It’s been raining almost all day. There is a low pressure area covering North West Europe which is centered over the Midlands, and the rain had been circling round Birmingham all day like dirty bathwater round a plughole. Really dirty bathwater, like you’ve been cleaning out a sewer all day, and you need to take a second bath just to wash off the water from the first bath. (My brother says I have not been complaining about the weather enough. Will that do, Ant?)

We used an interval of slightly less heavy rain to move the boat from Selly Oak to Edgbaston, after stocking up on food from the Selly Oak Sainsbury’s. Most of the way we had the University of Birmingham campus next to us, and they had two experimental canal boats moored there, one powered by hydrogen and one solar powered. I must admit, I feel a bit guilty when I see our diesel engine belching out smoke first thing in the morning before it warms up, so a solar electric canal boat seems like a fine idea to me.

I had been hoping to catch a cricket game today, Warwickshire vs. Derbyshire, but it was rained off, so we walked through the campus to the Barber Institute, an art museum and concert hall. Birmingham is known as a “Redbrick University”, a term used to refer to the universities founded in the 19th or early 20th Centuries in the major cities. However, more recent construction seems to have gone for a wood grain finish.

There’s a strange industrial looking tower or chimney.

Perhaps it is Birmingham’s space program?

The Barber Institute itself is indeed made of red brick, a fine example of 1930’s Art Deco.

Inside they have a chronologically arranged collection of art, with some quite good things. For instance, a Chinese battle swan, cunningly camouflaged as an wine jug…

and Byzantine coins that are curved rather than flat.

One theory suggests they were made that shape to make it easier to use them for tiddlywinks.

Pride of place in the domestic charm series must surely go to this one, though.

A Woman Looking For Fleas by Giuseppe Maria Crespi.

A final thought. If you are a starving student who can’t afford to eat anything but breakfast cereal, how many packets will you get through before you get your degree?

Now I’m off to stuff a marrow.