Don’t expect much in the way of variety of scene over the next few days. I spent all the month’s money in Cornwall, and payday is keenly awaited. Even the pigeon turns away somewhat disdainfully from the camera as I try to inject some interest.
A cold day today. Of course, ‘cold’ by British standards is not cold by, say, Canadian or central European standards, but we notice it in our own way. Look, someone in Royd Terrace has even lit a fire.
A return to work, whatever that means these days — for me it was mainly email. But the sun was shining outside, and on the rooves of houses up the valley. 2021 was only four days old when it cranked to a halt, but things are going better for ’22 thus far. Just about.
I am still obliged to go into Manchester now and again. It’s good for the step count and the general variety but it’s not an edifying experience. Since March, it’s been a city of the nearly dead. Buses come past plastered in adverts that — in essence — shout “Live In Fear” and “It’s All Your Fault, You Know”. I pointed my camera upwards. This shot is taken from Cross Street; I like the red chimneys, and the corrugations of the tower block peering through the mists behind.
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.
Less of a bleak theme today, and look, is that even sunshine making an appearance to top right? Time to spend some time at home, refamiliarise myself with its facilities and appeal.
Old and new London… Renzo Piano, architect of the Shard — tallest habitable building in Britain and the second-tallest freestanding structure, after the Emley Moor TV mast — claims to have been inspired by church spires. Myself I think he was inspired by Tolkein. If this isn’t Sauron’s tower Barad-Dur, I don’t know what is.
Winter, as such, I don’t mind. I can take the cold and it tends to look nice (as here). It’s the darkness that pisses me off, and we haven’t even reached the Solstice yet. On winter days when I’m around home I can just about get it in me to go out when the sun finally struggles up, but otherwise, if it can’t be bothered, usually neither can I.
The roof nearest the camera is that of my house. I suppose the architecture of my immediate locality is pretty offbeat, but after 15 years here I no longer really think about it. This is about as early in a day as we get sunshine during the winter, as when the sun is low, it does not get above the hillside to the east in the morning. From mid-November to mid-February each year we have to wait until the light gets round to this side of the building — then enjoy our nice, better-lit afternoons.
Brrr! Definitely the coldest day of the winter so far; it is becoming increasingly hard to kid ourselves we are still in ‘autumn’.
Being 42 