Poppies

Usually the Council are zealous in their extermination of weeds, sending out a small army of  workers with tanks of weed killer spraying every nook and cranny. Whether it's austerity or just plain bad management (at which the Council excels) this year there seem to be more wild flowers in unexpected places. I'm not complaining.

Spiral Path

This spiral ramp takes you up to the east side of Myton Bridge or down to the east bank of the river depends which way you want to look at it.

Twowheels

Here's a pretty sight to cheer you up on a Monday morning. Another boarded up shop, victim not of this recession but of some long forgotten down turn about twenty years ago. The building's odd appearance ( it was clearly part of a terrace) is no doubt due to high explosives dropped by some passing German in May 1941 demolishing the neighbours and creating space many years later for a police station where our hard working constables can make themselves a brew and put their feet up.

The Tenth Circle

Of Hell that is. Cottingham Day on a hot Saturday in July with thousands milling around like the living dead gawping at this and that and nothing in particular. And it was like Groundhog Day all over again exactly the same as last year and the year before that, vintage cars here, motocycle display there, hot and tired looking birds of prey display over there, an aged rock and roll show on the Green, art and crafts in the Derby and Jones Hall (try to look interested) and so on and so on. So nothing new to show for it all save this oddly placed mannequin advertising ice cream. I won't be going next year I've seen it all before. Still Snuff Mill Lane on the way home was looking at its Summer best

Sheep may safely graze ...

...but not on this pasture. If you peer closely you may see the Mayfair cinema reflected in the windows of this  shop on Beverley Road. The sheep has also starred in this blog before when the shop temporarily shifted into town. [ 1 ]. If you think this a tad odd I've seen cows, pigs and sheepdogs for sale here in the not too distant past, people buy the oddest things.

Weekend Reflections is here.

Mayfair meets Hollywood and Vine

Here are the mortal remains of the Mayfair cinema on a rather dull day. For thirty five years it showed the celluloid products of the movie industry before the little shiny box in the corner of the sitting room finally shut it down in 1964. Still there was life in the old building and it reopened the next year as a bingo hall. So for a while it was the mecca for pairs of fat ladies but even this business moved onto bigger and newer premises on Clough Road of all places. Then came the relaxed licencing laws and a boom in pub openings so it was turned into the Hogshead pub in 1998. At the height of this booze craze there about half a dozen new pubs in a half mile stretch on Beverley Road. A classic bubble that has now gone well and truly bust. I think only two are still open. Things were clearly not going too well when the name changed to Hollywood and Vine in 2011 (the sillier a pub name the sooner it goes belly-up). And now it's for sale. Surely this can't be the final reel in this story.

The Station, Stepney

Across the road from yesterday's post stands this pub. Now regular readers will note straight away the mock Tudor facade common to many pubs and probably applied in the 1920's or 30's. The pub presumably dates back to the 1850's  or 60's when the railway arrived. The little passageway to the left of the building has the grand name of  Kottingham Avenue. No-one is quite sure why it is spelt with a K nor indeed why it changed to this from Prague Terrace which it used go by.

Stepney, it turns out (OK it was news to me), was once a small village quite separate from the city of Hull. The local primary school had a rather neat little history prepared which you can read here, if such things interest you.