Cheese shop, Christmas Eve

Friday 24th December 2021, 10.40am (day 3,774)

You still can’t buy socks or men’s underwear in any of Hebden Bridge’s multiple retail establishments, but we do now have a cheese shop. Time for some Wensleydale, I feel. The kid has made his choice too, by the looks of things.

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Blue Bird enjoys his freedom

Thursday 23rd December 2021, 1.45pm (day 3,773)

Carousel, Halifax, 23/12/21

It’s Christmas — well, nearly. Whatever one’s stance on the battle to keep us locked up, and thus, in the thrall of newly-powerful financial interests that are exactly the ones pushing for further incarcerations (I wonder why), Blue Bird is still feeling happy about this time of year.

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Joe is back

Wednesday 22nd December 2021, 3.25pm (day 3,772)

Joe in Railway, 22/12/21

Including this shot Joe has appeared on 142 days of this blog, an average of about once every 26.5 days, and the most depicted person on here. But this is his first shot since 9th September, a date located just before he went off to university. However, here he is back from said posting. Different? Perhaps, a little.

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Factory at night

Tuesday 21st December 2021, 10.10pm (day 3,771)

Factory at night, 21/12/21

It’s the longest night of the year. On my walk to Low Moor station in Bradford tonight, I passed through this industrial zone in which all the factories were still lit, burbling away internally, though no people were in sight. The robots may well now be in full charge. It would explain a lot about current political trends.

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New tattoos

Monday 20th December 2021, 10.15am (day 3,770)

Friend George has a substantial amount of body art and is collecting more all the time — for now. Come next year, more health fascism will see the banning of most coloured tattoo inks (see this story); restrictions on our lives based on dubious health evidence, who’d have thought such a thing could happen. She’s getting them done while she can; the new ones are being dabbed clean a couple of days after being laid down.

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King Cross cemetery

Sunday 19th December 2021, 10.40am (day 3,769)

King Cross cemetery, 19/12/21

Two days in a row for Halifax, and two in a row clamped under an oppressive blanket of mist. In some parts of the town this morning visibility was down to ten yards. In the background of this shot, like some massive memorial, rises Wainhouse Tower, making its second appearance in less than two months and its third overall. (World’s tallest folly, etc. etc.)

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Brendan the busker

Saturday 18th December 2021, 2.50pm (day 3,768)

Halifax busker, 18/12/21

The cobbled streets and misty feel give this shot a Victorian look — except perhaps for the Rolex and No Entry signs. But we can ignore them. Would the Victorians have engaged in this much paranoia? Who knows. But Brendan — see his guitar case — doesn’t seem to care, and I’m all for that.

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Misty morning

Friday 17th December 2021, 10.35am (day 3,767)

Misty morning, 17/12/21

Friday, and the last day of work before Christmas. Spent at home, but it’s all done now, and the views were good in the morning.

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Waiting by the weir

Thursday 16th December 2021, 11.30am (day 3,766)

Heron, 16/12/21

The weir is where the herons work, in town. Maybe I return to this subject quite a lot — this particular heron might have been on the blog several times by now — but it’s sometimes a relief to see one, as on days like today (spent 95% inside, marking), there isn’t very much else to see. May they continue to fish happily away.

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Debi’s funeral

Wednesday 15th December 2021, 10.55am (day 3,765)

Funeral, 15/12/21

As time passes, and an increasing proportion of my life is depicted on here somehow, ‘cast members’ will start to be lost. Debi was the subject of my post on 11th February 2013. She lives in Hebden Bridge like me, but on that day we met in Brisbane while I was on my trip there and she was breaking a three-month visit to New Zealand to meet relatives. She was a fellow regular at the Railway too and has appeared on photos taken in there. We’d seen each other less recently, though unfortunately that is true of everyone, and a state of affairs I am increasingly refusing to tolerate: there was a healthy (in all senses) gathering of people today for her service in the Hope chapel, then the wake. RIP Debi.

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