This is Northern Rock’s flagship branch on Northumberland Street in Newcastle – as previously featured ad nauseam on 24hr news in 2007, when there was a run on the bank. It’s just finished its rebrand to Virgin Money – though it’s nice to see that they’ve left the distinctive clock in place.

This is Newcastle’s Town Moor at dusk.

The Town Moor is very close to the city centre: certainly no more than a ten minute walk away. It’s one of the largest urban green spaces in the UK: it’s bigger than London’s Hyde Park and Hampstead Heath combined.

The Freemen of the city regularly exercise their right to graze cattle on the moor, making it surely one of the closest pieces of working farmland to a city centre in the UK. This leads to all sorts of student tales of cows being lead to unlikely places within the city, which one has to hope are apocryphal!

As it happens, the grazing rights of the Freemen also extend to St James’ Park. This could cause LOCOG and the IOC one or two headaches should the Freemen choose to exercise their legal right during the upcoming Olympics – I suspect it could prove somewhat disruptive to football matches!

The usage of the Town Moor is governed by its very own Act of Parliament: the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Town Moor Act 1774, given royal assent by King George III. This is perhaps the only thing that Newcastle owes to a Tory government!

The Act was most recently updated in 1988 – also, of course, under a Tory government (or at least its modern equivalent) – though curiously the city loses the hyphens in its name in the title of the Newcastle upon Tyne Town Moor Act 1988. This legislation mandates that “the Town Moor shall be maintained as an open space in the interests of the inhabitants of the city … to afford air and exercise for the enjoyment of the public” – which is nice to know!

This isn’t the cheeriest of signs to feature, but I drive past it quite often and it always strikes me that, despite its title, it really isn’t a very polite notice. There’s no “please”, no “thank you”, and not even a friendly request. It simply states the desired outcome.

By these rules, me saying “I will have a cup of tea now” is a polite way of asking for a drink. Or perhaps the polite way of discouraging cold calling is to post a note saying “this doorbell is not for salespeople”. Or perhaps not.

Meet Scratch, next door’s cat. Scratch sent us a card when we moved in, which shows remarkable talent for a feline! Otherwise, Scratch seems to just love sitting on the front walls and gate posts of nearby houses, enjoying tickles and scratches from successive passers-by.

This is the MediCinema in Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary. I’ve never had the opportunity to venture inside – my job took me to a different hospital before it opened – but I understand that it’s a full scale 56-seat cinema with Dolby Surround Sound and all mod-cons.

Opened in 2009, it was the first purpose-built cinema within a UK hospital, and gives patients – particularly those in hospital for a long time – the chance to do something a little different to break up the monotony of hospital life. It even has space for people to attend in their beds!

The building of the cinema was supported by a number of local and national companies (from Fenwick to Disney!), and it’s maintained and run in association with the national MediCinema charity. I think it’s a really interesting example of a hospital doing something a little different!

The Great North Road was the original stage coach route from London to Edinburgh via York, beloved by Dick Turpin and his highwayman colleagues. This is the bit that goes through Gosforth in Newcastle (which is a bit far north for Dick Turpin, but I’m sure he had friends up north…!)

In 1921, the Ministry of Transport designated the Great North Road as the A1. The bit of the Great North Road shown above remained part of the A1 until 1988, when the Western Bypass was built. Of course, these days the A1 is but a small part of the E15 which runs all the way from Inverness in Scotland to Algeciras, right at the bottom of Spain. Even Black Bess would struggle with a ride that long!

Towards the end of last year, my Kindle cracked. Despite it being well out of warranty (I’d had it since August 2010), Amazon replaced it for free.

Today, the replacement broke – as you can see, the screen has died. Bizarrely, this seems to have happened totally spontaneously while the Kindle was sat on my desk. I don’t understand how that’s possible…!

Sadly, Amazon wouldn’t give me another free replacement this time around – but they are sending me a replacement for £50. As this model retails at £149, that’s still considerably better than most of Amazon’s competitors!

This is Newcastle’s former Grand Hotel, built in 1891. I’m not sure when it stopped being a hotel, but it now houses a Health Fayre sandwich shop, a branch of Blackwell’s, a Campus Coffee shop and Newcastle University accommodation.

One interesting conundrum about this building is its location. The road you can see running in front of the shop changes at some point from Percy Street (to the left of this picture) to Barras Bridge (to the right).

The Grand Hotel building is listed by the Council (and the architects’ original plans) as being located at 1-24 Barras Bridge. Yet Health Fayre, Blackwell’s, and Campus Coffee – which are all located within the building – are listed being on Percy Street. However, the Newcastle University accommodation situated above these shops, and whose entrance lies between them, is listed as being on Barras Bridge.

So there’s the intriguing reality of several doors located next to each other on the same side of the same building, with the middle one listed as being on a different street to the others!

I’m glad I’m not a postman!

I don’t understand who would rummage through their local clothes dump Zara store for the pleasure of spending £9 and 99 tiny pence for a screwed up, thrown on the floor piece of clothing. However, Inditex’s bulletproof financial performance proves that lots of people do! Mystifying!

If you judge your bloggers by the photos they take, then I expect you won’t be very impressed with me today.

Last night, I visited the art deco masterpiece that is the BBC’s Broadcasting House and its Radio Theatre, but emerged with only a single photograph showing this gimmicky interpretation of the BBC logo, from the Media Cafe.

I was there to watch a recording of Arthur Matthews’s new comedy, The Golden Age. It was very funny. There was even a small amount of audience participation, including singing – I expect that I, along with the rest of the audience, will be signed by Simon Cowell as soon as it’s aired. It was quite interesting to see a Radio 4 audience in the flesh: the stereotypes are all true!

Peering through the window of the Media Cafe, it was fascinating to see the new newsroom. From that perspective, it seemed rather smaller than I’d imagined, though it still looked like a pretty nice office to work in. There was also a corner upstairs for BBC Weather, which surprised me somewhat – I thought all that was done at the Met Office.

Anyway, it was an interesting experience – and free as well. I’d definitely go back!