Herne Bay

On Thursday I took a trip down to the coast with my family to Herne Bay. Mum and Dad had to do some things in town there so it was the perfect excuse to take a day and come along. 

Despite it being cold and miserable, I really enjoyed myself. We had never actually been there, either shooting past to visit my aunty in Dover or going to Margate instead.  This also goes for Whitstable too, which I hear is also nice.

Its remarkably sheltered there despite it being on the coast. I noticed a lot of Agave planted out in the communal beds along with Echium (Tajinaste Rojo for Spanish speakers) and a lone Opuntia down by the Indian restaurant. 

Apart from that, its also a dog town, in fact we saw a meat dog (a staffy) carrying a packet of ham along in its mouth, as well as a few other nice dogs. So if you're a fan of dogs you are well served.

But what if I don't like dogs and am a cat person, well, they have a cat cafe which was not open at all when we were there, but you could see a few of the cats milling around, including a few Weedle types asleep in a basket, in the window.

All in all I spent most of the time looking on the beach (stones) and eating fish and chips which had to be done when you're by the sea.

In a few other news I got the Wailing Siren Mystery ported over and am waiting for another book to come before I start work on the Disappearing floor.

Oh and Goemon 2 + 3 are now translated. Though there are some screeching from the left as 3 contains the word tranny in it. Its even present in the original Japanese as new half, but don't let that stop you enjoying it.

Doggo Time.

Not great at the moment, dealing with a bastard cold that has done the rounds of my family and finally ended up with me.

As the title suggests, there will be doggo's as well as puppers, too. We took a day midweek to take down some presents to my Aunty on the other side of town. It seems to be once a year we meet up now but used to be so much more years ago, when my granddad was alive.

She has a few rabbits and now a rescue dog, from Battersea and is mostly looked after by my cousins kids.  We didn't see them as they were at work and the buns were outside in the garden in a rabbit run. Wisely well away from my aunts dog, who it seems is another howl for rabbits.  Howl of course was my other aunts dog and a noted rabbit killer, but  I digress.

My aunt told us that her dog didn't really like guys and she did spend a few minutes barking at my dad and such, but she soon calmed down and sat on my lap and spent most of her time being stroked, licking my face and ears or ripping apart one of her toys, a pink ball.

Being a borkmeister.

Notes here for all doggo fans. She is called Bella, she is about 4 or so and is a Patterdale Terrier. Although you can think of her as more of a Black Jack Russell as she's the same size as a Jack Russell bur nearly all black apart from a white patch on her chest.

All in all came away slightly sad, from this, my cousin has boyfriend now (looks a lot like Moriarty from Sherlock. Real nice guy apparently.)  And was just left with things that life has passed me by, thanks to bastard autism.  I'll never have what the normies have TBH, and that makes me sad. I know they say don't let it define you, but I've never seen any pluses from being autistic. It's just a wall of sad, being human with out humanity.

Anyway enough self  reflection, we did find a way to get to Hounslow by tube so it doesn't take forever getting home. Which is a silver lining.

  

Uptown trip.

Not a bad trip uptown to be honest, just a lot more convoluted than it should be, due to rail improvements on the DLR and parts of the District line being closed.

In fact we saw quite a few people out, whinging about a second brexit vote. Overhelmingly middle class, middle aged home counties types with their E.U. flags and pithy worded plackards. They even had a cute doggo that was called Euro dog there on the tube. And you never see dogs on the tube as a rule.

Euro doggo seems to be some sort of howl (spaniel) / poodle crossbreed, a cockermutt*, if you will. Would love to have gotten a photo but train was packed and they would have gotten the manager. (Yes they were those sorts of people.)

The other doggo on the tube, (yes, there was two,) was much more easier to pin down, a nice medium sized husky. He had to be carried down the escalator as is customary, and while on the train was befriended by a small girl.

Had a look around Notting hill and did the usual record shops taking advantage of the bargain bin to pick up some overlooked house for the channel.  Walked down to Kensington and was gouged £2.49 for a can of U.S soda. Rather good too, ranking behind Jone's soda for a good American soda taste and sugar free too, which is a miracle as only Bepis do sugar free right. Kind of reminds me of Sargon brewing up a batch of liberalism for the kiddies there.

Had to go to Sloane Square because of the shut down for repairs and that and was reminded that getting the regular train is also bastard expensive and that £3.10 to London Bridge and their nicely renovated station from Woolwich Arsenal. As they say a total rip off. No wonder that climate cunt was pissed off at Canning town.

We also grabbed a leaflet stuck in the tube from anal rebellion. No doubt they are light on resources as it seemed to be stuck on with the worlds smallest amount of masking tape.  Can imagine doing a bad photo shop of this in paint.  If I get the time.

*edit, as its citation has gone awry, imagine if you would the dog in the link but with the traditional brown Springer Spaniel colouring.

Ayia Napa resort and wildlife

So Ayia Napa then. A UK Garage hot spot back in the late 90's and such its branded as one of those party towns, and place that we visited for a day some ten years later.  Our hotel was the Tasia Maris Sands a small and friendly place overshadowed by massive building works going on in the vicinity. 

The staff were very nice bar one miserable cow on reception, but we'll let that slide.  There was a buffet style diner, with a limited but good stock of stuff to eat.  I miss having sausage rolls for breakfast as they were replaced with olive rolls which weren't that nice. Also really liked the Apple Baklava they served as well as spinach pie and dolmades (stuffed vine leaves, which always taste of lemon). As you can guess I go fully native when I'm abroad.

Cool Dude

Quite a nice area actually, despite it being Ayia Napa, there is no UKG now, replaced by Elevator Dance Music its bland equivalent.  If you like the main drag, and innumerable cunts on quad bikes and motorised scooters then be my guest Ayia is great. Me I'll be down on the wasteland with the plants.  As you can tell I'm no fan of Fuck off, Fuck off, Ayia Napa.

The harbour area is better and there are some good places but mostly its bars and clubs and the attendant pricks they bring. Also a metric fuckton of russians.  

Highlights of this being some little dude with a smaller version of the troll guy shirt I was wearing. His mum was hot and also a Slav.

I also regret not snapping the strip club with a Costa coffee next door. I guess there is a market for combined lapdance / coffee bar. You could call it Starfucks.

Waiting 3 hours for your main to arrive.

Also, look out around 8 pm in the evening in certain spots for wild cats. They hang around to get fed and are adorable. My favourite must be a man ginger clone who is often on his own but if you offer food then a load will rush out of the bushes to meet you.  Cyprus has capitalised on this and you can buy cards, and other tat with strays on.  

Those not prepared to wait can go down the beach and look under the trees for a glimpse of several shoe persons asleep and awake. Includes a small Morgana type black and white with one eye. 

Plants. and other stuff.

Black Chamaleon Cardiopatium Corymbosum

The good people of Nissi Beach are spreading awareness of local and endemic plants by planting out, or more likely, conserving what dune and wasteland habitat is left. As a result there are boards up and tags put in to describe what flora can be seen. So if you've a yen to see the Sea Daffodil or Beach Morning Glory its well worth taking a walk along the wasteland down to Ayia Napa and cutting back when you get to the harbour.

Also take a look around to see the bird life, here a few of the places have Swallow nests, including the bike shop and next door to Pow the Shop. Mostly its sparrows here, so get used to them hopping around, dust bathing and begging for crumbs. Be warned they get quite close.  

Also have a look out for lizards especially the Agama lizard, which is one of the larger European lizards, or the smaller snake eyed lizard.

Snorkelling has it own rewards and you can be sure to spot some Ornate Wrasse as well as mullet and Gilthead. As well as attendant puffer fish, refugees from the Red Sea (and beyond.) Invertebrates include, round the rocks some shrimp, and a mass of snails including the feared Cone Shell as well as less feared mussels and ceriths. We were lucky to see a weed covered crab and on one occasion out on the rocks, an orange nudibranch. (NB is Chromodoris now invalid as a name, everywhere I've seen this, has it as Goniobranchus.)

On land we saw a rose chafer and in our final week quite a few Painted Lady butterfly. All in all quite a nice trip out.

Aunt Elsie

Aunt Elsie and Kim.

echinopsis chamaecereus

Going through a bunch of old slides from my mums side of the family and have come across some that my aunt Elsie took.  I can tell that I'd want to meet her as for starters all her stuff is named and that I find fascinating, as most of what my granddad shot wasn't, just generic shots of my mum and auntie on holiday.

I never met my aunt Elsie as she died before I was born, I knew she grew cacti and had a few books from Brian Lamb, including a pre release version of the pocket encyclopedia of cacti and a binder full of spare pages that made up the exotic collection of their books. 

I have a slide scanner culled from when Maplin went bust and have been slowly digitising my families slide collection. I can tell what slides are her's as well as them being named and that they are on square 127 film slides which are a bugger to scan.  I found adding them manually and jiggling them to get an area in shot is the way to process them.

Blue Pool swanage part a

blue pool Swanage.

Police, beauty and K9

Fans of strange TV rejoice, as Propeller tv have picked up Police Beauty and K9 for showing.  Saw this while having nothing to watch on a Thursday and periodically come back to it as its mesmerisingly awful.  

Reminiscent of NHKWorld  a news channel that was a weird mix of News and safe space, this evokes the same feeling as bugger all really happens.  Set in Beijing its an all female dog patrol unit that never fights any crime.  There is You You who is  pretty and I think owns the big Lab Cherry there is also Ni Na who owns a Springer Spaniel (a Howl) but in English her name is the sound of a police siren makes (we don't have much onomatopoeia but we are proud of this).  Oh and did we say that nothing happens.

Tuesday after world cup is case in point, a woman threatens to kill herself because her cat Little Emperor has gone missing after her derpy boyfriend let it out after a row they had. (and they are all its here all critters seem to be genderless but I digress)  The team are mobilised and You You says that her dog can sniff it out, cue brave doggo sniffing out embarrassed kitteh hiding out in a stairwell.  The woman does not kill herself and a lecture is given to them about considering Little Emperors feelings when next they have a barney.

Oh and the voice acting in this is wonderful the boyfriend  comes across as retarded and the girlfriend haughty. If you've ever seen telenovela dubbed you'll know the level of voice acting here.

Back to the show and our girls stop to pick up a run over mutt they spot on the ring road out of town and take it back to their local neighbourhood vets.  In the only piece of drama, their superiour and the vet decide on a name for our injured pupper. 

How about Wonder squeaks one guy.  no it was found on the fifth ring road out of town so why don't we call it fifth ring.  I'm guessing its better in Chinese but our hapless doggo is named fifth ring and the rest of the show is his battle to regain the use of his back legs.

The ending theme is the sort of thing that would grace a romance anime and fits in with the strange incidental music as a whole.

A word of warning there seems to be no English subs up on Youtube at the moment though Propeller are showing it with English Subs and dubs.  Which is how I've been shitposting about it here.

Yesasia have Mandarin TV Box sets for sale if you speak chinese though as noted the whole series seems to be up on Youtube.

Anyway UK viewers its on Sky 185 at 8:45 PM weeknights.