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  • Guildford, After All

    I intended to spend the evening at the Hollycombe Steam Museum. It is a collection of old steam powered amusement park rides and according to their website was open on Thursday evenings so that you could see it illuminated in the dark. After an hour and a half train ride from London to Liphook, I stepped out of the train station. The two cab drivers playing cards looked shocked to see me. After a ten minute cab ride to the museum, I learned that the computer that keeps their website up to date must also be steam powered. The museum was closed.

    So I asked the cab driver:

    “Is there anything else to do in Liphook?”

    “Nope.”

    “Are there any restaurants where I could get something to eat?”

    “Nope.”

    “So when other people get off the train where are they usually going?”

    “Either the steam museum or to visit friends and relatives.”

    “OK, back to the train station then I guess.”

    So I got back on the train. I had no plan, no internet access, and very little idea where I was. But then the train stopped in Guildford. I knew only one thing about Guildford : Ford Prefect wasn’t from there after all. But unlike Liphook it had a tourist map in front of the train station, and if I went all the way back to London there wouldn’t be time to do anything before it got dark anyway.

    So I got off the train, examined the map, and headed off toward the castle.

    The small town was quite pretty. The castle grounds were beautiful and covered in flowers.

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    Two older gentlemen were drinking in the park. They said that they were born in Guildford and had lived there their entire lives, which means they were probably actually from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse. They told me that Lewis Caroll wrote “Through the Looking Glass” in Guildford and gave me directions to this statue of Alice.

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    Then the park closed, so I headed to a small Italian restaurant for some delicious pizza and bruschetta.

    On the way back to the train station I passed this church.image

    The graveyard looked like it came from a movie, old and overgrown with vines.image

    After that I got onto the train and headed back to London.


  • Ghosts of the Old City

    My second ghost walk focused on the Old City. Our host introduced himself as the forth Richard employed by walks.com. He began by explaining that only about 5% of people can see ghosts. A slightly larger percentage can see things they do. A slightly larger percentage than that can hear ghosts. An even larger percentage can feel ghosts. And he was one of the unlucky few who could do none of the above.

    Once again I had a pile of questions I decided not to ask. If only 5% of people can see ghosts, does that mean that ghosts only reflect a particular wavelength of light that most of the population is insensitive to? If that were the case wouldn’t people tend to lose this ability as they get older? But how else could this work? You can’t have light selectively reflected toward some people and not others. Similarly with hearing ghosts, either the ghost produces sound waves or it does not.

    And what things are they doing that only some people can see? If we’re talking about flickering lights and hovering objects, does that mean that if Richard IV was sitting in a room with a psychic, she would see the lights flicker and he wouldn’t? Would a light meter register the change? If a ghost makes a light flicker in the middle of a crowded room where no one is able to see it, did it still flicker?

    And why are some people capable of seeing, hearing, and feeling ghosts while others are not? How can Richard IV possibly know that he can’t? Maybe he’s just never come across a ghost. Maybe the reason that he’s one of the unlucky few is that he is a ghost!

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    I got the impression that Richard was trying very hard to get to see a ghost, because next he said:

    “Now we will attempt to cross this busy street. Be careful because there are no lights. We shall reconvene on the other side.”

    Watching him dart through the traffic I wondered whether he meant the other side of the street or THE OTHER SIDE. But we made it.

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    Richard IV then explained that ghosts are creatures of habit. They repeat in death what they did well in life. For example, there was a criminal who repeatedly broke out of prison, but kept getting caught and thrown back in. Finally he was executed. Now his ghost keeps being seen breaking out of the prison!

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    Next was the ghost of Amelia Dyer. She took in orphaned babies for money, and then murdered them and kept the money. She was eventually caught and sentenced to death. On the way to be hanged, she passed a guard in the prison, stopped, and said “I’ll meet you again sir”. Years later while he was walking through the prison he heard a ringing bell, and turned to see her face outside a door. He rushed toward her and opened the door, but she vanished. He looked down and noticed a women’s handkerchief, fluttering toward his feet.

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    The next story was of a man who ate at meat market and later died of food poisoning. Shortly afterward, a ghost started appearing in the market, pulling pranks, overturning stalls and causing mischief. Apparently this ghost hung around after death just to annoy his killers a bit? Assuming that his killers belonged to the small percentage of people that could see his mischief of course.

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    The next ghost was one that appears only to the ordained. Whether this was a select 5% of the ordained, or if all ordained people happen to  be in the lucky 5%, or if something about the ordination process makes you capable of seeing ghosts was unspecified.

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    The next ghost wasn’t even dead! A woman in France was so ill they called a priest to administer last rights. On that night some friends saw her ghost in London. But the woman survived, she was only near death. And for some reason didn’t remember going to visit her friends.

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    The next stop was St Bartholomew’s hospital, where the ghost of a deceased nurse regularly gives patients their medicines when the living nurses forget. I think this hospital badly needs to tighten their security. Perhaps ghosts can pass through walls, but as far as I know they can’t take pills with them. If someone barely capable of manipulating the physical world can get into their pharmacy, remove medications and distribute them to patients I hate to think what a serial killer could do.

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    The final story was at Greyfriars church, which is said to be haunted by Queen Isabella. She was the wife of King Edward II, but had an affair with some guy named Roger Mortimer, who was later accused of murdering her husband. She was buried at the church, in her wedding dress with her husband’s heart placed on her chest. And now her ghost has been spotted around the church. Some say that she is clutching her husband’s heart to her chest. Others say she is scratching at her chest, as though trying to get her husbands heart out!

    Given that Edward II died in 1327 and Isabella died in 1358 I’m not sure how much of his 31 year old heart she could really have been buried with.

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    Overall I have to say I ended this ghost tour even more confused about the properties of ghosts.


  • Kerri Potter and the Half-Blood Philosopher’s Chamber of Deathly Azkaban Phoenix Fire

    Kerri Potter was proud to say that she was anything but normal, thank you very much. So when she was invited to go to Hogwarts, it was really no surprise at all.  She prophesized that the Sorting Hat would put her in Ravenclaw, and purchased the house scarf before even getting on the train.

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    On her trip to Diagon Alley she discovered it was much smaller and more crowded than she had been led to believe.

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    She purchased lots of weird wizardy gizmos, and a pink pygmy puff because “oogacoogyooochypinkycuuuuuutttteeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

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    After arriving at Hogwarts she attended the Great Feast. The tables were all scraped up and battered.
    Paul Hayes, the ghost of the construction manager, explained: ”We’ve gone through some fantastic chemicals to get lacquers off and failed miserably. Put 400 children in there and they’ll strip a table within 10 days. There will be nothing left of it. You know, and they’ll have their names in it. Yeah, they’re pretty good at that. They’re like termites!”

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    As the Sorting Hat sorted the first years into houses, it began raining flaming spirit oil.

    “Curse those tungston wires!” screamed the ghost of Paul. “When they get hot from the flame they aren’t strong enough to support the forces from the motorised rigs, and the candle-shaped tubes filled with spirit oil fly everywhere!”

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    “I told you we should have used magic” muttered his partner.

    After a wonderful dinner of roast hippogriff:

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    Kerri Potter left the elaborately decorated hall to go to bed.

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    The next morning Kerri was excited to attend her first spell class. However it turned out to be much more of a challenge than she was anticipating.

    “Just say ‘porn before’ in a loud, clear voice” instructed the professor.

    “Pardon me?” asked Kerri, puzzled at the strange spell.

    “Just say ‘porn before’!” insisted the professor, wishing she had chosen one of the British students.

    Kerri looked around at the wide-eyed children staring at her expectantly. Then she noticed the giant wizard chess board laid out in front of her.

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    And she said: “Pawn B4!”

    The pawn magically slid two squares ahead. Her very first spell cast!

    Next was potions class, which was taught by the faceless ghost of Professor Snape.

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    Next was defense against the dark arts, where they practiced their duelling poses. Kerri’s was so unintimidating that she was sent to the headmaster’s office.

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    The headmaster’s office was shockingly ugly from the outside.

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    The new headmaster had everything exactly the way Dumbledore left it. In fact he was dressed just like Dumbledore, but very pale and with far fewer wrinkles.

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    “The defense against the dark arts professor tells me you are not very good at duelling.” scolded the headmaster. “You must practice”.

    “Why would I practice?” asked Kerri. “My little brother isn’t even a wizard. All I need is ‘stupify’ to torture him!”

    “You cannot use magic outside of the school!” warned the headmaster.

    “Of course not. That’s why I’m working on a way to zap him from the school.” replied Kerri. “I think it may involve flu powder.”

    “Ah. That’s very clever” admitted the headmaster. “But I’m afraid you’ll never fulfill the prophecy with flu powder.”

    An awkward pause filled the room.

    “Aren’t you going to ask about the prophecy?” asked the headmaster. “I had to sort through Dumbledore’s eerily green memories to find it!”

    Kerri shrugged. “If it’s possible may not fulfill it, then it’s really not much of a prophecy. If it’s a proper prophecy, then I’ll fulfill it whether I try to or not. Either way it discussing it seems like a waste of time.”

    The headmaster assigned her a 5 foot parchment on prophecy for being a smartass and sent her on her way.

    She headed to the library to do some research on long distance spell casting. For some reason it was full of green hands. Way creepier than the floating books she had seen in the movies.

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    And so the semester flew by. Kerri discovered more ways to torture her brother from afar then she ever imagined. Soon it was Christmas. She wanted to check out Atlantis, but unfortunately that plan was foiled by some fine print.

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    So instead she went home with her good friend Baby Weasley. (Mrs Weasley had never really figured out birth control charms, and thus had many children after Ginny. She also ran out of names.)

    Mrs Weasley welcomed them from the kitchen. However her usual smile was missing, due to a terrible accident with the self-chopping knives.

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    On Christmas morning a raven arrived with a mysterious present. Ravens are much smarter than snow owls, and can be trained to deliver the mail in a single day while a snow owl takes months, which is why they are so expensive.

    When Kerri opened the gift she discovered it was a super visibility cloak! When you turn it inside out, you are  guaranteed to stand out clearly in front of any background! Other than a greenscreen of course. But what kind of wizard spends time in front of green screens?

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    Mrs. Weasley was concerned about the mysterious package, but Kerri pointed out that she was in Ravenclaw, and nothing interesting ever happens to people in Ravenclaw.

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    Upon returning to Hogwarts Kerri went to visit Hagrid. She found him in the forest with Aragog. He explained that he found the resurrection stone in the forest. Missing his pet spider, he had soaked it in Unicorn blood until it gained the power to do a proper resurrection.

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    Kerri pointed out that this was a dangerous thing to have around and turned it in to the headmaster.

    After mucking around in the forest with monsters, Kerri realised that there were no showers anywhere in Hogwarts. Presumably most of the students just use hygiene spells, however Kerri really wanted a bath. Fortunately the room of requirement appeared, and when she opened the door it contained another door, which led to the prefect’s bathroom.

    The bathroom contained real taps, cast out of real bronze, which were fully functioning and dispensed real coloured water. You would think wizards would use magic for some of this stuff, but almost everything at Hogwarts is actually constructed.

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    After her bath she headed back to the common room. She was surprised to see that many of the portraits had been replaced with blank green canvases. But this seemed like someone else’s problem, so she headed off to bed.

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    Late that night she was shaken awake. “Ugg…go away. I’m trying to sleep in a bed that’s only 5’9” long because the wizards that designed this place failed to prophesize that teenagers have growth spurts.”

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    The pest refused to leave her alone. She opened one eye and discovered it was Hagrid. “What are you doing!?! You’re supposed to be in the Chamber of Secrets fighting the Dark Lord!” he exclaimed. “There have been tons of mysterious occurrences to follow! Have you no curiousity at all?”

    “I live in a magic castle! Everything is exciting and mysterious. And it can wait until morning.”

    “But the Dark Lord has returned as a ghost!”

    “Of course he became a ghost. It is well established that his biggest fear was death, and that those that are afraid death become ghosts. If fear of death makes a ghost, Voldemort should be a super ghost.”

    “But he’s trying to get the resurrection stone. Don’t you want to be like Harry Potter and stop him!”

    “Name one of Voldemort’s attempts to return that would not have been completely defeated if Harry Potter had just decided to stay in bed that night!”

    Finally a Hagrid picked Kerri up and carried her down into the Chamber of Secrets. The door to the chamber of secrets, which turned out to be just a complicated mechanical device, had been easily opened with a can of WD40.

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    Inside it was clear that Voldemort had given up on magic, and was going for a muggle solution. The table was covered with an army of robotic nasties.

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    The ghost of Voldemort’s shattered soul was lying on the table, adjusting gears.

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    Trolls and possessed lion heads were being grown in pots around the room.

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    And decorating the evil layer was a giant floating headless aunt, a lifeless body, and the famous “might is right” statue.

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    Then Hagrid revealed that he was not Hagrid at all, but a Deatheater wearing a giant robotic Hagrid head.

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    “The headmaster hid the stone in the Mirror of Erised again. All you need to do is look into the mirror and I will have the stone again.”

    Kerri sighed and looked into the mirror.

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    “I don’t understand. Where’s the stone? Why is it just showing a giant Ice cream on a waffle?”

    In the confusion, Kerri grabbed her wand and yelled “expecto patronus”. In front of her appeared an Irish Deerhound in a suit of LEDs, who ran to get help.

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    The grown ups that actually knew how to cast spells came in and cleaned up the mess.

    For her bravery in defeating the Dark Lord, Kerri was rewarded with a job at the Ministry of Magic and a lovely pink office.

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  • Changing of the Guards

    Tuesday morning I was up early and I didn’t have any plans until I had to be on the train at noon, so I decided to go for a walk. I started off through Hyde Park.

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    Around 10:00 I came to Buckingham Palace, and saw the crowds lining up for the changing of the guards. I decided it must be at 11:00, so I may as well stay and see it. I found a place near the fence off to the side and watched them clean the windows using a cherry picker. Gradually the crowd grew around me.

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    Around 10:45 some horsemen rode by on the road behind me.

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    By 11:00 the crowd was dense. But nothing was happening other than children climbing on the fence and policemen yelling at parents to keep them off.

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    By 11:15 I couldn’t breathe as crowd behind me pushed me into the bars.

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    At 11:30 some guards started marching in the distance. I think there was music, but I couldn’t hear it over the crowd. Some Spanish tourists were encouraging their children to sneak in front. Which was fine with me because I could easily see over their heads, and it made some space between me and the bars. But the Americans next to me were less happy, and were screaming at them.

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    I tried to leave but couldn’t fight my way through the crowd.

    Then a guard with a flag marched right up to us. The fight briefly abated.

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    The fight resumed. It looked like it was going to come to blows. I realised I was going to miss my train if I didn’t leave right away. I yelled “If you just let me out she can have my spot!” but no one was listening. I shoved my way through yelling that I was going to be sick.

    The crowd continued on the other side of the street! Given that I couldn’t really see or hear anything from my spot against the fence I assume they must have just been there to watch the crowd.


  • Chessington World of Adventures

    While I was all alone without Matt, I decided to try doing all the things I never got to do because I was never single.

    So while he was off chatting with famous scientists and curing cancer or whatever, I decided to go to a British theme park and stand in the singles line and go on all the rides over and over.

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    Unfortunately I soon discovered a major flaw in my plan. British theme parks do not have singles lines. In fact, they seem actively opposed to the idea. This boat ride had a wait time of almost three hours that morning. The boats are designed to hold 6 people. But most of the boats actually went with two or three people in them.

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    When I got to the front of the line he asked “how many people are you with?”. When I said one he looked like I was crazy then pointed to a boat. Which I got into, all by myself.

    Next I tried a children’s ride, Toadie’s Crazy Cars. You drive around a track to help Mr. Toad find the missing moles. The moles are all hiding in very obvious pairs of pants in empty fields. You can recognize the moles by their odd flesh-coloured tails, which are sticking out of the pairs of pants.

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    After driving past several of these moles, the ride ends with a final mole in a field full of cocks.OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
    Brtish children’s rides are weird.

    I decide to try some adult rides next, and went on some awesome roller coasters. They do fill up the roller coaster cars instead of using one car per group, but they have signs everywhere as though this is not standard practice. And still no singles line, if a group has an odd number of people they just let the unpaired seat sit empty!

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    I took a break for a snack while listening to a talk about bugs. I was the only childless adult around. The presenter asked the kids “If you’ve been somewhere tropical you may have seen some scuttling across the floor. Many consider them pests. What am I talking about?” One of the other adults responded “children”. I laughed a bit too hard and people started glaring. So I moved on.

    I went on a couple of random viking themed rides:
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    And their most blatant Disney ripoff:
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    Then I went over to the zoo part for a bit. The cooler British weather seemed to make some of the animals more active:
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    Not the Binturong though:
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    The chimpanzees had a new baby which was really funny:
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    I went on the safari adventure just as it started to rain. The giraffes started galloping toward the building. A galloping giraffe is the funniest looking thing I have ever seen. They huddled next to the building, which did not even have an overhang.
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    The rhinosauruses  did not seem to mind the rain at all.
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    After that the park cleared out. It was really pouring, so I decided to go on the water ride. The staff were all freaking out about how they had never seen it rain this hard before. I thought this was odd, because it would have been a pretty normal storm for Edmonton. I guess London gets a lot of rain, but no real storms.
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    Next I wanted to do the ferris wheel, but when I got there the staff said they could not put me in a cart alone because it would throw the ride off balance. I’m pretty sure I weighed much more than the 4′ tall Chinese woman and her infant that they had just let on. I asked if I could ride with someone else and they said I had to leave and come back with the rest of my party. I turned around and asked the people in line behind me if I could ride with them and they said “of course”. The ride gave a great view of park with its thick green trees.

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    I did a few more rides after that, including riding the cobra several times. It was my favourite coaster:

    Then I went back to London to find a pub for dinner. They sat me in the back at a large table. The waiter asked if they could sit another family with me! Because apparently it’s weird to share a car in a ride at a theme park with a stranger for two minutes, but being asked to share a table at dinner is normal.

    I said yes, thinking I could meet some local people, but the family they sat with me was speaking a foreign language. I spent the entire meal trying to figure out which one. I was pretty sure it was Italian, but the words sounded more Spanish. Maybe Portuguese? Then one of the kids ordered chicken fingers, and I caught the word “pollo”, and realized they were just speaking Spanish with a Spanish accent instead of a South American accent.

    After 3 months of Spanish lessons, I couldn’t even manage to introduce myself. The only thing I could remember was “Hola! Soy Canadian!”, which would leave me sounding like an awkward beer commercial. I couldn’t even come up with “my name is” in the entire 30 minutes I sat with them. After finishing my fish and chips I awkwardly waved an said “adios” and they laughed and waved back.