Life Observed

More dull dismal weather. In fact it has been so dismal for so long that I ventured out with an off camera flash and a set of wireless triggers yesterday.  Here is a result. Not one of my better images I'm afraid.  Using this equipment properly brings with it the risk of looking like some sort of photo ninja :  You stand with legs splayed, bending forward. The camera is held between the legs at arms length down at ground level. The flash is held with your free arm high in the air aimed at the snowdrops.  To compete the effect you should shout " Eye-eeee-yaa " just before taking the picture. Well, that's what I do anyway.

Pictured in the parade at the end of a memorial service last weekend: This Para and his colleagues from other services. I get the distinct impression that you don't mess with this guy.

What is going on here? Another of life's little mysteries, that's what. Why do these things keep appearing? Is it some sort of test I ask myself.

Now here is an odd counterpoint. What is a teapot doing next to a large pile of wood? I look put for this kind of thing and take pictures when I can. It is what keeps the Universe together. I found this outside a tea shop. Still: Why is the tea pot outside not inside? And why all the wood?

Ah, home sweet home. I wonder how many caravans have been bought on a whim, because it seemed like a nice idea? I wonder how many now lurk in back gardens beyond use and repair.

One day, armed with a light box and some black and white film I turned my attention to an unsuspecting onion. Here is the result. This isn't the first time I have raided the kitchen for photographic purposes. The jury is still out on whether eating your subjects is allowed.

Here we have a recent satellite image of the Black sea coast and the eastern Turkish province of Snag with it's thriving Amish community and lucrative Silk Wells. Anathema, the local capital is also visible and is justly famous for it's fine amber Dichotomy. Yet there are still areas untouched by tourism and many a village where one can buy an original Crozier.

Ever wondered why they are called bonfires , as opposed to fires ? Well it is obviously from the French , meaning good fire. So next time your washing comes in smelling of someone else's smoke, remember it's a Good Thing.

Today we deal with International Relations. France. Hmm. They have a much better country than ours. It's larger, more rural and has nicer weather and better facilities. They have a Mediterranean coast, and access to the Alps and proper suntans. All in all it is very desirable, apart from the people and the food* obviously.  Clearly France should be British. We should invade and conquer France (they did it to us one), then we could indulge our natural superiority properly. If anyone doesn't approve of this, well, shrug .  *No. French food is not the best in the world. It's just that they tell everyone it is.

It turns out String Theory isn't that difficult after all. I even made my own. It is my theory that without string*, farms would fall apart. I think it is such an essential part of agriculture that farmers even keep* all their old bits of string. Here's some string that was kept earlier. *OK, Farms are held together with string, nails and amateur welding. Yes, I know. Farmers keep everything, just in case.

As you see from the evidence below, Hampshire is experimenting with this new fangled  horizontal snow . Snow that arrives horizontally has several advantages. Rather than accumulating inconveniently on roads and roofs, it piles up on walls, posts and hedges. However there are clearly still some technical issues to address.

Yesterday I spent all day doing technical stuff in a cave. A room full of laptop computers and electronics which (unlike our lab pictured below) had no windows at all. Surely this isn't a good thing. Also at this company I noticed in the toilets there are machines on the wall dispensing aspirin and paracetamol. Hmm. 

Old loaves: I have been too busy to take any decent pictures recently, so here we have a picture from 2006. See: I have been taking snaps of weird stuff for years and years, my friends. This was from my Olympus C8080 years, and the images seem strangely bland compared to four thirds results. Furthermore they get noisy above ISO 400. How things have changed these days. BTW: This is old school bread , you know the stuff with no horse meat in it.

At last the days are getting longer. Sun sets at about five pm, so we don't work the final hour in darkness, always a depressing prospect. However just a couple of weeks ago we were in the grip of proper cold, and here is a picture I snapped then. Icicles. Aren't they great :-)

More details from that little railway line...

Oh the joy of playing with really grown up Meccano! Here on the Watercress Line there's more cast iron than you can shake a spigot at. There are also more splendidly turned out volunteers than I expected. We had a splendidly sedate amble from Alresford to Alton and back. These days it seems positively slow, but in the late 1860s it was a rare thing to travel at the speed of a galloping horse. ... More watercress tomorrow

As you know, I do like life's little details. A long time ago a blacksmith made this iron latch for the churchyard gate. The bar is wearing well but time has not dealt kindly with this part, t he twisted wrought iron is pock marked with decades of rust. How many hands has it felt on it's gate, how many brides have there been?  How many infants has it brought in to church, how many coffins seen?

The old mysterious barn. I have had my eye on this for a few months, and I grabbed a picture as I drove past recently. I think this deserves a return trip when no one is around...