It's diamond geezer's 23rd birthday. It's not an especially notable anniversary, not like 20 or 25, but it still feels like a big number.

Events that don't cost a penny.

This blog has peaked. This blog has peaked. diamond geezer. Since then it's been a mostly upward journey, gaining readers and recognition year on year, and also a growing band of commenters ready to share their thoughts and anecdotes on the matter in hand. I've long been impressed that this blog continues to generate readership and reaction when the wider general direction of travel is decay and silence. 2003 -  250 visitors a day, 3000 comments a year According to my stats packages 2024 was the best year ever for visitors to this blog but 2025 hasn't been as good. Numbers have been in decline since the start of the year, and even the usual post-summer pick-up hasn't happened. Nothing terminal, indeed still frankly miraculous figures by 2015 standards, but a noticeable downward trend all the same. Also I suspect a lot of the supposed increase in recent years has just been bots, crawlers and AI-feeders dropping by to harvest data, and if they're excluded the decline probably started earlier and digs deeper. weekly rail news round-up it'd be even less. My post on ticket offices brought a fair few extra folk here this week, but I wrote far better stuff than that which only already-regular readers will have noticed. The blogosphere/Substack universe is much smaller than it used to be, and most of what remains is more interested in saying "look at me!" than "look at them". Jan 2025 - 19,600 clicks from Google Other social media services have degraded too. My @diamondgzrblog daily tweet used to get 700 views before Elon Musk destroyed Twitter but these days the tumbleweed service barely registers 200 views, and hardly any of them click through anyway. If you're the kindly soul who insists on plugging all my transport posts on Reddit thanks, but hardly anyone notices, let alone comes to read the full story. When writing what I think might be a damned good post I am increasingly aware that only those who already know I exist will ever see it. It's great to have a loyal audience, but I'm only in this privileged position because I got noticed before the mechanism for noticing people collapsed. Dec 2024 - 851 comments There are bloggers out there who'd be thrilled to get 70 comments in a year, let alone 700 in a month, so I'm not complaining about my reduced engagement. But something is discouraging readers from leaving comments as often as they used to, and there may be several factors involved. It might be that the conversation's moved on and now takes place on social media. It might be that bespoke pop-up boxes are too fiddly for my new majority of smartphone readers. It might be that people are reticent to leave a comment for fear of what the reaction might be. It might be I'm writing less interesting subject matter. It might be that commenting is something older people do and I'm not refreshing my audience with younger readers. It might be all sorts of things but it is definitely a thing, whyever it may be. lot of effort into it, but I've always been fundamentally reassured that more people were discovering it with every passing year. Now it seems the direction of travel is gently downward, thankfully from a high level but downward all the same, and will likely continue that way in the coming years. I have no intention of stopping writing just because not quite so many people are reading or leaving comments, but it's increasingly clear that not quite so many are. This blog has peaked.

Royal Courts of Justice art quickly covered up.

Every two years I walk the best walk in southeast England, which is over the Seven Sisters and across the top of Beachy Head. I did it again yesterday. [14 photos] This time I walked west to east, starting by the River Cuckmere in Exceat and finishing at Eastbourne Pier. This involves catching the ever-so frequent Coaster bus out and then walking ten miles back. It also means I kept up my record of never walking the same stretch in the same direction as I did last time.  Seaford ExceatEastbourne 2007 <<      <<<< 2009 >>>>>>      >>>> 2011 <<<<<<      <<<< 2013 <<      <<<< 2015 >>      >>>> 2017 <<<<<<      <<<< 2019 >>      >>>> 2021 <<<<<<      <<<< 2023 <<      <<<< 2025 >>      >>>> end of the extended walk because if you're knackered you can always bail at Exceat and catch the bus. There's no point describing the walk again, not on my tenth pass, but here are some things that were different this time. Cuckmere meander, a professional team had turned up to do a photoshoot involving a huge white flapping bedsheet. for natural fertilisation of cows". I braved ahead, and thankfully the field was full of sheep instead. South Coast Ultra Challenge was in full effect and its 2000 competitors would have skewed the statistics somewhat. Seven Sisters (n.b. there are of course eight) undulating, thus the most challenging section of the entire walk. Heading west to east the worst climbs are definitely number three and number seven. Some favourite sights: a biplane, the shadows of a flock of seagulls skimming across the grassland, the dazzling whiteness of exposed chalk, the foundations of a long-vanished hut, hot twins, rabbitholes, milky waves far below. grassier strip closer to the sheer drop for those of us who didn't want to plough the muscle motorway. cave, not that I've ever walked along the pebbly beach to see it. Haven Brow (→8min→) Short Brow (→10min→) Rough Brow (→5min→) Brass Point (→10min→) Flagstaff Point (→4min→) Flat Hill (→7min→) Baily's Hill (→8min→) Went Hill Brow Birling Gap/Belle Tout behind them. Inflation check: Since 2023 the price of a 99 at the Birling Gap ice cream van has increased from £3 to £4, while the price of a Magnum at the Belle Tout kiosk has only risen from £2.60 to £3. Beachy Head key points, especially those with a perfect view of the stripy lighthouse. A small chalk platform where I've stood for a great shot on nine previous occasions is now mostly out of bounds. Eastbourne downhill then all flat. feathered goggled folk on the Wishtower Slopes quaffing beer, listening to guitar music and being served tea and biscuits by a lady with a castle on her head. the pier has closed, ditto The Grill opposite. • I was back at the station five hours after I arrived... and will be back again in 2027.