There is something quite fascinating about the announcements made on trains. Is there any form of public speaking that varies in quality more. Sometimes the announcements can be delivered in an unbelievably apathetic tone, like it’s the last thing the train guard ever wants to do. A lot of it just sounds plain rotten. Sometimes […]
London trip — day four: Design Museum
Day four map: This was my final day in London, and my train was at 2pm. So I had only a few hours to spare in the morning, and decided to take in the Design Museum as my final activity in London. There were two exhibitions on when I visited, both of which are still […]
London trip — day three: Science Museum; London Transport Museum
Day three map: Science Museum My original tentative schedule saw me planning to visit the Science Museum, the Natural History Museum and the V&A in one day. But some last-minute chopping and changing of my schedule saw me eventually trying to squeeze the Science Museum into a 90 minute visit. It didn’t take me long […]
London trip — day two: Barbican architecture tour; Museum of Brands
Day two map: Barbican architecture tour Owing to my developing interest in brutalist architecture, I decided I would take a look at the Barbican Estate to see one prominent brutalist project in the flesh. I took a look at the Barbican Arts Centre website to see if there were any interesting events on. To my […]
London trip — day one: Royal Observatory, Greenwich; Tate Modern
Last weekend I took a trip to London for the weekend. I arrived on the afternoon of Friday 10 February, and left on the afternoon of Monday 13 February. London is the sort of place I could keep going to. I go about once every two years, and every time I go away feeling like […]
Grand Prix pre-season meetup
Have you ever wanted to meet me? Then tough, because you might have to if you are going to Badger GP’s Grand Prix pre-season F1 fan meetup! The good people at Badger GP kindly invited me to attend as a guest. While it’s a fair trek for me to go down to London, it was in […]
Why I want to watch more television
I have decided that my new year’s resolution is to watch more television. It may seems odd, since most people’s resolution necessitates getting off the sofa. There are a couple of drivers for my desire to become a couch potato. Views of the news One reason is that I have come to realise that I […]
Happy twenty-twelve
Happy new year. What are you calling it? “Two thousand and twelve” or “twenty-twelve”? It was a topic of conversation among my friends on New Year’s Day. There is also an interesting article by Ben Zimmer. I have long been in the “twenty-twelve” camp. I said “twenty-eleven” and “twenty-ten”. I often even said “twenty oh […]
The importance of design for transport
I was pleased to see an article on the BBC News website about the brilliance of the design of the UK’s road signs. Minimalist and clutter-free, British road signs are a design triumph. I often look to transport-related design of all types for inspiration. The reason is because they have to work well. Lives might depend […]