funkypancake

just added to davescollections

i found this chap on Sussex Gardens, London on the way to paddington station. it was face down which is the best way to find passport photos. the joy which greets you when you turn it over and find it's a real passport photo is amazing !

more like this on davescollections of course

another one for davescollections, this time found by a cash machine near the station in Reading.

i found these negatives last month. i'll pop them on davescollections too.

hot on the heels of boy 53 is boy 54, also a train pass photo. this time i handed it in at Paddington Station so i'm unlikely to make the reunion myself.

can you believe it, i managed to reunite this chap with his lost travel card! hoorah for a happy ending.

in all my time collecting photos for davescollections, this is the first one i've reunited

for those interested in the story of reunition:
from the ticket i knew his local train station, so i found which train operators run out of that station and phoned their lost property department. they put a note with my phone number in his file and when he went in to buy his replacement ticket he got the message to phone me

i found this train pass on the way to work yesterday morning. it's still got a month to run on it and costed 235pounds and thirty pence. i phoned his local train station and they took my phone numbers so if he gets in contact i can hand it over to him in person.

i'll let you know what happens and if i do meet him i'll be sure to capture the moment on camera and post to davescollections

(i've obfuscated (great word, but probably spelt wrong) all the sensitive details on the picture)

update: reunited here

here's something from last may. it's esther and kezia spotting something on the floor. but what is it ?

it's a thing:

i walked past this little scrap of paper yesterday morning and after a few steps i thought "i wonder if that's a passport photo", so i went back and found it again.

here's a photo of it. it was stuck in a muddy puddle under a little bush on the edge of the road.

i managed to kick it out from under the bush and flip it over and it WAS a passport photo !

once i knew what it was i was happy to put my hand in the muddy rain to retrieve it for the collection.

i can't explain the joy of finding a genuine passport photo, especially in such unlikely circumstances. so i won't.

here's a pile of photos i found on tottenham court road

some have writting on the back explaining what they are:

as seen on davescollections

i found this woman a couple of weeks back. she was here with some negatives (which show a rock band and some kittens !)

here are the negatives

with the photos were some LPs:

and curiously some old bank statements

you can just about make out a shoe in this picture.

another one for davescollections

what a great time saving idea - this photo shop has a selection of pre-prepared photos in its window to save you having to wait !

see davescollections for more lost/found photos

here is a bit of a passport photo, ideal for one of my other websites: www.davescollections.com (which i've recently updated by the way).

unfortunately all we got was the hair.

libraries are great places to find lost photos. especially university ones as we all know what students are like.

here's a display of lost/found passport photos from the library window at UCL.

i'll add to www.davescollections.com at some point

aha. the holy grail of street stuff is the lost photo. the lost passport photo is the king of the crop.

so imagine my excitement when i saw this on the floor. could it be a passport photo ?

i picked it up and yes !

a little along the street was this slightly burnt 'passport photo holster'.

i'll add this to davescollections when i get a chance

i'm a bit behind on davescollections. i really must catch up.

here are two photos we found on my marathon training walk in henley. one was of an elderly lady and the other was a school photo.

i thought this was a giant photo but i suspect it's some kind of advertising thing.

just cuz someone threw it away doesn't mean the idea isn't good. maybe it just wasn't appropriate for where they wanted to take their brand.

there's a gold thing stuck in this pavement. i wasn't sure if it was a ring or an ear ring. either way i didn't pick it up.

another one for davescollections. or is it ?

it was sent to me by the notorious Boy 34. He claims this time it'd real, but can we be sure ?

I'm inclined to agree this time as i think the strange holes in this photo are beyond a prankster's experience. but i could be wrong.

whether it's real or fake, it's still fantastic !

26things

i found a passport photo this morning near my hotel in brussels.

i'll add to davescollections in due course.

yesterday i spread all my found photos out on our living room floor, helped by my daughters.

i was very pleased with the modern girth of my collection.

see them all at davescollections.com

here is a fan stand. i suspect the fan on top blew too hard and whizzed off somewhere on its own. but where ?

i returned from holiday to find my colleague Telco John had found this passport photo for me. what a nice thing to return to.

see it on www.davescollections.com

i work in the 'media quarter' of london and occasionally i'll see film canisters lying around. here was one tied to some railings on tottenham court road.

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.

could this be the lock to the key ?

i call it a spade

it looked as dirty as ditch water

it's been a while since i've found a photo. i think this is punishment for not keeping davescollections up to date, but i will update it. soon ok.

so i was delighted to find this scrap of photo this morning on bentinck street where i once found this jewel.

here's someone to do list. mostly shopping for water, salad, birthday card, rings for dave and janessa (jewellry always popular), toothpaste and the Internet. and exchange rates for America.

this looks like a gift from elaine and roger from their wedding. how generous to give your guests a piece of ribbon.

but what of that word 'ebration' on the label. is that 'inebriation' (spelt slightly wrong, but that never stops me ?

it's another street coaster:

i see quite a lot of these. perhaps they should have their own category.

found near the caravans

there was a couple of abandoned caravans in the paddock behind where we were staying in scotland:

i think this would make a great desktop picture:

click for big fun (but don't blame it on the sunshine)

i spotted this little space ship on the road on the way to work this morning. i've always thought it quite presumptious that alien life forms would be the same shape and size as human beings (or beans).

so it was no surprise to me that now they've eventually turned up they've arrived in a teeny weeny spaceship on what must be to them a giant landing strip.

i was a little concerned that they've parked on the wrong side of the road though, so i suspect they aren't from the UK originally.

it's back to work tomorrow after 2 weeks off. the first week we were in scotland (by the way we are only up to tuesday lunchtime in retro-posts on that week).

whenever we go on holiday we always think about whether we would like to live in the place we are visiting. scotland was a bit wet but was incredibly beautiful.

my main concern would be whether there would be enough blogging material to photo. working in london is great for photos, but would the highlands be quite as good. nature can provide some fantastic photos of course, but it's the human touch on life that i enjoy.

if ever we did move (highly unlikely in the near future i imagine) then i think rivers could provide a solution to my human remains problem. we took a walk along the Clyde in Helensburgh and saw all sorts of junk washed up.

here's a fridge and a squashed buoy:

my first scottish find ...

holidays are good, but it's nice to come home too. especially when the weather is loads drier and warmer than on holiday !

but i have so much to share (700 photos - i'll try and narrow them down). i'll do it a week in arrears over the next 7 days starting tomorrow.

back in real-time for a moment, here are two 'finds' near our house upon our return. a comb and a snapped plastic spoon.

update: now i've looked at how much photos of quality items i've taken i think i may spread it over the next few weeks !

(from Dan who may wish to comment on his photo in the comments)

a piece of office history

boots in the mud on the bank of the thames

here is a very satisfying find from this evening. it's the best type of photo to find - a passport photo.

but better than that was the way i found it ...

i arrived at London Bridge tube station and realised i needed the loo. i finally found the toilets when i eventually found the signs but it was closed and said i needed to go to platform 6 to find the gents. but i needed a ticket to get to the dunny, but a lady let me through the barrier. after i'd visited the john i walked back down platform 6 and this lady was on the floor in front of me.

if i hadn't needed the bog i wouldn't have found the photo. simple as that.

i love finding photos when i've made some random diversion. it makes me feel i've been diverted to them !

there were jumpers and coats all over henley this evening. here is one example.

i spotted this little gold coin just along from where i found the jewel . it looks like a little roman coin. perhaps the wet weather washed it up from some underground long lost Roman settlement below the streets of london.

no bolts, but loads of nuts.

i really will get round to updating davescollections soon. i was thinking about this today and how i hadn't found a photo for a few weeks. and there on park lane was this little chap waiting for me.

park lane has treated me well for photos over the years.

lots of interconnected aluminium sticks leaning against iron railings. more wannabes i recon

i'm working from home today (8am start instead of 4am as i've got a stinking cold and feel like poo), so i was delighted when john sent me these photos of boots in the street outside my office.

it looks like he took these photos from my desk.

looking at the photo, i wonder if it's a setup by that bollard on the top left hand corner. he looks ready to pounce if anyone approaches them.

i spotted this thing on the floor this morning in a rather posh street. I suspect it might be quite valuable as it has some stamp on the metal and the jewel looks fancy.

but i know nothing about that kind of thing so it's probably not worth anything. i left it on some railings in case the owner comes back to look for it.

there's a tube strike today which means the streets are full of people with maps trying to find their way to work above ground for a change.

i kept wanting to shout "i do this everyday you know". but didn't. instead i enjoyed the chaos at every road crossing as people tried to work out the traffic light phasing and deal with the random london drivers.

i was heartened to see that if things got really bad people could turn to violence. this razor blade and carpet gripper thing (bit of wood with nails sticking up) would provide ideal weapons if someone wanted a duel.

not sure who would win though.

it's a work pass. handily dangled on some railings in case the lady in the picture comes back looking for herself.

a piece of photo. it's a person but of unknown agenda.

... broken guitars.

hoorah for tin pan alley

i found this 'this' behind the church organ this morning.

travelling by public transport is always good for catching bits of people's conversations.

the other day i overheard someone say "i've just had a conceptual epiphany. there are too many intervening variables".

i thought i'd never remember that so i wrote it down.

here is a snippet of someone's conversation in letter form. there's enough here to spark interest.

i got an email earlier today containing these negatives which mase found in the street in Cardiff. he says:

"I found a negative strip of 4 frames whilst walking to work today I work in Cardiff and found the strip discarded on a side street. The details are 8:55a.m. on Windsor Lane, Cardiff. I've scanned the print and have attached it."

after a bit of manipulation in photoshop it looks like this when un-negatived:

soon and very soon i shall update davescollections with my latest finds and add it. thanks Mase !