Seen at a post office while out and about:
Posts in EnglishPage 17
Can you guess the Radiohead song from under a second of audio?
Best i could do was 8 out of 15, only one better than the gentleman in the video.
You could make a good webpage out of quizzes like these â i donât know if iâd be willing to risk the copyright claims, but if anyone else wants a go at it, youâre very welcome to the idea.
The Victoria Tunnel
The Victoria Tunnel runs beneath the streets of Newcastle, from the Tyne up to the Town Moor. It traverses not only space, but time, through nearly every corner of Englandâs history: built to transport coal in the Industrial Revolution, on the site of an old Roman spring, it was used during the second world war to house those fleeing German bombs. It was even considered for use in the cold war, before the government realised that some musty old coal tunnels would probably not provide the greatest protection against a nuclear blast.
And now you can go down it. In 2007, Newcastle City Council decided to refurbish the tunnel and open a small stretchâof it â the rest is either unsafe for sending humans down or currently in use as a sewerâââup for public tours. Entry is via a side street along the Ouseburn, where the guides will cheerfully show you a map and some old photographs of the entrance. Once you get inside the tunnel itself, hard hats and torches are compulsory, and covid restrictions are still in full force. This was both a benefit and a malefit: yes, the tour was shorter than it would otherwise be, and masks get quite uncomfortable when youâre wearing them for an hour in a dank, dark tunnel, but on the other hand, our small group of family and friends got the place practically all to ourselves, without having to be shepherded alongside other members of the public.
The tunnel is just barely wide enough to fit three people side-by-side, and if, like me, youâre of a certain height, bumping your head on the roof is practically guaranteed. By every blast door, thereâs a plaque about whatâs above you, and how it factors into the tunnel and the cityâs history, stories with which the guides will gladly regale visitors (including some rather grim tragedies).
Coming back out the entrance, i felt more informed about this wonderful countyâs industrial history â just in time to pop over to a gentrified vegan âsuperfood pubâ. The wonders of modern life.
Information for prospective visitors
- Tours can be booked on the Ouseburn Trustâs website.
- Price: ÂŁ9â11 per adult depending on the length of the tour; ÂŁ4 per child
- Address: Victoria Tunnel Entrance, Ouse St., Valley, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 2PF â just next to the CrossFit gym.
- Accessibility: The tunnel was built in the 19th century and without accessibility in mind, so is not wheelchair-accessible. The Ouseburn Trust do, due to the pandemic, offer a virtual tour.
- Getting there: The Q3 bus from the centre of town stops nearby; otherwise, getting there poses a bit of a hike, due to its location.
Links for the 20th of August
- Recreating the original Thomas the Tank Engine model railway
- The holy war over Larry Landtrain
- An atlas of the underground tunnels of Washington, D.C.
- The Institute of Illegal Images, home to the worldâs largest collection of LSD blotter art
- The moose of New Zealand: did they die off in the 1900s, or do they still roam the South Island in secret?
- How fast can you type the alphabet? Best i can do is 3.162 seconds.
Links for the 14th of August
- Ranking all 43 US presidents by looks
- Thereâs a statue of Hermaphroditos in Den Haag. I might have to pay a visit next time iâm back home...
- Oh, to be a lesbian crofter sustainably farming with my wife in the highlands of Scotland
- In 2008, the mother of a gender-non-conforming son started a gender-non-conforming summer camp â 14 years later, a photographer with the New York Times revisits the attendees
- Pacific islands face more complex climate issues than just sinking
High Force
Nestled amongst County Durhamâs moors and Pennine peaks lies Englandâs mightiest waterfall. The waters of High Force tumble over 22 metres and 300 million years of stone, down into the plunge pool below. The falls were formed where the river Tees meets the Great Whin Sill, a tough slab of igneous rock covering much of the north of England.
When the water level is high enough, the force splits into two streams, one going the other way around the rocksâââafter storms, it can even overflow the plateau entirely. Alas, despite recent showers, my group were not so lucky.
The Raby family, owners of the estate, charge ÂŁ2 to see the view from the base of the falls. The falls tower over any mere human who dares navigate down, demanding oneâs respect and attention⌠and making it unmissable that, at the top of the falls, there are several people who walked their on their own via the Pennine Way, not having to pay a single dime. Drat.
Information for visitors
- Address: High Force, Forest-in-Teesdale, Barnard Castle, County Durham, DL12 0XH.
- Getting there: Public transit connections are few and far between this far into the countryside, so your best bet is to take a scenic drive via car through the Pennines and the nineteenth-century village of Middleton-in-Teesdale.
- Price: The Raby estate charges ÂŁ2 to access via the bottom, but the top can be freely accessed by a hike along the Pennine Way.
- Opening times: 10:00â16:00.
- Accessibility and facilities: The trail is not, to my knowledge, wheelchair-accessible. The site contains toilets and a hotel for anyone wanting to stay the night.
July 2021 recap
The month of July is almost over, so itâs time for the traditional wrap-up of all that happened.
On the nineteenth of the month, with just over half of our population fully vaccinated against the virus, England finally opened up and embraced full covid anarchy, come what may. For me, the primary feeling was an overwhelming sense of relief: no more having to suffocate myself with a mask at the shops, no more will-they-wonât-they, just⌠getting on with life.
Iâve taken the opportunity that is the unlocking to (vaguely) plan a series of posts which may come to this blog in the near future. Keep your eyes peeled!
Films and TV watched
The Big Lebowski â A film about three dudes who just want to bowl. I have heard great things about this film since roughly the moment i clicked on the âInternet Explorerâ icon for the first time, and i canât help but feel i would have enjoyed it a little more had it not had all the hype about it. Itâs an excellent film, and one iâll be rewatching soon, but i suspect years on the internet inflated my expectations to an unreasonable extent. (Very good/10)
Yeah, well, thatâs just, like, your opinion, man.
Paddington â Watched with some friends over Discord. A fine family film, and a decent contender for the dictionary definition of âwholesomeâ. We could all strive to be a little more like Paddington Bear. (Hard stare/10)
Fargo â A film about a man who just wants to sell a used car. A great black comedy thriller with even better accents (oh yah). (Super/10)
Whatâd this guy look like, anyway?
â Oh, he was a little guy⌠kinda funny lookinâ.
â Uh-huh. In what way?
â Oh, just a general kinda way.
Inside â9 â This comedy-horror-drama-plot-twistiness-is-that-a-genre?-probably-not anthology show just doesnât miss. Almost every episode is uproariously funny, slightly creepy, and has a twist that will leave you with your mouth hanging open at the screen.
Highlights include The Riddle of the Sphinx (the one with the crosswords), A Quiet Night In (the one without the dialogue), Cold Comfort (the one with the Samaritans), Bernie Cliftonâs Dressing Room (the one with the washed-up comedians), The 12 Days of Christine (the really sad one), and, of course, their exceedingly meta live special, Dead Line. (40 tablets/10)
Links for the end of July
- New Zealand has its own, crummier Stonehenge
- Wendy Carlos demonstrates her Moog synthesiser in 1970 [4 minute watch]
- Guy debunks 9/11 truthers with an actual steel beam [2 minute watch]
- Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of MH370?
- What's the deal with the Erdställe, the thousands of odd mediÌval tunnels scattered across Europe?
- The Young Directorâs Guide To Lighting (via interconnected)
- Furries are making virtual reality worth visiting
- Why does âTurn! Turn! Turn!â equal 241217¡524881?
Links for the 25th of July
- How to spot a good fake ID [in the state of Massachusetts]
- The race that only finishes when thereâs just one person left running
- Paralysed manâs brain waves decoded into sentences
- Whatever happened to IBMâs Watson after Jeopardy? The New York Times answers
- The cosmic importance of interplanetary quarantine (via bldgblog)
- What went into giving Kamala Harris a name in American Sign LanguageâŚ
- The Jessica Simulation: the story of a man who used a chatbot to simulate his dead fiancĂŠe (via waxy)
A map of Noord-Holland
I had that Mapmaking Itch, but, cursed by bike-shedding paralysis about the alternate history map idea i hadÎą, i decided to do a little doodle in the back of my journal insteadâŚ
Donât mind the chicken scratch. I would have done some nice coloured shading, but i couldnât be bothered to go downstairs to fetch the coloured pencils.
Absolutely gutted for Bukayo Saka right now. Poor ladâŚ
Itâs coming home
Links for the 6th of June
- Via National Geographic, The campaign to (theologically) abolish hell
- Why is central London suddenly full of US-American sweetshops? (via lmg)
- The search for Ban Tran, forgotten video game pioneeress (ditto)
- Exploring Londonâs forgotten tram tunnel (via things)
- Miniature models of old Hong Kong (ditto)
- A Royal Military Police video shown to first-time travellers along the corridor to West Berlin through East Germany in the â80s
- As the US withdraws from Afghanistan, the locals are taking back the PokĂŠmon Go gyms
June 2021 recap
My apologies for the delay. I knew iâd forgotten something!
Music listened to and TV watched
- Bo Burnhamâs Inside: A strong candidate for my favourite Thing of 2021. It is, frankly, unfair that one man can make me feel so many emotions in the span of an hour and a halfâââloved almost every minute of it! (That song about sexting does drag on a bit, thoughâŚ) (A+)
- Wolf Aliceâs Blue Weekend: Bloody brilliant. (A)
- Beabadoobeeâs Our Extended Play: Yeah, thisâll do for new music from The 1975 while we wait for that Drive Like I Do compilation album. (B+)
- Haimâs Days Are Gone: Didnât really do much for me. Some alright singles, though! (C-)
- Porter Robinsonâs Nurture: After months of promising iâd listen to it in full when i got my hands on the vinyl, i finally admitted to myself that it was out of stock and iâd have to wait until August otherwise. Itâs a pretty good album, but part of me wonders how iâd feel about it if i hadnât worn the singles to death already⌠(B)
- Euro 2020: Iâd never really thought myself the football fan type. Nevertheless⌠come on England!!
Most viewed pages on the site last month
- Index page: 256 views
- Linkroll: 136 views
- The Garden (index page): 65 views
- About the author: 46 views
- Things to do before i die: 28 views
- Music i like: 26 views
- What i believe: 25 views
- Toaster shade generator: 24 views
- Songs i have cried my silly little heart out to: 20 views
- There Are Two Continents: 20 views
Most read posts on The Garden (in no particular order)
Links for the 29th of June
- A hundred 3D animators put their own spin on the same basic scene. Awesome stuff⌠the human ability for creativity will never cease to amaze me.
- A digital museum of art depicting scenes from Danteâs Divine Comedy. A lot of it is in untranslated Italian, but hey, visual art is visual art.
- Keeping on the subject of digital museums: an extremely in-depth and extremely 2008 museum of toasters. Would that every website still looked as good and functioned as well as this!
- Artwork by eccentric artist Madge Gill (and Myrninerest?) has appeared around the Line, a sculpture trail in eastern London.
- The battle over the future of the U.S. Libertarian party. Low, low stakes hereâââeven our Green parties are more relevant than them...
Highly disappointed in myself for liking that new Ed Sheeran song. Where did i go wrongâ˝