Category: travel

We’ve been here before…

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After a lot of teasing, they finally shared the tour poster yesterday:

And the idea sounds pretty awesome:

Magne Furuholmen, Morten Harket and Pål Waaktaar-Savoy will be performing in An Evening With format, with an interval. For the first half of the concert, they will play new and old, familiar and less-familiar songs. Then, after returning to the stage, they will play the ten songs of their 1985 debut album Hunting High And Low in the running order of the original release.

Which, as I recall from my cassette tape days is this:

Take On Me
Train of Thought
Hunting High and Low
The Blue Sky
Living a Boy’s Adventure Tale
The Sun Always Shines on T.V.
And You Tell Me
Love Is Reason
I Dream Myself Alive
Here I Stand and Face the Rain

I thought that I’d missed their last ever concert. And then I thought I’d seen it.
It turns out that I was wrong on both of those.

But it’s always been a privilege for me to see a-ha in concert, and I’m happy that they’re still around and – hopefully – producing even more new material. While this all sounds very special, the surprising omission of a South African leg on the tour, together with the frankly terrifying state of the South African Rand means that we won’t be going along this time.

Still, if they’re going to do all their albums this way, there’s always the 2020 Scoundrel Days tour to consider. And then another 8 to follow that…

I’ll start saving now.

Bar Wall

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A quick flashback to a bar wall in Paris.

This was in Montmartre. I’ve no idea who the guy in the centre is (or was?), but I do remember that the bar in question was called Le Tire Bouchon – “The Corkscrew”.

This idea of “leaving your mark” when you visit is a very similar one to Ronnie’s Sex Shop (it’s not actually a sex shop) in South Africa’s Karoo. There, you’re encouraged to write on the walls or to leave an item of clothing (ties and bras are the most popular if I remember rightly) (I wasn’t wearing either on our first visit – rookie error).

The result is messy, random, eclectic and completely unique.
It’s also rather engaging. After all, I didn’t take any other photos of bar walls while I was over there.

More micro in the news

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I had literally an email about yesterday’s post, in which I lamented the frankly appalling image of microbiology in the news. And it turned out that the email was sent regarding a speling errer in the post, which I thought I had, and have now, corrected.

Still, despite the lack of support from the 6000 miles…  reading public, I set out with renewed vigour yesterday in an effort to find and document a better side of my favourite branch of science in the media.

I failed.

The most recent stories I could find which involved Microbiology were this one:

which included this line:

Staphylococcus aureus, which causes a range of conditions including MRSA, was found three times more often on the surfaces of air dryers compared to paper towel dispensers during an international study.

Well, MRSA is Staphylococcus aureus, it’s not ‘a condition caused by’ Staphylococcus aureus. It’s almost as if the S and the A in MRSA stand for… ag… you get my drift.

Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect anyone?

Anyway – the upshot of this whole thing is that there are fewer bacteria that are going to kill you while you’re in hospital if people use paper towels than if they use jet air dryers.

We found multiple examples of greater bacterial contamination on surfaces, including by faecal and antibiotic-resistant bacteria, when jet air dryers rather than paper towels were in use.

Nice. [dry heave]

And remember, folks: Hand dryers also terrorise the vulnerable.

… And this one:

No issues here though, because the chances of anyone picking up a virus and transmitting it to anywhere around the world in this scenario is… oh… is actually really high. Could there be a worse place for nasty viruses to be found? This is literally how pandemics start. Or at the very least, it’s how they become pandemics.

Not great.

The image that Sky News chose to illustrate this story is interesting.

Now, I’m not someone who travels an awful lot, but I’ve done my fair share of flying, and that looks highly illegal. I’m pretty sure that whoever’s plastic security tray that is, isn’t getting their stuff back.

But then, considering that it’s now all – from their Old Spice stick deodorant to their Maybelline foundation (mmm) – covered in nasty viruses from the tray anyway, maybe not getting it back is actually quite a good thing.

Perhaps the best professional advice I can give is for you to pick your hand luggage up from the plastic security tray, and then go and immediately wash your hands in the first public loo that you can find.

Unless there’s an air dryer in there, of course.
In which case, you’re already as good as dead.

Exhibition Road bubble

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A QP from our recent flying visit to London:

As we emerged from several hours in the Science Museum, a street performer was performing on the street by blowing huge bubbles, accompanied by some dreamy classical music from a dodgy stereo.

There’s something quite ethereal about seeing 2m diameter bubbles floating towards you down a busy city street.
Still: makes for an interesting (and challenging) photo op.

Sadly, many of my London and IOM photos are very disappointing. I’m not sure how many are going to make it as far as Flickr.

So you should probably try your very hardest to enjoy this one then, right?

Some more France photos

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I’ve gone through more photos from our trip, selected some, edited them and posted them onto Flickr.

The latest batch is here, and they’ve joined the previous stuff in this album.

This latest lot details the final couple of days on the Canal du Nivernais and River Yonne, from Bailly to Migennes via the prettiness of Auxerre.

This night time view of the Cathédrale Saint-Étienne d’Auxerre taken from the historic footbridge didn’t come out quite as I expected. For me, there’s a bit too much soft light on the building, but its position against the night sky together with its dark roof gives it an ethereal, otherworldly feel, so I’m happy enough.

Still lots of holiday photos to get through.

I can just sense your delight. Even from 6000 miles… away.