Happy Birthday,

to me!

yes 76 years old yesterday, we had a lovely day out and took lots of photographs that Diana sent to me on WhatsApp, but, yes you have guessed it, today WhatsApp is not working! I tried everything I could think of, normally WhatsApp opens and I save the photos to my desktop, but not today, I even uninstalled WhatsApp, and then tried to reinstall it, and this is what happened every time:

it went straight into pause, and stayed there! what is it with me? I do the same thing every time Diana sends me photographs from her telephone, but not today, when Diana is home from work I will ask her to send them to my email address if she can, such a shame we had such a nice day, not giving up I tried again, with this result:

it the locked up my computer, so again I had to restart it, again with no success, so that is that, on to Wednesday I am now off to give a blood sample at the Beckenham Beacon, and then going to Kelsey Park, to try out my new lens we picked up yesterday, hopefully tomorrow I will have yesterdays photographs so a full birthday post then.

A Very Short Post,

as I shall be out first thing on the way to having a covid booster, 

I played with a few photographs, this one from last week, I reduced the amount of beams at the top of the photograph by cropping it, 

although this one looked fine when I printed it at 10" x 8" it was terrible when I printed it at A3, one for the A3 bin, 

I then played with a couple from our trip to Dymchurch, on April 3rd.

both photographs I was not particularly happy with, but I could not deny the difference the new camera made to the resolution, it was amazing, so much detail even when cropped a ridiculous amount, two more for the A3 bin, after picking Diana up from work and our evening meal it was 2 more from Deadly 60, two half hour long programs being shown back to back, both of these on,

 parasites, I am not sure if you should watch these two before or after eating! next a Midsomer Murder, one we had not watched for some time, we followed that with a Bangers & Cash, which were this week restoring a,

 Nissan Figaro, photograph Fargo Owners Club, it is the cute small car we both like, but due to the mayor of London making the ULEZ zone bigger, financially impossible for Diana to own, it would be a fine of £12.50 a day every time we took it on the road! The mayor of London working for its citizens, not, after which Diana was off to bed, one more Bangers & Cash for myself before I too was off to bed.

As I Normally Say,

'Sunday has raced around again',

where does the time go? for today a special treat, Diana brought home some rhubarb, so rhubarb and custard it will be!

grown in Britain and proud of it! well done to Andy Hammond whose farm is in Nottinghamshire, 

time for my read and sherry, 

before some huge New Zealand mussels with garlic for our starter,

'Cheers!',

next up roast beef with all of the trimmings, with gravy for Diana,

sans gravy for myself,

and here it is, Diana's home made rhubarb crumble with ice cream,

and custard, 

lots of custard! we were full to bursting as we sat down for a afternoon with Columbo, after a snack in the evening, it was one from Bond, 

 Octopussy, a fake Fabergé egg and a fellow agent's death leads James Bond to uncovering an international jewel smuggling operation, headed by the mysterious Octopussy, featured in the film is the deadly blue ringed octopus, though in real life a lot smaller than the one on the film, it is however quite deadly, if one bites you that has a full load of TXX (tetrodotoxin) just one bite can kill in under an hour, there is no antidote for the poison in its saliva, so if you are bitten you have just enough time to make a will before you die, the good news is that only 3 or 4 bites a year are recorded, having said that the same author mentions that 1 death a year occurs, note self and everybody else, do not pick up a blue ring octopus, they seldom bite, but when then who knows? after which Diana was off to bed, a 05.00AM start for her, I watched a couple of Bangers & Cash before I too was off to bed.

Another Day Of Not Very Much,

again I watched YouTube videos, 

about how I should operate my camera, I also watched a few videos about photographing the maniacally fast humming birds of Costa Rica, why? I hear you ask, well, I have a cunning plan, next year I plan to visit Costa Rica in a workshop organised by Will Grey, he has a trip for himself, guide/driver and including myself 7 photographers to go there, details are here, 16 days in a tropical rainforest, looking forward to it already! on to my evening read and sherry, 

followed by a king prawn cocktail.

and a 'Cheers!', as I tuck into bangers & mash that Diana had left for me, after which,

 Wolf Hall, we had watched the television mini series before but it was enjoyable to start watching it again, this is what I wrote the first time we watched it, 

'one thing I like about this series is the realism of the costumes, according to the producers they are 99% accurate, based on pictures and written accounts of the period at that time, the other 1%? Mark Rylance (who plays the lead character Thomas Cromwell), has stated that the codpieces on the otherwise historically accurate costumes were made smaller at the request of PBS who felt that American audiences might be offended', 

and with that piece of trivia the second episode ended as Diana arrived home, no work tomorrow so we stayed up for a double helping of Poirot before we were off to bed.

Another Small Post Today,

I spent the day watching YouTube,

for two different reasons, firstly trying to understand my new camera, it is a Fujifilm GFX100s II, photo credit Andy Westlake, Amateur Photographer, 

to say it is complicated is a bit of a understatement, these are the symbols you can see in the view finder, unfortunately for me, it does not have a 'A' button, which all of my other cameras have, just turn the dial to A and the camera does the rest, but not this one! Secondly I wanted to try and improve my photography photographing birds, the problem is the pesky things never stop moving, 

which brought me up to my evening read and sherry, 

for tonight a chicken casserole that Diana had left for me, 'Cheers!',

I was then back to watching a few documentaries, this one in the warship series, which featured HMS Barham shown above at Scapa Flow in 1917, the hour long documentary frequently mention that a cameraman actually filmed the sinking, but the UK government put a ban on showing, as it was thought it would undermine confidence when the country was at war, this was mentioned several times and guess what? the documentary also did not show the footage after making so much fuss that the government did not!

here it is, although many years ago my condolences to all, it was a terrible tragedy, the ship sinking in just 4 minutes, keeping to a shipping theme, one more hour long documentary about the Titanic, this one making a statement that the hull of the ship was never actually pierced by the iceberg, what the programme maintained was that the rivets sheared through a number of reasons, the steel plates no longer being held together allowed water to flood into the ship, I followed that with,

 A Man for All Seasons, Sir Thomas More was the 16th-century Lord Chancellor of England which unfortunately led to him making the greatest sacrifice of all, Diana then arrived home so a coffee and a chat as we watched,

 No Time To Die, another great film from the Bond franchise, after which we were both off to bed.

A Fairly Short Post Today,

we were both up early,

as Scott from Original Sash Windows was calling round, to give us a quote to replace our windows with new ones, draught proof ones I hasten to add! the building is over 100 years old, over time the windows have shrunk allowing cold draughts into the flat, so ones in the same style will be quoted for, but double gazed and with draught proof surrounds, after he left we had a lazy day, Diana busied herself around the flat and started preparing for her trip to Berlin with Kai and Wilma, a girls few days out, for myself I telephoned many friends I has not contacted for some time, I know covid is blamed for a lot, but here is one thing that was sort of unexpected, pre-covid we would all meet up, not necessarily all at the same time, but every so often, but after a couple of years of covid many of us just did not return to keeping to seeing each other every now and then, so I made more than a few telephone calls, and as you can imagine each one was quite long, as we all caught up with the latest news from our respective families.

Diana was on a late shift, so I did not drop her off until 4 o'clock in the afternoon, arriving home the usual Tipping Point and Outback Opal Hunters until my evening meal, after which I spent the evening with Robbie Cumming, it was a pleasant way to spend the evening as I watched,

 Canal Boat Diaries, image BBC it does what it says on the label, following Robbie Cumming, who offers a personal take on life aboard his narrowboat, the Naughty Lass, as he travels the network of canals in the UK it was surprisingly enjoyable, stopping off at villages, towns and pubs, aboard his narrowboat, the Naughty Lass, a number of episodes were being played back to back, I have mentioned this series before:

'I have watched many of them before and thoroughly enjoyed all of them, if you have time for a lazy trip along some of Britain's waterways, grab a coffee and relax watching Britain slowly drift past, the series is called Canal Boat Dairies, and is proving extremely popular, it is now in its 7th. series',

after which I watched a couple of YouTube videos about bird photography, I need every bit of help I can get! then just before 10.00 in the evening I was out to pick up Diana from work, arriving home a coffee and a chat as we watched a Bangers & Cash before Diana was off to bed, for myself one more Bangers before I too was off to bed.

A Fairly Short Post Today,

as first thing a representative of a double glazing company will be calling round, 

to measure our windows, they all need replacing with new units, the old ones have shrunk so much over the past 100+ years the draught through them in winter is costing a fortune in heating bills, back to Wednesday, I was off to town, I had a parcel to post, parcel posted back home I was again playing with the camera, next week we are going up to London to pick up a new 500mm telephoto lens, for our upcoming trip to RSPB Minsmere, in a few weeks time, in the evening a milk and a read, no sherry,

 as tonight I am out to the Beckenham Photographic Society, I entered a couple of prints last week for the last of this seasons print competition, and then I will be picking up Diana as she is on late shift, back to Wednesday, for this evening a few bits and pieces from our picnic yesterday, 'Cheers!', at the club I had a limited success, everyone is allowed to enter 2 prints, 

I entered this one, Punting on the River Cam, which received a Highly Recommended, 

and this one Art Week comes to Folkestone, which rather pleasingly received second place, next off to pick up Diana, arriving home we were just in time for a Have I Got A Bit More News For You, after which Diana was off to bed, for myself a Bangers & Cash, before I too was off to bed.