I still haven’t found the photos that I was looking for, but I have discovered the photos from my 2015 visit to New York. And, in particular, to what I consider as pretty much the best museum in the world, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Back when I visited you were allowed to pay whatever you felt appropriate, although that system has since been heavily reformed.
But, the above wallpaper was cleverly done and showed the scope of the collections in the American Wing of the building. It was comprised of hundreds of smaller photos which from right to left show the date of the acquisition by the museum. When material is presented like this, it shows just how large the collections of some institutions are, it’s all quite inspiring.
The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the Coronavirus crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored…..
Cat’s Foot
The dictionary defines this as “to live under the cat’s foot, to be under the domination of a wife, hen-pecked”. Slightly intriguing that the ‘hen-pecked’ phrase has survived, whereas ‘cat’s foot’ seems to have been lost, particularly as there’s something quite quaint about the latter option. Georgette Heyer used the phrase in her books, but otherwise it’s now becoming archaic. Incidentally, the book defines ‘cat’ as “a prostitute” or “a cross old woman”.
This walk was socially distanced….. And is the second walk in preparation for the 2021 LDWA 100. But isn’t an LDWA walk in itself, because these have all been suspended until the troubles are over.
WALK NUMBER: 2 (Norwich to Mulbarton)
DISTANCE COVERED: 19 miles
NUMBER OF NATHAN’S FRIENDS WE “ACCIDENTALLY” BUMP INTO: 1
SUFFICIENT BEER CONSUMED: No
PUBS VISITED: 0
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Sunny (until it got dark, when it wasn’t sunny) and far too hot
ATTACKED BY ANIMALS: No
NUMBER OF SNAKES SEEN: 0
Since we were most impressed with the professionalism of our first training walk, we thought we’d go for a longer walk today, perhaps ten miles. We got a bit enthusiastic in the end though with the distance, but more on that later. Above is the pond thing near Trowse.
I had hoped to get a photo of the new Greater Anglia trains, but this East Midlands Railway train sufficed.
A field full of nesting birds. The first part of the walk went through Caistor St. Edmunds, so I’ve covered much of this in photos already. It was at this stage getting too hot, which was to be honest, a bloody nuisance. We had water, but no beer, so had the bare minimum that we needed for survival.
Nathan got excited by a rope swing. He scrambled down like a mountain goat. Well, a mountain goat with three legs anyway.
It all looked a bit high up to me, so I had a little sit down and took management control of the situation. Very much like Liam in his job, which seems to involve sitting down and drinking tea. Not that I had any tea, so I concentrated on the sitting down.
Anyway, there he goes. I was hoping he’d do something more dramatic, like go flying, but he was left uninjured. Which I suppose is handy, as otherwise I would have had to walk back on my own with him left in a heap at the bottom as I didn’t have a first aid kit with me.
Clear as mud, this sign is near the entrance to the metropolis that is Mulbarton. One of the most notorious members of Hike Norfolk lives in this sleepy little village and he has a room that only a favoured few have been into. Anyway, I can’t say any more due to potential legal action.
They were shut, which was most annoying as we had seen this sign from a distance and had planned what we could get ourselves. I was already trying to work out how many battered sausages I needed with my chips.
An old bus that excited Nathan, who is a former bus industry professional, as he likes buses. Shame the cafe bit wasn’t open though.
My bargain no-expense spared £1.35 snacks at the Mulbarton Budgens. The shop wasn’t exactly Harrods and some of the pricing seemed a bit dramatic, but I was happy with my value. Nathan was disappointed by the lack of sausage rolls, but he was the one who couldn’t be bothered to walk the extra 50 metres to the Co-op, so frankly, I didn’t have much sympathy. The Budgens did have this strange-looking doner kebab thing that looked hideous, but Nathan refused to buy it to test how awful it was.
Whilst sitting on Mulbarton Common, it was clear at this stage that our timing wasn’t going to get us back by the time that we had intended, but at least the weather was no longer too hot. Incidentally, Nathan thought he saw Clive just finishing his park run from February on the other side of the common, but I don’t think it was.
For those who are wondering whether they want to visit Mulbarton, it doesn’t have a Greggs, a Wetherspoons or a pub in the Good Beer Guide.
The medieval church of St Mary Magdalene at Mulbarton. We decided to head back the way we had come for most of the walk, as we were confident we knew the way. To be fair, we won’t dwell on our promptly going the wrong way twice debacle.
Flowers, we think that they’re bluebells. But we didn’t really have a clue and I don’t think we were that bothered.
Lots of lambs, all looked quite playful and I wasn’t scared of any of these. We’ve been very fortunate so far not to be attacked by animals or to see any snakes. Long may this good fortune continue.
An intriguing sky. Well, it intrigued us, so the bar here is low.
Books in a bus stop at Trowse. A nice idea. One of the elderly and vulnerable members of the walking community (who I won’t name) had placed some gin and tonic in a secure place for us, so we headed through Trowse to enjoy our liquid libation rewards. Which didn’t help with our time-keeping if I’m being honest.
As can be seen from the slightly fading light conditions, we didn’t get back by 7pm. Indeed, it is becoming apparent that our time-keeping is a little shoddy. Above is Pulls Ferry in Norwich, this was originally a canal which took the stone to the site where Norwich Cathedral was being constructed.
A heron or fancy pigeon, probably one of the two.
As a final note, we will be doing an audio recording, or Podcast if you prefer, of each walk and we’ll upload these for the first two walks sometime next week. It’s meant to cover the history of the walk, gossip about people who we know and some riveting information for anyone who might be tempted to start training for the 100. I can’t imagine we’ll inspire anyone at all, but it’ll keep us amused for a few months.
The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the Coronavirus crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored…..
Carouse
This word remains in usage in some areas, although I’m not sure that I’ve heard it used recently. The dictionary defines it as “to drink freely or deep”, making the drinking of alcohol sound quite philosophical. The more current definition of the word is though more ‘drinks loudly’, but perhaps that’s an inevitable result of drinking freely.
The word origin is from German, the phrase ‘gar aus trinken’ means to drink heavily, which got corrupted into English as ‘garaus’, and then ‘carouse’.
And here’s the word usage over the last two centuries. Given how the country has continued to drink freely, it’s a little surprising to see the word be used less frequently.
It’s a shame these photos were taken back in 2015 as the quality on my phone back then wasn’t great, but this is the seventh most used railway station in the United States and it has very frequent connections to New York.
It’s just visible if clicking on the photos, but the sign above them says that the seats can only be used by ticketed passengers and then for only two hours. They enforce that as well, or at least try to. The waiting room is grand in height, but not particularly large in size for such a busy railway station.
The railway station building dates to 1935, so is relatively recent, and was constructed during a period when railways were much more important to the transport infrastructure in the United States. It’s all about cars now, but at least this is one of the railway stations which has survived. The station was designed by McKim, Mead and White, who also designed one of the greatest railway stations in the world, Pennsylvania Station in New York. This was torn down in 1963 and was perhaps one of the worst architectural decisions made in New York, although it at least led to the creation of numerous heritage organisations.
I can’t recall exactly what was going on here, but it looks like something that I’ve constructed.
Since I live a little high up and there’s a contract for the window cleaning of the site that I have no involvement with, it’s always a surprise exactly when the windows get cleaned.
But every time this seemingly random event does happen, I get moderately startled as it sounds like a sea eagle has come clattering into the window….. But, it’s a relief to see that instead of a mangled bird, I do instead have clean windows.
Anyway, this isn’t the most exciting content ever, I will admit.
I still haven’t found the photos that I was looking for, but I have now discovered all my photos from when I visited Newark (the one in New Jersey, not the one in Nottinghamshire).
This was the only time that I’ve been to a McDonald’s and was asked by a staff member, and I’d add more inquisitively than in any negative manner, why I was there. When I told her that I was just visiting she then told me to be careful, which is never a great sign about the locality. Anyway, I’m very good at keeping myself to myself when required, but the atmosphere in the McDonald’s was quite tense and they had security guards trying to monitor the situation.
I didn’t spend long there, but I can remember thinking that the quality of the food was all brand standard and as expected, so all was well as far as I was concerned.
Walter Ellis was born in 1897, the son of George and Eliza Ellis who lived in Markshall which is effectively part of Caistor St Edmund. He joined the 5th Battalion of the Norfolk Regiment and was killed in action in Palestine, on 19 April 1917.
There was a major action, which was the Second Battle of Gaza, which took place between 17 and 19 April 1917 between the British Empire and France against the Ottoman Empire and the Germans. The 54th (East Anglian) Infantry Division were part of the military force, with the Norfolk Regiments losing a large number of men.
I’m not sure that Walter lies entirely at peace at Gaza War Cemetery, which is in the troubled Gaza Strip and which has been damaged twice by Israeli bombs over recent years, although they paid for the repairs to be completed to the graves. He’s a long way from home here in a place that he perhaps hadn’t even heard of when he was sent to fight there.
Since I’ve started shopping at M&S, which is new to me and entirely because I can’t be bothered to battle around Morrison’s, I thought I’d investigate their beer selection a few weeks ago. It was pretty unimpressive, nearly entirely IPAs and there was just one darker beer. I walked by last week and there were several darker beers, all of which seemed to be popular given by the gaps in the shelf. It’s probably just a different season of beers, but it almost looked like they changed the beer buyer at M&S Head Office.
Anyway, not normally one for buying beer for home, I thought I’d encourage M&S slightly (and slightly is the word here, as I doubt my purchase volume will be noticeable, unlike my purchase of their reduced priced Easter Eggs…..) and buy this Salted Caramel Porter from Meantime Brewing.
It’s excellent in its intent, although its delivery isn’t particularly good as they seem to have forgotten to put any salted caramel flavour in. The Untappd reviews aren’t marvellous either, mainly based around the lack of flavour, but it’s a smooth porter nonetheless. And I like what they’re trying to do.
The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the Coronavirus crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored…..
Captain Lieutenant
Quite a long definition, the dictionary notes that this is defined as “meat between veal and beef, the flesh of an old calf; a military simile, drawn from the officer of that denomination, who has only the pay of lieutenant, with the rank of captain; but so is not entirely one or the other, but between both”.
It seems a rather long phrase to describe meat, a bit clunky for a butcher to have to write out on their display or for a customer to ask for. And on that basis, I also can’t find much evidence that this phrase was much used, but there’s something very precise about the term that I like. It’s perhaps a shame that Morrison’s to this day doesn’t use the phrase in their market street butchers…..
