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For our wedding anniversary last year (30 years!), Fiona gave me the very wonderful Lego 21320 kit, Dinosaur Fossils, which builds into impressive skeletons of Tyrannosaurus, Triceratops and Pteranodon. This is a truly great kit and I’d encourage anyone to go out and find one. But you know what’s even better that Lego Tyrannosaurus, Triceratops and Pteranodon? Lego Giraffatitan. This is not a kit you can buy, but a rebuild …

Sunday afternoon and the rain has just set in. In land, hopefully, this will fall as snow, but here on the edge of the North Sea, it will just be cold rain. I’ve spent the last two weeks in various stages of being On-Call for my day job. I don’t like the experience, although I am compensated for it, and always find myself put out of place by the position. …

The swans have returned to the valley. It’s always comforting to see them back for the winter and to watch them fly by when I’m out running errands. It’s unusual now not to see them fly overhead in twos, threes, and more. Though never in the vast quantities like the snow geese. Fresh snow covered the top of Lyman Hill yesterday. First snow on the foothils and first frost here …

Kay (pronounced “kigh”, rhymes with “sky”) Nielsen was a Danish illustrator — active in the early 20th century — who was known in particular for his illustrations for the Norwegian fairy tale East of the Sun and West of the Moon. This is one example.

In 1916 a newly arrived New Yorker named Adolph “Eddie” Brandstatter and a partner opened a café in Los Angeles. Modeling it on an unnamed New York City restaurant, they named it Victor Hugo and designed it to introduce fine French cuisine and continental service to the cafeteria-loving city. Four years after opening the Victor Hugo, Brandstatter turned his attention to a Santa Monica project, the Sunset Inn, buying it …

Lab rotations are a regular feature of work in my research groups. Students join the lab and figure out a project they want to work on themselves. While this typically results in at least a serviceable final report and good learning outcomes for the student, occassionally the work done lends itself to wider dissemination. If a student feels motivated and we can support them, we may try to move towards …

Alexander Palace is a well-known sports and entertainment venue which sits within the 200 acre Alexandra Park in North London and is nestled between the areas of Wood Green and Muswell Hill. The land on which they sit was once part of Tottenham Wood, which itself was part of the Great Forest of Middlesex. From the 13th century the Great Forest became subject to deforestation, mostly due to the land …

This trip was pencilled in months ago, when the cup draw was made. I knew Harrogate to be a good drinking town, having visited on a Blackpool CAMRA trip around 14 years ago. And Harrogate was a new ground – Blackpool previously played there during the COVID season but this was the first time fans had the opportunity to tick it off. I could therefore continue my quest for the …

October was a month of pelts in prams, reflectors on jackets, low sun, pumpkins and gourds, rustling leaves, blue light, piles of apples,…

In my first post about this strange lash-up I saw in Stratford, I shared some photos of the CN crew bringing a short string of cars into Stratford's rail yard. The crew did a little switching, which was perfect for someone like me who never gets to see freight trains. My time in Stratford earlier this summer was quite prolific from a railfanning perspective. Not only did I get shots …

In 2015 I made a keyboard guide to help people find the keys on their muddled-up keyboards. At the time I used Apple computers myself so without really thinking too much I made it as an Apple keyboard, however a few people complained that as PC users this diagram was confusing and bewildering to them. Now, almost ten years later I am releasing an updated PC version. You can order …

Prime accompanist goes solo. [row-start] [half] [/half] [half] Personnel Norman Simmons (piano), Victor Sproles (bass), Vernel Fornier (drums) Recorded in 1956 in Chicago Released as Argo 607 in 1956 Track listing Side A: Capacity In Blues/Stella By Starlight/Jan/My Funny Valentine/Peppe Side B: Chili Bowl/Moonlight In Vermont/You Do Something To Me/Love Is Eternal/They Can’t Take That Away From Me/Tranquility [/half] [row-end] This gets you through the night. Good bounce, sassy Carribean …

Lily – Rose Tremain Chance find in Belmont Library. A less rosy view of the life of young girl / woman abandoned at birth and taken into the care of Thomas Coram’s Foundling Hospital. Victorian gothic? Author page: Lily – Rose Tremain

This 1984 debut record by The Cult (after they changed their name from Death Cult) addressed lead singer Ian Astbury's interest with Native American cultures and themes that would continue throughout most of the The Cult's career. Guitarist Billy Duffy hadn't quite found his signature guitar sound yet (that would happen on subsequent album Love covered here), but you can get a sense of where he was heading with it. …

The Beano and Dandy Comic Libraries were digest-sized spin-offs of the two full-size comics, which were published at the rate of four per month (two Beanos and two Dandys) from 1982 to 1997. Each one was 64 pages long and told a single, long-form story starring one or more of D. C. Thomson's main characters, often pairing them up in unusual crossovers. In 1997 the Comic Libraries were supplanted by …