Sunday 8th May 2022, 3.30pm (day 3,909)
Chosen purely for the shape and the symmetry. This VW serves tea and coffee to the market-goers in Hebden on a Sunday.
The tea van at the market
Being 42
Life, one day at a time
Category Archives: Transport
On the canal at Smithy Bridge
Saturday 16th April 2022, 3.35pm (day 3,887)
More of a mood piece than anything else: a pleasant, springlike, Easter Saturday spent (in part) ambling along the Rochdale Canal at Smithy Bridge. Here, we are about half way between Hebden Bridge and Manchester; keep going long enough and the entire canal may get documented on here eventually.
Scooting off
Saturday 2nd April 2022, 1.55pm (day 3,873)
My debut attempt to ride a scooter — which took place at a sports day in about 1991 — was so phenomenally embarrassing that I have never got near another one since. This is quite a hill the guy is about to head down, too. He has my admiration. At least it’s a one-way street.
Towpath life
Wednesday 30th March 2022, 3.55pm (day 3,870)
Sometimes in my more romantic fantasies of downsizing I wonder what it would be like to live on one of the barges on the Rochdale Canal — but these thoughts never last all that long before I think of the music and movie collections. If I really wanted to do it I’d probably already be doing it. The immediate neighbours would be Canada geese, too.
Mysterious van (pointillism)
Friday 25th March 2022, 1.50pm (day 3,865)
Whenever I walk past the new car park on Princess Street in Manchester, just north of the Mancunian Way (the shadow of which is visible), nine times out of ten there is a mysterious, anonymous white van parked in the service tunnel, as here. The metal grille in front of it adds a pointillist effect to what is basically an abstract. Yes, probably it would have been better without the shadow, but it was another sunny and warm day, so I’m not complaining too much.
On the way home
Monday 7th March 2022, 4.20pm (day 3,847)
In comes the 16:22 to Leeds, about as on time as it gets. It didn’t get me home at the scheduled time but that’s just natural variation in the Northern Rail time-space continuum.
Flintshire Bridge
Saturday 19th February 2022, 1.55pm (day 3,831)
Wales is the nearest bit of the world to my house that is not England. All the same, thanks to its particularly pervasive Covidnoia, it has only appeared three times on the blog in the last two years. One of these was as the background of the shot I took from the Wirral in January, and I think, in turn, that spot is the hill in the distance here. Connah’s Quay — which is where this shot was taken from — is a rather sad-looking place, oppressed as many electrical pylons as I’ve seen anywhere: shuttered up and closed down. The bridge rejects it too, taking people past it, not through it.
Morris Minor
Friday 18th February 2022, 4.55pm (day 3,830)
I’m not a fan of cars exactly, whether as objects in their own right or as subjects for photography. Actually I think they mostly get in the way. But I waive this concern for any car from about 1970 or earlier, like this Morris Minor which decorated the marina in Hebden this afternoon.
As this photo shows, it was kind of wet here today. But it was not the supposed weather Apocalypse, the ‘worst storm for decades’ if you listen to the UK media. A classic case today of how London-centric it all is. This very spot was under seven feet of water on Boxing Day 2015 for example, and on three other occasions since this blog has been running. Check the facts. Nevertheless I was still told (once again) to ‘stay at home’ and that should I disobey this order, the public services would not be responsible for my safety or well-being.
Departing King’s Cross
Monday 14th February 2022, 10.30am (day 3,826)
What goes down South, must come back up North again (at least, unless one wants to be paying hotel bills for an excessive length of time). I don’t know where this train was going, but I was on the 10:30 back to Leeds, and then home.
In First Class
Friday 28th January 2022, 5.20pm (day 3,809)
The first weekend away of the year. You can tell we’re in First Class because of the menu: stock up on the complimentary drinks and food, and the relatively small premium paid for these tickets is effectively refunded. Sometimes the food you want is even available.
Being 42 