Any Colour You Like

Had an awesome crossing on the water-taxi today. It was only 25mph northerly wind but combined with a strong tide out to sea from the cowes estuary in a southerly direction meant the waves were massive. They even had to get a special reinforced rubber boat compared to our usual glass fibre stately and civilised one. Got kinda soaked but it was soo worth it! I love my job on the island

I have taken up squash much against my better judgement and preconception that it is a sport for bankers and bankers only. And look at this for the most pimp squash racket ever! And about a fifth of the price of a tennis racket! Maybe there is something in this after all. It is also really good fun screwing over you opponent and very therapeutic taking all of your aggression out on an innocent rubber ball.

Elley had been planning a day out to a steam museum for a while but I didn’t really know all the details until we turned up in a little village near Farnborough. It was clearly one of the villages that had suffered from the Beeching Axe, but they had re-laid some narrow gauge rail and had moved some of the signal and points buildings to a largish plot of land down the road.

But it was field number two that was really novel. It had a whole host of steam powered fair ground rides which if anything were more interesting than the conventional steam transport. All of the electricity to run the lights in the field was generated by a static steam tractor. Each ride also had it’s very own steam engine powering it, and most even had a steam organ to play music to go with the ride:

These organs ran from perforated card sheets, but they had created modern arrangements of things such as bohemian rhapsody to appeal to a wide audience!

They even had wibbly mirrors and a haunted house from 1921…

…and lots of ‘period’ adverts. Not really sure what you get for your money from this one!

I just made my first espresso with filtered water. BLUMIN EKK! Rich, luscious and with twice the quantity of tiger-speckled crema… I cannot believe it has taken me 7 years before I have bothered to control this clearly most vital of variables!