Eyes bigger than our bellies.....again!

Eyes bigger than our bellies.....again!, originally uploaded by moclaydon.

And this wasn't even all of it.....now I think I need a bit of a lie-down.....

A sunny September Sunday

.....so what do we decide to do?....why, go to the cinema of course (I've never been known for making timely life choices!) Have to say we all thoroughly enjoyed the film though.....it sticks pretty close to the original story and leaves not a lot to the imagination...worth watching! Oh, and below is the firstborn striding out for the cinema door, I can reliably report that the bag on her shoulder was stuffed with sandwiches and battenburg cake, quite surprised there wasn't a flask in there too! (and no, I didn't ask her whether I could take her picture, I reckoned that, as the mother I could be deemed as having given consent on her behalf...though if she decides her bum looks too big I could still be dead meat!)

Possibly some frivolous links later if I don't fall asleep on the couch.....

Northern Print

 

You'll find this guy hanging around Northern Print on Stepney Bank, maybe to discourage loiterers! A couple of days ago I went to see the Northern Print Biennale currently showing at the Laing, there's some impressive stuff....well worth a visit if you've got half an hour to spare. Also on at the Laing at the moment, one of the galleries has walls full of Thomas Bewicks woodcuts, the majority only an inch or two in size.....luckily there's a big box of magnifying glasses for the visually challenged available!

Still here.....

wor::site has been disgracefully neglected recently....apologies....promise I'll try to do better! Coming up...Eat! NewcastleGateshead
"EAT! NewcastleGateshead 2nd May to 17th May 2009 - a festival which passionately advocates to all the pleasures of creating and sharing good food and drink in the North East." There's a downloadable programme of events here

ScienceFest

REMINDER.....Newcastle ScienceFest is on the near horizon. Most of the events are free but you need to book tickets. Check out what's on here

Upmarket shopping trip

Here we have Sarah doing a bit of quality shopping at Tynemouth Station Market this afternoon. But by 2.00pm some of the stallholders were already starting to pack up for the day. The weather, the time of year....or the recession, who knows? But I got some bargains, an old necklace (with a metal chain that will probably give me a flare-up of excema on the back of my neck...but hey it was only a pound), a WD & HO Wills cigarette card album for £4 ("The Sea-Shore", 1938, a complete set authentically speckled with age...or nicotine!) and a truly ugly vase (I was sorry for the stallholder, he looked half frozen)

Newcastle Science Fest 2009

Advance notice of the upcoming Newcastle Science Fest (website not yet open for business but there's details of how you sign up to be emailed with more information sometime in February)

One event that IS being advertised is the first ever UK Maker Faire on the 14-15th March (more details here).

"Maker Faire seeks to inspire, inform, connect and entertain thousands of Makers and aspiring Makers of all ages and backgrounds through the public gathering of tech enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, students, authors and commercial exhibitors."

Frost Fair

"Gateshead's Nordic Festival features a Frost Fair from Friday 28th to Sunday 30th November, taking place on Performance Square and in the Gateshead Heritage Centre, both adjacent to The Sage Gateshead. The Sage Gateshead plays host to some breathtaking street theatre and music on the Saturday and Sunday - but there will also be outdoor music from folk degree students, food and gift stalls and some very special reindeer! At 1pm and 6pm, look out for Los Kaos Theatre Company's Bjorn and Ursula: Bjorn is a very realistic polar bear, and with his Inuit herder Ursula, you'll learn lots about polar bears in their own icy landscape. At 3pm and 5pm, Pipers Wyrd will charm and captivate you with their three Northumbrian pipes in harmony. At 4pm, Swedish duo Fidola performs a magical fusion of Scandinavian, Estonian and British music."

More details and a downloadable programme here

Currently at the Laing

Two temporary exhibitions are well worth a visit if you've half an hour to spare, a perfect break from all that frenzied christmas shopping.....

"A dramatic new video installation by innovative British artist Catherine Yass will be on show at the Laing Art Gallery from 1 November 2008 to 11 January 2009.

HIGH WIRE draws on Yass's filmed footage of high wire artist Didier Pasquette, walking between three tower blocks in North Glasgow's Red Road, more than 90 metres above the ground.

The work explores the relationship between the enclosed psychological space inhabited by Pasquette, the architecture surrounding him and the open space through which he is moving.

The piece includes footage shot from a head camera worn by Pasquette, along with three other viewpoints, as he undertakes the walk with no harness or safety wires." (more)

....perhaps not for those of you who suffer from vertigo!

AND

Sir Stanley Spencer

"A major exhibition of work by one of the most innovative artists of the 20th century is on show at the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle.

Stanley Spencer, which is organised by Tate Liverpool, brings together sketches and paintings which span Spencer's life as an artist, including early sketches, visionary biblical scenes, and portraits from the Tate collection.The exhibition includes a number of self portraits, from Self Portrait, 1914, when the artist was in his early twenties, to a final self portrait painted in 1959, the year Spencer died." (more)

Runs until 11 January 2009

(Christmas) shop-till-you-drop....in the great outdoors

(the picture came from here)

The festive season is almost upon us so here's some dates for your diary....
Newcastle Continental Market (looks like it's happening in Old Eldon Sq this year) runs from Monday 24 November until Saturday 6 December
Newcastle Christmas Market takes over from Wednesday 10 December till Sunday 14 December
Newcastle Christmas Arts and Craft Fairs (Grainger Market) 13 and 20 December
Whitley Bay St Nicholas' Festival 5-6 December (flyer can be downloaded from this page)
North Shields Victorian Market 13-14 December (link)
and don't forget the......
NewcastleGateshead Winter Festival (webpage and brochure)
Glow looks good this year!
Thursday 11 to Monday 15 December
"This year Glow will highlight some of Newcastle's medieval town walls using large scale architectural light projections to present and join together sites both grand and intimate that are rarely seen by tourists or known to local residents. Several phases of development have radically altered Newcastle's visual landscape, and the trail aims to reveal buildings, spaces and views largely lost to the public, tucked away and "hiding" amongst late 20th century roads, buildings and development."

Back from foreign parts

So I'm back from Berlin....as you can see from the picture on the left the weather wasn't the best, that's the Fernsehturm (TV tower) in Alexanderplatz disappearing into the mist....we didn't bother going to the top! A`whistlestop tour.....

• Alexanderplatz
• Unter den Linden
• Brandenburger Tor
• Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
• Potsdamer Platz
• Berlin Wall Documentation Centre
• Gemaeldegalerie
• Altes Museum
• Berliner Dom
• Hackescher Markt (video, not mine)
• Olympiastadion

....and for a bit of retail therapy Ka De We
I'm all walked out, half a stone heavier and sporting a German chest infection....never mind, soon be Christmas! I'll post some pictures of the trip (and severely hung-over students) when I get round to downloading the camera.

60's Newcastle

Starts Monday, click the image for bigger. A few more details here, (and click on the image for all the gory details of the Bainbridge Revlon Make-up counter......go on, double dog dare you!)

Tyne and Wear Heritage Open Days

Visit the website

Download the full event listings booklet (2.6mb pdf)

But Heritage Open Days aren't just a northern affair, visit the National website to see what's on offer elsewhere. It's a great chance to visit places that aren't normally open to the public.

Went yesterday, worth a trot across the Millenium Bridge...

...."Early summer sees BALTIC present a magical new exhibition by internationally acclaimed Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara, in collaboration with design unit graf. The exhibition will feature a village brought to life with Nara’s iconic characters, turning ordinary life into art."

Until 26th October at BALTIC

Away day to the Lakes

Some pictures from somewhere higher than I expected to climb in the vicinity of Borrowdale and Keswick from yesterday's work away day....and before you ask, I've still got my feet in soak!

Haltwhistle walks

Local Walks - the Haltwhistle Rings are a pack of 22 circular walks in and around Haltwhistle. You can download them here in pdf format....maybe we could give one of them a try the next time we visit the ancestral home! Found at HaltwhistleTown.org

A good day out?

....think I'll be giving this a try this year! I picked up a leaflet today and it looks like a really well thought out service. You can download a timetable and read more at the HadriansWall.org website

Up on the roof of Durham Cathedral...fieldtrip

I won't bore you with the internal shots of venerable rafters made out of apparently whole trees...but suffice it to say, I'm covered in a fine layer of cathedral dust and I've stood in an awful lot of pidgeon shit this afternoon. The views were fantastic but the experience didn't do anything to improve my vertigo...that last shot looking down from the lantern gallery is surprisingly steady considering how much I was shaking at the time, it's a lot higher than it looks in the photograph.

Impossible smells exhibition....

.....at the Reg Vardy Gallery, University of Sunderland. Runs until Friday June 6. (Open: Tuesdays 10.00-20.00, Wed-Fri 10.00-18.00) Scents include odours found in a medieval plague doctor’s first aid kit, the smell of the fallout from an atomic bomb, the sweaty stink of a space station, the bouquet of extinct flowers and more. More information here and here

Get Schmapping

Free interactive tourist guides to more than 200 destinations worldwide available here You can use them online or download the lot to use on your desktop (big download, broadband recommended).....you can even create your own with the downloaded version (maybe we could do one for Haltwhistle or Whitley Bay!) to embed on a blog or webpage. Newcastle already has (a limited) one. Try Amsterdam or Berlin to see a more fully-developed guide