Cider tasting

Monday 13th November 2017, 7.40pm (day 2,272)

Cider tasting, 13/11/17

First day of the academic conference that has brought me to the east coast. I could picture the intellectual efforts, but let’s go with the evening’s alcohol consumption instead. These guys (from the Hedge Hoggers company) not only served us samples of their product but engaged us in its manufacture as well, hence the barrel of apples captured in the background. I don’t even like cider particularly, and I’m not saying I was converted, but it was a damn good effort.

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The Scarborough lifeboats set sail

Sunday 12th November 2017, 11.25am (day 2,271)

Scarborough lifeboats, 12/11/17

If one will decide to spend the weekend on England’s North Sea coast in November, one should expect some heavy weather; but today really took the biscuit. Storms washed over Scarborough in waves, every half an hour or so. Just as the foulness seemed to be gone, along came another bank of cloud and we were all drenched once more, with a foul wind to back it up. While on the castle headland this morning — one of the windiest places I’ve ever been, ranking up there with the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland — these lifeboats deployed; let us hope that whatever the reason, nobody had to be out there in the storms any longer than was necessary to get them back home.

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Substitution

Saturday 11th November 2017, 4.10pm (day 2,270)

Pickering Town, 11/11/17

Down at the ninth tier of English football, there are many leagues, this particular one the Northern Counties East League which encompasses teams from a slew of small towns across north and east Yorkshire. I have been actively watching football for more than 40 years now (blimey) but since school, not played it competitively, so I can’t quite get into the mindset of those who do, and wonder what it must feel like to put oneself through the physical paces week in week out for the satisfaction of a couple of hundred spectators at places like Pickering Town, which is where we were today (my 10th competition of the season). Visitors Barton Town are the ones making the substitution here, 1o minutes into the second half. The score was 1-1 at the time, but Pickering eventually won the game 2-1. Next weekend… somewhere else for these guys.

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Nice weather for ’em

Friday 10th November 2017, 3.30pm (day 2,269)

Ducks in rain, 10/11/17

This picture kind of misrepresents the day, it wasn’t this bad. But there was something end-of-the-week, Novembery, about the downpour that greeted us all mid-afternoon.

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Dying off

Thursday 9th November 2017, 3.30pm (day 2,268)

Dying off, 9/11/17

Today’s picture might have been of the Christmas markets being built in Manchester — but November’s not yet ten days old, for pity’s sake. A remnant of summer is preferable, even if it is mostly deceased. What it was doing out on this table in the afternoon, only the Contact Theatre Café knows.

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Birchcliffe, Hebden Bridge

Wednesday 8th November 2017, 10.30am (day 2,267)

Birchcliffe, 8/11/17

A cold and frosty morning but it turned into the latest in a run of very beautiful days. A train strike kept me working at home today and I cared not at all.

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IT helpdesk

Tuesday 7th November 2017, 1.55pm (day 2,266)

IT helpdesk, 7/11/17

How many IT helpdesks round the world look like this, I wonder? Still, they did help. On an iatrogenic problem, though.

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Gone to Liverpool (maybe)

Monday 6th November 2017, 11.15am (day 2,265)

Victoria bike, 6/11/17

Or Southport, or Bury, which are other towns named on the facade of Victoria station in Manchester and to where one can still catch a train…. unlike Fleetwood, Goole and other places where trains haven’t gone from here in a long time. Hope he/she locked their bike securely, wherever it was.

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Relaxed gulls

Sunday 5th November 2017, 1.55pm (day 2,264)

Relaxed seagulls, 5/11/17

Another very pleasant day to round off the weekend. We should all aspire to the level of relaxation evident in these gulls, even if the ‘lake’ they are on is an old gravel pit, or something (now a nature reserve in Heysham, Lancashire).

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Waves of walls

Saturday 4th November 2017, 10.15am (day 2,263)

Waves of walls, 4/11/17

And back to the Lake District I go. But why on earth not — it’s a beautiful place, particularly on a lovely autumn morning like this one.

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