magic roundabout

Excitement as I go to Swindon today! I've previously seen the famous 'Magic Roundabout' of Swindon and will be interested to know if it is still there. I believe it was an experiment in the middle ages of road planning and has amazing dreamcatcher wheels within wheels. I was thinking of checking on Google, but it will be more fun to see if I 'happen' across it.

yes, its the real streetsign

Technorati Tags: rashbre, swindon, magic, roundabout, dreamcatcher, dreamkatcher, will+young, hidden+message, teardrops, mp3, sparkle,

first footing

An accidental "First footing" occurred at the hotel on New Year's Eve. For those that don't know, the tradition of "first footing" is that the "first foot" in the house after midnight should be male and dark (ie not a Viking about to bring trouble). Getting this right is supposed to be a sign of good luck for the year.

So arriving back at the hotel room on the First, at about one thirty a.m. it was a little unfortunate that the key didn't work. To be honest, we just thought it a bit funny and a member of the Hotel staff was nearby delivering a snack and joined in our attempt to get back in. Yes, it was the right room and, yes, we had the right key etc. He then called for backup and the lady in charge arrived a few minutes later. Same questions and we even had the little card showing our room number.

Still all frivolity as well.

Then the person in charge called for the duty engineer, who arrived a couple of minutes later. He did some thing slightly forceful to the door which then opened and he was, indeed, the first person in the room. He was a tallish person, with a complexion suggesting relatives in India.

So a tall, dark, stranger was indeed the 'first footings' for 2008.

Technorati Tags: rashbre, new+year, 2008, 2007, first+footings, tradition, superstition, coal, bread, whisky, hotel, berkeley

bad drive

I'll call today the first normal day of 2008, complete with me properly back to work. A slight problem though, in that I became involved in a rather long traffic jam losing around two hours as a consequence of an unexpected motorway closure.

Londoners are used to random commuter problems but today's was particularly severe. When its 'leaves on the line' or 'wrong kind of snow', its easy to be irritated about the situation, but when there's ambulances and fire-engines moving along the hard shoulder it creates a different impression.

I eventually used some local knowledge to sneak off of the motorway at an access point normally used by police. I knew the whereabouts of the exit and sure enough they were encouraging the few of us who knew this route to escape back into the country lanes.

A slightly American look at 2007

Okay. Its from the jibjab people that do that "dancing gnome with your family in the movie" meme.

Its also not a bad retrospective for people in a hurry.

Thanks, panthergirl, for spotting it.

8

We were based at a hotel for the New Year. It wasn't my idea, but it was a great one and meant we were within easy staggering distance of the various festivities. Starting with a room already supplied with Champagne and where coffee arrived almost as one thought of the idea.

Then there were the afternoon cakes, which were somehow designed to look like fashion items from the current season. Kind of Hermes handbag shaped sponges and Nina Ricci inspired slurpy things - about ten designers were featured in this little procession of cakeness. There are pictures but they are on another phone and may take a while to extricate. Suffice to say "Yum".

A little later it was time to wander across to the Apollo for the New Years Eve performance of Wicked, playing to a packed house and one of the few shows in London starting at a normal mid evening time of seven thirty. Already by this time, the effects of gentle imbibing were beginning to be felt and at the end of the show it was a decision about whether to head for the Thames in the drizzling rain or to find another venue. the Blue Bar won and we decided to experiment with the cocktails which came in tall and rather exquisite crystal glasses (or in one case complete with the shaker which contained another full measure of whatever it was in every round). Pacing was important because as the midnight hour approached, the clubby dance atmosphere flicked up a notch as the waitresses in their glittering masks started to dispense party crackers and complementary champagne.

The arrival of midnight was probably something of a guess, but we all celebrated together, whether it was the right time or not and then after the flip into 2008, we continued for another hour or so before deciding to head for the hotel room.

Luckily Brunch was served until one p.m. today. They must have known.

Technorati Tags: rashbre, wicked, new+year, 2008, london, show, berkeley, hotel, pret-a-portea, champagne, blue+bar

Happy New Year

Enjoy the transition from 2007 into 2008 an' tak' a right good-will draught!

There is fun going forward.

sugar plum

As we wend our way through the twisting narrow alleys known as Camden Passage, we were on our way from The Living Room to Sadler's Wells Theatre, to partake of the Christmas evening tradition to watch pantomime or ballet. This year it was Nutcracker, which usually features orphans and toy soldiers springing to life.

But this was Matthew Bourne's version, which manages to be extremely pink. Bourne is well known for the version of Swan Lake which also featured in the film of Billy Elliot. If you don't know what I'm talking about then just assume its, well, alternative.

And this version uses the traditional Tschaikowsky score, and does indeed start in an orphan's home. But fairly rapidly the settings diverge as well as some of the moves which twist from the choreography that Bourne applies to this dream sequence of a story. So by the sugar rush of the second half, when the cast are visiting sweetie land, it is, indeed, pantomime mixed with ballet. Packed house playing to the seasonal spirits.

Technorati Tags: rashbre, living+room, camden, sadlers+wells, angel, islington, london, nutcracker, matthew+bourne, ballet,

smooth

After a while, everything starts to be capable of being covered in chocolate, if you have one of these things. It arrived under the Christmas tree along with some bars of chocolate, so what else but to give it a spin? Instructions are for wimps, so the first attempt created an interesting jamming of the equipment, before eventually the chocolate started to flow. As you can see in the picture, the earlier dipping of strawberries, pineapple and other fruit gradually deteriorated to whatever was available, such as the salted mini-pretzel getting the treatment in the picture.

Any suggestions for imaginative uses for a half kilo of very smooth chocolate?

buzzin'

Boxing Day became the day for quizzes and general frivolity. In between the earnest music quiz with some 45 tracks crammed into 15 minutes there were other rounds including the buzzer based movie questions and not forgetting the later turn towards karaoke...wait for it...RnB style.

So no need for Amy Winehouse today because we'd decided to make our own equivalently intoxicating music.

evidence

My little trick worked.

The combination of a mince pie, some sherry and a carrot was too much for Santa. I have photographed the after effects from the next morning. Clearly someone had descended through the chimney (I'd made sure the fire was out). They'd eaten the mince pie, drank the sherry and the entire carrot was gone. There were also some new mystery parcels under the tree. We must have been more nice than naughty.

xmas music quiz

In between the quaffing, turkey, mince pies and general revelry, there will be the statutory rashbre xmas music quiz. If you are a physical visitor to rashbre acres over the festive season, please don't cheat and listen. Anyone else is free to take a peek and even guess the tracks. They start slow and easy and get faster and more tricky, including a few mashups and some obligatory WIll Young tracks demanded for inclusion by Julie. One click on the picture is all it takes to be transported to quiz-land.

party games

Survivors of rashbre central's previous seasonal festivities will know that there's a certain point when the silly hats and party games make an appearance. Not the Nintendo / X-Box360 / Playstation variety, but games involving old wrapping paper, sticky tape, fruit and the like. For the convenience of others, here's a few sure fire winners, which can be played at everything from amateur through to full Pro standard.

Required items: Wrapping paper, sticky tape, magazines, newspapers, highlighter pen, pins

1) Guess the name : Yes - simply providing the guests with paper hats or pin on labels which they can't see with the name of a sleb (celebrity) on it. They have to guess with the Yes/No answers. Classed as an icebreaker. Marilyn Monroe, George Bush, Frankenstein, Albert Einstein, Babe Ruth, Jason Bourne, 007, Mickey Mouse, Madonna, Britney Spears, Alesha. You get the idea.
2) Dress the person : Kinetic Game, two teams: 2-5 minutes. Select someone to be dressed using either old wrapping paper or a couple of recent magazines or newspapers.
3) Kipper racing : multiple teams. needs a long clear indoor space. cut or tear a largish fish shape from a sheet of wrapping paper or anything similar to hand. Add detail such as a hole for the eye, maybe a dorsal fin. Lie them flat on the floor and give other team members further sheets of paper/magazines to use to create air currents to propel the fish from a start line to a distant improvised finishing line.
4) Tell a tale : Pre select some groups of 7 unusual words from a magazine or newspaper article. Hand them to each team and and ask each team member in turn to tell a story using the seven words. Other teams have to try to guess the words.
(Example words from random article today : luckier; heterosexual; chevrolet; banana; promoted; quitter; eggs. and from another page: emissions; cruise; leisurely; overcome; scoop; howling; endurance...you get the idea.)
5) Pass the orange : Why wait until after the dinner has finished to play this game? goes great with coffee.
6) Pictionary: drawing fast pictures based upon words. The boxed set is best for this one.
7) GrEEn GlaSS dOOr : The person in charge suggests playing this and that everyone else can try to be selected to go through the green glass door by suggesting appropriate pairs of things. Things that get in are a pOOl but no water; glaSS but no picture; MiRRor but no reflection (ie the first thing needs a double letter in it.. Play till last person gets it)
8) GGD variants : Play GGD (7) where instead of double letters, each sentence said by the next person has to start with a vowel "...and blah blah bla; ...or blah blah blah ...obviously" and another variant vowel/then consonant and another variant is start with next letter of alphabet.
9) Alphabet Game : Choose topic (Animals, Cars, Candy Bars, Popstars, Drinks). Start at A and round robin through to Z.
10) Stirring the Mush : Announce you are stirring the mush and (eg stand up, sit down, scratch your ear etc). Then start stirring the mush by ay hand/body gesture you like. The invite someone to copy. the trick is thay have to do what you did BEFORE you started stirring the mush (eg scratch ear etc). Tell them whether they have passed or not then select next 'victim'. Repeat until all have worked it out.
11) Erect-a-pup : More newspaper for this two in -oner. Part one. Teams. who can make the longest tube in 2 minutes from rolled up paper? Sounds easy. Just watch what happens. Part Two. Now, in another three minutes make a model life sized puppy out of tubes of newspaper. Warning that some puppies will have 3, 5 legs at the end of this.

I think thats enough to get started. No animals harmed in the testing of these entertainments. You'll have to email me for the (ahem) rules of the frying pan and wooden spoon game...and don't forget charades!

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