Say Cheese!

I wandered around with a camera in Whitmore Reans, Gnosall and Norbury Junction (the Cheese Boat), and my parents' place in Shropshire over the weekend. Click the links for more photos (of yellowhammers, herons, cheese, map twats and sparrows) or on these shots for bigger versions. I like the urban one for the mix of sunset artificial lighting.

Sat-Nav

Hello all. As it's a holiday weekend, I won't be troubling you with too many ramblings, opinions or links. What are you all doing with the break? I should be marking projects and writing PGCE essays, but as I accidentally left my Mac at work, I'll have to find some other ways to fill in the time. 

Friday saw the ascension into the firmament of Keiti Gachevska, who handed in her PhD thesis. If there's anything you need to know about organised crime in Eastern Europe, she's your go-to gal. Needless to say, a modicum of alcoholised liquid was taken in celebration. 

Saturday was also a long-awaited day - the arrival of the Cheese Boat at Norbury junction. Our motley crew (Emma, Neal, Dan and - eventually - James) converged on Gnosall (love those anglo-saxon names), walked for a couple of miles to stimulate our appetite, then set of (with a minor detour to a pub) for the junction, another couple of miles down the canal. We saw herons, a yellowhammer, lots of flowers, ducklings, and great views of the Wrekin. I'll post some photos when I get back into the office. 

The Junction hosted a rally of canalists, who are clearly divided between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as us landlubbers. Some went for beautifully painted narrowboats, satellite dishes, those horrible painted cans and twee names. Others opted for functionality - black paint, scuffed and marked, logs and battered bikes slung over the top. 

The Cheese Boat saw us coming. Apart from stiffing me for the pickle I paid for, we were pretty impressed by the interesting variations on cheddar, and very impressed by Perl Las and Perl Wen, two organic Welsh soft cheeses. Needless to say, we bought a massive amount, and washed it down with beautiful buttery bitter (Junction Best) from the pub. 

Already suffering from tendonitis, I added sunburn to the injury list - not the last wound I'd suffer that fateful day either. Thanks to my interestingly-pale (or pasty, as my 'friends' put it), I'm a bit paranoid about sunburn, as I blister in the presence of candlelight. However, yesterday looked overcast and I forgot my hat and factor 50. Thus by the time I returned to Wolves ready for Irina's party and Blast Off, I looked like a tomato with eczema - as a disconcertingly large number of former friends pointed out. 

We made a cameo at the Bulgarian-and-assorted-computational-linguistics do, then determinedly headed out to the Civic for Blast Off, Wolverhampton's best - and only - indie night. I'd prefer more Gorky's, Tindersticks, Stereolab, Field Mice and Neu! personally, but it's pretty good. One of my media students kindly mixed me a decent cocktail and James, Neal, Emma and I added to our walk-related injuries by dancing like loons until 2.30. Somewhere along the way, I added to my injuries. Finding something determinedly attached to the sole of my Doc Marten (of course), I tried to yank it off, only to discover that it was a large and jagged chunk of glass - cue much blood. Thanks to the Civic's security and First Aid people - kind, friendly and efficient, despite the absence of a pair of scissors. I was soon 'bopping', as I believe the young folk call it, to Hot Chip as though major haemorrhaging was nothing worse than a stubbed toe. 

The only downside to the day was Stoke's battling defeat at home to West Ham, only slightly balanced by Emma's beloved Munster getting hammered by unfancied Leinster. 

Take the skinheads bowling, take them bowling

I went bowling last night with my housemates and assorted nerds from the computational linguistics department. Very charming nerds they are too.

The bowling was surprisingly good fun. Turns out it's not simply what teenagers do before they can get served in pubs. My performance veered between atrocious and surprisingly good, though what made the difference, I don't know! I was later humiliated at air hockey by a computational linguist who shares a hairdresser with Fellaini (no skinhead he)!

Anyway, today's a big day. My fourth sister (youngest of the six of us) is 23 today, I went for a fast swim even though tendonitis is turning my hand into a hook, and I'm being observed by my PGCE mentor while I offer individual tutorials to 1st-year English students. Must practice caring voice (especially after a colleague described a recent piece I wrote as 'sarcastic… dripping with contempt'). Does that sound like harmless little me?

Tomorrow is full of cultural delights - primarily the cheese boat calls at Norbury Junction, a light walk, then the Little Civic for some fine lo-fi.