wendy house

A sign at the check-out counter of a childrens toy department makes it clear that only adults can purchase imitation fire-arms.   At least children wont be able to get their hands on imitation firearms when they feel the need to use them for nefarious purposes…   …naughty children.    

I can also report that there was not a group of children outside the store asking people to purchase the imitation firearms on their behalf,   they must be using more cunning organised methods to acquire them.

The staff at Jacksons are solution builders.   When something doesn’t work they fix it,   no unnecessary fuss.  

For example,    this light switch set in the Ladies underwear changing rooms controls 8 different lights in the main store.   The lights cannot be seen from the switch location.   Which lights are controlled by which switches?   You would need 2 people to find-out by a try it and see method.   Would you be able to remember from one day to the next which switch controls which lights?

The staff at Jacksons don’t have to learn or remember which light is controlled by which switch because they’ve cunningly labelled the switches!   Now, which lights are ‘spot 3.4′?

A couple of signs outside of the Royal Berkshire Hospital’s Medical museum left me completely discombobulated for all of 10 minutes.   How do these signs work together,   if at all?

Ambulances only

• as Medical Museum exhibits?
• as Medical museum visitors?
• Can park when delivering  Medical Museum guests?
• Can park outside the medical museum but their occupants have more pressing engagements than exploring the undoubtedly fascinating preceding accoutrements of their current treatments.

The Royal Berkshire Hospital building facade is very impressive.   Provision of a museum to enlighten the locals is a very thoughtful addition.

Why I love England #4.    welcoming

England welcomes all sorts of people,  even bus enthusiasts, as long as they behave like responsible citizens by following health and safety instructions and reporting suspicious unattended packages to the appropriate security authorities.

In the UK buildings can be licenced to pursue music, dancing, and entertainment of the  like kind, they also enjoy throwing several large dollops of befuddlement into the mix, just in case

have you ever wondered where wheelchairs go to relax,   hang-out,   shoot the breeze?  

Me neither.  

Apparantly it’s in a wheelchair park where they can cosey up to each other without anyone batting and eyelid or a googly…

Jacksons pay attention to branding detail.  

The store is branded with a dark green background to its main name sign above the mannequinned window displays and  below the large lettering that eponymously announces ‘Jacksons corner’  .    The text on its custom plastic bags and the piece de resistance is the wonderful font used to announce Jacksons on the green marble entrance way.  

I swooned.  

 I am easily pleased

Not ‘are you apprehended by the police for the ghastly crime of insufficient height’ but another clever  euphemism for wanting to go to the toilet.   The city of Westminster has signs to help you out with clever stick-people designs to illustrate the problem for those people who don’t understand the idiom ‘caught short’.     My favourite part of the sign is the invitation to text toilet,   for a toilet.    Hoorah,   no euphemisims there just send a text saying what you need,   effectively the bottom-line…

The sign over a Reading downtown establishment says ‘Vodka and Food’,   not ‘Spirits and Sandwiches’   nor ‘Alcohol and Chicken tikka Masala’   not ‘Food and Vodka’,   nor ‘Lunch and Liquor’.   I wonder who their audience is?   I’ve heard about ‘Chav’s’ since returning to Britian,   do Chav’s favour Vodka?

What does he CCTV camera directed at the entrance tell me?   Probably not much since CCTV cameras are almost ubiquitous in UK town centres,   apparantly in 2006 there was one camera for every 14 people,   but maybe it says something that I can’t hear…

The free Thames Valley Park bus service is outstanding.   It not only provides free wireless internet access,   it also provides signs to let you know where the internet access might be  a bit buggy.

A jumble sale in the local church,   not something I came across in the NW US.   The word jumble  didn’t crop up at all.   Ah,   memories of  crowds of people waiting for a sale to open, the rush to get the bargains,  old people with elbows of steel aimed with  the  precision of military training  at my softer-parts…     …money raised being put towards renewing the church roof….

I suspect that the people fishing were hampering the shoppers from parting with their cash.   All that  rowdy fishing and  other,   unspeakable,  disruptive disturbing behaviours that accompany fishing.  

I hope I’m not arrested for taking this photograph.   Shhhhh….. don’t tell anyone….

the bar staff,   2nd yr University of Limerick student, sold me Smithwicks beer  and told stories about how Limerick is known amongst the Irish as ‘Stab city’  illustrated with details of deaths amongst the people he’d met at a local the Boxing gym.    

The stone buildings are grey suggesting a  gloominess to match the mood of the weather

now this is evidence of serious  specialising.   A market dedicated to potatoes and a carpark for them too.   P for parking or P for potato?

Run away!

…after you’ve cautioned some children,  as a car with a puncture is approaching you in an alley with tall walls in Limerick?

I wonder what the sign is actually trying to say?

Beware adults running in front of cars?  

Beware cars skidding on corners,   you may have to run for it?  

Beware,   children drivers?    

If I had the courage and time I would wait near this sign to check if there are children driving cars attempting to run-down adults here.

even the extremely long list of fonts in my Microsoft Office Word 2003 doesn’t include this one on Nicholoson’s corneer shop in Sumner.   Small towns provide exquisite orginality and be-jeaned red car drivers

it’s just not clear if this sign is labelling products for or products by ‘feminine’s as trash.   Maybe it’s a deliberate ambiguity and the reference covers both!   Hooray!   My only remaining confusion is why such a powerful,   useful,   sign is hidden in  a toilet rest room cubicle

This signpost confused me.   We stopped,   I took a photograph,   was taking a photograph tantamount to loitering?  

Luckily,   at 42,   I was above the minimum for this section of Interstate 90 in Minnisota.   The road was empty.   I suspect the locals must be under 40.   I’m not ‘mini’.   I’m not a ‘mum’.   I wasn’t sure if I was breaking the law by not complying with the detail of the sign  on this remote, deserted roadway.  

Am I a naughty rebel or what?

Jennifer reminded me of this popular UK  ’uneven road’  sign.   Bumpy,   bouncy, my Favourite!   Uneven roads, accompanied by uneven posting, start today with  the road trip

Look after yourselves while I’m gone,   wrap up warm, drink lots of tea, take care, phone home, miss you already,

wandering-wendy

Pike Place Market has some suprising merchandise.   I’m glad they’re sanitary.

the word of Jesus brought to you  from a microphone on a downtown Seattle street corner (Pike & 4th) highlighted by a road sign pointing the one way…

A place to store your self.    A hotel where nothing ever happens.  

The Oregon coast Tsunami signs are way too common for the paranoid.

DONT PANIC    

(HitchHiker’s guide to the Galaxy,   D.Adams).

Advice provided by Oregon signs:

“Entering Tsunami Hazard zone” (e.g. consider panicing if you hear or feel rumblings that can’t reasonably be attributed to the Sea, your tummy, or a Unix critical internal contingency test)

“In case of earthquake go to high ground or inland” (e.g. if you panic run, drive,  uphill)

This sign is generously posted on the coastal routes. Methinks the ‘arrow’ should point at an ‘upward’ gradient because Tsunami escape involves getting to high ground.    

 Wendy the-earth-didnt-move-for-me-did-it-for-you?

UK Vacation 2

Temporary paper signs are often used to show when something is not working. They seem to come with HIGHLIGHTED apologies. These paper signs are ‘updated’ by helpful people. In the lift (elevator) someone has hand written directions to a working lift around the corner. We ignored the sign and discovered the lift was actually working…

The sign about “not entering the water‘ just tickled my sense of humour. I’d never thought of ‘entering‘ or ‘exiting’ water before. Describing the water as “not suitable for any other purpose” also made me wonder what people used it for, surely it has an aesthetic purpose? And where’s the harm in a playful summer water-fight? If its not suitable for anything then why is it there? Or is aesthetic not a valid public ‘purpose’? This municipal, metal, sign also had spikes on the lampost above it. Do they have problems with people climbing the lampost? why is that a problem to be deterred? Lampost climbing seems like a difficult, skillful and healthy activity. Maybe the spikes are some form of aesthetic that I haven’t yet learned to appreciate. I was mildly baffled by this. I suspect I will spend most of my life being mildly baffled by social engineering

“Pay on foot” also took a while to understand, as I looked around for a foot to pay…