From the streets of Durham

[shewhomust]

durham_rambler has ventured out into the early evening, remarking that he's like to see a bit more of Lumière, and it wasn't actually raining. I was half tempted to join him, half tempted to stay home, finish my book (Naming Monsters by Hannah Eaton, random comics festival purchase, rather good) and have dinner ready for his return: guess which half won?

Which even gives me time to write this - for values of 'this' which are pretty low. I'm feeling a bit blocked, not because I can't think what to write but because everything I start to write sounds so plaintive and whiny, which is not at all how I feel.

Road closures and general obstruction caused by Lumière meant that the Saturday market didn't happen yesterday: the covered market was as usual, but the open air stalls weren't there. On the plus side, they meant a bonus visit from J., who had looked at the restrictions and parked well outside the affected zone when she went to church today, just handy for dropping in.

A parish councillor (durham_rambler) has been looking through the latest planning applications, and tweets that these include a proposal to renovate the John Duck pub and rename it the Drunken Duck. Justification? "The proposed signage is representative of Durham's heritage and history and will add a high quality aesthetic to Claypath..." I don't know what it says about the current aesthetic of Claypath, if its quality can be raised by the addition of a drunken duck. Sir John Duck, 1st Baronet (c. 1632 – 26 August 1691) was mayor of Durham: no heritage content there, then (to be fair, the pub itself hasn't had that name for long: I still think of it as the Castle Hotel).