Category Archives: memes

current affairs, history, memes, personal, photography

4/52 Katyn Memorial

2 Comments

4/52 Katyn Memorial, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Week 4 of the 52 week challenge of a photo a week.

This is the memorial in Gunnersbury Cemetery, west London to the thousands of Poles murdered by the Russians at Katyn in 1940. I’ve inset the inscriptions as otherwise they are unreadable. Click on the picture to get a larger version.

The cemetery itself is rather interesting, if not a little OTT with competing acreages of black, white and brown polished marble. It is owned by the London Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, although it is actually in the LB of Ealing. Consequently it is the final resting place of many from the Polish and Armenian emigré communities. Many of the Armenian graves are written in Armenian script; and not all have a simultaneous translation. You will also find members of the Chinese community, at least one member of the French nobility and the expected English including architect Aston Webb. There is also a grave commemoration a number of members of the 24th Polish Lancers and a small group of twenty WWII war graves.

It is immaculately maintained and well worth a visit, even on a cold January day; it’ll look really pretty in the Spring when all the cherry blossom is out.

memes, music, personal, photography, topographical

3/52 Horns


3/52 Horns, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Week 3 of the 52 weeks photographic challenge and I almost didn’t get a decent picture this week. But then I saw this window display in Selfridge’s Department Store in London’s Oxford Street. All these brass instruments looked absolutely stunning – but impossible to photograph well because of all the reflections.

memes, personal

Thing-a-Day Preparation

Ready … Steady … Wait for it!

Again this year the Thing-a-Day challenge is running for the whole of February, and I intend to take part.

Join artists and creators of all types and backgrounds in a collective creative sprint to beat the February blues. Thing-a-Day invites you to join in a daily creative endeavour where everyone who signs up commits to making one “thing” (project, sketch, exercise, photograph, recipe) per day and shares it online on Thing-a-Day @ Posterous.com.


Participation is simple … 

Starting on February 1st, spend about 30 minutes making one thing a day. Knit, sew, cook, draw, paint, tape, solder, write, destroy, invent, document – or whatever you decide!  (Last year I posted a mix of photographs, recipes and haiku.  Who knows what this year will bring!)

In whatever way works for you, document what you’ve done and make that available on the Thing-a-Day Blog. 

The usual rules apply: no old/recycled work and no stealing the work of others – just something you did, new every day.

You have to register (so you can post to the Thing-a-Day Blog).  Registration opens on Friday 21 January and closes at midnight on 1 February.  You will need a Posterous account, but having set everything up you can post your daily contribution via email to Thing-a-Day and to your blog, Flickr, Facebook, etc.  This is in fact a test post to make sure I have all this set up correctly.  Last year’s registration instructions are here, but of course this years may be different when we get there.

OK, so now let’s see if this works properly. If it does then this post, with the photograph of my new dodo friends, should appear on my Posterous, the TaD Posterous feed, my Zen Mischief weblog, my Flickr photostream and my Facebook stream.

memes, personal

Ten Things – January

This is the first of a monthly series “Ten Things” which I plan will run all year. Each month I’m going to list one thing from each of ten categories which will remain the same each month. So at the end of the year you have ten lists of twelve things.

  1. Something I Like: Sex
  2. Something I Won’t Do: Play Golf
  3. Something I Want To Do: Visit Japan
  4. A Blog I Like: Katyboo
  5. A Book I Like: Anthony Powell; A Dance to the Music of Time (Well you knew I’d say that,didn’t you? And anyway it’s 12 books really!)
  6. Some Music I Like: Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here
  7. A Food I Like: Curry
  8. A Food or Drink I Dislike: Egg Custard
  9. A Word I Like: Cunt
  10. A Quote I Like: If you don’t concern yourself with your wife’s cat, you will lose something irretrievable between you. [Haruki Murakami]
memes, personal, photography, science, topographical

1/52 Solar Eclipse, London Style


Solar Eclipse, London Style [2011 week 1], originally uploaded by kcm76.

This is the view of the solar eclipse just after sunrise yesterday (Tuesday 04/01/2011) from my study window. Like what eclipse? Typical of the UK to cock it up; can’t this country get anything right? Bah Humbug!

This is also my first photo for the “52 weeks” (ie. a photo a week) I’m doing this year. I hope I can keep up the standard of getting something off-beat each week. Watch this space.

memes, music, personal

10 Song Shuffle

OK, Cat tagged me on Facebook, so here goes (after I’ve had a bite of lunch) …

What You Do
Once you’ve been tagged…(1) Turn on your MP3 player or music player on your computer.(2) Go to SHUFFLE songs mode.(3) Write down the first 10 songs that come up–song title and artist–NO editing/cheating, please.(4) Choose 10 people to be tagged. It is generally considered to be in good taste to tag the person who tagged you.

If I tagged you, it’s because I’m betting that your musical selection is entertaining, or at least amusing. To do this on Facebook, go to “NOTES” under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, enter your 10 Shuffle Songs, Tag as many people as you like (under the post) then click Publish. Otherwise post this on your weblog, as here!

The Songs
1. Pink Floyd; Wish You were Here
2. Incredible String Band; No Sleep Blues
3. Scott Joplin; Paragon Rag
4. Queen; Killer Queen
5. Vejvanovský (Pavel Josef, c1633-1693); Beatus Vir (Psalm 112)
6. Trionfi! A Florentine Festival; Canto di Lanzi sonatoridi rubecchina
7. Ludford (Nicholas, c1485-c1557); Gloria from Missa Benedicta et Venerabilis
8. Santo Domingo de Silos; Benedicta es tu Virgo Maria
9. Queen; Bicycle Race
10. Beatles; Here Comes the Sun

I tagged 10 people on Facebook, but from here I also tag Sue L.; Jilly at jillysheep; and Noreen at Norn’s Notebook.

amusements, current affairs, memes, people, pleasures

Snailr Postcard

Yay! I’m one of the lucky recipients of a postcard from The Snailr Project, brainchild of Anna over at little.red.boat. The card arrived this morning having taken almost a month to get here from somewhere in Texas.

Anna’s idea was that as she was doing a long (like 2 week) circular train trip round the US she would send random postcards to random volunteers to build up a sort of travelogue – except any one person got only one snapshot. In Anna’s words:

One journey of almost 7000 miles, six new cities, eight trains, fifteen days, and every vignette, observation and fractured bitty-bit of the travelogue broken up and sent as status messages the old way. By postcard. To a bunch of random people who asked for one. Because travelling slowly is nice. And so is leaving a trail to see where we have been.

Anna used a standard postcard, so she could prepare them in advance and not rely on local supplies.  She then customised each card with description, drawing, or whatever along the way and posted them whenever a mailbox hove into sight.

He’s the card Anna sent me from somewhere in Texas, just after they had been involved in a train crash on Friday 10 September!

Snailr Project Card

The caption to the map (which shows Anna’s route in red and the location with a * and snail logo) says

the snailr project isn’t injured. At all. Not even for insurance.

And the main text reads:

After the train had juddered to a sudden halt, and we pulled to a stop with one side half of a big, silver, grain truck (the front half) on one side of the train, the back half on the other, the rush around to find out who, if anyone, was injured, began. What a dreadful sentence. Sorry. Basically, we were ordered back to our seats and eight sets of people – first Amtrak staff, then paramedics, fire fighters, policemen, walked through the train asking if everyone was OK. They said they were. But half an hour later when people started talking to each other about later claims, all manner of injuries started appearing.

You can find Anna’s pictures from the trip with some commentary at snailrproject.com and also on Flickr.

I’m looking forward to the book of the postcards of the journey!

memes, personal, photography

05-02-10 Meme


05-02-10 Meme, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Here are the 12 questions, and my answers, to this week’s Flickr meme:

1. What was the last movie you saw in the theatre? None; in England you don’t watch movies in a theatre; it’s called a cinema!
2. Which parent do you think was the easiest for you to talk to when you were growing up? My mother
3. What shoes did you wear today? Trainers
4. What is your favourite season? Summer
5. Gum or Candy? Chocolate
6. When dismantling a bomb, do you cut the black wire or the yellow wire? The pink wire.
7. Do you whistle? Only when I snore
8. What is your favourite flower? Roses
9. Queen, The Beatles, or Rolling Stones? Late Beatles
10. What languages do you speak? English, maths, science, logic, common sense
11. Which chocolate company do you like the most? Divine
12. Top thing on your “to do” list? Make an appointment with my piercer

1. THE DOME, Cinema Worthing., 2. All About My Mother, 3. Inky trainer, 4. Hot, Air, Balloons … composite, 5. Chocolate heart on a pink gerbera daisy flower for you! (square), 6. Barbed Wire Pink, 7. Snore Graffitti, 8. Shades of ‘Marianne’ (hybrid gallica), 9. 170 – 1969 – Beatles, The – Abbey Road – UK – late 1970s, 10. another day., 11. The Heart Of Every Girl, 12. NEW LABRET PIERCING

As always the photographs are not mine so please click on individual links below to see each artist/photostream. This mosaic is for a group called My Meme, where each week there is a different theme and normally 12 questions to send you out on a hunt to discover photos to fit your meme. It gives you a chance to see and admire other great photographers’ work out there on Flickr.

Created with fd’s Flickr Toys

memes, personal, photography

4-18-10 Meme


4-18-10 Meme, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Here are the 12 questions, and my answers, to this week’s Flickr meme:

1. Night Owl or Morning Person? Neither, but slightly more lark than owl
2. What is the one thing that will make you happy? Beer
3. If you could be someone else for a day, who would it be? God, except he doesn’t exist so I can’t
4. If you somehow became the opposite sex, what is the first thing you would do? Have sex; like probably most men I want to know what sex is like for a woman. Oh I’ll do all the other thigs as well, but let’s start at the beginning!
5. What time is it right now? Later than I’d like
6. Random word. Go Vespiary
7. What is the plural form of “Starbucks”? Poisoning
8. If you won 40 Billion in the lottery, what is the first thing you’d do? Faint
9. If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? Of course but you will never know
10. X-men or Spiderman? Xanthene; makes as much sense as the choices offered!
11. Sword or gun?Penis. Remember “Make love not war”? Or to put it another way: “The penis mightier than the sword”.
12. What do you do for fun on your day off? Be depressed

1. NO ONE LOVES ME & NEITHER DO I, 2. Adnams, 3. nothing, 4. Stephanie1, 5. Beware the Moon, 6. vespiary – under construction, 7. Poison Midnight, 8. faint pink lips, 9. You’ll never know if he’ll have body hair!, 10. The Secret to Cloning — Revealed!, 11. Penis_girl, 12. Soul

As always the photographs are not mine so please click on individual links below to see each artist/photostream. This mosaic is for a group called My Meme, where each week there is a different theme and normally 12 questions to send you out on a hunt to discover photos to fit your meme. It gives you a chance to see and admire other great photographers’ work out there on Flickr.

Created with fd’s Flickr Toys