One of the recent candidates for “Railway pub dog”, Roxy is almost always seen standing, here or (if it’s cold) by the fire. Sitting and lying down are just things other dogs do. She is a patient creature, but I guess that’s a requirement for all candidate pub dogs. The leash is purely symbolic.
For the first three weeks of this semester I have been giving some classes in the Chemistry building, where resides this interesting display: I’m sure you realise what is going on here. As today was the last of these three classes, and I may never come back in here again, I thought I would capture it while I had the chance. They have omitted to include examples of the radioactive elements, but that’s probably a good thing.
22/02/2022 was today’s date, and a Twosday too: so Radon, to bottom right, perhaps is the most representative of these.
Before 2020 I never minded doing online teaching, because it offered variety, and was not the only game in town. But there are limits, and I probably reached mine about this time last year. Fortunately, a sense of Real Normal has largely returned. This particular class was always designed to be an online session — when it works, use it, when not, get face-to-face. Steve, one of my PhD students, peeks his face out from his virtual cell.
And still it rains, seemingly without end. The water race at the end of the old millpond in the woods is only rarely filled, and when it is it’s a sign we are once again in the ‘cross fingers and hope’ approach to flood defence. But the town stayed above water — today at least.
Wales is the nearest bit of the world to my house that is not England. All the same, thanks to its particularly pervasive Covidnoia, it has only appeared three times on the blog in the last two years. One of these was as the background of the shot I took from the Wirral in January, and I think, in turn, that spot is the hill in the distance here. Connah’s Quay — which is where this shot was taken from — is a rather sad-looking place, oppressed as many electrical pylons as I’ve seen anywhere: shuttered up and closed down. The bridge rejects it too, taking people past it, not through it.
I’m not a fan of cars exactly, whether as objects in their own right or as subjects for photography. Actually I think they mostly get in the way. But I waive this concern for any car from about 1970 or earlier, like this Morris Minor which decorated the marina in Hebden this afternoon.
As this photo shows, it was kind of wet here today. But it was not the supposed weather Apocalypse, the ‘worst storm for decades’ if you listen to the UK media. A classic case today of how London-centric it all is. This very spot was under seven feet of water on Boxing Day 2015 for example, and on three other occasions since this blog has been running. Check the facts. Nevertheless I was still told (once again) to ‘stay at home’ and that should I disobey this order, the public services would not be responsible for my safety or well-being.
Next week will mark ten and a half years that I have been doing this. In that time people have come and gone: at least two friends who have appeared on here at some point have died in the last 12 months. But new faces arrive in turn. I haven’t known these two as long as some others but now it’s Mark and Yathi’s turn to debut on here.
Umbra in Latin means ‘shade’, a sign that the umbrella was originally designed to protect against the sun. But this was not the application required in Hebden Bridge this afternoon. I believe this outrage against good weather can officially be termed ‘Storm Dudley’.
Another train shot, though this is a portrait of a person rather than a locomotive. Somehow yesterday’s loco just seemed much happier to be where it was. Then again, I sympathise: when is 7am on a Tuesday morning in February a time of vim and vigour?
What goes down South, must come back up North again (at least, unless one wants to be paying hotel bills for an excessive length of time). I don’t know where this train was going, but I was on the 10:30 back to Leeds, and then home.
Being 42 