it’s great outdoors
i loved scotland. and this shop summed it up nicely. it WAS great outdoors.
but it was also great indoors too ! (especially when we were visiting friends and relations, and staying in a lovely holiday house).
July 2004
crazy type font
in my experience, which i admit is a bit limited, it isn’t very sunny in scotland. like ever. so i suspect these tanning shops do very well.
i managed to get a tan just standing by this flourescent tan with it’s nice 1980s graphics and type font.
glaswegian bollard
i spotted this bollard in glasgow as we drove by. it’s covered in a lovely mosaic which is probably a Roman influence (Ha-ha-drain’s wall isn’t too far away after all).
scotland
quite a general sign this one, but welcome (quite literally folks) neverthelessormore
the long journey continued
here is a rare sign of family togetherness on the journey. about half way in esther moved up front and i was relegated to the back with kezia. this worked much better and reduced my moanyness greatly.
once we got to cumbria the scenery started to pick up:
… and dog signs too
service stations are great for dog signs as well as slippery signs.
here’s a door sign (from both sides of the door):
here’s a dog sign on a stick in the car park:
in more detail here:
the opposite applies here:
a selection of slippery floor signs
so, you’re thinking of starting your own collection of slippery floor signs – but where’s the best place to start. well, let me tell you. it’s motorway service stations. full of them they are.
the strange thing is that motorway service stations are increasingly becoming photo-fits of each other, yet the one thing they haven’t standardised on is slippery floor signs.
here are a few examples. i didn’t take photos of ones i’ve already got. some are quite similar though so i’ll talk you through them:
a classic hollow body picture very similar to this one. possibly caught a few micro-seconds later.
at first glance this is the same as this one. but look again, don’t be fooled. the claw is gone and the person has merged with the puddle. it’s never clear on these photos whether the subject slipped on the puddle or produced it as a result of their fall (is it blood ?):
as above with helpful explanatory words:
the water on this one isn’t quite as deep as this one:
very similar to (if not the same as) the waitrose version. this one is certainly more in focus. the chap seems to be dancing the can-can (and therefore more likely to fall over). they are using the full space available to them:
finally something a little more tenuous. it’s indicating that cleaning is happening and therefore, by implication, slipperness may appear.
traffic jam toilet conundrum
so, what do you do when you are stuck in a massive stationary motorway queue and your two year old starts screaming at the top of her voice that she needs a poo ?
well, you put up with it as long as you can then you get your wife to lift up the 2 year old whilst your 5 year old inserts a potty under her bott.
you then wait patiently and hope that the matter in question is just liquid (and not a Preecy Egg“)
you then get the 5 year old to hold the potty steady whilst the 2 year old is lifted slowly up and lowered back in to her car seat.
meanwhile the driver (me) needs to be extremely carefully accelerating and decelerating as the once stationary traffic queue starts to finally move off.
i’m pleased to announce there was no physical spillage or loss of dignity in the process, though i fear the emotional scars may take longer to heal.
M6 toll road
here is britains newest and only toll motorway. it cost £2 and was definately worth it. it’s a bit of cheek that we pay our road tax etc and then have to pay some more to have a decent road, but there we go (very fastly).
the government had arranged for a number of roadworks on the non-toll road before and after the proper toll bit so you felt like you were really getting the benefit of paying. i appreciated this as it was a kind of reverse familiarisation routine.
here is a rain white-out to make things even more fun:
a row of blue cars
kids love cars. and colours. so kids love a line of cars all the same colour. at least mine did.
another name change
kezia’s dolls changed names again. tiny baby is now called olivia.
anyone with little kids knows that sometimes you need a ‘code name’ for familiar items so you can talk about it without the child knowing. we used to call Esther’s comfort blanket Bernard so she wouldn’t realise.
Olivia, aka Tiny Baby, is called TB which meant for comedy moments shouting “have you got TB ?” “no, you have” “no i haven’t seen her since we took Kezia for a Preecy Egg” etc.
roadchef
there’s much i could say about motorway service stations, but i shall spare you. this one is called Roadchef which conjures up images of a line of chefs cooking roadkill (well it did in my mind)
and look at it inside with it’s wifi capabilities and airport waiting lounge style comforts. things never used to be like this.
the road to the north
scotland is a long way from the south of england, especially if you go by car and have two little kids with you. our 7 hour journey stretched to 11 hours and we had many a happy toilet stop.
i was allowed to take a few shots on the way when i wasn’t driving. here’s one that jane took of the motorway split just before birmingham. it’s got a jaunty jiggle hasn’t it ?
cashpoints
in the UK there are two main domestic financial institutions where you can stash your cash – banks and building societies. there is a difference, but i don’t know what it is !
anyroadupdown, banks used to be the kings when it came to extracting your cash and they had the whole hole-in-the-wall thing sewn up (if you see what i mean).
but the building societies got themselves together with their LINK network and soon they were allowing other building society card holders to use each other’s machines.
the latest ‘craze’ is cash back in supermarkets which are neutral on the whole bank vs building society debate (as far as i’m aware).
but there’s another force going on. it’s portable branded cash machines. they’ve appears in 24×7 grocery shops and here are a load in a motorway service station. note the branded bin in the middle. probably for making deposits.
these machines seem to run off a mains socket and a normal telephone line. i may get one set up at home. be ideal for if i realise i’ve run out of cash in the morning before heading off to work.
it’s good to be back
holidays are good, but it’s nice to come home too. especially when the weather is loads drier and warmer than on holiday !
but i have so much to share (700 photos – i’ll try and narrow them down). i’ll do it a week in arrears over the next 7 days starting tomorrow.
back in real-time for a moment, here are two ‘finds’ near our house upon our return. a comb and a snapped plastic spoon.
update: now i’ve looked at how much photos of quality items i’ve taken i think i may spread it over the next few weeks !
the south bank
london’s south bank is a bizarre concrete monstrocity. no bad thing of course. and it does mean you get some nice contrasting images.
