Slow Day in Thornbury

-

Sometimes slow days reveal as much as busy ones. Walking along the Severn, examining layers of transportation infrastructure—ferry, tunnel, bridge, newer bridge—you see each generation solving the same problem differently. The fossil beds reminded us this landscape was shaped by processes longer than human engineering. The Severn has been cutting through this terrain for millions of years. Our bridges are temporary interventions in a much older story. Evening brought the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony—complex feelings about celebrating that legacy.

Layers of Solutions

September 7, 2025

Spent the morning editing photos and hanging around the house.

Ian had a rehearsal for his play around noon, so Emma and I made ourselves scarce and hung out at Hawkes House in downtown Bristol. Nice combination of pub and coffee shop. There was pleasant live music while we were there.

Along the Severn
When we got back, after a bit more slowness, we went for a walk along the Severn. First stop was below the old Severn bridge. Nice trail that eventually gets into some fossil beds. We found a few.

We drove to a different location for a better view of the new Severn bridge and a view of the bridge across the Wye.

Today turned out to be a good overview of the various forms of transportation across the Severn between England and Wales. The old bridge route includes a tunnel under the Severn for trains that was built by Brunel in the 1880s. It also carries the primary electrical grid connection between England and Wales. At our second stop we were at a place where the rail line used to stop—everyone got off and took a ferry to board a train on the other side. This was before the tunnel under the Severn. The Severn has a long, interesting history.

We ate in because it turns out most pubs serve lunch on Sundays but not dinner. Had a nice chili with corn chips.

The evening was spent watching the opening ceremonies for the 2012 Olympics in London. Very incredible show.

Sometimes the slow days reveal as much as the busy ones. Walking along the Severn, looking at the layers of transportation infrastructure, you see how each generation solved the same basic problem differently. Ferry, tunnel, bridge, newer bridge. Each solution building on what came before while addressing new needs.

The fossil beds were a reminder that this landscape has been shaped by much longer processes than human engineering. The Severn has been cutting through this terrain for millions of years. Our bridges and tunnels are temporary interventions in a much older story.

The 2012 Olympic opening ceremony, even watched years later, captures something about British identity and innovation. Danny Boyle's celebration of the Industrial Revolution, the NHS, literature, music—all woven together into a narrative about what the country contributed to the world. Complex feelings about that legacy, especially after spending two weeks documenting the human cost of those innovations.

Images can be found here: https://beloretrato0.picflow.com/d43bka91mw/g0a1oqqtlr

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is Humanity Worth Saving?

-
Image
It's an interesting question given humanity's propensity for shortsighted and self-destructive decision making.  Glibly, the answer is no.  It's not worth saving and should get exactly what it deserves.  It is not earning its way as a responsible contributor to the universe.   That, of course, begs the question of what does the universe want? Other than a few fantasies that we've crafted it's unclear. We have values as humans such as order, beauty, and joy.  Science is the objective pursuit of discovering order in the universe.  Beauty straddles a line between the objective and subjective.  Much of what is considered to be beautiful are objective observations with subjective assessments.  Joy is entirely subjective and tends to be generated by the orderly and beautiful. These are potential self-centered reasons for humans to continue to exist, but in an of themselves don't answer the question of what the universe wants. What does the universe...
Read more

Understanding

-
One of the more entertaining aspects of the current conversations around AI is how much it challenges what we've believed, perhaps for centuries, about the nature of thinking. We've discovered that we don't currently possess objective and testable definitions for words like sentience and consciousness.  For reference, here are a couple of current definitions... Sentience - feeling or sensation as distinguished from perception and thought. ( Merriam-Webster ) Consciousness - the state of understanding and realizing something. ( Cambridge Dictionary ) Words like feeling, sensation, perception, thought, and realizing don't add a lot of value and tend to make definitions circular, but if you distill them you end up understanding as a component of each.  "Understanding" is a word worth exploring. Just for reference here are some of Merriam-Webster's definitions of the word " understand "... : to grasp the meaning of : to grasp the reasonableness of ...
Read more

Identity

-
I recommend the book ... Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment  by Francis Fukuyama In fact,  I'll even elevate it to the status of Lonnie's Core Educational Books that everyone should read.
Read more