Yesterday I opened up my Secret London Guide before breakfast and decided straight away that today would be the day I would finally go and visit The Grant Museum of Zoology after wanting to go for years and years.
I was not for one moment disappointed by the collection which is housed in a beautiful room and is part of the University College London. Artfully packed in vitrines were skeletons re-constructed, mounted animals re-imagined and specimens pickled and preserved in jars. Perhaps not for the faint-hearted but I found it fascinating!
Through-out the exhibition are i-pads which pose questions around the issues of conservation, ethnography and ethics; you could post replies there directly and on to twitter which I thought was excellent.
Below are a selection of the photos I took whilst I was there, don’t let them fool you into thinking think counts as experiencing the museum, it doesn’t – see how tightly everything is packed in — ?
I was fascinated by the way the liquid in these jars was disappearing, evaporation through a sealed lid?!
Illuminated by the light this trio watched over us
This brain coral reminded me of a Keith Haring doodle
Saving the best till last – these Sea Mice had beautiful iridescent fur.
How your sewing machine works
If you ignore the “awesome dude” who is narrating this you might discover a new side to your sewing machine in this video
Thanks to Toferets Empty Bobbin for uncovering this!
Dunwich Dynamo 2011
My pre-ride lunch before heading off into the night on the 110 odd miles that is the Dunwich Dynamo.
Our first stop at a pub about 20 miles in, couldn’t resist a lager shandy while we watched others ride on.
Camile here joined us half way through the ride and at one point pulled out a tin of fish which he ate with a stick, a few short hours in and sleep deprivation starts to do strange strange things.
I started to feel the fatigue setting in and could barely keep my eyes open. As if that wasn’t bad enough I was descending in the dark due to a withering front light which made for scary riding. I kept having to tell my legs to shut up as they were aching – only 70 miles in it wasn’t a good sign.
But as all good Brits know drinking will fix it, so we got on to the Jameson. Amy is grinning here because she enjoys a good bit of whiskey, though we didn’t realise how much until she got back on her bike and started singing loudly. Actually it’s not too much difference to the usual..
I couldn’t even really crack a smile I was so tired when we finally made it. The last 20 miles through real desolate countryside with cramp in my left leg was not so much fun but after a full fry up I finally got my well earned dip in the sea.
After the swim we went off to our b+b in the village to get some well earned kip. Then that evening I dragged everyone back to the beach, Harry smoked his Cuban cigar and I wandered off to take pictures of the surf.
Despite the pain in my legs, the weight on my back and the heaviness of my eyelids what kept me going was the thought of finally reaching the sea. I could stare at the surf all day and never get bored.
So if reading this has tempted you into coming along next year on this mad unsupported ride from East London to the Suffolk coast I would suggest reading this then strong-arming some friends in to joining you or even going solo because it’s a fantastic way to spent a Saturday night on the depths of the British summer.
nb. I can’t promise that summer will actually be taking place during next years ride.
JGB
In 1978 J.G Ballard was interviewed for Search & Destroy magazine by Jon Savage, this was reprinted in the A/W edition of POP magazine. The interview touches on a few interesting subject but one particular statement from Ballard which resonated with me was this -
“I think the form is part of the reason the novel has been losing ground for the last half century. The form is wrong – the form of the extended narrative, the long story doesn’t accord. It may accord with the way people lived or thought they lived in the 19th century, but it doesn’t accord with the way people see themselves in the 20th, certainly not in the late 20th century. Whereas Burroughs jettisons the long scale of narrative and action and drama and all the rest are sort of subsumed within each paragraph…. The trouble is, does it take a writer of genius to write like that? Maybe it does, because there have been so many bad imitations of Burroughs….”
Now that was being discussed over 30 years ago, I’d say that J.G really did understand the shape of the future. Newspaper articles not only getting shorter but more trivial, blogs and online content being by and large short and succinct.
If you want to explore Ballard’s work which I think you definitely should go here or just pick up a copy of Concrete Island
Not short on talent
This BAFTA winning short animation by Mikey Please is currently on a show reel at the Somerset House exhibition Pick Me Up. I missed it this weekend but it closes on Sunday the 27th so not all is lost! It’s doubtful that animation is going to ever become a lost art, there is too much awe in it’s execution – check it out the trailer
In the well of inspiration
Slapped wrist for me, being back at work has sapped all my energies for blogging. I have been fiercely knitting on the tube, undoing and redoing countless stitches for an i pod case – who knew dot stitch would be so difficult! When these projects are complete if I feel sufficiently proud they go here – http://www.burdastyle.com/profiles/msbritten check them out and comment at will.
I don’t want to say a great deal about this but after months of suffering my has Grandad passed away. He lived through some incredible times – coming of age during World War two he told me how he went down to the docks to sign up for the Navy with a friend. They asked to be put together on the same ship but they never were and this was the last time he ever saw or heard from him again. This seemed to be only the beginning of his World War two adventure which took him all the way to Australia where he met my Grandma. With whom he married on their return to England and raised a family of 6 together. He had more luck than most and had brushed with death on more than one occasion – having his last rites read to him twice, most notably he become the first person in Britain to survive a particular leukemia. My memories are of a man who liked the quiet life of sitting in front of the tv with a boxes of turkish delight stashed in the nearby bookcase ready for sneaky mouthfuls of pink gelatinous squares. I hope they’ve got a tv up there Bill.
House of pattern
I must write a proper post about the excellent Diaghilev and the Golden Age of the Ballets Russes exhibition at the V&A which I squeezed in during my Christmas break, it had many inspiring patterns and gave me alot to mull over. In the meantime when visiting my Grandparents this weekend I noticed how many patterns are throughout their house and so I happily snapped away. Here are a select few, textile only. Please excuse the poor image quality – new camera is winging it’s way to me as I type!
First person in space
If you don’t feel you have 6 minutes to watch this video then make/find or reclaim time. It documents the first person to go into space, not up in rocket to the moon but up in a contraption attached to a helium balloon which upon reaching 103,000 ft he jumped from!
