Fish catches man
Saw this story about a Marlin who got its own back on a sports fisherman; serves the bugger right for getting his jollies by killing a striking looking creature just to make him look like a big man, laughed my arse off.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Talbot
As part of British Comics Month over on the FPI blog I've set up a number of interesting interviews, but yesterday I posted up a Q&A with one of the best writer-artists in the land and the man generally credited with the first 'proper' UK graphic novel, Bryan Talbot, who talks about the brilliant Luther Arkwright, the incredibly powerful Tale of One Bad Rat and his forthcoming work based around the work of Lewis Carroll, Alice in Sunderland, which sounds utterly brilliant. He also talks a bit about the French-Japanese artist Veronique Tanaka who he is helping to get published; her work sound fascinating, I hope a UK publisher picks it up, I'd like to see more of it.
As part of British Comics Month over on the FPI blog I've set up a number of interesting interviews, but yesterday I posted up a Q&A with one of the best writer-artists in the land and the man generally credited with the first 'proper' UK graphic novel, Bryan Talbot, who talks about the brilliant Luther Arkwright, the incredibly powerful Tale of One Bad Rat and his forthcoming work based around the work of Lewis Carroll, Alice in Sunderland, which sounds utterly brilliant. He also talks a bit about the French-Japanese artist Veronique Tanaka who he is helping to get published; her work sound fascinating, I hope a UK publisher picks it up, I'd like to see more of it.
Laurel and Hardy
Glen Mitchell has terrific piece on BBC Radio 4 covering the live tours of two of my all-time favourite performers, Laurel and Hardy. In our modern society fame has become a rather cheap commodity - some achieve it for great works and achievements but there seems to be a never-ending river - or perhaps sewer would be a better term - of interchangeable, disposable 'celebrities' who pick up some form of fame for the most pathetic of reasons.
However even those who achieve fame deservedly for a great piece of music for instance, just don't come close to L&H at their height. Beatlemania doesn't come close; so many people turned out to see the pair in Glasgow a stone ballustrade broke while their arrival in Ireland was greeted by church bells mimicking the sounds of their famous 'Cuckoo' theme tune, peels rolling out across as most of the population came to greet them off the ship. There's a nice bit in Garth Ennis' excellent Preacher series where the hard-drinkin' Irish vampire Cass is talking about L&H to Jessie and recounts the same story, how the two of them were apparently in tears as they realised how much they meant to people. It must have been something else to have been a part of that crowd.
I loved L&H as a young kid watching repeats onTV during school holidays; I still love them and watch them on DVD today. The Cuckoo theme makes me smile right away while Stan still reduces me to tears of laughter with a few simple expressions. I loved watching Paul Merton's recent BBC series on the early comedians of the silver screen recently and when the Filmhouse had their Buster Keaton season I was there, laughing away and quite delighted to see that a man my age had his young boys with him and they were also in hysterics. These performers just had something timeless; they are still loved and adored today, their craft still admired but mostly we just still like to laugh at their films. Oscars and BAFTAs for the heavyweight categories of Best Director, Best Actor and so on are so over-rated; now the people who can make films which make us laugh and laugh and laugh? That's difficult and that's worth ten times the most magnificent dramatic performance.
Glen Mitchell has terrific piece on BBC Radio 4 covering the live tours of two of my all-time favourite performers, Laurel and Hardy. In our modern society fame has become a rather cheap commodity - some achieve it for great works and achievements but there seems to be a never-ending river - or perhaps sewer would be a better term - of interchangeable, disposable 'celebrities' who pick up some form of fame for the most pathetic of reasons.
However even those who achieve fame deservedly for a great piece of music for instance, just don't come close to L&H at their height. Beatlemania doesn't come close; so many people turned out to see the pair in Glasgow a stone ballustrade broke while their arrival in Ireland was greeted by church bells mimicking the sounds of their famous 'Cuckoo' theme tune, peels rolling out across as most of the population came to greet them off the ship. There's a nice bit in Garth Ennis' excellent Preacher series where the hard-drinkin' Irish vampire Cass is talking about L&H to Jessie and recounts the same story, how the two of them were apparently in tears as they realised how much they meant to people. It must have been something else to have been a part of that crowd.
I loved L&H as a young kid watching repeats onTV during school holidays; I still love them and watch them on DVD today. The Cuckoo theme makes me smile right away while Stan still reduces me to tears of laughter with a few simple expressions. I loved watching Paul Merton's recent BBC series on the early comedians of the silver screen recently and when the Filmhouse had their Buster Keaton season I was there, laughing away and quite delighted to see that a man my age had his young boys with him and they were also in hysterics. These performers just had something timeless; they are still loved and adored today, their craft still admired but mostly we just still like to laugh at their films. Oscars and BAFTAs for the heavyweight categories of Best Director, Best Actor and so on are so over-rated; now the people who can make films which make us laugh and laugh and laugh? That's difficult and that's worth ten times the most magnificent dramatic performance.
Monday, July 24, 2006
Down and out Cylon
As computer graphics continue to replace many traditional methods of effects and modelling in film-making there is a cost, as this poor destitute old-model Cylon found out:
As computer graphics continue to replace many traditional methods of effects and modelling in film-making there is a cost, as this poor destitute old-model Cylon found out:
Sunday, July 23, 2006
Film Fest Guide
With one thing and another I've been slow off the mark in grabbing some Edinburgh International Film Festival tickets this year, so today Mel and I made a point of heading down to one of the box offices and using our movie passes to get a nice raft of discounts on some of the movies we'd circled. Of course, one of the first laws of Festival going (Film, Book, Fringe, Jazz, whatever) is that you will never see a fraction of the events you circle, but as any seasoned Festival goes will tell you it is vitally important that you circle many shows in your programme guide. You must then carry this programme guide around during the entire Festival period with you, in order that you can pull it out of your bag in between shows while hanging around in places like the Filmhouse bar.
It is essential that this guide is clearly thumbed and dog-eared - a pristine copy is simply not acceptable if you intend to radiate the image of a cool, sophisticated, cosmopolitan Fest-goer. Forget the hip, expensive clothes or the right sunglasses - you can step out of a Harvey Nicholls dressing room and still fall flat on your face if you sit there with an unmarked programme guide. Of course, you must ensure that you have clearly circled some shows which you frankly have no intention of seeing because you think they sound dreadful and pretentious, but must nonetheless mark so that you can leave the aforementioned, dog-eared programme lying casually on the table in front of you in the bar so anyone else sitting next to you will know that you are a person of great taste.
This is established behaviour at the Festival (similar rituals apply to the Book Festival, Fringe etc) and it is considered the height of bad manners for another Fest-goer to try and call another on circled events which they know that person doesn't really want to go and see. Should someone be so vulgar as to breach this ancient etiquette the standard replies, delivered in short, clipped tones to imply you are being polite but do not wish to mix socially, are usually along the lines of "I really, really wanted to but it was sold out 5 minutes before the box office even opened" (which usually draws knowing nods and muttered "oh, I know what you mean, I tried to book this documentary about the plight of beetrot farmers in Kazikstan but it was so sold out") or "it clashed with another show" (which is a common gambit and also often true).
As you sit there in-between shows in the bar of the Filmhouse, Cameo, Pleasance etc, with your marked, dog-eared programme which clearly denotes your taste and sophistication you must also remember the Fest etiquette regarding celeb-spotting. Over the course of the world's biggest arts festival you will almost certainly bump into someone famous here and there - some performers, some simply there to enjoy the Fest and to be seen. You must at all costs remains totally cool and radiate a glow of being utterly unruffled should you find yourself next to a celeb at the bar, loo, show, curry house (or in the case of some of the more esoteric and 'cutting edge' shows on the Fringe it may be a show in the loo of a curry house). You must never, ever react with delight or awe; instead, should you make eye contact with the celeb you merely nod politely, offer a smile and 'hi' as if they are someone you know well and just happened to spot on your way to a critic's meeting to make fun of the Perrier nominees.
So there you go, folks, if you are a Fest-newbie, follow these tips and you too can still avoid being laughed at as a gauche and unsophisticated yokel dazzled by the flurry of shows and art on offer and istead appear to be hip, cool and fashionably jaded. Oh, and you should also actually ty to book some shows to go and see as well, that's almost as important as the tips above :-)
On which subject I've followed my usual Film Fest pattern, which is Mel and I circle a bunch of films we both fancy (and as noted above we won't see half of them), then we see which ones coincide and then run through which screenings clash with others we want to see. Finally we have the First List and off we go (as we did today) to buy a bunch of tickets (still utterly broke, thank the gods of commerce for credit cards). Then I start of the Second List; this is my personal list because I take time off to go enjoy the Film Fest, where Mel will only be off the odd day here and there so she's restricted to evening and weekend shows for the most part, so these shows are the ones I want to go to myself, so if I want to see a film about Korean hit-men from the 22nd century who kill each other using electric eels while one hitman reforms his soul and tries to protect a school girl with psychic powers developed because she wears the pants of a dead telekinetic friend (not Mel's sort of thing at all) then I can.
So today we grabbed a bunch of 2 for 1s on movies we both want to see, then since I am a bit behind I jumped into the second phase and bought some I was going to take in during my time off as well (at the discount rate, bless that movie pass, means I can see more movies). The third phase is when I then look at the Fest calendar, take in the gaps and then decide what to go see those days (or of it should be a slob day reading a book under a tree in the Meadows). Annoyingly I've missed the boat on a couple of flicks I really wanted to see, so I'll need to play the watch for returns/extra screenings thing I suspected Clerks II would sell out, especially since Kevin Smith will be over, but I was surpised to see Wristcutter: a Love Story was sold out as well. The story of a jilted lover who commits suicide and wakes up in a diner in purgatory sounds interesting and also sounds remarkably like the story for an acclaimed Israeli comic Pizzeria Kamikaze I added to the site a while back, although the programme guide doesn't mention it being based on the comic (perhaps they don't know or perhaps it sin't anything to do with the comic, although if it isn't it seems awfully similar); hopefully there will be some returns or it will appear on the last Sunday's Best of the Fest re-shows.
Al Gore's An Inconvenient truth has sold out (now he proves popular!!!! Too late!) but I did get tickets for the other Al - Franken in this case. I love Al Franken, although a lot of folks in the UK don't know who he is, but when you tell them he is the guy who wrote Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: a Fair and Balanced Look at the Right Wing Media and that Murdoch's Fox news tried to sue him with their batallion of Monty Burns-style lawyers for using their motto ('fair and balanced') and failed, in the process propelling his book to number one status in the US everyone goes, oh, that guy, yeah, he's great. Strangely I've yet to meet someone who says, oh that sod who ruined the good name of Fox News...
Oh, and I did get tickets for Art School Confidential, another partnership between cool cartoonist Dan Clowes and director Terry Zwigoff; they made the excellent adaptation of Dan's Ghost World ( acomic book movie folks who don't read comics books can enjoy; actually a comic book folks who don't read comics books can enjoy too come to think of it) a few years back, which I remember getting a freebie from the publisher to go to see (free goody bags, free drink, free movie - viva life!) and as a bonus Zwigoff and Crumb were there for the show, although regrettably the stars Thora Birch (who everyone thought after American Beauty would be the new Christina Ricci) and an unknown actress called Scarlett Johanssen (who did go on to be the Next Big Thing and is utterly gorgeous) weren't with them. More planning to do, more deb to run up on the credit car, more shows to book. Meantime Film Four is going freeview tonight, so I can watch some cool movies on there to warm up; coincidentally the first free one they are showing is Lost in Translation with the luscious Scarlett.
Only a few weeks to go then a whole fortnight off to relax and see some goddam brilliant movies, hang around in bars (with my dog-eared programme); even the fact the city is packed with tourists and Festival goers (the population almsot doubles this time of year) doesn't bug me as much when I am off - it can be annoying when you are working and trying to get about town but when you are off and in no hurry it can be fun. Actually this is the first time I've taken two weeks off back to back in nearly two years, so its going to be cool. The only thing wrong is it feels odd to have a Film Festival and know I won't be bumping into Shiona as I amble around between screenings, although I'm sure she will be there in spirit.
With one thing and another I've been slow off the mark in grabbing some Edinburgh International Film Festival tickets this year, so today Mel and I made a point of heading down to one of the box offices and using our movie passes to get a nice raft of discounts on some of the movies we'd circled. Of course, one of the first laws of Festival going (Film, Book, Fringe, Jazz, whatever) is that you will never see a fraction of the events you circle, but as any seasoned Festival goes will tell you it is vitally important that you circle many shows in your programme guide. You must then carry this programme guide around during the entire Festival period with you, in order that you can pull it out of your bag in between shows while hanging around in places like the Filmhouse bar.
It is essential that this guide is clearly thumbed and dog-eared - a pristine copy is simply not acceptable if you intend to radiate the image of a cool, sophisticated, cosmopolitan Fest-goer. Forget the hip, expensive clothes or the right sunglasses - you can step out of a Harvey Nicholls dressing room and still fall flat on your face if you sit there with an unmarked programme guide. Of course, you must ensure that you have clearly circled some shows which you frankly have no intention of seeing because you think they sound dreadful and pretentious, but must nonetheless mark so that you can leave the aforementioned, dog-eared programme lying casually on the table in front of you in the bar so anyone else sitting next to you will know that you are a person of great taste.
This is established behaviour at the Festival (similar rituals apply to the Book Festival, Fringe etc) and it is considered the height of bad manners for another Fest-goer to try and call another on circled events which they know that person doesn't really want to go and see. Should someone be so vulgar as to breach this ancient etiquette the standard replies, delivered in short, clipped tones to imply you are being polite but do not wish to mix socially, are usually along the lines of "I really, really wanted to but it was sold out 5 minutes before the box office even opened" (which usually draws knowing nods and muttered "oh, I know what you mean, I tried to book this documentary about the plight of beetrot farmers in Kazikstan but it was so sold out") or "it clashed with another show" (which is a common gambit and also often true).
As you sit there in-between shows in the bar of the Filmhouse, Cameo, Pleasance etc, with your marked, dog-eared programme which clearly denotes your taste and sophistication you must also remember the Fest etiquette regarding celeb-spotting. Over the course of the world's biggest arts festival you will almost certainly bump into someone famous here and there - some performers, some simply there to enjoy the Fest and to be seen. You must at all costs remains totally cool and radiate a glow of being utterly unruffled should you find yourself next to a celeb at the bar, loo, show, curry house (or in the case of some of the more esoteric and 'cutting edge' shows on the Fringe it may be a show in the loo of a curry house). You must never, ever react with delight or awe; instead, should you make eye contact with the celeb you merely nod politely, offer a smile and 'hi' as if they are someone you know well and just happened to spot on your way to a critic's meeting to make fun of the Perrier nominees.
So there you go, folks, if you are a Fest-newbie, follow these tips and you too can still avoid being laughed at as a gauche and unsophisticated yokel dazzled by the flurry of shows and art on offer and istead appear to be hip, cool and fashionably jaded. Oh, and you should also actually ty to book some shows to go and see as well, that's almost as important as the tips above :-)
On which subject I've followed my usual Film Fest pattern, which is Mel and I circle a bunch of films we both fancy (and as noted above we won't see half of them), then we see which ones coincide and then run through which screenings clash with others we want to see. Finally we have the First List and off we go (as we did today) to buy a bunch of tickets (still utterly broke, thank the gods of commerce for credit cards). Then I start of the Second List; this is my personal list because I take time off to go enjoy the Film Fest, where Mel will only be off the odd day here and there so she's restricted to evening and weekend shows for the most part, so these shows are the ones I want to go to myself, so if I want to see a film about Korean hit-men from the 22nd century who kill each other using electric eels while one hitman reforms his soul and tries to protect a school girl with psychic powers developed because she wears the pants of a dead telekinetic friend (not Mel's sort of thing at all) then I can.
So today we grabbed a bunch of 2 for 1s on movies we both want to see, then since I am a bit behind I jumped into the second phase and bought some I was going to take in during my time off as well (at the discount rate, bless that movie pass, means I can see more movies). The third phase is when I then look at the Fest calendar, take in the gaps and then decide what to go see those days (or of it should be a slob day reading a book under a tree in the Meadows). Annoyingly I've missed the boat on a couple of flicks I really wanted to see, so I'll need to play the watch for returns/extra screenings thing I suspected Clerks II would sell out, especially since Kevin Smith will be over, but I was surpised to see Wristcutter: a Love Story was sold out as well. The story of a jilted lover who commits suicide and wakes up in a diner in purgatory sounds interesting and also sounds remarkably like the story for an acclaimed Israeli comic Pizzeria Kamikaze I added to the site a while back, although the programme guide doesn't mention it being based on the comic (perhaps they don't know or perhaps it sin't anything to do with the comic, although if it isn't it seems awfully similar); hopefully there will be some returns or it will appear on the last Sunday's Best of the Fest re-shows.
Al Gore's An Inconvenient truth has sold out (now he proves popular!!!! Too late!) but I did get tickets for the other Al - Franken in this case. I love Al Franken, although a lot of folks in the UK don't know who he is, but when you tell them he is the guy who wrote Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: a Fair and Balanced Look at the Right Wing Media and that Murdoch's Fox news tried to sue him with their batallion of Monty Burns-style lawyers for using their motto ('fair and balanced') and failed, in the process propelling his book to number one status in the US everyone goes, oh, that guy, yeah, he's great. Strangely I've yet to meet someone who says, oh that sod who ruined the good name of Fox News...
Oh, and I did get tickets for Art School Confidential, another partnership between cool cartoonist Dan Clowes and director Terry Zwigoff; they made the excellent adaptation of Dan's Ghost World ( acomic book movie folks who don't read comics books can enjoy; actually a comic book folks who don't read comics books can enjoy too come to think of it) a few years back, which I remember getting a freebie from the publisher to go to see (free goody bags, free drink, free movie - viva life!) and as a bonus Zwigoff and Crumb were there for the show, although regrettably the stars Thora Birch (who everyone thought after American Beauty would be the new Christina Ricci) and an unknown actress called Scarlett Johanssen (who did go on to be the Next Big Thing and is utterly gorgeous) weren't with them. More planning to do, more deb to run up on the credit car, more shows to book. Meantime Film Four is going freeview tonight, so I can watch some cool movies on there to warm up; coincidentally the first free one they are showing is Lost in Translation with the luscious Scarlett.
Only a few weeks to go then a whole fortnight off to relax and see some goddam brilliant movies, hang around in bars (with my dog-eared programme); even the fact the city is packed with tourists and Festival goers (the population almsot doubles this time of year) doesn't bug me as much when I am off - it can be annoying when you are working and trying to get about town but when you are off and in no hurry it can be fun. Actually this is the first time I've taken two weeks off back to back in nearly two years, so its going to be cool. The only thing wrong is it feels odd to have a Film Festival and know I won't be bumping into Shiona as I amble around between screenings, although I'm sure she will be there in spirit.
Saturday, July 22, 2006
Please get out of the way
I love the notes Israel is dropping on Lebanese villages: "please not that the Israeli army and air force will be conducting surgical strikes in your area this week, so please, no parking on the road and we apologise for the inconvenience of blowing up your homes and slaughtering your children. If you could be so kind as to remove yourselves along the highways we have so thoughtfully cratered with bombs and routinely strafe this would be the best way to protect yourselves. Oh, and this message is backdated two weeks to when we first started bombing the hell out of your towns. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible."
I have no time for these Hezbollah numpties who clearly have little regard for the safety of civilians on either side, but we know they are terrorists. Israel is a democratically governed nation yet it is committing wanton acts of terror while Blair and Bush sit by and let them, slaughtering hundreds of civilians including children. What is even scarier is that the bulk of Israeli opinion seems to think that hundreds of innocents being killed by them is acceptable. And they wonder why so many people hate them so much. Of course you have the right to defend yourselves from lunatics firing missiles into your towns, but the Israelis seem to be shocked that they get hit back after bombing Lebanon.
Even if you are the most gung-ho hawkish Israeli surely you should be a bit more pragmattic about this - bombings of large areas of Gaza failed to return the solider kidnapped there and instead killed many innocents, ruined the land's infrastructure and pushed even moderates into hating Israel. So what is your strategy in the North - why do exactly the same again, but do it on a bigger scale. Oh, and bomb large parts of one of the few democratic nations in the region which is still recovering from a dreadful civil war. Yeah, that will really secure peace for your country and won't lead to more instability and a whole new generation of traumatised kids who will grow up with a burning hate of Israel. As far as increasing security this is about as successful as the 'liberation' of Iraq was in securing peace and stability.
Wouldn't it be nice if we could just put a big chunk of country aside for those fools who are utterly convinced that the only way to settle anything is with big explosions, well away from everyone else, and just let them duke it out there, leaving civilians out of it. How ironic that Israel should now be re-creating the terror of Guernica, repeating the awful crimes against civilians that an evil regime that they above all other people should despise, yet here they are committing similar acts.
And before anyone gives me that tired old argument that saying anything against Israel amounts to anti-Semitism, don't bother - that's the biggest load of cobblers. I'm not anti-Semitic, or anti-Muslim or anyone for that matter. I'm just anti bloodthirsty barbarians who think killing hundreds of innocent civilians is acceptable. Bush and Blair don't dare criticise Israel because their own records in this regard are less than spotless - actually, let's face it, they should be in the War Crimes court in the Hague. Maybe if we hauled more so-called world leaders off to the Hague to answer for their crimes then politicians would become less enamoured with warfare as a tool of policy. As ever it is ordinary folks on both sides who get caught in the middle. Oh, and wasn't it amazing what Boing Boing and other news sources published this week, that the American government made their citizens being evacuated from Lebanon sign a promissary note agreeing to reimburse the state for the cost of saving them? Isn't that what your taxes are for?
I love the notes Israel is dropping on Lebanese villages: "please not that the Israeli army and air force will be conducting surgical strikes in your area this week, so please, no parking on the road and we apologise for the inconvenience of blowing up your homes and slaughtering your children. If you could be so kind as to remove yourselves along the highways we have so thoughtfully cratered with bombs and routinely strafe this would be the best way to protect yourselves. Oh, and this message is backdated two weeks to when we first started bombing the hell out of your towns. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible."
I have no time for these Hezbollah numpties who clearly have little regard for the safety of civilians on either side, but we know they are terrorists. Israel is a democratically governed nation yet it is committing wanton acts of terror while Blair and Bush sit by and let them, slaughtering hundreds of civilians including children. What is even scarier is that the bulk of Israeli opinion seems to think that hundreds of innocents being killed by them is acceptable. And they wonder why so many people hate them so much. Of course you have the right to defend yourselves from lunatics firing missiles into your towns, but the Israelis seem to be shocked that they get hit back after bombing Lebanon.
Even if you are the most gung-ho hawkish Israeli surely you should be a bit more pragmattic about this - bombings of large areas of Gaza failed to return the solider kidnapped there and instead killed many innocents, ruined the land's infrastructure and pushed even moderates into hating Israel. So what is your strategy in the North - why do exactly the same again, but do it on a bigger scale. Oh, and bomb large parts of one of the few democratic nations in the region which is still recovering from a dreadful civil war. Yeah, that will really secure peace for your country and won't lead to more instability and a whole new generation of traumatised kids who will grow up with a burning hate of Israel. As far as increasing security this is about as successful as the 'liberation' of Iraq was in securing peace and stability.
Wouldn't it be nice if we could just put a big chunk of country aside for those fools who are utterly convinced that the only way to settle anything is with big explosions, well away from everyone else, and just let them duke it out there, leaving civilians out of it. How ironic that Israel should now be re-creating the terror of Guernica, repeating the awful crimes against civilians that an evil regime that they above all other people should despise, yet here they are committing similar acts.
And before anyone gives me that tired old argument that saying anything against Israel amounts to anti-Semitism, don't bother - that's the biggest load of cobblers. I'm not anti-Semitic, or anti-Muslim or anyone for that matter. I'm just anti bloodthirsty barbarians who think killing hundreds of innocent civilians is acceptable. Bush and Blair don't dare criticise Israel because their own records in this regard are less than spotless - actually, let's face it, they should be in the War Crimes court in the Hague. Maybe if we hauled more so-called world leaders off to the Hague to answer for their crimes then politicians would become less enamoured with warfare as a tool of policy. As ever it is ordinary folks on both sides who get caught in the middle. Oh, and wasn't it amazing what Boing Boing and other news sources published this week, that the American government made their citizens being evacuated from Lebanon sign a promissary note agreeing to reimburse the state for the cost of saving them? Isn't that what your taxes are for?
More cows
Some more cow parade pics from sunny Edinburgh, including the mini-cows.
If you don't want to look like a total tourist wandering round town with an A-Z you can go check out the Cartographical Cow instead
The 'Three Grazer', which takes the mickey out of the incredibly over-priced and frankly second rate Three Graces statue the national Galleries (behind this statue) insisted on spending millions on a few years back. I prefer the cows.
Slightly blurred because I snapped it quickly from a moving bus, but this was the open-air stage for some summer Shakespeare in the West Princes St Gardens. I wish I had known about it earlier (and not been so broke) because I'd have loved to go and watch A Midsummer Night's Dream on a midsummer's eve, right in the shadow of the Castle as twilight fell. Kind of reminds me of he award-winning Sandman short story by Neil Gaiman which had Shakespear'e troupe performing Dream on a chalk hillside on the South Downs for the real Titania and Oberon.
Good kite-flying weather!
Time to head for the cooler breezes of the beaches at North Berwick
The Blair Beach Project...
Some more cow parade pics from sunny Edinburgh, including the mini-cows.
If you don't want to look like a total tourist wandering round town with an A-Z you can go check out the Cartographical Cow instead
The 'Three Grazer', which takes the mickey out of the incredibly over-priced and frankly second rate Three Graces statue the national Galleries (behind this statue) insisted on spending millions on a few years back. I prefer the cows.
Slightly blurred because I snapped it quickly from a moving bus, but this was the open-air stage for some summer Shakespeare in the West Princes St Gardens. I wish I had known about it earlier (and not been so broke) because I'd have loved to go and watch A Midsummer Night's Dream on a midsummer's eve, right in the shadow of the Castle as twilight fell. Kind of reminds me of he award-winning Sandman short story by Neil Gaiman which had Shakespear'e troupe performing Dream on a chalk hillside on the South Downs for the real Titania and Oberon.
Good kite-flying weather!
Time to head for the cooler breezes of the beaches at North Berwick
The Blair Beach Project...
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