Tag Archives: Whistle Binkies

Holy Mackerel

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Fishers in The City Thursday night decided it was an eating night.  Thought I would have a Thai meal, so walked over to Thistle Street to try Dusit.  Dusit is probably the best Thai Restaurant in Edinburgh.  It is small and looked rather full with several people hanging around outside.  So I gave it a miss, because across the road was a fish restaurant called Fishers in the City.  This restaurant has a good reputation.  Despite not booking, they were able to find me a spot at the bar to eat.  Only just made it in time.  It was nice to see many minor celebrities being turned away at the door.

The place serves Fish, but does have meat for those who don’t fancy fish.  There are several fish types on sale as well as shell fish, cray fish and lobsters.

I started off with some some Scallops, and Mackerel for my main course.  Both these were quite simple, but excellently prepared.  The wine was a revelation, it was the house brand Sauvignon Blanc from South Africa.  Most definitely not a French brand, because it smelt and tasted so florally and fruity.  I don’t know the name of the wine, not that it matters because it is not on general sale in the UK.

I then headed back to the Royal Mile to take some photos.  These are in the gallery.  Then dumping the camera, I headed to Whistle Binkies for some Rock and Roll.  Here I heard the first set of a  Scottish band called Three Card Trick.  (Myspace)   They were very good.  Now I have a recording of them as my ring tone.

I want to announce my Edinburgh Gallery.

Newcastle and Edinburgh

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Visited Newcastle on Tuesday for three days, working on the Farsi project. I managed to get to Gateshead by 9.10 am. without breaking many speed limits.

Took the opportunity to catch a train to Edinburgh on Wednesday evening and met up with Ed and Mary.  The excuse was Mary’s leaving drink.  She has finished working with Walker/Elevon/Arelon/Cedar.  We met for a drink at 7.00pm in the Cafe Royal, went on for a Mexican meal at the Blue Parrot Cantina, then a bottle of Veuve Clicquot at the bar of Jon Marshals best friends, sisters brother in law’s wife’s husbands best friend or some such nonsense.

Finished there for a beer at the mobbed Igloo and finished off in Whistle Binkies at 3.00am Thursday morning.

Able to catch the early morning train back to Newcastle for a full days work, and then drive back home.

Panic set in when I left for Newcastle for Edinburgh,  realised I did not have my car keys, so phoned the office to organise a search for them.  After organising the Gateshead office to search my desk, coffee room, reception, and calling the taxi company, the keys were found in the door lock of the car. 

Edinburgh in the wind

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Tuesday flew up to Edinburgh for a planning meeting on Wednesday.  A very strong wind was forecast for Scotland, in fact during the night there were gusts of 124mph.  The flight was rather rough as we came into land, with some of the passengers puking up.  Need les to say I was unaffected by the turbulence.

Had to take a taxi into the city, no busses at the bus stop and a long queue of people.  Taxi driver said we would have to take detour with the main road being closed because of storm damage.  In the event this had been cleared up by the time we got to the location.

Arrived at the Apex, and had  a glass of wine and a Sandwich for supper, then onto Whistle Binkies  for some rock music.

Cambridge weekend – Saturday

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We were up and into breakfast by 8.00.  Continental breakfast, so there were croissants, and cheese and dried meats.  Chatted to a teenage girl during breakfast, who had stayed the night in collage.  She had been on an admissions day, and was touring a few universities to select the ones she was going to apply to.  She was from central Edinburgh and was familiar with Whistle Binkies.  A friend of hers had a band that played there on occasions.

Rosemary and I went out separate ways for the first event.  She heard a talk on Portraits and Professions, while I went and saw a talk on “A Wonderful Thing is a Phillips Machine”.

The Phillips Machine is an analogue computer, which runs on the flow of water.  It was build by an engineer after the 2nd world war to model the economy.  You could see the effect of changing the interest rates, government borrowing, savings, imports.  They were built in the 1950s.  Of fourteen build this and one in New Zealand are the only ones, which work.  Allan McRobie, a specialist in bridge design and dynamics gave the lecture and demonstrated the machine.  He had spent considerable energy in rebuilding the machine.

Next we had a tour of the Computer Laboratory on the West side.  We were shown some of the work, which is in progress at the university to do with new methods of interacting with a computer.

The first event of the afternoon was Question Time, chaired by BBC Edward Stourton.  The question was, “Where is it all going to end”.

Afterwards we saw a presentation by Sir Christopher Frayling about the image of Scientists in Movies.  Most of the examples were from older films, with very little from recent films.  Rosemary spoke to Christopher and was a bit dismayed that he had never seen the TV series CSI, where scientists are shown in a good light.

Tonight we managed an evening meal at the Galleria restaurant. First though a pint of beer, I had a very reasonable pint of Woodfords from Norfolk. We then went to the Galleria; we had eaten there two years ago on the balcony overlooking the river.  This year it was too cold to do that.  Reasonable meal, we started with a Tiger Prawn Salad and a Pastrami Salad.  Main course for Rosemary was Roasted Mushrooms, while I had Poached Monkfish.

Then it was back to college and bed.

Creme Brule with RBS

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Its funny how days work out.  Thursday started a quiet sunny day with not a lot to do.  Part way through the day, a serious problem was recognised, serious because no one had taken a look at it before and it was high on the user want list.  Ended up with me working until 21.00 in the evening trying to resolve the problem.

Eventually stopped at nine, and went back to the hotel to get changed into the glad rags.  I was off up to Petit Paris where my favourite spiky haired waitress was on duty.  Ordered my wine and pigeon breasts yet again.  Next it was rabbit in a lovely thick wine sauce.  Decided the bank were going to treat me, so I finished off with a Crème Brule.  On the table next to me were an older couple visiting Edinburgh for the festival.  They had never been to the Petit Paris, and really quite enjoyed the place. They had been to a number of plays, and walked out of at least a couple.

After the Petit Paris, it was off to Whistle Binkies for a very quick pint and 15 minutes of listening to quite a good band.  I had decided I needed to be back in bed to follow through the problem I was looking at; so I was back in bed by midnight.