A Gold Statue
You don’t see may gold statues. Or even gold coloured ones like this.
A Gold Statue
It does strike me as being rather gaudy.
Where’s The Middle Door?
I took this picture of one of Birmingham’s many buses.
Where’s The Middle Door?
Outside of London, buses rarely have the second door, that all London buses do.
Two door buses have the advantage of much quicker loading and unloading, especially for buggies and wheelchairs, which results in a faster service.
A Manchester bus driver told me that the low life hangs around the driver trying to nick his money on a one-door bus, but with two doors in London you never see this behaviour, as they leave the driver to get on with his job.
The image of bus travel could be greatly improved by making every one two doors, as the service would be faster and less hassle.
And whilst they’re at, why do drivers outside of London issue me with a ticket despite the fact I have a free bus pass?
Walking Down To Lime Street
This picture brings back two memories.
Walking Down To Lime Street
In 1965, when I arrived in Liverpool for the first time to start my studies, I remember lugging my cardboard suitcase up this same hill to get a Crosville H13 bus or something like it, to my digs in Huyton. Students don’t arrive like that in universities today. They’re probably taken in style by car for a start. I think C too, had to find her own way to her place in Dale Hall.
Also shown in this picture is the old Trust House Forte, St. George’s Hotel, where we spent the weekend of April 6th, 1974. How can I be so sure of the date? It was the day that Abba won the European song contest with Waterloo. I can’t remember much else about that weekend. I don’t even know, whether the children came with us or how we travelled to the city. I can remember being served some of the worst scrambled eggs of my life and the look of disgust on what his staff had produced on the restaurant manager’s face, as he wrung the whey out of them with his hand.
I have discussed this story of the scrambled egg with my son and he said he was there. We did go to the Grand National in either 1978 or 1979, but then we went afterwards to the Lake District. It couldn’t have been 1974 as Red Rum won that year on the 30th March. So as the memory of Abba is I believe right, that puts us there a week later.
The streets of Liverpool are paved with memories. Sadly, all the pictures from the time have been lost.
Would You Live In A Church?
The Church of St. Andrew in Rodney Street in Liverpool has been a ruin for years.
Would You Live In A Church?
But now it’s being converted into a hundred student rooms. For a city with a deep religious feeling, it does seem to be very happy to use old churches for secular purposes. Many of my university exams were taken in redundant ones.
I do like this piece from Wikipedia about the church.
Adjacent to the church in the churchyard is a monument to William Mackenzie, a railway contractor who died in 1851. It is in the shape of a pyramid, is constructed in granite, and was erected in 1868. Facing the street is a blind entrance flanked by uprights supporting a lintel containing a bronze plaque. The structure is a Grade II listed building.
There is a tradition that, as Mackenzie was a gambling man, he sold his soul to the Devil, and that his body was placed in a seating position above ground within the pyramid, in order that the Devil may not claim him. His ghost is said to haunt Rodney Street.
So will Mackenzie be surprising students in their beds?
Gates To A Palace?
Are these the gates to a palace? Or as they are in Liverpool, perhaps they’re the gates to a bishop or archbishop’s residence.
Gates To A Palace?
But no! They’re the gates to a pub. But it is the Philharmonic Dining Rooms.
A Liverpool Facelift
You’d think it would be something like an Essex facelift, which appears in Wikipedia as a Croydon facelift. Although, I’ve never heard of it with respect to Croydon.
A Liverpool Facelift
But as the picture shows, it’s not that at all!
Liverpool University’s Metric Signs
All of the fingerposts around the campus at Liverpool University are metric.
I’ve never seen so many metric signs in the UK. Even Liverpool council avoids the argument by using minutes, as one picture shows.
An Old London Bendy Bus In Liverpool
I saw this example of one of the dreaded London bendy buses in Liverpool.
An Old London Bendy Bus In Liverpool
It was being used to take students to and from accommodation.
Note the wi-fi.
3D Printing
I was shown some 3D Printing in the Department using this machine from MakerBot.
3D Printing
The surprising thing is the cost, as it’s only a couple of thousand bucks, not the tens of thousands I expected.
I can think of so many applications in all of the things I’ve done in the past.
Liverpool University Electrical Engineering and Electronics
One of the purposes of the day was to open the refurbished foyer of the Liverpool University Electrical Engineering and Electronics building.
In some ways it surprising how well the building has fared, since I arrived in 1965, when it was almost brand-new. To me it is one of the better 1960s buuldings, but I can’t find out who designed it.
One major change outside, is that there is now a pedestrian crossing, something that fifty years ago, the University couldn’t get the council to install. In fact classically the council did a survey in the summer and concluded that it wasn’t needed.
The Anonymous Widower 