Category Archives: Portrait

Newly formed family

Saturday 5th September 2026, 1.50pm (day 5,490)

Down aisle with dog, 5/9/26

Congratulations to my cousin, Dave Hall, the good-looking chap on the right (but you knew that) whose marriage to Abby brings together a gaggle of existing offspring, including Padfoot the dog: he was dressed in his tux too (not very apparent here) but, no, was not up front for the whole ceremony. He came back down the aisle with them though, and was just as happy about the experience as everyone else.

In fact after this day I am starting to think that there haven’t been enough weddings depicted on this blog. Like all ceremonies and celebrations there are reasons we have developed the rituals and the whole day was certainly a good way of affirming a bonding of two things — families — that were not bonded before, and of publicly committing to it. I’m in.

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Diamond, dog

Friday 4th September 2026, 5.45pm (day 5,489)

Diamond, 4/9/26

Diamond is as much part of the Railway pack as anyone, whether human or canine. She’s getting old now, as you can tell, so is not out as often as she might be — something that will come to be the case for all of us, in time, I am sure.

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Under cover

Saturday 29th August 2026, 11.50am (day 5,483)

Girl and brolly, 29/8/26

West Yorkshire is finally getting some rain. Although I’m not sure it was falling at the specific point this picture was taken — but what does she care? She has the shelter exactly as she wants it, and is quite comfortable, thank you very much.

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The subs’ bench

Wednesday 26th August 2026, 7.40pm (day 5,480)

Substitutes, 26/8/26

On we go with year 16…. Now I have reached the advanced age I have, spending my birthday evening at non-league football seems quite the right way of going about things. And on such occasions, the substitutes’ benches are often good sources of portraiture. There is a mixture of enthusiasm, indifference and boredom on these faces, and we are only 10 minutes into the game, I’m not even sure how many of these guys eventually made it onto the pitch. But at least it was a win, and for those of us who have been watching Brighouse Town recently, there haven’t been a great many of those in recent seasons.

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Women in my life

Tuesday 25th August 2026, 12.35pm (day 5,479)

Vicki and Clare, 25/8/26

Sister on the left, wife on the right. Between them, Vicki and Clare sort out as much of my life as anyone else these days. I think both of them have my interests to heart.

With this picture I have reached 15 full years of blogging — 15 x 365 = 5,475 and there have been four February 29ths. I started on 26th August 2011, my 42nd birthday (hence the title of this blog, in case you’d forgotten), and tomorrow, well, you do the maths. I suppose there have been some occasions when I have considered bringing it to an end, particularly on some days where, working at home or stuck in the office, I really have struggled to find anything particularly worth photographing. On the other hand, as I have no intention of ceasing to document things like walks, football matches and periods of travel, I imagine that deliberately leaving gaps in the record would immediately feel like I was letting myself down. So on I go. One of these days I may simply have a camera breakdown, but que sera, sera.

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Pink lady

Friday 7th August 2026, 3.35pm (day 5,461)

Pink Bristol lady, 7/8/26

Maybe not perfect, but definitely a potential case of right clothes, right light, right timing. The River Grille can get its free advertising despite its wholly unnecessary extra E.

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Bear Hug

Thursday 6th August 2026, 4.10pm (day 5,460)

Bear hug, 6/8/26

In Bristol’s Arnolfini art gallery currently resides an exhibition by Jonathan Baldock, called Held, which, according to the Guardian anyway, is “a tense world of folkloric psychedelia and pagan aesthetics that is weird, threatening and utterly compelling”. Well, OK, maybe I didn’t quite get it myself but Clare was not the only visitor who took the chance to get up close and personal with the exhibition’s centrepiece, entitled Bear Hug and which one was specifically allowed to engage with in this way — as long as shoes were removed. Apparently it has a heartbeat, so is a multi-sensory huggy experience.

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At Worksop station

Saturday 1st August 2026, 12 noon (day 5,455)

Worksop station, 1/8/26

I await the 12:07 train to Retford, they are presumably about to get on the 12:10 to Sheffield and Leeds. I took this from in the exact same position on the opposite platform, that is, sat on the edge of a flower bed under the footbridge: which explains why, for once, I think all the angles and perspectives are exactly right, not to mention their legs and heads lining up very well. There’s the mobile phone, of course, but we can’t have everything.

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The dog’s watching, at least

Saturday 25th July 2026, 3.30pm (day 5,448)

Llanfairfechan Town, 25/7/26

There are seven potential spectators in this picture, all present at Llanfairfechan Town FC in the later stages of a Welsh Cup Qualifying Round tie — five human and two canine. Fairly obviously, three of them are definitely watching the action, and they ain’t the three guys in the middle.

I hope they did pay attention in the end, because this turned out to be one of the better football matches I have ever seen. When this shot was taken the visitors were 5-2 up, but the final score — Llanfairfechan Town 5, FC Queen’s Park 5.

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Gowns on, and off

Monday 20th July 2026, 10.05am (day 5,443)

Gown returns, 20/7/26

It’s graduation season. Bearing in mind that the very minimum one needs to spend to get a degree from my august institution is in five figures, and for a 3-year undergraduate programme it is now approaching £30K (more, if you are an international student) just in fees — you’d think the UoM might just give them their gowns to keep, as with a wedding dress. But no.

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