New year, Christmas and Dinosaurs

Ah ! Here it is! i wondered where the hell I had abandoned my blog allowing it to gather metaphorical tinterweb dust.
Millions of probably amazing things have more than likely occurred, but the most prominent of these occasions has indeed been Christmas and New Year.
My Christmas has been a fairly laid back and simple affair, after Heathrow decided that it was incapable of dealing with frozen precipitation, it decided to call it a day, and so mine and Annas trip to Denmark was subsequently  called off, but hey it meant i had £200 surplus so we went off and bought epic amounts of food, made a den and hibernated for a few days surviving on chocolate, marzipan and duck, devoid from family members that had consumed too much or children bouncing on your head proclaiming that 'Santa has Come!' repeatedly.
This was also our time to test our culinary skills, as neither of us have ever cooked duck before, but a few guesstimates later and we ended up with this badman!

Its basically a miss-match of Danish and English Christmas cuisine, and even if the idea of Yorkshire Puds and raspberry salad do sound a little 'experimental', there is absolutely no doubt that it filled a hole.
Christmas morning saw the appearance of 'Mike the Enigmatic Dinosaur' whose expression was dependant on the angle in which you gazed at him...

Mike also has the uncanny ability to act as a transportation device (in the form of a space hopper) and a seat, which comes in handy! :D

So after Endless films had been broadcast, it was time for new year.
It may be because i wasn't invited to any amazing party or something, but i still maintain that new years celebrations are horrendously overrated. It just seems to me that new years is a night where partying is mandatory, and it forces people out that don't really want to be there. I don't want to be told when i have to get inebriated and kiss people, I'm more than capable of doing that on my own thank you! One day I will be all ready to go on a 'Mad One' but until that day comes, or Russell Brand/Rolf Harris invites me to a 'Banging new year rave' I have no intention of going out because some Anglo Saxon decided 'Every year on this night we should get wankered'
But because we try to minimise how dull and boring we are, and slow the aging process we decided to embark on a day trip, and where better to feel young than at a mueseum?
So off we trundled to the laaandon tawn's natural history museum, armed with dinosaur biccies and ham sandwiches!

My fave bit was by far the new Darwin wing which was full of specimen jars, and being a bit of a nature geek and a massive steampunk fan, I may of wee'd a little because i was so excited,

The octo's  where gorgeous to look at but me and anna had to wait roughly 4 years to see them because some dick  Art student sat there taking photo's, if you turned your flash off woman you can take perfect pictures, you penis, but as you can see it was well worth the wait  :D

I don't know why i love stuff in jar's in reality its a pretty morbid practice, but i think its a lot more tastefull then traditional taxidermy, for one the specimins can be used at a later date for dissection ect, so the animal may not of neccesarilly died in vain. Additionally pickling prevents mishappen faces, so foxes don't look like they are staring in to the lost arc  

Also it allows for accidental poses, as seen in the crocodilian below that appears to be singing in the shower, he looks so happy, propping himself up on the jar like that.

The fish bones were uber pretty after being dyed the little plaice thing below is simply gorgeous and the shark cartillage below is equally as awesome

I think what I really alike about collections like this is the sense or 'organised Chaos' essentially is some biologist showing stuff in jars and writing on a label everything he can possibly  think of, yes there is a standardised procedure, but looking at the menagerie of labels and stickers its clear some individuals have disregarded these codes of practise as worthless. There are no standard Jar sizes, labels, fonts or preparation techniques its a scientific free for all, with the curators solely responsible with trying to create some form of order in the chaos that is a scientific collection.

Although i love all of this stuff my highlight of the day was a 5 year old girl in the line to go in, how after being left to her own devices by her mother found some 'working girl' leaflets, with their funbags all hanging out, attracted by the bright colours picking them up and proud as ever revealing her find to her mum, who promptly snatched them from her embarrassed and quickly disposed of them, meanwhile me and anna were a chuckling with amusement

Like this only more pornographic Via

What I failed to see was a kid on a scooter shortly after whizz down the expansive ramp that leads up to the main entrance with his mum having kittens running behind...

Pic unrelated Via