Monday 4th March 2024, 9.30am (day 4,575)
A metaphor of some kind? Quite possibly. We are all waiting for something. But at least the sun was shining on Hebden Bridge station this morning.
Waiting on platform 2
Being 42
Life, one day at a time
Category Archives: Urban scene
The Crown lies empty
Friday 1st March 2024, 4.25pm (day 4,572)
Several public houses premises in and around Hebden Bridge have lain empty for years. This is the old Crown Inn in the town centre: at my back as I took this photo was Marshall’s Bar; neither of them made it through 2020 and have remained closed and empty since. Some pubs on the approach roads to town (like the Woodsman Inn) have been lying derelict for two decades now. Yet the contradictions of the property market are such that it seems now, by law, only new café-bars and restaurants are allowed to open in the town. It is clearly cheaper and more desirable to convert a former bank into a pub than convert a former pub into a reopened pub.
Sunday dog walk
Sunday 25th February 2024, 11.05am (day 4,567)
A pleasant day for sure. Long may it last (it probably won’t). I’m sure the dogs appreciate it just as much as the walkers do.
Halifax (and its Great Unfinished Bus Station)
Saturday 24th February 2024, 12.45pm (day 4,566)
Halifax town centre lies hard up against a very steep hill that mostly cuts it off very sharply. But this being Yorkshire, some buildings still manage to cling to the slopes. I imagine that safety fence is needed for various reasons.
This was not specifically a photo of the bus station, which is crowned by the scaffolded tower seen here, but it does prompt me to note that this still isn’t finished after what feels like about two years of reconstruction. The last photo of the old version of Halifax bus station was taken at the end of 2021. It’s now partly in use, admittedly, but the works are definitely still going on… it’ll be nice when it’s done, but will it ever be?
The Low Moor Demon, with head
Wednesday 21st February 2024, 10.25pm (day 4,563)
Since I last passed this way in October, this particular piece of random art has acquired a head — and a rather demonic head it is, at least to my eyes. Impressive though. What this is, and why it sits in a yard next to Low Moor railway station, I still have no idea.
Roofer at work (for us)
Tuesday 20th February 2024, 11.00am (day 4,562)
A quick return to the same point in space as depicted last Thursday, but now from the other direction. One of the two guys who’ve recently been scrambling about on our roof, fifty feet up — I hope to all hell that I never have to get on it — waves his arse into our bedroom window. But such behaviour can be excused, seeing as the guttering’s finally being sorted out.
Moon over Eiffel Buildings
Monday 19th February 2024, 6.20pm (day 4,561)
Hardly the most sumptuous shot. photographically, but it suffices to represent a day spent entirely in the local vicinity. It’s getting lighter in the evenings, as it always will at this time of year, but not yet past 6pm.
Scaffolding: the bedroom window view
Thursday 15th February 2024, 10.40am (day 4,557)
Scaffolding: it’s everywhere. Just as you think it might be diminishing its spread, you look away for a moment and then it’s right on top of you. Literally, for us this morning, and for however long it takes some guys to use it to fix our leaky roof.
The first blossom (and Turing)
Wednesday 14th February 2024, 3.25pm (day 4,556)
Definitely the first full cherry blossom sighting of the year, sprouting in the nicely sheltered urban heat reservoir that is Sackville Gardens, Manchester. Dr. Turing’s statue looks rather content to be there, as it usually does.
Hurst Road
Sunday 11th February 2024, 1.10pm (day 4,553)
The first shot taken in Hebden Bridge since 25th January. It’s nice to travel, but it is also nice to come home. Even if the weather while I was away was wintrier here than in Canada — this much is obvious.
Being 42 