The Solitary Review

Kingston Riverside in Snow December 2018

Kingston Riverside in Snow

A4, Acrylic and Pigment Liner, December 2018. Judiciously edited using Paint.net - and why not? The sky as originally done was a mess and when the picture was scanned it sprouted weird streaks of purple for some reason. So I deleted it and added a gradient in Paint.net. This picture is from a photograph I took on 2nd December 2010 - very early for snow here - it's now 9th December eight years later and although it's been cold and cloudy there has been no real hint of snowfall.

The Adventures of Bunter in Time, Space and Early Aviation

William at the controls as the plane reaches the bottom of its loop and mistimes it perfectly so that a fence takes off the upper wing and his head. The word ‘bunt’ Is now rarely used for an outside loop. First to carry out a bunt was the Owl of the Remove, William of that name: the original Bunter.

On several occasions he was fatally inconvenienced while attempting this difficult manoeuvre which requires exact spatial discipline and an engine sufficiently powerful to pull the aircraft upwards in the loop after its descent. On one such occasion he crashed in a field and burned for several minutes.

His cries of “Yarooo!” and “I say you rotters!” spurred on many imitators but none truly encapsulated the shuddering insanity of early experimental flight like Bunter. In Barnstorming Bunter, we see the luckless Owl repeatedly attempt daring manoeuvres only to die repeatedly. In Bunter of the Golden West his travelling air circus is beset by an ‘army of horribles’ who appear out of the sunset and slaughter everybody then slaughters them again as best they are able, just to be sure.

In No Peace for the Bunter his efforts to set up a Cross-Channel air ferry are thwarted by his capture by mercenaries who crucify him repeatedly at dawn, while dosing him with a drug which makes him forget the earlier occasions. His cries of “I say you rotters! I say!” are deeply moving. The mercenaries’ leader, naming himself Captain Blood and by no means clearly human, explains his concept of punishment needing to “take physical form (not necessarily violent); be publicly visible; and to be as eternal as is allowed by the boundaries of Time and Space.” Blood claims that Hell is the perfect sanction as it allows for the continuation of punishment after the subject’s life is at an end and is thereby not technically bounded by the space-time continuum. Compared to the Church, he says, I’m an amateur.

In Bunter and the Vardo Volley he takes the controls of a strange craft that does not seem to comply to the laws of our Universe and is plunged into a universe of constant pain and desolation. He meets some old favourites on the way including Randolph Carter and the multi-bodied creature that was once Wilbur ‘Wright’ Whateley. He also makes friends with a pack of smuns – ‘animals in size between fox and wolf, with the look of a small, parti-coloured bear.’ While outwardly fierce these creatures do not see humans as prey and once he understands their social system they are caring and protective towards him, treating him as ‘a somewhat dim and oversized member of their pack.’ HP Lovecraft notably threatened to sue for imagined similarity to The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath upon which the author told him to ‘sue away you mean old pisseur.’ Bunter of course enjoys the desolation tremendously and thanks his hosts profusely when at the end of several million aeons he finds his way home.

The Owl is Not What He Seems pits Bunter against the Russian Secret Service in a Wheatleyan adventure full of weird and impractical aircraft, Lovecraftian strangeness, and (again like Wheatley) a prescience regarding the Soviet Union that made the author mistrusted for decades until he was proved to have been right all along. “I say you chaps,” the Owl carols at one point, “I was stranded at Kadath in the Cold Waste for aeons of astronomical time. And between it and Siberia, I’d say hello Kadath, nice to see you.”

Tsinari Cafe, Thessaloniki, Greece

"Tsinari" is a traditional eatery in the Old Town of Thessaloniki, capital of Northern Greece. It has been there for ... many years. I lived near it in the mid 1980s and it was venerable then. Fortunately it is still going strong.

Acrylic and pigment liner, 15 x 15 cm, November 2018.

Chapter Coffee, West Kensington - review

A surprising place perhaps, for a trendy cafe given the downmarket nature of the Olympia end of North End Road, but the area is a bit of a ‘stealth suburb’ - nicer and better-off than it looks and gone upmarket in the years since I left.

I am greeted on arrival by a pleasant young woman – there is a counter but we are ushered to tables if we are dining in.

The kitchen space lets onto the cafe at the far end of the space.

This building is an old bank but I don’t remember when it was a bank even though it’s near the library I used to use when I lived here, and I had been known to frequent the shops in this little parade near the A4.

A big San Remo coffee machine on the counter and bottles of liquor behind. Comfortable sofas and metal chairs by wooden tables and a wood plank floor. All has a modernity that I left behind when I left this area. If I still lived near here, I’d live here.

Young trendy locals (and me). People stare at me. I’m used to it.

Kale figures largely on the menu but I don’t have any, I’m not tempted. Also avocado but in its case I just don’t have any today.

A huge roasting machine behind a glass pane. Pale grey walls in the modern style.

The serving staff are mostly young women – they are pleasant and their uniform is a smart short-sleeved black shirt and dark trousers.

Long black coffee £2.50 – intense and flavourful. Apparently there is a bean menu at the counter but as you are ushered to a table do you get to see it? Coffee was hot on arrival, needed to wait for it to cool. Eggs Benedict £10 – two eggs, chunky ham, two slices of toast and flavoursome sauce. Very palatable and it went down nicely. I was reminded of the crumpets poached egg and bacon that I used to have in a cafe near here and which is still going despite the best efforts of the place to go upmarket.

Filter £2.70

Espresso £2.50

White coffees peculiarly in ounces – 6oz £2.60, 8oz £2.80.

And I like the name – I’ve just passed 50,000 words in my NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) project so I’m allowed out again, and here I am.

From here I can look down the length of a side street and see my old flats at the far end. My place of dead roads – as William S Burroughs describes them, places you were once allowed to go and now no longer.

 

Chapter Coffee

137 North End Road

London W14

https://www.chaptercoffee.com/

 

The Bullring and St Martins, Birmingham

"Tell you what, right. We'll put it about that Birmingham is a post-industrial wasteland where people speak in funny accents and keep ferrets down their trousers and perpetually on the edge of a race war."

"And not mention the young and vibrant cultural scene, the green spaces, the genuinely integrated population, the house prices about half what they are in London,  and the straightforward and tolerant nature of most of the inhabitants. Or even the amazing sunsets."

"That's the idea. Keep the southerners from moving here and putting up prices, that will."

"Right you are."

 

Watercolour and pigment liner, September 2018

Croix-Rousse, Lyon

 

I revisited an old subject from three years back but one of my favourite places - the Croix-Rousse district of the fabulous city of Lyon, France.

Watercolour, 29.7 x 21 cm, August 2018

The Tolworth Apple Store

 

Watercolour, August 2018. The Tolworth apple store is a building in Tolworth, Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames. 

Parkrun alphabet

Parkrun venues done by initial letter (ongoing Alphabet Challenge):

A - B - Bushy, Beckton, Brighton Hove Park, Brockwell Park C - Cannon Hill, Crane Park, Clapham Common, Crystal Palace  D - Dulwich E - F - Fulham Palace, Finsbury Park G - Gunnersbury H - Highbury Fields, Hazelwood I - J - K - Kingston L - M - Mole Valley

N - Nonsuch O - Osterley, Old Deer Park P - Peterborough, Preston Park, Perry Hall Q - R - Richmond S - Southsea T - Tooting Common U - V - W - Weymouth, Woking, Wimbledon, Wormwood Scrubs (there are none beginning with X) Y - Z -

Cafe Review: Waylands Yard, Birmingham

This was another of those lazy mornings - had a full day the day before (including running too many laps of a parkrun!),then met a former work colleague for lunch, then in the evening to the legendary Hare & Hounds in Kings Heath to hear post-punk funkateers A Certain Ratio supported by the upcoming and exciting Sink Ya Teeth. Even without alcohol (I don't these days) I slept well into the morning. 

So, on the bus (at least Birmingham now has a smart card for the bus. Perhaps by 2020 they'll introduce next-stop information like pretty much everywhere else) back to central Brum, and a short walk up in the direction of Snow Hill to the Birmingham branch of Waylands Yard. Quiet still at this hour of a morning that was growing warm like a sleeping cat. Hi, what would you like? asks chirpy lady behind the counter. I'm not sure yet, but it will involve breakfast. But for now an Americano (which is very good ) and peruse the menu. Sandwiches, bagels, eggs, baps ... 

But of course. Eggy crumpets. Who could resist an eggy crumpet or two for brunch, especially if there is bacon? So I don't. Resist, that is. It is delish. Tuck into this interrupting my use of their wifi, because yes there is wifi and the password is noted clearly on a board, as is the varied menu of drinks and coffees and food. A second coffee I would like, but as time is pressing before my train I fish out the KeepCup from my pullcase and have it in that. Trundle back down the hill to Moor Street (yes, I could have gone on to Snow Hill but not all trains start from there I think). Chiltern Rail is its usual wonderful self as well. 

And you're home. Not that you weren't home, but you are home.

I had:

Americano £2.00 each
Eggy crumpets £5.95 + Bacon £2.00

Would I return: oh yes. 

Waylands Yard Birmingham
42 Bull Street 
Birmingham B4 6AF

Monday - Friday 7.00 - 18.00 | Saturday 8.00-18.00 | Sunday 9.00 - 16.00 (kitchen closes at 3pm)

Website

There was supposed to be another picture, of the outside, but for some reason it didn't take.

Carrer del Pont Vell, Besalu', Pyrenees

The Carrer del Pont Vell (Old Bridge Street) in Besalu', in the Pyrenees. Besalu' is an ancient and historic town with a varied past including a well-documented Jewish Quarter. The Bridge in question is quite remarkable. Maybe a painting of that one day. Watercolour, c. 25 x 28 cm, June 2018