‘Don’t you just hate the way all this sales-speak has divvied up the city into Quarters – as if we lived in fucking Paris.’ The quote’s taken Penny Feeny’s Between Hope and Paradise, a short story in Naked City, an excellent book I picked up from Route’s stall at Manchester Literature Festival’s Independents Day.

It’s actually about Leeds, though the same could be said for Manchester, with the property developer-coined Green Quarter and – worse still – the Southern Quarter, which seems to incorporate anything that’s cool between the university and Portland Street. I spotted that one in Itchy Manchester, for your information.

Anyway, today BBC Manchester is reporting that the Museum of Science and Industry – or MOSI, to give it a cooler name – is getting a £54m revamp. MOSI, the Beeb says, will form part of a so-called ‘Museum Quarter’ in the city. So get out your OS maps and marker pens:

The museum quarter will stretch nearly a kilometre from the River Irwell to the Hilton tower.

Here’s MOSI director Ian Griffin with some more:

‘The newly-redeveloped MOSI would create a modern, environmentally sustainable museum while transforming an under-appreciated area of the city into a vibrant new quarter with its own distinct character.’

Which got me thinking about other areas of the city and what they might eventually become: Castlefield as the Quiet Quarter, Cathedral Gardens as the Kids’ Quarter, Chorlton as the Over-friendly Quarter and… well, leave a comment with your own suggestions.

Surely one of the stranges government initiatives (in name at least) is In Town, Without My Car!, which arrives in Manchester city centre tomorrow.

From the negative point of view, this means some streets in the city centre will be closed off – from Manchester Cathedral down to Salford via the River Irwell, to be exact. But on the plus side, it means you’ll get the chance to do this instead:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIWfNkKfMyQ]

Yes, zorbing is one of the main attractions between 11am and 4pm. There will also be a climbing wall, capoiera (‘a martial arts-style dance activity’) and free-running/parkour, which I’ve mentioned before.

They’re also launching Wildabout Manchester, which aims to offer 14 ‘breathing places’ in the city centre where you can observe wildlife. Dog-sized rats on Princess Street, anyone?

Anyway, this is all part of European Mobility Week, which – if you didn’t already know – was this week. Read more about Salford and Manchester’s involvement on the council website.

With its brash motto and minimal website, Manchester 2600 seems the very model of a secretive underground society:

It is aimed at everybody with an interest in computer security, telephony, hacking, phone phreaking, cryptography, internet security/privacy issues, urban exploration and related subjects.

People from all walks of life are welcome, from both the ‘white hat’ and ‘black hat’ sides of the computer security world (you might be surprised at some of the people who have turned up in the past).

Though the Green Room on Whitworth Street used to be its venue of choice, the Bulls Head, opposite Piccadilly Station now hosts Manchester 2600’s monthly gatherings.

The Friday meetings begin at 7.30pm and continue ‘for as long as at least two participants are able to maintain an intelligent conversation’. So maybe not the uber-serious society I had them down as…

Critical Mass, the communal bike ride club/society/gang/thing, returns with its monthly outing this evening. And this time there’s a theme: ‘Dress in outrageous 80s clobber or as your fave goonie for a crazy fancy dress ride around our city.’

The ride begins at 6pm outside the Central Library (I caught it heading down Princess Street shortly after last month) and, in a show of solidarity, apparently hundreds of synchronised events will take place around the world.

Here’s a reminder of why Critical Mass exists:

It’s for anyone that rides a bike;
It’s a celebration of getting round the city without polluting it;
It’s about every journey being an adventure instead of just sitting on a
boring bus or in a stressful car;
It’s about cyclists riding together to demand more respect from other road
users;
It’s a way to meet other cyclistas

See their Myspace for more information. And I’ve got more bike-related shenanigans to follow…