DAY OUT: Burghley House (Nr Stamford)

Surprisingly it seems that our previous visits to Burghley House occurred longer ago than I thought, since neither of them appear on this blog (which started around 2014 IIRC). Not much has changed in the actual house, obviously... but outside they have been quite busy, including a 'Garden of Surprises', although I have to say it wasn't overly surprising. 

Still, the house itself remains well worth visiting and the Heaven Room and Hell Staircase are amazing works of art that you could look at for hours. Best of all we didn't even have to pay since we won tickets in a raffle. Perfect! 

Thankfully, after two days of horrendous rain, it stayed mostly dry for our visit, with just a light drizzle as we walked around the gardens hunting for sculptures....

SHOPPING: IKEA & Meadowhall

 

A quick Saturday visit to Meadowhall to pick up a strap from Maxine and to stock up on various Lindt products, preceded by an even quicker visit to IKEA to buy some new plates (finally, after months of procrastination).

GIG: Electric Circus (WASP tribute) (Nuneaton)

 

Before seeing 'Electric Circus' my one thought was 'I hope the singer sounds like Blackie Lawless', because that's going to be the key to success here. Well, full marks on that score because 'Johnny Lawless' (ahem) definitely hits the bullseye there. And the gig got off to a great start with a slew of WASP classics. 

But over the course of the gig it became clear that the band were either under-rehearsed or just not firing on all cylinders somehow, becuase some of the guitar playing was a bit wanting. You also don't realise just how integral Chris Holmes guitar solos are to the overall WASP sound and when you hear them not hitting the marks it starts to grate. Particularly the duel lead part in 'Wild Child', that, I'm afraid, was pretty painful to listen to.

It was enjoyable, sure and they did a decent job of capturing the essence of early WASP. The bass player was solid too, no complaints on his performance. But ultimately it seemed a bit weak, when a bit more application could have made it a lot better. 

Also, I couldn't escape the thought that Johnny Lawless actually looked a lot more like Tom Warrier than Blackie Lawless!

DAY OUT: Cotswold Sculpture Park (Near Cirencester)

 

Back in 2022, Rose and I visited the Cotswold Sculpture Park and because we enjoyed it so much and because we knew that everything was for sale (and therefore likely to change over time) we decided to revisit when enough time had passed. There were some pieces that we remembered from before, but there was enough new stuff to make it worthwhile.

Unfortunately we elected to visit on the day of a large agriculture show nearby, which meant there was a lot of horse boxes and the like - this resulted in an extra hour or so on the journey there, but at least the weather was good once we got there,. It had rained overnight, but it stayed dry while we were there and we didn't even need hats, so that was good.

Our favourite pieces were the owl and birds made of cutlery and also the three cat sculptures, but we also really like the Punk Kitty painting that was found just by the entrance.