among these dark satanic mills

Gentrifying  The Grimy Republic It's a dirty job ,but someone has to do it.....

 Billy Blake's "Jerusalem " where he spoke of being 'among these dark satanic mills...', was written while he sat above Beacon Hill in Halifax ..(said Ken Kersey over a pint of locally brewed lager ,looking at this view)....

Only an accountant will tell you if the £19 million spent on the Halifax Piece Hall   
was worth the money? All I can say is, I was surprised today  how good it looks.
Me & Cath go next week to the opening of the new Halifax Library which is just next door to The Piece Hall.

***

REST IN PEACE     My longtime Blogspot buddy Andrew Keogh here is his obituary in The Guardian. he died of lung cancer aged 66, and was a barrister, blogger, writer and political activist. He  was  born in Leeds.An avid Leeds United.Gratful Dead & Coffee  fan.....(n.b.we also had  a mutual friend in  Clive A.

They went to the L.S.E.in the early 70's)
  here is a link to "White Rabbit" to Andrew's  blogspot.Go on sweetly,dear legal man......

***

A bit of a dilemma for me this weekend .
 I keep getting pestered by google to allow this blog to be included on their AdSense programme.Because of my large(ish) number of visitors they have given me some quite generous estimates of how much i might "earn" each month. Essentially, each time you visit here,the more money Google gives me .The joy of capitalism.
 So what to do? Should I take the capitalist shilling which goes against the spirit of what i do here? On the other  hand , what google would give me would more than pay for my smugmug photo album subscription each month. {n.b. never did it} At the  end of the day  I doubt I will take up this offer. But ,whatever , thank you kindly for each visit you make.Long may it continue.............
.

sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment

Me and Cathy with friends.

2nd left:My Aunty Brenda.

This week's sepia saturday

is around sepia ladies 'working out' in The Olden Days.

A fairly easy one for me this week.My Aunty Brenda travelled from

Scotland to Essex in the early 1900's.

It was a Ladies College.She  was training in Podiatry.

And this is how she did it.......

 it looks like she had her some fun.
This  must have been a quite liberating experience for a late-Victorian lass.......

From someone at the start of a career...to someone at it's end.
I retired on Wednesday...... I went out into Hebden Bridge at 4pm this afternoon for a few nice drinks with some of the lassies from work.
On Friday 1st September (kick off 7.30pm) I will be having drinks in The White Lion in Hebden Bridge . All Welcome

love will tear us apart.....

 https://zimnoch.smugmug.com/Peterloo-Joy-Division-Manchester-20-August-2017/
and......today's BBC tv report..here.....

Joy Division play Hulme in 1979

 [here]  

Plus, one of my videos.........

gentrifying the graveyard..........

 a video I took of Holly Lynch ,Labour MP for Halifax speaking yesterday in Lister Lane Cemetery. If you know Halifax,to get your bearings,behind her is Gibbet Street with Lightowler Road on her far left .....(site of the old Poor House). ".....he would smuggle information,shall we say "alternative leaflets", up into  Halifax from   London in a coffin..."
You can see all my photos & videos of the day here......zimnoch.smugmug.com/Lister-Lane-CemetryHalifax-16082017/.

no place to hyde

.So.I am related to the author Robert Louis Stevenson.

I have described some details about this here before.Here is a transcript of something I first posted on this blog  in July 2006[view here]

This week's sepia saturday concerns 'bookish' topics.......

So.Basically.My maternal grandfather was married 3 times. He had a child with each of his wives. (My mum's mum had died in childbirth). I am not related by blood to RLS,but my Aunty Brenda's mum was on that ol'literary  bloodline.. stuff was complicated in The Olden Days .......

I'm a shit genealogist (blushes) I dont know who the old couple are (.tho the bloke isn't my grandfather.I know that much!)But this is a nice ,rare,photo of the 3 half-siblings ,all together.My Mum's  sat on the couples knee.My Uncle Gordon sat on his half-sister Brenda's knee......I guess this was taken in Scotland.Probably Perth or Fife.

Several events coming up in the next couple of weeks that will be featured here later....

• Next Wednesday (16th) I attend an event at Lister Lane Cemetry ,Halifax  .It's the 175th Anniversary of The 1842   General Strike.4 Chartists are buried there.I dont know much about either the riot or deaths ( similar to Peterloo?) although the Mayor & local Labour MP will be in attendance."Brass Bands and refeshments"they say..... ! Let us eat cake While we mark  the   "Plug Riot"
• Next Sunday (20th) at Albert Square  Manchester me & Cathy go to see (among others) actor Christopher Ecclestone (a former Doctor Who) read out the Peterloo Massacre "NAMES"

• A week on Thursday (24th) in Hebden Bridge Pubs  (k.o. 4pm) I will be having a few cheeky drinks to mark my retirement.

Below,a slideshow my    photographs  from the 2015 Peterloo Memorial.

  Read About The Peterloo Massacre here
 
A nice bonus for me was finding thislocal blogspot which seems to cover similar terrain.

have you herd?

So. There was this dream.........a couple of nights ago. We arrived to find  my late mother ,Marjory.Dressed up in her finest. Looking very determined  " I Mean Business " she said,firmly.........looking like a castle with a scar across her shoulder....

"After the advent of Christianity, the goat or God Pan with his beard, cloven hoofs and horns, later became associated as the unofficial image of the devil........"gnosticwarrior.com/goat.html
This week's  sepia saturday
topic is around the theme of "goats".(Ummm...that's what I herd, anyway.......)
 So where to go with this one?
While I pondered this problem  ( not having any sepia goats myself,on my person )  i went on facebook for alternative  inspiration.
I visited a page that posts old photos of Halifax.A few years back i found an old photo of my Mum (working in a Infant nursey ) there..........  that i never knew existed!

This morning I may have found another?
Its taken inside St Mary's church on Gibbet Street in Halifax.It's   of a  Polish Mass  sometime in the 1970's. The priest holding the service is Father Gaik.
Now, I may be mistaken but the figure on the far right,back row,(black hair:brown top)  looks very much like my Mum!Maybe it;s not her at all?It's just that there is something about the way she holds her body,reminds me her.
I dont know if this possibility makes me happy  or sad........?

Pondering this ,while  in Bradford this morning on business.Having an hour to kill at lunchtime. I walked around
Little_Germany[wikipedia] 

and     Bradford Cathedral[wikipedia]

Hoping to find some goats carved or painted somewhere .No Joy, although i did capture some splendid William Morris stainglass windows & fabrics.albeit,goatless..........


https://zimnoch.smugmug.com/Little-Germany-Bradford-Cathedral3rdAugust-2017/ By pure chance,i was later at a meeting in Halifax this afternoon...a 100 yards from where i lived as a child with my Mum& Dad.After the meeting I took a few extra photos of the building i knew best as a child......

you have made a happy man very old............

Hebden  Bridge: 1920's

I took myself to Bacup today. I visited Bob.here are some photos I took.Lovely bloke

So the  sepia saturday theme this week is "bridge"

As I was in Hebden Bridge this weekend. How could I resist? 

I turn 65 on Sunday.

(I retire from work-again!in  the middle of August.)

I keep checking my mirror.My skin is already  turning sepia......so it goes.......

people say believe half of what you see

Had me  a long talk with Norman Perry.I told him about how I used to live & work in the East End of London.what a nice bloke.
He seemed interested in me,as person,rather than some sort of voodoo doll.Refreshing  to find a willingness to  engagement from someone in a pub band, rather than they expecting me just being  some sort of 'extra' in their  vanity    project......

I went into Halifax with Comrade Ken& Phil the Ex-Fireman.

We went to The Upper George Pub .

i am hoping to go to this.Expect photos.

the family crest: it would make a lovely birthday present for the genealogist in your life

it's back! by popular demand.......

in Fawcett's Garden

a walk around the garden in  Hebden Bridge of    Rev John Fawcett :theologian.

it's amazing how much exposure Farage gets

Oh Jeremy Corbyn.the man they could not hang...

Farage will die knowing that he won nothing and gave us Jeremy Corbyn.....

Farage will die knowing that he won nothing and gave us Jeremy Corbyn.

There now follows a party political broadcast on behalf of........

thank god we have Trident

ditch the cunt.

where do the children play?

Cath's Birthday in The Grimy Republic

http://manchesterartgallery.org/exhibitions-and-events/exhibition/shirley-baker/

Thanks to Martin , Tony T.,Daz & Jim for a splendid afternoon in Manchester.......

It's Cath's 59th birthday this weekend.

We went into Manchester Friday to see an Exhibition that opened yesterday  at Manchester Art Gallery. It's  Shirley Baker's

photos of Working Class Salford in the 60's.

Cath goes to The White Eagle Lodge in Rawden ,Leeds on the day of her Birthday.

They are almost like Family to her..........

Bacup

always the Fire Exit never the front door........

The U.K. Mainstream Media is just an organ of government.
It is not independent.
It's propaganda.
It's Pravda
.It has & is doing every dirty trick possible to scupper Labour's chances in the General Election here.

As an indication of how News is hostile here is a rare example of Labour being able to bite back. It shouldnt be this way.It shouldnt be remarable .Sadly it is...... BBC presenter Nick Robinson interviewing Labour's Shadow International Trade Secretary, Barry Gardiner .

[from:]

 

Embed from Getty Images

*swoons*

You can donate here

birdbox ,bluebells & butterflies.

In the Garden:a Birdbox Chris just finished today.

Below a slideshow of my visit today with Cath to Hardcastle Craggs:

Joan

I travelled over to  Royton,(nr Manchester) today to attend Joan 's funeral ( Hydn's wife).Held at St Pauls Church .A massive place ,which  was packed.
www.saint-pauls-royton.org/

An impressive attendance for a beautiful lady.

Rest in Peace X

[Capo ]Martin took this photo of me near Royton Cricket Club, which hosted a meal for the mourners afterwards.

Thank You Martin for the lift to & from the Mills Hill railway station.

As I say, hundreds attended Joan's Mass.
 It lasted 80 minutes ( with a seperate cremation afterwards).
An Anglican/Cof E affair...yet  much "smells& bells"..more 'Catholic' than even recent roman catholic services I have attended  (remember I'm Polish,I know about such things!)
It's the first time ever I have taken the host &wine from a protestant vicar......very moving......
It was also good to meet up with 40 or 50  people i hadnt met up with for at least 12 months.

Labour Day in Hebden Bridge.

The fortune-telling lady. Has even taken all her things inside.........

A photo taken near Todmorden in 1975 by the splendid photographer Martin Parr

This week's sepia saturday

has , as it's prompt someone hanging out washing to dry.............

 The above is cheating really....i took it out of my Abruzzo bedroom window only eight years ago,Hardly "old".....but I think it perfectly captures the timeless ballet that is "hanging out one's  washing"...an art form that crosses both time and space ...........
(click to hear the BobCat) I see Bob from Bacup on Wednesday who celebrated his 81st Birthday  last week.He has moved house recently  & has just come out of hospital after eye surgery.

***

Bob from     Bacup

I also go to Royton to attend the funeral of Joan,Hydn's lovely wife. Hopefully  i meet up with some  friends from The Rochdale Hamam.

 ***

Also ,thru the week,I should be seeing Ken& Phil in Calderdale for a drink.First time for ages........

 ***

 Incidently.....Great News from Newcastle.The Turkish Baths there  will be reopening !
 I expect I shall eventually be testing the facilities (I hope they provide clean towels.......)
You may check  progress  [here]

me,as human clothes- horse, in an Istanbul Hamam.Look at my Gut!

Clare Road , Halifax    HX1 2JR

"......In one doll, the upper half spun and where her hand pointed at the end of the spin was the fortune for you...".       [read more...]

Another Martin Parr washing line.

a walk along the tow path between Hebden Bridge & Mytholmroyd today..

zimnoch.smugmug.com/Dropbox/Hebden-Bridge-Tow-Path-23rd-April-2017/

life size: full size anatomical skeleton

C'è un medico in casa?

I nearly kicked myself as I was driving through Sowerby Bridge today.
Could it be  the onset of election fever?

Driving past a mid terrace house, a van was unloading boxes & furniture 

A family was moving into the house .

Just as I passed, a young lass,maybe 9 years of age, was carrying a life size anatomical skeleton ( bigger ,of course,than she was ..) through the open front door.

What are the chances of that happening? 

You could easily go through your entire life & never see such a thing! I didnt have any  time  to find my camera. 

This May well rank as one of the best photos I never took.....

Peter Hitchins (writing in The Daily Mail) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hitchens

Below ,Mathew Parris  in  Friday's TIMES
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0ba87434-26a8-11e7-bc20-132b509ff5ce

 

A DONALD TRUMP PRODUCTION ™

 

*"Life After Death" by Chris Stone.*

*The Mandaeans of Iraq and Iran [microform] ; their cults, customs, magic, legends, and folklore : read the entire book. *