As seen at one end of the old bridge for which Hebden Bridge is named. I could leave this enigmatic image to stand alone, uncommented, but let me at least point out that this is a mannequin, not a real person.
Railway stations often give good photo — particularly when they are massive, Victorian palaces of rail, like Crewe, which is one of the biggest provincial stations in the country. If I didn’t live on the other side of Manchester you’d almost certainly have seen this place before, as everyone changes trains here at some point. As it is, this is the place’s debut on the blog. I like the red lights reflected in the wet platform and the misty haze beyond (in fact it’s raining heavily here, as it was everywhere in north-west England, yesterday morning).
Either someone from the local Mytholmroyd graffiti fraternity is concerned that an interloper is muscling in on their territory — or they’re doing one of those things where, lacking attention, they have done the equivalent of liking their own blog post. Which is it? Inquiring minds want to know.
The Railway has acquired one of these devices. I like pinball; it is a highly pointless activity but the complexity and fine engineering of the machines is often impressive. Are there entire degree programmes devoted to Pinball Studies I wonder? This shot is, of course, taken through glass, hence the reflected text at the top, which might almost be Cyrillic, though you’ll eventually work it out (the machine has a circus theme).
Anybody who thought I might spend a second consecutive day of bright winter sunshine ‘working from home’ obviously doesn’t know me very well. I guess the same applies to these three guys, though they enjoy here a form of sporting entertainment that’s not for me.
This is taken on the west coast of the Wirral peninsula. The river is the Dee, and the land in the background is Wales. Visible on the horizon is Moel Famau, where I spent a rather good day last June, doing the same thing as I did today — bagging a County Top walk. I guess this counts as a photo where one can definitely see the territory of two different countries, as long as you non-Britons accept that England and Wales are different places (which they are, in many ways).
A return to work, whatever that means these days — for me it was mainly email. But the sun was shining outside, and on the rooves of houses up the valley. 2021 was only four days old when it cranked to a halt, but things are going better for ’22 thus far. Just about.
The Huddersfield Astronomical Society must have once experienced better days, but perhaps these days is in need of some recovery work. Without getting too metaphorical about it, I’d say that’s true of a lot of things in 2022.
Clare has her little daily projects too. Maybe that’s one reason why we’ve managed to stick it out for 25 years (and counting) as a couple. 2019 had its temperature scarf, one line per day; 2021 was recorded on this quilt, one square per day recording weather conditions. Ask C what the coding is…
Welcome to 2022, and if all the days of weather are as good as 1st January, that will be fine by me. A beautiful day, and quite warm. I realise this would be a better photo without the foliage to the left but I couldn’t move it, and with limited positions from which this view was visible I decided I’d rather capture the sunbeams before they disappeared.
Out on a walk on the hillside above our house, and my father-in-law Dave acted as the ‘spotter’ for this one, pointing out the kestrel that was hovering above the grassland, hunting for mice or sparrows. Obviously wanting its profile done, it then landed and obligingly waited on this lamp-post for a minute, so I could get the shot (that’s the old, ruined Heptonstall church behind).
A Happy New Year to you all. I mention no politics here; I will merely say that had the shot of another bird-of-prey, the hawk on 5th March, been just that little bit better in focus, that would have been my favourite shot of 2021. However, instead I will give it to the minutes-old lamb captured on April 11th.
Being 42 