Neil Hopcroft

A digital misfit

Weird day. Off to Hunstanton – pictures posted already – I’ve been meaning to get to the seaside since I got back last year. It was snowing for a good chunk of the journey up there, but not much settling, sadly, I was hoping for some pretty countryside, but at least that meant the roads weren’t particular difficult driving. But what is it with the fenland drivers?

Theres two types – the fast and the slow. The guys in their beamers and mercs are pushing 90 as they glibly overtake along sweeping country roads through the falling snow, while theres people in the fiestas and metros struggling to get to fifty. I was following one of these thinking they were being ultra cautious because of the snowy conditions, until we got to a roundabout when they pull out immediately in front of someone coming around to turn across their path, thankfully no bent metal, just a good bit of braking. Not cautious, just an appalling driver.

Of course I probably fall more within the beamer category than fiesta, but I would like to think I at least pay some attention to the prevailing weather conditions.

Arriving I found most of the car parks closed, so headed toward the town centre, where there was plenty of space in what is, during summer time, the horrendously overpriced short stay car park. While the snow had stopped by this time there was still a rather fresh breeze coming inland.

The beach was devoid of people – I was the only one there, appreciating the full force of the weather. Time to trawl around the arcades to find pinball machines – there were a couple of note. The Lord of the Rings film tie-in was a nice tight machine, I’ve not played such a new table for a long time, Trocadero back in the old days was probably the last time. And a martian attack table of some kind, I don’t remember its name, which was a far better integration between the table and a computer screen being projected onto the glass to give the impression of hitting computer characters, previous tables I’ve seen using this concept have suffered from trying to be pinball and a computer game all in one, this was a pinball game, but one made more interesting by creating computer animated targets as well as physical targets.

Then, after lunch I headed up to the clifftop, where the carpark was closed so I just pulled up along the clifftop road. Pausing in my car for a little while before wandering over to look out over the sea. I was somewhat shaken when I got there to find adverts for the Samaritans at frequent enough intervals that they couldn’t be ignored.

*snap* I fell out of the happy world I was in where it was just a bit cold and blowy, back into the real world where I’ve really got some thinking to do, to figure out where things go from here[0], for a moment I contemplated the fencing and intricate hedgework they’ve created all along the clifftop. This, maybe, is to stop the ‘one-over’s, or perhaps is to give more structural integrity.

Walking back across the grass I was aware of eyes following me – the family in the car next to mine drove off when they realised they weren’t about to witness a jumper, in search of another untidy suicide. Voyeurs.

[0] Note: no cause for alarm!


3 comments

  1. The same sort of adverts always used to give me pause for thought when I visited Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol. There was even a phone there with a direct link to the Samaritans.

    Hope whatever thinking you need to do is progressing OK.

    • The thing that worried me was the depth of emotion they brought out yesterday afternoon – these kinds of posters surely shouldn’t be /making/ you think about jumping? Even if only for a few seconds, enough to scare me.

      Thinking is difficult – I’ve found myself in a situation somewhat different to that I thought I was in, and there is a very real danger of it hurting people I care deeply about if I don’t handle it well from now on. Its not something I can just walk away from, but getting it wrong is going to be worse.

      • I suppose the posters just bring out the reality of the fact that it really is something people do. So you find yourself imagining what it would be like if you did it. I think we all have dark visions of doing that kind of thing from time to time – the sign that that’s normal and healthy is that we then think ‘Erk! I really don’t want to do that actually!’ It’s if we don’t go on to have that response that there’s a problem.

        Sorry to hear about the tangled web, as well. I hope you’re able to work through whatever it is OK.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.