here's a mad scrap of a shopping list. but what does it say ?

i think i can work out most of the words. but that might because my spelling is of a similar level of accuracy.

you can click the picture for a big version (most pictures are now clickable by the way - i've decided not to tell you each time to save us all time)

lucky people who live at the top of this hill - they've ended up with a crock of gold in their front garden

we're getting towards the end of the glove season in the UK right now, so here's a few i've been holding back.

this bit of road is significant as it's where the marathon finishes. my feet remember it well.

last week as i crossed it i saw all these royal guards horses.

that was interesting, but not as interesting as the vehicle which was following them:

i managed to cross the road between the horses and the royal pooper scooper and got this photo looking back towards buckingham palace (where the queen was in residence):

i always wondered how this happens. and now we know.

the same can happen on the web apparently. you go to a website, stay their too long, and before you know it the world has grown up around you and you are left stranded on a tiny piece of sand.

here's one:

and here's another one:

you have to love the person that went to the trouble of making and erecting this sign

when you see a sign like this you want to look up and see what the danger is thus risking the danger they warn you against.

they should ban such signs for safety reasons

this door looked so real you could climb through it. but it was just a carving in an old tree. some little people weren't convinced and thought it was just locked.

after the fire i suppose

it just gets better and better. the costumes get more elaborate but the same broken spirit remains within them.

i've even started a new category for this.

i was sent this from reader mike who said it looks like a darlek. and so it does.

are you enjoying the new series of Dr Who by the way ? i am.

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do you know the secret about windmills ? well, if you promise not to tell anyone, i'll explain ...

early settlers in the england realised to their horror the pure energy that is released when you crush wheat. crushing the germ generates incredible heat which needs to be dispersed otherwise there's a risk of injury, death or even someone hurting themselves.

so how do you get rid of such energy and split the wheat germ in a controlled manner ? well, if you live near a river you crush it near water and let the water's coolness take away the heat.

but what if you live up a hill ?

in this case they crushed the wheat between two heavy stones. the two stones would lift slightly with each explosion thus converting the chemical energy in to heat energy in to kinetic energy. small graduations in the stone would cause it to rotate and turn giant drive shafts connected to windmill wings.

the wings would turn and cause great winds to move across the earth, thus dispersing the wheat power effectively. and that is precisely why windmills are placed on hills - it's the safest place to blow wind from.

blogette Victoria sent me a link to some fantastic bollard photos she took on a trip to San Francisco. They are here and here. you must look.

so for her, here is a family of bollards on the streets of london

why does this chap look so sad ? it's because he can't reach the pie by his feet.

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i'm proud to say i haven't mentioned next week's election on funkypancake and i plan not to either (d'oh).

here was a bus parked in paddington station. i'll be interested in how much politics i come in to contact with in the next week (other than the usual media - papers/posters/leaflets/telly etc).

here's a labour van at paddington station.

bus driver: "polling station ? i thought you said paddington station"

brother-in-law kev sent me this picture of a sign:

and it reminded me of this which i saw on the beach in norfolk:

is it a flag ? no. it's some pants:

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in the prison museum in Kings Lynn

red balloons (see here for original)

i knew things were bad, but not this bad on the underground.

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here is a man dressed up as summer:

he had quite an effect on people around him. click this picture for a big version to see people's expressions:

have you ever been to Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London ? you should do, especially when it's free (like it was yesterday for Shakey's birthday):

the inside is quite amazing (unless you stand in the middle in which case you get wet on rainy days):

and there was plenty of entertainment:

it was st george's day yesterday. english people have a bizarre relationship with their nationality.

we have two versions of national pride - football hooligan nationalistic madness and handkerchief waving dancing craziness. i definitely prefer this latter version (though we experienced both yesterday on our trip to london)

flying hanky people:

esther and i had a daughter/dad day in london yesterday. after the Globe we went for lunch in a restaurant then we went to HMS Belfast.

there was lots of climbing up and down ladders and i got all confused on the kids quiz. it's a bit of a weird thing to be a tourist attraction, especially for little kids, but it's what esther wanted to do.

in the end she decided it was a grown-ups version of 'soft play'.

esther and jane in a daffodil field.

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there's only so far that castors on the modern chair will take you. this one got grounded in the mud in the middle of this dark forest.

here's page 76 of the paddington station sign book in the streets behind the station.

anglesey abbey is quite beautiful and well worth a visit if you are near Cambridge.

this is a life sized stencil graffiti. it was quite incredible to look at.

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sent by matt the web landlord

another beast shot and stuffed by the royal family.

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the llama is a quietly confident animal. and it's not a bird (as i mistakenly explained to my daughter - oops)

when i took this photo i should also have asked him what his name was !

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here's a funny old thing. there were three rows of fences stopping people dropping off the edge of this cliff.

and on the furthest one away, right over the drop is a dog sign !

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here is my neice sarah hitting her brother's electric guitar with a drum stick. the guitar has real strings and pickups and a little on board amplifier.

the battery was running out so the guitar had a fantastic distortion sound. sarah's drums stick bashing and scratching created a nice post-grunge throwback vibe.

this winding path leads to a disease.

disease is one of those words that if you repeat it to yourself enough times stops sounding like a real word.

that makes it a good word i think.

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we all know how scared finnish people are of ice monsters - well here is some proof (as if we needed it).

this sign was sent by 'blog dipper' Keith. he took it on a recent holiday to helsinki. he likes how this sign conveys the terror of the disappearing hand and so do i.

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i wanted to take a photo of me with the docklands in the background so i did a moving self portrait.

imagine my surprise when i looked at it in full and read what the street sign said - this was totally unplanned !

(note how busy the track is around me)

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it's funny what people like looking at. i never have a clue which bloggy things are of interest, but occasionally people email me and express gratitude for something or other which is brilliant (hint hint!)

for example, tom emailed me saying he loved the slippery surface sign collection and referred me to this excellent example

so here for tom, and all the other slippery sign lovers, is a slippery floor sign in the underpass next to Tower Bridge

as seen here on a foggy morning. now seen here on a nice afternoon

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for every sensible family photo there must be an equal and opposite silly one where everyone pulls comedy faces (or vice versa).

self portrait at the location of the start of the marathon.

despite being in a crowd of over 35,000 runners it's weird how i didn't really have a conversation with anyone for 7 hours (from when i arrived at the start).

I suspect this was mostly because i did it at a different speed to everyone else. note the yellow fleece which i took off whilst walking (quite a feat as i had a backpack and a running vest on top of it).

i also haven't got a hat on at this stage. when it started getting really sunny i decided i needed a sun hat so i was going to pick up one of the discarded ones. but i didn't want anything too scanky. luckily just as i was thinking i might have no choice someone from the crowd gave me a free one advertising bottled water. and it was just the job.

in the background of this picture is the isle of dogs where the marathon course eventually snakes round to.

here is the actual sheep, actually crossing its actual field.

fantastic

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when we usually end up sharing our holiday days out with bus loads of european school kids. on one particualr holiday jane and i were bumped in to the same class of french school kids for three days running.

our recent holiday in norfolk was punctuated by coach loads of elderly people. these coaches unload their contents next to the tea room in whatever attraction we'd be visiting. they would queue up, drink their tea and cake, then get back on their bus to be transported off to another tea shop.

it sounded ideal. and all the people were really nice.

here are bunch of olds queuing at a tea shop, viewed from up a windmill.

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touching the sun can be very dangerous and should only be attempted by trained experts.

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esther (on her scooter) spotted this puddle and said we needed to take a photo of it. she thought it looked like a hippo.

it does, so i did and here it is

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what is it with seaside resorts and goths ? there's always loads of them milling around dressed in black and looking moody.

goths always make me smile. i used to be one but i wasn't very good because i was always smiling. i couldn't help it. we all looked so funny.

there's something going on here.

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i started at the back with a few thousand others. here we are making our way to the start line. at this point i was feel very unsporty in my long trousers, fleece top and mini rucksack (nearly everyone else was in shorts and running vests).

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we slowly shuffled until eventually we reach the starting line:

because i was walking, a few thousand runners whizzed by me in the first hour. this was a bit depressing, but then i'm not in any way sporty so i wasn't too bothered.

it was a bit disturbing seeing people pack away around me though:

i kept my pace steady throughout the race and enventually started to catch up with some of the people i'd stood with in the original line with.

By about half way my walking speed was faster than those who'd run as far as they could and were walking the rest of the course. By the time it was 8 miles to go i was being rarely overtaken myself and it was me who was doing the overtaking.

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those last 8 miles were great as my patient pace meant i could really push a bit faster to the finish. and i was whizzing round people (without having to resort to anything as vulgar as running).

somewhere in the middle my feet stung like mad things so i took my pain killers which helped hugely.

the last bit of the route is very well known walking territory for me so i knew how far i had to go. i even had time for a self portrait with big ben behind me:

and finally i made it to the finish line:

the official photographer said i looked 'very fresh' and i realised i hadn't really broken in to a sweat or got out of breath the whole race !

In the end i came 33,507th out of 35,680 people.

hoorah for walking. hoorah for all your lovely sponsoring and support. (and hoorah for pain killers)

give yourself a medal:

the outfits some people wore were amazing. i couldn't imagine running a marathon normally, let alone wearing a heavy hot costume.

here is a giraffe chasing mr tickle chasing the police:

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here is the pink panther answering his phone:

and a star and a person pretending to be a star:

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i was pleased to see some old friends had come to watch the marathon to spur me on

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i saw hundreds and hundreds of gloves whilst i was doing the london marathon, but i decided early on there was no point trying to get photos as i couldn't keep up with them without stopping (and causing trouble for those behind me).

but if you ever want a new jumper, gloves, hat or even a bum bag, then it's worth following a marathon course. it's full of discarded cardies.

here is a typical glove

bananas seem to be the fruit of choice for marathon runners. this bin near the start was bulging with old skins

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i did it. official time was 6:12 which i was quite pleased with.

i think i had around 15 minutes of 'stoppages' including waiting 5 -10 minutes for a potty kid to get me a plaster in the first aid section, and having to leave the course to buy a bottle of water from a local shop when they ran out of the free stuff (because i was so far behind at the start). then there was the mid-marathon toilet queue which was a few more minutes ...

my knees were fine (hoorah for the power of prayer) but my feet no longer look like they did this morning !

i took around 170 photos so expect plenty more marathon photos and stories over the next few days.

but for now, here's a self portrait somewhere around the 18 mile mark (around the time of my medical pitstop - the grin hides the pain)

thanks everyone for your generous sponsoring - it really kept me going !

just look at the amount of effort which has gone in to creating this sign !

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this chap was busking on the streets of kings lynn a few days back. his guitar didn't have many strings and the ones it did weren't in tune. luckily he wasn't singing.

i can see myself taking this kind of role in years to come.

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my brother=in-law kev works for a church in nottingham and often sends me pictures of gloves.

here he is (with baby sarah) showing his holy credentials in a pentecostal manner (despite being anglican).

christianity real is quite an amazing faith. God, who invented everything became an actual person for the sake of us humans. he was killed by us, to take the blame for the bad stuff we all do all the time. and after all that he even sent his holy spirit so we can experience him and be more like him before our time on earth is over.

how cool is that ?

it's a double category - cola on railings and bollard. what is stranger is that the tesco cola is unopened.

i'm writing this at 5.30am on race day just before leaving to get my train to london. see you later !

the 'holiday jiggy' is a family tradition.

here are my wife, her sister and their mother doing a jigsaw on holiday.

the finished article:

on holiday i did lots of training walks for today's marathon. one morning it was so windy (and cold and rainy) i nearly got blown off this sea wall in to the slimey bog to the left.

whatever the weather does today i suspect it won't be as bad as that morning !

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look how upset this dog is. it really breaks my heart to look at him.

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this is one of my favourite pictures from our recent holiday.

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as the blog turns two it's good to think of those who have to suffer so you can have a regular service. the main person who suffers is my lovely wife jane.

so, to thank her i've decided to use my This Is Pointless sign to introduce an interactive category and this is how it will work.

create and print off your own 'this is pointless' sign. cut it out and take a photo of someone holding it with a neutral facial expression in an appropriate location.

when you've got a nice one, email it to blog@funkypancake.com and if it's fit for purpose i'll plop it on the blog

here are a couple to get you going

my lovely wife thinking about the blog:

my brother-in-law doing the holiday washing up:

so what birthday greetings did you send the funkypancake blog (in the very short notice i gave you) ?

Rascale and unique eric, and a spider man burglar sent by clive and heather

princess carmen and maxx and brother edd

and cousin mike and catherine:

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i was very frightened when i saw this sign. it tells us that shooting happens around here for the sake of 'conservation' (perhaps a reference to taxidermy).

but the thing that really worried me was the big black square by the words 'affiliated to'. does that mean they got struck off by whoever they were affiliated to for reckless shootery ? or is 'the black square' some kind of fascist gun club ?

either way, things don't look good.

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this bridge marks the half way point of the marathon. rain and colness are forecasted for sunday so i suspect it'll match this early morning picture i took last week (though possibly with more people about)

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here is a no dogs sign from st katherine's dock london.

it's quite posh so the sign asks us to refrain from fouling

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here is my colleague harry. he's just spotted that the fridge has moved itself out from its usual hiding place.

fridges generally sleep during the day and harry was concerned that this one might be ill or injured as it was out in the day.

harry adopted a soothing voice and attempted to woo the fridge back in to its alcove. unfortunately he was not successful and it remained for a couple of other colleagues to man handle it back.

i'm working from home today. just to be safe.

esther and kezia's grandfather reporting a glove sighting near our holiday cottage. so my brother in law and i took our children in search of it.

we found two. and a muddy old hat.

cousing thomas and esther

kezia and esther and glove 1

cousin thomas and kezia and esther and glove 2

esther and kezia and the very muddy hat

i occasionally wonder if i'd like to live in the countryside. it would be quite idilic i'm sure but i wouldn't get the same sort of photos.

this is the country equivalent of a cola drink on railings. in london at least you know the street cleaners will be round later that day to clean the pavement palet for the next day.

in the countryside it's just litter.

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no jumping in outlandish ways

and no diving (as demonstrated by brother-in-law kev)

dead animals wot 'ave been shot by royalty.

makes you proud doesn't it.

spar (a 24x7 local supermarket chain) has its own dog signs. a nice bit of brand extension.

hey. Funkypancake is 2 tomorrow (saturday). last year i compiled a page of photos of readers so as to turn the blog inside out for a few moments.

i'd be delighted to do that again. the blog averages around 1,400 different visitors each day (over 22 thousand different visitors last month) so we should be able to get a few photos together !

so if you are a regular reader or an irregular reader or even just a random picture looker, then send me a photo of yourself and i'll compile a Readers' Faces with links back to your blog if you want.

or you could send me a mundane picture in the funkypancake style if you like.

Send your photos and suggestions to blog@funkypancake.com

if you won't do it for us, then will you do it for the cleaners ?

of course, if you've got a Daimler like this you can ignore signs like this as they are only applicable to peasants.

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i registered yesterday for the london marathon. i've now got my number, my safety pins and a magic chip thing to time my journey.

if only my knees would stop throbbing i'd be almost quite excited about this Sunday's activities

by the way - have you sponsored me yet ? be great if you could, even just a small amount

here are the registration desks:

and here is an arch of balloons to increase the excitement level:

there was also a trade show type thing where you could buy any manner of marathon clothing and food and drinks. flora were there in force as they are the official sponsors. and because marathon runners love snacking on marge as they run.

but they did have some quite nice mini yoghurt things:

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wonky groyne post

animals look a bit weird don't they.

here is a sheep with a squarish head:

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and here is a goat with mad hair:

reader Vin sent me this fantastic photo of a find in Burlington Gardens, Acton.

it's a record sleeve for Leicester's favourite son Englebert Humperdink "Love Is All". The record itself is sadly missing. But what a great find !

Englebert's brother used to run the fruit shop in the village where i grew up you know.

fancy that

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esther and me in jane's glasses

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i can't help thinking this photo would look better with a fire extinguisher in it. oh well.

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lines going every which way

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this is a secure compound. but where's the key ?

click the picture to find out

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but where's wally ?

the animal invasion of tottenham court road just keeps on getting better and better.

have they reached the magic formula by choosing a bear rather than their previous animals ? (or is it a tiger/lion - i'm no good at animals ?)

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this bear's got attitude. and wasn't bothered who knew it

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i loved this sign. it made absolutely no sense.

the only thing it had to do was point to the way to the 'understanding hunstanton exhibition'. but that had all been crossed out.

so there is no point having it out in the middle of the seaside promenade.

hoorah - that's just my kind of sign !

hunstanton dog control zone sign:

and me:

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esther and cousin thomas trapped behind bars

i've mentioned my friends' band the Pure Reason Revolution before. They've just released a new single. it's a 12 minute epic and well worth a buy.

here it is on the shelves in Virgin Megastore (CD and 10" vinyl)and it's even on Napster

visit the Pure Reason Website

watch the cosmic video all the way through in full here:
Low Quality Connection
Medium Quality Connection
High Quality Connection

can you believe it, but funkypancake is featured in a national magazine this month !

Dogs Today magazine has done a special feature on dog signs and funkypancake features quite heavily (thanks to Mark the journalist for the excellent write-up)

you must rush out and buy a copy. it's the May 205 issue you want, priced £3.50 (three and a half pond starling)

and there's a rather nice quote i shall treasure:

"[funkypancake] has a lust and zeal for life and all its quirks that those with far fewer worries in the world could be quite jealous of. From the mundane to the mad, the interesting to the absurd, [he] captures moments and objects that few of us ever notice ... and perhaps don't need to."

i got up at 6am most days on holiday to do some marathon training walks. as the sun got up so did i.

on the first morning i walked between Heacham and Hunstanton along the promenade.

i turned round when i reached these cliffs (although i carried on much further on subsequent walks).

have you sponsored me yet ? It's next Sunday you know :-/

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remember Moses and the Burning Bush ? if so you must be quite old - or you read about it in the Bible.

this little bush was sitting next to a gas canister, which can only mean one thing. someone is thinking of recreating the whole experience.

here's a weird dog sign. if you stare at it long enough its mouth starts to look like two ears.

it's actually a dog barking in to the air with a mouth like a beak !

were you looking for one of these ? if so, you can borrow this one.

click to experience the giant squirrel even biggerer

smiling spider

sad squirrel

i'd planned to go for my last long walk before the marathon in windsor park on saturday. unfortunately the pope's funeral meant Prince Charles moved his wedding to saturday and my walk got off to a very slow start as i battled through the crowds.

i decided to make the most of the event and get a few pictures.

here are some of the wedding watchers

hats

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the big crowd

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enthusiastic salesmen

father and son (this pictures says more about british society than any other i've taken i think !)

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i don't know if you noticed, but we've been on a family holiday for the last week. i've got literally hundreds of photos stockpiled including quite a few new dog signs.

but today i offer you this new dog sign which was on a lampost outside windsor castle. it's a pity charles and camilla didn't walk by as i took it, but you can see the media centre in the background.

this sign is for all those who've come to the blog as a result of the Dog's Today feature (which i'll tell you more about tomorrow)

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these mispelt signs were all over the bins in windsor

i learnt a new thing last week about flags on royal palaces. i always thought it was the case that if a union jack was flying it meant the queen was in residence.

however, it's only this standard flag here which means she's actually in the building. the union jack is just general decoration.

apparently the queen's standard is raised as she enters the building and lowered when she leaves to go off to one of the other palaces.

so now we know.

i was amazed at how many media people were at the wedding in windsor. there was almost more cameras than people. and certain more foreign TV channels and well wishers than UK ones !

is this a catapault to get people in to the castle ?

photographer's dark room

random interview

and then there were the obvious media stunts like this one from the London Dungeon

royal lookylikies

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this lady had a point to make. either that or she was 20-odd years late for Charles' last marriage.

rich and famous guests arriving for the royal wedding in windsor. i looked through lots of windows but didn't recognise anyone.

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esther made a light thing and the sun shone and it illuminated
this box lid

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have you visited www.bikeoff.org ? i hadn't.

you can't go this way:

you can't go that way:

and you can't go through the middle:

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dali melting clock and big ben big clock

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the bad news is we ran out of bread. the good news is we've got you 8 silver bowls of cress.

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how embarrassing. you dress up to go to work only to find someone else is wearing exactly the same clothes, right down the flourescent tabard and dust cart.

bloke on right: where did you get your jacket trim from ?
bloke on left: i swapped it for my hat down the depot

here is a doll in the streets of hull. it was just tucked out of view, but was a good find i'm sure you'll agree.

in remembrance of old holidays

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which why is Jermyn Street unsuitable for long vehicles ?

is it because Mr Street has a lack of spacial awareness and a long vehicle would be too much of an intellectual challenge ?

or perhaps Jermyn is simply a very small person and isn't strong enough to turn the wheel of a lorry or bus.

whatever it is that makes him unsuitable for long vehicles, i'm sure he's not pleased to have it announced on this sign.

it's good christians have their own range of accessories. i have a number of these cardboard carrier bags which have rather nice pictures of mary and jesus on.

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This is Brydges Place - it's london's narrowist alley you know.

i thought i'd contribute something to The Way We See It, but i didn't think these photos were good enough.

but i did enjoy finding it !

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are you sure we're being paid by the window and not the building ?

it's a bit of a pane but someone has to do it.

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this fell in a puddle

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now i could be wrong on this, but does this R mean red route ?

if so, who's idea was it to put a white R in a green box with a yellow border to indicate Red Route ?

it's amazing what you can see in the most mundane of places. take my office for example. the blinds are behind glass so reflect images of other blinds. how strange.

close up

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ideal for economic regulators

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sign says it all.

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at low tide you can see all sorts of strangeness:

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i walked past a sandwich shop on tottenham court road yesterday morning and who should i see in the window but Roland Rivron. this was where i once saw denis norden

i took this rather poor photo as i passed on the way to another shop

anyway, on the way back from my other shop i saw him in the street waiting to cross the road. i stood next to him and poked him on the arm and asked if i could take a picture of his head. he said yes. here is the evidence:

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