Birmingham is full of bears. I would often combine looking for bears with Lunchroulette. Most of the time I ended up near somewhere selling baguettes and I didn't bother taking photos of those. My lunchroulette photos are up to date but I realised that I hadn't uploaded any of the bear photos yet.

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A few months ago, a load of decorated owls popped up in and around Birmingham. I managed to find and photograph a few of them on my way to work and during my lunch break.

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We were back in Birmingham today so we paid a visit to Woktastic, which we go to occasionally when we're in the city centre. We always have the all you can eat sushi and every now and then they introduce different types of sushi.

The change this time was the introduction of deep fried sushi. I don't know how long they have been serving this since it's been a while since we were last there. Part of me thinks that deep fried sushi is such a bad idea and goes against the simple and healthy image of sushi. Another part of me thinks that if a food is worth eating, it is worth deep frying.

We continued yesterday's theme of visiting somewhere new, this time we drove west to the Black Country Living Museum. This is similar to Blists Hill at Ironbridge with a similar range of displays and shops.

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Every time we go to the Good Food Show, we try the St Germain elderflower liqueur. We like it but for some reason we never actually buy any. This year we finally decided to buy a bottle. They gave us a book of cocktail recipes so at least we will know what to do with it.

I was going to say that the Birmingham Back to Back houses were more interesting that I expected, but I didn't really know what to expect. The guided tour takes about an hour and you go through 4 different houses and one shop, decorated from different periods from the early 19th century through to the 1970s.

Walking from New Street station, we got to the houses much quicker than I was expecting. I recognised the stretch of Hurst Street but I didn't remember seeing the houses there before. I must have walked past them a dozen times without noticing them.

They were built when the surrounding area was still fields. None of the houses had running water - all the water had to come from the nearby 'Lady Well'. It isn't easy to imagine what the city was like back then but the short tour gave some interesting insights into the growth of the city.

Our only regret was that we missed out on visiting the sweet shop on the corner. It hadn't opened when we arrived, and was closed for lunch when we left.

The 'Woktastic Noodle and Sushi Bar' in Birmingham does an all you can eat sushi bar at certain times of the day, including all day at weekends. We've had sushi a few times before but I'd never been to a place where you pick it from the conveyor belt before. It was also the first time I had eaten so much raw fish.

(To build up an appetite first we went round the Sea Life centre to look at the fish. There was also a 3D 'Spongebob' film being shown, which was a bit of fun.)

The range of sushi is impressive - a wide variety of the different rolls and nigri. Noodles and vegetables were also available. The spices soy beans were very soft and tender. The pods were a bit tough but I soon realised you weren't supposed to eat them.

For £12.99 it is definitely good value. Since most of the bowls contain 2 of each type of sushi, we usually shared so that we could try a bit of everything. We managed to try most types before we got to full and had to stop. Next time we're in Birmingham we might return and see if we can try what we missed this time around.

We had one of our rare trips to Birmingham today. It's been nearly a year since I last went.

Leaving New Street Station via the Palisades shopping centre, we stopped at the Pretzel shop. We bought two: a cinnamon and a hundreds-and-thousands coated one. They were a bit messy to eat but worth getting. Next time I think I'll get a couple of plain ones. One to eat there and the other to bring home and eat with cream cheese.

We visited the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery, which was bigger than we were expecting. We went in by one door and came out of a different door in a different building. We didn't notice when we crossed the bridge between buildings.

At the Bullring, we got to Selfridges while the Krispy Kreme doughnut light was on, meaning that free doughnuts were being offered to customers. Which was nice.

There were also some cheeses on special offer in Selfridges. We bought a creamy but mature one called Old Amsterdam and a really nice ewe's milk cheese, but I can't remember what that one was called.

Update: Found the receipt for the cheese - it was called Brinata.

I had thought about going to Urban Pie (outside the Bullring) back when I worked in Birmingham, but never actually got around to it. As we happened to be in Birmingham this afternoon, we decided to eat there.

Fortunately they had a half-price offer after 5pm so we had a pie and a beer each without breaking the bank. My Aberdeen Angus pie was pretty good and Emma liked her Chicken and Asparagus pie. Both pies were well filled, with tasty pastry. Much better than your usual supermarket pie.

We went to Birmingham by train. The website for the Think Tank science museum suggested taking the 'Station Link' bus service, so that's what we did. It wasn't terribly easy finding the bus. There was nothing in New Street Station itself (which was no surprise really, New Street is one of the worst railway stations in the country. The planned multi-million pound replacement can't come soon enough) but there was a sign outside pointing to the bus stop.

The bus took a fairly roundabout route towards Millennium Point, taking us within sight of the building a couple of times before it finally got to the actual bus stop. We were still quite a way from the building itself, so it wasn't that handy a stop.

Things didn't get much easier when we got into the building. The huge atrium didn't make it immediately clear where the way in was. We wandered further in and only noticed the big sign when we turned round.

The museum itself was a fairly typical science museum. There was a mixture of exhibits aimed at kids (literally - many were too low for adults to use) and more serious industrial history. There was a Planetarium on the top floor. The show we attended was about the possibility of alien life and was fairly interesting.

The museum covers similar ground to the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry but with the disadvantage of charging an admission fee. Both cover the past and present of industry, with Think Tank having a floor devoted to the future. Of course both also have sections emphasising local contributions to science and industry.

The £8.50 entrance fee was a little steep. For only a few pounds more, you could take the train up to Manchester and visit a better museum with free entry.