Guardian newspaper catches up with reality but misses several of the essentials. Nice kindly article last week: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2008/oct/17/popandrock2

But scarcely any mention of the essential technologies, such as modding etc. Nor would you have gained any real idea that this is a great cross-generational style. I went to the June White Mischief and (mid-50s) was by no means the oldest. Complete age range from 18-70+ I would say and all enjoying ourselves and getting into the fun and serious business of dressing the parts.

This picture shows us getting ready to go out.

I took son to Weald and Downland museum for a whole weekend of bronze age sword making. Just brilliant. However no pix of that since the technique is (quite properly) the intellectual property of the instructor who worked out how it had to be done to get the authentic results. The swords still have to have their handles and the finished articles will have their portraits here in due course.

There was however a nice steam traction engine trundling quietly about the place.

I have been making a point of going into city centre back lanes and entrances that are open. In nearly all cases I have been walking past these for the whole 20 years I have lived in Glasgow. Many of them are revelations. Some of horror and squalor, filth and graffiti etc. But others have wee gems like this old petrol pump.

This is within 50 feet of the City Chambers, in the back alley that goes behind the Housing Benefit office. There is the social work car pool and lots of these white ceramic bricks but also this amazing ancient petrol pump. I like to think of it as the last one, selling zero gallons, hence the setting on the counter at the top. It could actually be an object of beauty if cleaned up a little. I wonder if i could make them an offer they couldnt refuse?

I will be putting more pix on flickr.

The entrance to the lane is surprisingly rural:

I finally got around to finishing the installation of the bellpull mechanism today. September weekend holiday and the weather was vile, so a good opportunity to get it done. The flat has had a horrid dingdong "Avon calling" type chime although the bellpush was the original brass one, ever since Ally bought the flat in early 1980s. However we now have a nice bellpull, which says "Waste" on it, just to confuse the unwary.


It now has a brass pull, huge wooden pulley and makes a pleasant tinkly sound from a small brass goat bell.





You can see the full details at Instructables: http://www.instructables.com/id/Steampunk_mechanical_bellpull/

Fascinating morning noseying round Reids Gear Works in Linwood, Scotland. The firm is shutting down after 4 generations and the Clyde Heritage Trust hopes to retrieve items not going to auction and also to get at least some of the buildings listed. Very few industrial buildings are listed in Scotland, compared to other types of buildings and this is a very rare example of a complete original that still has many old fittings and furniture.

I have no idea what this object is so if anyone has any idea, do let me know. It seems to have no means to connect it to any power or water or anything but must do something.

The factory specialises in making gears some of which are enormous, also winches and capstans. They first make a very accurate pattern in wood which is used to make the sand mould for casting, then the casting is drilled, milled, ground etc to the correct precision.

I took loads of pics which you can find at Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/8946321@N07/

We had a quiet week on the Isle of May this summer. Due to the terrible weather the daily tourist boats hardly came out and we actually had the island entirely to ourselves for a couple of days, which is always lovely. A few years ago the powers that be exerted themselves in a piece of gratuitous vandalism and demolished one of the wartime buildings (Indicator loops hut) in Fluke Street, resulting in a substantial pile of broken brick, which is very slowly being used as hardcore for paths and so on. I did some modest rearranging of the various coloured bits to make this smiley facing the principal keepers house on Fluke Street. My family never noticed so I wonder if anyone else has yet. I admit it is a bit like those tests for colourblindness.

You can see all about what the building was like at http://indicatorloops.com/mayisland.htm The authorities claimed it was hazardous but I reckon it was built to be bombproof pretty near and showed no signs of deterioration. It just didnt fit their image of prettiness perhap.s

Is this cheating a little? This pic is actually my dad's house. The ship is one that he and I made together the year I was 15 and is from the age of transition from pure sail to steam, as it had an engine and propellor as well as the usual three masts square rigged. Having slogged through the slow process of making that, from a wooden kit, I then understood how such models worked and made a number of others from scratch over the years, including one from paper and card, on the same frame and plank principle, and another of the Mayflower from the original plans in Plymouth Library.

The cruder wee toy models on top of the cupboards represent two of the sorts of ships I sailed on when I was a merchant navy deck officer, and a traditional Cypriot bus, known to the squaddies there in the 1980s as a Bondu Bus.

Its just been the first dry weekend since May and sods law we had to spend the entire time indoors at the Green party conference. Lets hope for better weather over the holiday weekend.

I was chatting to a fascinating young woman today who makes the high-accuracy wooden 'Patterns' used for making the greensand moulds for casting iron. She does both artistic items and machinery parts but started out as a sculptor. Good to know that such essential skills have not totally died out. However she had not heard of steampunk, which surprised me given that she was arty/engineery and young. Amazing how many people have never heard of the culture, even though it is all over the place in films and so on.