Life Observed

Close your eyes, feel the hot sun on your back. Smell the roses in the garden. Aaah. Lovely. A picture from last year, in the garden on a clear summer's day? No. Alas. Sainsbury's roses in a vase in our sitting room in the dark in January. Sunlight courtesy of off camera flash . Tamron SP90 old school lens, and the Olympus E-M5 of course.

Sometimes the only way is monochrome. We managed quite well when all you could get was black and white. Why does everything have to be so colourful these days? Hmm?

This was one of those scenes that make you stop the car on the way to work to get the picture before it vanishes.  I was much taken by the almost graphic nature of the scene. The black and white of the snow on the tree trunks caused by the cold Easterly winds we've had recently.  This narrow stand of trees are thinned and maintained regularly, so I suppose they are some sort of habitat. Click on the picture for a larger version. Farming seems to include a lot of habitat these days. When I was young it included a lot of mud.

Catching the Easterly gales, this little cottage weathers the cold snap with some style: I've never had a thatched cottage. I wonder if they are actually that warm. Furthermore, the idea that the expensive and inflammable roof is home to all sorts of flora and fauna is a little disturbing.  You have to admit, they do look nice however.

Here is a favourite view of mine. For the past three years I have seen this view on the way to work each morning. Sometimes the spire is outlined against a blue sky, sometimes it is shrouded in mist. Every now and then, the churchyard is rendered white by the winter snow. Lovely. I shall miss our little village. BTW Blogger. There's nothing wrong with the word favourite. Stop underlining it.

This floats down from the sky and gently coats our land in nice white fluffy stuff, and causes untold chaos and disorder. I mean, would it would cause more chaos if it arrived compacted into two foot cubes? 

No, this is not another attack on the Periodic Table , today we focus on ice, snow and driving. Part of the reason we seem to do so badly when the weather turns properly cold is the nasty driving conditions. Everyone drives these days because we destroyed our public transport system in the past fifty years courtesy of strikes, management inefficiency, government dithering and over pricing. So along comes the unexpected snow, we get into our cars and slide all over the place, blocking the roads and preventing the gritting lorries getting through. They laugh at us on the continent because we are so poor at this. Well, they should try driving on ice with worn out summer tyres. Let's see how they do eh? sdf