coast to visit with some friends who live in Deal, we decided to make a weekend of it and stayed down there. On one of the days we took the train up to Margate for the day and visited the Turner Contemporary art museum there and had fish and chips on the sea front! It was November but the weather was glorious, and the light was somehow different, I snapped the picture above to show the strangeness of it. I can see why it was one of J.M.W. Turner's favourite places to paint, well, that and he had a mistress there apparently, I guess we're all human.

London Stories

While walking through Bloomsbury (London) the other week I spotted this sign on the wall of a rather regal looking building, I thought that it must be an old sign as Homoeopathy is something that's been long debunked. How wrong I was, a bit of subsequent Googling and I learn that this is indeed a hospital and belongs to the NHS! These days it has been renamed "the Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine" (whatever that means?) and stopped providing NHS-funded homeopathic remedies as late as 2018! In my mind 2018 is many decades too late, think of all those mislead people sincerely hoping to find a cure for their ailments and being given this nonsense (i.e. sugar water) Sadly I think this place is still offering sugar water except these days it's in the form of things like acupuncture, hopefully the other things they do are based on a little harder evidence base.

I often wonder why people fall for this quackery, I guess if you're suffering and can't find relief then you'll try anything, but you really have to wonder why people don't question why this kind of thing is called "Alternative Medicine", after all if it actually worked reliably then it would simply be called "Medicine".

Italian Memories

Back in Summer 2017 we took the kids to Italy. We toured around Tuscany, arriving into Pisa, then to Florence and down to Chianti then back to Pisa and home. It was a great trip and the teenagers were just old enough to appreciate the cultural aspects as well as the beach and the swimming pool. We must return sometime, the wine, food and even beer were outstanding.

Manchester Memories

Had one of these tonight, an old faithful from Manchester maestros Track, I remember visiting the brewery next to Piccadilly station a couple of years ago with some friends it was a great space with a superb beer offering where they had this specific beer on cask and keg, perfect for a side by side taste test, must make my way up there again some time!

Friday Smirk

The boys discover that they're being watched..

Trafalgar

It was the anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar yesterday (21st October 1805) I remember as a kid visiting HMS Victory in Portsmouth on a school trip and it making a big impression on me at the time, I made sure that I took my kids to see it when they were old enough (a great day out BTW). In recent years I've also visited the Maritime museum at Greenwich and there they have a painting by JMW Turner of the battle (similar to the one above), it's an impressive piece, well worth a visit if you're ever out that way.

Bostonian Memories

Back in 2022 we took a trip to Boston (USA) we stayed there a couple of days and then toured around New England and even had a day trip up to Montreal in Canada, it was a great holiday. On our second day (July 4th) we saw representatives of the city read out the famous declaration of independence (yawn!) from the old British customs house (note the lion and the unicorn on the top of the building) in the middle of the city, I snapped this picture of the event (above) The speech itself was mildly interesting but like the Bible soon descended into petty parochial nonsense, mainly whining about having to pay tax, much like many right wing politicians do these days in the UK.

Water's back

It's been raining a lot here in the South East of the UK and on my walk today I noticed that my favourite little pond (see above) is starting to fill up with water again! I was worried that it had permanently dried out as it hasn't had water (or life) for many months now due to the drought we've been experiencing over the Summer. Hopefully it's back now and the little critters can return to brighten up my lunchtime strolls!