An Autumn walk Through Brno

  As some of you know, I live in Brno. Brno is a city in the south of the Czech Republic, and it is closer to Vienna and Bratislava than it is to Prague. It is a city of more than 350,000 and that makes it a little bigger than my hometown of Hull, England, but not by much. I find that surprising really as, while Hull has the feel of a grimy, northern working class city, Brno is more like a picturesque, but industrial village.   Brno feels smaller, more compact and is simply blessed by beautiful surroundings and topography. Where Hull is endlessly flat, stretching into the plains of Holderness, Brno is hilly. While Hull is made up of long streets of Victorian houses all joined together in

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The Chess Piece

In the run up to Halloween, here is another true and strange tale of the paranormal. I will post a new strange true story each day so don’t miss them… A friend of mine once told me this story on Halloween many years ago. It chilled me to the bone. Whether it is true or not, I am not sure although he swore on his mother’s grave that it was. In the late 1970’s, the central cemetery in west Hull was a real eyesore. It was overrun with trees, bushes and weeds and it was used as a place for illicit activities. Most people gave it a very wide berth. Most of the graves in the cemetery are Victorian and grandiose monstrosities of a bygone era. Pretty damned creepy in

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Poltergeist

In the run up to Halloween, here is another true and strange tale of the paranormal. I will post a new strange true story each day so don’t miss them. up in my house was on the whole, pretty good. We had great parents, almost every weekend we were gone camping somewhere, we had two proper holidays each year and I have no complaints at all. Just a bunch of heartfelt thanks to my parents and a growing sense of awe as to how they did all that with three small boys and not a lot of money. When I was eleven, we moved. It was a good move to be honest from a terraced three up, two down in west Hull to a rather nice semi-detached outside of Hull.

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Just A Game?

Another short story taken from my book – My Haunted Life. If there is one game that most certainly is not a game it is the Ouija board and I have avoided that board like the plague most of my life. However, one night, in my late teens, my friend and I went to visit an ex-teacher of his. Well actually, we went on the pretext of visiting her but actually, it was her daughter we really went to see but that really is as they say another story. It was quite late by the time we arrived. We had already been for a beer at the pub and then had the idea to visit as we drove home. Their house was a huge home in a well to do

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The Sea

I think my favorite place to be is by the Sea, which is strange because I live in a land locked country now. But for most of my life, I have lived close to the ocean either in Hull or Houston. Perhaps the Sea is in my blood coming from a fishing port on the east coast of Britain – an island. Whatever it is, the ocean sings to me whether azure blue or broiling grey, the smell, sights and sound of an ocean raises me up. I think of water as essentially a feminine element influenced by the Moon. A magnetic element that draws you to it. One that cleanses and washes away dirt, tiredness and sin reinvigorating the body and the soul. A body of water is like

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Reminiscing About Summer

As I look out of my office window, I see a steady stream of drizzle. It is dark enough to have the lights on and if the truth be told, cold enough to put on the heating. It’s also august 27th and it has been like this for much of August. What happened to summer this year? From time to time some strange golden ball does appear in the sky emitting something that passes for heat but it is a pale washed out version of those seen in previous summers. If I hadn’t spent 12-days on Kos, I would swear summer was yet to arrive this year. I guess I shouldn’t moan too much. Maybe I simply betraying my English upbringing with my weather obsession? I remember as a small

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Ghost Stories

As many of you may already know, I had a strange and psychically troubled childhood some of which is documented in my book Inner Journeys. along the way, I bumped into a few ghosts too…. We lived in a typical semi-detached house on the outskirts of Hull. So far as I know, it was built in the 1920’s and had little history that might make you think it could be haunted. I recall my first impressions of the place though as a young boy. It was cold with no central heating, felt damp and gloomy and the bare floorboards and old wallpaper added a certain creepiness to the place. Of course, my Dad was an amazingly resourceful man and very soon, the entire place was redecorated and central heating added.

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My Short Acting Career

Many many years ago, when I was about 13 I think, I was persuaded to appear in the school play. The play, and I will never forget it, was The Snow Queen. I managed to land the part of the Story Teller which, looking back, was a bit contrived but I guess was meant to be a parody of Hans Christian Anderson or similar. I played no role in the action but introduced the story and then popped in and out to explain what was going on, help the characters make key decisions and harass the audience. I can still recall part of the introduction where I was engaged in dancing a little dance while reciting a poem…. Snip, snap, snooper Pooper bazalooper Snip snap snooper It went. Did I

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Of FA Cup Finals, Hull and Yorkshire

This last weekend, I and a good percentage of my fellow East Yorkshire compadres (not all as Rugby is still big in Hull and Hull KR played Hull FC that same day!) were either sat in the London sun at Wembley or, like me, huddled in front of the biggest TV we could find. Of course, none of us really entertained the idea that we could actually win the FA Cup but we all brimmed with pride and awe at the occasion none the less. But you also knew, as underdogs, we had nothing at all to lose and there is always the chance, no matter how slim, that on the day and for 90 minutes, Hull City could be the better team. Of course, 10 minutes after kick off

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Wonderful Memories

There are some nights when finding myself alone I end up walking the pages of Youtube. Its a veritable memory lane really and it brings back such powerful and emotional memories. There is the video of Sandie Shaw that reminds me of our black and white TV with curtains in the small living room of the two up two down that was home in Westlands Road, Hull. I would sneek down to watch Top of the Pops and I do remember how I hated the Rolling Stones but adored Ms. Shaw. Cuddled in beside my Mum on the sofa watching the black and white box in the corner. How innocent I was… we all seemed to be back in the 1960s. Later we moved to Willerby…. it was a ‘posh’

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