Not missing - just lost

The net and I parted ways when I went from the leisurely pace of spending a week or two in each place to just two or three days at each stop. However, things are now picking up in the slowing down manner of speaking.

I spent a morning at Corbridge just along the Wall from Newcastle. Went looking for a Steam Gala that was to open that day but its site in the rugby field was empty. Went to the car boot sale that had been bumped from the rugby field by the missing Steam Gala and came away empty. I was going to say that it's the same trash everywhere, but I'd never seen a large suitcase piled high with remote controls before. But then I don't go to flea markets in Canada. I could have gotten a copy of "The Goon Show Book" but we already have two copies in the house. There was a porcelain statue of a very happy, very large lady in a very small bathtub with a happy looking scrub brush. I'm not so crass as to take a picture. OK, I'd didn't have the pair of wherewithalls to stand there and take the picture. In either case, you'll have to imagine it by yourself.

Corbridge is a beautiful little town near one of the Roman sites and a great place to wander about. There's a splendid AngloSaxon-Norman-Medieval church - St. Andrews, which has the first "fortified vicarage" that I'd ever seen. In case you're looking at the picture and asking "Why didn't you show the side with the windows?" This is the side with the windows.



I'd like to think that the vicar needed the extra firm support because of the "Primitive Methodists" who moved in across the street, but they arrived some time (about 500 years) later. They probably still got his back up even then.

The irritating neighbour that caused the vicar to found his house within a rock was William Wallace.


Leaving Corbridge, I drove east along Hadrian's Wall, south through the Lake District, north through the West Dales then several times around the compass west of Manchester, and finally north, west, south and west into North Wales.

Found at the Roman Site of Chesters


One of the great things about going along Hadrian's wall is driving past the Roman forts. That's not to say that you should skip the forts entirely, though there is a certain amount of sameness to them. They're a bit like archaeological digs of McDonald's restaurants a few millennia on from now. They're really a lot the same - deliberately. They didn't bring in a hot new designer for each one.















1st archaeologist: Look at this - three fryers. What do you think?
2nd archaeologist: Definitely a high status McDonalds.
Francis Prior: Looks like "ritual" to me.
1st archaeologist: Well, maybe one of them could have been ceremonial...

For me seeing the fort remains is really a backgrounder for history and stories encountered elsewhere. Unlike sites from later ages, it's hard work to evoke the time and life from the "floorplan" remains, but it's inspiring to look over some of the views and see a very similar landscape to that seen by the Romans.

However, driving by the forts, you have an experience that is almost as weird in Britain today as it was when the Romans set up housekeeping and road maintenance. The road is straight. Straight like an Ontario concession road. Straight like, shall we say, a Roman road. It's the B6318 and it's called the Roman Military Road. After driving down from Glasgow, and subsequently driving to London, I believe that this was not only the straightest road that I drove on, it was the only straight road I drove on.


Castlerigg Stone Circle (click photo for more)

Castlerigg is to the north of the Lake District in the Cumbrian highlands. This Stone Circle is described in my English Heritage Guide as the most spectacularly located circle in England and it certainly is too me. Only a hundred or so other circles to check out before I can commit definitively. The site was swarming with twelve year olds with measuring gear on a school outing with math teacher (orange jacket) bellowing from time to time - "Come on boys - let's get the job done!" I think he was enjoying it. I know the kids and I were.

You know, when you stand there looking at a stone circle it really makes you think how great the human race is. I mean, of all the aliens that have visited the earth, they can only come up with crop circles. What a bunch of wimps. Cheap, lazy and gone in a couple of weeks. Now those beaker people could build for the long run. That's muppets fer ya.


Along the dales


Some places are hard to find, even hard to find out about. On the other hand, some call out to you. Well, they call out to me anyway.
Giggleswick and Wigglesworth

And I used to think the Yorkshire building society pairing of Bradford and Bingley was slightly silly with Bradford being the sober and moderating influence on irrepressible Bingley. Imagine a prudent successful financial institution called Giggleswick and Wigglesworth (they're less than five miles apart). You can't. Can you?

Having married into a gang of Brass Bandidos, I'd hoped to stop and catch part of the Saddleworth Whit Friday Band Competitions which happened on the Friday (June 5). My plan was to arrive at noon spend a few hours groovin' to the tunes and then hit the road to lay down with the lambs in North Wales by early evening (in the farm-stay B&B sense, not the biblical sense). Prior to checking the updated website on Thursday, I thought that the competitions started in the afternoon, after the Whit Walks in the morning. In fact, they start about 4:30pm and finish about 11:00pm. The competition sites are spread out through a rabbit warren of hilltop and valley towns in Saddleworth, and just 45 minutes of getting lost among the road diversions and parking restrictions convinced me that the only way to see any of the competition would be to book into a hotel long prior to the start of things. Will do that some time.

Sadly, it appeared that I just missed the end of the Whit Walk because of an abusive relationship I had with two roundabouts in Oldham. No matter how badly they treated me, I went back. But no matter how often I went back, neither of them would ever show me any favour. I must have spent at least 45 minutes in a town I was direly warned not to enter in the first place.

So on to Wales.

Cult of the Pepperpot

First - An admission.

At some point in the mid sixties, I'd rush home to watch Dr. Who with William Hartnell as The Doctor - that is Dr#1. I distinctly recall watching what I now know to be the very first episode - "An Unearthly Child - Why does Susan Foreman live in a Police Box in a junkyard?".

Then I left those childish things behind (Hey, it was the seventies, man).

At the beginning of the eighties, we'd sit down and watch Tom Baker (Dr#4) as Dr. Who for the wit and silliness. Of course, I also read Playboy for the interviews.

Some Baker era Doctoring from "City of the Dead" scripted by Douglas Adams:



Other than that, I've had little interest in the perpetually resurrected program. However, I clearly stand alone in this country. When it needs something to restore its manhood, England seems to close its eyes and think of the Doctor. How long it can keep this up is open to debate. I remember from the Tom Baker era that the Doctor can only regenerate 12 times. Or is it regenerate 11 times for 12 existences? I don't recall, but given that next season introduces Dr#11, they're either on or approaching thin ice.

Now you've paid your admission, let's get on with it.

Just a few weeks I was telling a friend "J." about the performance of "Enjoy" a play by Alan Bennett that I'd just seen in London, when I pulled out a bit of previously-believed-to-be-useless trivia. David Troughton, who played the male lead in "Enjoy" was the son of Patrick Troughton, the second Dr. Who. I trumped myself by recalling that I'd first seen David in "A Very Peculiar Practice" - a particularly offbeat dark comedy about life at a university. Peculiar Practice starred Peter Davison who is perhaps best known as Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small, but is also known as the fifth Dr. Who. This prompted J. to recall "I was at school with David's brother Michael (yet another actor...)." "Aha," I thought, "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon? How about Three Degrees of Dr. Who" Probably nobody in the UK is more than three degrees away from one of the (so far) 11 Dr. Whos. I mentioned this idea to J. who smiled and said "I guess so, David Tennant (Dr. Who #10) lives around the corner and is a regular at the cafe where my daughter works after school".

It'll never fly. It's far too easy.

However, far sillier than Tom Baker ever was are the Daleks. I'll wager that the Daleks are the worst designed robots ever. Ok, I'll give the designers credit that they didn't just build another tin man. And given that they were introduced in episode 2 of the first season their design may have been driven by a budget limiting them to using whatever was already in the workshop or available from the cleaning staff and could be assembled with PVC glue. (Fingertips difficulty of 3.).

So, given a robot that could be neutralized by a rubber mat, a flight of steps, or a can of string cheese, you'd think they'd have been finished years ago. Ten Doctors later they are still here. Kind of like Fidel Castro. Ten US presidents later and he's still there.

So far, in less then five weeks in England, I've encountered Daleks three or possibly four times. And, to be honest, I hadn't expected to see even one until the Dr Who Museum in Land's End.

Daleks at the Shrewsbury Cartoon Festival.























Daleks at Meccanuity









A Dalek in Waterstone Book Store, Lincoln


















Victorian Era Steam Driven Dalek at Coalbrookdale


















Why are the Daleks such darlings? Well the obvious answer is that they are silly. But I think it goes deeper than that, and I don't mean deeply silly. Daleks are genetically, developmentally and temperamentally the eternal underdogs. These are not the American style of underdogs that whip the pants off the arrogant overdog in the third period, fourth quarter, or ninth inning. Daleks appeal to that English love of the hopeless underdog that needs to be taken home, given a warm cup of tea, wrapped up in a blanket and returned to the wild when they've recovered. Daleks are just overgrown mechanical hedgehogs in need of a St. Tiggywinkles hospital.

Whereas the Borg could rule the galaxy but for some singular flaw in their design, the Daleks couldn't fetch a tray of cucumber sandwiches if the floors had just been waxed.

Imagine James Dysan designing a new aluminum (or is that aluminium?) and rubber pepperpot for the next Doctor. When they suck, they suck like a black hole. When they exterminate, everything checks in and nothing checks out. And more than with any Borg, Cyberman, or Vogon, resistance will indeed be futile. They'll get the job done but they won't be nearly as endearing as the poor klutzes are today.

Speaking of Whos, Quadrophenia is touring the provinces here in preparation for the West End. And now speaking of productions touring the provinces, Hitler, My Part in His Downfall is now on
tour

Shrop 'til you Drop - Ironbridge

Coalbrookdale, as you may not have known and I certainly didn't, was the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution and as such is now a UNESCO heritage site. The painting to the right is by William Williams - makes you wonder if his patrons paid the bill twice. This year it's celebrating the 300th anniversary of that blessed event when one Abraham Darby first smelted iron ore with coke.

In 1777, Abraham Darby III started work on the first iron bridge over what is now known as Ironbridge Gorge in Coalbrookdale.
The iron business is pretty much gone from Coalbrookdale but it has been replaced with a raft of museums, including the Museum of Iron, a Victorian town, a tile museum, A china museum and a teddy bear museum. The last one seems a little peripheral and somewhat opportunistic. However, I didn't check it out and maybe it has examples of early coal fired teddy bears, or the prototype cast iron bear given to A. A. Milne, that, when it went bump, bump, bump down the stairs on the back of it's head, did over £1000 damage and left Christopher Robin with a permanent limp and the inability to say "Pooh" without producing some of the same.
But the reason I went to Coalbrookdale wasn't to visit the museums, although I'd certainly like to go back a pump iron there some day (intellectually speaking). I went to see went to see a boffo show of engineering know how, enthusiasm and wit - "Meccanuity 2009". This annual Meccanno fest is held in a hands-on kids museum called Enginuity. It was a gas...



A few more pictures from the area:

Coalbrookdale and Ironbridge

Shrop 'till You Drop - Much Wenlock

Much Wenlock - so named to distinguish it from Little Wenlock. So, much ado about little.
It's a pretty little town nestled in the hills south east of Shrewsbury. All the pretty ones nestle, don't they?

"Much More Books" is in the high street. I wonder if that's Abraham Znaimer's - the uncle Moses snitched and modernized his idea from. (Thas a Canadian joke)

Shown above is the guildhall - a particularly fine building. The lower level is the market place, and upstairs is a courtroom (now a visitor center) and the council chambers. The chambers are still in use and feel like they were designed by people who wanted to make a serious impression with a double dose of gravitas, but didn't want to be seen as ostentatious. The result is a room that is peculiarly grand and cosy at the same time.

Before heading to the ruined Cluniac priory, I stopped in to a deli, and lined up at the counter. When my turn came, I got the lowdown on what was on, what was off, and what all the local terms meant. After a few minutes pleasant discussion with the counter lady, I settled on a cheese and onion soup, field mushroom salad with fresh locally made compote and , warmed multigrain bread.

"Oh, and a coffee. White." I said, completing the order.
"Is that to eat in or takeaway?"
"Eat in."
"Please take a seat and I'll come over and take your order".

Fortunately we didn't have to do the entire rigamorole again, but I was taught my lesson.

The Priory had an unexpected treat, as this video shows:



More of my pictures of the town and the Priory at:

Much Wenlock

Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival

There were two reasons for the exact timing of my vist to Shrewbury - to see Steeleye Span on May 1st and to attend the Cartoon Festival the weekend before.

Not surprising at all is that the theme this year's Cartoon Festival was "Science and Darwin". An open air studio was set up on the Market Square where the public could watch artists at work and see cartoons take shape. Click here for a couple of picture sets following the progress of individual cartoons in the studio area.

There were workshops for kids and adults in cartoonery which I didn't participate in. Instead, I attended three very different talks by cartoonists.

Robert Penwill : The Origin of Spaces. Roger was an architect for the better part of three decades, and now cartoons full time. Among many other gigs, he's resident cartoonist for Cadalyst (AutoCAD) magazine. His was a scripted talk with cartoons illustrating the development of architecture. Although he was reading from a script, the talk was a delight as he journeyed from becoming an architect during the days of Brutalism (60s/70s concrete) through cave dwellings and up to the possibly very silly future. The cartoon at the left was his illustration for the introduction of Computer Aided Design. Check out his website here.


Bill Stott: The Science and Philosophy of Serious Ranting – illustrated This was another fish altogether. Something like: "Improvisational standup cartooning." To get a flavour of his performance, check out his blog for April 20th, just before the festival: Bill's Blog. He riffed on lots of subjects, and in less that a minute (often less than 30 seconds) he whipped off an illustration of his current rant. In the picture album here, Bill is seen in the last sequence drawing his Darwin cartoon.

A Bill Stott story (read it to yourself in a Lancashire accent):
Rabbit comes into a butcher shop (Bill pauses to tell and illustrate how bad he is at drawing rabbits. They always come out as kangaroos).
Butcher: May I help you?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher: No this is a butcher shop, you want the green grocers's next door.
Rabbit leaves. Next day, Rabbit enters the butcher shop again.
Butcher: May I help you?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher: No, I told you yesterday, this is a butcher's shop. You want the green grocer's next door.
Rabbit exits. Next day, Rabbit comes in and stands in front of the counter. Butcher stares at him.
Butcher (slowly): What do you want?
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?
Butcher (steaming): Look I've told you twice before and I'm telling you for the last time. This is a butcher's shop. The green grocer's next door. If you come in here again asking looking for lettuce, I'll nail your ears to the counter.
Rabbit exits. Next day, Rabbit enters Butcher shop and stands in front of counter. Butcher stares at him fiercely.
Butcher: "What?"
Rabbit: Got any nails?
Butcher: Nails? No.
Rabbit: Got any lettuce?

At the end of the talk, Bill offered to sign any drawings from the easels (there was one on each side of the stage) if attendees wanted to take them away. I got his drawing of a woodworking teacher from the 50s (ex WWII RAF he sez) with brown shop coat and "magic pocket" that could hold 47 metal rulers and a mallet.
Steve Bell:[such a superstar that his talk didn't need a title]. Steve Bell has been the resident political cartoonist at the Guardian for decades. Unlike Penwill and Stott, he gave up his first career after a year rather than almost three decades. That career was teaching, and he explained his departure by saying "They know when you don't want to be there".

Steve Bell has created many iconic caricatures of political celebrities such as Maggie Thatcher, John Major (Major Underpants) and George Bush (as a progressively weirder chimpanzee). His talk was facinating because he described the process of coming up wit these caricatures. All of them evolved. Things would happen in one drawing (Bush's long arms) and then get incorporated into the ongoing development of the character. At some point Bell realized 'Oh, he's a chimp' as opposed to the way one might expect it to appear "I think I'll draw Bush as a chimp".

He covered a really satisfying spread of topic on the creative and political aspects of cartooning. All in all, a splendid time.