OS Maps

I've been meaning for ages to get myself a custom-made Ordnance Survey map. You can order them with your home (or anywhere you choose) right at the centre of the map and customise the front cover with your own wording and photo too. I thought it would be fun, in this age of lockdown, to create one to to help me to explore my own local area even more fully. In fact they stopped making them right back in March when we first locked down, but I noticed they'd started offering them again so I ordered one.

I don't know what the available maps are like elsewhere but here in the UK we are quite proud of the Ordnance Survey. It came into being for military purposes after the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion (an attempt to restore the Stuarts to the throne) led to the need for detailed and accurate maps of Scotland. Attention then turned to mapping the south coast of England, to help with planning the defences against possible invasion from France. They used theodolites to divide the landscape into accurate triangles, fleshed out with detail on the map. It grew and grew, sponsored by landowners who wanted (effectively) aerial views of their land holdings. Ordnance Survey now produce detailed and up to date maps and related data, both paper and digital, using satellite information and other means, that enable government and businesses to plan effectively - as well as providing us walkers with sound information about rights of way and all the features necessary to navigate safely. Ever since I was a child I have found maps fascinating. Now I have my own, custom built, at a scale of 1: 25 000, that is 4cm on the map = 1km on the ground. You can see footpaths and bridleways, roads, rivers and the steepness of the terrain shown by contour lines. There is so much wonderful detail, it's almost as much fun exploring the map as it is exploring the actual territory.

The detail below is just a tiny portion of my map, which stretches from the centre of Bradford in the south up to Ilkley and Otley, west to Haworth, Keighley and Silsden and east to Apperley Bridge and Yeadon.

Lockdown bandit

Until now, despite the pandemic lockdown, it hasn't been mandatory in the UK to wear a face mask. Some people have been donning them, but I'd never bothered. I'm not entirely convinced by the science, at least as far as low grade and home-made masks are concerned, and I worried that it would make me touch my face more and thus put me at more risk. Since the recent slight easing of restrictions, the guidance recommends face coverings 'in enclosed spaces where social distancing is not always possible and [you] come into contact with others that [you] do not normally meet, for example on public transport or in some shops'. So I decided I needed to make myself some. 

I don't want to order online as there is still a shortage of PPE and I don't want to cheat those more needy out of supplies. I rooted around in my sewing box for a few scraps of suitable material and some elastic, got my sewing machine out and set to work, using a pattern I saw online. I was reasonably pleased with the result. At least they fit quite snugly and are more comfortable than I imagined. I used quite thin elastic, since with my hair, hearing aids, glasses and earrings, there's not a lot of spare room around my ears! I found my glasses fog up so I unearthed some pipe-cleaner to mould around my nose, which helps a bit. I couldn't find anything else suitable; I have no plastic-covered wire and paperclips weren't bendy enough. The only trouble is the pipe-cleaner was bright green so it will probably bleed and rust when I wash the masks. I might have to take it out again. 

Made a couple for my daughter too. It brought back a memory of sewing tiny long-sleeved blouses for her to wear, when she was just nine months old and we had our first family holiday in Greece. You couldn't buy light summer baby clothes with long sleeves, and I was desperate that she wouldn't get sun-burnt. (Sunscreen for kids wasn't as effective then as now.) Here I am, still sewing things for her out of love and concern for her safety! It was a satisfying afternoon's work. 

Conkering the world

When they announced the Forest of Saltaire initiative (see HERE) I thought it sounded a worthwhile venture. However, I'm not a great one for gardening  - I can kill a 'living lettuce' on the way home from the shops - so I didn't end up doing anything at the time. Last autumn I picked up a couple of horse chestnut conkers, just to enjoy their shiny smoothness and rich colour. Then they got tossed into an empty container in my backyard, which happened to have a little soil in it, and I forgot about them. In the New Year, I noticed they'd softened and cracked and I remembered the forest idea. I really didn't hold out any great hopes but I planted them in some fresh potting compost. I'm really excited that they have sprouted and produced leaves. My friends are questioning whether they really are horse chestnuts!! I assure you they are, nothing illegal going on here, honest. Now all that remains is for me to attempt to keep them alive. I'm going to have to remember to water them. I might transplant them into a bigger pot soon. I also noticed a sycamore seedling has rooted in the front garden, so I think I'll have to rescue that too. I certainly don't want it establishing itself by the house wall but, rather than just toss it in the garden waste, I might try and nurture that too. We need more trees. 

I can see clearly now...

I promised a proper update on the cataract surgery... I have to say I'm really enjoying no longer having to wear glasses. The wonder of the miracle operation has completely blown my mind. It was so easy and painless, it only took about fifteen minutes each time. Three weeks on from the second surgery and my sight has pretty much settled down, so that I can see distance quite clearly. I still need reading glasses; I'm making do with some of those cheap off-the-peg ones until I can get my eyes tested properly in a few more weeks. Using the desktop computer is the trickiest bit, since it's neither near nor far but somewhere in the middle! I'm back to wearing mascara (phew! I hate being without it!) and feeling quite renewed. The best bit is being able to drive at night without suffering the painful glare of halos round lights.

If anyone is thinking of getting it done, I'd say 'go for it'. I haven't regretted it so far. There was a short period when I couldn't see clearly and, since I can't hear clearly either (being deaf), the combination was all a bit upsetting! Thankfully that didn't last long. I've also developed a black 'floater' in my right eye which can be a bit annoying, but that is more a product of age than the surgery I believe. I feel very fortunate to live somewhere where I could so easily get this treatment, and at a time when the technology is so advanced. (At one time I think you had to lie flat on your back for two weeks after the operation!) I'm still on the eye drops regime for another week or so, but that's a small price to pay for the privilege of better sight. I'm very thankful.

I keep finding that song running through my head:

'I can see clearly now (the rain has gone).

It's going to be a bright, bright, bright, bright sunshiny day'. 

Selfie

Me in a blue mood... The theme for my online group for December was 'Selfie'. I think perhaps it was envisaged that we might dress up in the style of Cindy Sherman, whose work consists exclusively of photographic self-portraits where she imagines herself as different characters. Or we might even copy the Japanese grandmother's hilarious self-portraits HERE. That's just not 'me' however. I've always hated dressing up and I haven't that kind of sense of humour at all.  So my submission was a rather more muted affair, reflected in a blue-toned modern artwork in a gallery.

2019 was a rather blue year in some ways. We hope for better things nationally and globally in 2020. Speaking personally, my world will be a little bluer and a little less yellow in a positive way after today, as I am due to have my second cataract operation. With two plastic lenses, the world will be bright! I am not nearly as apprehensive as I was the first time, now I know what to expect. Yes, there's always a slight risk something could go wrong but que sera sera. I won't be driving or doing anything very vigorous for a week or two afterwards, until it settles down. I've some local pictures that I took in the summer and haven't yet posted, so I think I will take you on a sunny walk to remind us of what we're missing.

An eye opener!

This isn't my eye... but it's here to illustrate the next little adventure I'm going to have in a day or two: cataract surgery. I can't say I'm looking forward to it, though no-one seems to think it's a big deal. It will be carried out at a nearby eye clinic under a local anaesthetic and I gather the operation only takes around half an hour. I shall be home in time for lunch!

I won't be able to drive for a while afterwards and it may take several weeks to settle down so that I can get a new prescription for glasses (assuming I still need them). I'm mainly concerned that I'll be bored, if I can't read very well and I can't play with my photos or post to my blog for a while. What will I do? Housework? Baking?

Fear not though... I've recently come back from holiday in Harris and Lewis so I'm about to start a blog series with photos that I took there. And then if I still need more, there are some local ones I've taken especially. Hopefully I will be back, taking photos and online, before too long. See you soon (and more clearly, I hope!)

Photo by Laitr Keiows, used unchanged under Creative Commons Licence. 
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en

Nostalgia

I had a bit of a nostalgia trip in Leeds one day, finding myself up in the university area. I didn't actually attend Leeds University (I studied at Bradford) but I had friends at Leeds and often came to gigs at the Students' Union. I haven't been up to the university quarter for ages and I was surprised to see how much has changed and how much new building there has been, although the wonderful art deco Parkinson Building (below) with its prominent tower has been there since the 1950s.

Friends, it was here on these steps that I queued overnight in the snow to get tickets to see The Rolling Stones in 1971. Yes, I have lived! Happy days.

The curious chimney on the pavement outside the Laidlaw Library, above, is actually a sculpture: 'A Spire' by Simon Fujiwara. There's a touch of nostalgia in that too, since it references Leeds' industrial heritage. The base contains pulverised coal, upon which Leeds' prosperity was built. The Spire also relates to the two adjacent church spires, as the very modern, glass-fronted Laidlaw Library is shoehorned into a space between two churches.

Ten years of reasons to be glad (iolus)

This is another image I produced in Photoshop. I've used layers and some motion blur to give an impressionistic feel. It's a bed of gladioli, stately blooms with long colourful spikes of flowers, that were growing in the allotments in front of Salts Mill. They're kind of old-fashioned; I remember my grandma used to grow them in her garden. She used to call them 'gladdies'. Plenty of reasons to be glad... not least that it's my birthday today!

I also realise that I have now passed the ten year milestone for this blog. Ten years! How did that happen? When I started it in June 2009, my aim was simply to challenge myself: to take more photos, to take better photos, to take more notice of and learn more about my home village (Saltaire, which had recently been designated a World Heritage Site) and to learn how to compose a blog. I had not expected to fall in love so completely with the process and discipline of blogging. Nor did I foresee just how passionate I would become about photography or how that would open up the world to me, to learning and exploring. Nor did I realise that I'd make friends through blogging and through photography, some of whom have become really special to me. It's been (and still is) a genuine pleasure and a wonderful hobby. One day too, I guess, I'll be glad to look back on what is effectively my personal journal. It'll make me smile and remember all the good days. And if, as it seems, in the process I am making a few other folk smile sometimes, well, that's well worth it too, wouldn't you say?

Ilkley Camera Club exhibition

I was delighted to be able to go and view our (Ilkley) camera club's exhibition at Cliffe Castle, Keighley. (It's on until 14 July.) We have some extremely good, creative members, and there is some stunning work on display. Everyone can be justly proud of the exhibition, I think. Special thanks to all those who were involved in choosing the hanging order of the prints, as they look really good in their groupings. I'm always surprised at how smart my own photos look once they're printed, mounted and framed. I'm by no means one of the best photographers in the club but I continue to be excited and inspired by my membership; there's so much to learn and enjoy. We don't have weekly meetings in the summer but we have arranged a number of club outings, so hopefully I'll be able to share some of the fruits of my involvement in those.

All the photos I've entered in the exhibition have appeared on my blog at some point, but here are the majority of them again. In the photo above, mine is The Reedbed (bottom left).

Apocalypse now

So there I was, on Sunday at about 1pm, catching up on a bit of ironing, with the tumble dryer rumbling away in the background, when suddenly... everything stopped. At first I though the dryer had blown a fuse but, on checking, I realised it was a power cut. A couple of houses opposite experienced the same, which was somewhat reassuring (though, oddly, none of my neighbours on my side of the street were affected).

I checked the Northern Powergrid website on my 'phone (oh, the wonders of technology) and it wasn't reported so I duly reported it and, shortly after, got a text to say engineers would be on to it pronto. At first they said the repair would be achieved by 4.30pm so I settled down to wait it out. It was, unfortunately, raining hard and blowing a hoolie, so there was no question of escaping for a good walk, which I would have done. 4.30pm came and went and eventually I got a message saying it would be 9.30pm before a repair was done! (At least they kept me updated.)

What do you do? Everything I thought of needed electricity - boiling a kettle, making toast, using the microwave or oven, getting on with some housework. No vacuum cleaner, no iron, no hot water or heating. No TV, no computer, no broadband - so no iPad. I had a book from the library - hurray for reading! Thankfully I also have a gas fire and hob so I was able to keep one room warm and boil water for a cuppa. (They're talking about banning new houses from having gas supplies altogether and many flats, like where my mother lived, are all-electric. What do people do then?)

It started to get dark and my phone ran out of battery. :-(  I made something to eat, worried about opening the fridge as it was rapidly warming up. Daren't open the freezer either, though luckily it's small and was well-stocked so I gather they can last a good few hours without power. I went to church (as planned) and managed to charge up my phone there during the service. When I got home there was a mini-digger out at the back hacking up the pavement, under floodlights, and several chaps with cable tracers, and another message on my phone saying they expected the repair to be achieved by 1am!

So I sat in the dark with a few candles burning and the street light outside shining in and tried to read by the light of a torch, which was hard work after a while. I began to wish I could knit or crochet... But it was strangely peaceful and I was happy enough. Friends and family had kindly offered aid, but it was hardly a life and death situation. When I went to bed, I realised I couldn't remember which light switches I'd tried... and, sure enough, at 12.23 am I was woken in a sudden blaze of light! Then - oh no! - it all went dark again. I got up for a drink and the lights came back on and stayed on. Phew! Eleven and a half hours without power. (If it had been twelve, I would have been able to claim compensation, ha!)

It was not, by a long way, the worst experience of my life but I was surprised by how much of an impact it had. We take so much for granted and yet 'civilisation' is such a fragile thing, resting so much on infrastructure working and people broadly agreeing to move together in the same general direction for the common good. As I've got older, I think I have taken fewer things 'for granted' and I'm grateful every week when the bin-men turn up for the rubbish, the train arrives more or less on time, the light goes on when I press the switch and things mostly behave how I expect them to. Not to mention my brain and body slipping into gear every morning when I wake up (even if the process isn't quite as smooth as it once was!)

But it is increasingly clear that not everyone is working towards the same future (yes, including whoever thought it a good idea to drop takeaway cartons into the newly-dug trench!) It is a little worrying, don't you think, that we now rely so much on electricity, plastic, computer-guided programmes and so on, and have largely lost the ability to get back to basics even if we wanted to? At the very simplest, the toasting fork my grandma used to use in front of the open fire, on occasion (and only for fun even then), would be no use here! It makes me quite fearful for my granddaughters' future, as I suspect change (for the worse) may come rather more suddenly than the gradual advance of 'progress' that I've seen during my lifetime.

A power cut is hardly the apocalypse, but it certainly left me pondering...

New Year, new camera

This is my Christmas present to myself! (Not only for this year but for at least the next ten Christmasses - haha.) As I recounted a couple of weeks ago, I had a fall and managed to trash my Nikon DSLR. Ouch. I've healed from my bruises, thankfully. The verdict on the camera and lens was that it could be repaired but, of course, at some cost.

Well, it so happened that a friend of mine was just at that time selling his Fuji X-T2 camera body, a beautiful camera that I'd long thought would be nice to have. It's a mirrorless system, so it is quite a lot lighter than a DSLR, and it's much more up-to-date and full of features compared to my rather old and basic Nikon. So, after some heart-searching, I bought it! Bought an 18-135mm lens to go with it and have spent many happy hours reading the hefty manual and trying to get to grips with the controls and functions. It's quite a lot different from my old camera in the way it is set up. It will take me a while to become fully 'at one' with it. Hopefully, you won't notice too much of a reduction in the quality of my images while I learn how to use it. Ultimately, maybe, you'll actually notice an improvement. I think images should be sharper. So, here goes...

I hope you treated yourself, one way or another, over Christmas. Now the New Year is here though, I'm rather looking forward to 'getting back to normal'.

All that remains is for me to wish you a very happy New Year and a healthy, happy and peaceful 2019 - a year that hopefully will see a calming down of all the political turmoil and us all being kinder to one another and to our planet.

Devon: Self portrait

Each day of the Photography programme involved a session of input covering technical and compositional considerations, and some spiritual reflection linked to the day's theme, before we went out with our cameras. I've long found photography to be a source of spiritual blessing for me, a form of active meditation, especially when I'm out on my own with my camera. It was enriching therefore to find this confirmed, developed and shared with others.

Our theme for the first day was 'self-portrait'. Aaagh! I'd much rather be behind the camera than in front of it and I'm not fond of my tripod, so this was a real challenge. I went down to the beach, with the idea of taking a picture of myself with the sea behind. It's a beautiful cove, but quite rocky - and it was very, very, hot with hardly a breath of wind on the beach. I set my tripod up, with difficulty, clambering about on the uneven rocks. Then followed a fruitless time of trying to get the camera at the right height, myself in the right position, taking photos with the timer... I got hotter and hotter and crosser and crosser and didn't get a single picture that looked good and properly focussed, though it was pretty hard to see them in the bright sunshine on the backscreen of my camera. In the end I retreated to the small chapel carved into the rocks by the beach. There, in the half dark and relative cool, I did manage to get a photo that was at least in focus. It's by no means one of my favourite photos of myself, all dishevelled and hot! Yet I'm sharing it, simply because the point of the exercise was to be vulnerable and to be honest. So that's me, with no artifice.

It's a steep walk back from the beach to Lee Abbey, still too hot. I paused for breath and noticed my reflection in the window of the hydro-electric plant by the waterfalls. This one's out of focus too, but in this case the blurring was the result of the reflection in the dirty, warped glass and seems rather more artistically pleasing!

It was a good, and humbling, exercise.

Deeds or Words

I've mentioned before on this blog that it is 100 years this year since women, over 30 and who owned property, were granted the right to vote in parliamentary elections in Great Britain. (It wasn't until 1928 that women gained electoral equality.) There's been an interesting exhibition in Shipley College, showing letters, papers and ephemera recently acquired by the Saltaire Archive that had belonged to Isabel Salt. 

Isabel was the daughter of Titus Salt Jnr (and therefore granddaughter of Sir Titus Salt). She was well-educated, well-travelled and was a noted Suffragist. I had not fully appreciated that there were two strands in the battle for women's suffrage. There were the Suffragettes, women like Emmeline

Pankhurst, who engaged in direct action and civil disobedience in their fight for women's rights. There were also the Suffragists, women who campaigned and were vocal in their call for women's right to vote but who disagreed with the militant methods of the Suffragettes.

We're familiar with the purple, green and white colours of the Suffragettes. I hadn't realised that the Suffragists wore red, green and white. There were newspaper clippings in the archive that showed that Isabel, after speaking at a meeting, was described in a newspaper as a Suffragette and wrote a polite but robust denial, claiming herself to be a Suffragist. 

The exhibition was accompanied by a short, original drama, describing the various positions held by Thomas, a soldier (soldiers were not allowed to vote); Isabel Salt, a Suffragist; Maggie, Thomas's sister and a Suffragette; Rev. Oates, a man 'sitting on the fence'; and Mr Henry Beecher, a Conservative MP and prominently opposed to women's suffrage. I believe the actors were members of Bingley Little Theatre, though there didn't seem to be any note of their names anywhere. 

The displays at the exhibition included, with my permission, three of my photos (blushes...) that I took at the Women's March in May. (See HERE) So that was gratifying! 

Selfie

It seems so normal to call these 'selfies' now, doesn't it? Funny how a new word can become so quickly accepted as common parlance. This is me, my hat (my trusty Tilley hat, such a good investment) and my camera, getting up close and personal with a dry stone wall!

The march of time

The last portrait I had taken was a couple of years ago on my birthday so I asked my daughter to take another this year. I don't think I look all that much different... a few more fine lines, I suppose. Not much you can do to halt the march of time, short of a facelift, but at least we have the benefit of make-up and modern hairstyling to soften the look. I was looking back at photos of my grandmother and aunts at a similar age. They look positively ancient in comparison. (And sadly, my maternal grandmother didn't even make it to her sixties.) Grey hair, perms and unflattering specs served to emphasis their age. Indeed, even in photos at twenty years younger they look older than I do now! They all had good skin though and that has been passed on to me. I've so much to be grateful for.

Wonderlab

The National Media Museum in Bradford has recently changed its name to the National Science and Media Museum (it was always part of the Science Museums group) with a greater emphasis on the science of sound and light. They have opened a new gallery called 'Wonderlab', aimed at children, but when a rainy day spoiled a planned walk for me and some friends, we decided to go to the museum and play. It's a fascinating place, though a bit bright and noisy for us oldies!! (Perhaps would have been easier on the senses outside of the school holidays, as there were a lot of children racing around excitedly.)

I especially enjoyed the infinity mirror maze, where you really couldn't tell what was a mirror and what was a corridor or whether you were coming or going!  Hundreds of 'me' visible at any one time. It was utterly mesmerising, although considerably disorientating.

Being deaf, a lot of the 'sound' exhibits defeated me but I liked the light lab that explored the colour spectrum, with lots of filters and lenses to understand refraction and the effect of mixing different coloured lights.

Worth a visit if you're in Bradford, especially if you have children with you. (Free entry too.)

All the fun of the fair

Liverpool trip
Have you ever been in a Hall of Mirrors, those distorting mirrors that they have in fun fairs and amusement parks? For some reason ever since I was a child I have found them absolutely hilarious and have been known to collapse, helpless with hysterical laughter, once inside. I was delighted to find that the seaside resort of Southport did not disappoint. There was a hall of mirrors in the pier amusements. I'm taking the risk of posting some images! I might pin the second one on the fridge as a deterrent!

Sundial

Liverpool trip

In Port Sunlight's memorial gardens there is this sundial. It celebrates the Diamond Jubilee of HM Queen Elizabeth II in 2012. I've never seen one like this before; it is analemmatic, using the shadow cast by a person to indicate the time of day. You have to stand on the relevant month as marked on the paving stones and read the time from one of the two rings of markers, the outer being GMT and the inner British Summer Time. So it was almost two in the afternoon when I was taking the photo. 

Can you believe your eyes?

If you're local, do please consider visiting Cliffe Castle museum to see Ilkley Camera Club's exhibition, starting this Saturday April 29th until July 16th. (Museum opening times here). I have three prints on show. There are also talks/slideshows by some of our members on Saturdays:

6th May – Keith Allen

Planet Earth and its wonderful birdlife – a photographic tour

20th May – Nick Hodgson
Around the World in 80 Images – my passion for travel photography

27th May – Peter Farmer LRPS
Glorious Churches – getting the best from your camera

3rd June – Sharon & Tim Sawyer
Our Workflow using Lightroom & Photoshop

17th June – David Stradling
My photographic journey from Landscapes to Portraits

24th June – Richard Spurdens DPAGB EFIAP/GOLD
Portrait Photography – using Lightroom to process portrait & fashion images

1st July – Len Downes
Band Aid – overcoming the problems of Gig Photography

15th July – Larry James
Composition

We've had to move to Keighley as the Manor House museum at Ilkley, where we've always had our exhibitions before, has closed down. Cliffe Castle is a very interesting place in its own right though and well worth a visit. Our exhibition coincides with a display on Fairy Folklore, exploring local tales and beliefs about the fairy folk, including the Cottingley Fairies. The first photo of these 'fairies' was taken in 1917. To celebrate that centenary, part of our exhibition shows photos we entered into a competition called 'Can you believe your eyes?', which includes photos that are not truthful but look as though they are, and some that are truthful but look so odd that you could think they are fabricated.

Making cushions

You may recall a post on here about a craft shop called The Craft House that's opened in Saltaire? (See here)  
I mentioned that they run a lot of craft workshops and classes. I've been seeking new opportunities to extend my creativity, stimulated by a book I was given when I retired: 'The Artist's Way for Retirement' by Julia Cameron, full of suggestions and exercises that I'm really enjoying working through. As I used to enjoy sewing when I was younger and I have a faithful sewing machine (a 21st birthday present from my parents!), it seems like a useful skill to pick up again. So I decided I'd enrol on a one day 'Cushion Making' workshop.

It was really good fun. The other young women in the small group were friendly, the tutor was skilful (and didn't shout like my school needlework teacher used to!) and the room we were in, in the basement of the shop, was light, airy and well set out. We were supplied with endless drinks - in the colourful ceramic mugs depicting Saltaire that I'd so admired in the shop - and biscuits too. I learned how to put a zip in neatly (which I once knew but had largely forgotten) and how to do corded piping, which I'd never done before. My end result was a fairly neat and smart cushion, although with hindsight I needed perhaps to attempt some appliqué on it to really set it off. It's quite plain: cream with a colourful piped edge. I was really pleased with myself though, and very much enjoyed the day. It was also good to see and be inspired by the lovely cushions created by the others.

I think it's so important that we continue to have enquiring minds and to carry on learning, experimenting and trying new things as we get older. No need to get set in our ways! I'm hugely enjoying having more time to 'play'. I shall keep looking at the list of workshops at the shop, and see if anything else particularly catches my eye. Someone may be getting a new cushion next Christmas!