Time on my hands: Fossil watches at John Lewis

The Piccadilly station clock signals 5 minutes before rush-hour...

I’ve been on the hunt for a new watch. It’s hard to always read the time on my once trendy, but now slightly scratched, Storm watch with a blue face which has done the job for some considerable time. 

Looking around shops and online made me think of the many watches I have had over the years. In fact it led me to waste time, a happy hour reminiscing on all those watches which had adorned my left wrist over the decades. 

I want something stylish and practical which is easy on the eye and also easy to tell the time at a glance. A watch that is elegant enough to see me through meetings I have around college and the north-west in general but which will also inform me of the Cinderella hour when I am living it up at a gig or bar in the Northern Quarter. 

I searched in department stores and on Deansgate, in the jewellry shops of King Street and even ventured into the Arndale Centre, but all to no avail. Exasperated, over a coffee in North Tea Power a friend mentioned that John Lewis sell watches. I’d forgotten about John Lewis- as it’s not in the city centre but out in the furthest of Manchester’s southern suburbs in Cheadle Hulme. 

So on an afternoon when the hail in Hale stopped my sowing of seeds in the vegetable patch, I went shopping instead. I ended up finding some timepieces I liked and have narrowed it down to two of the fossil watches at John Lewis. There were 17 in the ladies' range and I don’t know whether to go for the Georgia Glitz or possibly the Stella Glitz. (I sense a slightly worrying bling pattern in my taste here…) The men’s range looked quite varied too, so that might solve a birthday present problem I have looming later in the year. 

So it looks like a watch with a “glitz” in the title may soon be joining a select band of time pieces that I have owned. I fondly remember the orange face of my very first watch as a teenager and the fact that it supposedly could be worn underwater. I never did put that to the test. I then succumbed to the 1980s digital watch craze, with a couple of watches which I am sure were en vogue at the time. 

But my strongest memory of purchasing a watch came in Malaysia in the 1990s. Having walked to the top of a hill on Penang in humid conditions, we came across a local lad with a tray full of watches. His sales pitch won me over: “Genuine imitation watches” he cried. Top marks for honesty, kind of. It was the only time I've ever bought a genuine imitation watch; I fell for the novelty value of its Chinese numerals and it lasted me for years.

Monday Mural: Kelzo's train of thought

Walking through Stevenson Square last Thursday evening I was pleased to see the street art being updated. Even better was that I saw world-renowned veteran artist Kelzo at work, box of aerosols on the ground (follow the white arrow!) with the man himself creating this train bursting through a barber shop's shutters. More Monday Murals.

Live Below the Line for Oxfam

My large bowl of tagliatelle with red onion, leeks, avocado, walnuts and spinach.

Oxfam in the North contacted me to help spread the word on a new Oxfam campaign called Live Below the Line. It challenges people to live below the extreme poverty line, on less than £1 a day, for 5 days from 29 April to 3 May. 

More than 1.4 billion people worldwide, over 20 times the population of the UK, live in extreme poverty. Live Below the Line will raise awareness of the daily challenges faced by people living in poverty, push forward the campaign for change and raise money for Oxfam’s life changing work. 

The registration link for anyone that wishes to get involved. Personally I don't see this as much of a challenge in the UK- 50p a day would be but a £1 is easy. But I imagine a lot of people buy more expensive food than me and buy lunch at work rather than making their own etc.

As a part-time vegan and full-time vegetarian I do eat as cheaply and ethically as possible, in the main. Enough tasty and nutritional food for 5 days for £5 is actually easily achievable for everyone in the UK without having to think too hard, as follows: 

Breakfasts of muesli and apple juice.

Three lunches of home baked bread with houmous, sunflower seeds and salad. Two lunches of home made soup and home baked rolls. Fruit.

Main course, three nights of tagliatelle with red onion, leeks, avocado, walnuts and spinach. Two nights of a vegetable chilli (onion plus whatever vegetables are on offer, tin of kidney beans, green and red lentils).

Tap water to drink, plus coffee, tea, tomato and orange juice.

Enjoy!

Weekend Reflections: Blossom in the park

A walk to Stamford Park where the puddles can get you down. Or you can go wildly splashing through them as if you are 5 years old once more. Or then again you can also see them as a photo opportunity for an entry to Weekend Reflections.

Skywatch Friday: Railway rainbow

Thursday of last week at about 6 p.m there was a downpour followed by brilliant sunshine; and what was actually a double rainbow going up and over the railway viaduct that snakes (a little) and cuts through Manchester's city centre. 

This week's other Skywatch Friday posts.

Whatcroft Hall

From yesterday's inner-city high-rise overcrowding we move 25 miles south to a more palatial abode. The dome of Georgian Whatcroft Hall (built 1780 for James Topping)  near Davenham in Cheshire dominates in the distance, while a nesting swan chases a Canadian goose from its territory. 

Taking part in Rurality Blog Hop #12

ABC Wednesday: "O" is for Out in the morning

"O" is for this week's ABC Wednesday .

It's nice to be out in the morning was performed by Mancunian beat band Herman's Hermits in the late 1960s. It mentions some Manchester suburbs that had then seen better days, so I thought this 1960s tower block was a good photo to accompany the song.

"It's nice to be out in the morning when you've got somewhere to go, but seeing the same old places that can make you feel so low.

Besses o' the Barn where the brass bands blow, home of the heights where the chimneys grow. Boggart Hall Clough with its concrete flowers, it's not the Taj Mahal but it's ours.

But the town is people more than things. It's the mums and dads and kids and love that give it life.

United's ground where the champions score, a hundred goals to the reds stand's roar. And Bobby Charlton, Best and Law. It's a most fantastic day when they play.

It's nice to be out in the morning when you've got somewhere to go, but seeing the same old places that can make you feel so low.

Ardwick Green where the grass is grey, Beswick, Hulme and Harpurhey. Whalley Range where the tomcats roam; they're not the sights of Rome but it's home..."

Black Prince holidays & Prince's Trust T-Shirts

Every time I walk past this Black Prince Holidays sign at Bridge 208 on the Trent and Mersey Canal I am catapulted back in time to the nostalgia of the Enid Blyton Famous Five books- there's something about the imagery of the sign and what it offers that reminds me of picnics, ginger beer and jolly childhood japes... Five Go Mad in Cheshire perhaps?

City Daily Photo are today marking St George's Day. I would rather England's national day be marked by someone else-an English person or someone who actually set foot on this isle would be a start. Ideally someone who did some good or is revered.  Shakespeare might be a popular replacement, it's his birthday and death day today and another national public holiday wouldn't go amiss. Anyway, I think this photo is as vintage English as it gets. 

Onto other matters and another Prince. Not so much a black prince as the Prince's Trust charity which is fundraising in Manchester today.
Shaanti (below) are a collective made up of students from the University of Manchester, competing in a nationwide challenge to raise as much money as possible in 24 hours for The Prince’s Trust charity. All profits will support disadvantaged young people. T shirts with designs inspired by India are for sale exclusively for 24 hours today, 23rd April, through http://shaantimcr.bigcartel.com  and around Manchester University.

All 300 t-shirts have been kindly provided by Next, whilst the designs have been created by the comedian Doc Brown and designers Sophie Cull-Candy and Bethan Buss.

Monday Mural, an Oakland CA mural in Manchester UK...

I only noticed this mural along the side of The Cornerhouse Cinema  last week.  I was not sure who it was of, who it was by or whether I liked it...

I  have since read that Trust Your Struggle had been invited to paint it with the intention of "reflecting on the unchanged situation of the black community in Oakland, California, which has suffered extreme police brutality since it was first highlighted by Newton and Seale in 1966. The project also attempts to regard the potential neglect of working class ethnic communities within Britain, and the dangers of neglecting a more evenly balanced and socially inclusive approach to rebuilding Britain in the current economic climate."

It seems more appropriate than ever then, to link today with Monday Murals which is hosted in Oakland.

Weekend Reflections: Squaring off the old...

Current day banks and offices dwarf their 19th century counterparts (which are often more characterful in my view) in the city's financial district. Bur the modern glass does make for some reflection opportunities, enabling me to take part in Weekend Reflections.