Museums – Well Eye Never

April 2024 Favourites

Hey there, hope you’re all doing well. I’m good, although like all disabled people in the UK I feel great unease over the government’s proposed changes to our benefits. My PIP review still hasn’t been dealt with after 9 months as it is. I’m not going to rant about it here though – I’ve posted a brief thread and shared several other posts on my Twitter/X page if you want a wider sense of people’s reactions. But please do read the proposals and respond to the consultation if you can (by 22nd July), as it’s vitally important to have our voices heard at this early stage. Same goes for the separate consultation about fit notes (until 8th July) too.

But anyway, on to much nicer things, and there’s plenty that I’ve enjoyed during this past month, including a couple of exhibitions, a West End musical, a theatre workshop, stand-up gigs and other comedy shows. One of the exhibitions was a press invite for my journalist friend Emily, and I’m due to be paid for the workshop I took part in, but nothing is sponsored to be featured here and all opinions are my own as usual.

So let’s crack on with this month’s post and video, and I hope you enjoy!

January & February 2024 Favourites

Welcome to my first Favourites post and video for this year! As I had a very busy Christmas that lasted until mid-January, it made sense to combine the latter half of that month with February for this roundup.

Recent weeks have been quite relaxed compared to the festive period, as hoped and expected, but there’s still quite a variety of bits and pieces to mention. These include an audio described gallery tour, a free meal, a special scenic view of the city, an important new audio play, things I’ve been watching that have been recommended by friends, and other entertainment I’ve enjoyed. Some of these items are PR-related, as indicated when appropriate, but all opinions are my own regardless. So I hope you enjoy!

Christmas 2023 Favourites – Part 2

Happy New Year! I hope you had a great Christmas, and that you have a prosperous year ahead as well.

This is the second, bumper part of my festive Favourites, as the first part covered the month of November, where I had a free Christmas meal, explored a trail of snowmen sculptures and saw some of London’s displays, among other activities.

Since then, in December and early January, I’ve met friends in both London and Devon, seen four incredible theatre shows, explored a museum I hadn’t been to before, had some lovely meals in restaurants, ate far too much food at home, celebrated the 60th anniversary of Doctor Who, watched lots of comedies on TV, and enjoyed some music as well.

So once again, as with every Christmas, this is a bumper post and video. One of the meals was a free PR invite for my journalist friend Emily to review, but as usual I’m not sponsored or affiliated to write anything here, and all opinions are my own. I hope you enjoy!

October 2023 Favourites

Hello again, and welcome to my latest little roundup, at a time when I know that things are far from cheerful news-wise. The war in Israel and Gaza is horrific to say the least, and like everyone else I can only pray for peace and express my solidarity with the innocent civilians affected on all sides, just as I do for the ongoing Ukraine conflict. Then there’s the Covid Inquiry, stormy weather and other stuff. But on the plus side, the plans to close railway ticket offices have just been scrapped (for now at least), which I had a little rant about in my July post, so well done to everyone who campaigned against it.

So as always I hope my posts are a pleasant distraction from things like that. And for me this has been a pretty relaxing month really. I didn’t go to any theatre shows this time, but I did revisit a couple of my favourite museums, explored a couple of sculpture trails, and had a nice Halloween tour with my friend and colleague Emily. Plus I got my Covid booster, had a few other nice walks, and went to a retirement party (all the best Pauline if you’re reading this!), but I don’t need to write about those little bits here.

So let’s crack on with this month’s post and video, in which nothing is sponsored or gifted as usual, and I hope you enjoy!

40th Birthday Favourites

Here we go, the big four-o,
These two score years have not gone slow!
Amazing how the time has flown,
And since my youth how much I’ve grown.
I had to celebrate, you know,
With food and drink and West End shows.
So with my friends and on my own,
I’ve really marked this milestone.

There’s stand-up stars who made me laugh,
Musicals well-choreographed,
Eating blind and on a cruise,
A 9-course feast and rounds of booze,
A major rock star’s prized possessions,
Art displayed with cool projections.
An action film with audio description,
And shows I’ve seen on television.

Come see how I’ve spent my time,
I promise it’s not all in rhyme.
Here’s why I’m feeling all aglow,
Enjoy this post and video!

AD | Frameless – Audio Described Tour

Note: I was given complimentary admission to this tour, for feedback and review purposes, but all opinions are my own.

For many people, art is already what they would consider immersive. A carefully considered and expertly crafted painting on a flat canvas has the power to draw you in, so that you’re totally absorbed by its people, places, fashions, creatures, scenery, history, objects, shapes, patterns, colours, messages, emotions, etc. Galleries with framed paintings on their walls have been successful for centuries with good reason, and will rightly continue to be so.

However, there is always scope to experience and enjoy the medium in alternative ways. Not only can it give even the most regular and fervent art connoisseurs a new perspective, but there are a lot of other people for whom it’s nothing short of vital to approach it differently, because they need assistance, encouragement or inspiration to fully appreciate and lose themselves in the masterpieces being presented to them.

For instance, as much as I love a good gallery, the fulfilment I can get from them as a visually impaired person tends to be very limited, hence I don’t go to them very often. On the few occasions I have wandered around such spaces on my own, where accessibility hasn’t been fully considered by the venue, it’s in the unfortunate knowledge and reluctant acceptance that I’m missing out on the full context of the pieces and cannot appreciate the finer details they contain.

I have, therefore, been delighted to take part in audio described tours at several museums and galleries since moving to London, which have really opened up this world to me and enabled me to engage with it more thoroughly.

But in late August I had a descriptive tour of Frameless that took it to another level, with its use of cutting-edge technology that showcases artworks in a way that I’ve never personally encountered before. The buzzword ‘immersive’ is being bandied around a lot in the cultural sector at the moment, and not always accurately judging by the reviews for some attractions, so I have felt uncertain about visiting such places. But for me Frameless very much lived up to that billing. And they have more audio described tours coming up, so I wanted to give some insight into what it’s like.

July 2023 Favourites

Hello again, I hope you’re all doing well. For me, July has been a relatively quiet month, thanks to the wet weather, my PIP review and preparations for my birthday month in August all interfering with my time.

Nevertheless, in this latest post and video roundup there are a few nice outings I can mention, a couple of comedy shows I’ve been bingeing on, and a bit of music as well, none of which is sponsored or gifted as usual. So I hope you enjoy!

June 2023 Favourites

Half the year already gone, and what a year it’s proven to be already. My support worker job is continuing to go well, so I have a nice little update to share on that. Then there’s the usual mixture of theatre, museums, walks, TV, music, etc that I’ve been enjoying, some of which you’ll already be aware of from my posts over the last few weeks. And apart from a press trip, nothing here is gifted or sponsored. So let’s crack on with my latest roundup post and video, and I hope you enjoy it!

Science Museum – Sci-Fi & Vaccines

It’s been a few years since I went to the Science Museum before the pandemic, but I finally got back there recently to spend a nice afternoon looking around a couple of their exhibitions, one about science fiction and the other about the Covid vaccines.

I also downloaded the large print guides that are available via the Accessibility page on their website, and was therefore able to read them on my phone during my visit, so that was really helpful too. Now and again the order of objects presented in the guide wasn’t quite in the same order as I was looking at them, so I had to reorientate myself a bit, and use my monocular (my pocket telescope) to look at the small text on the labels to match them up to the book, but that wasn’t a major issue on the whole.

So here are little reviews of the two exhibitions I saw on my recent visit, with a selection of photos.

May 2023 Favourites

Hello again. As you May have noticed, so to speak, from a few of my recent posts, this has been another very eventful and enjoyable month. Which means there’s plenty to mention in this latest roundup post and video, including a big royal event, a musical, explorations of nature and animals, and a few things I’ve been watching and listening to. None of it’s sponsored or gifted as usual. So I hope you enjoy!

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