Category: Uncategorised

I was out delivering for Amazon/Morrisons today, around Peterborough, when I stumbled upon this place, Elsie’s Vintage Tea Room. In a little out of the way village called Nassington.

Wow!

‘Wow!’ was exactly, and all, I said, on stepping inside. After admiring the superb exterior, I really wasn’t expecting the interior to trump it. But it does.

Amazingly, I was heading the wrong way, in my dinky little motor, thinking about how I might execute a u-turn, without also executing some Lycra clad oldies, all togged up for cycling. And, just as I made to go into the turn, I spotted – at an acute angle – a flash of my very favourite shade of green.

What’s more the sublime green adorned what was clearly a nicely formed wooden shop front. Even though I could only see it as a thin foreshortened sliver, it really drew my eye.

I grabbed a hasty lapsang souchong and battenberg slice. Both lovely. And then had to resume my rounds. But I made a promise to myself – and the proprietor – amidst fulsome gushing praise for his wonderful establishment, that I’d be right back, with the mrs.

And so it we’re booked for lunchtime tea this Saturday coming, at 1pm. I’m so excited. Particularly as I’m keeping it all as a surprise for Teresa. I hope she’s as blown away by it as I am!

The devil’s in the detail. SndGraham and Clare clearly understand and appreciate that. What a job they’ve done!

Blah…

Very often I discover places like this either when they’re shut. Or, worse still, when they’ve permanently closed. To stumble upon something so pitch-perfectly delightful, and it be open both there and then, and as a going concern to be returned to, and thereby savoured and enjoyed?

What bliss!

The tears don’t come any more
They start to well up
And then they die
Still-born on the cusp

The tears don’t come any more
Though the ache is deeper
Though the need is greater
Will sleep never come?

The tears don’t come any more
In the deep dark of night
Shut out the light
Shut out the sounds 

The tears don’t come any more

The rather cool Scary Pockets collective have done some excellent funky Joni covers.

Hey, Joni – as Sonic Youth sang (on their Daydream Nation album) – what do you think?

Guest singer Rett Madison even manages to look a bit Joni here!

I think it’s great to see the young cats – and a few older ones, like Larry Goldings!) – still diggin’ the greatest female artist of our (all?) times.

We had thunder, lightning, and heavy rain, around 2-3am, last night. I went out at about 8am this morning, and the above is what I saw, pond wise.

Will it stay away, or gradually fill up and settle? I have sealed the liner. So I kind of expect it to slowly drain. It’d be fab if it didn’t require sealing.

We shall see…

Here are four images derived from the 360° snaps I took on my Ricoh Theta. I love these! In the first, the camera’s on the table by the window, and I’ve opted for a ‘looking back towards the door’ view.

I also wanted to vary the lighting of the room plenty. Above we have just two sidelights. Below, even cosier, just a single bedside lamp, and some strings of LEDs.

I shot more photos from the next position, with the Theta precariously balanced atop the TV. And in the one below, the overhead bed light looks almost aggressively bright! Might need to make a shade for it?

Strangely, the embedded 360° pics I put up using Algori 360 only allow for a ‘flat’ spin around the image, on a horizontal plane. Whereas, within Theta’s own software (Theta+), the images can be looked at fully in the round, zooming in or out – the more you zoom out the more fish-eyed it gets – and at various aspect ratios.

All of which makes for a great deal of fun!

The view above is great for seeing the LED light strings, and the bed. Whereas the image directly below is a good way to appreciate the irregular shape of this room. Oh, and the safety feature, that is the CO and smoke detector.

As mentioned above, already, I tried to vary the lighting. And in the final shot of this post, this helps accentuate the cosy string of LED lights on the bed-head. All in all, I really love these images. I think they make the room look nice.

Or perhaps it’s just that they capture qualities of the room that are nice!? Whatever! I do love what the Theta brings to the photographic party.

All these pics are possibly going to useful if/when we decide to let this room. Teresa’s v keen! I don’t really want to do it. But economic pressures may force my hand.

This is bit of an experiment! And so far a bit of a confusing one.

I’m trying to put up 360° photos, taken on my groovy Ricoh Theta camera. I’m sure I’ve done so before. Although exactly how I don’t recall.

This time I’ve added two WP features; are they both plug-ins!? I really don’t know! One, called Gutenberg may or may not be. The other, Algori 360, moist serpently is.

Anyhoo, downloading, installing and activating them wasn’t straightforward, leastways not for a non-tech-nerd like me.

And it seems that although I’ve installed both, I can only access their combined functionality – and thereby embed 360° photos – by use if the web-based version of WP, and via the iPhone app version.

Having said that, I’m writing this in the latter. But where the 360° image ought to be, instead I see this:

The other issue is that I wanted to ace a single post with multiple 360° pictures. But I think Algori 360 only supports (or, I’d say, allows/facilitates) one such image per post (or is that page!?).

I hope I can find an easier and more amenable to my own designs way!

I’m wondering whether I ought to move my military history and mini-military hobbies stuff over to my main sebpalmer.com area?

I’m finding that I can do WordPress ok on my iPhone, but Google Blogspot stuff is harder to do. And so my activity on AQOS (aquestionofscale.blogspot) has fallen into desuetude.

This is partly ‘cause I do very little on my iMac any more. And that’s for two main reasons: a general antipathy to computer based travails; and my iMac being old, and running shite.

* As pictured on the inner dust-jacket of an edition of his work entitled, 1812, which narrates the Russian campaign…

Anyway, I was looking at AQOS, to see what books by Antony Brett-James I’d read and reviewed. And I was mighty surprised to see that, whilst I’ve read two, and I’m now reading a third, I appear not to have reviewed any of them!?

I’m startled. I usually always review any Napoleonic literature I read. It may be that I did reviews but they only went up on Amazon.co.uk. If so, they may be lost forever, as Amazon deleted all my (thousands of) reviews, when they booted me off Vine. No explanation ever given!

Considering the many hours unpaid work that went in to so many of my reviews – esp’ the stuff on non-Vine things, like music and literature/military history – I think this was/is pretty shoddy.

I did back up some of my reviews. But not all of them, alas. There’s a lesson to be learned there, methinks; always keep my own copy of any such writings!

So, last night, I thought reading some Napoleonic history might help me sleep. I chose this book. It didn’t help me sleep! But I did enjoy what little reading I managed to do.

* He knew the cost of war first. Not just fighting in it. But losing his brother, Ivor, two years his junior, who died in the Sicily campaign (I think?), 1943.

I’ve certainly both got and have read Brett-James’ 1812, subtitled Eyewitness Accounts of Napoleon’s Defeat in Russia.

I can’t believe I haven’t written a review of it!? I’ll have to have a root around in my digital archives, and see if I can find anything. Of else read and review it again?

I had started Europe Against Napoleon, some time back. But – very unusually for me – I’d not finished it. I think this belongs to my fairly recent reading burn-out phase.