Not sure if this will be some kind of internet meme thing, but today I got me thinking about the most important/significant school lesson I ever had. Not from the greatest teacher, but the thing we learnt has made a big chunk of the man I am today.
It was a geography lesson, the teacher was a bit of a donkey, more interested in teaching football than geography and I guess he must have been mighty hungover in class on several occasions. Much of the geography he taught was on data collection and statistical analysis. We were thirteen or fourteen year olds in a big expensive school, we all lived up to twenty miles away from the school.
On this one occasion he gave us a task, we were to draw a map of our route to and from school.
But sir, we're not cartographers, how are we supposed to know the routes? Can we trace from an A to Z or the road atlas.
No we were to draw it from memory, the same route we taken to school every day for the past three years.
It was a hell of a task. Folk were gazing out of the window in despair. I remember Tom Binns's map just had the first mile or so, then an area labelled 'cloud of uncertainty', then he arrived outside the school.
But it made me wonder, had I had my eyes closed for so long. Did I actually not know where I was? It made me think more carefully, playing back the journey that I took every day. How did I get where I am. Can I retrace my steps just in my head?
Its not like the London Underground where you get on the train, then its just darkness all round until the next stop. God knows what the route is.
Then again, with the London Underground, can you remember the sequence of the stations on the line you take?
Can you remember the sequence of the streets on a Monopoly board?
So, aye. Mr Brennan's Geography class where we had to draw our own route to school, that was the most significant lesson I had at school.
Showing posts with label Bolton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bolton. Show all posts
Saturday, 10 July 2010
Monday, 22 March 2010
Photographer locations at The Battle of Bolton
Fond as I am of Bolton, I was somewhat saddened to here of the trouble there over the weekend. Two baying mobs decided to congregate in the town square and have a ruckus cos that's what they're into.
Flickr has a handful of photographers on location and I can't stop myself from putting together a google map of their locations across the day.
If you click through to the larger version, the photies are listed in time order, so you can follow the progress of each photographer. To be honest the most exciting point is around 1:00pm where a smoke bomb goes off and some UAF bigwig is arrested, dragged off and has his toothbrush confiscated.
View The Battle of Bolton in a larger map
Its a bit of a work in progress, but I'm finding it immensely satisfying.
Any suggestions about improvements I could make, warmly appreciated.
Flickr has a handful of photographers on location and I can't stop myself from putting together a google map of their locations across the day.
If you click through to the larger version, the photies are listed in time order, so you can follow the progress of each photographer. To be honest the most exciting point is around 1:00pm where a smoke bomb goes off and some UAF bigwig is arrested, dragged off and has his toothbrush confiscated.
View The Battle of Bolton in a larger map
Its a bit of a work in progress, but I'm finding it immensely satisfying.
Any suggestions about improvements I could make, warmly appreciated.
Monday, 8 March 2010
Has Nick Hogan been released?
I used to be an underage drinker, fifteen years ago, tumbling around the mean streets of Bolton. I've lost count of the number of times I was found lovingly wrapped round a lamppost in a pool of my own vomit (it was either once or twice) or fingered a similarly drunk underager in the churchyard round the corner (twice, possibly three times)
The main school pubs for my lot were Ye Olde Man and Scythe and later The Malt and Hops. The Malt and Hops was a smaller ale bar attached to The Swan pub on the corner of Bradshawgate and Churchgate. I went in there three times, twice because Timbo said the girl who I fancied off of my school bus was in there (she was once) and once cos I was going to try to smoke.
Even to this day, the smell of cigarettes in pubs brings a smile to my face, it reminds me of being young. Some time in May 2007, I escaped from smoking ban Scotland to have a nervous breakdown, down a bottle of vodka, drove to London and went to a gig. The stench of Silk Cut was beautiful, at that moment I knew for sure my destiny lay in London.
Anyhoo, Last time I went to Bolton, The Swan was closed. It's former landlord is a chap called Nick Hogan. He's in a spot of bother at the moment, bankrupt and in prison for refusing to pay a fine. He was fined for allowing smoking on his premises.
Think about that for a moment. Not fined for smoking, but for allowing it. The smokers, they weren't fined, as they had been allowed to smoke, but allowing them to smoke in licensed premised was the illegal act, not the smoking itself. Punished for not joining the police.
The Bolton Evening News has a fine array of pieces about the Nick Hogan case
Bolton Council's political make up is thus:-
Old Holborn and Anna Raccoon summoned up the massed ranks of the pro-choice blogsphere, a fund was set up and donations invited. Even mighty Guido waded in.
On Friday the target of £9712 was reached, but now things have taken a murky turn. Internet messageboard Freedom2Choose waded in, claimed they'd got Nick Hogan released and demanded Old Holborn handed the money over to them immediately. Then mysteriously their announcement on it was taken down. And as far as I can discern Nick Hogan is still in prison.
The money was raised four days ago, tied up in a crock on the internet. All ready to be transferred to where ever it need to go to secure the landlord's release.
Keeping someone in prison isn't a cheap thing, it costs money, about £106 per day. Those four days that Nick Hogan hasn't been released during have cost us, the taxpayer, £427. I guess its possible that someone somewhere said that the financials could wait until after the weekend, cos there's no one in the office who knows how to switch on the 'puter at weekends, but that's just not good enough.
I donated £1.50, I demand to see justice and see the release of a bankrupt landlord.
Villains of the piece
**UPDATE**
Actually, I think I went to The Swan a fourth time, after I'd moved to Glasgow, it must have been around Christmas 1999 or 1998, I was 19, on a whistlestop trip back to the mothership. I was doing the rounds of Bolton, trying to go to as many of the old haunts as I could. I stopped off in The Swan, didn't see anyone I knew and was about to leave I heard a voice call my name, I turned to find a well fit sixteen year old addressing me. "Don't you recognise me?"
It too a few moments, but I finally twigged that this was Georgie Brennan's younger sister who I'd last seen as a woefully underage lass on a climbing course in the lake district some years before. My, she'd blossomed, and now she was on the correct side of the too young/too old equation ((your age/2)+7=youngest age you can pull without it being gross)
So of course instead of taking advantage of the situation and adding her notch to my tree in the churchyard round the corner, I ran off to The Spinning Mule on Nelson Square to tell my brother. I can be such a fuckwit sometimes.
The main school pubs for my lot were Ye Olde Man and Scythe and later The Malt and Hops. The Malt and Hops was a smaller ale bar attached to The Swan pub on the corner of Bradshawgate and Churchgate. I went in there three times, twice because Timbo said the girl who I fancied off of my school bus was in there (she was once) and once cos I was going to try to smoke.
Even to this day, the smell of cigarettes in pubs brings a smile to my face, it reminds me of being young. Some time in May 2007, I escaped from smoking ban Scotland to have a nervous breakdown, down a bottle of vodka, drove to London and went to a gig. The stench of Silk Cut was beautiful, at that moment I knew for sure my destiny lay in London.
Anyhoo, Last time I went to Bolton, The Swan was closed. It's former landlord is a chap called Nick Hogan. He's in a spot of bother at the moment, bankrupt and in prison for refusing to pay a fine. He was fined for allowing smoking on his premises.Think about that for a moment. Not fined for smoking, but for allowing it. The smokers, they weren't fined, as they had been allowed to smoke, but allowing them to smoke in licensed premised was the illegal act, not the smoking itself. Punished for not joining the police.
The Bolton Evening News has a fine array of pieces about the Nick Hogan case
When Bolton Council brought the prosecution he pleaded not guilty to five counts of failing to prevent people from smoking in his pubs and four of obstructing council officers.
District Judge Timothy Devas (ah, the same Tim Devas from the Nottingham Police dog handler thing - I&A) found him guilty of four charges of allowing people to smoke.
He was cleared of one count because he was not on the premises at the time, and he was found not guilty of four obstruction charges.
If a fine is not paid, court enforcement officers follow it up, and if it remains outstanding the case will be brought back to court for magistrates to give an alternative sentence.
A Bolton Council spokesman said: “The court’s decision marks the end of a lengthy process and proves that, ultimately, flouting the law can have severe repercussions.
Bolton Council's political make up is thus:-
Lab (minority) - 27
Conservation - 23
LibDem - 9
Other - 1
Old Holborn and Anna Raccoon summoned up the massed ranks of the pro-choice blogsphere, a fund was set up and donations invited. Even mighty Guido waded in.
On Friday the target of £9712 was reached, but now things have taken a murky turn. Internet messageboard Freedom2Choose waded in, claimed they'd got Nick Hogan released and demanded Old Holborn handed the money over to them immediately. Then mysteriously their announcement on it was taken down. And as far as I can discern Nick Hogan is still in prison.
The money was raised four days ago, tied up in a crock on the internet. All ready to be transferred to where ever it need to go to secure the landlord's release.
Keeping someone in prison isn't a cheap thing, it costs money, about £106 per day. Those four days that Nick Hogan hasn't been released during have cost us, the taxpayer, £427. I guess its possible that someone somewhere said that the financials could wait until after the weekend, cos there's no one in the office who knows how to switch on the 'puter at weekends, but that's just not good enough.
I donated £1.50, I demand to see justice and see the release of a bankrupt landlord.
Villains of the piece
- District Judge Timothy Devas
- Bolton Council
**UPDATE**
Actually, I think I went to The Swan a fourth time, after I'd moved to Glasgow, it must have been around Christmas 1999 or 1998, I was 19, on a whistlestop trip back to the mothership. I was doing the rounds of Bolton, trying to go to as many of the old haunts as I could. I stopped off in The Swan, didn't see anyone I knew and was about to leave I heard a voice call my name, I turned to find a well fit sixteen year old addressing me. "Don't you recognise me?"
It too a few moments, but I finally twigged that this was Georgie Brennan's younger sister who I'd last seen as a woefully underage lass on a climbing course in the lake district some years before. My, she'd blossomed, and now she was on the correct side of the too young/too old equation ((your age/2)+7=youngest age you can pull without it being gross)
So of course instead of taking advantage of the situation and adding her notch to my tree in the churchyard round the corner, I ran off to The Spinning Mule on Nelson Square to tell my brother. I can be such a fuckwit sometimes.
Wednesday, 18 June 2008
Hunger
There is nothing in my tummy. I'm running out of money. My limitless talents are of no help. I wasalmost talked into lending a friend £500 that I don't have, because she was a girl in need and the closest thing I have to a buddy at the moment.
I got home yesterday to find a big old parcel, could it be the Bowlie Round 19 mixCD at long last?
No, it was even better
A friend from the internet's sexblogger community had sent me a load of goodies. Much skipping round the house and making 'eep'noises.
Managed to send off one Just Joans CD, at long last. Only another five to do, then the overwealming waves of guilt will begin to subside.
Ooh, memories of talking to people at a gig the other day. I could do with chatting to people I don't know more often than I do.
I've branched out, inspired by the parcel, I wrote a bit of erotic writing over on the nuddy site. Most of my traffic comes from non-English speaking countries so it could be a bit of a waste, but it was worth a try. Have a strange urge to exorcise daemons by writing more of that sort of thing, but again feel doubt that making up for a lack of social/sex life with fiction can only be wrong wrong wrong.
I got home yesterday to find a big old parcel, could it be the Bowlie Round 19 mixCD at long last?
No, it was even better
A friend from the internet's sexblogger community had sent me a load of goodies. Much skipping round the house and making 'eep'noises.
Managed to send off one Just Joans CD, at long last. Only another five to do, then the overwealming waves of guilt will begin to subside.
Ooh, memories of talking to people at a gig the other day. I could do with chatting to people I don't know more often than I do.
I've branched out, inspired by the parcel, I wrote a bit of erotic writing over on the nuddy site. Most of my traffic comes from non-English speaking countries so it could be a bit of a waste, but it was worth a try. Have a strange urge to exorcise daemons by writing more of that sort of thing, but again feel doubt that making up for a lack of social/sex life with fiction can only be wrong wrong wrong.
Friday, 4 April 2008
Failed attempt at being.
Its mostly guilt that brings me to Barden's Boudoir tonight. Sure I could claim to be a big fan of Arthur and Martha, but that would be doing a great disservice to Sharon from The Gresham Flyers who spent the best part of an hour working on me last weekend.
Since I've known half the people in the room for half a decade, but save the merest glimmer of recognition from the girl on the door, it counts for nothing. What I get, I have to get myself, like my damned fool plan to have one of the most popular political blogs in the UK, on a whim, because I can.
My car's parked just down the way, this is my first time in Stoke Newington, well, the first conscious time. A mob of locals came yahooing down the street as I locked my car, I swear one was packing heat. I'm only quite sure I'm not some kind of split personality serial killer, avenging some half-imagined crimes of the past, but sometimes I wake up in strange placed covered in blood that isn't my own.
Arthur and Martha on stage, halfway through AutoVia, my favourite song of their's, alas it the final song of the set. 'Arthur' seemed to be rocking out a little more than usual.
Summer festival appearances should be good.
I don't know if I was actively trying, maybe it was just going through the motions, I stood at the front, as near to the speakers as possible without people thinking 'he's standing as close to the speakers as possible', but I didn't hear any of the second band, save the blistering shards of an epic guitar solo and people clapping. Instead, I was in another place.
It was like in geography class or some MRPII meeting, slipping out of consciousness. Faces of girls I'd loved and any tenuous connection they had with the band before me. Memories of seeing them there or photos of the scene, glimpses like from a passing car, from too far away or the wrong side of the room. The stabbing shards of seperation, of missing something very important, of helplessness, of fate and damned bad luck.
Even in my slipping out of lucidity, I knew something was wrong and sought to guide my stream elsewhere to Manchester and Bolton and married life, anything away from the hell I occupied.
But it didn't quite work, the stabbing shafts of reality and it all comes back to east London cutting through. The here and now, crushing on what once was, or what I remember of it.
Even the reaffirming terrible truth that what I remember isn't the same as what actually happened.
The memories are wrong, incorrect, I know that for certain. But they are still the memories in my head, crystal clear, as though it was yesterday, last week, last year or a decade ago. The memories, soured by the truth.
Where the hell are the toilets in here?
I think I saw Das Wanderlust at Indietracks, but I can't for the life of me remember what they sounded like, and it would be unfair to judge them on tonight's performance considering it was mostly "imagine that last song sounded great" on the grounds that the singing girl had lost her voice, and the one song where DJ Waz played the 7" and the mimed along.
There were people behind me who wouldn't stop talking.
If asked what did I think of the evening, in an imaginary conversation with some vague acquaintance who happened to ask, I think in order to improve my quality of life I should have gone to the My Sad Captains single launch instead. I can barely control what goes on in my head, providing rope to hang myself was never going to be good and a better tunes would have been nicer.
Maybe that's unfair.
I think I've made many bad life decisions. I can't quite pin-point any of them, where or when.
Except climbing out of an eleventh floor window in 1997 and deciding to climb back in.
The oddest thing, after the bands I slouched out of the venue to scribble notes in my car, and as I drove away, I wanted to kill myself even more.
Since I've known half the people in the room for half a decade, but save the merest glimmer of recognition from the girl on the door, it counts for nothing. What I get, I have to get myself, like my damned fool plan to have one of the most popular political blogs in the UK, on a whim, because I can.
My car's parked just down the way, this is my first time in Stoke Newington, well, the first conscious time. A mob of locals came yahooing down the street as I locked my car, I swear one was packing heat. I'm only quite sure I'm not some kind of split personality serial killer, avenging some half-imagined crimes of the past, but sometimes I wake up in strange placed covered in blood that isn't my own.
Arthur and Martha on stage, halfway through AutoVia, my favourite song of their's, alas it the final song of the set. 'Arthur' seemed to be rocking out a little more than usual.
Summer festival appearances should be good.
I don't know if I was actively trying, maybe it was just going through the motions, I stood at the front, as near to the speakers as possible without people thinking 'he's standing as close to the speakers as possible', but I didn't hear any of the second band, save the blistering shards of an epic guitar solo and people clapping. Instead, I was in another place.
It was like in geography class or some MRPII meeting, slipping out of consciousness. Faces of girls I'd loved and any tenuous connection they had with the band before me. Memories of seeing them there or photos of the scene, glimpses like from a passing car, from too far away or the wrong side of the room. The stabbing shards of seperation, of missing something very important, of helplessness, of fate and damned bad luck.
Even in my slipping out of lucidity, I knew something was wrong and sought to guide my stream elsewhere to Manchester and Bolton and married life, anything away from the hell I occupied.
But it didn't quite work, the stabbing shafts of reality and it all comes back to east London cutting through. The here and now, crushing on what once was, or what I remember of it.
Even the reaffirming terrible truth that what I remember isn't the same as what actually happened.
The memories are wrong, incorrect, I know that for certain. But they are still the memories in my head, crystal clear, as though it was yesterday, last week, last year or a decade ago. The memories, soured by the truth.
Where the hell are the toilets in here?
I think I saw Das Wanderlust at Indietracks, but I can't for the life of me remember what they sounded like, and it would be unfair to judge them on tonight's performance considering it was mostly "imagine that last song sounded great" on the grounds that the singing girl had lost her voice, and the one song where DJ Waz played the 7" and the mimed along.
There were people behind me who wouldn't stop talking.
If asked what did I think of the evening, in an imaginary conversation with some vague acquaintance who happened to ask, I think in order to improve my quality of life I should have gone to the My Sad Captains single launch instead. I can barely control what goes on in my head, providing rope to hang myself was never going to be good and a better tunes would have been nicer.
Maybe that's unfair.
I think I've made many bad life decisions. I can't quite pin-point any of them, where or when.
Except climbing out of an eleventh floor window in 1997 and deciding to climb back in.
The oddest thing, after the bands I slouched out of the venue to scribble notes in my car, and as I drove away, I wanted to kill myself even more.
Tuesday, 25 September 2007
The end of days, end of days
Finally got round to writing up my school reunion thing...
How can it be a waste of time and really important, at the same time? I'm prejudicing this school reunion thing. After having driven for 5 hours I'm in the Lion car park opposite the school, debating in my head whether to go in and where to go in.
I'm telling myself I can't possibly drive 220 miles here in order to turn round and drive 220 miles home again, but in writing it down, the idea has merit.
It wouldn't be the first time or the worst time, that 840 mile trip to HDIF still bubbls up in my head from time to time.
Fuckit, I'll do another lap of the building then try my parent's place.
Do I even have the right day?
In Bolton town the sun was shining, rolls of flesh on display. Outside the Olde Man and Scythe there was Morris dancing, and I think I saw Jo Allen from the old Strathclyde/Lostock Arms axis.
It looks like wi-fi and the internet hasn't reached this town yet. I got five minuts into the librar/museum before it was slinging out time.
Where is everyone?
The Olde Man is the only place that hasn't changed. All the clubs have new names or are derelict The Jungle became Uropa, 5th Avenue became Jax, Hawthorns – IndieGo, and the Malt and Hops – Barristers.
Queens Park is still Queens Park.
Only on the way home do I regret not seeing people
How can it be a waste of time and really important, at the same time? I'm prejudicing this school reunion thing. After having driven for 5 hours I'm in the Lion car park opposite the school, debating in my head whether to go in and where to go in.
I'm telling myself I can't possibly drive 220 miles here in order to turn round and drive 220 miles home again, but in writing it down, the idea has merit.
It wouldn't be the first time or the worst time, that 840 mile trip to HDIF still bubbls up in my head from time to time.
Fuckit, I'll do another lap of the building then try my parent's place.
Do I even have the right day?
In Bolton town the sun was shining, rolls of flesh on display. Outside the Olde Man and Scythe there was Morris dancing, and I think I saw Jo Allen from the old Strathclyde/Lostock Arms axis.
It looks like wi-fi and the internet hasn't reached this town yet. I got five minuts into the librar/museum before it was slinging out time.
Where is everyone?
The Olde Man is the only place that hasn't changed. All the clubs have new names or are derelict The Jungle became Uropa, 5th Avenue became Jax, Hawthorns – IndieGo, and the Malt and Hops – Barristers.
Queens Park is still Queens Park.
Only on the way home do I regret not seeing people
Friday, 21 September 2007
Its been almost a week since I spoke to Nat, and also a week since she spoke to me too. Likewise with my mum, but its getting on for a fortnight.
Its kind of like that conceit from the Die Hard movies where Bruce Willis doesn't phone his wife.
Friday, almost weekend time. Some gig at Monkey Chews tonight, Fiona can't make it cos her boyf's parents are around, so I'll go on my own, watch the bands, lurk in the shadows and escape into the night. Not sure whether to start driving up tonight, or tomorrow morning, but I feel strangely obliged to go to this Bolton School Reunion thing tomorrow, although my feelings are similar to that I feel before NPL or Bowlie meets.
What happened to my friendships with the folk there, did I drift away, did I do something, of is it just in my head. Like when Lynsey Mop accused me of being a hermit and that's why she stopped speaking to me, when cause and effect work both ways, I became a hermit cos people stopped speaking to me.
I know how my mum feels, its a case of making that step of wandering round saying "Hi, how you doing, I'm Chris,". Its hard sometimes.
I got a feed for the podcast, its here
http://www.btpodshow.com/feeds/theindiepopprogram.xml
now what?
If you wait long enough there'll always be a webcomic about everything in your head,
This from xkcd
and this from Sinfest
Its kind of like that conceit from the Die Hard movies where Bruce Willis doesn't phone his wife.
Friday, almost weekend time. Some gig at Monkey Chews tonight, Fiona can't make it cos her boyf's parents are around, so I'll go on my own, watch the bands, lurk in the shadows and escape into the night. Not sure whether to start driving up tonight, or tomorrow morning, but I feel strangely obliged to go to this Bolton School Reunion thing tomorrow, although my feelings are similar to that I feel before NPL or Bowlie meets.
What happened to my friendships with the folk there, did I drift away, did I do something, of is it just in my head. Like when Lynsey Mop accused me of being a hermit and that's why she stopped speaking to me, when cause and effect work both ways, I became a hermit cos people stopped speaking to me.
I know how my mum feels, its a case of making that step of wandering round saying "Hi, how you doing, I'm Chris,". Its hard sometimes.
I got a feed for the podcast, its here
http://www.btpodshow.com/feeds/theindiepopprogram.xml
now what?
If you wait long enough there'll always be a webcomic about everything in your head,
This from xkcd
and this from Sinfest
Friday, 14 September 2007
oLD SKOOL
Still pouring through the manufacturing production line in my bedroom churning out CDs and packing, its thrilling stuff, but I got distracted by pictures of nekkit women again, could be the start of my next internet phenomenom.
Facebook tells me that next weekend there's a ten year reunion thing in Bolton, and it looks like a load of my mob are going. I seem to have lost touch with most of the guys from chool, apart from Timbo who I caught up with on MSN until the house intenet got cut off, Sapna who was around Glasgow and the late Big Tom. Facebook notwithstanding, I seem to have let them slip during the last ten years.
So I'll probly roll up to Bolton and put in an appearance, lurking in the shadows and leaving after a token round of hey how's it going. I have this nagging suspicion in the back of my head that I was a bully at school or at least a bore, who folk would chose not to stay in touch with, at least that explains all the non-replies on Facebook.
I thought I could just have a weekend on my own, chilling out doing what I wanna do instead of rushing up and down the country, but alas, next weekend is also a high end audio show which I ought to go to. Could it put pay to Bolton?
Facebook tells me that next weekend there's a ten year reunion thing in Bolton, and it looks like a load of my mob are going. I seem to have lost touch with most of the guys from chool, apart from Timbo who I caught up with on MSN until the house intenet got cut off, Sapna who was around Glasgow and the late Big Tom. Facebook notwithstanding, I seem to have let them slip during the last ten years.
So I'll probly roll up to Bolton and put in an appearance, lurking in the shadows and leaving after a token round of hey how's it going. I have this nagging suspicion in the back of my head that I was a bully at school or at least a bore, who folk would chose not to stay in touch with, at least that explains all the non-replies on Facebook.
I thought I could just have a weekend on my own, chilling out doing what I wanna do instead of rushing up and down the country, but alas, next weekend is also a high end audio show which I ought to go to. Could it put pay to Bolton?
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