Quote of the Day

Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.
- Leo Tolstoy

Quote of the Day

One should examine oneself for a very long time before thinking of condemning others.
- Molière

Quote of the Day

Nihil tam absurde dici potest, quod non dicatur ab aliquo philosophorum.
[Nothing can be said that is so absurd that it has not been said by some philosopher.]
- Cicero

Quote of the Day

Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimension.
- Oliver Wendell Holmes

Some odds and ends from Great Britain

Just some random pics to round out my many posts about the latest trip to Scotland & England...

I bought this t-shirt and lots more at the Monty Python reunion show on July 5 in London. I have been informed that the bird is in fact a macaw, not a Norwegian Blue, a fact which I shall do by best to forget.


This tree is called the Fortingall yew, and is reputedly one of the oldest trees in Britain. Local propaganda tourist information suggests that it's 4-5,000 years old, but it's probably closer to 2,000.


Dull, the little place in Scotland where the Highland Safari Park is.


At the hotel in Lincoln they knew about my interest in toilet paper folding and the maid had even made me a paper swan. Awwwww.


A lovely double rainbow that appeared above the place where I had dinner in Lincoln.

Quote of the Day

Metaphysics is almost always an attempt to prove the incredible by an appeal to the unintelligible.
- H.L. Mencken

Quote of the Day

Legend: a lie that has attained the dignity of age.
- H. L. Mencken

Quote of the Day

To be in love is merely to be in a state of perceptual anesthesia--to mistake an ordinary young man for a Greek god or an ordinary young woman for a goddess.
- H.L. Mencken

Orford Castle

The final post from my trip to Great Britain, is from Orford Castle, which lies out by the coast of Suffolk. The castle was built in the late 1100s by Henry II to give him better control of what the Earls (later Dukes) of Norfolk were up to. Today, the outer fortifications are gone, but the keep remains remarkably intact and is considered one of the most remarkable in all of England.

The structure is quite unique in construction; it has a round tower in the middle, with three interclasping towers around it.

The keep as seen from the parking lot.


The fireplace on the first floor.


The shitter. You knows you wants it.


There's a stone missing approximately in the middle of the picture, with darkened stones below it. This was a urinal, with the hole in the wall leading to the outside of the castle. It saved the commander of the castle from having to descend to the lower levels to take a leak.

Sutton Hoo

After the pleasant, if unexpected, detour to Framlingham, I set course for my original target: The Anglo-Saxon burial site at Sutton Hoo. It's not far from Framlingham - I think it took me appx. 20 mins to drive there. There's a large hall that contains replicas of the original findings (which were donated to the British Museum) and models of how they think various items such as houses might have looked in days of yore. There's also a building which houses the ticket sales, the museum shop and a fairly large cafe. It's a ten minute walk from these structures to the actual burial sites, which can be seen as mounds in the landscape.

Highly informative and highly recommended for an hour or so, but not more unless you're really, really, really into the minutiae of speculation around Anglo Saxon Britain.

What they think the burial chamber of the richest grave might have looked like.


This is a silver replica of a helmet they found in the grave. The original was of iron and was badly shattered.


The graves.


The shipgrave mound.

Quote of the Day

Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him.
- H.L. Mencken

Quote of the Day

It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.
- Henry L. Mencken

Framlingham Castle

On Saturday I had planned a trip down to the digs at Sutton Hoo, but on the way there I happened to see a sign for some castle I'd never heard of, so I took a detour. The weather was warm, though largely overcast and I had plenty of time to spare. Well, the castle was Framlingham Castle, and shame on me for not having remembered it in the first place. It is one of the most historically important in all of England, as the seat of the Dukes of Norfolk and also as the place where Mary Tudor held residence when she became the first female ruler of the kingdom in 1553.

The castle was the stronghold of three influential families; the Bigods, the Mowbrays and the Howards. The penultimate duke, Thomas, was the uncle to two of Henry VIII's wives (Anne Boleyn and Cathrine Howard). It caused the building of a royal castle nearby - Orford Castle - so that the king could keep an eye on what the mighty Dukes of Norfolk were up to. The castle was rebuilt and modernized several times, but was more or less abandoned after Mary went to London and it was eventually turned into a poorhouse. Nowadays it's run by English Heritage, meaning I spent not a dime to walk in and spend 90 wonderful minutes there.

The main entrance.


The poorhouse. The buildings were put up in the 17th and 18th centuries and today contains a small museum, a shop and probably some offices as well.


The last owner of the castle was Sir Robert Hitcham, who was one of the earliest known rich guys with noble yet largely futile ideas about edjumacating the lower classes.


The Dukes' private lodgings used to be connected to the formal gardens by a bridge, the foundations of which still stand.


The Howards had airs of royalty. They invoked Henry VIII's wrath by incorporating royal emblems into their heraldry and would build chimneys that led absolutely nowhere just because they'd seen it on royal castles.


There's a small lake just outside the castle. It was much larger in olden days, and would provide the inhabitants with fresh fish for Fridays (try saying that fast, ten times) when, by papist tradition, they could not eat meat.

Quote of the Day

An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.
- H. L. Mencken

Quote of the Day

A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.
H. L. Mencken

Lackford Lakes

On my way from Lincoln to Bury St Edmunds I happened upon a property owned by the Suffolk Wildlife Trust, more specifically Lackford Lakes. Having some hours to kill and wanting to get an anthropological take on one of the most British of all species - the birdwatcher - I went in. I spent a surprising (and exhausting in the summer heat) couple of hours wandering about the area, taking pictures of birds, blending in with the birdwatchers and sweating my way through fields, mud and deep, dark forest.

This picture, to any sane man, is not worthy of anyone's attention, certainly not for more than a few seconds, precisely to establish that nothing of interest is happening. Yet, when I arrived at the shelter (they call it a "hide") from where these pics are shot, there were about half a dozen geezers with cameras and binoculars watching intently. I shudder to consider how boring my life would have to be before I took to watching birds. Then again, there are probably those who feel the same way about my interest in US politics...? Nah, that's crazy talk.


This series of a swan climbing up on a platform and cleaning herself was the most exciting thing that happened all day. I kid you not.


Stretching. You can feel the suspense rising can't you?


OMG! She's cleaning herself! Like, far out, man!


And some black bird has landed and is flashing the lake. This is too hardcore for me!


There were people sitting in shelters with thermos flasks and packed lunches. Some had huge telelenses on their cameras, staring out onto what, to me looked like perfectly still, utterly dull ponds. I have no idea what they were hoping to see, as pretty much all the wildlife in those ponds were sweltering under the same heat I was, and thus had no inclination to make any public appearances.

Lincoln

I've been to Lincoln before (here and here), but this time I decided to expand upon my inquiries and to that effect I took at 45 minute guided bus tour. I didn't go into Lincoln castle this time, since they were in the final stages of building the famed visitor center which will open next year. Woe is me as I shall then have to return to Lincoln. Woe indeed. Yep. Woe, woe, woe.

Anyways, the tour was pleasant enough, mostly in bright sunshine, and I later spent a couple of hours foolishly sitting in the sun, to the point that I spent the next day dizzy from being sunburnt. Feast yer eyes on these pics I took while I was still somewhat mentally alert.

The towers of the mighty cathedral.


This is a funny image. The tableau originally showed English kings... and their respective queens. The heads of the latter were later erased and made into new kings. So there are several dodgy figures up there with a woman's body and a man's head.


This image, found on the walls of the cathedral is said to be Edward I, aka Longshanks, aka "The Hammer of the Scots", aka "cunt" and his wife. I've written before about how Eleanor (whom he married when he was 15 and she 13) died in Lincoln and a grieving king erected a cross at every place they spent the night, until they reached London, where she was buried at Westminster Abbey. There's some doubt about wether the figures depicted are actually connected to Edward & Eleanor but to that I say pfffffffth.


The very pretty area down by the Brayford Pool (fed by River Witham) is now Lincoln's city centre, aka "downhill". The area by the castle & cathedral is "uphill".


Up at the public toilets outside the castle, I saw this ingenious system. The bottom button is for soap, the middle is for hot water and the top button starts a fan to dry your hands. Wheeeee!

Quote of the Day

Faith is the commitment of one's consciousness to beliefs for which one has no sensory evidence or rational proof. A mystic is a man who treats his feelings as tools of cognition. Faith is the equation of feeling with knowledge.
- Ayn Rand

Quote of the Day

Actually, it only takes one drink to get me loaded. Trouble is, I can't remember if it's the thirteenth or fourteenth.
- George Burns

Quote of the Day

When work is a pleasure, life is a joy! When work is a duty, life is slavery.
- Maxim Gorky

Quote of the Day

Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.
- Cyril Connolly

Quote of the Day

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
- Oscar Wilde

A visit to the Highland Safaris

Highland Safaris is a company situated in the tiny hamlet of Dull. I kid you not. Dull is twinned with Boring, Oregon. Anyway, as the name indicates, they arrange various kinds of safaris, if you can call it that, taking tourists out to try and glimpse Scottish wildlife in their natural settings. They also offer a much cheaper and less time consuming activity, namely feeding of red deer. Ever the sucker for big eyes and a wet snout, I signed up. Here are some of my pics.

Eyeing me skeptically.


I had food, so for five seconds we were the bestestest of friends. They give you a small cup of pellets at the beginning.


What is this? An empty hand? Hrmph!


Mr Deer was a friendly fella. Beautiful antlers, which they drop in March or April each year. They then grow out again in less than four months. Also, the old story that you can tell a deer's age by how many points there are on his antlers is apparently bullshit.


He had perfected the pleading look.


And would tilt his head to look cuter.


And then ruin it all by sticking his tongue out like a retard.




I scratched the other buck, his father, between the antlers. He got a dreamy look and forgot about food for a few seconds.


This one would also let the kids scratch and pet him.


Our guide was called Andy and was very knowledgeable and witty. He told a family that sat next to me that one deer had died from lead poisoning. When they all went "aaaaawww" he deadpanned "yeah, a bullet". Well played, Sir, Well played.


After the deer, we were shown a tame barnowl. The highlight of this session was when the owl flew up on the television set and refused to come down.


In flight. I actually petted it and they're unbelievably soft to the touch.

Black Wood of Rannoch

The Black Wood of Rannoch is one of the very few remaining parts of what was once a forest that covered much of Scotland, the so-called Caledonian Forest. The whole of what is today Rannoch Moor was covered in woodland, which then was slowly reduced due to wind, weather and human activities.

Most of the trees you can see today in Scotland are either relative newcomers from other countries or they're planted (some admittedly hundreds of years ago). But this wood, consisting largely of pine trees is ancient; maybe as much as 9,000 years old, which is when we knew the pine came to Scotland. The trees themselves are only a couple hundred years at most, but the wood has been here for millennia.

Tree.


Another tree. Have I mentioned that I love pines?


On the beach I found this fireplace. One can almost be forgiven for imagining it has been here since 5,000 BC. Sigh.

Rannoch Moor

I have written before about the beauty of Rannoch Moor at its western point, where for example the Glencoe Mountains and Loch Tulla are a part of the landscape. Today I have seen its eastern beginnings, and they're quite nice too. Just don't expect me to walk the 12 miles of moors and mountains in between (though I might be persuaded to take the train sometime).

Water.


Mountains.


The road goes on for a mile or two to Rannoch Station, where it ends and the railroad line begins.