yen_powell

Is the centre of the black plastic knob pry-offable? Can't tell cos pic is a little blurry. Usually that comes off with the end of a screw driver on the bikes I've had and there is a little bolt inside, or maybe even a little circlip to stop your knob dropping off if you twist it loose too much.

I only rode around the area of Rhodes City, and even then I parked outside the walls of the old town and walked in when inside. I used to park by a lace stall and the extremely ancient old lady running it always greeted me with a big grin and a thumbs up. I liked Rhodes, it's like most Greek islands but with hardly an litter and cars will actually stop on the main road if they see you trying to cross and wave you over.

Someone who didn't want to carry them all the way to the skip I reckon. Sensible chap.

Mmmmm, lurvely.

It's the feeling that I can outwit any of the residents if necessary.

Left back through the church, glad to see my bike was untouched. This monument is yet another from the Coutts family. The Queen banks with them. I'd love to see her bank card for when she pops to the cash point to get some readies for a night out.

Finally I left the church yard on the opposite side to where I had entered, walked under the railway mainline and found a canal with all new shops and restaurants rammed with people. Seems it was the old coaling storage area judging by the name of the place. Two old gas holders had been reused as the surround for super expensive flats. I spotted the Post Office Tower whilst wandering round the shops. I still imagine a kitten clinging to it every time I see it thanks to The Goodies tv series.

I went outside to see the Hardy Tree and the bugger was fenced off and hidden behind small hedges, I could barely see the stones. Next I went to look at the tomb that inspired the designer of the red telephone box. Again, a fence was a round it.

I wanted to visit the Hardy Tree in St Pancras Old Church yard so on Sunday I headed down the motorway and into my work borough to start with. Traffic was a bit rough along Hackney Road thanks to roadworks closing lots of other main routes around there plus the adjacent Columbia Road flower market. I was filtering down the outside of standstill traffic, cyclists were filtering down the inside and the Deliveroo mopeds were filtering down the outside of me AND the cyclists. At the same time lemming peds were emerging at all locations and crossing all our paths with gay abandon. Gay abandon is like normal abandon, but better dressed. I left my borough, negotiated the madness that is Old Street roundabout and then headed along City Road which used to be a daily commute for me when I would drop my old girlfriend to work at Madame Tussauds before heading back to my own work. It hasn't changed much and soon I was riding down the side of Kings Cross station and parking in a convenient solo motorcycle bay across the road from the church yard. I went into the church first. Unusually for me I actually took a few pictures inside. One was of St Pancras himself, must have been a carbolic church if they have a statue of a saint I suppose. St Pancras is depicted wearing a fetching Roman outfit. I gather he was beheaded for being a Christian. The church is supposedly rebuilt every 200 years and there were large cracks at one end as you'll see. Walking around the tiny surrounding path of the church I turned a corner into a cloud of bees. I stepped back rapidly and took a few pictures of the almost hidden beehives tucked behind the church. On the way back out I noticed that the gravelled path had slabs as stepping stones made from old tomb stones, the date clearly visible on one of them.

My plan is to visit the Hardy Tree tomorrow, something will probably happen to change my plan though.

A real chocolate starfish

It's like this forum.....but in a big marquee.

Credit to Steve Martin (not the film star) Bloke on the left is Graham, the man who crept into my tent many years ago wearing a dress.

More pictures from the weekend, the next post are a proper picture takers pics This man had flashing eyebrows. Let me take a picture of your flashing eyebrows Superman, okay says he. Managed to get a pic in between flashes. Cow with legs growing out of its chin. Zoom in on the pic above and you can see a strip of blue and Portsmouth the other side of it. The monks' garden where they grow their food. Zoom in for all the baby ducks following mummy duck. Behind the bar.

I'm back to normal.....Well for the notification wossname at least.

Quite a few years ago at the same rally I was in my tent boiling a kettle on my gas stove to make a cup of tea before going to sleep. I was kneeling down to do this in the porch of my tent as it wasn't very high. I happened to glance behind me and nearly leapt out of my skin. A bloke called Graham was sitting behind me, I had not even heard him come in. He was wearing a dress (his wife's he claimed), but also had a moustache and a pipe in his mouth. I was a bit weirded out by it all. Anyway, on Friday night a bloke in a long leather coat with a beard came up to me and my friends and said hello. None of us knew who he was, despite his insistence that we knew him and him repeating his name over and over. It was the dress man. The addition of a beard had completely changed how he looked. He is the bloke wearing a monk's robe and glasses sat behind the inflatable doll in one of the pictures above. We made him put his hand over the beard and we all went, 'Oh yeah!!!!'

Turns out I have been riding right past it every time I get off the ferry.

That's what I asked Buckster when he showed me his scar.

I made it back from the Isle of Wight tranny run bike rally. Stan the Tran was magnificent as usual. The last band on Sunday night had people quietly distributing song lyrics set to the tune of 'Stand By Your Man' to sing to him and his wife as a surprise. STAND BY YOUR STAN was a musical masterpiece. He got a bit tearful, he has had 2 rallies cancelled by Covid etc and lots of trouble getting it going again this year. Apparently a light aircraft's wheels were only a few feet above my head as I drove into rally control which is next to a grass runway. Never heard it with my earplugs in and engine running. I visited a monastery and sat in a church with orange windows on Saturday, the light inside was something else. The monastery and church were built by local bricklayers and builders using cheap Belgian bricks and it was bloody gorgeous inside. I didn't have the heart to whip out a camera as I sat inside quietly taking it all in. The grounds were really nice as well, not even an admission charge to wander around. https://quarrabbey.org/monastery/vocation/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-monk/

£21 a day, but you get to choose from five shelters, I mean attractions.

I don't think I have put the gay Sikh punk rocker on yet, he was a teenager in the mid to late 70s. Next time he comes round on the blog I will post it, another cool story.

Illiterate (I had to bloody look up how to spell that), gay, road sweeper who had to follow a list of streets he couldn't read to do his job. Good story today. https://spitalfieldslife.com/2022/04/22/kevin-obrien-retired-roadsweeper-x/

Every cloud and all that eh.