I quite like doing these round-ups of previously unblogged minor things at the end of each month. You can read what I wrote in October, and now here’s November:
Peter Pan-to time (oh no it isn’t)
We’re off to see Peter Pan at the Bradford Playhouse this weekend. It’s the annual pantomime from one of the local amateur dramatics societies, The Bradford Players. It also marks ten years since I helped backstage with Sleeping Beauty, a previous pantomime production. We don’t see a panto every year, but we know some of the cast and so we want to support them. Some tickets still available for the performances taking place today and tomorrow, but be quick.
The Bradford Playhouse is hosting another panto next month – Cinderella. By contrast, this is a professional production – several showings have already sold out but others have good availability. It’s cheaper than many mainstream theatres, and by booking to see it, you’re supporting smaller independent theatres.
I suck at soldering
In last month’s unblogged update, I mentioned how I was playing with a ESP development board to add Wi-Fi control to an existing non-smart device. In the end, I gave up, as my soldering skills just weren’t sufficient to keep the wires soldered to the contact points on the circuit board. If you’re interested, the device I was modifying was an Ikea Uppåtvind air purifier, and I was using this guide. To be fair, even if it had worked, I was using a much larger board than the D1 Mini recommended and so there’s no guarantee that I would have been able to re-assemble it anyway.
York Christmas Market
Whilst we were in York last weekend, alongside visiting York’s Chocolate Story, we also had a browse of York’s Christmas Market in Parliament Street. Even on a Sunday morning, it was very busy, and overall the city was the busiest I’ve seen it (remember, I grew up in York). Indeed, people have been complaining about how busy it is.
Christmas markets can be a bit hit-and-miss – I remember going to the Manchester Christmas market several years ago to find it was basically the same four stalls repeated across the whole city. York’s market is mostly local businesses, and it’s a good mix of food, drink and gifty things. We always buy a litre bottle of barbecue sauce from The Chilli Jam Man when we go.
Black Friday
I literally only bought two things on Black Friday this year, both from Amazon:
- A 3 way plug with USB-A and USB-C (sponsored link). Christine has had one of these for a while and uses it daily; I’ve bought a second one because I want a charger for the bedroom that doesn’t have any LEDs on it.
- The Actually Delicious One Pot Cookbook (sponsored link). This is the latest cookbook from Poppy O’Toole, aka Poppy Cooks, and it’s reduced to £10 (from £22) in their Black Friday sale. We already have her Potato Book and Slow Cooker books and use them both frequently.
