Adventures in Birmingham - September 12th 2010

Island BarOur regular school night fixture, Island bar are celebrating their birthday and as such are giving a raffle ticket to everyone who purchases a cocktail. As a rare drinker, they kindly offered to put some colour in my sparkling mineral water so I don’t feel left out.My friends however, win 3 sets of glasses between them. Nice!Pecha KuchaMy friend Jo Hardy has put on this event which is a good enough reason to go. I’m not too keen on ‘networking’ in the evenings, (not keen on networking at all actually) and this show does not kick off until close to 8.30pm but it is a fantastic idea.With the rough theme of ‘Birmingham’ a favourite subject of mine, six speakers talk about different subjects using 20 slides which show for just 20 seconds each. So each talk lasts 6 mins or so.I learnt about a renowned local architect from 1960s to 1970s, John Madin, about the Birmingham Music Archive and most importantly that we should not feed bread to ducks because it fills them up without them getting their proper nutrients. Ducks need 5 a day too!Urban Coffee CoFriday night is music night and Urban have a superb live band doing bluesy covers. Apparently MojoHooker bring the blues back to the Midlands. Have no idea where the 'blues' went in the interim period but it’s good to have it back. I love music in coffee shops and have been actively encouraging Urban for the past year although the Friday night is more about watching the band rather than whispering to friends in between the tracks. It's loud!Ikon CafeHardly a week goes by without a trip to Ikon and this time curiosity took me to Ikon Cafe to listen to ’My Favourite Things’ talk by one of my fave radio peeps/musos, Stuart Maconie. Curiosity is now abated.