Unfortunately,

Diana was asked to go to work this morning,

so I decided to play with a infrared image, I choose this one at random from a trip to Kew Gardens, above is how the image appears out of the camera I had professionally adapted to record infrared images,

if you are not interested in photography skip this bit, from a post many years ago, our daily Lumix G8 now joins its converted infrared brother, which I had converted at Protech Photographic a few years ago, and good they were too,

so normal pictures in one and infrared in the other, note the remotes where the flash would normally be, although it does not look it, both cameras and lenses are exactly the same, just that one had a infrared only sensor in it,

the camera on the left is the infrared converted one, on the right the normal camera, the reason for the remotes is if you want to take a long exposure and have two cameras taking pictures of the same scene in a different way, in my case one normal and one infrared, it is difficult not to have the cameras suffer from camera shake when touching and pressing both shutter buttons, so as well as the mounting rail, I use both cameras timers to give a 2 second delay in operating, note the difference in colour in the screens, as one camera 'sees' differently to the other, if you want see my efforts so far from a few years ago, have a look here at our infrared blog, not to everyone's taste but for myself great fun, back to the image I chose for today,

I used a colour swapping program,

and the started playing with the colours,

as well as luminance,

until I made this image that I liked,

and then added lots more colour,

next black and white,

finally a oldie-worldie look, not to everyone's taste but I enjoy playing with the colours, if you like the look of infrared here is a post I made about how the effects are achieved from way back in June 2017, by now Diana had arrived home, so it was time for a Sunday afternoon film, 

for today the 1958 released film Dracula, great if somewhat dated fun, next it was time for our evening out, 

and here we were at Beckenham Junction tram stop, we were off to Croydon, meeting Steve at the tram stop,

who had kindly bought tickets for us to go to the Fairfield Halls, 

a light refreshment before the show,

Steve bought a 'T' shirt,

Diana bought chocolates!

and this is who we are going see, the Illegal Eagles,

we were soon inside,

and had a great view of the stage,

Diana had brought a coffee with her, white wine for Steve and myself,

unfortunately the event was not very well attended, which was such a shame,

the show began,

with as you might expect all of the classic Eagles numbers,

and what a show, the band were so good, 

then the two necked guitar made its appearance,

the top a 12 string, the lower a 6 string, 

all too soon the show was over, 

it was to coin a phrase, 'Absolutely Fabulous', not a note wrong, even the most diehard Eagles fan would have been so impressed with the Illegal Eagles, what a show,

 as we left we had a chat with one of the band members,

bass player and vocalist Trevor Newnham, 

 born and raised in Hornchurch, Essex, Trevor had reached the tender age of fourteen when his parents bought him a Marlin Sidewinder bass and a Laney Linebacker amp, what a Christmas that must have been! and I think Trevor has a new fan!

this is a short video of a couple of tracks that Diana took, we made our way back to Beckenham where we said our goodbyes to Steve as we made our way home, where it was feet up for a nightcap, once again many thanks to Steve for treating us to such a wonderful evening, and with that we were off to bed.

As Time Moves On,

many companies have to move on as well to survive,

photographs Hario, one such company in Japan, Hario, did just that,

 Hario’s original glass studio in Tokyo’s Kanda Sudacho neighbourhood, since their founding in 1921, Hario has done one thing: create high-quality glassware, making specialized heat-resistant glass and provided the scientific community with beakers and test tubes, but times change, 

so the company moved into creating quality glassware for the kitchen,

table,

and home, as it became apparent that machines were producing more ands more glassware, again a new line was thought of,

and a step into hand made jewellery was made,

and sold in their shops, you can also buy in their online store,

as it happens Hario’s original glass studio in Tokyo found that heat-resistant glass was perfect for jewelry making, because it allowed the artisans to stretch and bend the glass into delicate and exquisite shapes,

 heat resistant glass also has the benefit of being considerably lighter and stronger than regular glass so it doesn’t pull on the ears or neck, 

what a great example of changing with the times.

Many Gravestones Have Epitaphs On Them,

perhaps one of the most famous, 

is Spike Milligan's, 'Duirt me leat go raibh me breoite' Gaelic (Irish), translated "I told you I was ill", a typical Spike joke as most people cannot read Gaelic, which brings me onto other messages on gravestones, recipes,

photograph Rosie Grant, “Cooking these recipes has shown me an alternative side to death,” 33-year-old Rosie Grant said. “It is a way to memorialize someone and celebrate their life.” Grant started searching for recipes and managed to find a few all over the United States, She has spent the past year finding more gravestone recipes and she has stumbled upon a few gems. In a Utah cemetery, Rosie discovered the final resting place of Kay Andrews, which has her fudge recipe engraved on the gravestone, this time with some simple but clear instructions. The fudge turned out great, but the real treat was learning Kay’s story, hearing her family talk about what made her special, and learning that the woman had always liked to share things with people, other recipes include the nut rolls etched into the gravestone of one Ida Kleinman, in Israel, or another American woman who has the recipe to a savoury cheese dip etched into her gravestone. So far she has cooked 12 or 13 such gravestone recipes and she is already looking for more to share with her TikTok followers, 

 “When we’re in mourning, food is very comforting to us,” Rosie told TODAY, “These recipes feel like a more tactile, all-senses-included way to remember someone rather than only using your memory. But when you’re eating grandma’s special cake or cookie or whatever it is, you feel a little bit more connected to her.” Rosie Grant told The Washington Post that she would love to visit all the gravestones whose etched recipes she has used so far, as a form of respect to the people buried there. “My goal is to go to all of them,” she said. “I would love to cook the recipe and taste it at their graveside as a cheers to this person who gave this gift to me and to everybody else.” I wonder if this is an American thing, or are there any UK gravestone recipes out there?

Whilst Printing A Few Things For The Shop,

I ran out of black ink,

the printer we have is a HP Envy 5020, luckily I had a spare, but after finishing I started looking for a new black and colour cartridge,

whilst doing so I found that HP offered a service where by you subscribe to one of a few plans and they send cartridges to you based on what plan you buy, it is called the HP Instant Ink Store, I went for the £2.99 a month plan, then the problems started, firstly I had to attach the printer to the modern with a cable, which I did not have, but, I could link the printer using Bluetooth, and so it began, although easy for most people linking the printer with Bluetooth will have been easy but for myself I had no idea what I was doing, but eventually it happened, I was then asked for a code in the printers window, which I could barely read, I entered the code and was told that the capitol letter O could be confused with the number 0, I thought if they knew that why use O or 0? but there it is, and then, hey presto, I had a code which I could enter into the HP ink site, by now the morning had passed and I was well into the afternoon, I had not stopped, even for breakfast, but as far as progress was concerned I was steaming now, address filled in, user name entered, plan selected, payment details taken, then the page I had been waiting for, 'click here to activate your account' I did, and received the following message, 'your version of Windows is not compatible with the HP Instant Store, please contact your administrator', all of that for nothing!, so on to Amazon as usual, just my luck, but breakfast first, in the afternoon I watched a few documentaries before Diana returned home from work, 

then it was time for my evening read and sherry,

and a real treat,

fish and chips,

followed by a crispy topped crème brûlée,

eyes down and tuck in, we listened to music then watched 2 films, 

first a black & white film The Two Headed Spy, released in 1958, which as it happens in based on a true story, slow to start, but for its time a enjoyable spy movie, 

we followed that with the latest release of All Quiet on the Western Front, this is by far the most realistic and gruesome portrayal of what I can only imagine the horrors of the First World War was like, the film even shows how after the armistice was signed at 5.12 AM men were still told to fight right up to the eleventh hour, all 2,738 of them as both sides tried to fight to the end, gave their lives needlessly, a very moving and well made film of the horrors of the First World War, we rounded off the evening with a Midsomer Murder before we were off to bed.