Miscellaneous photos from Birmingham
Nov. 9th, 2013 04:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
highlyeccentricBut none really of Birmingham, since I didn't do much touristing there. I have some photos of All Saints Brixworth on my other camera yet to dig out, though...
I spent most of the week schlepping around Dr J's new flat (spacious if run-down!) and his neighbourhood. I quite like said neighbourhood, but it's hardly pretty. So I have no streetscapes, just public service information:
There's evidently a certain... demographic around the place. However, there is also the Ort Cafe, who serve tasty vegetarian breakfasts, cheap cups of tea, and not-actually-profitmaking community events. There's a large sad stuffed puppy on the piano, one set of salt & pepper shakers is a pair of robots, and when we walked in there was a group of about six adults with (from appearances) Downs Syndrome playing foozball.
I demanded of Dr J that he feed me meat, but also beans, because a brief increase in meat intake the previous week had caused my digestion to sulk. Here, beef, beans AND pork:
Quite some time was spent playing these two games. Dr J, in looking for the basic set for me as a gift, found Star Fluxx for himself, and it is a most magificent game. His colleague and drinking buddy, Lady Byzantine, came over on Tuesday and we all three played one VERY INCREDIBLY ENDLESS game of Fluxx. Much fun was had.
Also on Tuesday I met up with former student S.L. in Derby. She's currently startling people with her advanced skillz (she's a double-degree student, so is taking second-year Arts classes while actually being in fourth year) and her complicated thesis plans (no one believes us that an Australian honours year is more or less equal to anyone else's Masters, but then they're perplexed when we have plans for 20 000 word theses... sigh).
Anyway, we went into a shop which sold vast amounts of chocolate desserts, but I can get chocolate in Switzerland. So I ordered one of these:
I wasn't entirely sure they existed, you know. Like Butterbeer and pumpkin juice, knickerbocker glory might as easily have been a literary trick played by British childrens books...
Observe: a man and his robot. The power of robot to brighten grey moods is notable.
Books! Author copies of a book wot Dr J made. Well, Dr J and someone else and many contributors. I'm not sure what he was more smug about, the book itself, or having caused +1 publications for various of his friends.
Then Geneva put on a lovely sunset for my return, as if to show off the fact that there's still daylight here after 5pm and the temperature is above 10 degrees...
I spent most of the week schlepping around Dr J's new flat (spacious if run-down!) and his neighbourhood. I quite like said neighbourhood, but it's hardly pretty. So I have no streetscapes, just public service information:
There's evidently a certain... demographic around the place. However, there is also the Ort Cafe, who serve tasty vegetarian breakfasts, cheap cups of tea, and not-actually-profitmaking community events. There's a large sad stuffed puppy on the piano, one set of salt & pepper shakers is a pair of robots, and when we walked in there was a group of about six adults with (from appearances) Downs Syndrome playing foozball.
I demanded of Dr J that he feed me meat, but also beans, because a brief increase in meat intake the previous week had caused my digestion to sulk. Here, beef, beans AND pork:
Quite some time was spent playing these two games. Dr J, in looking for the basic set for me as a gift, found Star Fluxx for himself, and it is a most magificent game. His colleague and drinking buddy, Lady Byzantine, came over on Tuesday and we all three played one VERY INCREDIBLY ENDLESS game of Fluxx. Much fun was had.
Also on Tuesday I met up with former student S.L. in Derby. She's currently startling people with her advanced skillz (she's a double-degree student, so is taking second-year Arts classes while actually being in fourth year) and her complicated thesis plans (no one believes us that an Australian honours year is more or less equal to anyone else's Masters, but then they're perplexed when we have plans for 20 000 word theses... sigh).
Anyway, we went into a shop which sold vast amounts of chocolate desserts, but I can get chocolate in Switzerland. So I ordered one of these:
I wasn't entirely sure they existed, you know. Like Butterbeer and pumpkin juice, knickerbocker glory might as easily have been a literary trick played by British childrens books...
Observe: a man and his robot. The power of robot to brighten grey moods is notable.
Books! Author copies of a book wot Dr J made. Well, Dr J and someone else and many contributors. I'm not sure what he was more smug about, the book itself, or having caused +1 publications for various of his friends.
Then Geneva put on a lovely sunset for my return, as if to show off the fact that there's still daylight here after 5pm and the temperature is above 10 degrees...
no subject
Date: 2013-11-09 11:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-10 01:22 pm (UTC)Please pass congrats on to Dr J.
But... tell me he didn't bring you to Birmingham without showing you the library?
no subject
Date: 2013-11-10 05:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 01:40 am (UTC)http://www.libraryofbirmingham.com/ss/Satellite?blobcol=urldata&blobkey=id&blobtable=MungoBlobs&blobwhere=1318265899951&ssbinary=true
no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 01:23 pm (UTC)