Day 233, Green screen, wheezing, activity unreality

Marching about, walking to the shop, running round the block, turning pedals at less than the optimal rate.  Counting steps to oblivion, ticking off moments of mortality.  Arbitrary factors presented as design for living.

Outside, events appear.

Viewed by three trainee guide dogs with their handlers listening to instruction from an intonation-sapped and lifeless script performance while my legs go by them at slow pace.  The Golden Retrievers managing to look attentive perhaps in the hope a treat will be offered.  Then, knees and ankles are ignored by cemetery dwelling Jackdaws as they hop and jump between the gravestones scuffing in the grass for insects.

Being baked in the sun and wheezing like a consumptive, the relics of the deceased beneath my technical sports footwear don’t give a monkeys.  Dog walkers are everywhere, hordes of dogs.  A large black, white, and patchy cat with a bell and half a moustache plays with an invisible prey.  Even through bunged up nasal tubes the heat amplifies into a constant oppressive fug the smell of some giant and invisible dog shit.

Senses, data, representation.

The odd collection of estate agents signs, not just the usuals, Blundells, Saxton Mee, Haybrook, but ones with completely odd names.  Like they’ve been made up, faked so it appears as though there is huge activity in the housing market.

A feeling of unreality starts to wash over, is it all a construct, are the houses even real or just rickety facades, wooden hoardings painted to appear as more tangible structures.  Maybe there is no such thing as streets, roads, houses. Perhaps our reality is all for show and we’re being filmed for the real audience of drugged puppets living in chrome and white tunnels through the granite subsurface paying for their TV in a real world that we don’t inhabit.  The blue sky and clouds is a green-screen projection onto our retinas, we are tunnel dwellers too but our messed-with senses betray nothing but an unease from streets where there are more doors than people.

Distress and consequence.

If this goes too far it’ll end with needle jabs and self-inflicted biting to determine whether there is pain, “I am real, I am, look at me, there’s blood, and it even hurts slightly... at least I think it hurts… it does hurt doesn’t it?”

Recovery and absorption.

Watching TV, glued to the exciting developments presented.  Fascinating and factual insight into the world of others: Take That Out, Britain’s Hardest Crafter, Big Bother, American Idle, The Vice, Crims Dine With Me, Master Chuff, Wotnot and Where, How Clean is Your Grouse?

A single, quiet night in, down the tunnels.

For official/internal use only:
4545

0-9

Day 232, Stone arch, scene shift, relic

Here's a stone arch at the bottom of Holberry Close.  An inner-city street in Sheffield, England.

Holberry Close is just below Holberry Gardens, both of these streets were formerly known as Havelock Square but were renamed in the 1980s.  The name change was one element of a much wider process instigated by the City Council to change the nature of the area due to it having a bad reputation.  The area had become a red light district and was rather run down.  It also happened to be where Peter Sutcliffe picked up his last potential victim on the night he was apprehended.

The streets were renamed in honour of Samuel Holberry, the Sheffield Chartist activist.

This 1950s map of the area also shows the arch at the bottom of the Square.  The road layout changed enormously in the late 1980s as many houses were demolished to clear the path for Hanover Way.  Hanover Way is on the other side of the new builds shown in the above picture.

So far a search for information on what the stone archway originally belonged to hasn't revealed anything.

For official/internal use only:
3334

0-9

Day 231, the hangover inheritance

A friend of mine's partner ran The Hanover for a while.  She'd previously run Bring Your Own Brown Sauce a restaurant on Chesterfield Rd but then moved into the pub trade.

I'm pretty sure the only time I have ever been in was during her custodian of the place.

That was sometime in the past.

Look, it sells real beer.

Another acquaintance of mine was a regular in the place.  He became part of one of the fake band names that one of the other regulars used to post to the NME as performing at various venues.  This fakery continued for some time and given that the NME never checked the authenticity of these postings, why would they, there is a long list of non-existent bands to confuse future musicologists.  

It was reputed that my acquaintance inherited a large sum of money, although this is completely untrue.  He did come into possession of about two thousand pounds which he then lost in a convoluted story involving him, a female friend of his, and a trip abroad which never took place due to his friend legging it with the cash.

The name of the band was Bob Gilpin's Inheritance.

And here is Bob standing in front of one of my deconstructed motorcycles.

My understanding is he has now left the building, it is not recorded whether he left any inheritance.

For official/internal use only:
4433

0-9

Day 230, Magic rune mark

There it is on the wall.  A mysterious, runic shape.

Panic set in, the party had no Vorpal blade with which to disrupt non-material beings.  Quickly a Des Ew wizard spell was prepared in case of an encounter.

The party decided to run and to hasten their speed had to discard a number of items, a chest containing stamina potions, a Speedbow and the supply of Slayer arrows, and the Mace of order.  Even then the party struggled, it was then discovered that their pace was being slowed due to one member having an injured leg.  The injury was healed using a Vi potion made using a Priest spell

The rest of the journey was uneventful and the party arrived at work unscathed and on time.

For official/internal use only:
5444

0-9

Day 229, Showroom dummies

Armless, genital-less, immobile.  Like a giant thing with missing bits.

It is of course Kraftwerk.

Noted for their minimalist style, often wearing nothing more than custom styled and monogrammed handkerchiefs over their nipples, they are a peculiar bunch.

Here are the last remains of Florian Schneider, who departed the band in 2006, left to gently decompose as part of an extended performance piece in a back garden in South Yorkshire.

It is not often that such, formerly reclusive, artistes are seen in the wild.  Catch it now while you can, 5 Stars, The Guardian.

Obviously it will only be a matter of time before this performance loses some of the cutting edge that has rightly made the Schneidermeister something of an expert in this field, or is it a yard?

Right, I'm off to listen to Trans-Europe Express, but here's Señor Coconut with their version of the Kraftwerk song, Showroom Dummies.

For official/internal use only:
6566

0-9

Day 228, Urban nature

After visiting friends in Nether Edge I've walked, and cycled, sometimes with a bit of a wobble, through this small patch of inner city wilderness on my way home.

Sunnybank urban nature park.

Today I walked through there as I was notching up steps for the Global Corporate Challenge, "create a culture of health".  The bit in quotes puts me quite on edge, "welcome my son, welcome to the machine."

Sunnybank was the last place that my enormous black and white cat, Bottom, had a taste of fresh air and wilderness.  There was slightly more grass then and he had an opportunity for a mooch about and a sniff of the air, although he wasn't really in the mood.  The PDSA were the destination, they were located on the other side of where Waitrose is now, and it was his final resting point.

As soon as I got a decent income the PDSA were the first recipient of my regular charitable donation, and that's continued ever since.  The amount of benefit people get from their service is enormous.  I'm no fan of charity, a civilised society should be paying for the resources needed via taxation, without the personal preferences of a charitable donor having effect.  But then we are a closer to being pre-civilised given the way we express our concern.

This made me think of the NHS and what position many people would be in if we didn't have it.  It would be humans that would be dependent on handouts, and the fat cats in this case would be of a whole different type.  And who would be the recipients of that charity, those that had the greatest need or those who conformed to the moral template of the giver.  This compounds inequality, and really we don't want to go there.

On the other side of Sunnybank my thoughts changed, as with the weather.  It was raining when I left the office, but as I passed through Sunnybank it started to clear up, then it warmed up considerably.  My moment of cat-based reminiscence passed, and I made my along the Ecclesall Road and then up through The Botanical Gardens.  It was a pleasant wander out of the office and an opportunity to clear my head.

For official/internal use only:
5566

0-9

Day 227, Weather event

On this, the first meteorological day of summer, the weather was excellent.

John Humphrys on Radio 4 gave this slightly grumpy weather report:

"The weather is wet and windy, as you'll know if you look out of the window."

I did as Humphrys commanded, and was presented with this sight.

As you can see there is not a cloud in the sky, there was no rain, there was no wind.

The weather report did imply that this was the weather for the entire country.  In the delightful oasis of peace and tranquility of Sheffield we often have our own weather which is completely unrelated to that reported by the observation stations.  Although given that the observation station often used for Sheffield is almost fifty miles away, and on a flat plain on the other side of another couple of cities, it is surprising it is ever correct.

So there we are, made it with ease to the traditional British pastime of not only talking about the weather but also complaining about something/anything/the weather.

It wasn't long however before the words of John Humphrys were borne out.  Only five hours after his declaration it came to pass, bloody wet and windy outside the window, exactly as he had said.  And it has continued in that vein for the rest of the day.

A traditional British summer at last.

For official/internal use only:
5666

0-9