yen_powell

As I said earlier, rode 50 miles to my friends' house, parked up in their back garden then 9 of us, including 3 children got on the bus, then the train and entered The Tower dead on 10am as per our timed Covid style tickets. We walked in as one of the Yeoman of the Guard ( a Beefeater) was doing his walk and talk tour so we joined on to that for a few locations then split up and wandered round individually. If you want a laugh, the youtube video gives you an idea of how good the Yeoman warders are, I think they choose only natural comedians or more likely, to have got that far in the armed forces before being chosen you develop a sense of humour. Pictures below, it's a big place in a small area. All pictures, apart from the St Katherine's dock ones, are taken inside the fortress. Some pictures show where the staff and their children live, what a strange life that must be.

Last one gone.

Sometimes, he's been knocking his stuff out for about 15 plus years I reckon and it' covers lots of things. Lots of old house interiors and attics, crypts, old places of worship, tombs etc. I will warn you, he is a bit cat obsessed so you get the odd bit of stuff about his dead cat. Oh yes, he has photographs taken from inside the model of St Pauls Cathedral. This was how the King was persuaded to let it be built by getting inside and looking out the windows. https://spitalfieldslife.com/2020/07/10/inside-the-model-of-st-pauls-o/

I think I've mentioned this website before. A new article every day, he does repeat himself occasionally. 90% of them are fascinating, stories of ordinary people with extraordinary lives that no one knows about until they tell you. I've been to visit some of the places he mentions, others I already know about due to working in the area and being nosy. Just some examples to start with A place I am going to soon, hidden behind Kings Cross and St Pancras Station, just to see The Hardy Tree and the inspiration for the red London telephone box. https://spitalfieldslife.com/2018/06/10/at-st-pancras-old-churchyard-x/ Find out who actually makes ballet shoes, you'll be surprised. https://spitalfieldslife.com/2021/07/11/the-point-shoe-makers-of-hackney-x/ The story of where a famous saying comes from https://spitalfieldslife.com/2021/07/31/the-foundling-of-shoreditch-x/ I might put a few more on here at a later date as I find them again. Ones such as the transvestite of Bethnal Green and his/her electric cooker collection, The tramp so stylish he is paid to model neckerchiefs, a small shop that still has stock from the 1700s and supplies spares for the Queen's coronation and other coaches, the Bangladeshi mechanics who inhabit the hundreds of railway arches hidden away from view, the old mechanic who used to work on souping up the Krays AND the Flying Squad's cars at the same time in the 50s, the day to day life of the Raven Keeper at the Tower etc. .

I also have the same problem with walking and cycling. The road I live on is flat, I walk along it no problem. Yet on my push bike it is a vicious incline which I'm either panting to ride up or speeding down hoping my brakes will stop me at the far end.

A cobbler/cobblers is a shoe mender/shoe mender's shop. Cobblers is also one of the million slang word for testicles, no idea why we have so many.

When I was a small child on holiday these sort of post cards cracked me up. Now I'm a mature adult, I snurk on the inside only of course.

Yes, now I'm glad you brought that up. Why is it that no slope looks as bad as it is in real life in a photograph or a video. If I took a picture of the top of Everest it would look like a billiard table.

Is that even fallen over. Sometimes doing that is easier than trying to get the side stand down on very uneven ground (on smaller bikes only of course).

You don't need a jack. Adrenaline and embarrassment usually suffices.

Just found this picture when looking for something else. Me standing next to someone else's bike. Mine is the black AT at the other end. The one I'm standing next to belongs to the person in the Chuck Berry story on page 3. Strange Dave is fettling at the back.

Maybe to stop it getting too top heavy and falling the rest of the way into the dry ditch. I went past it quite quickly, but after about a 100 yards, I decided to turn back. I think it may have also reminded me of the Navigator in the first Dune film. Also Raggety from 1070s puppet Rupert the Bear

Not one of mine, I'd only have a single arrow in the wrong direction, you get better head-ons that way.

I saw a brand new cottage with a thatched roof today, they still make the odd one. Thatch was banned in London after the Great Fire, but special permission was given for one building to be constructed with one. The replica of The Globe Theatre passed fire safety regulations, partly because the original burnt down and everyone got out safely.

I only went out for a little poodle on local roads originally, but whilst out I remembered that I had put a post code into my satnav and saved it a month or so back for one of the places in my Wild Guide book. There were two places I wanted to visit, a hidden quayside with nice views over a river with the best name ever (The Twizzle) and another similar place, but where the quayside stones had originally been part of the medieval London Bridge. I didn't have the book with me and could only find one of the post codes on the satnav, so off to the Twizzle it was, the old bits of London Bridge will be for another day. On the way there I went past a farm entrance with a hedge next to it with a small gateway set into it. Being nosy I stopped and stuck my head through and found a little graveyard, miles from anywhere as far as I could tell, and next door a little church. No idea how they get much of a congregation as no village is close by?? Like most little Essex churches, it is built to look like a wooden rocket ship. I also shot past a tree that to me looked like a giant wooden snail rearing up, so did a u-turn and took some pictures of that. I finally arrived at Quay Lane in a place called Kirby-Le-Soken. The book had said to park in the village and walk up Quay Lane, but I rode up it as far as I could until I met a sign saying any further was private property. The road was very narrow so I plonked the bike into a little concreted entrance to an electrical sub station and after chucking my jacket into the top box I started walking further up the private road (but public footpath). After about 500 yards the narrow lane opened up to reveal a little cottage with its own private bridge. According to the book, it is called Witch's Cottage. A little further along the road ended at a gate into the river. I took a few pictures by the gate then backtracked a few yards and walked along the field footpath which popped out by the river again. A few more snaps and I headed off to Frinton on the coast. It was only 2 miles away, but due to a weird combination of mini roundabout, a railway level crossing and 100 year old drivers it took me 20 minutes to get there. Frinton is the sort of seaside place that doesn't allow pubs, chip shops, fruit machines or ice cream sellers. I plonked my self down on a bench on the cliff top and had a coffee out of my flask. I could see loads of wind turbines out in the channel. They definitely weren't there when I last came here in 1976!

You know, Wednesday, when the things is on the thing. By the blue doodah.

Yes, all pictures in black and white.

So I've pulled my trousers up and I'm still in shock and not paying too much attention to the doctor. I finally realised she is waving a very small transparent pill container at me and speaking. The container is a few inches long, has a label on it and a screw lid. She wanted me to go to the toilet and provide a urine sample. Not easy with such a small container, but I did my best and gave the outside a good wash afterwards. I handed over the still warm container and the last thing she did was sit me down and open a book in front of me. I recognised it at once. It was the book of numbers they test you for colour blindness with. I first did this test at an opticians when I was 8 years old. I can only see the first number, the rest is just a sea of dots. I have even asked people who can see the numbers to trace them with their finger and I still can't see them. Strangely every eye test since they have made me do it again, like I am going to be miraculously cured of being colour blind. So of course, I fail the test as usual. Oh dear she said, you can't join the T.A. if you're colour blind!!!!! Now why didn't she tell me that at the start, we could have skipped the anal foreplay and gone straight for the rejection! Not only that but I could have spent my weekend previously indoors in the warm instead of running up and down an assault course. I left the room and went out to the waiting area. My mate was waiting with a smirk on his face, knowing what I'd gone through. "Don't worry" he said, "As you get promoted they put more fingers up. Become an officer and you get the whole bloody arm!" A few days later I go back to Tilbury and see the sergeant who first signed me up and sent me on the 2 day testing weekend. He's seen all my results. He's especially upset about the colour blindness because I got the highest score in the intelligence test out of the 100 blokes there, not that much of a feat as I said, some could barely write. He asked me if I was still keen to join. I asked how that was possible being colour blind. He looked around to make sure no one was listening and then told me to go to another regiment and apply all over again. Then I could learn the colour blindness test and fake it. I thought about it for a few seconds. "I'd have to have a medical again wouldn't I?" "Oh yes.". "I think I'll leave it if it's all the same to you, cheerio........."

Fuck me, you've got a picture of Prince Andrew squeezed up against an ex miner.

There's more medical yet, tomorrow though.

Eventually the day ended and we were free to do whatever we wanted in our Victorian barracks with luxury downstairs stables and horse troughs, all at no extra charge as well. Someone asked if we could go to the pub and the answer was yes, but anyone not there in the morning when our names were called was failed. Myself a a few others walked across the parade ground and out the gate to a pub in town somewhere. This had some of the sergeants in there already so I bought them all a drink to ensure better marks if they saw me dragging my self along the ground crying. I think this worked actually. Coming back later that night we couldn't find the gate we had come out of, we got a bit lost. So rather than walk right round the huge outside we climbed a large wall instead to get into the parade ground. We did it the old fashioned way, none of that leaping on each other stuff like earlier when I got muddy hair. Then we jogged across this huge expanse till our buildings appeared. Back in the room I squeezed into the awful supplied sleeping bag which had a distinct sweaty feet smell. On the other side of the room was the bloke with the damaged plums. He was telling everyone loudly that someone had swapped his sleeping bag because it definitely never had a broken zip when he got it. A voice in the dark told him to go to sleep or they'd chuck him out the fucking window. I zipped mine up and snuggled down to a guiltless sleep... In the morning we did the assault course again, poxy thing. I was even floppier across it than before, but I think my beer buying paid off here. Then we got taken to a store and top government experts measure my feet and wrote it down carefully, hopefully against the right name. If my overalls were anything to go by, I might have to stuff the toes of any future boot with paper or cut the toecap off. I then went into the next room and a respirator was stuck over my perfectly formed face. This was then tested by someone putting a hand on the filter and asking me to breathe in. Nothing happened, I just went blue and the veins stood out all over my head. Apparently this meant it was a good fit. The rest of the day passed in a blur, I think they had me upside down doing the sit ups again because my guts felt like I'd torn a foo foo valve. Finally we got our results individually before being sent to our respective lorries for transport back to where we had started from at the crack of dawn the day before. I was told I had passed subject to the medical. The man with the squashed spuds was one of our group and he moaned all the way back to Tilbury because they had failed him. A week later I had an appointment at Laindon medical centre. My sweaty mate came with me. He kept sniggering as we sat in the waiting room, but wouldn't say why. I was soon to find out. My name was called and I was told to go to a particular room. I knocked on the door and heard a female voice tell me to come in. Bugger I thought, woman doctor. I predicted I would be dropping and coughing at some point. I opened the door, hoping she was awful looking.....No such luck. Ask me to take my clothes off in front of a female medical person nowadays I wouldn't think twice. 22 year old me was a bit more worried about it. So, I was weighed and my height measured. The doctor was quite fit and when she bent down to do something to the scales I got a flash of cleavage. Brilliant I thought, that's all I need. I thought about Maggie Thatcher as hard as I could. Then she asked me to lay on a trolley and pull my trousers and pants down and my shirt up. As I lay there she started poking me in the guts. She saw me wincing, as the upside down pull ups were still having their after effect. Then she grabbed my bollocks and gave them a quick squeeze. This woman must be marvellous at selecting supermarket fruit I recall thinking. Then I swear she flicked my knob about a bit with the end of her biro. NOW, the next bit....you have to remember I was still young and naive. So when she asked me to turn on my side and draw my knees up under my chin, I did so not realising what was to come. "Just relax" was what I heard before I nearly shot off the trolley. As I lay there stunned and violated trying to go to my happy place she was already washing her hands at the sink. I'm off the trolley by now, still with my trousers and pants round my ankles, hopping up and down. "What did you just do?" I asked. "I just put my little finger up your bottom she said". I was shocked, we hadn't even been formally introduced and she had not bought me dinner or anything. "Are you sure it wasn't a thumb??" Still hopping about from foot to foot, I complained it was still stinging a bit. "That's because it's a very tight muscle" she replied. "That is because NO ONE has done THAT before, are you sure you're a doctor, you're not just here to empty the bins or something are you?" says I. "Look on the bright side", she said, "you'll never get piles., err, you can pull your trousers up now.