When I was off earlier this month I went down the coast a little outside Edinburgh to the Scottish Mining Museum, which I've been meaning to go to for ages (the 26 bus right from the city centre takes you to right to the entrance). Annoyingly the visitor centre and inside attractions and tours weren't up and running, even though I had checked the website before going down and it indicated everything was, but I did get to wander around all the surface remains and had the place largely to myself at the time too, quite atmospheric, so quiet now but once teeming with hundreds and hundreds of men working in the mine, the mighty boilers of the power house and the nearby brick kilns. Shot quite a lot of photos and only now uploading them - the first batch are on my Flickr page, with more to follow, and also a short video 360 panorama:
Oh yes, special treat arrives in the post today, an early copy of the next League of Extra Ordinary Gentlemen book by Messrs Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill, Century:1910, which is out here towards the end of May (so lucky, lucky me, got one of the earliest copies in the kingdom, oh its good to have contacts!). This third volume of LOEG is going to come in three volumes covering a century, from the 1910 book, then late this year the 60s and next year the early 21st century. I've been really looking forward to this, started reading it on the way home from the Book Group meeting tonight (we were doing Kurt Vonnegut's fascinating and darkly humorous Galapagos), superb stuff, as ever Alan puts layers upon layers of historical, social and cultural references while Kev's artwork is as brilliantly detailed as ever, demanding close attention for small components as well as the larger parts carrying the main narrative. Must force myself not to sit and read it all in one sitting, ration it out for a couple of evenings...
Doctor Monastashus van der Koala, head of medical studies & sneezing at the University of Woolamaloo has been updating the Gazette to recent international epidemic news. He points out that while the mainstream media has been covering (or stoking public panic about, depending how you view it) the Mexican Swine Flu outbreak across the world (he advises worried readers that if going to a Mexican restaurant do not dance a salsa with any pigs who are present, no matter how friendly they are or how big and jolly their sombrero), he alerts us to a similarly name disease which has so far been ignored by the meedja: You Utter Swine Flu. This is a contagious condition which manifests itself in sufferers growing pencil moustaches and enduring uncontrollable urges to perform Terry Thomas impressions and generally act like utter cads. You have been warned.
You know I just realised when I got the WG back on the air tonight that I had forgotten my own sixth anniversary - the blog version (it previously existed as spoof newspaper articles done one emails from '91 onwards) of the WG started on April 7th, 2003. I notice that by coincidence back then I was writing a satirical piss take about the media's ridiculous bird flu coverage (or panic inducing nonsense) which had everyone convinced the world was about to end any moment and lead me to a new hobby which involved standing close to visiting Asian tourists in Edinburgh and doing an elaborate sneeze and dropping feathers to scare the hell out of them. Now today its Swine Flu. Plus ca change, plus la meme chose. I do wonder if both stories could dovetail - if some flu ridden birds and pigs, high on Lemsip, got down together and bred could they produce a hybrid strain of bird-pig flu and thus the world ends in a cloud of sneezes, feathers and the smell of bacon. Well, maybe when pigs fly. Which if the birds and pigs get it on could happen.
Apologies to anyone who swung by over the last week and found some odd 'parking' site instead of the Woolamaloo Gazette - my domain registration had expired but the company had my old email and so I never got their reminder (they used to send snail mail too just in case but obviously not any longer). At first I thought I had a hijacker at first, but it had just been parked as a now not owned domain, but I got it sorted out (after a lot of long waiting on hold) and with some help from my mate Darren (who set up the original cogs and wheels once I bought a domain back at the start). Anyway, finally notice as of this evening its back up (and with it my regular email which comes through the same domain), which feels good - hated not having the Woolamaloo on the air, even if I don't write quite as much on it as I used to.
Here's what dad and I saw steaming in to Edinburgh this afternoon, steam whistle blowing, smoke and steam billowing, Union of South Africa, an A4 Pacific steam loco (the class which set the world steam engine speed record) with the streamliner casing. I know the streamlining was more about image and marketing and didn't give much of an advantage in reality, but ye gods its lovely. Elegance and power from a different era when travelling the length of our islands drawn by some great steel, fire breathing dragon like this was an adventure and not the boring, over priced chore its become now.
(click the pic for the larger version)
Imagine charging down from Edinburgh along Britain's east coast mainline to London behind one of these magnificent engines, the sea on your left as you roar down towards Berwick upon Tweed, the roar of the engine resounding across the landscape, easily pulling a long line of carriages with its enormous power, crossing the border, cruising into Northern England, passing ancient York, surging south on steel and iron and fire and water at a speed most people of the time would never encounter anywhere else in their life (this series could easily cruise beyond 100mph) until you arrive in King's Cross in the middle of London. Before most people had cars, long before motorways existed it would have been remarkable to travel so swiftly, to go from one great capital city of the United Kingdom to another in just a few hours, and in comfort and style as well. God, that was the era to travel by train in this country...
I've no idea what production they were shooting but as I was crossing North Bridge to work this morning I saw these bright lights in front of the old Scotsman building (now a restaurant/bar, the Scotsman relocated to new premises down near the Parliament a while back) and I grabbed the camera from my bag and fired off a quick shot - its not well focussed and there's reflections in it, but then it was shot from the top deck of a moving bus, so it was the best I could manage as I passed. I saw Christmas trees outside and a colleague noticed the hotel on the other side of the street had Christmas decorations, which would have been in the background through the windows of the restaurant, so perhaps a Christmas-set scene, but that still doesn't tell us what the actual production was. Oh well, something unusual on a cold, misty, gray morning...
Continuing to play with black and white at the moment, realised I've never taken Dizzy in B&W and with her gorgeous soft gray and white fur she's perfect for some monochrome treatment; click the pics to see the larger versions on my Flickr:
