Was invited to the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans this evening at the start of a very pleasant evening out with someone who I met for the first time in Moscow two weeks ago. There were many good people shots that got taken today but this was, for me, the best.
Anyone who’s been to New Orleans knows that its visual attractions are varied and eye-opening. You’ll doubtless be seeing more of the city itself – and its inhabitants and visitors – over the next few days.
But here’s the reason I’m here, the Blackboard World 2012 conference at the truly colossal Ernest N. Morial Convention Center – a building that is literally a mile in length. This is Michael Chasen, the CEO of the company, at his morning keynote. I like the pose I’ve caught him in and also the display on the board behind him, which is a neat way of summarising it. He did have a reason to talk about pee particularly, but I won’t spoil the mystery by telling you what it was.
This is the worst thing I have had to post about on this blog.
Until 1.15pm today had been a very uneventful day. It then started raining: hard. Very, very hard.
By 2.15pm the road on which I live had become a river, and then we saw that the lane which goes into the woods was pouring out water (and stones). Whether it was just rainwater or whether, as some speculated, the old reservoir at the top of the woods had burst its banks, the normally placid mill stream turned into a torrent. Where it goes under the main Keighley Road and through a sluice pipe into the river, this backed up against the retaining wall to an astonishing degree, rising literally 15 feet in half an hour and eventually pouring through the gardens of the two houses nearest the bridge.
The owners of the house were not in. Myself and other neighbours tried to save vital items and – most importantly – the two dogs (which you have seen before on this blog). But most of the ground floors were taken out. Our house is uphill from the stream, so was fine (a couple of idiot drivers ploughing through the stream at 30mph being the main threat).
More photos and footage can be seen on YouTube and Facebook for those into their weather porn. For comparison, the lake you see in the woods at a couple of points is where we played mölkky the other day.
I’m supposed to be going to New Orleans tomorrow, by the way – but I ain’t promising anything. At the moment, Hebden Bridge is impassable to cars.
From left to right: Pete, my brother-in-law, who may or may not moonlight as the lead singer of a thrash metal band of renown in certain circles; Vicki, my sister; Clare; and Daisy, my niece (aged 13). Out of shot – Joe and Tom (nephew). As this is a 21st century household, note the Mac on the table, part of the family. In the oven: a roasting leg of lamb. A good afternoon was had by all. (Except, perhaps, the lamb, and even that got treated well.)
More performance: but that’s because it’s Hebden Bridge’s annual arts festival at the moment. This is the Great Mandavi – a.k.a. Dave from across the road – captured just at the moment he warms his tongue up and his hat falls off. How do you decide you can do this kind of thing, by the way? I mean, what drives you to try it that first time?
It rained all day again and Hebden Bridge was one thunderstorm away from flooding once more, but the heavens relented at about 7pm, and we were spared. I don’t want to talk about the weather. The evening was a much better distraction. But I am supposed not to publish any photos of the burlesque performers so here’s the compere, Lady Wildflower, a much more pleasing shot than one of flooded fields and replacement bus services and rain and general weather-related gloom.
Well, there went the first six months of 2012. So far we’ve had four nice weeks of weather (two at the end of March and two at the end of May) and the rest has been dreadful. The nostalgia freaks would have us believe that all children spent their youth frolicking in hayfields at this time of year but it’s hard to engage with that reality at the moment, when it’s raining most of the time. So here’s Joe doing long multiplication. He’s getting kinda good at it.
This was supposed to happen last weekend. Once a year the populace of Hebden Bridge spend a little while building ephemeral but beautiful costumes and parade down the town to the park. It’s like Carnival in Rio, but shorter, with less naked flesh and in Yorkshire. A lot of fun though. Today it became something of a two-finger-salute to the weather, which for the entire month of June (except maybe for 3 days around the 18th) has been dreadful. Market Street – the main road through the centre of Hebden – has been devastated, with maybe two or three businesses out of about 30 still open, or likely to reopen before September. And it was still raining today – in bursts, but they were heavy bursts.
I took 89 photos of the parade within the 17 minutes it took to pass me; so to pick just one was very difficult. That being the case, interested parties could look at the top 20 pics, on my Facebook site. But I pick this one for here mainly because of the happy smile of the central model and the fact that this was the only picture of all the ones I took which I felt worked despite the fact there was a spectator firmly in the background. For some reason, it just seems to work with him there. We were all in it together, so to speak. And for just a short time we forgot the floods and the rain and just enjoyed the spectacle.
It’s a nice shot (if a little out-of-focus). Unfortunately, this encapsulates the day because there’s no way I should have been coming home late enough to catch the sunset streaming through onto the face of my single-serving model. British Airways stranded me in the sixth circle of Hell that is Heathrow Airport for 7 hours this afternoon because their first choice of plane needed fixing. OK, I don’t want to go up in a dodgy plane but why the hell was it left to me – a passenger – to inform the BA ticket desk in Terminal 1 that one of their planes had gone tits-up, a full hour after the pilot told me and the rest of the passengers that it wasn’t going to take off?!
I’ve been on the go since 3.30 am this morning UK time (6.30 Moscow). I’m going to bed.
Today was a salutary lesson in what Principal Skinner (The Simpsons) once said: “Children! Do you want to be like the real UN, or do you just want to squabble and waste time?!’
I am being unfair. It was a very interesting day today. But the experience of writing a document then, in effect, having to have it endorsed by 120 different people from 40 different countries was a new one on me. I therefore distracted myself from the more repetitive parts of the process by taking photos of the delegates. As you can see, everyone seems quite interested. Rule one of taking photos of crowds: even if it’s meant to be a photo of a crowd, focus on someone. This is Tatiana, from Brazil. There are good reasons to pick her as a focus: what a face!
