Wednesday, 10 February 2016

While I was away


I've only been into town once in about two months or so, so I missed the official opening of this, the C4DI building, that is going to be the fountain of so many brilliant ideas that we will all live happily ever after in a digital wonderland. While the future maybe bright the once gleaming brass skin is already going a bit grubby, sorry, that should read gaining an impressive patina. Work is well under way on the rest of the site and the old dry dock is finally dry with some sort of construction going on in it.


Tuesday, 9 February 2016

Having another dig


If you've got a few visitors coming round you might tidy up a bit, run a hoover over the carpets maybe sort out those convenient piles of stuff that you like to have to hand. You wouldn't throw out all the furniture and decorate every room all at one go, would you? Well maybe you would if you work for Hull City Council. So it comes about that, with less than a year to the City of Culture thingy, a mad panic has taken over and every street in the centre of town has "works" going on. Well I say "works" but it's hardly a hive of industry, less Ford Maddox Brown more Jerome K Jerome.  And will it all be worth the inconvenience, the loss of customers, the closed businesses, the mess and the hassle? Silly me, of course it will ...

Monday, 8 February 2016

Same old same old


I'll post this and maybe a few more before I disappear again. Hull is like some aged tart undergoing cosmetic surgery at the moment, it's not a pretty sight. Those nips and tucks are all being done in one go so you can imagine the mess.

Sunday, 6 December 2015

Woody, Deadly and TTFN


That's nightshade, of course. Above Woody Nightshade or Bittersweet (Solanum dulcamara) and below Deadly Nightshade (Atropa belladonna). Both these plants are poisonous so you wouldn't be daft enough to eat them now would you? And you'd teach your youngsters not to go near them.


Both these pictures were taken by Margot who also grew the plants because she likes poisonous things...

Right I just can't be bothered to do this for the time being so I'll be back when I'm back. Smell you later.

Thursday, 3 December 2015

Mission creep





To the sickening braying and howling of a pack wild animals filled with an unsatiated blood lust the Commons after a ten hour so-called debate that was a litany of hypocrisy and cant, voted yesterday to make our streets safer by making the streets of Syria considerably less safe. The RAF likes to practice its killing in the skies over Hull and East Yorkshire presumably because our skies are so similar to Iraqi and Syrian skies.

Tuesday, 1 December 2015

Yet Another Charity Shop

Charity shop, Hallgate, Cottingham
The long running slow-down in economic activity has been a boom time for charity shops, they were the fastest growing retail sector last year and there's over 9,600 of them throughout the land or so I've read. They're in every town and on every high street. In Cottingham there are seven that I know of, that's more than one in ten shops devoted to raising funds for some cause or other. Now a connoisseur of these places would say that the slightly seedier the ambience the better the bargains to be had and it's a real bad sign when the professionals move in and a Mary Portas style makeover happens. This means higher prices, less stock and a reduction in customers. This one has opened recently for some local charity and has a nice mix of books, bric-a-brac and clothing. All very pleasantly and unprofessionally arranged to appeal to the browsing passer-by on a gloomy afternoon.

'Shop window' is the City Daily Photo's theme for the first day of the last month of the year. See what goodies are on display here.

Thursday, 26 November 2015

These are local lights for local people



In a operation to delight the gloomy Grinch, Cottingham's seasonal lights were switched on in strictest secrecy on the other day. The need for subterfuge was to stymie the urge of thousands of non-locals from, ermm, Hull and hereabouts to descend upon the village to enjoy an hour or so of entertainment before the lights went on. Such meetings of outsiders required, it was said, dozens of security attendants to marshall the throng, attendants that the Parish Council couldn't or, I'm guessing, wouldn't afford. Not that I care for Christmas and its attendant pap one way or the other but there was no need to marshall families with little children as they all behaved themselves impeccably. But there must be security or we shall most surely perish or be sued for a stubbed toe or some such. So there's no big switch on, no happy children,  no opportunity for a little bit of business, no party, bah!, humbug!