Category: Architecture

Avatar Rescued by an old friend

When we bought our house five years ago, we moved in to a former military town where all the army things were being steadily demolished and replaced with new housing estates. As part of this new utopian vision, we kept being told that there would be a new town centre, which would one day materialise on the big patch of derelict space in the middle of town five minutes’ walk from our new place.

Over the years we’ve kept hearing stories about all the brilliant things that will be there once they build it, putting a range of wonderful conveniences on our doorstep. But the big derelict space continued to be big, derelict and empty. Would we even live to see this fabled wonderland, this Eden of small town commerce?

Well, finally, things are changing. A couple of months ago work started to build the steel frames of the first building, which will be a big Sainsbury’s, soon to be surrounded by other things as part of a phased construction project. And in the last couple of weeks, with people and cranes and diggers on site, new signs have gone up to advertise the company building it. I couldn’t be more delighted. Look who it is!

As yet, though, no sign of their cufflinks or their children. I’ll keep looking.

Avatar The thin door

The door is thin. Really thin.

The sign on the door is French. Really French.

Whatever is inside is a secret. The door is locked. Locked with a thin key. A thin, French key.

What could be inside? Only the thinnest French treasure.

Perhaps the recipe for the perfect baguette.

Perhaps a lifetime supply of those chocolate Mikado sticks.

Perhaps the world’s longest tube of LU chocolate biscuits.

Perhaps a string of onions twelve storeys high.

But you will never know, because the thin door is too thin for you to get through.

Too thin and too French.

Avatar Newsboost – New Year’s Chris

As the Chris DNA continues to run amok in all parts of the modern 21st century, it was left to experts to predict just how bad it would be at the end or the year and what monstrosities we would have to face during the festive season.

Big money was riding on a couple of obvious options: Chris spliced into a mecha Santa, Chris spliced into one or all of Santa’s reindeers, some kind of I don’t know Raymond Briggs snowman Chris hybrid with bells on, and the ultimate horror of horrors, Mariah Chris-tified Carey belting, ‘All I want for Chris-mas is shoes’.

It was egg on all of our collective faces though when people in the street started to look and point at a familiar landmark in London which seemed to be undergoing a transformation. Behold!

Big Ben was no more. Big Chris with his big man work ethic had muscled in and now the capital city was doomed.

Ding dong, merrily on high. It’s only a matter of time before he captures what he needs and moves onto much more serious buildings like MI5, Scotland Yard, the British Museum, that Subway in York that almost didn’t serve me because I was pretty drunk, and anything owned by Noel Edmonds.

2026 will have to start with a shriek and a scream. Happy New Year, everyone.

Avatar “Shed Avengers 2” – mini review

A few years back, I reviewed Shed Avengers, a game I managed to complete but found somewhat frustrating. I said I probably wouldn’t play it again.

Well, the same studio has now released Shed Avengers 2, a follow up to the original, where the same hapless protagonist finds the new roof felt he fitted in the first game has started to deteriorate, allowing rain water in to his garage once more. I expect you’re both dying to get your hands on it and give it a go, but I got a sneak preview.

This is a shorter game than the first, since the whole roof doesn’t need re-felting, but don’t think for a moment that it’s going to be easier. Since the first game the garden has filled up with all sorts of new things, including the materials for a half-finished renovation of the flowerbeds and a new log store built up against the garage wall, offering new hazards and problems to solve.

The game opens with the discovery that there is still no ladder on the premises long enough to safely get you on the roof, but now with the added difficulty that the place where the ladder went last time is now home to a log store and a water butt. The only place to put the ladder is therefore down the side of the structure, which is almost a foot lower down, meaning you have to climb to the top of the stepladder and then step on the handle at the top to try and heave yourself up while the ladder wobbles about on its unsteady gravel footing.

Once you’re up on the roof, you find several large tears in the felt, plus most of the clout nails holding down the edges have torn through the felt leaving dozens of little holes. All of these need painting over with a tin of thick rubberised emergency roof repair material, which is viscous, difficult to apply and probably toxic. A thick frost had formed overnight which is only now melting, leaving the roof partly icy and entirely wet.

Maneouvering across the roof is extremely difficult. The underlying woodwork is still fragile and prone to movement, but is now overlaid with felt that is already torn and mustn’t be disturbed any more, in case more tears appear. This makes it difficult to reach all the places that need to be repaired.

I thought I’d mastered this one by the time I’d got half way around the repairs, and it was certainly a much quicker game to play than the first. But it had a final trick up its sleeve – the final level requires that you get down off the roof without sustaining a life-changing injury in order to win.

This is very tricky since you are, by now, freezing cold and can’t feel your hands. The top step of the stepladder, itself not to be stepped on according to the instructions, is so far below you that your feet don’t reach it. By rolling on to your front you can just about get your foot on to the handle which is absolutely not safe to step on, and dismounting involves a careful balancing act so as not to destabilise the ladder and fall. Naturally there is nobody else on the premises to either hold the ladder and help you down, or to find you lying on the ground with several broken bones and call the emergency services.

Like the first game, while Shed Avengers 2 presented me with interesting problems to overcome and puzzles to solve, I wasn’t keen to go back and play it again. However, it was clear at the end that there was still rain water coming in to the garage, which stopped me getting a perfect score, so I will have to give it another go in January. I can’t wait.

Avatar The way forward

When your time comes, where will you go? How do you see yourself passing from this life to the next?

You might not have thought about it, but you probably should. Best not face the grim reaper without a plan.

I wasn’t sure how I’d go about it until the other day when I happened upon this grand Victorian monument in a London cemetery.

Then I had a look at the clear label at the front, and knew what to do.

Avatar Cabinet saga, part 2

Back in May I offered a tantalising glimpse of my next DIY project, which were a set of custom-made alcove shelves. In the two and a half months that have passed since then, you have probably thought about little else.

It’s not yet time to show you the final result – not when I can wring another post out of this story – but it is time to update you on scribing, a new skill I had to acquire as part of this project that would let me cut pieces very precisely to fit the contours of my old house’s wobbly walls.

Read More: Cabinet saga, part 2 »

Avatar The Squirrel Capital of Disneyland

In Disneyland, nothing is normal. And I’m not just taking about that fact that there are grown adults walking around wearing Mickey Mouse ears and carrying a stuffed toy Cheshire Cat. Nope, everything in Disney gets ‘imagineered’ which is a horrible phrase to describe how they pay too much attention to stuff many won’t even notice, but when you do, it’s quite nice.

Whilst queueing to have “Blanche Neige et les Sept Nains” inflicted upon me, I glanced up to see these funny little buggers and it made me chuckle, so here they are for you to look at with your eyes too (and you can avoid having to queue to see such things)