A Museum Christmas Carol

St.Acetone, patron saint of museum workers composed this Christmas carol in a Byzantine prison cell where he was facing charges of excessive cleaning in the face of silver artefact tarnishing.

Any similarity to the tune of Away in a Manger is entirely coincidental


A day in a museum, no dosh and mislead,
The hassled curator lays down his tired head,
The boss in the office walked to where
he lay,
The sleeping curator was snoring away.

The public are moaning, the curator awakes
But tired curator, no excuses he makes
He asks museum manager, come down from on high
And stay by the front desk till home time is nigh

desk bells they ring, they are rung out by visitors all day,
until tours are done and delivered until Christmas day,

Be near me, scotch whisky, I ask thee to stay
Close by me for ever and soothe me, I pray
Bless all underpaid curators with their unkempt hair
And take us to conference and drink the tea there

desk bells they ring, are rung out by visitors all day,
until tours are done, and delivered until Christmas day,
thank Christ was born, for our 1 day off is Christmas day



Festive greetings to museum staff and volunteers everywhere

Always look on the bright side of life

Does the title seem familiar? Fans of Monty Python's Life of Brian will recognise it immediately. Although, if I'm ever crucified in a case of mistaken identity I feel I would struggle to find the same sense of optimism on display there, but I might find the high notes easier to reach.

Why Monty Python? Well, this week I read an article concerning 'The Monty Python Guide to Running a Business'*. Silly me, I hadn't realised that the Pythons were actually business gurus and not just very naughty boys.

Thus while I sit here in my Santa Claus suit in the Museum of Unreason Christmas Grotto, my thoughts have turned to the benefits of ageing Oxbridge educated schoolboy humour for museums. The Christmas Grotto is a last minute innovation for the museum sparked by the news that Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery is not having theirs this year**. So I have persuaded the volunteers to wrap up unwanted artefacts for grotto presents as an acceptable form of ethical disposal. Unfortunately by charging £10 per child to enter the grotto (double for adults) means that we are not overwhelmed with visitors and I'm sitting here surrounded by a mound of festively wrapped horse gelding*** implements (for the girls) and scold's bridles**** (for the boys).

I'm now on my 3rd pint of the eminently quaffable Santa's Butt Porter***** that I've discreetly hidden in the seat of Santa's chair. In actuality Santa's chair is a Victorian commode reputedly used by Friedrich Engels when a young man in Manchester after a particularly excessive evening sampling some slightly undercooked Hindle Wakes******. It was this particular experience that inspired him to write the Communist Manifesto... apparently. Now it makes an excellent beer store.

So, I've decided the best way forward is to ignore Monty Python's business acumen and simply suggest renaming museums and their galleries after famous Monty Python quotes. Try this at your museum Christmas party. Here's my effort:

Museum of London Archaeology Gallery - What have the Romans ever done for us?

British Historical Taxidermy Society - The parrot is no more

People's History Museum - Come and see the violence inherent in the system

National Trust Cheddar Gorge Visitor Centre  & Shop - Blessed are the cheesemakers

Thackray Medical Museum - I've got no option but to sell you all for scientific experiments

Imperial War Museum - Well, warfare isn't all fun

National Horseracing Museum - You've got two empty halves of coconut and you're bangin' 'em together

Museum of the Dead - Well, that's cast a gloom over the evening...

The Veterinary Museum - Your cat is suffering from what we vets haven’t found a word for

Natural History Museum - All brontosauruses are thin at one end, much much thicker in the middle, and the thin again at the far end

Museum of Unreason - Your type really makes me puke you vacuous, toffy-nosed, malodorous pervert! (which coincidentally is an extract from our customer care policy)


What this all means is......(at this point a large cartoon foot descends to squash the blog)


Merry Christmas!


*http://www.inc.com/jeff-haden/the-monty-python-guide-to-running-a-business.html

**http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-25230304

*** gelding - as a verb relates to the act of castration of horses primarily to make the animal calmer and better behaved  (source Wikipedia)

***scold's bridle -  An instrument of punishment used primarily on women, as a form of torture and public humiliation. The device was an iron muzzle in an iron framework that enclosed the head. A bridle-bit, about 2 inches long and 1 inch broad, projected into the mouth and pressed down on top of the tongue.The curb-plate was frequently studded with spikes, so that if the offender moved her tongue, it inflicted pain and made speaking impossible (source Wikipedia)

**** This special holiday porter brewed by Ridgeway in Reading is made for winter - rich and warming, the way they like it at the North Pole. It was inspired by this famous line from a well-loved children’s storybook: "And Santa sat on his great butt, enjoying a hardy brew...", ideal for museum staff everywhere.

*****Boiled chicken stuffed with prunes, simmered overnight and served, hot or cold, with a lemon-flavoured gravy - yum

10 Words to Cut From Your Writing*

In my constant efforts at self improvement I was drawn to an article on 'lean writing'. The thrust of the article suggested that you could easily cut out 10 unnecessary words from your sentences. The words in question were:

Just
Really
Very
Perhaps/maybe
Quite
Amazing
Literally
Stuff
Things
Got

I'm sure you have written a sentence with all of them in before. I have.

'Just a short note to really thank you very much for all the quite literally amazing stuff you've donated to the museum which we've already got, so perhaps you maybe want to retrieve your things from the skip out the back''

Now try that sentence without the unnecessary words.

''A short note to thank you for all you've donated to the museum which we have already, so you can retrieve it all from the skip out the back'''

It works! So not everything you read on the internet is bad advice.

But the larger point is that we can be prisoners of our language, free up some words and free up your mind. Can this liberating effect be applied to museums? What words can a museum do without? What would be the effect? Here are some suggestions in no particular order:

Backlog
Accreditation
Trustee
Friends
Curator
Concession
School
Conservation
Object
Volunteer

Abolish those words and instantly your museum is a happier place. You don't have a backlog! Yippee. No objects and no conservation issues means we don't have to have a curator, instantly creating savings. With no concessions you can charge full price all the time. You'll have no friends (nothing new there), but no trustees telling you what to do either. They just turn into greying busybodies and therefore indistinguishable from the paying public. With no volunteers they'll just become unpaid staff, and therefore you can now sack the staff who have the temerity to ask for pay - yet more savings! No school groups means no graffiti in the toilets and no headaches at the end of the day from all the noise. Finally, no accreditation and heritage nirvana is surely reached while the dustbin will be full of unloved and unused paperwork.

Just reflect on that for a moment and don't pretend that I'm not offering you a seductive vision of the future for your museum.

I might apply this to my personal life, and after the week I've had I'm going to abolish the following:

Rain
Queue
Tax
Breathalyser
Fine
Mortgage
Arrears
Cholesterol
Erectile dysfunction
Hangover

Happy Friday 13th to one and all!

*http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/229369

Twitter Wars - @WillyShaking v @FrannyBacon

Having discovered in last week's blog that Shakespeare may have been the first person to use the word 'tweep', further research uncovered the fact that William Shakespeare was a prolific user of the micro blogging phenomenon that is Twitter. I understand academics have erroneously suggested that Francis Bacon composed his tweets. The evidence is scant, and if you follow Twitter, Francis Bacon's @FrannyBacon user aphorisms seem to lack the poetry of a finely honed William Shakespeare @WillyShaking tweet. All of which must give the lie to that particular conspiracy theory. The evidence is right there before your very eyes. Compare them for yourself below and see if you agree.

Here are some from the William Shakespeare @WillyShaking archive.

"Tweet all, retweet a few, do wrong to none"

"If twitter be the food of love, tweet on"

"It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but our twitter feed"

"Tweet to many, message to a few"

"Better a witty tweet than a foolish tweet"

"There is nothing either good or bad but tweeting makes it so"

"Hell is empty and all the devils are on twitter"

"The course of retweets never did run smooth"

"And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tweets in trees, tweets in the running brooks, tweets in stones, and tweets in everything"

"But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's tweets"

"How far that little tweet throws its beams! So shines a good tweet in a naughty world"

"Life is as tedious as retweeted tale, vexing the twitter feed of a drowsy man"

"Tweets without thoughts never retweeted go"

"Tweeting isn't doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet tweets are not deeds"

"A retweet sought is good, but given unsought, is better"

"The empty tweet makes the loudest sound"

"Now, God be praised, that twitter gives light in darkness, comfort in despair"

"Pleasure of tweeting make the hours seem short"

"When tweets come, they come not single spies, but in battalions"


Here are a handful of Francis Bacon @BaconButty

"Tweeting is power"

"It is impossible to tweet and be wise"

"A prudent tweet is one half of wisdom"

"Twitter makes dull men witty"

"The job of the tweeter is to always deepen the mystery"

"Tweets are thieves of time"

and finally.

"blogging about tweets steals even more time" @museumu

Follow us all at @museumu, @WillyShaking, @FrannyBacon for insightful and poetic thoughts on social media

England's Green and Pleasant Car Park

I am conscious I have been neglecting our car parking heritage lately. I note there was not a single mention of car parking  heritage at the Museums Association Conference. However, yesterday I was privileged to place my modest limousine in a car parking slot that is proof of Oliver Cromwell's assertion that 'God is an Englishman'. 

Suitably organic, lacking the geometric precision of other European spaces, and placed in a suitably bucolic setting. Just drink in its beauty, feel the sun on your face and bask in the distant memory of summer and thank heavens you are part of 'this happy breed of men [in] this little world'. 

 

And did those cars in ancient time 

Drive upon England's roadways green? 

And was the holy park for cars 

On England's pleasant pastures seen? 

Be quiet, tweeps. Wherefore throng you hither?*

I am over the MA conference and back on terrafirma, but my thoughts have been on twitterfirma ever since. Learning the new word 'tweeps' was possibly the highlight of my conference (I'm not sure what that says about me - or the conference). My thanks must go to the prolific museum tweeter Rachel Cockett (@RachaelCockett) for introducing me to the word. Since then I've have been adding 'tw' to most things much to the annoyance of the general public. The process is simple, if you tweet, read tweets, or even think about tweeting whilst indulging in everyday activity simply 'twitterfy' the word or phrase. For example, since the conference:

I've been twubbing (tweeting in a pub)

I've had a nice relaxing twubble bath

I've twined in a restaurant

and I've tweeded the garden - and very nice it looks too.

The possibilities now become interesting. Cockney rhyming slang will have to adapt. Will cockney 'tweezers' go out for a 'twuby' on a Saturday night, dressed in their 'twistles', I would suggest this is no less incomprehensible that the real thing.

When the kids have an extra day's holiday is that because the teachers will be having a 'twinset' day?

Will bagpipers now indulge in a quick 'twirl' of the pipes?

Do you tweet in the hairdresser's? Having your fringe whilst sending a tweet would that be a 'twinge'?

If somebody gives you a hint and you tweet it, would it be a 'twinkling'?

If you share the highlight of the conference on twitter would that have been the 'twilight'?

Would a museum curator accidentally 'tweak' a Ming vase by dropping it on the floor?

I could go on, and probably have. This all very diverting  - please tweet if you have some good suggestions with the long term aim of getting these words into the updated Oxford English Dictionary.

But beware - there are dangers. I'd never want a twitter chat to become a 'twat'. Or do I?

*  A Comedy of Errors - I may have found incontrovertible evidence that Shakespeare invented the word 'tweep' although there is a large coffee stain on the page in question so I can't be certain. 

Museums Association Conference 2013 Twittering Awards

How was the conference for you? Tweetful?

I sensed this year was a less intense twittercasion than last year. My own tweeting was down 70% and that includes my less than informative, "#museums2013" tweet. At least it proved I knew where I was and what year it is - could the same be said of all the speakers?

The first conclusion to jump to is that tweeting has peaked. Is twitter now on the slippery slope towards unfashionable desuetude?

There were a tremendous amount of retweets this year, I would suggest the majority of the #museums2013 hashtagged tweets were in fact retweets. Good snippets of information  were great especially from the simultaneous sessions, but many tweets were like buses they came in a rush all at once. Was this due to the intermittent wifi at the conference centre? I spent many a frustrated hour trying to send 140 characters of great pith and moment into the ether rather than listening. Goodness knows what the speakers must have thought as their great insights into museums were being received with scowling faces and phones being waved in the air.

I suppose this is a long winded way of saying the choice was more limited for awards this year.

There is usually a plethora of food related tweets from the conference. Pleasingly, yeast featured this year. Yet I believe my first award nicely sums up the entire reason for conference attendance for me.

Best reason for conference attendance tweet
@Purcelluk Good to see you @GM_Museums at the MA conference and thanks for the cupcakes! #museums2013

Meeting colleagues, having a good time and eating cake.. oh and there were some talks as well


Best excuse not to tweet
@nwestrep_ma Feeling happily tired and glad to be home after two brilliant days at #museums2013 - sorry been far too busy to tweet during conference :-)

Aren't MA reps are well trained, hardworking and corporately 'on message' - It must bring a manly tear to Mark Taylor's eye.


Best I've learned a new word tweet
@RachelCockett Museums Association conference #tweetup for museum tweeps. Non-tweeps welcome. #museums2013.
A 'tweep'?


Best hope for the future tweet
@GaladrielBlond7 the first time in my life visited the museum. it's cool. 

Surely the holy grail is for museums to be cool for the next generation  - and at least one has succeeded


Best advice to cope with budget cuts
@iainawatson Maurice Davies building future museum out of cardboard and string!

Will the next Museums Journal be made from sticky back plastic?


Best big brother is watching you tweet
@marktaylor_ma 1500 people attend #museums2013 and not one person from DCMS. No wonder they are out of touch.

"I counted them all in and back out again"


Best worst maintenance of equilibrium under stress tweet
@MuseumGeoff I am NOT advocating violence towards another person. But if I get my hands on them #museums2013

Prize to person who can make the best suggestion for how to finish the sentence


Best the more I read it the stranger it becomes tweet
@EastMidsMuseums "More love, less loss" - promote what audiences can do to help the environment w ur dead animals, not make them feel helpless #museums2013

A plea to love dead animals? A suggestion to ask for audience ideas as to what to do with dead animals? Are audiences helpless or dead animals? OR all of the above at the same time?


Best suggestion for what to do with an animal skin...ever
@ErinHillforts Quote of the day: "if you'd never seen a walrus & all you had was the skin, you'd stuff it til it was really fat and smooth!" #museums2013

I don't think it has to just be Walruses, just think of any cute animal with strangely shocked faces  - perhaps this is what @EastMidsMuseums had in mind for the previous tweet.


Lastly, criticism was thin on the ground but there were compliments a-plenty. "great session", "excellent session", "fun session" etc. But what was the best of the best compliments?

Best Complimentary tweet
@NickPoole1 Totally brilliant introductory role play on Board problems at #museums2013 from @Cubists great stuff!

Congratulations @NickPoole1 that is a proper complimentary tweet if I ever saw one and congratulations @Cubists for earning it.


And so the conference closes for another year. If any of you have come across better tweets, or better categories then do let me know.

Next year, will we have our tweetfaces on again? Or will it continue to fall? I suspect the quality of Welsh wifi may answer many of those questions.

eich gweld y flwyddyn nesaf

MA Conference 2013 - A National Disgrace

Did the title get your attention?

I tweeted my comprehensive review of the conference on 14th November, so in this blog I want to concentrate on a conference phenomenon I have become increasingly aware of over time. Namely 'nationals bashing' the fine art of criticising our national museums at each and every opportunity (at this point the conference organiser Sharon Heal breathes a big sigh of relief).

It is there, subtly, blatantly, snidely; in keynotes, workshops and practice sessions; at lunchtimes, coffee breaks and network sessions. If the subject of 'the nationals' comes up criticism is not far behind. 'They get all the money', 'they won't work with the smaller museums', 'philanthropy all goes their way', 'DCMS is only interested in the nationals', 'they couldn't care less about us' ad nauseam. This is then backed up by figures trotted out about Londoncentric funding etc. Has it not occurred to anyone that if you put the sector's best people with the best collections in the biggest city(ies) you are going to get inequality... of excellence.

Yet the nationals can't hit back and state the bleeding obvious to the rest of us. This is because they represent and are symbolic of our nation. I now need to narrow down my hypothesis. Last year in Scotland the talk around 'national' was dominated by 'nationalism' and the 'Scottish question'. I imagine a different dynamic next year in Wales, but in England there is no National Museum of England and England is the subject from now on.

The strong cannot criticise the weak, the wealthy the poor, the best collection the worst collection. It comes across as arrogance and panders to the very perception that you are being criticised for. The obvious comparison to draw is that of the arch criminal in a Hollywood blockbuster movie. The criminal is well educated, refined, wealthy, speaks with received pronunciation and is usually to be found in his (v. rarely her) lair surrounded by priceless artefacts exhibiting taste and culture. In other words the very epitome of a national museum director. Added to that is the scheming, the ruthlessness, the sacrifice of everything and everybody for personal gain - again the very epitome of a national museum director. The iconic archetype is Alan Rickman in Die Hard (1988) - the clues are all there that he is a museum director. The film makers try to throw you off the scent by calling him Hans Gruber - 'grubby hands?' as in 'get your grubby hands off my collection' - the message could not be more obvious. And what does Hans Gruber do? He seems to be able to fund a well staffed and well equipped army of combat curators determined to get private sector sponsorship and if not then to stop at nothing to take the money anyway.

Only the downtrodden underfunded small regional independent McLane Teddy Bear Museum is there to stop him - in other words a cowboy playing at being a museum. So how does Hollywood solve the problem and create a Leninist museum utopia of equality? Answer - throw the museum director off the top of a very tall building.

Now I am not advocating that we find the tallest building in Cardiff next year and start chucking the directors off the top (although I would quite like to throw Sandy Nairne, the Director of the National Portrait Gallery, off simply because half way down I think he will unfurl his bat wings and soar skywards laughing manically - or is it just me that thinks that?).

Can I make a pitch now to the MA for my talk next year's conference, 'The Die Hard Effect: how Hollywood is to blame for the poor staff morale in UK museums.'

The solution is to simply work through and then beyond these perceptions at the beginning of the conference. We should literally pillory any and all members of staff from a national museum (I am sure there are plenty of regional museums willing to lend them). The short term satisfaction of throwing rotten vegetables at David Roth shouting, "Yippee-ki-yay V&A!" is soon assuaged and proper English guilt will kick in and numerous apologies exchanged. The resulting dialogue over a cup of tea will commence and an understanding will soon emerge that we are all in the same boat working towards the same purpose to make the world a more educated and cultured place for the future of mankind.

And if that doesn't work we can still throw them off a tall building.

Make 2014 'Love our nationals' year - the campaign starts now.

Iffy

If you can keep your collections when museums around you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on budget cuts,
If you can trust your staff when the board doubts you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can accession and not be tired by the backlog,
Or being loaned an item, don't deal in valuations,
Or being dated, don't give way to dating,
And yet don't display too well, nor label too wise:

If you can budget - and not make grants your master,
If you can drink - and not make alcoholism your aim;
If you can display a Triumph and Bentley
And treat those two cars just the same;
If you can bear to re-read the panel you've written
Criticised by the public who are a rod for your back,
Or watch exhibits you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make a major bid for your museum
And risk it all on one turn of HLF funding,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about it to your boss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your public long after closing time,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Go home!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your sanity,
Or walk with councillors - nor lose the common touch,
If neither board nor friends groups can hurt you,
If all men work with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Museum and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Curator, my son!

Rudyard Unreason (1865-?)

MA Conference and Pictures of Car Parking Spaces

I am preparing myself physically, mentally and spiritually for the upcoming Museums Association Conference in Liverpool. The MA has unsurprisingly not replied to my offer to be the blog of record for the conference. I will nonetheless tell it like it is for those need to know. I regard it as my public duty to the world's museums.

At the conference itself I am particularly curious to find out more about the MA's new strategy document. I think it encourages museums to hold 1970s themed 'swinging' parties and is called Museums Change Wives. 

In the meantime here are some pictures of car parking spaces.


A renaissance inspired cubed square space


The great mystery here is: why is the number more heavily eroded than the bordering lines?


The designer here was clearly an American Football fan


A proper man-size space - alas restricted to coaches only


natural and festive - a delight for any car to park in


I'm not sure what to make of this duplicated message - who needs the reminder?


My favourite type of space - a little corner of a car park I can call home


A disused space?


Some proper effort has gone into the design of this one - disciplined segregation through design


Anarchically undifferentiated car parking space comprising sensuously geological material in the heart of England

See you all at the conference, I'll be the one with a moustache.

Happy Upbeat Quotes

One of the modest reasons for this blog was to change the world into a better, happier place.

It seems after four years that this might be beginning to happen.

Regular readers of the blog will recognise this image

I used it to illustrate the true meaning of life, but used a quote from Wittgenstein as the title, "I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves"

And yet on a Seivo search engine this image popped up under a search for 'happy upbeat quotes'.

http://seivo.com/index.php?page=search/images&search=happy%20upbeat%20quotes&type=images

My first thought was that if Wittgenstein was their idea of a happy quote then I would be reluctant to search for 'miserable unhappy quotes' on that particular search engine.

BUT, it is only the image that is displayed. In other words the car park itself is the quote. AND it is a happy upbeat one. That makes me happy and hopefully there are people parking their cars all over the world with smiles on their faces.

At last I am beginning to think my work may be done. Another of my reasons for the blog is to develop the appreciation of car parking spaces as heritage and art. Work is still to be done in this respect, but the moment I find an artwork concentrating purely on the car park space as its focus - then I will die a happy blogger.

Great British Programme Museums

The British Government has decided to gamble the nation's future tourist income on promoting museums based on popular TV programmes that have gone down well abroad (well America at least). Less wealthy tourists have no place liking British popular culture and therefore are ignored. But are the museums any good? The Museum of Unreason casts a critical eye over them.

1. Top Gear Museum - popular everywhere except France (something in itself worthy of celebration)

The museum was built 10 years ago, even so it has seen very little change and the displays themselves remain minimal. It is open regularly with events liberally spaced throughout the year, but what do you actually get? Patrons are faced with prospect of standing around in an empty warehouse being abused by some badly dressed costumed interpreters. You have to question their volunteer recruitment policy as the museum seems to be exclusively populated by xenophobic middle aged men. Of the few cars on show visitors are only allowed to touch the reasonably priced one. The do it yourself car making events are original and inventive but lack the important ingredient of audience participation.

In the end it is a museum that manages to proclaim British ingenuity and superiority whilst demonstrating the exact opposite and in the process offending everyone. A difficult achievement that we can all learn from.

I leave the final words to Jeremy Clarkson himself, "It was rubbish when it was new, it was built by idiots, and it's rubbish now...you avoid it like you would avoid unprotected sex with an Ethiopian transvestite." 

 1 star

2. Dr. Who Museum - the longest running (i.e. interminable) science fiction show in the Universe

This museum has been going for 50 years, although it is often forgotten that it actually closed down for over 10 years before a HLF grant greatly improved the graphics and displays to bring it back to life. As a result it is now and more popular than ever, but what is the visitor experience like? Well, inside it is much larger than you would expect. In fact, according to the other-worldly manager of the museum, "It's vast complicated and ridiculous." That is no exaggeration; there is so much to see, but the major drawback is that there is no logic to the visitor route - the chronology is all over the place. And what is it with the museum guides? They have a disconcerting tendency to change (sometimes in mid sentence) into completely different characters - confusing.

If you are intent on visiting, what is the best advice? "Don't blink. Don't even blink. Blink and you're dead. Don't turn your back. Don't look away. And don't blink.” Not recommended for narcoleptics.

3 stars

3. Downton Abbey Museum - more tea vicar?

A recent museum, it just seems like its been around for a hundred years. Following the National Trust country house heritage template (5 million members can't be wrong - well they can but that is a matter for another blog) with an interpretive strategy of '..the clock stopped'. Cynics suggest that they have just forgotten that clocks need winding up occasionally. 

Visitors get the traditional room settings and a complete set of servants quarters (National Trust take note). The downside is that the servants quarters are actually fake and 60 miles away in London. I therefore recommend you buy the 1 day pass.

Simon Schama described the museum as 'cultural necrophilia' - wrong! I can recommend many other museums (try Guanajuato's El Museo De Las Momias for example) offering better examples of that for dear Simon. It is not cultural necrophilia as it is something very much alive, breathing quietly in a corner and offering restraint, dignity and manners. This museum offers a comfortable certainty (allowing for the odd liner sinking and World War) in a world of uncomfortable uncertainty. Is it cultural? It is certainly cultured; perhaps it's culturally uncultured culture; and therein lies its appeal - a pretty pretentious soap opera augmented by the auratic gaze of nostalgic traditionalism. Perfect.

This museum is unsinkable - so what is its future? The noble Lord Grantham himself said, "..every ship is unsinkable until it sinks."

5 stars

4. Sherlock Museum - the footprints of a gigantic ....museum?

A modern redevelopment of an old museum set at the same location in West London. The downside is that it is only open for 3 days a year for an hour and a half. This means, inevitably, that you have to queue. It uses the traditional room setting in the Downton Abbey manner but much much smaller and only comfortable for a handful of people at a time. The real problem is the simplistic interpretation which just leaves clues forcing the visitor to try and work it out themselves - baffling. At least Sudoku fans should enjoy it. The occasional violin music give me a headache fortunately the museum cafe sells opium laced cream teas to ease the pain.

Given that the museum states ,"True deduction can only be obtained through a certain amount of self annihilation" I came away suitably diminished, certain in the knowledge that if I opened my mouth I would, "lower the IQ of the whole street". Entertaining? Yes. Confusing? Possibly. Interpretive style? Elementary.

3 stars

5. The Office Museum - the second best museum in Slough 

A slice of industrial heritage, celebrating the great British paper industry. Sadly it hasn't been updated in over 10 years. However, the museum itself successfully explores the 'back office' function through its social and professional relationships. Less glamorous than our country house heritage but nonetheless just as important. It gives an excellent insight into the collapse of British manufacturing base through egoistic incompetence (n.b. all politicians should visit). As Gareth points out;

"I did learn a lot from David. I learnt from his mistakes. We're very different people; he used humour where I use discipline. And I learnt that nobody respects him. And in a war situation, if you want your platoon to go over the top with you to certain death, it's no good saying to them "Please come with me lads, I'll tell you a joke." It's a direct order "Come with me." And they'll go "Yes, he's got good leadership skills, let's all go with him to our certain death". 

Wise words we can all benefit from.

If a museum's strength is that it enables us to learn from the past, in the hope that we can apply the lessons to the future, then The Office Museum is ideal learning material because it didn't last long before closing down, transferring to America to gain long-running success.

For the British economic delusion in a nutshell I leave the last words to David Brent, " I'm sure Texas couldn't run and manage a successful paper merchants." 

4 stars

Movie Museum News

Latest news from around the movie museum world.

• There are rumours of a move for the Wizard of Oz museum so that it won't be in Kansas anymore. 
• It is believed that the Cool Hand Luke museum is due to close because of its failure to communicate. 
• The owner of the White Heat museum has fulfilled his mother's dying wish to build it in the Himalayas and was heard to say, "Made it Ma! Top of the World!" 
• The new method to get donations at the free to enter the Jerry Maguire museum has the docents pursuing visitors around the displays shouting, "Show me the money" 
• Sadly the Few Good Men museum has closed, the owner believes it is because the general public couldn't handle the truth. 
• In order for the Jaws museum to expand its visitor numbers, its going to need a bigger boat. 
• The Treasure of the Sierra Madre museum has abandoned its membership badge policy. As the Chair of the Friends Group so eloquently put it, "Badges? We ain't got no badges! We don't need no badges! I don't have to show you any stinking badges!" 
• I can confirm the new Graduate museum will be made entirely out of plastics 
• The headline review of the Beyond the Forest museum - WHAT A DUMP! 
• At last the new displays at the Poltergeist museum - they're here! 
• In news from the HLF funded 1940s British Films museum, recent complaints about the Genevieve displays has made the curator wonder about the new visitors, "Are they Americans?" Furthermore, the I Know Where I'm Going section's concentration on growing a male only audience means they, "...haven't heard any intelligent female nonsense in months."
• Plans to extend the British Swinging Sixties Museum ended in disaster when they were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off.
• And finally, after the recent withdrawal of financial support for the Modern British Animation museum it is being forced to relocate. The director said, "Cheese! We'll go somewhere where there's cheese! Everybody knows the moon is made of cheese."

Life is Art. Art is Life. I am Art. Art am I

The demand to provide a temporary art exhibition at the Museum of Unreason has inspired a debate on art. I naturally assume that anyone who works in a museum is open to the beauty that the world offers us, but our thinking seems limited. The staff came up with local art group/school competition/public curation of the art in storage. Ludicrous ideas all. What about hanging everything upside down and pretending to be Australian? Or smashing up several artworks in the gallery to represent the fragmentary nature of memory (not my idea - but a brilliant one). In the end I have decided to curate a special art exhibition called, 'ME' to tell the a day in the life of ME.

Morning

The Unmade Bed, Imogen Cunningham 1957 Metropolitan Museum of Art

A Regular Day at the Museum

Work, Ford Maddox Brown, 1863, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery

Lunch

Joel Penkman, 2011

which merges into Afternoon Tea

Tea Time (Woman with a Teaspoon), Jean Metzinger, 1911

closely followed by the Pub

Cranbrook Arms, Rob Adam 2011 (http://www.treeshark.com/treeblog/?p=335)

Home at last???

Switch, 1994, Rachael Whiteread

Lights  - eventually

Two Candles, 1982, Gerhard Richter

Oops left the gas on

 Cold Dark Matter: An Exploded View,1991, Cornelia Parker

Resulting in

Piss Flowers (5) 1991-1992, Helen Chadwick

What have we learned from this? Live life, experience life, record it in whatever way you want and celebrate it. In my view, if Helen Chadwick can take plaster casts of urination to create things of exquisite beauty then the only thing that is limiting us is our imaginations. Oh and also most of the imaginative art is being done by women - just think what could have been produced had we given them the vote 5 years earlier.

Have you come across a great idea in a cultural venue? Let me know so the Museum can copy it and I can claim it as my idea -because nobody will let me borrow these paintings...boo. 

Museum Phobias

As promised last week, this week is phobia week. A straw pole at the Museum of Unreason revealed the following top ten phobias that museum staff and volunteers suffer from. I cannot claim this to reflect museums as a whole, but do you recognise yourself here?

There was a strong case to be made for Walloonphobia (fear of the Walloons) at the Museum of Unreason, but I think that is due to a works charabanc outing to Liege two years ago that went horribly wrong. If it is a general phobia in UK museums I would be rather surprised  - but does it actually explain the dearth of interpretation for Belgian visitors in our museums?

10. Polyphobia- Fear of many things.

The staff are scared, in the words of the receptionist, "Where do you want to start?" When you last visited a museum, did you notice the member of staff twitch and cower slightly as you approached them? Could you actually find a member of staff? In honour of the current coalition government I propose we rename this phobia Cameroclegaphobia

9. Metathesiophobia- Fear of changes.

The management of change is difficult for any organisation, to do so in museums is practically impossible so give  up and take pride in cultural stasis.

8. Ponophobia- Fear of overworking. 

The staff seem to suffer terribly from this, however hard I drive them. Although they do have a point, so I make sure I leave work at 3pm every day.

7. Ideophobia- Fear of ideas.

Excerpt from my latest meeting with the Chair of Trustees

"What shall the new display be on?" "I have no idea." 

"How do we pay for it?" "I have no idea." 

"What is your job?" "I have no idea."

This phobia explains an awful lot.

6. Chrometophobia - Fear of money.

Is this the true reason for so many volunteers in the heritage sector? I bet if you offered a volunteer money he/she would run away screaming. Certainly when any volunteer asks me for travel expenses I run away screaming, is that the same thing?

5. Ephebiphobia- Fear of teenagers.

It is no coincidence that the lowest museum visitor demographic is the 16-24 age group. 

4. Kainolophobia - Fear of anything new, novelty.

My hilarious handshake buzzer appeared to expose this phobia amongst the museum staff.

3. Zemmiphobia- Fear of the great mole rat.
Many museums have mice, some employ cats to solve the problem. Unfortunately our rodent infestation ate our cat and volunteers seem to be disappearing rapidly. NEVER go into the stores unarmed - or perhaps its just my Zemmiphobia?

2. Plutophobia- Fear of wealth.

We complain about cuts, poor wages but we wouldn't have it any other way. We don't want to be bankers. We have integrity, we have cultural capital and in our world a bonus is a pound coin found down the back of the sofa. Anything else just scares us.

1. Disposophobia- Fear of throwing stuff out

It had to be. The Museums Association is trying to force us to rationalise our collections. Don't they realise they are dealing with ill people. Would you make an agoraphobe stand in a field? No, so don't make me ethically dispose of my unnecessary objects.

Pictures of Cats With Funny Expressions on their Faces

Last week during my blog I discovered the secret of life. Somewhat surprisingly I found it in a car park in Louisville, Kentucky. It is strange the links that are made in life that eventually lead to self actualisation, but there it is. Alas rumour has it that this will now form the plot for Dan Brown's next novel. So I can only apologise to the car park users as I expect the lot to be full with tourists from now on (once they find it).

Anyway, this week I promised pictures of cats with funny expressions on their faces.

This is my cat Lulu, named after the diminutive Scottish teen pop singer from the 60s. Why? I suppose you haven't heard my cat sing.

Happy Lulu

Serious Lulu

Reflective Lulu

Angry Lulu

Lulu in love

Can I go now?

Taking cat photos was not as easy as I expected. Just google 'cat' and millions of cute felines suddenly appear - how is that possible? I follow my cat for days taking photographs and nothing cute happens. Although I did rip my trousers falling out of a tree in the local park, and the old lady I fell on didn't find the experience cute at all. It was only when the policeman examined the boring cat images on the camera was I allowed to leave the station - 4 hours later.

Frustrated, I took action. When I attempted to put a clown's nose on Lulu, she objected. It wasn't a fair fight. She was young, quick, angry and well armed and I wasn't. I beat a hasty retreat as I didn't want to go into work with mysterious marks on my face again. So I ended up with these photos - and from this moment on let it be known that all other cat pictures on the internet have been Photoshopped - do not believe them.

This incident confirmed what I had always suspected - I had a small dose of ailurophobia*, but also made me realise I had a big dose of amychophobia**. This got me thinking about phobias. It is well known that Alfred Mosher Butts invented Scrabble to overcome his hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia***. I'm not sure I've spelt that correctly because my word processor's angry caterpillar immediately underlined it. I then realised it was set at U.S. English so took out any unnecessary 'u's and swapped the 's's for 'z's - that didn't help at all - the caterpillar just got angrier. So I set my spellchecker to 'English' English and ignored the caterpillar confident in the knowledge that machines don't know everything.

Anyway, all this got me thinking about phobias. Then it got me thinking about phobias in museums. It is thought that the director of a certain farming museum is an agoraphobe****, and rumour has it that the Visitor Services Manager at the People's History Museum is an alektorophobe*****.

So this week I will be conducting a survey at the Museum of Unreason to discover and then report on the ten most common phobias in the heritage world  - watch this space (unless, of course, you are an astrophobe).

* fear of cats
** fear of being scratched
*** fear of long words
**** fear of tractors - probably
***** fear of chickens

"I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves"

The title is a quote from Ludwig Wittgenstein*. I was looking for a phrase that had a suitably upbeat quality as I contemplated yet another car park and happy-go-lucky Ludwig came up trumps.

Examine the scene. Your eye is drawn down the disorientating white lines** towards the solitary individual surrounded and dominated by inanimate and uncaring vehicles. A scene of despair and inconsequentiality in an uncaring (and possibly hostile world) or as we know it, Tescos. And in the end, we all die etc. etc.

The person who sent me the photo commented, "The guy in this photo is totally isolated against the landscape of cars, which I thought was humorous but also a bit scary..maybe a bit of a metaphor for how I felt. Everything here seems too large and unnecessary .."

Other than my stomach, which is too large and unnecessary, I didn't find this photo humorous, scary or depressing. Those who read my blog regularly will know (and possibly be slightly concerned about) my enthusiasm for car parking spaces and their uniqueness. As I reflected over a period of days I came to realise that inherent in this picture is the meaning of life.

In order to explain, lets go back to your childhood. A place of mystery and wonder where we react in an emotional way to the world around us. We simply experience life. Then we go to school, college, university (or borstal - in my case - a simple misunderstanding that got out of hand), gaol etc. We learn how things work and why things happen but in separate disciplines - physics, chemistry, history, geography, divinity (religious instruction) - I went to  a posh school, at least until I was expelled - yet another misunderstanding. We learn to separate, to specialise -to find reason, to find meaning in detailed knowledge. In the heritage world we have specialist curators, alas increasingly rare due to cutbacks, but somehow apt to have rare people looking after rare things rarely.

Thus we leave our education system knowing lots about bits, but with little or no ability to work out how it all fits together, but with the constant search for understanding. Surely this is a sure fire guarantee of societal existential angst, depression, suicide and death amongst the populace (how else do you explain the popularity of Strictly Come Dancing?) We may as well hand out a tanto*** with each degree certificate.

We are always striving to find meaning and museums are amongst the worst culprits. Yet it can be found in a car park by its very meaningless. Take the Buddhist concept of 'Emptiness' - stop the ceaseless search for the meaning of life by just simply experiencing life and therefore find meaning in the meaningless. For example, you can only 'know' the meaning of love if you are in love - you know its meaning by experiencing it. I try and apply that to museums. Museums too often try to educate and offer knowledge thereby failing in their duty to give meaning. The most telling comment in Judith Henry's excellent 'Overheard at the Museum' book is, "This forces you to think and I don't really like to do that." I can sympathise with that viewpoint. At least you can come to the Museum of Unreason and not think and find meaninglessness AND therefore the secret of life itself (I should put that on our advertising leaflets).

And so back to our picture. Here is a moment of wonder, you are experiencing a precious one-off event -yet your thoughts jump into the routine drudgery of life, the size of the cars, the angle of the lines etc. And so you fail to see the brilliance of what is going on. We try and find meaning and the very act of trying means we fail. Don't think! And find the very act of not thinking a liberating life affirming experience. How many museums offer that? Yet every car parking space does offer that, because it is not there to encourage you to think. An empty car parking space is the Buddhist concept of 'Emptiness' in physical form - it is Nirvana, it is a Christian Heaven (a full car park being Hell obviously).

Next time you go into a parking space, stop for 10 seconds and revel in the wondrousness of the experience. I will guarantee the weekly shop will be much more bearable because of it.

Here endeth the lesson - next week pictures of cats with funny expressions on their faces.

*Three of Wittgenstein's brothers committed suicide and he himself contemplated it. Yet he was the most important philosopher of the 20th Century according to Bertrand Russell - personally I think I would rather be happy.
**I like to think the white lines are spaces for trandems, but I suspect not
***tanto - ceremonial sword for committing seppuku

Are you a museum piece?

Following my last 'car parking space as toothbrush' blog, I have been literally inundated with another picture. I am currently musing upon its societal implications, but the one thing I have been struck by is how they are all the same -yet different (I'm playing a spooky tune in my head while I'm typing this). I have been thinking about this during our great nation's Heritage Open Days. Apparently a great success according to the Norwich Evening News*, but less so in the small village of Unreason - my musings on this annual event will be the subject of a later blog. I sat there bored, questioning my existence and the point of museums. I was at a new low, our funding was being cut again and my Russian girlfriend's grandmother was ill again and needed me to send more money.

However, we did have one visitor yesterday. I never realised that our government's esteemed Culture Secretary has a second home in Unreason. In fact many members of he current government either live, have second homes, or claim expenses in Unreason and the surrounding hamlets of Unreasonable and Unreasoning. He didn't actually visit but I saw him through the window as he walked past. However I fell into conversation with Mr.Vaizey as I followed him down the street. He eventually informed me from the tree in which he happened to have climbed that I was a museum piece myself.

I stopped, put down my pitchfork and immediately cogitated on the profundity of the man. Buildings are museums, ancient objects are museum pieces, car parking spaces should be museum objects, but they pale into insignificance against the very uniqueness of the human individual.

Consider this, there is only one of you, it is highly unlikely that there will be another person like you, never mind what what you do, what you collect and how you interpret the world around you. You are brilliant, unique and the world is different because of you - celebrate that and go to sleep with a smile on your face.

You are the very definition of rare. How can you put a value on one-of-a-kind? You can't. It is inestimable and therefore your value is infinite. You are more important than a museum, you are THE living museum. That was a revelation to me of biblical proportions - so I delved into that book of wisdom to clarify this thought.

 Proverbs 29:18 from the King James Version (that's the only proper bible) says , 'where there is no vision, the people perish'. Blinkered theologians have interpreted the 'vision' as the redemptive revelation of God. I fact our Culture Secretary says it is really saying that the 'vision' is the redemptive revelation of your singular beauty and individuality - realisation of this will allow you to thrive, grow and blossom. Yet too many of us perish, caught within a self-defeating spiral of self doubt imposed upon us by others and society.

So I went back to the museum, put the pitchfork back onto our Witches of Unreason display, then stood in front of a mirror and revelled in the museum piece before me; sent my girlfriend's grandmother a get well card, then rang the Chairman of Trustees to say not to worry everything is going to be alright, that I am God and car parking spaces ARE heritage.






*http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/news/heritage_open_days_festival_is_a_huge_success_in_norfolk_1_2754206

Life is ...a car parking space

Take a look at this picture of a car parking space. It could be anywhere in the world (well, not really anywhere - connoisseurs will instantly recognise the soft yellow lines, and the cracked, sun baked concrete bitmac mixture as Texas U.S.A. - probably south near the Gulf of Mexico).  You wouldn't take a second glance at it, unless you were in a car and looking for a somewhere to park. And there is my point. I would argue that the most common form of pleasure and relief we experience in our car based society today is the discovery of a free car parking space. Next time you pull onto your drive, into your garage, or finding some on street parking near your house - think of that pleasure. It means home, it means a safe haven - most memories will feature that space however unconsciously.

Next time you go shopping, go to work, or to a museum (as I do on a daily basis) just reflect on that small skip of the heartbeat when that magical space between two vehicles comes into view. On this crowded island of Britain that could be translated into unconfined joy and tears of relief (I particularly recall one such moving experience when Christmas shopping a few years ago).

Let me take that thought a step further and use this particular car parking space to illustrate the depth of importance of the car parking space in our lives.

The car parking space enables society to function, it enables life to happen - it is by proxy the arbiter of your mood, the barometer against which you measure whether you have had a good day, the enabler of activity (or frustrater). It is the lungs of enterprise, the heart of capitalism, the place of that first kiss, the conception of the first child (or fourth child in Ron Howard's case) and in the case above a crucial step in dental hygiene.

This picture was sent to me with this quote attached,

"This car parking space sits outside of my dentist's office. Without a car parking space, I wouldn't have been able to park my car. If I didn't park my car, then I wouldn't have gone into my dentist's office for my appointment. If I didn't go to my appointment, then I wouldn't have gotten my teeth cleaned. So ultimately... this car parking space is like my second dentist."

There you have it in a nutshell. Car parking space as tooth brush. Car parking space as health clinician.

Salvador Dali never said far better than I.

"Progressive art [and car parking spaces] can assist people to learn not only about the objective forces at work in the society in which they live, but also about the intensely social character of their interior lives. Ultimately, it can propel people toward social emancipation." (I added the bit in brackets - Dali would have said it but I feel he lacked the imagination).

Artists are always arguing that life is art (Tracey Emin's 'My Bed' in 1999 anyone?) then car parking spaces are art, maybe brutal, angular vorticist art - but art nonetheless.

There it is - the car parking space rules our lives, they ARE our lives and therefore let's celebrate them as ART, as DENTISTS, as MUSEUM pieces worthy of our respect. Next time you conveniently park - shed a small tear of sorrow at the neglect at these wondrous rectangular boxes.

Rules for success for museum professionals whilst in the pub

Let's begin with the idea that no-one gets what they want in life. Well boo-hoo! I don't have an Aston Martin car in my driveway (I don't even have a driveway). The closest most of you will ever get to a luxury car is in a museum. So if you can't get what you want then do the next best thing and have a career in museums. The logic is inescapable. Can't afford a big house? Volunteer for the National Trust etc. etc.

So the first and only definition of success is to work or volunteer at a museum or heritage site. This may not be what a successful businessman or entrepreneur defines as success and not everyone can volunteer (if not why not?).

So what else may help you? For the rest of this blog I am inspired by James Caan (he of Dragon's Den fame) and his, 'The Eight Rules of Success To Think About Every Morning'.  So what does James Caan think (link below).

1. Application
Work hard? I agree there is nothing wrong with hard work. The trick is to work effectively and strategically. The paying public can't help your career, so why bother working hard on customer service. Invite your trustees to the pub get them drunk and have them agree to a pay rise (have a pen and beer mat handy). That is working effectively. So if you are reading this in the pub, look at the people you are with. Can you exploit them? If not, at least get a drink out of them (and maybe a kebab later).

2. Believe in yourself
If you do not believe in yourself, who else will? Wise words. There are many brilliant people in the museum world, but they seem to believe that saving artefacts and buildings and (may the god's preserve us) interpreting it for the audience are more important. I realised many years ago that I am the most important person in the museum and the artefacts and resources of the museum are there for me and my use. Future generations will thank me for it. So if you are in the pub with your friends just tell them how good you are and how much better than them you are. They will instantly recognise your greatness and grant you personal space to realise your dreams by moving to a separate table on the other side of the pub (make sure you have got a drink out of them first as per #1).

3. Be creative
Stand out from the crowd. Creativity is one of the most valuable qualities any person can have. I cannot agree more, the annual accounts are a magnificent work of fiction.

4. Be there first
This applies in all forms of life, from the avoiding queues to the gents at a football match by limping to the disabled toilet, to elbowing the octogenarian volunteer out of the way at the Friends of Unreason annual party buffet to get the last cucumber sandwich.

5. Build a Brand
No-one who has ever been to the Museum of Unreason (for directions see my What's in a name blog Feb 2013) will ever forget it. Think creative interpretation and labelling - but most of all make sure that when the public leave they know who is responsible for it. I have a life-size cutout welcoming them OUT of the door telling them to spend more money next time they visit or not bother to come back. It's safe to say our visitors do at least one of these.

6. Seek advice
Speak to people who have years of experience. What? And make the same old mistakes. We want museums for the 21st Century not 19th Century. Unless of course they are influential people (see #1) in which case hang on their every word, agree with everything they say - then do the opposite but reference them in your literature.

7. Get organised
In particular I like Caan's, 'make sure you are not wasting precious time on tasks that can always be delegated to someone else'. Do this and that is why you are in the pub and the staff are still in the office.

8. Don't run before you can walk
Don't take on too much and only do work with a decent profit. More wise words. Then spend it in the pub so that by the end of the day you can't even walk never mind run.

Here is the link: http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130813104917-32175171-the-eight-rules-of-success-to-think-about-every-morning?trk=mp-details-rc

Car Parks - the workhouses of our time?

I am aware that I am ahead of my time in my appreciation of car parks and the thousands of beautiful spaces they contain. I have been mocked in the street for it; told to move along by uniformed personnel when admiring well crafted spaces in multi-storey parks. Yet I will live to see the first car parking space museum. I will tell you why.

A beautiful space with multi-coloured
block paving
(Photo courtesy of the
Museum of Car Parking Spaces)

Bill Bryson, the well meaning but easily pleased American, wrote a book in 1995 called Notes from a Small Island. It was an amusing journey around this country that was on the whole positive. He ends on a strangely untypical effusive note,

"I realised what it was I loved about Britain - which is to say, all of it...What a wondrous place this was - crazy as f!@k, of course, but adorable to the tiniest degree...this is still the best place in the world...."

He lies of course. In fact he condemns himself from his own mouth (or pen) on p.64 (Black Swan 1997 paperback edition). I have edited down the two page rant.

"Just consider the average multi-storey car park. You drive around for ages, and the spend a small eternity shunting into a space that is exactly two inches wider than the average car [3 inches too wide in my opinion]. Then, because you are parked next to a pillar, you have to climb over the seats and end up squeezing butt-first out of the passenger door....you have to find your way out of this dank hellhole via an unmarked door leading to a curious chamber that seems to be a composite of a dungeon and a urinal...all of this is designed to make this the most dispiriting experience of your adult life."

Yet he moans (p.103).

"..the British have more heritage than is good for them."

Wrong! We have too much PRETTY heritage, do we need 12,000 medieval churches? How about 11,999 medieval churches and 1 multi-storey car park?

Let's compare car parks with workhouses. It was a phenomenon that spread across the country after the 1601 Poor Law Act; had it's architectural heyday in the Nineteenth Century, before being abolished in 1930.

Here's an extract from George Eliot's, Scenes of Clerical Life (1854),

"...the workhouse, euphemistically called the 'College'. The 'College' was a huge square stone building, standing on the best apology for an elevation of ground....depressing enough to look at even on the brightest days."

She wasn't alone, Charles Dickens was no big fan (Oliver Twist cannot be described as a comedy). The word 'squalid' turns up frequently in his writing. In his 'A Walk in a Workhouse' (1850) he compares the workhouse unfavourably to prison.

"We have come to this absurd, this dangerous, this monstrous pass, that the dishonest felon is, in respect of cleanliness, order, diet, and accommodation, better provided for, and taken care of, than the honest pauper."

So why compare the multi-storey car park to the workhouse? Both are/were full of squalor and misery. BUT one is now 'heritage' and the other is an eyesore of no value beyond mere utility.

Today you can go to the National Trust owned Southwell Workhouse museum for a 'family fun day out'. It was built in 1824 and opened less than 100 years later as a heritage site. The first multi-storey car park was built in Chicago U.S.A. in 1918. Wouldn't it be great to celebrate its 100th anniversary with a car park museum (preferably built over a medieval building).

Time is running out - get behind my campaign now.

Car Parking is a Gender Issue

My apologies for the delayed blog. I have endured another period of 'gardening leave' following a misunderstanding when the Chair of the friends group handed me a wad of cash saying, "Here is a fundraising donation for you." I was touched by the regard with which I am held in the organisation and immediately bought myself a new set of golf clubs. At the subsequent disciplinary hearing I convincingly argued it was a genuine misunderstanding - that 'you' has a very different meaning  from 'your museum'. As a precaution I enlisted the help of my Russian mafia girlfriend to construct a 'convincing' argument (by way of thanks I paid her from a couple of spare coins out of the numismatic collection).

Anyway after a month of leave I'm back at work and my handicap is down to 18.

Now to the main point of the blog - women only car parking spaces. 

My research has yet to discover the world's first car parking space (my money is on the USA), but I have discovered the rise of women only car parking spaces. Disabled spaces and parent/child spaces are commonplace in the UK but I have yet to see a 'women only' space. It seems that in some German states 10% of spaces must be designated for women. These are near entrances, security guards etc. This makes sense in terms of safety, although statistically a woman is in more danger in her home and only 1 in a thousand crimes in car parks are sexual assaults. But it seems a progressive move and if we can get that figure for sexual assaults down to 0 in a thousand then they will be worthwhile.

Another country blessed with this foresight is China. Although rather than having a sign, it seems they have gone for wider spaces in different colours for women. They have taken to heart the statistic that women cause twice as many collisions in car parks as men, rather than that of violence inflicted on women in public places. So this appears to be a safety measure for men rather than women. 

However it is Korea that seems to be the true home of the women only car parking space. The Seoul city authorities have painted 4,929 spaces pink with the thinking that women in high heels should not have to walk as far to their destination. So car parking is a fashion issue in Korea. Perhaps they could develop this initiative by having minimum heel sizes closer to entrances. Perhaps having the highest heel spaces closest to a first aid station.

Quite what this all says about the difference between Chinese, Korean and German societies I'm not sure - but I applaud the idea as both a safety and fashion issue.

What would a 'men only' space look like? My guess is it would have a minimum parking speed and be exactly 1 inch thinner than the average car width. But wait! It seems the German town of Triberg has already introduced the first men only spaces, which are apparently much more difficult to manoeuvre into than 'normal' spaces. As a man I'm up for that challenge!

So imagine a future with car parks containing multi coloured spaces in different shapes and sizes with different footwear regulations.

 That is a world I would want to live in.

Please send me photos of any car parking spaces worth preserving for posterity at museumofunreason@gmail.com