Author Archives: marktrevorowen

A hobby of mine is taking pictures of buildings around the Isle of Man that have caught my attention, for good or bad reasons. I thought I might post a few here, starting with this great big gateau of a construction, at the southern end of Douglas Promenade. This was originally built as The GrandContinue reading “The Ghost of The Grand Hotel”

The poet TS Eliot observed that he had measured out his life in coffee spoons. These days, he’d be better off with cake forks. We seem to mark major life events with cake. Is it your birthday? Here’s a cake. Had a baby? Cake will help. Getting married? You get a cake that’s actually threeContinue reading “Googling my Bonnag”

Many of you will hopefully have seen the evergreen and ever-so green sitcom about self-sufficiency, The Good Life. You’ve certainly had plenty of opportunities. It originally ran for four series in the 1970s and seems set to be repeated every few months from now until the sun expands and vaporises the solar system. In aContinue reading “All To The Good”

I live in the Museum Quarter of Douglas. Rather appropriately for a place with a connection to the past, it’s replete with antique, second-hand, and charity shops. Items on display in the windows offer snapshots into other people’s lives. Often it’s quite melancholy; one local shop recently had four or five sets of golf clubs,Continue reading “The Life of Gladstone”

Sometimes I set out with a really clear idea of what I want to photograph. I rarely set out thinking ‘Today I want to take a picture of a really fierce-looking cat, guarding a clock tower with no clock.’ On the day that I took the above photo, I’d visited Peel to take some landscapeContinue reading “The Fierce Cat of Lake Lane”

I’ve just re-discovered this column that I originally wrote for the Isle of Man Examiner. It’s caught my eye because (a) one of the ludicrously unlikely things I suggested has now (sort of) happened, and (b) I am ridiculously pleased with the pun I came up with at the end. At the time of writingContinue reading “Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast”

The annoyingly dead but otherwise marvellous writer Douglas Adams recommended that those hitchhiking around the galaxy should always know where their towel is. In the not-completely unlikely scenario that there might one day be Manx people backpacking through Betelgeuse (let’s face it, we get everywhere), I think we’d replace the towel with a coat. OneContinue reading “Always Know Where You Anorak Is”

I recently needed to find my exam certificates. Given the length of time since I got the things, this naturally involved a piece of Indiana Jones-style archaeology. These fragile, ancient documents were eventually discovered at the back of a little-used drawer, next to my cheque book. Flicking gingerly through the aged papers, I was remindedContinue reading “Just Not My Type”

A Christmas tale. Snow is a rare visitor to the Isle of Man. The balming effect of the gulfstream on the local climate, as well as less-welcome influences on it of recent years mean that, below the central mountain area, winters often pass without sight of snow. The chances of it falling within the narrowContinue reading “The Reality of the Spire”

I’ve written a piece for the splendid We Are Cult, about the books of Helene Hanff. Here’s a link: http://wearecult.rocks/helene-hanff-beyond-84-charing-cross-road If you’re interested in movies, TV, music or books that are a little off the beaten path from the bestsellers, please have a browse round the We Are Cult site. There are some really goodContinue reading “Helene Hanff: Beyond ’84 Charing Cross Road’ – for We Are Cult”