15 Minutes by the Climbing Rose….

Posted on July 13, 2020 by

 

I always find that I am fighting a losing battle trying to capture bees – especially with my antiquated equipment.   Hoverflies on the other hand are far more obliging.

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If you Build it, they will come…

Posted on July 12, 2020 by

 

There was a time when I was the only person whoever ventured into the damp paddocks and fields of Ratby Meadows.  This was a self deceit of course but that is how it always felt as I explored the common.   As with many such places it was surrounded by the modern world and yet it had its own peace.  No more.

 

Today it is a modern pleasure park known as Everards Meadows.  Gone are the scrubby grasses and the forlorn horses replaced by clear paths and freshly cropped grass and people flock for reasons that are something of a surprise to me.  But then I am looking at this with old eyes: Eyes that have seen the past and cannot be totally reconciled with the present.  The one thing is sure:  The Everards Brewery company knew what they were doing when they moved across the road and decided to build this family entertainment brewery.   Even in the lockdown and the brewery not yet complete   there were plenty of people enjoying the first proper summer sun we have enjoyed for several days.   Goodness only knows what the place will be like once it is fully open?

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How to Kill the Buzz…

Posted on July 11, 2020 by

So two weeks in and what little reserve of fun I had has totally evaporated.   Every day around 4pm I hit the UK Covid dashboard for the latest figures on just how the infection in Leicester is doing and I have to say the data publicly available is encouraging.   The above graph shows the real problem that city of Leicester, Oadby/Wigston & Blaby were facing (I know parts of Charnwood are included but they don’t really affect me – selfish I know).

At the height of the problem in Leicester, a city of around 350 thousand the infection rate was 10 times higher than the rest of the East Midlands region which has a population of around 4 million – you can see that Oadby/Wigston & Blaby were really bad as well.  Now we can argue about where the boundary line was drawn but clearly something had to be done.  Fortunately, it would seem that the semi lockdown is working and we can only hope that the current position of zero infections continues.

This doesn’t really help me because the lockdown this time has all but drained any creative drive I might have and I find myself in a limbo.  This is made all the worst because I know many people are not sticking to the rules (although the guidance is so wolly that at times I have difficulty knowing whether I can do this or that).  Whatever the case I feel becalmed waiting for 4pm to come around for my next stats fix.

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Any Old Day….

Posted on July 4, 2020 by

Another day in lockdown (sort of).

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Be careful what you wish for…

Posted on July 3, 2020 by

Was it just one week ago?  Was it really? Well yes it was and boy have things changed since I moaned about the tiny heatwave we were enduring at the time (by we I mean me!).  Since that day it has been dull and drizzle all the way with just the occasional downpour – oh the joys of the British summer.  To top all of that I find myself back into some form of lockdown as a result of administrative Fiat.  I say lockdown but it would seem that many people are just ignoring its existence and as usual central government have covered themselves with a big bucket of…well you know what.   It would be uncharitable to suggest that playing mandarin games are more important than actually saving lives – am I being too serve? Probably.

So it is time, once more, to catch up with things I had not gotten around to (this is a much smaller list). The one thing I have noticed is that the second time around it isn’t anything like as much fun(?) as the first.

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Lines on the ground…

Posted on July 1, 2020 by

So here we go again…we are back into lockdown – sort of I think – but as I sit here writing this the nearby major road seems to be just as busy as it was yesterday when weren’t back in lock down ( I could go on about the nonsense line drawn for the boundary of the lockdown area  but what would that achieve?) .   I get the feeling that this whole thing was rushed by central government who don’t seem to want to talk to the people on the ground and provide them with the data they need to make informed decisions – perhaps it would be different if it was part of London or County Durham?

Anyway, we are where we are and I guess we’ll just have to get used to a return to something approaching the situation a few weeks ago – I think?

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Doing things the Hard Way….

Posted on June 27, 2020 by

With just over five months to go Donald Trump still faces the same electoral problem he did when I last wrote about this – he needs to get an additional 6% of the vote to have a really good chance of of being reelected.  To date everything he has done to try and win over that block of voters doesn’t appears to have worked and every day the bad news for Trump is growing.   This doesn’t mean he can’t win (as an aside I still think he is favourite to win because he has the power of the Presidency to dictate the agenda although as each day passes this power seem to be waning and it won’t be too long before it will become a burden rather than an advantage) it just means he is running a very unconventional campaign which sounds somewhat familiar.   Should he loose we can expect a shit storm the likes of which few of us will have experienced.   However, come what may at 12:00 hrs on the 20th January 2021 he will no longer be President of the United States no matter how hard he might scream about a rigged election.

The more I see and hear Joe Biden I can see why he is the opponent the Trump team did not want to face.  For a start, and I am aware this can be spun as being anti Trump, he looks like a President of the United States of America.   It doesn’t matter that when he opens his mouth he stumbles he just has to stand there because, when compared to the incomprehensible and dubious nonsense that comes out of the current Commander in Chief, he is a soaring orator. That in a nutshell is the problem with for Trump – none of his usual attacks stick:

  • ‘Sleepy Joe’ – from a President who seems to spend more time either watching Fox News or on the golf course than trying run the country;
  • Dodgy business relationships – I’m really not sure reopening the Ukraine saga is going to work too well for Trump;
  • Suggestions of sexual misconduct – well the President paid a porn star $130 thousand dollars  to keep their liaison  out of the press and this, of course, is just the tip of a very dubious set of relations;
  • Biden is anti law and order – Biden’s voting record as a senator would suggest otherwise and the behaviour of Trump’s Attorney General at the moment leaves a lot of questions to be asked about political interference in the whole ‘law and order’ process;
  • Biden is soft on China – I think Biden has to say nothing but rather replay the interviews of John Bolton about how Trump tried to get the President of China to help him get reelected.

(I could go on but I think I have made my point)

Biden is the worst opponent for Trump in his quest for the 6%.  This doesn’t mean that Biden could screw things up, but as things stands today,  it is going to take something monumental for him to do that. However, if a week  is a long time in politics then 5 months is an eternity so anything is possible. One thing is for sure Donald J. Trump is doing things the hard way.

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I Hate the Summer….

Posted on June 26, 2020 by

I know this is a very unpopular view to hold but it is true I don’t like the summer (Please excuse the hyperbole in the title.).  I really don’t like the way it gets very sticky and humid (I’m sure if I lived near to the sea where there are cool sea breezes I might feel differently – but I don’t) and when it is a bright sunny day it is really next to useless for the type of photography I make for much of the day.  This in turns I have to get out late into the evening – it doesn’t get dark until after 9pm at the moment – and by this time I feel lethargic because of the heat of the day.  In short give me spring or autumn any time over the heat of summer.

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Contemplating the Eternity of Nothing….

Posted on June 22, 2020 by

Over the past few days the monotony of the lockdown (I’m really not sure whether this is still a thing anymore?) has been getting to me.   Thank goodness for Procreate!

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Constant Nonsense….

Posted on June 21, 2020 by

Sometimes it is tempting to think that we’re entering a whole new world when in fact it is just the same world turning around and around.

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