Yeah, yeah, ’tis more family stuff. If you were stopping by because you were hoping for some rant about accessibility, disability politics, other politics, or something to do with the web, then I’m sorry, but I ain’t got nothing for you today.

I’ll try and get some things together about that sort of thing soon, though, if that’s any help.

No, today I’m going to tell you about our trip to the Centre for Life. Me and the GLW have decided that we want to try and make a committment to have at least one “family outing” per week.

It’s all too easy to let it slide when there is housework to do, when …

Mothers tired she needs a rest, the kids are playing up downstairsOur House (Madness)

…but as we’ve always really enjoyed our trips out to the seaside, to the castle, to Beamish and the like we’ve decided that we’re going to try and do something every week. Not only because it’s fun, but we think it’s good to do things together as a family.

So this week we went to the Centre for Life in Newcastle.

We were a little wary about it at first because it’s eight bloody quid each to get in (although being ‘4 and under’, the kids were free) and the last time we’d been, we’d whizzed around in what had seemed like about an hour, and left feeling… well, somewhat ripped off.

But that had been about three years previously, the kids were keen to go, and so go we did. And I’m glad we did.

Before we’d got into any of the displays, we were cornered by one of the staff, who informed us that the ‘whizz, bang, pop’ show was due to start in a couple of minutes, and did we want to see it. So we trooped off to see what was basically a large-scale demonstration of chemistry, done in a way to entertain kiddies.

You know — a big tube full of indicator solution, so you put acid in at one end and it turns red, alkali at the other end and it turns purple. Hydrogen gas was manufactured and ‘popped’ and then a methane rocket was sent flying across the room and into the far wall with a spectacular bang.

It also gave me the opportunity to convince BTP that his father was incredibly clever, by whispering all the answers to him whenever the demonstrator asked a question. Hah! I knew that A-level chemistry would come in handy for something, and while impressing a four-year old probably wasn’t what I had in mind when I sat it, it’ll do…

And then there were the displays. First of all, there was some kind of exhibition showing man’s nearest ‘relations’, explaining exactly how much DNA we share with chimpanzees and so on, but it wasn’t just a series of things to look at, read and point to. Nope.

It was mostly a series of interactive displays — replica hominid skulls you could fill with little yellow pellets to compare the cranial capacity (brain size) of Homo sapiens and his ancestors; replica “monkey hands” you could shake to feel what different grips/hands they had, and rather spectacularly an archeological ‘dig site’, where you could use a paint brush to brush away small chips of rock to reveal bits of an embedded hominid skeleton.

And then we found something that was supposed to be a reindeer stomach, full of semi-digested moss, telling us what a delicacy this would be in parts of the arctic. A delicacy it may be, but you’d not catch me eating one — my kids would lynch me for eating Rudolph!

Then there were some bits of transport — one of those ‘Arctic Cat’ snowmobiles things, which let to the inevitable cries of:

I want a go! Please! Why can’t I have a go! It’s not fair! I want one!

…as my wife tried to patiently explain to me that it was fixed to the wall, we weren’t supposed to climb on it, they cost a lot of money and we didn’t have any snow for me to drive it on anyway. Pah! s’not fair…

But then there was some other vehicle that the kids were allowed to get on, which looked like some sort of bizarre cross between a milk float and a small car. I still have no idea what it actually was, mostly because I was too busy taking photographs to notice any information next ot the display.

And then after that there was a model city, which you had to supply with water (by pumping a handle up and down), with electricity (by turning a handle round and round), with food (by quickly rotating a wheel), with transport (by doing something else I can’t remember) and removing the waste (by flicking a switch back and forth). Well, working as a team, the four of us managed to get that city running, I’m proud to say.

I’m not entirely sure what it was supposed to demonstrate — something about the interconnectedness of essential services, perhaps? — but it was fun to play with.

Then we played a game where you had to jump on the frogs. Hmm. That doesn’t sound quite right, but basically you had to leap about from tile to tile, standing on the tiles when they were lit up in green, in order to try and stand on as many tiles as you possibly good in a minute, which was… something sciencey.

And then there was a skipping machine, as ably demonstrated by the GLW. BTP also gave it a go, but seemed to thing the objective was to get the rope to hit your legs, rather than to go over it…

Then we arrived at the ‘astronaut’ show which was breathtaking. It’s one of those auditoria things where you lean right back in your seat and the entire roof is the screen, so when the camera pans along it actually feels like you are moving — and indeed both BTP and SWP separately asked “how are we moving?”. It then showed us something about space and that in a very kid-friendly way although I was too busy watching the stars flick by across the screen to pay much attention.

I am really glad we went when we did, because the astronaut show (with added Ewan McGregor narration) was brilliant and this was the last weekend it was on at the Centre for Life. Keep an eye out for it — if it’s on somewhere near you, consider going.

There was a strange robot-like thing that you had to ‘feed’ by putting discs with food on it into his mouth, and the idea was that you had to get approximately 10,000 kJ of energy into him with the balance of fat, carbohydrate and protein about right. This was made slightly trickier by the fact the kids weren’t trying to play this game at all, but were simply trying to pick up as many discs and possible and shove them into the robot’s mouth.

And then there was just time to find the strange, stringy bouncy thingies and for the boys to have a bit of a bounce on them, before it was time to go. As is almost inevitable, the way out is through the gift shop, but it wasn’t actually too bad: a couple of candy canes setting me back only another £1.40 (I had wanted to get them a venus fly trap, but couldn’t persuade them to go for that instead of sweets).

The only question is: where are we off to next week?

Thoughts so far include: the sea life centre (now called the deep blue reef or something), Beamish museum, the Discovery museum, Washington Wildfowl Park (in the brief lull between bird flu scares), or somewhere further afield?