Yesterday afternoon, as my wife and me slowly ambled up Calverley Street towards our destination of Leeds Museum, she pointed out this was her inaugural tour of the building housing our city’s historical artefacts. “It’s not mine. I’ve never been before!” I joked weakly. She smiled disingenuously, called me an idiot for what definitely wasn’t the inaugural time, meanwhile continuing uphill towards the former Mechanical Institute building. A few years back […]
Tuesday 1st May – Met up with friend and ex-colleague this morning. For 20 years we stood side by side in the metaphorical trenches of IT Incident Management – For a number of reasons, March 2014 was the last time we were comrades in arms. I’ve no intention of elaborating on those reasons, other than to say the shell shock of undertaking the role, along with my wife’s illness, drove […]
Sunday 22nd April – This lunchtime I partook in a pre-train journey beer with my brother Ian at Newcastle Central station. A jovial hour in which we reminisced about our existential escapades prior to me leaving the north east of England around 31 years ago. Our knockabout banter including tales of our kid’s ‘eventful’ driving lessons and subsequent tests. As part of this, he spoke of paternal mentoring at the […]
Easter Sunday – It’s April Fools Day. As a result we’ll have a day littered with inane pranks, silly stories and tiresome practical jokes…… In other words, it’s business as usual dans maison de Strachan. I find some practical jokes quite funny, such as the prank an acquaintance plans involving the filling of hollow Easter egg gifts with toothpaste…….. Unless one of them is mine in which case I’ll be […]
There was an ‘interesting’ verbal interaction with Mrs Strachan senior this morning as we climbed into my car while bound for the White Rose Shopping Centre. As we fastened our seat belts in synch, the following discussion took place:- “I see a bird has s**t on your car window.” highlighted the old lady, while pointing at the front passenger door window. I looked over at the white avian faeces on […]
I’ve just returned from my six-monthly dental check-up. To call visits to orthodontists calming or serene would be over-egging the pudding, however they are significantly more bearable than those of my childhood. During those fledgling years, treatment on my teeth was administered by an elderly guy called Mr Gravestone. An ordinarily decent man, but whose patient care mirrored that of the sadistic dentist in the 1976 movie Marathon Man, starring […]
Yesterday afternoon, I undertook a small decorating job, treating my en suite walls to two coats of emulsion. Consequently, in the areas bereft of tiling, the room that provides alternative shower, toilet and washing facilities now adorns a chroma of Natural Hessian. This is a fairly neutral colour from a paint company’s bathroom/kitchen range, providing a rich matt finish. Not to be confused with the hue of Rudolph Hessian, which […]
