Anti-cyclist Notices

I complained recently in my blog about Dublin about the ubiquitous No Cycle Parking notices.

But how about this one, fixed to railings in Portugal Place in the middle of Cambridge?










I suppose it proves that Cambridge has better educated prejudiced people.

Rochester and Diggers

On Saturday I got taken, as a birthday treat, to Diggerland outside Rochester in Kent. It is a kind of theme park owned by a firm that hires out and sells JCB digging equipment. They have several such parks around England. My family had noted my complaint that I had never driven a tractor or any sort of big earthmoving plant. The plan is you pay your entrance fee and then go round the park taking turns on whatever takes your fancy.


You can dig some pretty big holes once you have got the idea of which lever to push in which direction. It takes a bit of getting used to, but it isn't rocket science, so a lot of fun can be had.

The aerial photo was taken from a cherry picker 50 feet up. Rochester Cathedral spire can just be seen slightly right of centre in the distance. In the foreground are many of the Diggerland rides.

Having had our picnic and exhausted the rides (as so often, there's almost as much fun watching other people mess up as in doing it oneself), we went into Rochester itself.


Imposing castle, right next to the cathedral.









The cathedral itself is smallish and Romanesque.

















There's a big light crypt.








The quire has the remains of this fine Wheel of Fortune wall painting.











In a transept is the Baptismal Fresco, claimed to be the first fresco painted in an English cathedral for over 800 years. It was painted over an eighteen month period in 2003-4 by the Russian iconographer Sergei Fyodorov.

Where fresco painting differs from just slapping paint on a wall, is that it is done onto fresh wet plaster. The paint and plaster dry together, thus binding the colour into the material. Only a small portion of plaster can be prepared and painted at a time, since the former dries quite quickly and then can't be used.


When complete the font of the cathedral will be placed in the transept in front of the fresco.

The top, obviously, depicts the baptism of Christ; the bottom left the baptism of King Ethelbert by St Augustine of Canterbury some time round about 600 A.D. On the right newly baptised Saxon Christians emerge from the River Medway and are given communion by Bishop Justus.


The work is quite impressive - one of the best artistic additions to a cathedral in Britain in the last half century.









The baptismal transept from the High Street.






Rochester's High Street is long and pretty. Almost every other building appears to have a plaque on it telling of its appearance in some or other work of Charles Dickens. Some even appear more than once - Eastgate House, an imposing Tudor mansion, is Westgate House in one of his books and The Nun's House in another. All harmless fun and I expect it gets the tourists in.

Greetings from New Zealand

Every time I send out a book I email the buyer with a little standard paragraph asking them to email me back when the package arrives. I've never bothered to add up what percentage of them do, but there are a fair few every week, mostly just a couple of words acknowledging receipt.

But today I had the best ever, a real work of art. The book, by the way, was called Boot and Shoe Design and Manufacture and was quite big, so it went sealed in a blue M-Bag, which is supposed to be delivered unopened to the customer who lives in New Zealand and who wishes to be known as Sylvia Carp.**

Here's what he wrote when he emailed to say it had arrived.

Arrived 07:40pm NZST Thurs 21st May 09

Proceedure: Sheepdog notes activity. Woof woof.Yap yap. Owner shouts. Shurup ya mangy heathen etc. Feeds goat, hens ... returns to bothy. Blue sack at doorstep. Suspicions: old Australian "Snake in a Sack" trick. Thinks: *wrong continent*. Pokes sack with shepherd crook (not cheap chestnut pommy type that bends out of shape in rain as used in nativity plays). Thinks: *Bloody big bag for one book*. Tentative fondle of bag in book region. Thinks:*Yes, book. Fear not*.

Notes: Blue bag stamped "Royal Mail Great Britain". Bow to royal bag and inspect.

Inspectors report: Bag, blue, huge sufficient carry ferret, nets (long and purse types), 410 shotgun foldup type, Woodbines, ploughman's lunch, fox terrier. Bag has small tears to recto and verso, tape repairs numerous, green customs label fits dog collar and keeps dog quiet for 1/2 hour. Dog O.B.E. other buggers' efforts. Contains book wrapped in cardboard. Shelf book, wall mount bag, feed dog cold porridge.

Expressions: Thanks mate

**Latest message from customer:

Yes, publish and be damned, pseudonym Sylvia Carp please, otherwise I get a lot of useless goat offers of the "I was going to take them to the slaughter house but ..." variety. I'm not a goat dealer but a secondhand bookseller retired trying to escape telephone offers of "readin books" etc. The situation is getting ridiculous. Yesterday I received a bootmaker's textbook from a theology specialist and ordered theologian Sara Maitland's Book of Silence from a rag and bone dealer in Yoevil.