cider drinking moths

have downloaded, or uploaded (however you want to view it) my holiday snaps to:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/57585081@N00/
It's past midnight - should've been in bed long ago but got a fire going in the back garden and attracted housemates to it, like moths, who drink cider, so cider drinking moths.

No place like home

Ahhh Manchester.....all the denizens were out playing in the public fountains in Piccadilly gardens when I walked through and letting all their newly sunburnt red and white bits hang out. Even the tramps had vest tops on.
I'm sure I didn't leave my flat in this state.
Richard Branson's personal vendetta against me continues - he stopped all trains to Manchester from London last night two minutes before I arrived at Euston. I rang various people who were all away or otherwise engaged - obviously I need to make some more boring friends in London. Everyone promised to put me up or find someone to do so if I needed it but then I spotted the train to Rugby and so got halfway home and visited the Black Pig on the way and continued on this morning.
I'm going to have a fire in the back garden.
ahh..home, but it definitely wasn't this messy when I went

Trying not to be grumpy and failing

I'm really really trying not to be grumpy but it's difficult. I got a fitful hours sleep in Burgerking before getting on the train which despite being a luxury high speed one has really small seats just too small to sleep in, even though I found two. The TER trains have wide comfortable squidgy seats which it's easy to sleep in but not these. And the armrests are made out of an especially hard plastic and the lights are brightly on. I managed to sort of wedge myself in and cover my eyes with my hat so that although I wasn't asleep I was in that sort of suspended animation state where you don't use any energy and so don't get any more tired than you already are – just grumpier. But because it's a luxury train it has air conditioning and what is the point of having air conditioning unless everybody knows about it? So of course it is set to just below comfort levels so that anyone not moving very much (i.e. me) quickly starts to get borderline hypothermia. And then, not half an hour in (so only 4:30am) some woman comes tramping down the aisle screeching 'Morgan, Guten Morgan' in a children's TV presenter voice. I assume it's the guard and jump up to dig my ticket out but it turns out she just wants to know if I want some coffee. I glare at her and say 'Nein – nur schlarfen' and crunch back down into my self imposed stress position. She continues her merry way up the brightly lit ice box of a train carriage loudly asking if anyone else would like some coffee. Then the announcer comes on but not content with just saying 'Next stop, Stuttgart' she has to say 'Hello, good morning , the train will shortly be arriving at Stuttgart, that's stuttgart, the time is bloody stupid o'clock in the morning, thank you for travelling with Deutsch Bahn ICE, on this train from Munich to Mannheim, connections from Stuttgart are for Berlin, etc etc, we hope you have enjoyed your journey with ICE and we look forward to seeing you again ..blah blah...' and on and on as if she was on cocaine or something, and then all over again in English. Grrr. And then the guard did come round and then insisted on seeing my ticket again on her way back down the train. And not only are the stupid seats too narrow but so is the aisle so although I only have two toes protruding out by half a centimetre everyone who walks past has to bang into them. And I got my wallet nicked and so I keep checking everything twice to make sure some thieving sausage eater hasn't made off with the rest of my belongings. And I'm tired. And the burgerking is sitting in my stomach like a greasy brick.

Post-post note
The discovery in Koln that the local speciality was giant size cakes did something to elevate my mood and after eating a toffee iced walnut pastry the size of my head I felt better. After all I had a lot of sunny snoozes yesterday so I should be charged up enough to get through a day of low sleep levels without becoming homicidal, even though I got off at the wrong station in Brussels and am now on the super-scenic (i.e. slow) train to Gent. But there exists a place where they make cakes as big as my head and so the world is alright after all.

fucking Santa Claus and Burger King

It's half past one in the morning and I'm sat in Burgerking at Augsberg train station. I'm not sure how the day ended up here. It started well enough – the sun was sunny and even getting repeatedly lost en route to the botanical gardens was worthwhile as I discovered the beautiful garden allotments of Augsberg. I don't think people live on them but each one has a shed, or chalet so magnificent that you could (I happily would) and most of them had, in addition to the usual allotmenty bits, little lawns, and swings, paddling pools and barbeques. All were divided by high hedges and gravelled walkways which gave the place a distinctly mazy feel. I felt a bit Alicy and had a snooze on a bench in the sun with one eye half open in case the white rabbit hopped past. Then I found a long water side gallery of stunning graffiti. I eventually found the botanical gardens and they're lovely too – difficulty was that anywhere else you could just head for the nearest trees but every time I saw a load of huge mature trees looming over some four storey building or another I'd go there and find out that it was just another load of huge mature trees that they'd just decided to leave in between the houses – to make the place look pretty. So the gardens were lovely, especially the Japanese garden and the apple strudel and ice cream (Bavaria's only real contribution to global cuisine – unless you count sauerkraut – I don't) was lovely too – so lovely I had to have another little snooze in the sun. Then I caught the bus back to Konigsplatz and wandered round the little town market which was – you guessed it – lovely. As was some Noodle and tofu soup (couldn't stomach any more piles of meat and potatoes or donner kebabs). I picked my rucksack up from the lovely youth hostel and caught a bus out to the Aikido Dojo where I met Suzanne there about to start the children's class. She's a tiny powerhouse of a woman and although I couldn't understand everything she said she is so expressive that it was easy to follow the class. I trained with the kids 5 'til half six and then with the adults from 7 'til 9 . It was great to do some proper exercise after a week of relative idleness and recent training meant I was able to keep up. I even out-knackered one of the guys – but it turns out he's a paramedic and had just finished a shift and so I guess he had an excuse. Suzanne asked around and found a lift back to the station for me – with someone called Chris – who turned out to be the paramedic. He came out of the changing rooms with a black t-shirt on that said 'fucking Santa Claus' in sparkling script across his chest and maybe it was that or the beer (they have beer in the dojo vending machine!) but for some reason my brain went walkabout and after being dropped on the station (and escorted to the right platform, and hugged) I went in my bag to find my wallet had gone missing.
I rang Suzanne who raced back to the dojo and rang Chris who checked his car whilst I emptied and repacked my rucksack and bag in case they had developed any secret pockets that my wallet had self-migrated to and watched my train pull away from the platform. Suzanne came to the station and we went to the dojo for another look but there was no sign of it there. It must have been lifted from my bag in the station but I've no idea how – some twat must have lightning fingers is all I can say. So Suzanne rang the train people and they've re-reserved me a place on the 4am train which should still get me to Koln for my connection to Brussels, which might get me to Calais in time for the ferry. Suzanne lent me some money but the station restaurant was shut and so here I am in Burgerking, feeling a bit sick, very tired, un-thrilled at another two hours wait, and totally stupid for getting my wallet nicked. I've cancelled the card, I think my drivers licence was in there and I can't recall what else – random bits and pieces.
Great – now a large group of singing, clapping, chanting, staggeringly drunk Bavarian chavs have come in. I shall sit and look growly and hope they ignore me.

Youf hosteling

Wow – wish I'd found this place last night. Like not needing to be a young person to have a young person's railcard you don't need to be a youth to hostel (although I turned down the cheap option of a dorm room for a single with en-suite). It's half the price of last night's and even nicer and includes breakfast. I have a little balcony that looks over a little river and some pretty back gardens. I only have the one night here and have to book out at ten which is a bit of a pain as it'd be nice to just settle down but travelling is meant to be just that and I'll be stationary again before long so I must enjoy this feeling whilst I'm lucky enough to have it. I managed to get a reservation on a night train to Koln for tomorrow for only an extra 20 euros which means I can train at the dojo on Friday night (I've had a couple of lovely emails from Suzanne who teaches there) which gives me an extra day in Augsberg and should get me to Brussels on Saturday morning. Today I have mostly been mooching around Augsberg, finding this place, having a sleep and even a little bit of homework. I'm off out now to find food and maybe music if there is any to be had.

Waking up in Augsberg

I've just opened my hotel curtains to a view of a green roof and some trees behind. I'm on the third floor and looking across the rooftops I can see a lot of trees. I got here late last night after finding all the hostels in Munich full and deciding that if I was going to blow money on a hotel I'd be better heading up to here and now I have the whole day to explore.
I found the surfing spot in Munich yesterday, or I think I did. I took some photos but there were no surfers braving the waves, probably due to the constructions site which had harris-fenced of access to the edge for quite some distance. Walking around the city being awed at the magnificent buildings and all the parkland by the river was beautiful and I didn't head up to the intersolar trade fair until mid afternoon.
It was massive – made France look small by comparison – one hall was just full of Chinese stalls although they made a good showing throughout as well. I saw a funny wind turbine that looked like a fish and some cylindrical pv cells, lots of building integrated stuff and generally wandered around going 'ooh, it's all so big' before finding Katy who I worked briefly with at CAT two years ago and Chris. Chris had an invite to the Valentin software party so Katy and I gatecrashed that and got fed little test tubes of drinks in multicoloured layers with dry ice in so they smoked. They had a guy with a big beaker of the stuff who put bits of fruit on sticks and froze them and then dipped them in chocoloate and then froze a load of popcorn so that when you ate it smoke came out of your mouth and nose like a dragon. Then the three of us went down to Munich and ate outdoors to the sound of a string quartet who were busking across the plaza. The monster storm the night before which blew over trees had cleared the air nicely.
I got a load of contacts and information for my thesis project who I have to email when I get back. I'm becoming an expert at the 'networking glance' where the first thing you check is someone's badge to see if they're any use to you, whilst they do the same to you and then you have this few minutes to pick each others brains. Every now and again you meet someone who you actually get on with and that's nicest. I found a chap at the conference who had missed giving his poster presentation because he got the rooms confused so I got him to explain it to me which was much more helpful than just reading it because I was able to ask all the stupid questions that the poster assumed I'd know and therefore really understand it. It must be very difficult to compress a years worth of work onto one sheet. Anyway – work bit of the holiday is now over and now it's holiday holiday, and breakfast time.

Home straight – for today

Lindau -Munich train delayed but under way now. I continue to be impressed by the rooftop energy arrays, and by the recycling – all the bins are divided into separate waste streams – and people seem to observe them as well. Also there are covered bike parks everywhere. This last is seen as a bit of a joke back in blighty – something to put in on a building to get an extra BREEAM point but here they seem to provide them without thinking and know what? - they get used. I say build them and they will come. Last hurdle tonight will be to find a hotel somewhere near the Bayerischof where the conference is and get clean and then sleep.....mmmm...

Escape from France

I was too late for the Strasbourg-Stuttgart train so they refunded my ticket at Nancy. In the same way that people really struggle to understand why you'd catch the train rather than fly, people struggle with the idea that you might be happy taking the slower train. Whenever a ticket clerk tells me that the train I'd like to get on is fully reserved (I suspect they only have one interrail ticket per fast train – it's probably run by Richard Branson) they put a face on more appropriate to telling someone you've just run over their child. Or they'll tell you that it's just not possible to get to a certain place and then reluctantly admit that is might be possible with a different route (even if it's only ten minutes longer). We really have become obsessed with speed and convenience. This route is a lot more scenic. The next train to Strasbourg went right through to Basel and as it seemed the only way I was going to get out of the country (only the international trains go from France to Germany it seems) I took that option and am now on a little two carriage train rattling it's way to Lindau. The outskirts of Basel were pretty – lots of allotments and so many solar collectors and PV panels on the rooftops. It's blazing hot. The Bodensee is gorgeous and I'm envious of the swimmers dotting the shoreline. If I had time I'd catch a train down to Oberstdorf for old times sake and call past Immenstadt to see if they still serve Guinness to the bikers in the Feuervogel. I managed to grab some food from a supermarket next to Basel station (all I have eaten all day is a pain au chocolat and an apple tart, and the end of a packet of nasty crisps in my bag since the UK). I should have enough time for a beer at Lindau before another train to Munich which gets me in at 22:45 having missed day one of the conference and the dinner, hey ho. But at least I'll be there ready for tomorrow morning. I have a meet up with a chap called Eelco who I'm hoping is going to get involved with my thesis project (as in give me a load of free kit and some installation) so it's quite important that I come across as a serious researcher and not some smelly old tramp – fortunately I've saved back one outfit of half fresh clothes, the rest will have to get washed in a hotel sink tonight.
I'm thinking that I'll not go back through France.

Lost in France – Part 2

Am on the train to Nancy after finally pulling out of some hick town the name of which has already escaped me. It was the first platform I've seen where the train times were just displayed on a paper poster, one train per platform. Everyone was smoking and the clerk gave the impression of someone who drinks wine for breakfast. Interrail is a very lovely way to travel but not a very effective way to arrive, which I suppose is rather the point. I have splashed out on a real ticket from Strasbourg to Stuttgart as it seems the only way of escaping France and to guarantee arriving in Munich today – I'm hoping the German trains will run with a greater degree of efficiency than the French, that is if I make Strasbourg in time for my connection. The main problem with Interrail is that none of the fast trains are included – I sort of figured this would just be the Eurostar but it's quite a lot more – sort of not like being able to travel on Virgin in Britain. God knows I'd rather not as I'm starting to feel after a few trips this year as if Richard Branson has a personal axe to grind with me but it is a lot of trains not to be able to use.

Lost in France – Part 1

I spent Saturday night in a ropy pub B&B in Dover. Getting in late I thought it best just to go for the closest rather than traipse around the town. It had a loud band on so I drank some whiskey to a Johnny be Good medley and Teenage Kicks and listened to grizzled Carl at the bar who thinks the youth of today are unfairly maligned and used to work on banana boats which are very fast and never spend more than 12 days at sea. I missed the first ferry by minutes after walking down to the port (past a string of lovely looking B&B's offering much cheaper rooms) but got rescheduled for the next crossing without problems or surcharges. I walked from Calais port to the station and felt very smug as my co-passengers arrived from the bus as I was tucking into my second crepe at the restaurant de gare. In Lille they have huge black plastic statues of babies with wings and scaly tails and lovely fountains and lots of bars selling moules and frites and beer. I'm don't know if the missed ferry would have been enough to spanner up the whole plan and so to make sure I got on the wrong train at Lille (it was the right one on the board but the wrong one on the platform) so instead of skirting round the edge of France, preferably through Belgium, I ended up going through Paris and then onto Troyes. I got in late again but wasn't falling for the first hotel trick this time. Oh no. I did a full circuit around the town and found that everything was around the hundred euro mark, or full, or shut before heading back to the cheapest hotel outside the station. Still - I got to have a cocktail in the main square which was called a Tahiti and came with a red sugar encrusted rim, a skewer of fruit balanced on the top and an umbrella, which it didn't need as even at that time of night it was still warm enough for bare shoulders. The train station hotel had rooms on balconies around a central courtyard with giant plastic coconut palm trees – class.
I'm finding that I remember more French than expected but being as I expected zero it's still not much help. I am struggling with the temptation to use a 'Carry -On' accent and speak in pidgin French in an Ab Fab way. I am eating more ham and cheese baguettes than I would like and nowhere near enough moules, frites and beer.

Day 1 – Mach to Dover

A heat pump lecture over ran making me panic about missing my train and so a mate kindly gave me a lift from CAT to Mach in time for the 2:07 train to Birmingham (which was then delayed). It was my last module of my MSc and as we pulled out of the station and away past the PV arrays of the Eco-parc shining blue in the sun I felt both sad and excited and thought about the ending that started my volunteering at CAT and the end of that which marked my starting on the course and my job and the ending of the taught modules and the start of my thesis and soon the end of that and the start of what else? Endings are always beginnings too. I've started writing my final essay on what happens when buildings are handed over to the end user who then behaves in a completely different way to how it was predicted and over rides all the controls. Basically focusing on how we think it's the end of a job but it's only the start of the building's life and the beginning of it's contribution to our carbon emissions, and what we can do at that point to keep them as low as they were designed to be (although that's not even particularly good). I'm writing on my new Samsung net book – what a bad environmentalist I am – that's a PC, a laptop, a net book and a work PC all in my name. I have justified it to myself by saying that I will write a huge chunk of my thesis on it whilst I am away these two weeks. Thus far I've hardly touched it – sinking with ease into the Wales induced incommunicado status that I usually adopt. I've had 71 emails in the last four days! But now I'm appreciating it although my internet dongle keeps cutting out which is frustrating as I've signed up to www.couchsurfing.org and was going to optimistically try for a couch in Dover tonight – I know it's late but those that don't ask, don't get (or 'shy bairns get nowt' as Lindsay is fond of saying) and I thought I'd try it anyway, on the off chance......
....that was a few hours ago, I got distracted by 33,000 football fans from Gillingham on the train heading nosily back from a one nil victory against Shrewsbury town at Wembley - by the time I got a connection back it really was too late.

Challenges to carry out on my trip so far are to take a photo of the river surfers in Munich complete with the no-surfing sign and train at the Iwama Ryu dojo in Augsberg.

Machynlleth to Dover

A heat pump lecture over ran making me panic about missing my train and so a mate kindly gave me a lift from CAT to Mach in time for the 2:07 train to Birmingham (which was then delayed). It was my last module of my MSc and as we pulled out of the station and away past the PV arrays of the Eco-parc shining blue in the sun I felt both sad and excited and thought about the ending that started my volunteering at CAT and the end of that which marked my starting on the course and my job and the ending of the taught modules and the start of my thesis and soon the end of that and the start of what else? Endings are always beginnings too. I've started writing my final essay on what happens when buildings are handed over to the end user who then behaves in a completely different way to how it was predicted and over rides all the controls. Basically focusing on how we think it's the end of a job but it's only the start of the building's life and the beginning of it's contribution to our carbon emissions, and what we can do at that point to keep them as low as they were designed to be (although that's not even particularly good). I'm writing on my new Samsung net book – what a bad environmentalist I am – that's a PC, a laptop, a net book and a work PC all in my name. I have justified it to myself by saying that I will write a huge chunk of my thesis on it whilst I am away these two weeks. Thus far I've hardly touched it – sinking with ease into the Wales induced incommunicado status that I usually adopt. I've had 71 emails in the last four days! But now I'm appreciating it although my internet dongle keeps cutting out which is frustrating as I've signed up to www.couchsurfing.org and was going to optimistically try for a couch in Dover tonight – I know it's late but those that don't ask, don't get (or 'shy bairns get nowt' as Lindsay is fond of saying) and I thought I'd try it anyway, on the off chance.....that was a few hours ago, I got distracted by 33,000 football fans from Gillingham on the train heading nosily back from a one nil victory against Shrewsbury town at Wembley - by the time I got a connection back it really was too late and so I've booked into a slightly ropy pub/guesthouse in Dover. It was the first one I found outside the train station and had a fun (very young) band on who played a Johnny be Good medley and Teenage Kicks. I had a pint of bitter and a Jamesons and chatted to Carl at the bar who told me he didn't think the kids today were that bad and that he learnt spanish working on banana boats, which are very fast - never more than twelve days at sea and said I should go and visit Dover Castle, it changes a thousand times.

Challenges to carry out on my trip so far are to take a photo of the river surfers in Munich complete with the no-surfing sign and train at the Iwama Ryu dojo in Augsberg.

Calling Trans-Europe Challenges

Well I still haven’t embarked upon anymore suggested challenges but I have a few challenging excuses for this and so will blog about them instead to fill the commitment gap.
On Saturday I attended the first meeting of the choir that will be performing the songs of Doris Day in a production called Desperate to be Doris at the Library Theatre in Manchester in September. It’s run by an outfit called Lip Service Theatre and I have a list of songs that we’ll be doing. I’m especially excited about 'The Deadwood Stage' and 'Enjoy Yourself – It’s later than you think' which I’d always known only as a Specials song but sounds just as great sung by Doris. I was thinking my hair might be long enough by then to bleach and curl into a Doris Day style but apparently we’ll be dressed as daffodils. Or possibly sheep – I don’t think they’ve completely decided on that yet but it all sounds ridiculous and excellent fun. And it’s set in a pyjama mail order call centre. So with Spokes moving to Wednesday I reckon I can do rehearsals for that on Monday, singing on Tuesday, aikido on Thursday and still have Friday night off.
Suddenly realised that the Manchester 10k was nearly upon me and got Mike to come running round Chorlton last Sunday morning – not nice but I made it round three miles. I went out again tonight and did about four and it felt better. One more I reckon before Sunday and I should make a decent showing – if I can track down my race number. I know it’s somewhere underneath the drifts of paper that have accumulated throughout my flat – clear my flipping clutter would be a good challenge. I have Saturday to find it and also do all the little jobs that have been building up or not fully completed before disappearing off again for potentially a month, depending how tomorrow goes.
Tomorrow I have an interview for the Ken Dale Travel Bursary – an award from CIBSE (Chartered Institute of Building Services Engineers) for a research trip round Europe. I must focus throughout and not use the words ‘holiday’ or ‘jolly’ or ‘blag’ but instead refer to the important research of great weight and import that I will carry out with due diligence and seriousity. Oh yes. Amsterdam has some very interesting district heat mains – that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. There are two other candidates so if something horrible happens to them.............
Whether I get it or not I am definitely off to Wales for a week of building knowledge and then Munich to the Solar Thermal Conference (because this is what I do on my holidays). I’ve just got my bike fixed and it’s running like a new bike after rattling along making a noise like a bag of spanners every time I change gear and not actually slowing down when I press the brakes. It came to a head when I had a catastrophic wheel failure in Bristol but now.........oh it’s lovely, it’s like having a new bike but one that I already love like you love a bike after having it for three years and riding it every day for two. But because I have chosen to Interrail it to Munich I have to leave it here, in Manchester and won’t have the pleasure of going up and down the Welsh hills with the newly functioning gearage. I think it’s going to be quite an entertaining challenge to get round Europe – I have a train timetable the size of two bricks to wrap my head round with two hundred little symbols none of which mean anything remotely resembling what they look like they ought to mean.
So until I return from my travels my bag of challenges from you lot will have to remain untouched – sorry. If you have any additional ones more suited to a cross Europe jaunt that I could do in the meantime then please feel free to suggest them.