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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to ask if you've been to the Keswick Pencil Museum?

323 replies

BlooferLady · 29/05/2011 19:11

Oh! Oh! I am HOWLING with laughter! Grin Grin

They have the most fantastic website - it's priceless, I can't see through my tears -

From 'Plan Your Visit' - "Explore the museum before you come and discover all the great things to see and do. You can journey through the history of pencils and pencil making!"

It's only a tenner for a family ticket but for £15 you can visit the bungalow museum as many times as you like during the year! Grin

And the cafe is called SKETCHERS!!!!!

And there's a genuinely spine-chilling wax doll stuck helplessly in a cavern underground - WTF is he doing, mining for those erasers you stick on the end???

Reassuringly, they can take large numbers, and there's a Drawing Zone where you can get hands-on with the pencils

Oh Lord I'm laughing so hard I've nearly thrown up my prawns - surely some MNetter has been there? Is it as AWESOME as it looks?!

OP posts:
ConcreteElephant · 30/05/2011 08:33

Muttimalzwei - only the factory has moved to Workington, the Museum remains in Keswick.

Flying Onion - surely you can see this thread is tongue in cheek. The idea of a pencil museum is rather eccentric wherever it's located. I'm a not thick at all thank you Southerner who loves the lakes and all the wonders within, from Cumberland wrestling to the view from Dale Head and I find your comment quite rude.

TheFlyingOnion · 30/05/2011 08:34

I didn't say you were a snob, I said you sounded like a bit of a snob...

I agree with the other posters who said they like charming, eccentric type of attractions like this. Give me the pencil museum over Alton Towers any day!

And you haven't lived until you had your picture taken with the world's biggest pencil. Smile

Has anyone mentioned they give you a free pencil on entry?

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:34

Has anyone been to the Shell Grotto in Margate?? I understand it's that ghastly town's last remaining place of interest, but it was closed when we went.

On the plus side we did stay in the coolest yet creepiest hotel EVAH - the corridors are crammed full of headless porcelain dolls, and shop dummies dressed in dusty 20s flapper frocks, and clusters of elderly telephones, and it had one of those rattling brass cage lifts. It was almost worth traipsing through Margate's streets littered with dog shit and broken glass ...

OP posts:
purepurple · 30/05/2011 08:36

Guess who the waxworks are Great Yarmouth waxworks

TheFlyingOnion · 30/05/2011 08:36

but concreteelephant its the tongue-in-cheekness aspect that seemed a bit patronising to me iyswim

bigTillyMint · 30/05/2011 08:36

Just remembered! When you head up to the Lakes for the Pencil Museum, go here too. I remember it from many, many years ago!

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:36

And you distinctly inferred I was a thick Southerner, which is Not Nice, and Not In Keeping with a nice thread .

I want to be Aunt Mabel!

OP posts:
foxinsocks · 30/05/2011 08:37

I went there on a school trip as a child. From London. Never quite understood why. I think it had just opened.

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:38

AAARGH!!!! Those WAXWORKS!!!!

OP posts:
TheFlyingOnion · 30/05/2011 08:39

I quote "What is 'Keswick' anyway? Is it North?"

Keswick is a big town! I don't live anywhere near Margate, but I know where it is....

foxinsocks · 30/05/2011 08:40

Ps I was always quite partial to a nice tin of pencils too Lol. It makes you feel very British that museum. I distinctly remember feeling that!

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:44

My dear little spring onion, do please direct your energies to more worthy sources of your disdain, 'cos you ain't half going to develop a stomach ulcer otherwise :) . I see you're fairly new to MN: here's a wee tip - whilst the anonymity of an internet forum does loosen one up to be more direct in one's opinions, it's not carte blanche to be rude and snippy.

I know you mean fox - there's something peculiarly English about that nailed-to-the-mast determination to have a good time, come rain or shine!

OP posts:
Punkatheart · 30/05/2011 08:45

Auntie Mabel going to the poo factory with Pippin. 'This is where your poo goes, children...'

Happy days.

Threadworm8 · 30/05/2011 08:45

Don't be daft, Onion. That's a joke. It isn't even a joke at Keswick's expense. It's a self-satirising Southerner joke.

ConcreteElephant · 30/05/2011 08:46

I do swym FlyingOnion and I think it's a fine line between tongue-in-cheek and patronising certainly, but since the thread had plenty of people who had, despite their expectations, rather enjoyed the Pencil Museum, and it had also turned into a bit of an appreciation for mad little museums everywhere, I think I decided people weren't being snobby on the whole...

I also hate it when people are snooty about things no one is forcing them to go to, things which other people enjoy etc... So I do see your point of view.

I spent many summers dressed as a Victorian serving wench / stable boy (depending on the day) at a Victorian copper port/ mine museum so I'm all about the eccentric tourist attraction Smile

bubbles12 · 30/05/2011 08:47

As a child, I loved the pencil museum! We always went on a rainy day when on holiday in Keswick. I am still partial to a nice tin of pencils, in fact you will be delighted to hear that I still have a really big tin of coloured pencils from there that I will not use as they just look too nice all lined up together. Wink

TheFlyingOnion · 30/05/2011 08:48

oh do piss off BlooferLady

there's nothing so boring on MN as seeing the "I've been here longer than you". debate. Its cliquey, silly and pointless.

urgh

(and thanks, concreteelephant, you have it in one)

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:48

Thank you for explaining Thread - it's also a me-satirising joke (and see posts passim about my ability to get lost on the way home from school Grin )

Dammit Concrete I should be dressed as a serving wench - my bottom is so big I wouldn't even need a crinoline! I went to a brilliant NT property a while back where there were a couple of kitchen maids cooking rabbit pie. A tourist (I think from the States) very politely stepped forward and asked it it was edible, and she stayed perfectly in character, with a broad Norfolk accent, and said in a horrified voice that it of course it was edible and cook wouldn't stand for anything but the best Grin

OP posts:
Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:49

Good gracious woman! You've kicked off with calling people thick, and you're now telling people to piss off! Can't you see you're like, bringing everyone down, man?!

Ah well.

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TheBride · 30/05/2011 08:50

Did anyone else ever see "Potters Museum of Curiosity"? That was seriously fucked up, but we all loved it. It used to be in Arundel in W Sussex and then it was moved to Cornwall, but it was things like calves which had been born with two heads/six legs, stuffed, and these weird wedding scenes made entirely of stuffed kittens, dressed in morning suits (real ones).

Threadworm8 · 30/05/2011 08:51

Oh god those attractions where you have people dressed up and in character make me want to die. So, so embarrassing, dodging their attempts to interact with you. Leave me alone!

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:51

Bride, in all seriousness, that has shot straight to the top of my list. I need a spreadsheet for this stuff....

OP posts:
Threadworm8 · 30/05/2011 08:52

That's the risk you take Bloofer when you start a museums thread on MN. They always kick-off bigtime.

Original poster
BlooferLady · 30/05/2011 08:54

I know right, Thread? I should've known what I was letting myself in for. Did you see someone accused me of being like a character off of Grease? I found that weirdly flattering but I think she meant to be mean

I feel like saying I find the Tate Modern so ugly and dull I want to gouge out my own eyes but dear God can you imagine the flaming Grin

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muttimalzwei · 30/05/2011 08:54

If you haven't heard of Keswick you haven't got much of a clue.

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