It's always amusing when you see an old person in a supermarket start running with a trolley then pick their feet up and let the momentum of the trolley carry them forwards. You can almost hear them thinking 'wheeeee' as they go. For some reason, it's nearly always a man doing it.

Last time we went to the Bear Inn, I had a starter which consisted of an entire wheel of brie. This time I skipped the starter and went straight for the Winter Pie Platter for my main course.

The platter consisted of a tiny cornish pasty and 3 little pies (venison, chicken & mushroom and steak & ale), along with mash and mushy peas.

The National Poultry Show was held at Stoneleigh Park. There were lots of different types of chickens, ducks, turkeys and geese on show, as well as some for sale.

It's probably wrong but after a few minutes of looking at lots of different chickens I started to feel hungry and thought "I could really eat a roast chicken".

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A new junction has recently been installed in the city centre, based on similar ones pioneered in The Netherlands. The traffic lights have been removed from the junction between Jordon Well, Cox Street and Whitfriars Street and the junction has been coloured red:

Today was the first time I have been into the city centre since the junction was finished. Apparently the theory is that vehicles and pedestrians all have the same priority as each other and all vehicles need to slow down and navigate the junction with care. Similar schemes have been tried in Europe and they seem to work.

While we were in Asda they did the 2-minute silence over the shop tannoy, and I think everyone stood silently and observed it. It must have been strange for people coming into the shop and finding everyone standing silent and still, but fortunately nobody seemed to be confused by it. The only thing disturbing the silence was the self-checkout machines repeatedly asking for confirmation since the people checking out their shopping had temporarily stopped and the machines were getting confused by it.

This morning, Emma phoned me on her way to the bus stop to point out that the wooden fences along our street were steaming. It had been very wet yesterday but it was comparatively warm and sunny this morning so the fences were warming up.

We went to nearby Baginton for this years Heritage Open Day. Within a short distance there were several sites, including the Electric Train Museum and Bagot's Castle, neither of which are normally open to the public. We also visited Airbase, where they had a selection of vintage aircraft on display.

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We first noticed these flat peaches a couple of months ago in one of the grocers or small supermarkets in Coventry which specialised in foreign foods. Shortly afterwards we started seeing them everywhere, including in Tescos.

They seem to have come from nowhere and become ubiquitous very rapidly. We bought a pack last year and were dismayed to find they went mouldy very quickly but I did manage to salvage one to eat. It was quite juicy but slightly bland. I think I will stick to normal peaches or nectarines.

We have just returned from the War Memorial Park where the annual Coventry Caribbean Festival is being held. It has been a warm sunny day so the sound of the steel band and the smell of barbecued chicken helped create a good atmosphere.

Our slice of watermelon and tray of Jerk Chicken was interrupted by a few wasps but we managed to finish eating without getting stung.

The Charterhouse Fields lie just off London Road, to the south of Coventry city centre. For many years the fields have been accessible to the public but one of the local schools is attempting to annex a large portion of the site for their own private use. The Save the Charterhouse Fields Campaign is battling the school and council to prevent the loss of public access.

It would be a shame if the site was closed because I have walked through there a few times, taking photos or picking blackberries.

The above photo was taken in 2008 shortly after snowfall. I have more photos of the fields which were taken with my pinhole camera.

More information about the campaign is available from their website.

I went for a short walk through the village of Great Alne (near Alcester). I saw this old sign near the old mill.

The Godiva Festival, Coventry's annual free summer festival took place this weekend. Here are some photos from the parade through the city centre and the festival site at the War Memorial Park.

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Tonight we ate at Bombay Joe's on Walsgrave Road. We were walking up the road looking at the different restaurants looking for one to eat in.

We started with the traditional poppadoms with chutneys. For the main course we shared a South Indian Garlic Chilli with chicken and a Chicken Dansak. For side dishes we had pilau rice, chilli naan bread and Tarka Dahl. The curries were both very nice - the first was one of the restaurant 'specials' and had huge pieces of garlic in the sauce. The Dansak was described as 'sour and sweet and fairly hot' and we hoped the heat would offset any sweetness. The end result was well balanced without any obvious sweet or sour flavours. The Dahl was very smooth and buttery - we would never dare to add that much ghee into a meal but somehow when you eat out it seems ok.

As usual in Indian restaurants, the portions were well sized and we were both feeling rather full when we left. Recommended and worth visiting again.

I'm in Chicago for a week, attending a conference. We got here on tuesday but our luggage didn't arrive until last night thanks to our 1st plane being late and the airline not having enough time to transfer the luggage over to the 2nd plane. Unfortunately my laptop charger was in the luggage so I had to restrict computer use because I didn't want the battery to run down and leave me unable to do any work.

I'll upload some photos eventually but I'll just waffle on slightly at random for a few minutes first.

There seem to be a lot of 'news' style programmes on in the mornings and I found myself watching a lot of 'Good Morning America' on ABC but I had to give up because they were spending so much time talking about the upcoming Royal Wedding. I'm sure I've seen more about it here than back home.

I really can't watch Fox News. It seems to be aimed at 10 year olds, or at least aimed at people who like inane comments and slightly stupid sounding presenters.

Why did CNN give Pierce Morgan the Larry King job? Surely they could have found someone better, or at least less annoying.

About half the adverts seem to be for pharmaceuticals of various types. A lot of these have a spoken warning at the end which seem to imply that one of the side effects might be death. I know they have to be careful and try to cover all eventualities but that would put me off wanting to take some. Also I mocked an advert for a product aimed at people who couldn't produce enough tears and so needed something to lubricate their eyes. I really wouldn't have thought there was a huge need for such a product and couldn't understand why it was being advertised so much. That was until I spent 2 days in an over-air-conditioned conference centre which seems to be sucking all moisture from my body. Now I understand. If most offices are as bad as that then there is definitely a need for the product, but surely a simpler solution would be just to turn the air conditioning down a little. Where I am right now, there is a bridge between the conference centre and the hotel and there is often a howling gale blowing though, probably caused by an imbalance in the air conditioning in the two buildings.

OK, I spent longer prattling about medicines and air conditioning than I really intended. One thing which has impressed me about Chicago is the public transport. The buses and trains are cheap at $2.25 for a journey or $23 for a pass which is valid for an entire week. This even includes a trip from the airport to the city centre. The buses also have a loudspeaker which gives the name of the next stop or road junction, which makes it really easy to find out where you are and when you need to get off. This is so much better than the buses in Coventry, which are expensive and not part of a properly 'integrated transport' system and half of the drivers don't seem to know their route very well so if you try to ask them if they go past a particular place they can't or won't answer you. The 'Travel West Midlands' company which runs most of the Coventry bus service can't even be arsed putting prices on its website so as an infrequent bus user it's a pain finding out the prices because all the buses are 'exact change only'. The Chicago buses are also exact change, but since all journeys are the same price and that price is well publicised, it's a much friendlier system.

Beer is quite expensive here with pints being between $5-8 depending on bar and type of beer, but a lot of bars seem to stock a good range of 'proper' beers and not just industrial factory-made tasteless lagers. I've been impressed with the beer selection in most of the places I've been to so far.

Food in bars is reasonably priced and of course the portions are enormous. We've not been disappointed by either size of quality. Food in shops is quite expensive, with fruit often costing $1 a piece and snack bars are at least that much too. I was terribly disappointed with the american Tropicana juice. Back home, Tropicana is a premium brand and is nearly all 'freshly squeezed' or at least not from concentrate. All the juices I've seen so far here have been made from concentrate and have other flavours added, usually listed as something like 'Naturally occurring flavours not from Orange' or something similar. The flavour is nowhere near as good as the UK Tropicana.

There is a bloke in Broadgate in the city centre who is running marathons in a giant hamster wheel. His aim is to raise money for charity.