Up on the roof.....the biggest clockface in UK :)

As I'm typing this my rabbit, TJ, is sat on my feet, he's come to see what I'm doing. He even managed to communicate to me he wanted more hay on Monday morning - he's very clever.

Anyway so the Liver Building was 1000 years old in July, and John William's from Royal Liver kindly agreed, as we work in there, to give us a tour....ooh it was great. We found out how the atrium was the old booking hall for the Canadian liners taking people to emigrate, we saw the commemorations to the men who had given their lives in the Wars, we went up on the roof, into the clockworks room and way way up the spiral steps into the towers where the clocks are and where the birds sit atop.

My legs were wobbling with fear at the very top, the views were amazing and John was very interesting. We also got to see the original boardroom that is untouched since it was built...It was full of ornate carvings, the seats had liver birds on them, there was gold leaf ceiling. It even had this little desk that they used to use to call the various secretaries/ tea ladies/ minute takers etc!!!

A true gem of a piece of history....and did you know there is a third liver bird hidden away in Liverpool watching over us??

Amazing to think it was built on an old dock hey! There are some great ghost stories I've been told about both the Liver and the Cunard Buildings but I shall save them for anoother day...x

Oh and we collected around £50 in donations, which was matched by DB so it raised £100 for Alder hey children's hospital. Good stuff chaps x

The Docker's Umbrella - underground in Liverpool's disused railway

It turned out to be one of the hottest days of the year when Gill Torres (DownSouth Liverpool magazine) and I met our tour guides for our planned afternooon 'Ghost Hunting' in Dingle disused railway terminus. It was the last station of the Old Overhead railway or as the scousers know it 'The Docker's Umbrella'.

Totally and utterly fascinating. There are loads of vintage cars down there just left to rot, like and old Liverpool corporation van, there is rope everywhere (some made and some not) this would all have been used on the docks – the roper maker died and all his stuff was just left there. The actual station platform is now a car mechanics garage. There was a fire here in early 1901 when a train caught fire and as it entered tunnel it met with lots of flammable stuff – 8 people died so it’s abit eerie being down there thinking of that.


Well worth going on I'd say but take your wellies and a woolly hat as it's freeezing down there! xxx

Enter your Huckleberry Finn....What??? Cockney Cashpoint :)

I was making my way to London City along the Hackney Road on Tuesday morning this week. I stopped to get out £10 (or as I now know it a 'Speckled Hen').....I put my card in and it asked what language did I want....'English or Cockney'.....it made me chuckle all the way to London Wall!

Huckleberry Finn =  rather than their Pin
Sausage and mash = cash
Speckled hen = £10
Rattle and tank = bank

Very amusing! My Gran was a Cockney and would have loved this. We used to sit and sing all the old London songs together...my old man said follow the van, any time you're lambeth way, knees up mother brown....good times, good granny xx

The most clever lift in London

I drove to London on Monday night. I stayed in the hotel near Shoreditch and I was amazed to hear that the lift (elevator) had learnt french in the last 6 weeks. She can tell you which floor you are on, that you are going up, that the doors are closing. I said hello to her in french to mark the occasion "Bonjour ascenseur, ca va?" Sadly she must have gone shy as she didn't reply. So we headed up from the rez de chaussee to my bedroom for the night and I trotted off merrily to meet my complimentary slippers!

I hope she doesn't learn too many more languages as it might make using the lift a rather long process!

Days off....daydreaming

Ok so i am off today after a late drive back from London last night. I have a to-do list made, but I'm going a bit Shakespeare on it right now....as in "to do or not to do". I have been playing with TJ and Lolly my house rabbits and doing some jpegs of the flyer for this Saturday's new Allerton Road Farmers and Producers market.
And I have so many things I want to write about I could be here allllll day!

I want to write about:
St George's Hall Winter Arts Market on 3rd and 4th December
My Pet rabbits and their story...from Leeds via Wales to a Liverpool vicarage
Allerton Road farmers and producers market
The funny cashpoint and the lift that learnt to speak french
and ooh just allsorts .................

Free as a bird...

The day: before halloween, a Sunday. Background: I had just re-arranged my room the night before and I was relishing the rare lie-in that awaited me!

My bed was right by the sealed fireplace....and so I was peacefully asleep, when around 8.30am I was awoken by an almighty squawking and what sounded like flapping by my head. I'll admit I freaked out and started crying (this doens't bode well for me wanting to change career and become a vet!). I rang the caretaker, who looks after the vicarage where I live. So he said if i wanted to save whatever was there I had to unblock the chimney. So after a bit more crying, I called Dick Van Dyke and he wasn't free...so I rang Will and Matt.

After taking off the fascia board we unveiled an amazing original fireplace from the 1800's and a bird's leg poking out of it, at which point I screamed and ran out (vet...no...). Matt then unblocked the chimney, which unveiled a rather big shock.....one big, live and breathing, fat, scared, stuck..Jackdaw. And then a dead bird fell out. Cue more screams. So aided by the mop handle I had gone to get Matt got him to move...and then he flew out the fireplace into my room! holy moly....he ended up flapping at the window but he was safe and he was free. Matt calmed him down and we used a sheet to wrap him up. Matt took him downstairs and as soon as we got outside the fat jackdaw flew off, giving Matt a thumbs up as he left (that bits clearly me being stupid as birds don't have fingers and thumbs). We found 7 dead birds and I feel awful they may have died and they were just a few metres away from me and if I'd known I could've saved them.

But anyway why I'm writing this is to say if you have chimneys, if you live in an old house...get them covered. You could save a few of our feathered friends....I am now going to try and convince our landlords to net them off or see if I can get someone to come and do it.

Watching that little (fat) chap fly off it made me think that freedom is the most important thing any creature can have. Freedom to be, freedom to move, freedom to choose, freedom to fly away.

"Curiouser and Curiouser" said Alice

Thursday 3rd November - Whilst not a great 'art buff' I do appreciate Art and if I have an opportunity to go see some, then I'll take it!


Nearly 2 weeks ago I went to the private view of the Alice in Wonderland at the Liverpool Tate. I got there late...as usual...so I headed up to find Di & Lorraine. I really enjoyed it..all the old manuscripts and the first presses of the book. And these amazing little tea sets - so cute.

I never knew that Lewis Carroll was his pen name and he was really called Charles Dodgson and Alice was based on the daughter of a vicar from Oxford from the Lidell family; Alice Liddell.

It seems from what I've read since that Charles has great affection for Alice Liddell and so I wondered where they both ended up; I found this info on another website (incompetech.com) Charles lived to see Alice in Wonderland become one of the most translated and beloved children's stories ever. He saw the first stage version in 1886, and saw edition after edition sell out. Charles died on 14 January 1898 of a severe bronchial infection, possibly aggravated by the newfangled asbestos fires he had had installed in his rooms to replace the unsafe coal fires. As for Alice, she eventually married one Reginald Hargreaves and sometimes toured to speak in celebration of one Lewis Carroll anniversary or another.

The Tate takes you through a little journey, of a book you remember from long ago, and I imagine many will wish to re-read after attending. I loved it as I love all the animals in it, and the crazy creatures he created. And it may be one of the reasons I have always loved animals. That along with Gerald Durrell's books!

So do go and see it if you get chance, it's on until 29th January 2012. Personally I wasn't keen on the contemporary art section that made up the second part of it - but it's all about personal taste, and I guess Art is there to evoke feelings of any kind.

Worth a trip....don't forget you looking glasses hehe!....x