A Stroll in the Park

Our next stop was Central Park. the bus took us up past a long line of posh shops then turned around to head for the Guggenheim Museum then dropped us off outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Our goal was to take a long stroll through the park and see the sights along the way. Our first sighting was a huge display of cherry blossoms in the trees and in bushes that were bigger than our house. We spotted the local robins, though they looked bad ass since they had black heads. After passing the King Jagiello Monument we arrived at the turtle pond and it certainly didn’t disappoint and we didn’t have long to wait before some its inhabitants came up to greet us. Our next port of call was the Belvedere Castle but unfortunately it was closed for restoration and was surrounded by scaffolding. So instead we called in at the Shakespeare Garden to admire the tulips. The only trouble was that every time we followed a footpath, we seemed to disorientate ourselves and achieved a great deal of circles.  

What to do on the 4th of July?

Hopefully, the same as every other day. If I worked for an America, I might get a free doughnut in celebration, but that might be it. Otherwise, it’s business as usual. Not every day can be celebrated in every culture, or even within the same culture. People still die on Christmas day however festive it may seem. Life goes on. When I was America, I joined in the festivities and no-one excluded me just because I was British. Likewise, I don’t expect Americans to display plastic dragons and have people walking about in suits of armour during the end of April. Americans visiting Britain at that time will have to recognise that we don’t see it (or much else for that matter) as a holiday. I’ve always wondered of running a British bar in New York though. Would I treat that day as just a normal day, or would I have the staff wearing traditional redcoat uniforms or dress them up in black to mourn the loss as a bit of fun?

Flag Fetish

Why is there a need to put a flag on every major building? Do people sometimes forget which country they’re in? It might be understandable if there’s a similar destination that looks the same, but being as there’s a giant departure board with a list of domestic destinations I’d have thought that it would be obvious. It’s a fetish that this democracy has and many other countries including my own don’t see the need for it.  I have no idea whether it’s law or what the reasoning behind it is, but there’s going to be a cost for cleaning or replacing it. Do the citizens get that demotivated if they don’t see their patriotic symbol? Or perhaps it’s a sign to remind their people to behave themselves according to their constitution; that their freedom of speech and choice of direction comes at a cost to others. It’s subliminal messaging in a different format.

Marvel Studios Character Guide

I got this as a freebie when I bought a DVD in a supermarket. I really hope that no-one shelled out money for this as it’s quite terrible. For starters, the cover clearly states: “Meet the Heroes and Villains of Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Endgame!” And villains are in plural. Yet there’s only one villain in the whole book which is Thanos. There’s no mention of Ebony Maw or any of the Black Order members. You might argue that his role in this movie is fairly insignificant, but he does have more lines than Black Panther who has his own page, and Quicksilver, who doesn’t even make an appearance in the movie. Some characters have two pages which is fair enough as they’re major characters, but it would be a lot easier to do a double page feature of their characters and superhero aliases side by side. And would it have killed them to have included the cast members’ names in there too! The final thing that I found annoying was the unnecessary taglines in the pictures directing the reader to parts of the costumes. I would have understood it more if was pointing out technological gadgets, powers or even fashion relative to the character’s origin, but having obvious labels such as “Leather Boots” of “Bathrobe” shows that the ‘authors’ really haven’t thought this through.       

The Rough Guide to Scotland

Scotland: The Rough Guide, Third Edition by David Abram
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I somehow ended up with this book from a previous visit of Scotland; I certainly didn’t purchase it and I suspect it just ended up in my bag after sharing a previous trip with someone else. Writing this review twenty years after its publication isn’t going to do the authors a great credit, but I guess the scenery hasn’t changed much (although the transport and parking services might have been reviewed). In general, I found this a brief but fair guide for the country. Only the major areas are mapped; but that’s probably all you need now. I was surprised that certain sights that I visited were omitted; but that could be because I focused most of my visit to a specific area. I think that if I was to buy another guide book; it’ll be a title from a different series; perhaps one that isn’t always focused on money.

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"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

-Alfred Tennyson.

This phrase should be the motto of the British people. It encourages people to do their best in the worst of circumstances, though its preceding lines advise us that there are limits as to what we can achieve and when. But the most important part of this message is to never give up. We should always be encouraged to seek out a solution; and it’s solving a problem or making improvements should make no difference and we should never accept anything less. We should always be encouraged to improve ourselves. It amazes me that this was devised by an artistic man who never saw military service. It’s therefore humbling that Tennyson declined his first offer of baronetcy in view of his comfortable lifestyle and it wasn’t a title that he inherited. It’s a message that we should all take forward and interpret in our own way; and that we shouldn’t just leave it in the hands of fictional MI6 agents.

Grand Central Station

This morning we decided to take a tour of the north side of the city. As we’d already been given our tickets, we were free to go at our own pace, and we tried for an early start but so did everyone else and we had to wait for a second bus to arrive before we got moving. I would have liked to have got a brief glimpse of the United Nations building but that would have meant a forty-minute detour just for a quick pic. So our first stop was the Grand Central Station. We were lucky enough to sit on the top deck of the bus and because of a traffic jam on the roads we managed to get some great shots of this gorgeous building. Once inside, we climbed up to a balcony for a great view of the station with its famous clock and its stone pillars. Rush hour was just ending so it was the perfect time to explore. We spent twenty minutes here before walking back to await the next bus.