I’m in the middle of what is, for me, quite a long run of days without going anywhere in particular. So I have to find photographic succour in Hebden Bridge and Manchester, familiar territory but there’s plenty to see if you look around.
There is a very good judo club in Hebden Bridge – good enough to have produced members of the junior Great Britain team. Joe – that’s him to the right – is not at that standard yet, and probably never will be (though of course, who knows). But I am glad he does this because it’s the one main physical exercise he gets and also I think it’s good for mental discipline. Today he was going through the grading process and is now, I am proud to report, a yellow belt. Which is more than his old man has ever managed in 42.66 years on this planet.
This staircase-cum-alleyway leads down the side of our allotment (which sits behind the hedge to the right). It’s a lot steeper than it looks on this photograph, and a tiring climb which is probably why this cat is doing the sensible thing and just chilling. After a very busy – and mentally confusing – week for me, I know how it feels; I did as little as possible today.
This whole line of ducks took it upon themselves to saunter up the main street of Hebden Bridge today: sort of like we used to do while at primary school, to dash through the secondary school campus now and again on the way home and feel dead hard about it. I was too slow with my camera to capture more than this one, but never mind.
Despite how it probably appears from this blog, I do spend the usual proportion of my life at work. But it appears relatively rarely on here simply because it’s not usually appropriate to whip the camera out and start taking photos of colleagues, students, whomever I should run into in the course of working life. Here’s an exception. And well done to my student Ainna (not pictured) who passed her part of this event unconditionally.
Awww. These chicks hatched today, in an incubator located in Joe’s after-school club.
Incidentally, this is only the second photo of the whole blog taken on a camera other than my Fujifilm Finepix JZ which has taken all the other 234 or whatever-it-is pictures. The first one was when I borrowed the Nikon for my ‘professional development’ photo shoot in the woods with Joe. This one was on a very basic camera borrowed from the school, because I broke the cardinal rule – ALWAYS take the camera. Really. Always. You don’t think you’ll see something worth photographing when you pick the kid up from school? Wrong.
Spent most of the day working at home and otherwise around familiar haunts. Only the six-monthly visit to the dentist’s gave opportunity for much variety and even then I had done the ‘treatment’ picture already. So here’s an abstract.
Don’t ask me why it’s being dismantled. It disappeared for a short time a couple of years ago, then turned up back again. Probably there’s a plan to put some big screen TVs up for all the sporting media jubilee overhyped rip-off events going on this summer (sorry, sorry). I bet these guys don’t even know. They just work here. The guy on the left looks utterly bored at spending his working day thirty feet up a ladder spinning a huge wheel around with his hands (well, that’s what they were doing).
No particular story behind this one, just a photo to encapsulate what was a nice, sunny day – although a chilly one.
Back to work tomorrow after 11 days off. Well, I suppose it’s gotta be done now and again.
From England’s steepest and highest points yesterday to one of its flattest, lowest expanses: and all only a couple of dozen miles away. I like these little worm casts (though I am sure my parents will remind me of some long-buried beach holiday of my toddlerhood in which I was terrified of this kind of thing); a kind of natural sculpture. Or possibly just untidiness.
Being 42 