Busy day at work to end a busy week, and a busy month. Sometimes you’ve just got to admit that the most photogenic thing you saw all day was the rear view of a pretty woman on the walk home to the station. One chance to snap it, taken. I nearly cropped this to just show her bottom half, which works quite well with the leaf, but her hair is too good to omit even if it untidies the composition a bit.
This blog is one of my personal diaries as well as a gallery, so occasionally you get pictures because they have meaning, even in a small way; and not because they are particularly accomplished photographs. Today is one of those.
This is Joe going off to school fully on his own for the first time, as opposed to being accompanied at least part of the way. I suppose there is no going back from here. Which is fine, good luck to him.
We are still above water, for now. Let’s move on to other things.
This photo is not bad considering I was slumped forward, half-naked, on a bench, sticking my camera over my shoulder and shooting blindly, while in the middle of a four-hour session, the first half of which was marked by stoic acceptance, the second half by suffering and pain. Yes, my tattoo is under way. This is Clare at work, you may see here again in a few weeks’ time.
The Boy can still be enthused by models of worlds with trains in them, all lorded over by men of a certain age with, presumably, a slight God complex. But I do admire the skill that goes into their creation and some of them really are very fine miniatures. However, I got more interested today in taking photos of the people (almost, but not quite, exclusively male); this one was the best, I thought, mainly because he had good lighting. They all had this look of intense concentration, however.
All the students arrive all at once, and it’s both the most hectic time of the year as well as the most optimistic, in some ways. Everyone’s fresh, we meet people for the first time and learn about their hopes and aspirations. Scary time too, for them at least. Hence the ‘Purple People’ who have dotted themselves around the campus, and they’re being used, as you see here.
Significant academic year for me too. I am on sabbatical in the second semester and from mid-December to late August will not be in Manchester at all. January – June I will be in Australia. Looking forward to it…
Joe has appeared on this blog more than anyone, but then again, my genetic heritage is invested in him, so I guess that’s understandable. If we can persuade him to practice enough, he might even open for Iron Maiden one of these days. Although they’re probably all dead by now.
Awwww. Snapped today during a working lunch in the Students’ Union in Manchester. As well as her super-cuteness I like the symmetry of the various hands and limbs of both mother and baby but also the asymmetry of the other face in the background. Iris (5 months) thus becomes the youngest person to feature on this blog.
As I move into the second year of this blog, some things are going to recur. Some of them at the same time each year (tomorrow, for example, Clare is running Alice’s Run again), others at different times, like this one. Here we are at Turf Moor, Burnley, for this season’s match-up between Burnley FC and my beloved Brighton & Hove Albion. Last season it took place in April, on a cold, grey day – and the match (and result) lived up to those conditions. Today, earlier in the season, much sunnier and warmer, and a happier trip for the travelling Seagulls. Burnley 1, Brighton 3.
Another walk today. I snuck it in based on a good weather forecast in the morning, and so it was, but after noon we went back to the same old rubbish. Never mind, it was good while it lasted.
A distinctive feature of the walk was being able to have my lunch sat inside on a very comfortable couch instead of outside on some damp mossy rock somewhere. The reason was the existence of Mosedale Cottage, a ‘mountain hut’ or bothy, some three or so miles from any other building. When I turned up there were these three shepherds having lunch there as well, and why wouldn’t you, it’s definitely the most comfortable place to have lunch for miles around. We shared the room for 10 minutes, moved on. It was as good a spot for lunch as I’ve managed on any Lake District walk.
21st century mermaids don’t sit on giant seashells but on plastic drums that may or may not have held toxic waste, and they wear jeans and black tops instead of diaphonous robes. But they still look like they have only one big leg and sit trying to seduce the sailors on the local fishing boats.
