Sigh, encore

Security Alert Closes Birmingham

On a Saturday night, naturally, when the clubs are in full swing.

It sounds like a false alarm, maybe a fake device or a stray bit of luggage controlledly-exploded. I hope so. I do hope so. I spent a lot of years in Brum, and I still think of it as home in some ways and have good friends there.

This reminds me a lot of the 1996 IRA campaign -- a fairly small number of actual bombs and lots and lots of false warnings and precautionary evacuations wearing on everyone's already taut nerves. Central Birmingham had its share of bad things happening a couple of rounds before that, of course, so the awareness and preparedness will be there.

Time for another cup of tea.

Saturday Night

Time really flies by when I'm messing with html. Here it is, nearly 10.15 and I haven't even had dinner yet. And I'm sure it wasn't even 9 the last time I looked!

Retail Adventures

I went to the mall this afternoon, intending to look for shorts and maybe something to replace the late lamented silk shirt.

Now, the mall entrance nearest to the bus station is through the second-floor housewares section of a certain department store. I was heading for the down escalator when I noticed some 'drinkware' -- pitchers and glasses of various shapes -- that at first glance appeared to be part-full of colourful liquids, and on second glance to be coloured to give that appearance. Intrigued, I picked up a margarita glass -- and the bright-pink liquid slopped. I was sure for a moment that I'd made a mess, and was thinking that it was a stupid way to set up a display. Then I examined the thing a little more closely and realized that the liquid was in fact sealed within the double walls of the glass. The things were labelled 'freezable', so I imagine the idea was that you'd stick them in the freezer and the liquid would freeze and retain some extra coolness.

I was so disconcerted by this incident that instead of going down to womens' clothing I kept on through menswear and over to the bookstore next door. ( books )

The sartorial part of the expedition went fairly well, too. ( Read more... )