I’m not quite sure how I came up with the idea for this infographic. It just sort of showed up in my mind one morning. But once it was there, I felt compelled to make the graphic and share it. I do know the inspiration for it and for whom I made it: a few dear friends I sincerely hope can use it to cope better with stress and anxiety. I reckon all of us (most certainly me included) could do with some help with stress and anxiety from time to time.
Maybe it will come in handy for you too?
Back on the track of the Lion Man …
From Basel, the next stop on the tour was the historic spa town of Baden-Baden, Germany.
Generally speaking, travelling from Basel to Baden-Baden should have been a piece of cake (black forest gateau if you don’t mind please). However, the ticketed date coincided with a day of national rail strikes, and the Basel to Baden-Baden service was cancelled. Long story short, and luckily enough, my Airbnb host had ample free time and enough entrepreneurial spirit to offer to drive for what I thought was a very reasonable price (especially with such little notice and me with so few affordable options). The rail journey would have taken around an hour and a half; door-to-door service with the Airbnb host was about two hours. I travelled by train a few times after that with no industrial action or any other issues affecting my trip.
Once in Baden-Baden, it was time to relax. And this lovely little city was an ideal setting for just that. Since the days of the Roman Empire folks have been enjoying the geothermal wonders of Baden-Baden. Indeed its name actually translates from German to English as “Baths Baths”.
So, when in Rome …
Welcome back to Tracking the Lion Man, a series of posts about my trip to Switzerland and Germany en route to the city of Ulm to view the Löwenmensch (Lion Man) of Hohlenstein-Stadel – a prehistoric sculpture carved out of mammoth tusk.
As mentioned in my introduction to this series, logistics, budget, and a bit of preference gave the Swiss city of Basel an edge when deciding where to commence my trip.
Over the past decade, I’ve visited Basel a few times. Having only ever gone there for work, without deciding venture there independent of obligation, I learned to love it without having developed a strong impression of it beforehand. So I was happy to go back there again. This time with no agenda other than for a couple of days of fun. Similarly, I was glad to be able to show Basel to my partner travelling with me.
Back in 2014, writing about my first visit to Basel, I said that “for a compact destination that’s big on culture, I reckon Basel should be one of your top choices. I was really impressed with just about everything saw and experienced there and would relish any chance to go again.” I’ll stand by that statement nine years later after multiple returns.
Here are a few highlights from my recent time there.
Hey folks. I’m back after a few weeks hiatus from my 2023 Resolution.
For part of that time off, I was traveling. Pertaining to my resolution to start blogging regularly again, my trip served to whet my appetite to continue blogging, reminded me why I used to get so much pleasure of doing it regularly, and even rekindled my love of travel writing.
Have a scroll through the blog and you’ll see I recently started a series called Tracking the Lion Man. It’s about my trip. New ‘Lion Man’ posts should follow soon. I hope you enjoying reading about my experiences.
My break from blogging allowed me a chance to consider how well I’ve done keeping my resolution. Having several days ‘off’ to think about the key takeaways that I listed in my last post proved useful.
I’ve just returned home from a week away in Switzerland and Germany. The reason for the trip was to have an in-person look at the Löwenmensch (Lion Man) of Hohlenstein-Stadel – a prehistoric footlong sculpture carved out of mammoth tusk on display in the city of Ulm not far from the cave where it was discovered in the southern German state of Baden-Württemberg.
A lovely destination in it’s own right but one without an international airport, Ulm is not a straightforward destination to reach from London. So getting there required a bit of added planning. As far as I could tell, the most logical routes from London seemed to be flying to Memmingen, Stuttgart, Munich, Nuremberg, Zurich or Basel and then catching a train or hiring a car to drive to Ulm.
When considering options for getting there, one route stood out more than others: fly to Basel and then travel by train to checkout at least a couple of other places along the way to Ulm.
Eleven posts in as many weeks with a couple of busy weeks ahead, I thought now would be a good time to pause my 2023 Resolution series and take stock of what I’ve shared thus far.
I’m pretty happy with what I’ve written here and how I’m managed to keep my resolution. Going back over the previous posts, it’s interesting to see how I seem to be giving myself advice that not only applies to my goal to start blogging regularly again but also to attempting to tackle any objective.
So, here’s a recap of this series with a key takeaway from each post alongside a link to each post. I hope you find some value in the ideas expressed and can use them to help accomplish whatever your goals might be.
1. Spring weather;
2. Crossing things off my to-do list;
3. Nice bike ride;
4. Partner home from work early; and
5. Finding a chance to do one of these posts!
Hey! I’m actually having fun working on my 2023 Resolution, and I hope you folks are enjoying reading about my attempts to keep my resolution to start blogging regularly after a long hiatus.
For me, it’s interesting to observe how new ideas emerge from old ones. Maybe for the first time ever as a writer, I feel like I’m putting significant thought into how that process occurs. It seems clear that as I publish more posts in this series I become more aware of how ideas emerge and enter into my writing process. That’s fascinating to see and nice to acknowledge. More so, I’m sticking to my commitment to blog more regularly fairly well, and I’m glad about that. So, all in all, this exercise has been a largely positive experience for me.
But now I’m going to go negative.
It can be easy to feel a bit underwhelmed by our birthdays as we get older. After all, they come around every year don’t they? However, there are certain birthdays that carry far more gravitas, serving as milestones that are to be celebrated with friends and family.
Is there any birthday more momentous than a 50th? It marks half a century on earth, a remarkable achievement whichever way you look at it. A 50th birthday calls for a proper celebration, a simple birthday card and cake isn’t going to cut the mustard. We’ve put together three fantastic ideas to help celebrate a loved one’s 50th birthday in style.
Read on to check them out.
New premium shoe brand Zebra Oasis sent me a pair of shoes to review. ZO claims these kicks are the world’s first fully recyclable shoes. Nice. Made of hemp, merino wool, bamboo and cotton, they look pretty snazzy too. Double nice! But how do they feel to wear?
Here’s what the brand says are the key features of these shoes, followed by my thoughts about these features and what it’s like to try them out.
Welcome back to my 2023 Resolution series.
Since my last post, I’ve been thinking a lot about inertia, how it stands in the way of me writing regularly and how I can move past it. I’ve come up with some ideas for dealing with inertia so that I can ‘click over’ and get on with my writing (or whatever else I might want to do).
Surely, I’m not the only person ever affected by inertia. So, I hope my ideas can help other folks as well. Have a look at these five ways to deal with inertia and see what you think.
I haven’t written about any restaurant visits in a looooong time. Inspired by a few recent dining experiences, though, I reckon I’ve got some recommendations worth sharing.
Not only have I not written about restaurants in a while, I haven’t spent anywhere near as much time socialising in writerly foodie circles as I used to. So excuse me if I’m out of the loop or stating something that to many already seems obvious or even passé, but I can’t help but wonder if London is going through some sort of Chinese food renaissance.
It seems to me there’s a greater number of eateries offering Chinese fare across London than, say, five years ago. More so, the quality of food seems considerably higher. More even, the variety of regional and ethnic cuisines available around town is broader and more expertly presented. Further, a number of old guard Chinese restaurants appear to be upping their game or finally receiving some hard earned recognition.
Here’s a list of five places serving Chinese food where I’ve had especially yummy meals in the past couple of months.
And more time lapses between these posts …
But it’s not necessarily because of lack of initiative. My job is getting in the way a bit, and my work schedule is tighter and busier than it was at the start of the year. And even if you can’t see the written evidence here on the blog, that doesn’t mean I’m not doing ‘behind the scenes’ things to ensure I’ll have interesting stuff to write about in the future. I’m doing my best to remain committed but also being adaptive and flexible to the realities of life.
Uh oh! It’s been well past a week and I’ve yet to publish anything new in this series, or anything else for that matter. No big deal, really, but I have noticed motivation and dedication continuing to slide since my last post.
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Through the ‘resolution’ writing process that I kicked off last month, I realised that I already have strategies for embracing serendipity and appreciating the good in my life. I recalled how I once applied those strategies to writing. I’m glad I remembered these ‘tricks’ and that I’m applying them to both my current writing and other life in general.
But I can feel the motivation flagging. 2023 is now routine and much of my time is spent dealing with the same sort of rigamarole as before. Blogging is just another item on my to-do list. Writing with regularity is a task.
1. Shri Lakshmi Foods in Walthamstow;
2. Another sunny day with some free time to ride my bike;
3. Checking off a few long lingering items from my to-do list;
4. Chess.com; and
5. Being generally content with my work schedule.
1. Discovering the work of Dr Barbara Fredrickson;
2. Coffee;
3. Under the Banner of Heaven TV series;
4. Playing around with ChatGPT; and
5. Riding my bike.
My previous post in this 2023 Resolution series was about how I ought to try incorporating serendipity into my writing process. As I wrote the post, I realised I had already developed a way of incorporating serendipity into my writing, but just hadn’t applied it to my writing process.
Five Good Things is a blog series that I started back in the spring of 2020, when the reality of the Covid-18 pandemic hit and I began settling into the “new normal” of life under lockdown.
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1. Fire of Love documentary;
2. Food shopping at Borough Market on my way home from work;
3. Playing chess;
4. Being in a warm home on a cold day;
5. Having enough food in the cupboards and fridge so I have options for my dinner.
1. Having a chance to make a nice breakfast for myself;
2. Planning trips and dreaming about fun stuff ahead;
3. Sasquatch Chronicles podcast;
4. Feeling like I’m doing a decent job keeping up with my schedule and to-do list;
5. Getting back into the habit of doing these Five Good Things lists on my blog.
In just three weeks, my blog post about my new year’s resolution has evolved into a series of five posts.
That was not the plan or how I thought this resolution might play out.
The moment when I happened upon the parakeets in my back garden last week remains at the fore of my thoughts.
The image of those birds – once considered exotic and rare but now a relatively common yet still strikingly vivid sight to behold – has me thinking about the concept of adaptation and how I could apply it to my goals as a writer. Like those parakeets adapting to – and thriving in – a new environment, I should realise that adapting to change is a key step to developing talent and skill as a writer.
My last post was about not having anything to write but deciding to publish a post anyway if only to give myself a chance to exercise my creative muscles and get back into the routine of writing regularly.
But as fate would have it, inspiration found me in the most unexpected of places – just outside my own backdoor.
It’s been a week since I shared about my new year’s resolution to start blogging more regularly. So here I am eight days into January, resolved and ready to write.
But what am I going to write about? I’ve got nothing.
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My new year’s resolution for 2023 is to start blogging regularly again.
It’s been more than three years since I stopped writing as my main source of income, and I’m starting to realise the impact it’s had on me.
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The plant-based party promises a jam-packed calendar of cookery classes, live standup comedy, fitness sessions, activities for children and families, interviews and talks and the chance to mix and mingle with over 200 exhibitors and an anticipated 10,000 attendees during the weekend of 12 and 13 November.
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Aside from ensuring all of the necessary legal boxes have been ticked, you also have to create an attractive and inviting home that will appeal to tenants who may have plenty of other options to choose from.
Fortunately, there are a number of simple steps you can take which will help you make sure your property is rental-ready to the highest possible standard. Read on to find out more.
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If you are considering moving to Singapore, then it is important you do some research beforehand and find out a bit about the country before you make the commitment to move.
In this article, we will go over 5 different things you need to know before you move to Singapore, so keep on reading to find out more.
I recently received a sample of their beans and could not be more pleased with the results from brewing them for my morning cup.
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When the invitation for this event came my way, I happily RSVPed. Not my first Parmesan tasting session, I’ve had the great fortune of attending a number of similar happenings over the years in London (as well as in Parma and the region of Emilia Romagna). Every time I’ve left at least to little more amazed by how such a simple product can express such complex flavour and add such significant depth to so many different dishes. Plus, I’d heard good things about Angelina. So, on the evening of the dinner, I arrived with high hopes and a hearty appetite.
Expectations were more than exceeded and my appetite was satisfied wholly.
By awarding badges as incentives, custom pin badges are a highly efficient way to boost morale. To spread the word about your brand, use personalised badges. Or, to demonstrate participation in a particular group or organisation, use personalised badges. Enamel pins can be made according to your specifications for any purpose. Custom pin badges do include a few intriguing and obscure aspects, so feel free to unravel the riddle.
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If you can make it round to Sadler’s Wells before the festival ends 2 July, I’m certain you’ll have a wonderful time enjoying world-class performances by some of the best Flamenco musicians and dancers in the world today.
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If you are new to the gym, here are our tips to improve your help.
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Throughout May 2022 (and for this month!), Heliot Steak House at the Hippodrome Casino is offering a limited-edition World’s Best Steak menu created by Executive Chef Ioannis Grammenos. The menu showcases steak from some of the top winners of 2021;s World Steak Challenge.
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