• Since the end of January ish we prominently listed our Easter opening hours on our website, and mentioned this on social media.
• In the building we has posters with the Easter opening hours.
• In website blogs and updates we occasionally called back to the Easter opening hours.
• In the run up to Easter we posted regular reminders, and links to the website Easter opening hours, on social media.
• In the week before Easter our email newsletter listed our Easter opening hours.

Someone has blamed us of “only announcing you were closed on social media when it was pretty much your opening time".

On the one hand, do you not check opening hours before driving for miles at Easter?
On the other, have we fallen down here?

While on a guided tour of a cemetery, the tour guide was momentarily distracted by a cat. She then explained that they often see cats, due to the amount of wildlife they can catch in an otherwise urban area.

The stray cat they had previously sort of adopted was sadly run over. After I asked, it was admitted that it was was quietly buried in corner of the otherwise very very expensive plots - "staff privilege". 

Winter nights have drawn in, and many museums and houses are using the dark hours to run dark events - ghost hunts, bat watches, lantern making... So when a photography club emailed an "Elizabethan House" about some night time photography, staff replied to them, willing to help plan an after hours visit.

I know about this because the photography club's response to this plan was apparently so unpleasant, that the house's staff compiled a joke letter, and then wanted to share it with you all.

It is easy for us, within our institutions, with our detailed knowledge of how they function, to scoff at public misunderstanding about their inner workings. We have a duty to educate and inform the public not only about historic sites, but also the surprising ongoing costs just to maintain the status quo, let alone develop them.

Aaaaaalllthough... Staff frustration is very understandable when someone expects to bring 8 to 15 people on a special out of hours visit, paying less for the whole group than is usually paid for one person!
And they then threaten to break into your venue.
​
Read on to see the full image sent to me of the venue's mock letter.
​And do watch out for that box hedge!

Although at least when people ask this, however daft it may seem, it's better than people in the supermarket asking us where items are - because wearing black trousers and a coloured polo shirt MUST make us staff for the venue. No one would ever pop into a shop on their lunch break from work without first getting changed into distinctive civvies!

There were a lot of very excited and horny pigeons right in the middle of the eating area, right outside the main entrance to the Museum of Childhood.

At a previous venue I worked at, the army came for the day.

And began the day by ramming a lorry into the wrought iron gates, knocking a two foot wide stone gatepost over, driving over the gatepost, and wedging the lorry's axle on it. It was the first time the driver had driven on duty since passing his test for the vehicle. Poor lad was mortified.

And that was just the start of things........

Phone calls I, and a public facing team member in a heritage venue, have both had this past four days:

"I can't find the option I want on the website drop down menu, so phoned to arrange it in person"
"The option isn't on the website because we don't offer it any longer."
"You don't offer it online?"
"At all, it's not an option we provide at all. You can - "
"Who do I need to talk to to get that option?"
"..."

"My son was playing on the balance beams yesterday and fell off them, so I wanted to raise it as a concern."
"I'm very sorry to hear that, was he hurt?"
"Not so much, but his trousers have been washed twice and are still stained, I think you need different wood chips or something dryer in that area."

"Can you tell me what the soup of the day is in the cafe?"
"Of course I can find that out for you if-"
"Why do you need to find it out? Why don't you know?"
"I'm not based in the kitchen, but can ask them."
"Well, I suppose that'll do."


"It says on your website that some of your collection is in storage, I explained to my wife that it means it isn't on show, and that we won't be able to get in there, but she insisted I call to make sure. We did a tour of the stores at a museum in Birmingham a few years ago, and now she pretty much forces me to check 'can we see in the stores' every time we visit somewhere with an archive. So I'm sorry, but I have to ask or I won't hear the end of it."

It's your child's birthday, it's your anniversary, it's your once in a lifetime visit to our country, it's your dad's special birthday, it's your honeymoon.

A special event occasions a special experience; taking a dino mad kid to a natural history exhibition, taking the missus on a guided tour of a stately home. But if you get in touch with a venue a couple of days before you plan to visit, find out that what you want to do or see is fully booked out or unavailable (and advertised as such for months in advance) and then play an emotional blackmail card, the odds are that staff will feel for you - but not be able to do a darn thing about it. 

Really, we'll want to help, we'll make suggestions for alternatives, we'll add your name to waiting lists. But if that guided tour is fully booked, we have good (insurance often) reasons why we can't "just squeeze two more on" and if that exhibition is closed we probably can't "let you have a peek" because it'll be covered in dust cloths, hoardings and workmen/curatorial staff, with most of the exhibits missing or not even on display. 

I hate saying no to people (I know, I whine a lot here, so that may be a shock) but it hurts knowing there is a disappointed kid whose parents have already said "Yeah! we can do that!" or a new spouse whose ideal honeymoon will be less ideal. 

So a plea, if you will, to plan ahead a bit - because at the very least, birthdays happen the same time each year - and the more warning you give your chosen museum, gallery, historic house, castle... the more likely the staff will be able to pull out the stops and make your day awesome. 

We want you to be happy, and we want to be the people who make that happen. So plan a little, and we can plan a lot.

I've seen a lot of museums, galleries, heritage sites and stately homes holding Easter egg hunts, find the bunny/chick/egg trails etc. This makes sense over a period when the kids are off school, you want to entertain those visiting you, and want to attract new visitors looking at a range of options - you tap into the reason for that holiday break.

This is the first year though when I've stopped and thought, but is this relevant, and in the long term, beneficial to those sites? 

These mistranslated signs often do the rounds, but being sent this I felt rather compelled to share. Beyond the usual rude, violence inducing or plain bewildering, this Zoo is apparently a pinnacle of "we'll translate the signs because we have to, not because we really want to". I'm very glad we stick to English in our venue, which may seem elitist,  but seems to work well for both sides of the equation.