Damp, and packing up early. So much of 2026 thus far has been dull and drizzly weather — nothing poor, not in West Yorkshire anyway: other places have had snow, or storms, but not us. We have just remained clamped under the same grey clouds for weeks now.
Having managed to avoid going to work in Manchester for several days (a run that is not over yet), I nevertheless concocted a reason to go there on a Sunday, to ‘get out of the house’ — go figure that one out. I did not regret this, but it was a day on which the city lived up to its reputation for a certain dampness of climate. It’s not obviously coming down in this shot, but you can just feel it, can’t you?
With five minutes to go in Chadderton v Burscough, the score still 0-0 and a big chunk of the Atlantic Ocean seemingly pouring from above, I am sure I was not the only one wondering why I was still there. At least this person had some protection. I notice the title of the post might also refer to the netting, which I have included mainly because it seems to enhance the rain effect. Did I mention it was raining?
On a day of almost constant rain these two made a stoic but attractive couple. The one on the left is certainly thinking a) why he has been so carefully groomed, almost like an anatomical diagram and b) why, unlike his mate, he wasn’t deemed worthy of a coat.
The latest anthropomorphically-designated bout of crap weather, ‘Storm Claudia’, apparently came through today but while things were definitely damp this wasn’t a major event. Either way, staying indoors and watching next door’s guttering struggle a bit seemed like a good move. I had work to do.
Rain has certainly been a feature of the last couple of days. On Friday it came down mostly continuously, while today, Saturday, offered more of the ‘heavy shower’ pattern — as with what came over about 13 minutes into Halifax v Brackley, and a couple more times during the game, too. At least football is a sport (unlike tennis and cricket, say) which plays on through this kind of thing.
October 2025 began without a great deal happening, at least not to me. For now I am staying in my little bubble. Maybe this shot is representative of that, somehow, but maybe it’s just a nice splash of colour.
I pick this shot for the colour palette mainly — the blue of of his jacket works very well. It is taken from inside the ground, as the reversal of the lettering makes evident. As you can also see — it is raining, a lot. But the game behind me did manage to reach a conclusion. Nothing to do with Keighley Cougars, a rugby league club (you have never seen rugby league depicted on here, and unless I radically change in my remaining years, you never will) — the owners of that club decided they fancied a football team as well so simply bought one, Eccleshill United of Bradford, and teleported them here for as long as they feel like dabbling in another mode of football.
Some might say we haven’t had enough rain in 2025 and probably they have a point, but there’s been quite a bit lately, and today it was obvious even at 8.20am that there was going to be plenty more. So profoundly uneventful was today that this is basically the same shot as on last Monday — only without the boots and with more water outside. But I had work to do, so what the hell.
This shot somewhat misrepresents the day’s weather, as for most of my time in Solihull today (near Birmingham, and making its debut on the blog) I walked and sat in quite pleasant sunshine. But not from between about 2.30 – 2.50pm. And the seats for the match to come were not under cover. Fortunately, it stopped, and two other big fat thunderheads that looked like they were later coming in also passed us by.
Being 42 