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  • San Diego – Museum of Man (Gigantopithecus)

    San Diego – Museum of Man (Gigantopithecus)

    There’s one exhibit that I remembered from the Museum of Man in San Diego, which is their model of Gigantopithecus. This is a recreation of the largest great ape that ever existed and they lived between two million years ago to around 300,000 years ago (or so Wikipedia says). Standing at around 7 to 8 feet high (although it wouldn’t perhaps have been standing for much of the time), the ape likely went extinct because food became harder to find and evolution favoured smaller apes.

    Here’s what the exhibit, called Mr. G by some of the staff, looked like in the museum, but I was disappointed to read that it was taken permanently off display in 2016 (I visited in January 2015) when they were modernising some of the exhibits. The ape had only been created in 2003, so its life-span was quite short and I’m not sure what they’ve done with this intriguing item.

    The museum said that “one of the special features of Mr. G was that he was built with an infrared sensor so that any time someone came near, his eyes and eyelids would move”, although this had stopped working in the last few years, and it definitely wasn’t working in 2015. Anyway, I hope that somewhere this ape is still around, it’d be a bit irritating for the species of gigantopithecus if even their models went extinct.

  • Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Twenty-Four

    Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Twenty-Four

    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…..

    Bermudas

    The dictionary defines this as criminal slang for “certain places in London, privileged against arrests, like the Mint in Southwark. These privileges are abolished”. Liberties were areas of the country where, in effect, a private landowner or, later on, a governmental organisation, had taken over from the Monarch. The Liberty of the Mint, in Southwark, was an historic quirk as it derived from a property used by King Henry VIII as a mint for coinage. A charter in 1550 issued by King Edward VI transferred the area to the City of London, but the mint was excluded.

    The mint was ultimately closed and in the eighteenth century it was claimed that the small area was effectively a liberty, and thus exempt from any civil or criminal enforcement. This was a marvellous innovation for criminals, as they could live in this small area, free from anyone being able to pursue them for their criminality. Attempts were made to get rid of it in 1695, although the required Act of Parliament wasn’t passed until 1723.

    Living in the area wouldn’t have been pleasant, since it was a very small area and most of the residents were criminals or those suffering financially. There was no employment in the area, so there was no way to earn money to pay debts off, with no chance to leave the narrowly defined area as otherwise debt collectors could seize the individual. The only freedom was on Sundays, when debtors and criminals couldn’t be stopped.

    There’s not much evidence of the word ‘Bermudas’ being used in this sense, although there is some, usually in the form of the ‘Barmoodoes’ or the ‘Bermoothes’ spellings. But it’s a lovely reminder of the quirky nature of London’s history.

  • San Diego – First San Diego Courthouse

    San Diego – First San Diego Courthouse

    This is another of the buildings in the Old Town San Diego Historic Park, an area that was nearly devoid of visitors when I visited. Which had the advantage of making it feel like that I had stepped back in time to nineteenth century America, and the disadvantage that nearly everything was shut.

    This is a replica building and was installed in the park in 1992, but it’s an authentic copy of the original structure which was built in 1847. It was initially designed as a town hall and it was used for that purpose until 1869, when it became the town’s courthouse.

    In April 1872, it was destroyed by a fire which damaged many of the buildings in the area and it was this disaster which was the beginning of the end for the Old Town area. Alonzo Horton was starting to develop a rival settlement, in what is now downtown San Diego, which was better equipped with fresh water and other facilities. Many of the buildings here weren’t reconstructed and people started to drift away from the area.

  • San Diego – Robinson Rose House

    San Diego – Robinson Rose House

    Old Town San Diego is the site of the first European settlement in California, although the centre was so far from a drinking water source that the heart of San Diego shifted towards a more suitable location.

    This is the Robinson Rose house, although it’s a little bit of a fake arrangement as it was built in 1989 to be used as the park’s information office. It is though an authentic replica of the 1853 house that was constructed by James Robinson, an important local businessman and lawyer. He used it as his legal practice, as well as his private residence, selling it in 1868 to Louis Rose, a local entrepreneur. They’re not entirely sure when it was demolished, but it was some time around 1900.

  • San Diego – Commons Bar

    San Diego – Commons Bar

    This bar in the Gaslamp Quarter of San Diego isn’t here any more, it closed in January 2018, which was three years after I visited.

    The Commons was a sports bar, although that’s not rare in San Diego, but it was all clean and comfortable.

    I remember deciding that I’d sit by the bar, which was modern and all on-trend at the time. It also wasn’t very busy, although that’s not surprising given that it was a weekday afternoon in January.

    And this is evidence of my ever changing beer tastes, as it’s a Stones Pale Ale, which I’ve just discovered was discontinued shortly afterwards (they now make Pale Ale 2). Perfectly acceptable, but I’m not sure that I’d have picked that now if given a choice. Stone Brewing is a local company though and it has an international reputation, primarily for various types of IPA.

    I like happy hours and there’s plenty of those about across the United States. Here I went for chicken wings, but I remember were perfectly acceptable. I know this as I’ve never had chicken wings in the United States that weren’t perfectly acceptable….

  • San Diego – San Diego Public Library

    San Diego – San Diego Public Library

    San Diego public library moved to its current location in 2013, in a building designed by local architect Rob Quigley, who can apparently see his building from his apartment. I visited this structure in January 2015, as part of a free tour organised by the library and I still consider this to be the best designed public library that I’ve visited anywhere in the world.

    Unfortunately, the photos I took with my phone back in 2015 aren’t great, but they’re all that I’ve got to use, so they’ll have to do. Although I feel the need to return to San Diego, for many years my favourite city, so perhaps I’ll go back.

    Huge efforts were made with the external design of the building, which cost $185 million, which is primarily just for the library, although there’s also a school housed here as well.

    Whilst waiting for the tour, I had a little browse here, at the books for sale section, although I couldn’t easily carry any, so I desisted.

    The interior of the library.

    The baseball section of the library.

    This is the area for teenagers, where adults are banned from (other than staff) to try and ensure that they felt it was an area just for them.

    A lecture theatre area.

    An old library cataloguing system, I think for press cuttings. I like that these things are kept in place, although technology might make them partly redundant, they can still be an inspiration to people.

    There was lots of space to work, in areas that were quiet and with areas that had extensive views.

    This was quite advanced at the time of my visit, a 3D printer.

    Some of the things that had been designed on the printer.

    At the top of the building there’s a viewing gallery, with fine views over the local landscape, including the bridge to Coronado at the rear.

    The view of the top of the building when standing on the viewing terrace.

    And the pinnacle of the building, the rare books section, an integral part of the design.

    The tour was interesting and engaging, all free of charge to visitors, and it’s no surprise that the library is proud of their building. The council have taken a pretty negative approach to much of this, there’s a public ordinance voted on by local residents which demanded a greater public spend on libraries, but councillors have over-ridden it. When I visited, the library had seen a cut in its library funding, but a local backlash saw it returned back up to a higher level.

    As a library, I found this impeccable. Modern, bright, proud of its traditions, spacious, exciting, well-designed and clearly an important part of their local community. Very lovely.

  • Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Twenty-Three

    Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Twenty-Three

    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…..

    Bene Bowse

    The definition of this is “good beer”, with ‘bene’ being slang for good and ‘bouse’ is an old word for alcohol. The word ‘bene’ is Latin, meaning good or the best, and it is where the words benign, benefit, benediction and beneficiary all come from.

  • Montreal – McDonald’s Poutine

    Montreal – McDonald’s Poutine

    I remember spending quite a lot of time in Montreal popping into restaurants for drinks and snacks, as it was so cold outside. Fortunately, Montreal is interlinked below ground, so it’s possible to travel quite long distances without surfacing into the snowy city.

    Back in January 2015, before the advent of self-service terminals.

    I had to try their “world famous” Poutine.

    For my tastes, I still think the cheese curds bit is superfluous, but the fries in gravy were delicious. I’m wondering though what chips, feta cheese and gravy would taste like, I bet it’s delicious.

  • Montreal – Snow

    Montreal – Snow

    Above are some of the history information boards, which I cleared to read the interesting facts underneath. The left-hand side was in French, so I saved time by leaving that half. And below are some more photos of the city under a reasonable covering of snow back in 2015.

  • Montreal – Five Guys

    Montreal – Five Guys

    One of the reasons I keep this blog up is that otherwise I forget easily where I’ve actually been. Looking back on these photos from 2015, I hadn’t realised that I had been to a Five Guys in Canada. It was back in January 2015, when there was snow on the ground and it wasn’t exactly warm outside.

    Unlimited soft drinks.

    It’s hard to photo Five Guys hot dogs to make them look appetising, as they fall apart and don’t look very interesting. But, they’re excellent, and the little fries aren’t really that small a portion.

    I can’t add much to this, since I’d forgotten that I’d even been here a few years ago, but I’ve checked and the restaurant, which is located on McGill Street, is still trading. Well, it will be when this virus is over.