This monstrosity spent the day plonked outside the house, squatting on the pavement, a metal pile of unfriendliness. Want to walk up Keighley Road? Naaah… sod you. There should be a law against it…. Oh, there is: double yellow lines. But those are clearly of concern only to wimps and lefties.
The traffic lights say go, for what cars there are. No social commentary today, I just like the effect of a fairly long zoom down Brook Street, taken on my way to the office.
Mondays have hardly been the most exciting days recently, even by present standards. But while, in no way, a decent photograph aesthetically, this is at least interesting. What you see here are Jupiter (the brighter one) and Saturn setting over Hebden Bridge, seen from my home. I did not realise this until today but apparently these planets are almost due to touch (from our perspective) on 21st December; the closest apparent conjunction since 1623. One to look out for, if you have any interest in astronomy.
This is the first time I have knowingly had Saturn in my viewfinder, and seeing as I had managed in the past to get a decent shot of Jupiter and its moons with my camera I did try for the rings. No joy — though the blurry disc I did get was, definitely, squashed-looking.
Misty weather discouraged a walk up anywhere high, but a nine-mile stroll along the Rochdale Canal to Todmorden and back at least stretched the legs today. While not really visible on this shot, this boat did have the remnants of a ‘For Sale’ sign painted on the side; I guess by now it’s probably quite a bargain, if you’re prepared to do the salvage work.
Saturdays are football days…. still just about. But while we might potentially have been in attendance at Morecambe FC today for their FA Cup tie with Solihull, this is declared ‘unsafe’ by Our Glorious Leaders at this present time, so like the other interested hundreds we had to make do with TV. The local mug and, in the background, Clare’s scarf offered totems of support. But it’s unreal, fake somehow. The trouble is that no one in ‘authority’ really gives a toss.
The grey gloom of life is matched by the weather and none of these conditions make for optimal photography. This day last year I was having a very fine day out in Indonesia (and photographing butterflies 5,000 feet up); two years ago I’d just come back from Germany. No similar excursions look feasible for quite some time. The local birdlife will have to sustain me today. I do quite like the correspondence between its little red legs and the chimney pots in the background.
Here I am still going into Manchester a couple of days a week, largely because it gets the step count up. I will try not to get symbolic and just observe that I like this picture because of the various chunks of detail, which seem to lay over one another like a collage, particularly on the right hand side. And the pigeon which sneaked itself in.
No, I won’t do it. I won’t stay cowering at home, plugged into the Matrix and denied the world outside. My physical and mental health — the things we’re supposed to care about, right? — these are too important. And most of the woods and parks that I am frequenting are pretty busy with other people, suggesting that these souls, at least, have taken the same decision. It is not for the gaggle of failed journalists and lobbyists for the tobacco industry who got themselves elected about a year ago to tell us what is healthy and what is not.
Went into Manchester and back, and did hope to get a photo from there to provide more variety to the locations. But it’s been a while since the view from the house at sunset made it: and today seemed a good day to return to that theme. Red sky at night is good news, right?
I didn’t leave the house all day today. There didn’t really seem a great deal of point. This tortoiseshell butterfly has also moved in, it seems. I guess a domestic house is like an old people’s home for butterflies; the winter isn’t biting yet but I doubt these will last long outside, regardless. It’s welcome to inhabit our living room. It gave me something to photograph today, at least.
Being 42 