365 to 42

First the answers from Sunday; 1. Alanis Morissete Head Over Feet 2.Meatloaf Paradise By The Dashboard Light 3.Madonna Don't Tell Me 4.Nirvana Lithium 5.Oasis Wonderwall 6. Rolling Stones. You Can't Always Get What You Want 7.Red Hot Chilli Peppers Under The Bridge 8. The Sex Pistols God Save the Queen 9.The Verve The Drugs Don't Work Not many got the Sex pistols, I think it must be an age thing. The news this morning is all about the financial meltdown and how terrible it all is, to hear some of the reports you would think that it’s the end of the world, what a load of crap. Ok, so the American government cannot decide if it should throw lots of money at the problem or not, and all the people telling them they should work in the financial sector, just where the money will end up (also securing their jobs and fuelling their bonuses, as if they haven’t taken enough money already). On the other side of the fence are the people saying that if you throw the money at so...

Answer to yesterday will be show tomorrow just to give more people a chance, covered that first as some people are quite impatient. We’ve just come back from sunny Rutland, I think we may have to move there as it seems to get all the sunshine we don’t. We both had a fantastic time and I feel that I’ve been away from work for a whole week and not just a weekend, wonderful. As always the welcome from Sandra and Trevor (and Sam) was great and the whole weekends activities (eating, drinking, eating, walking and drinking (with a bit more eating thrown in) were just what we needed, thank you both so much ( I know they read the blog and so this saves me an email). So people have commented that last weeks post were a bit depressing, well on the surface they do look that way, but looking back to that time made me smile so much, I think that even bad times can, after a long time, bring back good memories. So I may drag up some more memories from my dark and distant past, but may change the names...

Quote Sunday; they all have one thing in common but many writers, 1. ...and don't be surprised if I love you, for all that you are. I couldn't help it, it's all your fault. 2. we were barely seventeen and we were barely dressed 3. Tell me love isn't true, It's just something that we do 4. im so happy cause today, i found my friends, theyre in my head. 5. I don't believe that anyone feels the way I do about you now 6. you can't always get what you want-but if you try sometimes-you'll find- You'll get what you need 7. Sometimes I feel like I don't have a partner Sometimes I feel like my only friend Is the city I live in, the city of Angels Lonely as I am, together we cry 8. 'Don't be told what you want. Don't be told what you need. There's no future, there's no future, there's no future for you 9. Like a cat in a bag waiting to drown. How many do you recognise. ---------------- Now playing: Alanis Morissette - Hand In My Poc...

A quick post as the weekend is here and there’s things to do. First an update on Kep he is still getting his paws washed every night, much to his annoyance and we are waiting on the results of his blood test. He is still in fine voice, barking as I type and will walk for miles if we let him, it’s just that his pads look very grotty. To cheer him up I asked him to sit for the first photo shoot with the new lights, as you can see below he’s a natural. I’ve added a new bit to the page so you can now (if you’re on Blogger) follow me and I will start to follow my favorite blogs too. ---------------- Now playing: Kate Bush - The Man With The Child In His Eyes via FoxyTunes

It’s strange but I never thought that writing this blog would take me back to times I had forgotten. Having spent 2 days thinking back to a time almost 20 years ago it has got me remembering lots of little details, the smell of a warm bear suit as you get in it after someone else (mostly the smell of the antiseptic wipes we used inside the head), the sound of a jazz band running through their numbers before going on stage, the feel of the big top just as lights drop before a show, the incessant sound of rave music (one of the other bears was a DJ in his spare time, hence yesterdays track), the days spent sitting in porta cabins watching the rain and praying for more (£1000 bear suits don’t like water, if it rained we did nothing), comparing injuries and scars (ice skating, stilt walking, fire juggling, rollerblades and unicycles were at are disposal, but not always the correct training). I wonder where my fellow bears are today, 2 were training to become doctors, 1 a dentist, 1 a nurse...

As I was saying yesterday, I over heard the conversation while sitting outside of my place of work, wearing a furry bear suit, waiting to start my next stint as an entertainer/ costumed character (bear) at a local theme park. The job was to put on a large bear costume and walk around the site entertaining the crowds who were waiting to get on the rides, but normally degenerated into hugging the prettiest girls and scaring the children (a 6 foot high, 3 foot wide, dark grey bear, resembling a Brillo pad on legs, can look very scary if you are only 2 foot high and it takes you by surprise, like hiding at the bottom of the ball pool). The main point to the job was that you had to look happy and without your face on show it was not just a plastered on smile, your whole body had to be happy, happy, happy. As any ex theme park worker will tell you, its no fun. After what I had just discovered I was a long way from happy and it was at this point a positive appeared, in the shape of one of the...

I’m crap with names; I have trouble remembering the names of people I work with (except Phillippa’s), I even had a girl friend who name I could never remember, while I was seeing her! After 20 years I still have problems with my mother-in-laws name (got it wrong in my wedding speech). So one day many years ago I’m sat out side of my place of work (wearing a furry bear suit, but that’s another story) listening to 2 girls discussing the suicide of a bar maid from a local pub. It’s strange how you can sit and listen to a conversation like that and feel totally detached, even find it a sort of amusement (not in a funny way, but like watching a soap). As the conversation moved on I started to think that I knew the girl in question, but only slightly, and so started to pay more attention. It was only after a few more details had emerged, that I realised that it was not the girl I thought, but to be sure I butted in and asked if they knew the girls name. They did, and at this point the whole ...

I’ve had my camera for nearly 18 months (15,000 photos) and decided that it might be time to have a read of the instruction book. Like all owner manuals it is designed to be read before you even touch the thing and it only really makes any sense after you have been using the thing for a few months, it also seems to be written in that strange form of English that comes from a translation from Japanese (who am I to talk about strange forms of English). Still I have now identified 2 buttons that had got me stumped and have found some really cool controls on the in built flash. I got an award last week from Suburbia, thank you very much, as with all awards there are certain rules to follow: 1. Link to the giver 2. Nominate up to seven (oops...) other fab blogs and link to them 3. Leave messages announcing their rise to greatness. note - You may have been given this already, so that means you are a GREAT blogger I would like to award this to the following fellow bloggers who are my daily re...

A Meme that does not take all night to do. So thanks to Scarlet for having faith in me that I'll actually complete this meme! So... Instructions: What you are supposed to do...and please don't spoil the fun...Copy/paste, type in your answers and tag four people in your lists! Don't forget to change my answers to the questions with that of your own. (A) Four places I go over and over: Work, The Lakes, the Pub, bed. (B) Four people who e-mail me regularly: No one other than work, how sad is that! (C) Four of my favourite places to eat: Salsa, Keswick. El Rio’s, Macclesfield. Castro’s, Leek. Home. (D) Four places you'd rather be: The Lakes, The Lakes, The Lakes, Antarctica. (E) Four TV shows I could watch over and over: Midsummer murders, Dr Who, Torchwood, The Simpson’s (F) Four people I think will respond: Suburbia , wontletlifedefineme , Lisa B , girl with the mask Have fun peeps! ---------------- Now playing: Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way via FoxyTunes

Quote Sunday, inspired by the poster below it is all to do with rules, regulations and the law. Haven't you learned anything from that guy that gives those sermons in church? Captain What's-his-name. We live in a society of laws, why do you think I took you to see all those Police Academy movies? For fun? Well I didn't hear anybody laughing! Did you? Except at that guy who made sound effects. Vroom! Beep! Honk! Honk! Ha-ha. Where was I? Oh yeah, stay out of my booze! Homer Simpson An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law. Martin Luther King Jr. The laws of gravity cannot be held responsible for people falling in love. Albert Einstein Nothing travels faster than the speed of light, with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own set of laws. Douglas Adams...

While sitting here trying to think of something to write a chap on radio 2 is telling a hitch hiking story (yes we listen to radio 2, Caz got fed up with the continual me me me of Chris Moyles and they now play really cool tracks, The Ramones earlier) and this took me back to my hitch hiking days. In the distant past that was my youth I had a very strange habit of drinking my taxi fare and at the end of a very drunken evening finding myself 10 miles from home with no way to get back. I would then start to hitch hike back, something I would not recommend to anyone (just to cover myself if anyone thinks it’s a good idea), and in the process would get to see the best and if not the worst certainly the least nice side of people. Amongst the lifts I got were, a taxi (free of course) a police car (again no charge, get it, charge) another taxi (this time full of drunks who made the driver stop, I had to lie on the floor!) a young drunk woman who was driving home at full speed after an argum...

Disaster, due to an unforeseen occurrence (the battery running out ½ way though taking a picture, after only 20 mins warning) I lost all the shots I’d taken over the last hour. But this has happened to me before, so it was straight out of the camera for the card (do not be tempted to try and use it in the camera as if you get it to work it may write over your shots) and back home to run the photo recovery software. The software I used, which recovered all the shots, is PhotoRec , which is a free down load and a must if you used a digital camera. Until it happens you really do not appreciate how fragile your kit is. So today’s rescued shot is of a Mushroom (or Toadstool, I don’t eat them so I have never learn the difference) taken in a local wood. ---------------- Now playing: The Ting Tings - Fruit Machine via FoxyTunes

The money market is in melt down and soon we will all be back to swapping vegetables for stuff (my green house not looking so funny now). Well that’s what “they” want you to believe; the “they” in this case being the media, but has anything really changed. Has your house got smaller over night (or have you just fallen asleep in the wardrobe again), has the pound in your pocket just turned in to chocolate, have the large banks suddenly changed the way they do business, NO. Its just that the finance industry is based on confidence and trust, at its most simple you lend money and trust it comes back (you never can guarantee this, try lending a fiver to a friend), but if everyone is telling you that friend will never pay you back, even if you know he will, you will still feel that you should not take the risk. This is what his happening but on a bigger scale, and it is being fuelled by the press, who seem to have too much time on their hands and nothing more important to write about. I’m n...

Some days getting the pictures for the blog is the hardest part and on others it’s getting the word, someone at work said that it must be hard work to keep this up day after day and she was right (as always). I think on average I spend a good hour a day on either taking the images or processing them and writing the words, but I think this is time well spent as both my photography and writing have improve no end. To day’s image is a good example as with out the blog I would have never spent the time to put it together and I’m very happy with the result. So here we have Kep trying his hardest to remove the lamp shade, he has, for all his concerned fans, only had to have this on the once as he has shown that he can be trusted not to lick his feet for the time required, which was why we got this in the first place. Money well spent then. ---------------- Now playing: Kylie Minogue - Kylie Minogue - Can't Get You Out Of My Head (m's extended radio mix) via FoxyTunes

At it basic level photography is all about light, the effect of light on the subject and the capturing of that light in the camera. Although the art is picking the right subject or position, light and the use of it is the back bone of a good photo. For most of my work I have next to no control over the light as the sun is very hard to turn on and off, so find that I can have the best position, overlooking the best subject and still not have a good photo. A good example of this was the walk up to Esk pike, dull and grey to start with, then turning to thick fog with less than 10 meters of visibility. Only to have the cloud lift to produce some of the heaviest rain we have ever walked in, to the point at which we decided to postpone the trip to the summit for ½ an hour by taking a route that took us some way back towards the car. Taking a picture during this time was only possible if you wanted a record shot of how bad the day was and to see if your camera was water proof. By the time we ...

Kep’s doing fine and really appreciates all the kind words, even those not so kind ones from Sam (but he really did deserve them after what he said about him). Each night around 7.00pm we call Kep in to the kitchen and close all the doors, I don a pair of rubber gloves (add maniacal laugh for effect), fill a washing up bowl (one brought for the purpose) there then ensues a mad chase around the kitchen while we try to get more medicated shampoo on the dog than on us and the kitchen, it is always a close run thing. Afterwards Kep sits behind Carolyn’s chair looking at us as if to ask what all the fuss was about. Today’s photo is of Catbells, one of the prettiest places in the Lake District and very easy to climb. If you are of average fitness and pick a good day it gives you some of the best views (see Friday’s photo as it was taken from the top) for very little effort and risk, to make a day of it catch the boat from Keswick and walk from the dock, picnic on the top and catch the bo...

Dog quotes, just for my poorly pooch. If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went. Will Rogers We give dogs time we can spare, space we can spare and love we can spare. And in return, dogs give us their all. It's the best deal man has ever made. M. Acklam Anybody who doesn't know what soap tastes like never washed a dog. Franklin P. Jones Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea. Robert A. Heinlein If you think dogs can't count, try putting three dog biscuits in your pocket and then give him only two of them. Phil Pastoret My dog's not spoiled ... I'm just well trained. No matter how little money and how few possessions you own, having a dog makes you rich. Louis Sabin Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies. Gene Hill Did you ever walk into a room and forget why you walked in? I think that's how dogs spend their lives. Sue Murphy ...

A couple of answers to questions that have popped up during the week, yes I do have very patient friend, every time I stop to take a picture they treat it as a rest break and dig out the chocolate. Yes Scarlet, we may have had In bloom before but as this is the 211 post I find it hard to get new tracks and sometime just feel it the right one for the moment. Ranger Faff, you can have this on your wall (as can any one), the photo is 300DPI the image size is 35cm x 110cm (20mb), I do not how large this could be printed with out losing image quality? As with all the images they are for sale just email me with details of size and type of print for a price. Now to the photo, Kep has a problem (he looks a pratt), no really he has got a slight case of something (not the athlete’s foot as first thought) on his pads and has to have them washed each night. The lamp shade (really it’s not, but it sound funnier) is to stop him licking his feet while his they dry. While I am a caring parent and fu...

One of the best ways to wreck a friendship is to involve money, mainly because we all have differing incomes and attach differing levels of significance to items you buy and the money you buy them with. When, as we were, you are living with someone else for a week this can cause real problems, enter Kitty. The system is as simple as it is wonderful, you all put in a set amount at the start of the week and then when it comes to buying joint stuff like food or drinks, Kitty pays. This is were the madness starts to show, Kitty becomes an extra member of the group, being included in the conversations, like “ will Kitty let us have this extra tub of ice cream?” of course being a girl the answer to questions like this is always yes. This of course leads us to the conclusions that Kitty is a very generous girl, and following the run of the conversation during the week ended up with her dressed in a French maids outfit and thigh length boots! Photo today is of the Newlands valley with a stor...

When walking as a group for 6 or 7 hours you soon find that topics of normal conversation dry up, after all how long can you talk about the weather. At this point the conversation can go two ways, one is to go very deep and serious, and the other is to get silly. The first is easy to understand, you talk about work or relationships, often in a way that you would not in a normal situation, the second is what we term mountain madness and is where the conversation takes a silly turn, like thinking the sheep are plotting against you, i.e. planning a Lambush (Lamb-ambush). As we normally walk with the same people both types of conversation can go on for not just one walk or holiday but gets added to over months and months leading to conversations that to an outsider would sound totally wrong in so many ways. Take Mr X (name changed to protect the innocent), he once fed a bit of chocolate to a sheep and now many years latter is still trying to live down his sheep fetish, with one or other of...

Thank you for all your comments yesterday, I am unhappy about not getting the job, but my manager said he was happy that he was keeping me in the team and some of my ideas in my application have been shown an interest in and I may get to follow these up, so not all bad news. Yes Aims, this shot was stitched (as is today’s) for those that don’t know what that means look here , I find myself shooting more and more of these type’s of shot as I cannot seem to fit the landscapes into one frame (this took 7). It has taken me years to get it right but now it is paying dividends and most of the shots I try work. In Saturday’s post I said I would cover some things in greater detail, yesterday it was about the rain, today I will take a moment to discuss taking a moment. When walking in the hills you often find the best views are often the greatest distance away, take yesterdays shot, we had been walking for around 5 hours just to get to that point with another 2 hours to get back to the car ...

One of the things about a holiday is all the catching up you have to do when you get back home, you’ve only been out of you life for a week and allsorts of things creep up on you, all weekend was spent on house keeping (mostly by Caz), Monday I spent on the blog and now I get chance to sort out the photos. At work I had 150 emails to wade through and also learn I had failed in my job application, on top of that they have changed our intranet so I cannot find anything! All making me wish I was back on top of a mountain again (if only to throw my self off). Mountains, I love being on top of them, but hate the walk up, all up hill and hard work, and I hate the walk down, all tired feet and failing light. But on top you are the master of the world, given a bit of luck you view will seem to go on for ever and if you have picked the right one you will only have to share it with the people you have brought with you, although on most mountain tops you only meet like minded people so its not t...

Monday and back to work after a week’s holiday, can there be a worst day (well yes, but on a normal day to day rating this one rates quite high). Still I get to spend some time blogging and I have a weeks worth of blog post to read on my favourite blogs, so it’s not all bad. What I did on my holiday, a bit of back ground first for the new readers. We normally spend two weeks a year walking in the Lake District, in the north west of England , one week around March/April time and one in September or October. During these weeks we have been trying to clime all the Wainwrights (theses are fells or mountains over 1000 feet high as described in Mr Wainwrights pictorial guides). These range from small grassy hills that you can walk up in ¼ of an hour, to mountains that can take you all day, in all 214 assorted fells, crags, pikes, dodds, and mountains, and after this last week we have just 12 to do. So that’s the back ground, now for what we did (the “we” by the way is Caz and me and some...

There is an Eminence,--of these our hills The last that parleys with the setting sun; We can behold it from our orchard-seat; And, when at evening we pursue out walk Along the public way, this Peak, so high Above us, and so distant in its height, Is visible; and often seems to send Its own deep quiet to restore our hearts. The meteors make of it a favourite haunt: The star of Jove, so beautiful and large In the mid heavens, is never half so fair As when he shines above it. 'Tis in truth The loneliest place we have among the clouds. And She who dwells with me, whom I have loved With such communion, that no place on earth Can ever be a solitude to me, Hath to this lonely Summit given my Name. William Wordsworth ---------------- Now playing: Ludwig van Beethoven - Moonlight Sonata via FoxyTunes

I’m back, again! As some of you may have noticed I’ve been rather quite this week apart from the posts, this is because I’ve been away on holiday and not wanting to advertise the fact the house was empty I have pre-done the posts and now I’m back and have missed blogging like you would not believe. So before I unpack and start to dry my walking kit, a photo from last week holiday and a taster of things to come. This week you will meet kitty, learn about “moments”, “Lambushes”, “mountain madness”, Sneck lifter and rain, and hopefully see some good photos (as I have not yet seen them my self, that’s my next job). Today’s photo shows Caz and Trevor on top of Eagle crag. ---------------- Now playing: Kylie Minogue - Put Yourself In My Place via FoxyTunes

This is not as you would first think the back of the houses, but the front. My first friends lived along here, Stephen and Nicky, and to me with just a back yard all this green space was fantastic. Unlike the rest of the area this has improved over the years, when we first played here it was unused and over grown, a mini jungle away from the adults. It was my first experience of independence, tree houses, dens, playing with fire and girls ( well girl, who is most likely married and got kid of her own, just hope she has kept the long blond hair, think the blond one in Abba) not that anything happened, just my first kiss . Some years later we moved into one of these houses, a real step up from our first one, my view out of my bed room window now included grass trees and the back of a chip shop! ---------------- Now playing: The Wedding Present - Go Wild In The Country via FoxyTunes

This striking building was the fore runner of the supermarket, a super corner shop. It started out as the co op and then fell empty when the new super market was built, some years later it was reopened as a shop and butchers and into this strange building I arrived to start my first job, 3 hours on a Saturday afternoon, mopping, brushing and cleaning, what joy! Not the most glamour’s of jobs but I did not have to get up at dawn and walk the streets doing a paper round like most of my friend did and I was in the warm (unless I was cleaning the walk in fridge) and best of all I learned how to mop! Years later and many changes the place is once again a co op and as I walked passed I wondered who was doing my job now. ---------------- Now playing: Kaiser Cheifs - Time Honoured Tradition (Live) via FoxyTunes

This was once a communal yard for 9 or 10 houses, a safe wide open space where kids could play without any worry. The homes of 3 families with children we knew backed on to this and during the long summer holidays we could always be found hanging around here. But that’s not the reason the photo is here, for me this place hold a memory that few know, if any. One day I was just about to start a gym class, in my first year in high school, when I was call out to go to the school office, relief (no gym class) was followed by fear (what have I done) was followed by shock ( What’s happened) as I was taken home. At home in a darken room I had the news broken to me that my dad had died. After what seemed a long time but was probably only an hour I was able to get out and tried to find some quiet place to get my head around what had happened. This was the place, I lay on top of the wall, the one that you can just see in the center back ground, and cried, and after a while I stopped and listened ...

This photo takes in a lot, first of all note how the factory (now a block of flats) looms over the tiny terrace houses, then look at the gap between the houses and the other mill behind them. At the back of the row of terrace houses you will see the top of a brick extension; this marks the back of my home for the first 14 or so years of my life. I will say that it was not as grim as it looks; at least not back then, but the view out of the back windows has not changed. The factory with the Gothic looking tower was where I started my first full time job, not very far to roll out of bed. In front of the factory were 2 lamp post that were just far enough apart to use as goal post and in the days before we became over-run with cars all the kids used to play football here. This was my world, but walking round it now I feel like I’m visiting from out of space. For my mum, she played this album to death in that house. ---------------- Now playing: Dr. Hook - A Little Bit More via FoxyTunes

What a surprise a picture of a pub amongst my special places, but this one represents a lot more than a good pint. Your first kiss, do you remember all of them? I remember very few of them, mainly because I was drunk for so many, but the ones that stick, well there the ones that matter. My first, first kiss you will hear of later, but I will start with my most important, a young girl just turned 18 (and by just I think that as midnight had just gone by that was the reason for the kiss) many years later we still kiss, although at the time I did not imagine we would have been together for over 20 years. Another that sticks in my mind was with a girl I’d lusted after for years, after the kiss I told her so, she asked was it worth it and I said no (full of style in them days). Now to the picture, imagine the scene, a young boy (18) and an older woman (20 years old!) just finishing their first date, up to that point I had dated girls of my own age, this one could drive, had been places, and...