I’m not one for that ‘Live Laugh Love’, if I’m honest. In any encounter with that fashionably asinine sentiment- usually found in the wild in italics on bathroom walls, my response is frequently vocal and always abrupt. ‘Graffiti’, I am known to opine, ‘used to be funny at
It's a pun, not a typo; you can put the knives away. I'm quite embarrassed really, looking at all the drafts in my unpublished folder. It's been too long again, and I'm astonished to see how many people stick around to see
Each time I come to write one of these posts, I feel a need to apologise for a long delay. Perhaps it’s my propensity for feeling guilt at everything, perhaps the time passes too quickly to keep up. This summer has been no exception, and Willow and I found
There's always a prior job to do; a pre-task that needs finishing before the job that is actually next on the list can be attempted. It's usually a fix, or an assembly; I will have bought something to do a task with before I'm
I have a funny relationship with money. Love-hate, one might say. I love it, it hates me; or to put it another way, we are diametrically opposed in our outlook and aims in life. This year I've so far tried several different ways of charming it into my
Bringing the sunshine to midwinter Funny how time is passing in a haze here. As I started to write this post in January, the opening line of 'Storm after storm batters us this winter, from the rains of the Autumn and pre-Christmas weeks, to the winds of the new
A Post For Rob and Lorna It’s been a while since I opened this page to type. Not that it hasn’t been on my mind throughout; and the lack of published prose has become a bit of a stick with which I have begun to beat myself; so
The Restless Forge is- or will be- a working smithy housed on a narrowboat called ‘Murphy’s Game’ (nee MORLAS). This boat is a vehicle for many things; from the workaday minutiae of any forge- the commissions and repairs- to a base for teaching blacksmithing to others. It is also,
Let’s walk and talk for a minute, if you will. It’s been a month since I started writing this post, or almost a month; and quite a month at that. As I typed the first line of this post on my phone, I strolled up the towpath to
A not-so quick update
A call to arms and hands
On temporality, and the passing fad of industry
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On the conclusion, and on moving on in a different way
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A big day of it, 8 and a half hours without a by-your-leave or a stop for coffee. 14 locks, three canals, the M6 and the Aston Expressway, and finishing the day digging down past the pilings to find somewhere to anchor the mooring chain. We did the Birmingham run
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An Unexpected Journey, or Getting the Run Around
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So, that’s it then. The initial month-long closure turned swiftly into six weeks, and then just as quickly into three months at least. We all saw it coming; the diplomatic way that Waterways staff used qualifiers such as “hope", “plan", and “aim" were the giveaway. Well,
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I've tried to write this post a few times; most frequently in the early hours of the morning when stress turns into insomnia and rest cannot be bought with care nor medicine. When reading the drafts back however, they strike me more as entitled whining than updates and
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A bit of midwinter footage to finish off the story of 2023. Here is part of Christmas Eve’s afternoon run, itself cut short because I’d left the boat key at home and had to drag us both back down the bypass (sorry about that). I’ve already written
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Here it is, the end of the year. Or, there it was, at least. It's already been Christmas and New Year, despite it still being a few weeks away just a few minutes ago. An entire week has passed in the mere seconds since I started this draft.
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Hello all, well it looks like I’ve finally resolved the video upload glitch here, so in celebration here is a good 90 odd minute cruise through the Stoke area and into Staffordshire proper, coming to rest at a pub named bizarrely enough, after the actor Neil Morrissey. The mind
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The end of the Trent and Mersey
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Step aboard again, a short journey this time. The cool autumn air takes the comfort from the body; a little from the soul, too. Another year is on the wane, already; heady days pass into memory and away to the ether with falling housedust and retreating echoes. The clank of
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Staffordshire always strikes me as a busy county. One of roadsalt-greyed grass verges and constant roadworks. Huge roadside pubs, always boarded up; nobody ever having time for a swift libation, I assume, it being so busy round here. This view is borne largely from experience; I've travelled through
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Into Stoke and beyond