Whimsical Musings of a Loon

Architecture is one of my main loves. For someone who adores trees and countryside as much as I do, I find the aesthetic of buildings and structures as beautiful and intriguing as pieces of art. Cardiff has never interested me architecturally like other cities and places do/have done. Growing up in the 80s and 90s, Cardiff was ugly and unremarkable even to a child. Wandering through the city centre in 2018, which I do pretty much daily, I am always struck by the changes this small but sturdy Welsh capital where I was born and raised has undertaken. Rumblings began in the 1990s; a shape-shift exercise. The rugby world cup final in Cardiff in 1999 saw one of the main new developments - a brand new 74,500 seated stadium slap bang in the heart of the city. A spikey ship masted-like structure (with a retractable roof which sometimes reminds me of a giant bread bin); it seemed so space-age and giant. A burst of new bars and hotels subsequently opened - and as an sixth form student at the...

The light is bright, the essence is full of promise, if but a slightly seedy one. On the busy train into Cardiff, two white-haired old ladies sit on the battered seats, their Dot Cotton house coats visible underneath their rain-macs. Tightly pursed lips, arms folded cross their robust darlek-shaped bodies, clutching their handbags as if their lives depended on it. There is a slight smell of odor de cooking-oil. "No discipline" utters one critically to the other, whilst staring directly ahead with a glare of a Terminator. "Dave says he needs to go back to the doctors for his pills". Replies the other, frowning. "They don't listen." "That'll be another bus trip." "We were brought up to listen." "John Lewis is nice." The mouths fasten shut and the two masses of old cotton-wooled hair bob up and down in complete un-agreement with each other. The train chugs along, a DJ tracked monotonous soundtrack. The light is yellow and...

It's a little like when you've drunk too much of the fizzy pop and extras, the dregs of night have long turned into the early roots of morning, and you suddenly have an epiphany that you absolutely love to pieces your best mate/s who stand over the toilet of a Cardiff drinking establishment yacking their guts up. "I loves you y'know...you're bloody great you are...". Suddenly everything you hate about the world (which is really everything), that you've been copiously moaning about all evening, is a distant memory faded into oblivion. And isn't life wonderful. Until the hangover. Then it's full-steam ahead back to Shitsville.

Today's random crappy graffiti. And apparently Buddy Holly is alive and well and living in Cardiff. Nice. Better tell Peggy Sue.