February 2025
The Welcome Return to BJs
10/02/25 23:23 Filed in: Writing
Several weeks ago I found myself looking at various Apps for recording To Do lists etc on my phone. I was surprised at how many had monthly or annual charges. It put me off; to the point I recalled I used to keep—and enjoy—Bullet Journals: quite quickly I came to the decision to return to them. At the end of the day paying for a blank journal twice a year would be cheaper than paying for an App. Whilst it’s one more thing to carry around (or keep track of at home) it does have the benefit of being one less thing adding to my digital footprint. Not peering at my phone for any time at all would be time well spent and make me feel better I reckon.
I do currently use Calendar a lot for general daily To Do lists on my iPhone, but a more meaty, structured way of recording and scheduling seems beneficial—and would beneficially add to my WRITING one way or another. One thing I need to do is to STRUCTURE and timetable writing. So I’m back to the BJs—which I promise to only shorten to BuJo in future. Honest.
I do currently use Calendar a lot for general daily To Do lists on my iPhone, but a more meaty, structured way of recording and scheduling seems beneficial—and would beneficially add to my WRITING one way or another. One thing I need to do is to STRUCTURE and timetable writing. So I’m back to the BJs—which I promise to only shorten to BuJo in future. Honest.
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Routes and Routes (and occasional curves)
I’ve used Routes in Pokémon Go a few times, but given my usual (non Pokémon) routes around Liverpool I thought it would be good to have some which fit my more common walks around the city. So to that end I’ve created a few of my own. This means that now if I am walking between Dr Duncan’s and the Vines, or the Vines and the Grapes I can follow these paths rather than find a path a little out of the way by the necessity of following other prescribed routes; for instance there’s one from the Vines (or Lidl) to the top of Bold Street. They may be close to where I want to go to, but they leave me walking a bit of a way from my ultimate destination.
The first time I set up a route it was from a very common walk of mine between the key venues of The Vines (Big House) and Dr Duncan’s. The former being where I quite often watch the matches on the telly boxes and the latter being the lovely pub closest to Queen Square (where my bus comes in). Unfortunately either my phone or provider developed a GPS issue and so for my first one it randomly put in a strange switch back to the route—so if you want to do it you have to double back on yourself and start the route again to complete the route (it’s not too far but it is not ideal to retrace your steps in that way).
A wayward wiggle on the way from the Doctors
To those that haven’t done it; you actually select a start point and the end point (which have to be Gyms or Poké Stops) and then you physically do the walk you want to between them. When you get to the end you have to put in some details (name and description etc) but unfortunately there’s no editing capability if there are any errors which you’d like to correct (like this GPS one).
I’ve since created my second route (Vines to the Grapes) and then a third (The Grapes to The Philharmonic). In reality I was doing it to the Queen of Hope Street, but there is no Poké Stop for the QOHS so needs must.
Anyways, if you want to do a decent pub crawl taking in three consecutive routes (and hence pick up some Zygarde Cells on the way!) then you could follow these three (‘From the Doctors to the Big’ - ‘Grapes & Vines’ - ‘From the Grapes and Upwards’) whilst taking in the following pubs:
Dr Duncans
The Vines
Dispensary
Grapes
Belvedere
Caledonia
Queen of Hope Street
Philharmonic Pub
If you don’t get any Zygarde Cells you can at least get yourself some decent ales and your daily steps in (and maybe catch some decent footy as well).
The first time I set up a route it was from a very common walk of mine between the key venues of The Vines (Big House) and Dr Duncan’s. The former being where I quite often watch the matches on the telly boxes and the latter being the lovely pub closest to Queen Square (where my bus comes in). Unfortunately either my phone or provider developed a GPS issue and so for my first one it randomly put in a strange switch back to the route—so if you want to do it you have to double back on yourself and start the route again to complete the route (it’s not too far but it is not ideal to retrace your steps in that way).
A wayward wiggle on the way from the Doctors
To those that haven’t done it; you actually select a start point and the end point (which have to be Gyms or Poké Stops) and then you physically do the walk you want to between them. When you get to the end you have to put in some details (name and description etc) but unfortunately there’s no editing capability if there are any errors which you’d like to correct (like this GPS one).
I’ve since created my second route (Vines to the Grapes) and then a third (The Grapes to The Philharmonic). In reality I was doing it to the Queen of Hope Street, but there is no Poké Stop for the QOHS so needs must.
Anyways, if you want to do a decent pub crawl taking in three consecutive routes (and hence pick up some Zygarde Cells on the way!) then you could follow these three (‘From the Doctors to the Big’ - ‘Grapes & Vines’ - ‘From the Grapes and Upwards’) whilst taking in the following pubs:
Dr Duncans
The Vines
Dispensary
Grapes
Belvedere
Caledonia
Queen of Hope Street
Philharmonic Pub
If you don’t get any Zygarde Cells you can at least get yourself some decent ales and your daily steps in (and maybe catch some decent footy as well).