Tag Archives: 54

The Conwy estuary

Wednesday 14th August 2024, 2.20pm (day 4,738)

Conwy estuary, 14/8/24

As no one really gives a toss whether I turn up at the office or not — particularly not in August — why not take the opportunity to get on a train, do a few hours’ work on the day, but still then take the afternoon off and spend it somewhere nice and sunny? The Conwy/Llandudno region is a fine-looking part of the world (as we discovered when we came here eight years ago). These kinds of regular Days Out are probably what it will take to keep me going for the rest of my life, spiritually — so let’s take the chances while they still come. And when the trains are working.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The online conference experience

Tuesday 13th August 2024, 6.55pm (day 4,737)

Digital Pedagogy Institute, 13/8/24

If you ask me, ‘hybrid’ meetings and conferences are a disaster, certainly if you’re one of the online participants. But online-only gigs work well enough, particularly when most of the others in the ‘room’ are located in Canada. So let’s proclaim from the upstairs office, instead: from where we get to look at the little details of other people’s offices.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Bridge Gate collage

Monday 12th August 2024, 9.20pm (day 4,736)

Outside Shoulder, 12/8/24

For some reason this looks and feels like a collage. The streak of the bus in the background and the overlay of the reflected lettering on the guy’s head are what make it, I think. The whole thing seems to sum up my Monday night, anyway.

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Catching the light

Sunday 11th August 2024, 2.00pm (day 4,735)

New sprig, 11/8/24

This little new sprig, coming out from what I think is an oak tree (those do look like oak leaves), is catching the light in a figurative sense — but surely a literal one, too. I imagine that it’s exactly because that little patch of trunk achieves direct line of sight to that ball of helium 93 million miles away that the sprig has been encouraged out into the world. Life’s like that.

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

There goes your weekend in London

Saturday 10th August 2024, 9.35am (day 4,734)

No London train, 10/8/24

Like, I am guessing, everyone else in this picture I was waiting for the arrival of a train that was due to comprise the 9.45 service from Leeds to London King’s Cross. But sadly we all drew the card that says “Cancelled!” in the regular UK Public Transport Lottery. Not only was our train never to arrive but this vanishing act just prefigured a state of affairs that lasted all day. All this on the first full day of the football season, too. I gave up and went home.

At least I could rearrange my weekend’s hotel room without penalty — others will not have been so blessed. Hundreds of people, not just here but up and down the eastern half of the country, with plans wrecked, because the Powers That Be can’t be bothered to maintain their infrastructrure or design a system that has just those crucial little extra bits of redundancy and fail-safe. Up yours, peasants! Of course this will all change now we have a new government *cough*.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Meeting in the Turing building

Friday 9th August 2024, 12 noon (day 4,733)

Turing atrium, 9/8/24

Paid one of my occasional visits to campus today; I count 22 pictures in Manchester in 2024, so one every 10 days, and not all necessarily because of work. Not that there seem to be many people around when I do turn up, although this is excusable in August.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Cinema foyer (homage to Martin Parr)

Thursday 8th August 2024, 11.20am (day 4,732)

Cinema foyer with parr photo, 8/8/24

In the mid-1970s the esteemed, and very good, photographer Martin Parr (see this page) moved to Hebden Bridge aged 23 and started capturing scenes from local life. These were published as the exhibition and photo-book The Nonconformists. The picture seen here, of the policeman walking in front of the cinema snack bar, was taken in exactly the same spot that this print now hangs, nearly 50 years later. It doesn’t really look a great deal different, on the whole.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Late bus home

Wednesday 7th August 2024, 10.55pm (day 4,731)

Late night bus, 7/8/24

OK, maybe just before 11pm isn’t ‘late’ to some of you but I am not a night owl; this is the latest shot in five and a half years, in fact (allowing for a couple taken past midnight that lose the award on a technicality). It isn’t great quality but it is the only one I captured today that might have artistic pretensions.

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

More garden produce (very green)

Tuesday 6th August 2024, 4.35pm (day 4,730)

The garden doesn’t produce vast amounts of food — believe me, self-sufficiency in vegetables is something we are a long way from achieving (though for a few weeks each summer we manage better with fresh fruit). But when edible products do emerge, they get used. We haven’t had fresh peas and beans for years.

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

Daisy Hill station

Monday 5th August 2024, 7.10pm (day 4,729)

Daisy Hill station, 5/8/24

There are some days when I really can’t think of any caption or explanation for posting a photo beyond the fact that I just quite like it. Daisy Hill is a place (in the Wigan-Bolton hinterland) with a cute rustic name, but its railway station doesn’t follow this lead — at least, not while some renovations are going on.

Tagged , , , , , , ,