Rat a tat tat, doo bop doo dah....

The weekend saw the start of Hull's week long Jazz Festival I popped down to 'Jazz in the Gardens' on Saturday not really knowing what kind of Jazz to expect. I was a little unhappy upon recieving my programme from a helpful council man, to find it was more world music on the saturday, and the classic, big band, New Orleans and Dixieland Jazz was to be featured on the Sunday. I stayed for around an hour and a half to sit and listen with my mate Rob and his 7 month old daughter. The band that was playing 'Bombon Cha' was an 8-piece cuban salsa band and I wished I had kept up with my Salsa dancing classes as there were a number of appealing ladies dancing to it at the front. I didn't manage to get any pics at this event. I couldn't make it to the Jazz on the Sunday, but I did go for a little bike ride to see if I could find anything that would capture my attention for a photo. I found a few things, buildings mostly.

Victorian Monolith

An lovely piece of Victorian industrial architecture, lovely in it's bruteness, standing like a monolith against the sky, I thought I would post a black n' white photograph as I ain't done one in a while.

No particular view

Here's an experimental image I was playing with a few weeks ago, I had no particular theme or aim, but I think it makes a nice picture.

Pipework

A photo I manipulated slightly showing some big ole pipes on Hull's marina, they may be something to do with the old dock gate mechanism or maybe for pumping water out of the lock. I don't know, i'm not an engineer or anything...I just thought it would make an interesting image.

On patrol.....in style!!!

Austrian police are testing a Porsche 911 as a traffic control car to help prevent motorists from speeding.
A spokesman said the £65,000 sports car, than can do up to 177mph, had been a major success and they are planning to buy more.
He said: "The preventive effect is excellent. Drivers just needed to see it parked alongside the road and they slammed on the brakes.
"The only thing is that it's a bit cramped. But there's still enough space for the essential equipment like the speeding radar and the breathalyser."

What next... detectives wearing white suites, shades and driving a Ferrari Testarosa?

Canteen

A canteen so dreary has no life of it's own

A canteen whilst drab is a place to behold

From within it's walls come talk and laughter

Or solitude and silence, sometimes anger

A lifeless room looks out to the sun

A place now bereft of talk and fun

As the room becomes refuge from the sleet and the snow

It's purpose apparent as the numbers grow

Newspapers, food and gossip just begun

People reaching out, crying for the sun

A dried up potato, a scoop full of rice

Meagre, measured portions and then there's the price

Gold bullion in exchange for a spoonfull of sauce

Please Mr Canteen man, I could eat a horse

Summer time comes and the canteen does empty

Except for the smokeroom which still holds a plenty

My Other Blog

I have converted my other blog (see sidebar link) which was my photography blog, into a blog to chronicle my attempts at learning to paint in watercolour. It's a new hobby I decided to take up as recently as the weekend before last. I hope to get better at it, having never done much painting outside of the art class school days, way back when. Although this is a photo blog of sorts, my dedicated place for photography is at fotothing (see sidebar link) so feel free give honest comments on my meagre primary school like, attempts at painting if you wish but do be gentle and I hope it's as entertaining for you to follow my artistic development as it is enjoyable for me.

Wonders of renovation

It never ceases to amaze me at what can be done with an apparently derilict building. The white building to the front (right) of the picture, looked ready to be knocked down a few months ago and after some serious renovation it now looks fantastic! The picture also shows Hull's Holy Trinity Church.

Sunsets

I posted a sunset or two on my other blog but I had a couple of others left over so i'll put em up here, one from last night actually.

Everybody jump...jump....jump

I took this photo this morning walking the dogs, it's Mia jumping a log.

Pissing It Down

This was the mundane view yesterday as I was trapped in the garage, due to the torrential rains.

Aye up flower

It's a nice time of the year is summer, here's a flower in our garden.

Visit to the park

At the weekend I visited Hull's East Park. It's the first time I have been in there for around 8 years. It is currently undergoing a facelift and is looking rather nice, although there are still works to be finished. We took the dogs and one of them decided to go for a swim in the lake, endlessly chasing Ducks for about forty minutes. A new animal/bird house has been built, unfortunatly the bird I was trying to capture, kept ducking behind a bush.

My first watercolour

On Sunday I was given a masterclass in watercolour painting by a friend, this is my first ever picture, it's quite tatty, but all I can do now is practice to get better.

A Drawing

Of my dog Mia, which I did last week.

Dinner & Art

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Winning Ways

I am quite pleased with myself, yesterday I played my mate Rob at chess as we do regularly and I managed to win him twice in a row!!! Considering I have only ever won him twice in about 5 years of playing against him, this is a good thing, however, his baby girl was spending the night in hospital so this may have contributed to his poor concentration, so I will restrain my bragging rights.....a little.

First shot

My new phone arrived this morning, I am impressed by it's all-round functionality/usability/quality. The MP3 player sounds excellent and the photo's are decent although I need to reduce the white balance a little, I ain't got round to listening to it's radio yet. Memory wise, because it is packed with so much stuff for such a small item, they have had to develop a new kind of micro memory card, due to lack of room. At the minute, the maximum capacity is 1 gb at around £35-40, I shall purchase on one payday, and will just have to wait for the bigger capacities to reach the shops in the coming months. I am also impressed with the quality of video capture. The above picture is our dog Duke eyeing up our fish.

Moving with the times for convenience sake!

Technology has finally caught up to my bassline standards of what I consider acceptable, and as such I have purchased the new Sony ericsson mobile phone, the K800i. It has a 3.2 MP Sony Cybershot digital camera (great for bloggin) a Sony walkman MP3 player and radio and yes it makes phone calls as well, I just need to purchase a 4 gig memory card for it and i'm sorted, then there will be enough room for plenty of pictures and music, I can even upload pics and manage my blog from the phone, how wonderful. I wish i had it the other weekend when camping, instead of taking my mp3 player, phone and digi camera seperately.

And I would walk 500 hundred miles and I would walk 500 more....

It was very nice weather on Saturday here in Hull. Danny, Rob and I decided to walk the 15 or so miles to Hornsea via the old 'Hull to Hornsea' railway line which is now a cyclist/pedestrian/dog shitting route. I stupidly wore a yellow t-shirt which attracted hundreds of thunder-bugs, and as a result, when we got there I had to drink my pints of ale indoors, in order to stop the buggers 'dive bombing' my beer. One picture (the view behind) shows Rob consoling his tired weary feet, another shows Danny (the view in front) setting the pace.

Keeping it real!

Here is a picture of my brother Danny, keeping it real on the second day of a camping trip we attended a few weeks ago.

My trusty pocket Knife

I didn't take this picture for any reason really, just thought it was a nice shape, I played with the image very slightly on photoshop adding a modest looking filter.