Tag Archives: 50

May 07 2020
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Daily Post, Hebden Bridge, Urban scene

No play allowed

Thursday 7th May 2020, 11.10am (day 3,178)

Wrapped swings, 7/5/20

On Sunday our glorious leader Mr. Johnson will apparently announce, well, something: as eagerly awaited as the (absent) football results, this speech will define our fate for the next few weeks. My prediction — we will be let out to work, but not to play, a conclusion I somehow try to illustrate with these taped-up swings in the nearby playground. But who will admit that play creates work…. one of those ‘non-essential’ elements driving the economy and giving meaning to our lives? You can’t have one without the other.

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May 07 2020
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

In the woods, again

Wednesday 6th May 2020, 9.20am (day 3,177)

In the woods, 6/5/20

Another day celebrating green-ness, for there is not a great deal else to see at the moment. At least the sun is back out.

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May 06 2020
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Daily Post, Hebden Bridge, Urban scene

Chimney pot group portrait

Tuesday 5th May 2020, 3.20pm (day 3,176)

Chimney pots, 5/5/20

I love the individuality of these chimeny pots, and the different characteristics of each of the groups. The four on the right are definitely having a conversation, the leftmost of the four turning to the others as it mutters some choice gossip.

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May 04 2020
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

First caterpillar to complete the Pennine Way?

Monday 4th May 2020, 1.05pm (day 3,175)

Caterpillar on Pennine Way, 4/5/20

Well, OK, perhaps it is ambitious to expect that this caterpillar will manage to complete all 300+ miles of the Pennine Way, but if you’ve never been near it, it’s done more of it than you. And it also becomes the blog’s first caterpillar, a singular honour.

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May 04 2020
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Daily Post, Landscape, Sport

Football landscape, awaiting inhabitants

Sunday 3rd May 2020, 1.20pm (day 3,174)

Heptonstall football pitch, 3/5/20

For most of the teams in England, this weekend should have marked the end of the football season. For me, this started back on June 21st in Anglesey, but seeing as the only anti-COVID strategy anyone could think of involved killing off most of what gave life meaning, it was ended, along with everything else, after March 14th. What remnants of grass-roots sport will be left when the paranoia finally lifts and we realise that in the long run, for our survival as a functioning society, we have to get outside again — that is still to be seen.

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May 02 2020
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Daily Post, Interior

Fresh bread

Saturday 2nd May 2020, 5.55pm (day 3,173)

Rye bread, 2/5/20

During the Great Hebden Bridge Flour Famine of early April 2020 I panic-bought some organic rye flour, at a ridiculous price, when it seemed to be the only bag of flour available in the town. Subsequently, I have tried making pizza with it, and then batter, and both were dismal failures. Then today, Clare suggested the entirely logical approach of making rye bread with it. At this it — and she — was a roaring success. There will be more of this.

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May 02 2020
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Daily Post, Interior

The last class of the year

Friday 1st May 2020, 9.25am (day 3,172)

Online teaching space, 1/5/20

It was my last scheduled teaching of the semester today. Normally we would have concluded this significant moment in the academic year by some kind of group photo, as on 4th May 2018, and said our goodbyes, at least amongst those I will not be supervising over the summer. There can be none of that this year. I sit in a room and talk to a laptop for an hour and twenty minutes and take questions here and there and that’s it. I do plenty of distance teaching anyway, so it’s not that I’m pissed off about this as such — but I miss people, and if you claim not to, then I worry for your sanity.

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May 01 2020
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

Birdwatching, again

Thursday 30th April 2020, 10.45am (day 3,171)

Jackdaw, 30/4/20

So, there went April 2020, spent entirely under a form of house arrest for reasons that I am finding increasingly hard to understand — ostensibly to protect me from a disease that I may well have already had, but really because having dug ourselves into this hole, we now have no idea how to get back out of it. And I’m not just pointing the finger at the British government here. Six weeks ago everyone panicked, and it’s now, ‘OK, now what?’. A question to which no one seems to have a very plausible answer.

Meanwhile, as we look forward with no joy at all to what is very likely to be an equally dismal May, I have to point my camera out of the window and capture the small part of the world that is permitted me. Hello jackdaw. Enjoy your freedom.

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Apr 30 2020
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Daily Post, Interior

The house’s senior object

Wednesday 29th April 2020, 11.45am (day 3,170)

Doll and vice, 29/4/20

Lockdown continues so some obscure corners of my house get their chance on the blog. When we moved in, the previous owner had left all his furniture (he emigrated to Thailand and then — this is, sadly, true — died six weeks later). Over the intervening 19 years all that he left us has gradually been replaced, with the sole exception of this huge old chest of drawers in the attic, crowned by the vice that you see on the right here: its rather battered appearance is testament to its ongoing use for a variety of creative projects.. Between them then, these things have been here longer anything else and, as the drawers are far too big to get back downstairs (they must have been assembled in situ), they won’t ever be leaving with us either.

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Apr 29 2020
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna, Hebden Bridge, Urban scene

Sale deferred

Tuesday 28th April 2020, 11.35am (day 3,169)

Closed shop, 28/4/20

As predicted yesterday, the weather did change, into cold, damp greyeness. All very depressing, especially at the moment. It’d be nice to think this shop can open soon and restart its sale, but it ain’t gonna be next week or anything, is it. Meanwhile, the ducks get on with life and wonder what the jackdaw wants out of them: an alliance against the pigeons maybe?

I haven’t been producing many photos lately for understandable reasons but this is the first time since lockdown began (March 17th basically) that I have managed a photowhack — meaning, this was the only photo taken today.

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