THE
HOLE IN THE ROOF

ARCHIVE
for May 2002
LATEST UPDATE: Monday 27th May 2002
-
Ello
peeps - This isn't really an update, so much as just letting
you know that we're in the process of gathering a few little
things together for emergence in cyberspace shortly (i.e. The
Shrine is alive and well behind the scenes). But most importantly
- albeit aeons after the fact - we'd like to say thanks to you
all as The Shrine celebrates its 1000th genuine hit (which occured
on Sunday 19th May). That's way more traffic than the original
Flincher tales got during their couple of years online - so
we must be doing something right. So watch this space and we'll
continue to, er... do more things right.
UPDATE:
Friday 17th May 2002
-
New
item of memorabilia added - a Compatibility
Tag for monkey transfusion or something silly. Go have a
look.
-
A
couple of lines about staff pay, pantomimes and medal presentations
added to the History
page courtesy of Jeanne Hopkins - to whom we offer our most
sincere thanks.
- Coming Soon: Ray
Hurley-Castle will be adding some of his exploration memoirs. Knowing
him, most of it will be about eating scotch eggs and salmon mousse whilst
sitting on an upholstered tartan blanket in the maternity department,
but it should be interesting - you can bet on that.
UPDATE:
Tuesday 14th May 2002
-
Just
one thing added today: a new article from last Friday's Maidenhead
Advertiser, indicating that the battle to save the CRCMH
site from redevelopment is far from over. A positive sign indeed.
UPDATE: Tuesday 7th May 2002
-
Welcome
to the longest single update in the history of The Shrine.
-
Well,
what isn't new? We've got a few things for you here -
the first of which is fairly significant and indeed interactive:
a CRCMH Message Board. Yes, at long last, you're now instantly
able to put your own words, thoughts, questions, tales and opinions
about the CRCMH online in realtime for all to see. This is not
the final version however - just a generic board hosted
on a remote site which will suffice and allow your talents to
run rampant just until we get the proper one up and running
on our own space. It should be good fun, so let's get some activity
on it - we'll get the ball rolling for you. Anyway - when you're
ready, go here to
the contact page where the board is linked from (amongst other
places) because there's a few important things about it to read
first. Enjoy!
- And speaking of
the contact page - it's been
completely altered to now feature three main things: a) the gateway
to the Message Board, b) Info and a link to the UK based Friends
Reunited website (check out the page and you'll understand why),
and finally c) As ever, the instructions for communicating with The
Shrine webmasters.
- And only now do
I get to mention the actual page you're viewing. Regular visitors may
notice that The Hole in the Roof page is a bit shorter than usual
(though not by much given the length of today's update). Starting from
now, we're archiving each month's updates and babble on separate pages.
At this stage then, after 7 weeks online, there's only the archive for
April thus far. All
future archives will always be accessible from the foot of this very
page.
- New celebrity
added to the Celebrities
page. Indeed, he's perhaps the most famous so far - literary genius
Rudyard Kipling.
- A couple of teething
problems sorted on Ray Hurley-Castle's CRCMH Experience (aka
Conquest 2002) and a new colour image (of a broken lamp and the new
fence) added to it bringing the present collection total to 163 photos.
And while we're at it, here's a saddening yet important message from
Ray himself, immersed in Stage 2 of his project:
"Tell your readers
that unfortunately, since my previous visit a month ago, others have
visited and wrecked loads of the place. For instance, the pathology
lab is simply no more. But fortunately, it seems the vandalistic muppets
didn't explore too far to the north, so the main areas of concern for
Conquest 2002 Stage Two were indeed very worthy. But the issue
must be addressed that there are too many foul culprits about, and they
should be locked-up or preferably drowned. But on a lighter note, a
vast array of new material is up for the selection process for inclusion
in Stage 2 of the Conquest 2002 project. This includes
some 500 new digital images of joy and 70 movies of random quality,
mostly good but small (ranging from 3 seconds to 60 seconds) in length.
Also, there are 400 advanced photo system images, including many on
the 'panorama' setting (cue music) 60ish SLR. So be patient, and I'll
have some all-new photographic wonderment for you all shortly. Aren't
I great? Love & Herpes, Ray Hurley-Castle xx"
- In light of Ray's
comments there, although we under no circumstances advise anyone to
enter the CRCMH anymore, perhaps we should again stress the unwritten
#1 rule of exploration (which already features in the virtual
tour) once again: You
can look but don't touch. Well, okay - so you can touch, but don't destroy.
Always ensure that you leave things in such a way that others can also
experience the surroundings. Is
that clear? Good.
- Some interesting
new tales, thoughts and reminiscences added to the Your
Tales section - 5 in all (I think). And this page has, like The
Hole in the Roof, now been split up so that it contains an archive
of older messages. At present this features the tales sent to us before
the creation of The Shrine. It might be mentioned though that
if the new Message Board takes off properly, the need for maintaining
the hand-picked Your Tales section will theoretically diminish.
Time will tell. Though it's a good place to store the longer messages
I suppose.
- Things to hold
your breath for: We're toying with ideas of getting a CRCMH related
desktop theme and a screensaver up here to download, and possibly other
assorted little things just to add a bit more spice to the site. And
painstaking work has already begun on a fairly basic yet incredibly
groovy CRCMH Adventure Game for your PC - but it's long slow
work. Initial programming is looking good, but the finished article
might be so big that it can only realistically be distributed on CD
rather than as a download, which sadly would mean charging to cover
postage costs. Still, it's a long way off yet, but hey - there's something
for you to fantasize about! We'll keep you posted on its progress over
the coming months.
- I think that's
just about it for this monsterous update. It probably isn't, and you'll
spot something new and think "Why wasn't that mentioned?"
- but I'd better bugger off now before I remember something else...
UPDATE:
Friday 3rd May 2002
-
Yes
folks, it's finally here - We at The Shrine are proud to present
Ray Hurley-Castle's Conquest 2002 Photo Archive,
stage one of which contains a hospitaltastic collection of 162
images in both colour and B&W. But before you get too excited,
it looks like there will be several hundred more appearing over
the next few months. Potentially, the collection could reach
3500 images by the time it's all been compiled, but I'm almost
tempted to say that, well, that's just getting silly. Still,
it'll be interesting to puzzle over the best ways to present
this growing archive for you. Anyway, that's the future, but
this is now. And this new addition comes courtesy of our longtime
associate Ray Hurley-Castle who both took these photographs
and is hosting them online in collaboration with The Shrine.
Nevertheless, he insists that all enquiries relating to them
be directed to us because he doesn't deal directly with the
public (apparently). So there you have it - have a flick through,
and enjoy! Oh, and one final note on the subject - It's taken
a bit of effort to get them all up online in a very short space
of time so, as is common in these instances, there may be a
few teething problems. Therefore, if you do spot anything that
isn't working quite right yet, please let us know and we'll
get fixing the problems asap. Groovy...
- Just another quick
note to say: Stay tuned over the coming days because a few more interesting
new things should be appearing around the start of next week. How bonus
can you get?
UPDATE:
Wednesday 1st May 2002
-
New
item added to the Memorabilia section - a somewhat groovy
rubber stamp of strange
purpose. Also in the Memorabilia section, two new menu
items - liver and brown (whatever that implies)
have been unearthed and added to the What's
for dinner? page. In addition, the photos on the dolls
and plaque pages have
been replaced with new shots of far better quality.
-
The
new gigantic photo section is coming along very nicely and is
nearing completion. So, not long to go now folks - although
I can see it taking ten years to upload...
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