”Few novels will change your life. This one will.”
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“Why did children seem to be so often spontaneous, joy-filled and concentrated while adults seemed controlled, anxiety-filled and diffused? It was the Goddam sense of having a self.”
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June’s Book Club at Church St is discussing the cult classic ‘The Dice Man’. Published in 1971 by George Cockcroft under the pen name Luke Rhinehart this novel tells the story of a psychiatrist who begins making all of his life decisions based on the casting of dice. The novel has it’s darker moments with chapters concerned with issues such as rape, murder and sexual experimentation so it should lead to a healthy debate!
On Thursday 20th June join us at Church St from 6pm for drinks & cake offers as well as the customary lively conversation.
Last month we launched our new collaboration with the aptly named ‘Urban Cycles‘. Half-term week saw everyone, from the occasional cyclists through to the daily commuter, checking in for their Dr. Bike service, it was great! The guys at Urban Cycles had a wonderful time chatting to customers about everything to do with bikes. One question they heard a lot was, ‘How do you do that?‘ This question lingered in their minds after they’d left and eventually led to their deciding to host ‘Bike Kitchen’ at the JQ Emporium on the last Sunday of every month.
Bike Kitchen offers you a variety of services. If you want to just check your bike in for repair while you enjoy a hearty brunch that’s cool, if alternatively, you’d like to become a member of Bike Kitchen (annual fee of £10) then the crew from Urban Cycles will show you how to fix your bike and give you access to all of the industry tools you could possibly need. Bring any problem you have and they’ll help you work away to find a solution.
So whether it’s time for a summer service or time to learn some new skills, Bike Kitchen offers you a solution. And, if your bike is ‘just fine thanks’ then why not join in the post lunch meander. A leisurely ride lasting about an hour leaving JQ emporium at 1:30pm. If you haven’t got a bike that’s no problem! Urban cycles are solutions obsessed so they’ll have a whole fleet for you to borrow from.
Urban cycles will be with us on the last Sunday of every month, commencing June 30th 10am-4pm. See you and your bike then!
Tomorrow’s coffee for Filter Coffee Fortnight comes to us from Ethiopia, and it’s no exaggeration to say it is a stunner! This coffee has a heavily fruited dry fragrance with vanilla sweetness. The wet aroma is sweet like honey and the cup has notes of fresh hay with chocolate. It is highly fruited with sweet dried strawberry and berries emerging as the temperature cools down.
Not only does it taste and smell wonderful but it’s also one of those cups that, when you know a bit about it, really makes you think about how totally amazing the coffee world is. It’s grown by the 2,000 smallholder farmers who comprise the Konga Co-operative. Their small plots of land are spread over the beautifully lush Yirgacheffe (‘Wet Lands’) countryside of Ethiopia, at an altitude of some 6,000 feet. When this exceptional topography is combined with traditional farming practices – you couldn’t wish for more perfect growing conditions for extraordinary quality coffee.
Grab a cup of this coffee on your way to work tomorrow as part of Church St’s Filter Coffee Fortnight between 8am-9am for just £1.00. Then sit back at your desk, close your eyes while the computer starts up and imagine being high in the wet lands of Ethiopia.
‘His work radiates an abyss of a cruel urban milieu we can sometimes recognise around us. His subjects are suffering, lost, and abandoned. However, through all that, there is an infinite sense of hope’.
Gradanski List
Church St has some great new art on display by the seasoned artist Damien McGinley. Damien has been developing his artistic practice for over 14 years and has exhibited his work internationally as part of various art collectives.
His more recent work is primarily a series of mixed media works, reflecting both the rural landscape and the urban environment as part of Project U-Neek. It’s self titled ‘Coffee & Cigarettes’.
Tonight we are holding the third in Project U-Neek’s series of exclusive and intimate artist launch events. They are an exciting and unique opportunity, especially for any creatives out there, to be inspired and make new connections.
Come along tonight from 6pm to hear more about Damien’s story, the man behind the artwork as well as meet and mingle with other special guest artists and performers from the area.
