Suburbis

A blog by a woman who creates and thinks, and is trying to work out how to make the world a better place - just a tiny bit of the world, at least.

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Detail of ‘Northumbria, 2017: cricketers at Bamburgh,’ screenprint. © JE Davis

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https://janetedavisart.wordpress.com/2017/04/01/tapas-jug-print/

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(via Mind your platens and friskets!)

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Reopening this Tumblr

I forget what blogs I have. I forgot this one. Tumblr reminded me & asked me if I want to keep it. I do. I still may forget to post in it regularly.

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My iPod is over-compensating for the greyness of the day as we pass through Northallerton. I have rarely visited the town centre but remember it as worth visiting.

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From the incomparable xkcd. It made me chuckle.

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I wasn't feeling well and wanted a story to listen to whilst I tried to keep warm and drift off to sleep. I had run out of stories and comedies that I wanted to listen to on BBC iPlayer radio, and I couldn't afford to buy an audiobook. So I tried asking people on Twitter if they knew of any websites with free audiobooks. I particularly like classic British detective fiction that is about solving puzzles not gore and violence. The people on Twitter were brilliant and came up with three suggestions:

http://nostalgic-radio.com/

http://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks

http://librivox.org/

In the meantime I had also remembered:

http://www.gutenberg.org/ has mostly digitised books but, if you browse the catalogue, you will find some links to free audiobooks.

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I keep listening to this preview on Soundcloud. I really like the first version of 'Love Is Lost' on David Bowie's The Next Day album.

At first, I was unsure about James Murphy's 'Hello Steve Reich Mix' during the initial 30 seconds. Then I thought it was interesting.

Around 5mins 30 secs in, it sends a shiver down my spine and brings a tear to my eye.

Around 6mins 20 secs, the brittle light reference to 'Ashes To Ashes' is simply exquisite.

I am currently addicted to this track, and very curious about what the other new tracks are on The Next Day Extra.

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Also see my previous post with the side view...

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I discovered this triangular pencil amongst my other pencils. It is an oddity, and I have no idea whence it came. The word "hardware" is written on one side), KINGDONS on a second, and Andover 65005 (an old form of telephone number if it's a UK one) on the third.

So, it appears to advertise a hardware shop called Kingdons, located in Andover, Hampshire. The shop name is not coming up on a Google search, which suggests that it closed down or was taken over years ago.

I have no idea how this pencil came to be in my house! I have only been to Hampshire once within the last 40 years, and I would not have picked up this pencil there. Nobody who has visited my house in the past 30 years has spent time in Hampshire, as far as I know. All I know is that it must date from the 1970s at latest to have the telephone number written like that.

Or, maybe there's a pencil fairy...

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Goodbat Nightman - by Roger McGough.

God bless all policemen and fighters of crime,

May thieves go to jail for a very long time.

They've had a hard day helping clean up the town,

Now they hang from the mantelpiece...

Thursday 3rd October 2013 is National Poetry Day. This is a poem that has always made me smile. In my head, it is recited in a Liverpudlian accent.  Liverpudlian is a good accent for poems except for...

the poem that I was asked to read at a school concert that contained the word 'grass.' This was when I was 17, in the 6th form in a Norfolk grammar school. The English teacher said that although my (very slight) northern accent was charming, I needed to lengthen the 'a' in grass so it could be heard better at the back of the hall. Having been made conscious of my short northern 'a,' each attempt after that sounded more and more northern until it sounded thickest Scouse (I've never had more than a slight accent, even as a child in Liverpool).

The English teacher gave up trying to make me lengthen my 'a' in 'grass.'

A lot of poetry works well with North Country cadences and vowels.

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Janet E Davis, Dog skull, tinted charcoal on paper, 2nd October 2013.

October is The Big Draw month. Everyone can draw. I need to draw more.

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Drawings of doctors: a patient's eye-view - gallery

Between 2004 and 2010, the artist Nick Wadley spent several periods of time in hospital. The drawings he made from his bed, collected together now in his book Man +Doctor, chart his encounters with medical professionals, from initial examination through surgery to life on the ward

This is an extraordinary set of drawings, capturing the sense of vulnerability and frailty one can feel as a patient. The drawing that particularly caught my eye was The Ward Round. It perfectly describes that piece of theatre, when the consultant does his or her ward round.

The consultant did not visit every day, in my experiences, but even senior registrars could be at the centre of this drama with a cloud of medical students (in various stages of awakeness) and one or two of the nursing staff hovering. But registrars were only the support act to the consultant's main act. We had to be ready for the consultant. We had to be washed, dressed, breakfasted and tidied before the consultant even opened the door to the ward. The sense of anticipation mingled with fear and hope was almost palpable. The air of reverence seemed to enter the ward before the great man (as it was in my experiences as an in-patient). Another patient once griped about the fact that the consultant had spoken to me for 10 minutes and only spent 30 seconds with her, and I suddenly realised that some patients felt the need to compete for the consultant's attention.

The first time I ended up in hospital, a friend brought me a couple of pencils and a drawing pad. The drawing I did helped me to be calmer and less panicked about being in a lot of pain (they'd failed to spot that I had damaged my back as well as smashing my ankle when I fell down the stairs).

I think all patients should be offered iPads if not drawing materials. The pain is more bearable if one can focus on something else.

I am writing this in October which is The Big Draw month. Everyone can draw. It's an important form of communication, a means to express oneself. It is for all ages, and there are events all over the UK for both adults and children listed on the website.

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Seaside in the sun (years ago)

I was about 2 years old, and don’t remember wearing that colour since. I remember the smell and light inside a green-painted wooden beach hut we hired for a day at another seaside. My gran was red-faced with the heat and finding breathing difficult. And at yet another beach, there were rides on patient donkeys. On a beach in Wales, three or four years later, jellyfish were dotted across the beach.

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I love the colours in these photographs and can almost smell the sea air and hear the birds.

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I am fascinated by Stef Mitchell's method of printing in the field (and vehicle), and this lovely blog post shows a very busy day of printing! I would love to see the faces of people who come across Stef's en plein air printing unexpectedly.

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Character notes

I found these notes in a small notebook in a drawer. I don't remember when I wrote them. I do recognise that it was going to be a satirical novel but am unsure that I understand all the notes. Anything below in square brackets is further explanation.

Joe Grimaldi Hetherington.

1950s.

Very tall, shoulder-length white/blonde hair & grey/red beard, aquiline nose. Very laid-back, still tends to wear cords of his youth, with hand-knitted jumpers or T-shirts.

Married to Laura, a moderately successful, auburn-haired artist.

Children grown up.

Has returned to youthful habit of smoking spliffs to counteract chronic back pain.

Cedric Gradgrinde

Last of the Gradgrindes. Tired of people saying they thought that the surname was just a satirical invention by Dickens.

Married to Muriel - a sharp-nosed woman who's obsessively tidy & takes gossip v seriously as an occupation.

Cedric is small, thin-lipped, wears 1/2 glass[es], grey, thin on top. Conventionally dressed. A "colonial" from an obscure African state. Family had gone there in 1870s to escape teasing over name.

Paul Muskett

Lanky, middle-aged man, never grown up. Very into Civil War re-enactments - & esp into experimental "archaeology" regarding camp followers.

Also curator specialising in firearms.

Mr & Mrs Stabbe. About 40.

The Poisonous Pair -

She - tow-haired, small colourless eyes, big-boned & clumsy; dull, beige skin - tendency to wear camel.

Vera "Chrissi"

He - collar-length dark, lank hair, snub nose, broad-faced but receding chin, fleshy neck, perpetually sweaty, pale, fleshy. Tendency to wear odd colours - mustard, puce, fluorescent orange.

No children.

John.

Clorinda Murgatroyd -

known as Violet Simpson -

dark-haired red-faced woman about 42 years old. Mystery past.

As I typed the above, I realised that I probably wrote these notes around 2000.