Happy Oatcake Day!

Yes, indeed, somebody decided a few years ago to institute a National Oatcake Day - to celebrate North Staffordshire's own local delicacy. (For those that don't know, it's a thick savoury pancake served with melted cheese - and it's wonderful).

Chris Bates

I must admit that I've never lost my taste for oatcakes, which really are the food of the gods, even if they are a 'poor man's dish'.  As a new book published today says: "An Oatcake Is For Life – Not Just For Breakfast".

The dozens of little shops making oatcakes in this part of the world are part of the charm (oatcakes must be eaten freshly made; after a day they are half what they could be).
The Oatcake Kitchen in Dresden is one of my favourites, and it even has a range of...yes...oatcake merchandise, including mugs, greeting cards and T-shirts!
Chris Bates, who runs the shop (and appears on some of the greeting-cards even), is something of a local legend...

Links: The Oatcake Guide

Gedge's Surgical Shop

Parts of Stoke-on-Trent have barely changed since the 1950s. Like a number of once-important industrial cities, it saw great decline in the second half of the 20th century. Things still struggle even now.

One of the advantages of this depression is not a lot changes, so that a social historian still has lots to work with.
For example, lots of shops may have changed hands and business-type since the 1950s, but the new owners can't even be bothered to change the shop-fronts much. As we see in this photo.
Whatever Gedge's Shop was once, it's now a takeaway, but the landlord clearly doesn't think it worthwhile to remove the old name.

Incidentally, it seems hard to believe that there were once stores that labelled themselves "Surgical and Rubber Shop". I confess that I'm not even sure what such shops stocked!

Back England - by betting

This betting shop seems to say that the best way to be patriotic during these European nations football tournament is by having enough faith in the English team to place a bet on them.

Am I alone in finding that a rather distasteful exploitation of our desire to see England do well? Or... maybe it's just me.

Anyway - good luck to England tonight.

Mannequin mystery

The sign language of mannequins is a mystery to me, but this figure seems to be pointing at something - her over-red lips perhaps?  Her companion seems unimpressed.

Or maybe it all means something else altogether.
Or nothing...

Jubilee tawdriness

The Jubilee celebrations have been a tawdry affair so far, with a lot of shops and town centres taking advantage of the situation to sell some pretty kitsch, cheap stuff under the name of ‘loyalty’. Hmm.

Let’s hope the actual day is celebrated with a little less emphasis on making a buck.