Google Earth is an amazing thing. I can spend hours looking at satellite views of places I have been to before (or would like to visit) all over the world, some tantalisingly indistinct, others sharp enough to see pedestrians.

Sometimes the pictures surprise- buildings demolished years ago are still visible due to the satallite mapping being out of date.

A saunter to 55 deg 0′ 22.60″ N 1 deg 39′ 53.28W brings you to what looks like a garden feature in a Council Estate I lived in when I was aged 10 or so. It was the Kenton Bar Estate in Newcastle and a saunter to the co-ordinates shown shows the primary school to the South (which I attended for about 9 months), some flat roof single storey flats to the East (looking rather like Lego shapes) and two blocks of low rise flats at right angles, one to the North and the other to the West with a bit of a gap between them.

This area was designated as a sort of modern Town Square and shops were built under the Western Block. To the left of the parade was a coin-op Launderette which had all brand new Bendix machines and, innovative for the time, a Dry Cleaning machine. In the centre was a Newsagent, called North kenton News (which was a misnomer as North Kenton was thought of as the older and much scrattier estate adjoining to the North East). There was an Off License, Goldfinch Wines, which my Parents later had as tenants for a couple of years. There were also two vacant shops seperating the three open ones and I seem to recall that when we first moved there in late 1968 only the Offy was open.

There were intended to be shops below the other block of flats but they were never constructed so there was clear space below apart from the stair wells. The square was on two distinct levels joined by a ramp and stairs either side of a water feature. I visited the square a number of years ago and was surprised to find it had been tapered to a slope (as it is on the Google Earth view) and I’m pretty sure the path running at right angles to the Western block is the vestigial remains of the ramp as there are some low level light fittings I recognised. The vestigial wall at the left hand end of the Northern Block gives an indication of the height differential with must have been 10′ or so.

There is a very prominent feature removed from this 60’s socialist eutopia square that fascinated me as a kid, both aesthetically and technically. It would be interesting to find out why it was built in the first place and eventually removed at what must have been a considerable expense. Anyway, I will blog on what was missing after a suitable pause for comment and speculation from all three of my readers.

We have a routine on Mothers Day, inspired by an episode of “Little Bill” that David saw many years ago. Karen gets served breakfast in bed, consisting of Scotch pancakes made up into faces by the addition of raisins.

As David recently discovered the joys of Banana Splits, we also have marachino Cherries and squirty cream in the fridge so the pancakes had red noses and hair.

The fact that David was at his Grandmas because of the Mayor’s Ball last night was readily circumvented- when we got back home this afternoon, Karen had to go back to bed in order to be served breakfast!

…not this Sunday just gone, nearly four hours at Rothwell Sports Centre whilst David and I went for our orange belt Karate grading.

GKR Karate have changed the system a bit since we last went. Now all belts grade together, although under 12s and over 12s are done seperately. This is because it has been made easier for the Kids- they don’t have to do Kata until Green belt.

Grown-ups, however, still have to perform Kata at yellow and orange. In GKR Karate, the first two Katas are similar, the second including a number of kicks as well as the stance, block and punch movements of the first kata.
Once the main stuff is out of the way, the lower grades get some sparring tuition whilst the higher grades are tested on the advance Katas.

Whilst my balancing during very slow training kicks is still terrible and some of my advanced hand movements are a bit suspect, I’m pleased that my stamina and skill are much improved. Last time, I was close to needing a sit down after the intense routine, this time it was much easier- and indeed more enjoyable.

I had a minor panic attack last friday in the Dojo- the 2nd Kata was being done much faster than normal and I mixed my blocks up somewhat, something immediately being picked up by Sen Sei, the instructor. This gave me a slight crisis of confidence that maybe I had been doing it wrong for ages. However, I was just having an off day and sailed through it today, hindered only slightly by an enthusiastic but dyslexically limbed orange-belter in front of me!

We had a book fair at work in aid of Children in need today, as well as it being a good hook to get staff involved in our “right to read” scheme, where we visit nearby primaries and listen to kids reading books on a one to one basis.

Knowing this event was coming up, I took the opportunity to have a bit of a clearout of the vast number of management books I have acquired over the years. I originally intended to sell them on ebay, but taking a couple of Ikea sacks in to work was much less fuss!

My loft looks something like the back room of an Oxfam shop as Karen is often loath to get rid of things and I have tended to save boxes for a while now if there is a vague chance that the item will be ebayed. I cleared out a load of baby items for the Morley for Thurokovil appeal jumble sale last Spring but it is still an obstacle course.

I have a monster collection of floppy disks, many from when I was self-employed which probably contain software that has no use whatsoever, being for a doomed (now defunct )product development that kept me solvent even if it drove me to distraction at the futility of it all in a Marvinesque way (as in HHGTTG). The trouble is, that was my early days of venturing onto the internet and in amongst the chaff are 100% whole wheatgerm emails and documents that would be worth a fortune to a biographer if I suddenly became rich and famous. Maybe a trip to the tip is on the cards…

The book fair had a great selection, although the most interesting ones were the ones I had donated! I came away with a book about the history of magic illusions and another one which is some sort of conspiracy theory about the Titanic actually being her sister ship the Olympic.

Returning to my desk, there was a small bemused crowd looking out of the window- it seems that a sex worker was providing a client with personal services, in a nearby alleyway that was slat fenced so not particularly private. It started as a hand shandy and migrated to a pugwash (if you are unfamiliar with these terms, Roger Mellie can help). We did think that fire hoses may have sorted out the issue- it works with dogs apparently (unless they get stuck).

When you are a Councillor, notices of meetings are also known as Summonses. Most of us think of a Summons as something a Court sends you when you have committed an offence but Councils are something a bit like clubs who summons members to meetings as they are expected to attend. The Houses of Parliament work the same way and indeed old established clubs and societies like the Masons follow the same practice.

I’ve been summonsed to a special meeting on Wednesday. What is special about it? Well, it is a training event on the Councillor’s code of conduct. Why does it have to be embedded into a meeting? Beats me, perhaps someone thought that they would get a better attendance if it was a pukka meeting as the sound of training can be a bit dry to some. However, by making it a proper meeting, it comes under the auspices of the Public Bodies (Admission to Meetings) Act 1960, which means the public are entitled to be present unless specifically excluded for particular items where publicity would not be in the public interest. My “yellow bible” doesn’t mention training as a valid reason to exclude!

The matter is further complicated by the meeting time being 6pm, but the listing outside the Town Hall shows it as 7pm. Technically, the meeting should be postponed until then, as it is an obligation to post details three clear days before the meeting, i.e. if the poster was changed tomorrow, the meeting would have to be on Friday.

The other thing I’m not overly impressed about is that the meeting is at 6pm- I’ll have to rush eating tea and so on. I would have been much happier if we had simply been invited to a straight-forward training event- so what if some people don’t come? it is their choice as individuals and selling the event on the benefits always goes down better than being told to do something for your own good. We get enough of that from the Government…