Old School

I attended Elmslie Girls’ Independent Grammar School here in Blackpool, founded by two sisters named Brodie and sited on Whitegate Drive in a substantial double-fronted detached house. The school grounds were filled with Elm trees (hence the school’s name) and also abundant with crocuses every spring, from which came the splendid purple and gold of the school uniform.

Attending an all girl’s school had its ups and downs. The atmosphere was great. Sports were very competitive and many students excelled in music, sciences and the arts. I hazard a guess that this was probably due to a lack of distractions by boys but it was also due to a great sense of camaraderie and identity.

I had started at Elmslie Girl’s Grammar School as a naturally very bright, scholarship holder with an acquired Liverpool accent that was more of a strain for my headmistress than my already blossoming career in International ballroom dance. It had been made clear to me, before I was offered a place at the school, that if the standard of my school work should deteriorate due to dancing, then the dancing would stop. Mum and Dad were surprised that I even considered agreeing to Miss Oldham’s terms, but it made me all the more determined to succeed at both.

In the late 1960s and early 70s, my study of English Literature was peppered with novels, short stories, poetry and plays. Each academic year I was entertained by at least two Shakespeare plays, a novel by Charles Dickens and poetry by the Romantics.

In 1970 I was reading aloud in English: A passage from Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw, when suddenly the voice of Eliza Doolittle was transformed into a cockney twang. Immediately I was playing Audrey Hepburn, the most beautiful and glamorous actress that I had ever seen. Lerner and Lowes pastiche of Shaw’s remarkable play was transformational for me. 

Pygmalion was a turning point. A working class girl in a public school, intelligent but awkward, playing the role written for me by others. Suddenly I knew how to live in both worlds. I became a living pastiche. I let the school and the world of dance transform me into from ugly duckling into a swan and I soared.

Our school uniform was distinctive. A deep purple blazer, trimmed with gold braid and a brimmed, purple felt hat with a taffeta band adorned with a fabulous enamelled badge bearing the Red Rose of Lancashire and the crossed keys of St Peter, topped with the bishop’s mitre. I really wish that I still had by hat badge. If anyone has a spare please feel free to contact me.

On the downside, we Elmslie girls were affectionately called, The Purple Virgins. Needless to say that I have no comment to make on that score. I know what I know and I promise ladies my lips are sealed. We have a code of honour. We have a school song with a Latin motto. Attending Elmslie was a little like being a student at Hogwarts. We had our secret passageways, spooky staircase and archaic sick bay too.

I am proud to have been an Elmslie girl and loved wearing my purple regalia. It carried a certain kudos and on through my lifetime it has opened a few select doors. I am still in touch with many school friends and as 2018 would have been the school’s centenary, hundreds of former purple virgins gathered in Blackpool in the spirit of friendship and reunion about which we sang in the school song so many years ago. Eat your heart out J K Rowling.

Omne Bonum Dei Donum

Omne bonum, dei donum
Is the motto of our school
All good gifts they come from heaven
To be grateful is our rule.

Midst the splendour of the elm trees,
In a shady place and cool,
Towering up above the branches,
Stand our much loved Elmslie School.

Omne bonum dei donum
Omne bonum dei donum.

Joys and sorrows both are known there,
Battles are both lost and won.
Fearlessly we all press onwards,
Happy when the task is done.

When our schooldays are behind us
And fresh duties we pursue,
Memories then will crowd upon us
And old friendships we’ll renew.

Omne bonum dei donum
Omne bonum dei donum.

"It matters much more what a girl is than what she does, and if you have learnt to work hard, play hard, keep faith, forget self, help others, you will have begun to be, in the highest sense of the word, a useful member of society. I would remind you of the famous words, "To labour and to love is the sum of living".

Miss Elizabeth Brodie
July 1928

Thanks for reading, Adele V Robinson

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Old School

There is old and there is old. The oldest schools in continuous operation are the Shishi High School, 143 BCE, in Chengdu, China and The King’s School, Canterbury, 597 CE, in Canterbury. Which is pretty impressive and I would like to check out the one in Kent at some point.

But I can’t miss the opportunity to go back even further in time to Sumeria (a part of Mesopotamia) where the schools (known as edubba, ‘House of Tablets’) trained the scribes of Mesopotamia in reading, writing, interpretation of texts, general knowledge, and the specifics of whatever field they would eventually work in. The Sumerian scribal school was operational by 2600 BCE and their curriculum continued by the other civilizations of Mesopotamia that followed.

map of Mesopotamia (between Euphates nd Tigris rivers)

How do we know that? The web site Brewminate states that ‘Based on information from tablets discovered in the ruins of the city of Nippur (primarily) and elsewhere, students entered school before the age of ten and graduated around twelve years later having mastered cuneiform script, Sumerian and Akkadian, and an array of subjects including agriculture, architectural design, astronomy, botany, engineering, history, literature, medicine, philosophy, religion, and zoology. They attended class from sunrise to sunset for at least 24 days a month (possibly year-round), and graduated in their early twenties as scribes.

A lot of student learning was done by writing out cuneiform compositions (‘school texts’) on clay tablets. A large number of tablets preserving scribal students' exercises (called ‘exercise tablets’) have been found and they come in different shapes and sizes, depending on the level of the student and on how advanced the assignment was.

The students were primarily boys, although female scribes are also known in Mesopotamian society. The eduba literature paints a vivid, if highly embellished, picture of daily life for young scribal students. According to these compositions, a boy would leave his parents' home in the morning, go to the eduba, and begin his lessons for the day. These included things like reciting texts learned previously and forming new tablets to inscribe.

Punishments for misbehaviour - talking out of turn, going out at the wrong time, writing poorly, etc. - could be harsh: in one exaggerated account, a student describes being beaten no less than seven times in a single day. After a day at school, the student would go home again to his parents, where he might tell them about the events of his day or recite homework assignments to them. Maybe not entirely accurately some scholars now think.

excavating Nippur

School was optional and was funded by the parents of the students through tuition. Only the children of the upper class and nobility could afford to attend. Daughters of nobles, merchants, or clergy were allowed to attend if they were going to follow in their parents’ profession. Slaves were also sometimes sent to school, especially those belonging to merchants or priests, so they could help with the scribal responsibilities of their masters.

Tablets had standard shapes and sizes which were mandated by the instructors and formed by the students. Students, therefore, had to create their own writing tablets and then learn how to inscribe them with hand-made implements.

A complete schoolroom would have had shelves on which completed work was laid out to dry, storage chests for miscellaneous school supplies and for the safekeeping of ‘textbooks’ They would also have had large ceramic vessels which held the damp clay that would be moulded into writing tablets and others filled with water into which old tablets were dropped to soften so they could be erased, reformed, and reused.

a Sumerian maths primer

The whole faculty was structured on the model of the family where the father was head of the household. The head of a Mesopotamian school, in fact, was known as the ‘Father of the Tablet House’ and corresponded to today’s school principal. Every other faculty member was an expert in his particular discipline, and older students, known as ‘big brothers’, served as teacher’s assistants in guiding younger learners.

Most of the information above comes from: World History Encyclopedia Joshua J. Mark, Brewminate, Psychology history books.

The first written records of The Epic of Gilgamesh date back to around 2100 BCE and students would have been copying the story but it would have been known in oral form which they would have learnt at school. Here is an excerpt (and I’ve cut a few lines to make sense):

“[Tell me] how you came to stand in the gods’ assembly and sought eternal life? Ut-napishtim spoke to him, to Gilgamesh,

“Let me reveal to you the secret of the gods. . . . [T]he gods . . . decided [to] make a flood. . . .
So he repeated their speech to a reed hut, x “Reed hut, reed hut, brick wall, brick wall: This is the message:

Man of Shuruppak, son of Ubara-Tutu,xi
Dismantle your house, build a boat.
Leave possessions, search out living things. Reject chattels and save lives.
Put aboard the seed of all living things, into the boat. The boat that you are to build shall have her dimensions in proportion, Her width and length shall be in harmony...

I realized and spoke to my master Ea,
“I have paid attention to the words that you spoke in this way, My master, and I shall act upon them. . . .
I loaded her with everything there was, Loaded her with all the silver,
Loaded her with all the gold
Loaded her with all the seed of living things, all of them. I put on board the boat all my kith and kin.
Put on board cattle from open country, wild beasts from open country, all kinds of craftsmen. . .
I saw the shape of the storm, The storm was terrifying to see.
I went aboard the boat and closed the door. . . . For six days and seven nights

Epic of Gilgamesh

From Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others, trans. Stephanie Dalley. Oxford: Oxford University Press (1989)

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.

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Old School - New Technology

 

One of my grandchildren is doing Key Stage 2 Standard Assessment Tests, otherwise known as KS2 SATs exams this week. He’s on track, so I’m sure he will be fine. He likes to do his homework at my house, which is fine. In recent weeks, the homework has been SATs practice papers for Maths and English and a list of spellings to learn. Maths is good. He is a whizz at maths, except anything to do with mixed fractions. Not my forte, either, better ask Grandad. I’m good at passing the buck. I’m good at English. At least, as a published writer I thought I was until I encountered an English paper he needed a little help with. Thank you, Google, for topping up my old brain with ‘subordinate clauses’, ‘subordinating conjunctions’, ‘relative pronouns’ and many more terms new to me that I tried to quickly learn. I decided that although I have qualifications to prove I am (was) educated to a certain level, I finished up feeling a bit thick, and he’s not quite eleven.

He attends one of my old schools. I had five different primary schools due to my father’s job in the licenced trade taking the family to various towns. As a child, I was very unhappy at this school and failed to settle in. These days, someone would pick up on that and show care and encouragement to a child, especially coming in new to the unfamiliar. For all that I once hated it, I’m at home there, now. I look after the infant’s library as a volunteer. Previously, I worked there. I would be out of my depth now. Methods have changed so much, even since my own children’s primary school years. I suppose we must move with the times.

My grandson will go to high school in September, where things will be even less familiar to me. That’s if he tells me anything about it, of course.

In my day, the Eleven Plus created the great divide between Grammar or Secondary school, and made some of the exam failures, like me, feel disappointed and even worthless. The KS2 SATs won’t be responsible for anything like that, thank goodness.

When I was at secondary school, we had to use fountain pens in English. Handwriting was encouraged to be cursive and perfectly formed, something to take pride in. Untidy writers were made to practice on specially lined paper. Sometimes, English homework would be to learn a poem by heart. It would be recited in class. No escape.

My grandson has developed his own handwriting style, as we all do. At school, some work, including writing is done on an iPad. Modern technology is the way forward and as things change and improve, we must keep up. I am ‘old school’ in my ways and in my thinking, but coping, I think, in this digital age.

My poem is not intended to sound cynical, but more of a sigh to what has passed never to return. A comparison from then to now.

An Alternative Education

The 3Rs soon to be redundant
Computer-led kids will be abundant
With all information mega-quick,
It only takes a scroll down and click.
No need for any conversation
Included in their education.

Last year’s reception class have all gone
And taken a leap up to Year One
To drag sticky fingers on iPad screens
And work out what technology means.
Will this be their basic foundation
Instead of formal education?

Numeracy, or let’s call it Maths
Has rules to follow specific paths
Beginning with learning how to count
Then adding up and sharing out.
One click away from calculation
Takes away their education.

When did this digital preference start?
Oh, why no poetry learnt by heart?
‘Spell check’ becomes their favourite teacher
With ‘grammar check’ an added feature.
The only future expectation,
A self-taught on-line education.

The infants are learning to use a pen
It’s not a skill they’ll need again,
For a future spent staring on-line,
Social activity in decline
With hardly any interaction,
So they won’t need our education.

PMW 2015

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Old School

I recently asked AI about myself. It told me was I was one of the leading figures in educational developments in the twentieth century, which came as a revelation. I never knew.

Of course, my ridiculous biography said everything about our brave new world and how technology shapes our lives and, apparently, our histories. It wasn’t always like this.

I actually left teaching in 1999 after being a head of English for fifteen years. I found myself one day sitting in a staff training session when we were being introduced to the wonders of ‘white boards’. I remember clutching the piece of chalk in my jacket pocket, feeling like Butch and Sundance must have done as they realised they were part of the past and there was no hope for them in the era to come. Instead of going to Bolivia, I resigned and started a new life.

Back in the twentieth century, everything was so different. I was a teacher in a time when we taught ‘pupils’: ‘students’ back then were studying in HE. We had no idea that in a quarter of a century’s time, every kid would be walking around with a mobile phone, effectively a personal computer, in their pocket and would be doing their work on an electronic tablet. We’d have protested if we were told that every lesson in every subject must follow the same pattern, that all that matters is results and, above all, Powerpoint rules, ok?

I admit at times we wandered into class and asked, ‘Where did we get up to last time?’ or ‘Would you like to watch TV today?’ I admit that on a miserable day, we might have allowed a joke-telling session. I remember a headteacher once catching me perched on my desk doing an owl impersonation for the least able year 11s on a Friday afternoon. But school could be fun. It was about more than just achieving Grade 4. It was also about stimulating kids to think, enjoy learning and, in my case, to enjoy English.

My latest novel, ‘How Was It For You, Mr Pilgrim?’ is about a young English teacher starting out on his career. Set in 1976-77, in a light-hearted way it presents a society, people and schools as they were half a century ago. 

from the front cover of 'How Was It For You, Mr Pilgrim?'

No one could claim that everything was better – for a start, misogyny was rife (indeed, the Sex Discrimination Act had only recently been introduced) – and in many ways the country bore little resemblance to what we have today. There were just three television channels, there was no need to wear a seat-belt, take-away food meant fish and chips…

However, some things never change. Here, our hero, Paul Pilgrim, is doing battle with his most challenging group:

‘OK, there’s a book between two. Don’t fight over them. And you’ll need a pen later. Yes, alright, I’ll find some for all those who haven’t got one. Settle, settle. Shush. Gillian, keep your hands to yourself. And you, Jimmy – especially you, Jimmy. Quiet now, everybody. Come on, settle down. Quiet. This is about a dead soldier who’s been killed in a war in South Africa.’ He began to read: ‘They threw in Drummer Hodge, to rest uncoffined – just as found…’

‘Sir, what the f…? What’s that about? That’s stupid, that,’ Bobby Savage interrupted straight away. ‘He won’t be coughing if he’s dead, will he?’

‘Yeah. It’s rubbish. What’s it mean?’ asked Gail Hudson, as if he cared.

‘Oh dear.’ Paul sighed. He didn’t feel strong enough to survive the battle either…

Discipline, back then, came in very different forms. Not always in a good way. One boy in the novel is complaining because he’s always caned at least twice a week and it’s Friday afternoon and he’s only been caned once and he thinks it’s not fair keeping him waiting for a second beating until the very end of the day.

In this extract, one disgusting boy has been caught making masturbatory gestures at the deputy head of department:

‘Jimmy, you are a bad, bad boy,’ said Allison, standing over him. ‘And you should know that I am not fond of bad boys. They have to be punished.’ In another place, at another time, Paul would have loved to hear her say exactly the same thing to him, but here she was on a different mission.

Widdle tried to lean away but she grabbed him firmly by the left ear. Her long red fingernails bit into his earlobe and she twisted and lifted and the boy rose from his seat.

‘Agh. Agh. Gerroff, miss. Aagh. That hurts. Give up! Stop! Ow! Gi’ up!’

She held him there.

‘And what do you have to say, Jimmy?’

‘Ow. Nothing. Ow. I mean I’m sorry, miss.’

‘Louder.’

‘I’m sorry, miss.’

‘Very sorry, Jimmy?’

‘Very sorry, miss. Very sorry, miss.’

The class was loving it. Several thumped their table in approval.

‘I’m pleased you have apologised, Jimmy, for you have done a thing which is not acceptable. I am also worried that someone from my own class might hear about your disrespect later. So, do you know what we are going to do now?’

‘Agh, agh. No, miss. No.’ He was on his tiptoes and his pug face was even more contorted than usual.

‘We are going to take a little walk to my room so that you can apologise in front of my class too. Is that alright, Mr Pilgrim?’

‘Well, yes, of course, Miss Argent,’ said Paul, unable to take his eyes off the blood which had begun seeping from Jimmy Widdle’s earlobe and was trickling down her nails.

She walked Jimmy from his seat, still on his toes and with his head on one side. She left the door open. The delighted chatter in Paul’s room was drowned by the howls of laughter that greeted Widdle’s entrance next door.

‘She’s great, her,’ said Widdle on his return. ‘And she fancies me. She’ll do anything to get her hands on me, she will…’

If you were around in the 1970s, you might enjoy being reminded of what life, in school and out of school, used to be like. Or what it might have been like. If you weren’t around back then, you might be surprised by what you missed.

An early review of the novel said, ‘It’s full of fond, bawdy scenes, peppered with on-point satire on various kinds of posturing, and an underlying vision that juggles irrepressible optimism with something darker.’ And approval like that made even the author want to read it again.

The book is available in paperback, for Kindle and in Kindle Unlimited. If you want to find out more, take a look at www.keithbrindlewriter.com.

Keith Brindle

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Upside Down

Politicians, psephologists and people on omnibuses might be claiming that this week's local council and regional assembly election results flip the old 'two party' political landscape on its metaphorical head, but once the blue dust has settled I think they will realise it's been a tremor rather than an earthquake - though hopefully enough of one to shake Labour up a bit, as we expect better of them.

Now if you really want World Turned Upside Down, take a yomp in time with me back to the age of Roundheads and Cavaliers, the English Civil Wars (three of them between 1642-1651), and the subsequent establishment of the republican  Commonwealth of England.

Even if you're not into history, you're probably aware that England underwent  a seismic shift in the middle of the 17th century. It was in essence a revolution, the deposing of the monarchy and the establishment of a new puritan republic. The parallels with the Iranian revolution of 1979, the deposing of a corrupt Shah and the subsequent supremacy of the religiously fanatical Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) should not be underestimated. 

The lasting impact of the Civil Wars was the curtailment of the power of the monarchy and the establishment of the key principle of multi-party democratic politics via parliament, but for the duration of the Commonwealth of England, the rise of religious puritanism meant a clamp down on social structures that were deemed to be frivolous at best, immodest in the main and immoral at worst. It all became quite strict. Theatres were closed, dress and fashion became plainer, religious observance was a paramount duty of everyone and that observance itself had to be serious and shorn of frippery and fun. (They weren't called puritans for nothing.)

Even Christmas got cancelled - and that had a modern ring to it. Or if not cancelled, as least the fun and excess would be taken out of it. In other words, no ho ho! For parliament decreed that the holiday should be a solemn occasion, and so outlawed traditional English Christmas celebrations, which were seen as too closely associated with Roman Catholicism and the old aristocracy.

"Old Christmas is kickt out of Town"

I wrote a poem in a recent blog about what life must have been like for Iranians in the last fifty years: "I have never truly found life. The light was elsewhere." Ordinary English people living under Oliver Cromwell's Protectorate must have felt a similar sense of repression, that life was dour, all the fun had gone out of it.

Popular protest against such stricture came in the form of a ballad of the time, titled...

The World Turned Upside Down

Listen to me and you shall hear, news hath not been this thousand year:
Since Herod, Caesar, and many more, you never heard the like before.
Holy-dayes are despis'd, new fashions are devis'd.
Old Christmas is kickt out of Town.
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

The wise men did rejoyce to see our Savior Christs Nativity:
The Angels did good tidings bring, the Sheepheards did rejoyce and sing.
Let all honest men, take example by them.
Why should we from good Laws be bound?
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

Command is given, we must obey, and quite forget old Christmas day:
Kill a thousand men, or a Town regain, we will give thanks and praise amain.
The wine pot shall clinke, we will feast and drinke.
And then strange motions will abound.
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

Our Lords and Knights, and Gentry too, doe mean old fashions to forgoe:
They set a porter at the gate, that none must enter in thereat.
They count it a sin, when poor people come in.
Hospitality it selfe is drown'd.
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

The serving men doe sit and whine, and thinke it long ere dinner time:
The Butler's still out of the way, or else my Lady keeps the key,
The poor old cook, in the larder doth look,
Where is no goodnesse to be found,
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

To conclude, I'le tell you news that's right, Christmas was kil'd at Naseby fight:
Charity was slain at that same time, Jack Tell troth too, a friend of mine,
Likewise then did die, rost beef and shred pie,
Pig, Goose and Capon no quarter found.
Yet let's be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn'd upside down.

                                                                (as found in the Thomason Tracts, dated 8 April 1646)

It should come as no great surprise that England's flirtation with republicanism only lasted eleven years. Tired of military rule, religious oppression and political experimentation, the majority of people in the country turned with relief to the old ideas of what constituted a proper Parliament and government, and the monarchy was restored with sensible checks and balances. And yes, theatres opened, life became fun, the nation got its yo ho ho! back and Christmas became Christmas again.

Thanks for reading. Have a good week, S ;-)

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Upside Down

I’d been having a few tentative thoughts about the subject of Upside Down as a topic. I’ve heard about cakes but that didn’t do much for me, I was very tempted about maps. And this morning when I was having a shower I realised that I was turning the shampoo container upside down as it passed the half way full mark and wondered what other objects around the house I turned upside down for convenience.

Anyway I started making a few notes on that when I needed to check on a particular fact and was very surprised to find reference to a whole house that was upside down. And not only that but there are loads of them.

Apparently the very first one was built in the Centre of Education and Regional Promotion in the north Poland town of Szymbark (see image above). Completed in 2007, the house was designed by businessman Daniel Czapiewski as a statement about the uncertainty of life in post-Communist era Poland.

The construction of the timber-clad house proved rather problematic. The foundations alone required 200 m3 of concrete. Danmar, a timber construction company, took 114 days to construct the house, rather than the normal time of just three weeks, in part due to the regular breaks workers had to take because of the disorientation caused by the strange angles of the walls.

Indeed, visitors to the house often report feelings of giddiness and nausea only a few minutes after they have entered through one of the attic windows and walked along the ceiling.

The interior of the house is furnished in a style typical of houses in the Communist-era Poland of the 1970s. There is even an old TV that shows vintage propaganda.

that upside down feeling

There are many such houses and buildings around the world now such as:

Germany (Trassenheide): Die Welt Steht Kopf (The World Stands on its Head) is completely furnished, including a bathroom and kitchen.

South Africa (Hartbeespoort): An art installation and tourist attraction where the building is angled for stability.

Poland (Pobierowo): A bright blue, modern-styled home frequently visited for its interior.

Niagara Falls: This house looks as if it has been literally picked up and placed on its roof.

And how about the UK? Well, the Upside Down House UK was launched in November 2018 with its first house in Bournemouth and they have expanded to multiple locations nationwide. Tom Dirse, its CEO said: “The success of our very first house in Bournemouth back in 2018 motivated and propelled the business which has gone on to expand throughout the country including residences in Brighton (see image below), Bristol and Lakeside Shopping Centre. Each location is unique, with its own identity.”

From what I can see the other houses are in Cardiff, the Metro Centre, Clacton, Great Yarmouth, Swansea, Portsmouth, Skegness and Liverpool. Although I have just spotted that one is being built in Blackpool.

I will just go back to that reference to some people feeling nauseous when walking around the houses. Years ago when I lived in Coventry a group of us went for a pint at the Crooked House in the Black Country (see image below). We rolled pennies uphill along the floor and bottles up tables. The fixtures and fittings were at wonky angles. A couple of us had to leave the building as they were feeling wonky themselves. I think they took their beers with them.

Upside Down

It's funny how beetles
and creatures like that
can walk upside down
as well as walk flat.

They crawl on a ceiling
and climb on a wall
without any practice
or trouble at all.

While I have been trying
for a year (maybe more)
and still I can't stand
with my head on the floor.

                            Aileen Lucia Fisher, 1986.

Thanks for reading, Terry Q. 

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Upside Down

At the beginning of last summer, we spent a few days on the south coast of England, between Worthing and Brighton, or thereabouts. I really liked Worthing and could be quite at home there. Brighton was pleasant. Being a holiday resort, it was busy, as to be expected. On the front, a quirky upside down house generated interest. I believe it is a tourist attraction. We didn’t visit. At the time, it didn’t occur to me that our own holiday resort, Blackpool, might benefit from the same thing, but sure enough, as I sit typing, an upside down house is under construction somewhere on the sea front at South Shore. While I’m having my daily whinge about the state of roads and pavements in my locality, and wondering why we need special food waste bins when it’s simple enough to bag it separately – oh, yes, someone said rats, ok – I remind myself that Tourism Planning and Town Planning are probably not the same, and don’t share an office, or if they do, it’s all upside down. Was I dreaming about Blackpool being put forward for a future City of Culture status? Let’s wait and see. Mr Bickerstaff had a daft idea about a tower and that worked out just fine.

Upside down, topsy-turvy, inside out. This is still how my house is and has been for nearly a year. I wish the fairies would come during the night and sort it out. Packing up and getting rid of things no longer needed takes forever and I’ve got to be ruthless to downsize. It goes against my nature to part with most things. We’ve spent weeks in our caravan, quite happily with not much more than the basics. Funny, that. We haven’t moved house before. At this rate, it might not happen until Blackpool has City of Culture status.

The family home, children raised here now grandchildren treat it as their own, which is how I like it. This is how sentimental I am. Old photos show the changes through the ages. Furniture, carpets, décor, all a mix of good ideas, or not. We’ve always had painted walls, apart from the lounge. It is painted now, but until recently it was wall-papered. When we did the papering, I did the cutting and pasting, my husband did the hanging, smoothing and finishing trim. Once, we had the entire room papered with the pattern upside down. My fault, of course. Luckily, it was a subtle design, mostly hidden by book shelves and tall furniture. I don’t think anyone noticed.

Imagine the horror of being stuck upside down on a malfunctioning ride in an amusement park. It has happened. A group of people spent thirty minutes suspended upside down 100 feet high for about half an hour when a ride they were on stalled. Everyone was rescued safely and without injury, apart from the discomfort of blood rushing to their heads giving visual problems, dizziness and headache. This occurred in Portland, Oregon, USA in 2024. It might have happened elsewhere, too.

A poem,

Upside Down

It’s funny how beetles
And creatures like that,
Can walk upside down
As well as walk flat.

They crawl on a ceiling
And climb on a wall,
Without any practice
Or trouble at all.

While I have been trying
For a year (may be more)
And I still can’t stand,
With my head on the floor.

    

                                 Aileen Fisher

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Osmosis

Oh bejasus,  osmosis , a challenging theme if ever there was one. Happily, I think I've got an angle on it, and it's all to do with bicycles and policemen, if memory serves.

When I was at university (over fifty years ago now, how can that possibly be?), I had an Irish friend, one Dhiarmad MacDhiarmad, who introduced me to the writings of Flann O'Brien (real name Brian Ó Nualláin). 

O'Brien had only recently died and his novels - now regarded as prominent examples of modernist metafiction - hadn't yet reached a wide audience or the cult status they were to achieve in the last quarter of the 20th century.

Indeed, the book that inspired today's blog, 'The Third Policeman', although written in 1939/1940, was not even published until after O'Brien's untimely death in Dublin in 1966. He was so disappointed when it was originally rejected that he pretended the manuscript had been lost and he didn't write another novel for over twenty years.

a bicycle

I haven't re-read 'The Third Policeman' since the early 1970s but what I do remember of the absurd and entertaining plot is as follows:

The narrator, who is never named, has written a book about de Selby, a philosopher and scientist, but lacks the funds to get the book published. With an accomplice, he kills a local man-of-means in the parish by hitting him around the head with a bicycle pump, so as to acquire the money to publish his book. Unfortunately, the accomplice absconds with the money-box. The narrator is then persuaded by the dead man's ghost to go and enlist the help of the police in locating the money. He goes to the police barracks where he meets two bicycle-obsessed policemen, Sergeant Pluck and Policeman MacCruiskeen

At the barracks, the narrator is introduced to various peculiar or irrational concepts, artefacts, and locations, including a contraption that collects sound and converts it to light based on a theory regarding 'omnium', the fundamental energy of the universe; and a vast underground chamber called 'eternity' where time stands still, and mysterious numbers are devoutly recorded and worried about by the policemen. They try and arrest the narrator as the likeliest suspect in the murder case, but he claims as he has no name he cannot be brought to law. 

He persuades a friend to help him escape custody but his rescue is thwarted by MacCruiskeen riding a bicycle painted an unknown colour which drives those who see it mad. He faces the gallows, but then the two policemen are called away by dangerously high readings in the underground chamber. 

He eventually manages his escape from the barracks on a bicycle of unusual perfection. Riding past the house of the man he murdered, he is tempted to go in, whereupon he encounters the mysterious and reportedly all-powerful third policeman, Fox, who reveals that the money-box contains not money but 'omnium', which can become anything he desires. To be honest, I can't remember what happens in the end. I shall have to get hold of a second-hand copy from somewhere and read it again.

more bicycles (third policeman not shown)

And the osmosis part? After all, that's why 'The Third Policeman' has been dragged into today's blog...

Osmosis is never mentioned explicitly in the novel, but it is clearly the governing principle behind the 'atomic theory' posited by Sergeant Pluck and Policeman MacCruiskeen, namely that through excessive use, the atoms of a person and their bicycle are exchanged. 

As people ride their bicycles, they absorb atoms from their bikes, while the bikes absorb human atoms. This leads to a blending of identities, whereby, according to Pluck and MacCruiskeen, people become part-bicycle and bicycles become part-human.

The inhabitants of the parish are often described by the percentage of bicycle they have become, with some residents being over 70% bicycle. Because of this atomic transfer, people in the novel often lean against walls on one elbow, a position described by the narrator as a bicycle posture.

The result of all this osmosis is that bicycles often try to enter houses, while people develop strange, metallic, or mechanical behaviours. The policemen worry that if this trend were to continue unchecked, the residents and their bicycles would completely swap roles.

Sergeant Pluck is so wary of his own bicycle that he keeps it, or rather her, locked in the lone jail cell.

a leaning bicycle (she/her)

If you wish to investigate Flann O'Brien's writings (and I urge you to do so), here's a brief bibliography:

'At-Swim-Two-Birds' - pub. 1939, a metafictional satire populated entirely by characters borrowed from other books and legends, on the grounds that "there are already far too many existing fictional characters". It was a favourite of James Joyce and is widely considered O'Brien's greatest achievement.

'The Third Policeman' - pub. 1967, as summarised above already.

'The Poor Mouth' - pub. 1941, a darkly comedic pseudo-biography written by a man from his prison cell where he is banged up for a murder he didn't commit. 

'The Hard Life' - pub. 1961, a comedic coming-of-age novel set in the squalor of turn-of-the-century Dublin, deriving humour from despair at the human condition.

'The Dalkey Archive' - pub. 1964, featuring both De Selby (from The Third Policeman) and a fictionalised James Joyce, this comic philosophical novel set mainly in the bars of Dalkey recycles many of the ideas from O'Brien's second novel, still unpublished at that time.

Back-pedalling madly, I've taken inspiration from musing about people and bicycles and osmosis and such and have been working on two new bicycle poems today, a semi-serious and a silly one, (the latter wrapped around an old joke).

Bicycle People

Hunting mammoths on mountain bikes
might have been fun ten millennia ago,
likewise chasing prey on tandem across
vast savannahs, spear guy at the back -
but where was the wheel when they needed it?

Take-away curries by Deliveroo cyclists
could’ve been speedier in four thousand
B.C. for Harrapan city roads were paved
for sure and side panniers were a thing -
but where was the wheel when they needed it?

And Pheidippides, that original marathon
man two thousand five hundred years past
could certainly have smashed his personal
best with a bicycle and not burst his lungs –
but where was the wheel when he needed it?

Because there were wheels around by then -
in potters’ sheds and on chariots, they just
hadn’t gone inline in pairs on a frame, For
that leap was still over two millennia away
and even Leo da Vinci couldn’t conceive it.

We had to wait so long for Baron von Drais
and his Dandy Horse, with saddle but minus
mane and tail, for Trésaguet and a scientific
approach to road surfaces, and then whoosh -
the industrial age rushed in all metal frames

and pedal cranks pneumatic tyres and brakes
so little girls in Glasgow didn’t get knocked
over in the street.  Nowadays bicycle people
are everywhere- - hunting for work, jumping
red lights and waiting for the oil to run out...

Officer Doggerel

We were just settling down to plates of curried curate's eggs

on toast  last night  when insistent  knocking interrupted our 

repast. I cursed.  The doorway framed a vast  policeman, his

thumbs  hooked  into  his tunic, pantomime style. Without a

nod  he made  his accusation.  "Your dog's  reported  to have

chased a man  on a bicycle  the length  of  the street  barking

in a  most  threatening  manner." He  rocked  backwards and 

forwards  on his  size  fourteen  feet  waiting for  me to speak. 

"Not  my dog,  officer.  He's sick  in bed.  Anyway  he  doesn't 

own a  bike. Must  be someone else's." "Is your  dog brown?" 

"Black, officer."  "This  dog  too  was black. Is he a heathen?"

"No, a good  catholic sort." "Wearing a dog  collar  perhaps?"

"Only on  holy  days, since you ask." I answered, forgetting it

was  Good Friday.  "Do you mind if  I  just come in and take a

quick look around? " If  you must," I replied, playing for time.

To my relief, Seamus had  wheeled the bike out into the yard

and was already  pedalling  away down the back lane, his tail

wagging behind him, before  the policeman  stepped through.

"What do we have here?" he enquired,  "curried curate's eggs

if  I'm not  mistaken. My very favourites."  The least  I could do

was invite  him to join me.  "Were you anticipating  company"

he asked coldly,  "somebody who doesn't use  a knife or fork?

Who wears  a dog collar  and  rides  a  bicycle  perhaps?"   We

sat on in silence while he  scoffed  Seamus's Good  Friday  tea.

Thanks for reading, S ;-)

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Osmosis

These are some facts about water:
1.8 billion people still do not have drinking water on their premises.
3.4 billion people — nearly half the world’s population— still lacked safely managed sanitation, including 354 million who practiced open defecation. (WHO/UNICEF 2025)
Improving access to water, sanitation and hygiene can save 1.4 million lives per year. (WHO, 2023).
Better water, sanitation, and hygiene could prevent the deaths of around 1,000 children per day. (WHO)
Approximately 10 percent of the global population lives in countries with high or critical water stress (FAO/UN-Water 2024)

In the meantime the UK Parliament and our media are totally obsessed with drivel about the appointment of a politician.

Genesis Water Tech asks: ‘Ever gazed at the vast expanse of the ocean and thought, “How to desalinate seawater using Reverse Osmosis technologies? Can we really convert this seemingly endless source of saltwater into freshwater?”

many hot countries rely on desalination for their water

The answer is a resounding yes.

Understanding the Reverse Osmosis Desalination Process
One of the processes of turning seawater into freshwater is no magic trick, but a scientific marvel called reverse osmosis. It’s one of our best bets for tackling water scarcity since over 97% of Earth’s water is saltwater.

But how does it work? The reverse osmosis desalination process uses pressure to push seawater through a semi-permeable membrane. This special layer allows only certain molecules to pass, so when pressurized sea water comes in contact with this membrane, pure H2O molecules slip through while salts and other impurities get left behind.

Key Components of a SWRO Plant
A seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plant is more than just pipes and water. It’s an intricate system, each part working together to convert saltwater into fresh, potable water. One of the first aspects of how to desalinate seawater using RO is the importance of pre-treatment.

how reverse osmosis works

The Importance of Feed Water Pre-treatment
The first step in the process? Feed water pre-treatment. This is vital for maintaining efficiency and extending the lifespan of the RO membrane elements. By removing large particles before they reach the RO membranes, we can prevent fouling and clogging among other issues that might reduce their effectiveness over time.

Next up are high-pressure pumps. These pumps require optimized electricity to power both high- and low-pressure systems within SWRO plants. But why all this pressure?

You see, pressure vessels hold a key importance in a SWRO plant setup because they contain multiple RO membrane elements where actual desalination happens. They manage flow rates by creating enough force to push feed water through these tiny pores on membranes – overcoming the natural osmotic pressure.

Last but not least are energy recovery devices or ERDs as we like to call them here at Genesis Water Technologies Inc. Our goal with ERDs is simple: recover as much energy from the brine stream after it passes through membranes, then reuse it. Why waste good energy when you can recycle it back into your system? Now that’s what we call smart engineering.

Advantages and Environmental Impact of Reverse Osmosis Desalination
The magic behind reverse osmosis desalination lies in its efficiency. This process makes it conceivable to convert seawater into potable water, an incredible accomplishment taking into account that 97% of the planet’s water is saline. Plus, compared to other desalination technologies, reverse osmosis has a leg up.’

a desalination plant

A Digression

Far more people died
during the period of conflict
from drought and starvation
than from acts of war.

For instance
the virtual eradication of Bangla Desh
and most of its population
due to crop failure as a result of rising sea levels
had been expected for so long
that it barely made the news.

I’ve checked the records
and coverage of the decrease
in flow of the Indus
was barely mentioned
outside the Asian Subcontinent.

There was more coverage
of water shortages in Capetown.
To the return of the dust bowls
in the North American midwest.
Many of us will remember the shock
when Perth was abandoned.

Questions are starting to be asked
as to why people like me
have never addressed the implications
of this lack of coverage
but that is a separate question
and did not affect the course of the war
in any meaningful way.

From my 'Notes on the Causes of The Third World War', IDP Pamphlets 2020

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.

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Blackpool Rocks

A shortish blog this evening, after the rollercoaster of watching Blackpool FC finally scrape enough points to avoid an unthinkable relegation to the bottom division. Non-football-invested  readers won't understand the emotional toll taken by today's events. I'm exhausted. Nevertheless, after a couple of glasses of restorative retsina, I feel duty-bound to write something about my adopted home. 

Firstly, it occurs to me that the phrase Blackpool Rocks cuts both ways for our beloved seaside town and for its football club, the fate of one frequently being a barometer of the state of the other. 

When Blackpool is rocking in a good way (the sun is shining, the sky is blue, the waves and the football are sparkling), it is one of the most exciting of experiences; the town exudes a kind of sugar-rush seaside euphoria. However, when it's rocking in a bad way and almost on its knees (dark days of lack of imagination, inspiration and investment), then it can feel depressing, though only momentarily; for being Blackpool it is defiant and ultimately bounces back. That is why it's on the long list (with the likes of Middlesbrough, Portsmouth and Sheffield) to be in the running for the UK's City of Culture in 2029.

And then there's rock...

Blackpool - Rock City

...which, I have to be honest, is vile stuff. It's day-glo bright, sticky (in more senses than one) and sugary as hell, usually with a peppermint flavour (though now available in synthesised curry, gin or pizza varieties apparently). It's maybe good for the local economy, but it's terrible for health and for teeth. I've never liked it and the only thing that ever intrigued me about it was how makers get the letters to run all the way through - always in capitals, lower case being too fiddly.

If you want to know the secret of the letters, or the origins of rock as a seaside confectionery (it seems to be almost exclusively so... I know only of Edinburgh rock as an exception), or how it is still made largely by hand, here is a link to an instructive YouTube video from Ade Edmonson, part of his 'Ade In Britain' TV series. This episode features his visit to Lancashire and the sequence about Making iconic Blackpool Rock (just click on the title to activate the link) runs from the 12th minute in until the 22nd minute. 

I'd also like to give a shout out to is some of the finest rock bands to have originated in the jewel of the north. Between the 1960s and the 2020s, these worthies have made Blackpool rock, if only in some cases for a few years. It's not an exhaustive list but it may bring back happy memories for some of you:

Beetroot, the Blade, Boston Manor, Bruce & the Spiders, Cherry Blossom Clinic (the UK, not the US version), Circus, Complex, Emily, Jethro Tull, Magic of the Market Place, Marie Celeste, the Membranes, Mohawk, Perfect Riot, Rainbow Cottage, the Rockin' Vicars, Section 25, the Senators, Strange Bones, Treacle, Tunnel Vision, the Wheels, the Wild Ones. (I've omitted Graham Nash and Robert Smith, famous Blackpool born musicians, because their bands - the Hollies and the Cure respectively - did not originate in the town. Feel free to let me know in the comments of any much-loved local rock bands I've overlooked.) 

Back to rock (the confection) for my latest poem. I know it's traditional, but surely in this sugar aware age of soaring levels of diabetes and obesity, the end must be in sight for the teeth-rotting candy stick. Call me a killjoy if you must. I'm getting in early with a wry requiem for the death of sugar boilers and sticky seaside tack. I was going to title the poem Rock Is Dead or Requiem For The Rock (after a Neil Young song) but went with a rip-off of the Harry McClintock song instead.

RIP Rock Candy Mountain

"Farewell, sweet prince"

she whispers lovingly

as they kill

the lights, then lock

the rock factory door

lair of sugar boilers

for a seaside century

one last time and bolt

its heavy yard gate.

Their final extruded 

black coated

requiem rolls read

(caps on) 

IN MEMORIAM

from one end 

of the pole and 

I AM NO MORE

from the other oblate

a sugar-spin 

on Chinese whispers

and no one's sure

how they managed

that subtle mid-stick

not-quite-anagrammatical

twist of fate.

Finally, as a musical bonus, have a listen to 1960s group Honeybus (not local) performing their Deram Records single She Sold Blackpool Rock. Just click on the song title to link to the YouTube video.

Thanks for reading, S ;-)

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