The timing didn’t work out for having her party closer to her actual birthday, but yesterday was the day. Fiona had invited six friends, but only four could make it. We rented a 9-seater minibus for the day and drove to the Coronel adventure centre in Huizen for three rounds of laser tag and DIY pizza (they provide the dough and pizza toppings, everyone puts on a disposable apron and gloves, and prepares their own) afterwards. Alex got a little tense, but we all had a great time. Lots of running around with big grins, and 10-year-old-serious team strategy sessions between games.
It was a beautiful day, sunny and about 14°, and when we got back all the kids went out into the back garden to poke things (rotten pears still lying around from autumn) with sticks (blown down from the huge dead tree that I need to get taken down). Abi and I, exhausted, went for a bit of a lie down. Amazingly, Fiona and two of her friends still had enough energy to go along to their dance class half an hour later.
For all the work with time zones I’ve done in the past, it was only yesterday that I noticed that (in Western Europe, at least), the clocks are not on summer and winter time for the same amount of time. Summer time starts on the last Sunday in March, winter time starts on the last Sunday in October. Summer time is 7 months long, winter time only 5.
Edinburgh from the evening of Tuesday 18th February until Friday 21st. I was staying at the Ritz Hotel on Grosvenor Street, whose name makes it sound quite posh. This is the hotel Jim dubbed the “serial killer special” after seeing the photo of the chintzy, blood-red room I stayed in last time I was there. I watched Red 2 on the journey there, and finished reading Leonard Richardson’s Constellation Games before bedtime.
I didn’t have any other books with me, so on Wednesday evening I swung by Pulp Fiction on Bread Street and picked up The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen and Deception by Jonathan Kellerman, two authors I’ve always passed over until now. (Having finished both of them a week later, I think The Surgeon is probably the better book, but Kellerman’s is the series I want to read more of first.) I started reading The Surgeon over an extra-hot half chicken at Nando’s, but quickly stopped because turning pages + greasy finger food = nonono. Back at the hotel I watched The World’s End. (No wifi in room; previously downloaded.) I enjoyed it, and thought Simon Pegg’s character Gary King was particlarly well-realized, but the ending was weak. Maybe I need to see it again to give it a second chance.
Thursday evening I made good on my promise not to over-eat by buying an extra sandwich at lunchtime and just saving it for dinner. Watched The Amazing Spider-Man, partly because it was on special offer on iTunes, but it actually turned out to be really good. I like Andrew Garfield as Spidey – he brings less of an angsty vibe, and more of a jaunty swagger to Spidey than Tobey Maguire did. Yes, it does feel a bit soon for a series reboot, but I can deal with it. Looking forward to the next film in April.
Friday evening I flew down to Gatwick, met up with Abi and the kids, and spent a lovely weekend with Jules & Becca. We went in to see Wicked at the Apollo Victoria in the London on Saturday afternoon, and had a fabulous time. We had figured that Fiona would love it, but Alex thought it was just about the best thing ever, too.
Abi flew back to Amsterdam on Sunday evening, but the kids and I stayed an extra night and took the train up to Edinburgh on Monday afternoon. Early in the morning, though, Jules dropped me off at the edge of Guildford on his way to work, and I took a sunny walk to the station against the flow of commuters. (I like urban walking.) At lunchtime, just before catching the train, we ate at the food court in the Friary Centre. The kids had McDonalds; Jules, Becca and I ate from Thaï Express, and when you ask for “extra spicy”, let me tell you: it is genuinely hot. And delicious.
Train travel with Fiona is always a risk because of her travel sickness, but she didn’t experience any discomfort on the way: Guildford to Waterloo, taxi from Waterloo to King’s Cross (which is so much nicer than the last time I was there, many years ago), East Coast line from the London to Edinburgh (first class! very reasonably priced when you book ahead and choose an off-peak time), and finally a tiny switchback from Edinburgh to Drem, where Dad came to pick us up from the station.
Tuesday I went in to Edinburgh to do some more work, while the kids hung around with Mum & Dad and Kyle & Rachel once they got out of school. I brought back fish and chips in the evening. Wednesday was a lazy day in Haddington, and we drove up to Murthly late afternoon. We stopped at the Sainsbury’s just before the bridge for some groceries (and sweeties). I made tuna pasta for dinner, and we watched Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 in the evening. The curious thing about the film is that the trailers make no mention of the actual plot, or the real antagonist the heroes face. It concentrates on the good and funny bits, which is fair enough, but it makes me think that the actual film could have been better if it had concentrated on just those elements, too. Mum & Dad were still babysitting until late in the evening. We were all asleep by the time they got in.
Falkirk Wheel
Thursday we went to the Falkirk Wheel, which is a magnificent experience. Abi, Alex, and I had been there a long time ago, but Mum & Dad never had. In the winter season there are only three boat tours each day. We hadn’t thought to phone ahead and check, so we were lucky to catch the last one at 14:00. We were lifted up in sunshine and had a great view out over the surroundings.
Back towards the boat lift
On the way back through the tunnel and into the boat lift’s gondola, we watched a black curtain of rain slide across the landscape towards us. It hit us on the way down, battering the glass roof of the tour boat with hailstones. Fortunately the worst of it didn’t last very long.
A Kelpie guarding the Wheel
The Wheel is now guarded by two small-scale reproductions of the Andy Scott’s Kelpies. After lunch at the nearby Rosebank Beefeater grill in Camelon, we tried to get close to the real thing. All the parking at The Helix is on the wrong side of the canal, though, and the footpaths are still under construction. (The official opening isn’t until 21st April, apparently.) It was cold, and we needed to get back, so we had to make do with a drive-by on our way up the M9. They’re a stunning sight, and I’d love to go back and see them up close.
The Kelpies
Thursday evening I drove Mum & Dad in to Perth to see Mike & The Mechanics. After I had dropped them off, the kids and I watched Pacific Rim and ate lots of chocolate and crisps.
I had been admiring Dad’s new Troop London messenger bag earlier in the week. I had been thinking about getting a new satchel to replace my old @Media Ajax freebie from seven years ago. House of Bruar is one of Troop’s stockists in Scotland, and on Friday morning (with the kids still asleep) Dad and I took a wee drive there to have a look. We pawed around, spreading plastic packaging material all around the carefully arranged display (seriously – it’s amazing how much loose wrapping you can stuff into a single bag). After much indecision I finally settled on a “Classic Messenger Bag”, slightly bigger than my old one, but lined and padded, sturdy and stylish. Not too small that it won’t fit my laptop, iPad, a couple of books, and a sandwich or two; not too big, lest I fill it with so much crap it gets unwieldy. Just right.
In the evening we drove down to Edinburgh to watch Kyle play a junior masterclass rugby match in the half-time interval of the Edinburgh Rugby vs Ospreys RaboPro12 match at Meggetland. I had never been to a rugby match before, and I had a good time. (Edinburgh won!) It was very cold, though, and Alex definitely didn’t want to be there. Fortunately there were hot dogs, burgers, chips, hot chocolate, and donuts.
Sutherlands at Meggetland
On Saturday we all met up again at Scotland’s Secret Bunker (!) in Fife. We’d seen signs for the bunker before while driving through Fife, and we were aware that it was an underground command post that, in case of a nuclear war, would have housed government and military figures. I had no idea just how astonishing the actual site is.
You enter through a fairly standard farm house (okay, so it’s surrounded by razor wire, radar emplacements, and decommissioned military vehicles, but they seem like decorative additions for the tourists). Inside, you go down a set of stairs, and then walk down through a long tunnel to a set of fairly standard institutional corridors that would not look out of place in any large office building. Only completely underground. There’s no feeling of being crammed into a tiny functional space. At first glance, it’s just completely normal.
An ordinary corridor…or is it?
It’s only when you step through the doors leading off the corridors that it all goes cold war on you. A tiny medical center. Dormitories and switchboards. Map rooms, radar monitoring stations, cipher suites, an emergency BBC broadcast facility, a cinema, a chapel, an armoury.
Switchboards undergroundOps room
The walls are decorated with old Royal Observer Corps recruiting materials, posters warning of the dangers of nuclear fallout, instructions on how to dig latrines, and press clippings from the time when the threat of nuclear war was very, very real.
Uh-oh
My photos can’t do the place justice. The facility was still in operation while I was at university in St Andrews, less than 10 miles away. It only shut down in 1992, when the old Soviet Union collapsed and the cold war danger dissipated. Watching the flickering black-and-white public service broadcast films shown in the bunker’s cinema brought back childhood memories of wondering which room in our house had fewest outside walls, and would make the best shelter in the case of a nuclear blast. The secret bunker is a relic from that age, a chilling reminder, beautifully preserved in place. It’s a bit out of the way, but it’s well worth the visit.
Sunday was a quiet day. Late rise, pack. Hang around reading and chatting. Kyle and Fiona had hoped to go out to The Space in North Berwick, but the timing and transport options (too many passengers, not enough drivers) didn’t work out. Scott drove us to the airport late in the afternoon, and we got our flight back to Amsterdam (along with plenty of creme eggs). Abi picked us up at the other end, and there was much rejoicing. We hadn’t had time for dinner on the way, so we stopped off at McDonald’s for drive-through, and the kids ate when we got back. I had a cheese sandwich. Then bed.
I’ve loved Maxïmo Park since their stunning debut album A Certain Trigger in 2005. I had heard thay are great live, and I was sorely disappointed to have missed them when they played Utrecht on their National Health tour in 2012. (I had actually–giddy with excitement–bought a ticket before I realized that I was going to be in Scotland with the kids for their autumn break that week.) But yesterday evening I finally caught them at Melkweg in Amsterdam. For the second time today, I’ll note:
Holy. Shit.
As usual, I got to the Melkweg way early. (Since missing the first ten minutes of The Tragically Hip in Glasgow a few years ago because I’d foolishly thought that 20:00 on the ticket meant I still had plenty of time, I don’t trust venue schedules any more.) At 19:50 the place was practically deserted. The balconies were blocked off, too, which probably meant there was going to be a relatively low turnout. (Melkweg has a capacity of about 1500.) On the plus side, this meant I was easily able to bag myself a great spot close to the stage and up one step, to help me see over the heads of the inevitably tall Dutchies. Also, right in front of one of the massive speaker stacks. Yuss.
His Clancyness came on at 20:00 and played a nice set. More people arrived, and at 21:00 the lights went down and the sound came up. A haunting electronic drone, throbbing with promise, building and breaking in complexity, played over a blue-lit stage for about five minutes while the sound guys stage left made final adjustments, and finally covered up the glowing apple logos on their MacBook Pros.
The the band came on and launched into Give, Get, Take, the opening song from the new album Too Much Information. Paul Smith was dressed in a natty checked suit, white shirt, Doc Martens, and his trademark hat. Right from the start he was electric, dancing around the stage, posing, jumping, and shaking his hips. His voice was so pure and clear, and so like the recordings that I wondered if he was miming, but no: his live delivery is just extraordinary. The first four tracks they played were all loud and hard and fast to get the audience moving.
Sometimes hearing a favourite song live for the first time can be a disappointment. But when they played The National Health, it was just as powerful as I’d hoped. Locking eyes with the audience, shaking his finger for sharp emphasis, Paul Smith put so much power and emotion behind the words that it made me shiver.
Unfortunately the middle part of the set was plagued by technical issues. Lukas Wooller’s keyboard died during A Fortnight’s Time, and even the replacement keyboard didn’t work straight away. It took him and the techs a good twenty minutes to get sound out of it again. In the meantime, Smith was very apologetic, asking the audience for suggestions of songs they could play that didn’t involve a keyboard. Graffiti was a popular shouted choice, and they shuffled the set list around to accomodate the disruption. I’m sure it would have been even better with keyboards, but Graffiti was never going to be anything but a huge crowd-pleaser.
It was interesting to see a very different Paul Smith during those unrehearsed, slightly panicked moments after each song ended, wondering if the keyboard was ready yet. When he’s singing, he’s mesmerizing; when he’s thanking the audience between songs, he’s charming. But in the face of equipment malfunction he seemed shy and vulnerable. He’s a brilliant performer, but not a natural raconteur. (Puns about “sourcy” behaviour backstage notwithstanding.)
Her Name Was Audre was a great little guitar-and-drums punk tune to end the interruption, and things were properly back on track for I Recognise The Light, a funny track from the new album that I hadn’t properly appreciated until then. The sound quality at Melkweg was fantastic yesterday evening, with the vocals definitely leading the mix. As well as bopping up and down, I spent a lot of time listening to the lyrics, and hearing and interpreting them in a different context. I usually listen to music as a background to other activities, but at a concert I’m right there, doing only that: listening. I didn’t used to like Write This Down much, but the live performance completely changed my perception of it. Likewise, I hadn’t found anything special in Drinking Martinis from Too Much Information until the live experience transformed it for me.
Smith introduced By The Monument by saying that they were playing it at the request of Emma who had contacted them, at which point the woman standing next to me went into a squealing fit of utter delight. I can only assume she was Emma. The Undercurrents, another of my favourites from The National Health was glorious. Girls Who Play Guitars had the crowd in a frenzy. And finally, Midnight On The Hill, one of the most emotional tracks on the new album, gave them a truly shining exit.
The encore was playful. The last track on Too Much Information is Where We’re Going, and it starts with a simple strummed guitar and the line: “I don’t know where we’re going.” Someone in the crowd shouted, “Going Missing!”, which was the obvious response. Paul Smith interrupted the song with a laugh and told us that we’d get there soon enough. Big roar of approciation. So they finished Where We’re Going, a delightful, simple song about uncertainty and anticipation, and then segued straight into their big finale, the much-loved Going Missing.
To everyone who told me that Maxïmo Park are a must-see live band: you were right. So awesomely right.
A few weeks ago Abi played laser tag after work on a night out with some colleagues. Fiona latched onto the concept, and decided that she wanted her birthday party to be a laser tag party. I snuffled around the internet a bit, and found the Coronel activity centre in Huizen, about 40 minutes drive away. I recognized the name “Coronel” because Tom Coronel also runs plasma-discounter.nl (and a set of other web shops), which is where we bought our TV five years ago. What I didn’t know is that he and his twin brother Tim are also champion racing drivers, and big supporters of junior racing.
The Coronel activity centre’s headline activity is indoor karting. The web site shows that there is also a laser tag arena, and an indoor climbing and adventure area. They cater for kids parties, with a variety of packages. It looked worth a visit, so the kids and I decided to go and check it out on Saturday, and, you know, maybe avail ourselves of the facilities while we were there.
Holy. Shit.
I’ve never seen an activity centre like it. It’s enormous. The web site gives you no idea what it’s like when you step inside. The front entrance leads to a reception and café area inside the first zone, which houses the full-size indoor karting track. We didn’t try it out, but it looks great, with a tunnel and an overpass.
There’s a spectators bridge over the race track from the karting café to the second zone. The climbing and adventure area is inside warehouse the same size as the one housing the race track. It’s decorated like some kind of pirate island training camp. Climbable tree trunks, punctuated by platforms and crows nests, and connected by wire bridges and cargo nets, stretch up to the ceiling. The floor is sandy like a beach, with picnic tables for thirsty adventurers to enjoy a drink from the tiki bar. There’s an archery range.
Dazzled by this, we carried on along the bridge to the third zone. This one seems a bit smaller, but I’m not sure if it really is. It houses another bar (of course), but also a full-size bake-your-own pizza restaurant, and a beauty salon where you can host a make-over party. Oh, and a 1000 square meter, two-storey laser tag arena. That too. But because it’s behind closed doors and doesn’t have a viewing gallery, it’s not quite so obvious.
We had a chat with the woman running the bar, and talked about party options. Luckily for us, we’d got there not too long after the 13:00 opening time, and the first party of the afternoon wasn’t due until 15:00, so we were able to get slot of laser tag game time just for ourselves to try it out. It was great. The arena was really too big for just the three of us playing a free-for-all deathmatch. There were long stretches where I was just wandering around trying to find someone to shoot. I imagine that with a bundle of 10 year-olds running around, it’ll be just fine. (Alex won.)
After the game, we enthusiatically agreed to the party booking, and then walked back to the karting café for a drink. Fiona and Alex were both sweating from the excitement, their hair plastered to their foreheads. Alex was a bit sad that we didn’t have time for another game, but we’re going to try to head back next weekend to grab a session for Abi’s birthday.
