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i was lucky enough to have to go to Ipswich today for a meeting. if that wasn't excitement enough, i spotted this fantastic cleaning device.
notice the articulated driver's standing section which moved independently from the main vehicle giving it a nice roman chariot feel.
did you notice the hit counter this month ? We've had over 10,000 different visitors which is very exciting.
and a few days ago we had our 3,000th comment.
so that's all very exciting isn't !
and here is the 3,000th photo i've taken with my new camera which i got on the 13th August 2004. I took it a couple of days ago so that's about 75 shots a day.
it's a lady with a fancy coat pushing a hospital wheel chair containing her handbag down the street.
this giant carboard contraption was about a metre square and looked like it was under huge pressure. it could explode open at any moment.
i took a chance with getting the photo - my flash could have been the thing which set it free. but it wasn't. so we are ok.
but it was tempting to undo the tape and see if it popped up in to a giant carboard house.
it's modern street accomodation for the flat pack generation. ideal for street folk. free with every can of Super Strength Lager.
it's a while since we've had any milk pictures. i see a lot of milk bottles and cartons in the morning but haven't taken many photos of them.
so here are three together. the chaps on the outside are giving the one in the middle a lift up. Is he injured or preparing for an acrobatic feat ? i wasn't sure whether to look away or stay for the show.
how ambiguous some photos can be.
life is becoming more integrated. cameras on your mobile phone, cars with MP3 players and DAB radios, egg and chips, and of course, diggers on lorries.
it's a super dooper scooper.
this lamp is due to be mended.
i was quite impressed the council had been so good with their signs which even explained what was wrong. it's broken because of electricy supply fault apparently.
i was less impressed when i saw that their charter said it should have been mended by 13 March 2004. i may phone the helpline so we can find out what's going on.
one way round england's archaic licensing laws is to buy a couple of cans of strong beer and sit on the benches outside a pub.
ok, here's a little lunchtime competition. if you get the right answer i'll post some more pictures of where it was.
so, this bloke spends his day going up and down in a lift. but where is it ?
here's another clue - he's driving the fastest lifts in europe (7.5m/s) which take you up 158 metres above london:
we're two green ones down on yesterday. but there is now an empty can of beer. what DID happen here ?
i had to get down low for this photo. much to the worryment of passers by.
the flower itself was about 5mm long, so this photo is probably actual size.
i walk past the gates of the Wallace Collection every day but it's never normally this exciting.
i suspect they've either had a fancy corporate event or a fancy private event. Or maybe they had an opening preview for their new collection which starts tomorrow (according to their website).
but i wish it was just completely for no reason. how fantastic it would be if everyone just decorated their front gates for no reason.
so that's my challenge to you today. find and put up a fancy decoration on your house/flat/caravan front or on your desk at work.
when someone asks you what you are celebrating, just say "life itself" and do a little twirl.
i walk from paddington station to tottenham court road in the mornings and i see a lot of stuff no my way. sometimes there's a theme which only becomes obvious once i reach my office.
today's theme was obvious quite early on. and continued throughout my journey.
groc sent me a link to a photo of people dressed up as bollards. how cool is that ! click on the picture to see a slightly bigger version (on the excellent bunchofpants photo collection site)
they gave away 1 million sandwiches last year. but is that good i wonder ? 1 million is a lot of sandwiches.
imagine if they all went to one person. initially you'd be pleased and they'd probably be some media interest. but quickly you'd realise the logistical nightmare which would result.
You could sell a few on, but time would be running out before the best before date expired. And then what ? I pity that poor person i really do.
if you don't press the button correctly you have to pay £1000. that's a lot of money. you'll probably find that most tube trains stop at the station anyway.
it's only the emergency trains which don't stop which is why you need a special button. probably.
this lady sells newspapers outside St Paul's Tube Station (why did Saint Paul need his own Tube Station ? Stations of the cross or something maybe).
anwyay, i'd seen her picture on another website recently so i mentioned this to her and she said in a really giggly voice "ooooh, i'm famous" !
i saw ricky gervais yesterday morning whilst walking to a meeting.
A bit later at the meeting one of my colleauges who also works nearby said he sees him most days. and he's a regular Denis Norden spotter too.
click for big
shop advert showing lots of coat hangers.
.watch out for the door .and "nibbles" .And Full Stops At The Beginning Of Sentences Instead Of The End
a seriously wounded bollard
tombola or raffle ?
how many times have you wanted to sit next to a bin for a while but had no convenient place to rest yourself ? well, i'd have had no trouble this morning if i'd wanted to sit next to this bin as there were not one, not three, but TWO seats provided.
if i'd sat there i would have pondered the circularity of throwing a dustbin in to the dustbin (as seen on the right of the left hand picture). i may also have been able to consider doing a little ironing (as seen on the right of the right hand picture)
i thought this was a fancy egg cup. but it's got some stange compartment up the top, so i suspect it's not.
i was particularly impressed by the effect the camera flash had on the pavement on the picture on the right. it turned bland tarmacadam in to shimering jewels. a bit like God does really.
i once worked in a restaurant as a commis chef. i hadn't got a clue what that meant (and still don't) but it did involve having to go on a council run kitchen hygiene course. so i'm qualified hygenic.
anyway, one of the important things i learnt was to always check your milk bottles for dead mice. another important thing was never to eat the raisins you find in the store room cupboard.
i also learnt that you need different coloured chopping boards for different types of food - cooked meats, uncooked meats, salads, mannequins, spleens etc.
perhaps these bags use a similar coding. perhaps not. but it's a nice story anyway.
here are some plastic flower petals on the floor. i included my boot-toes as i thought you might be interested.
if you aren't interested in my boot-toes then just look at the top half of these photos.
a sign and some cameras further down the road.
we've been away this weekend.
we journey'ed to the north of england to a small hamlet called Hull. Here is a birdseye view (what a pea would see).
we stayed with our lovely friends richard, julia, joseph, hannah and bethany. they have a variety of aninmals.
we had a great time and i got loads of photos to show you. but i'll pace myself.
meanwhirl, here are esther and kezia taking bella the dog for a walk.
pewari is a regular reader.
i didn't know this and neither did most of the rest of you i'd guess. but she does and i know that because she told me. in an email.
but not only that, she also sent me this photo which contains not one, not three, but TWO different random shoes.
i've no idea of where she found them, but they look very good. so a big thank you to you (if you are pewari, which at least one of you is).
matt sent me this car he spotted on Whitechapel High Street. it looks very good.
it has an L plate which means someone is learning to drive in it. or maybe it means the car is learning to be a real car. from the looks of it it needs plenty more practice.
dog soup in brussels.
there some great clouds going by at the moment which reminded me that ages ago i said i was going to ask a geography teacher and a meteologist why it doesn't rain as much first thing in the morning (ie why i usuallly manage to avoid rain on the way to work).
the geography teacher didn't even believe my hypothesis. she lives in a rainy town in the west of town and hasn't done much teaching for a while as she's been making babies. so she's probably forgot.
but our friend the meteologist sent the following:
You are quite right that it is more likely to rain in the afternoon particularly in the summer with showery type rain. Showery type rain comes from convective clouds and for convection you need wamer surface so air near surface can warm up and go up (convect!) To warm surface need sun, longer sun been out warmer surface, more convection more likely to have rain. In some parts of the tropics you can set your watch by when the rain starts in the afternoon.
Non-showery type rain (due to "weather fronts") dont give a stuff about the time but thats the type which seems to rain all day (or more)
So now we know !
i'm working from home today so got to take esther to school which was fun. there was a coffee morning for parents so i had a hot water as esther proudly showed me all the work she's already done this term.
then it was registration time so i came home to work.
on the way we saw this lost eeyore. According to esther he's been there all week and has no tail.
here's your friday quiz. what do you think this ? i think it's quite guessable.
what have they done to the humble kit kat ? they've given it a subtle make over which i'm not happy with.
look at the cheap special offer label. 30 pence. much too cheap for a quality product. It was a limited offer and there was only one in the shop.
but look at the picture on the back ! chocolate shouldn't be eaten by dyed haired bimbos !
you can see what happens when they try:
the kit kat is supposed to be a sophisticated chocolate bar not some giddy headed fun biscuit.
this bloke has one leg longer than the other. poor chap.
£7 / 100ml is quite a lot for a drink. That's £70/litre. There was obviously some mistake on the pricing label and i wanted to make sure it wasn't the price / bottle figure which was incorrect.
so i pointed out to a shelf stacker in Tescos that i wasn't prepared to pay £17.50 for a 250ml bottle of juice and he got very confused.
so i pointed at the sign a few times and explained my maths until he eventually walked off.
in the end it only cost me £1.75 so i needn't have worried anyway. And if it makes my cold go away then it was money well spent.
but it probably won't so probably wasn't.
look at all these door bell buttons. brilliantly anonymous.
it's now darker than it is light in the UK which is a shame. it's dark when i leave the house and nearly dark when i get home. so that means i need to use flash for my photos which don't look as good as when lit by the sun.
and so seasonally adjusted misery has kicked in and i've got my first sore throat and head cold. the weather's too hot for a coat but too cold not to wear one.
enough of this uncharacteristic whingeing !
the leaves on the floor are starting to look nice.
street advertising could be the future. especially if you were trying to market a product to street cleaners.
here is the little sign. i would have got a better picture only a man with a dog appeared at the doorway next to wear i was standing and i think he thought i looked a bit suspicious !
i've seen two mouses in the last few days. both on pavements and both very tricky to get nice photos of. i didn't show you the other mouse as it was quite frankly dead. and i wasn't sure if you'd like that.
so here is a living mouse sitting nicely outside paddington station.
esther is now in year 1 at school and now gets homework. here she is with her first set of spellings.
it's a list of words beginning with 'sh' and includes shop, ship, shed, shampoo, she, and bizzarely, he and we !
her writing and spelling are alreayy better than myn.
ever wondered what's in the other half of those horrible street toilet things ? well, here's the answer. there's a giant circular brush and lots of pipes and gubbins.
if they'd been a no loitering sign this picture would have been even better.
i would have called it something like "stand waiting in the street".
there's something very amateur about this use of blue and the poor edge-work of the blue colouring-in. you learn to appreciate decent colouring-in when you have little kids about the house.
