Almost all my phalaenopsis orchids are in flower at the moment. This is just one of the more stunning, taken a couple of days ago in natural daylight.
Another from the archives this week. This was taken in October 2013 when Noreen and I travelled on the paddle-steamer Waverley down the Thames from London (Tower Pier) to Southend and back. We left about 9am on a cold misty morning, but this cleared to a lovely warm sunny day. The final leg of the return journey was in a rather chilly twilight, but it did provide some good photo opportunities …
This week I bring you (again) Tilly the Cat reclining on Christmas Day. It’s amazing what one can do with art effects to make and not very good snapshot look tolerable.
Another from the archives this week as I wanted something suitable unto the season, but it isn’t nice and frosty (like it should be) so nothing new on the horizon. So here is one of I think the earliest digital photographs I took — it was so early I’ve lost the date but from memory it was actually a February and was pre-Autumn 2005 as we use this as our Christmas card that year.
These roses were in our garden. We have this magnificent pink rose which just flowers and flowers and flowers from mid-May onwards. And whatever year this was it carried on flowering until the buds got well and truly killed off by heavy frost.
Another from the archives this week, and yet more pussy porn. This is our Tilly cat when very young (probably about 12 weeks) shortly before she came to us from our next-door neighbours. Tilly is now over 2½ and a well-grown sturdy small peril.
One day last week we made a flying visit to Anthony Powell’s former home, The Chantry, to see his son John. And to make the reacquaintance of the resident cat, Jake — “that’s not a cat, that’s a tiger”; yes, although he’s very slim he’s a big cat. And he is very affectionate: he believes that everyone, especially visitors, is there for him to lay on — oh no, not on your lap but on your chest and shoulder; purring all the while like a Harley-Davidson! And I pity any poor piece of prey that encounters those claws, for they are very sharp. Here Jake is subduing Noreen.
This week another from the archives — actually taken many years ago.
Along with the the font, this wall painting (in the SE chapel) is one of the treasures of St Augustine, Brookland. The painting has been dated to the 13th century and depicts the martyrdom of Thomas Beckett in Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170.
One from the archives this week. I spotted this some while back. This is the woodland burial park where my father (at the time) and subsequently also my mother are buried. My father would have been turning in his grave — which is only about 50m from this notice.
This week I bring you a really poor quality shot, but one for the record. n Saturday lunchtime we had a fox in the garden. This isn’t unheard of, even in daylight, but it isn’t something we see more than about once a year. But on this occasion Mr Reynard hung around for quite a while — maybe 15 minutes — sniffing around the garden and finding the odd tasty morsel which the starlings have missed. So I managed to get a few, not very good, photos. They’re poor partly because I was shooting through the study window, and the window is grimy hence the slight mistiness; but I knew if I opened the window this would be enough to scare the fox away.
This week it’s time for more pussy porn, so here’s Tilly the Cat again. She hates my printers; they have to be watched ans supervised:
“I must watch this rotten printer. I don’t trust it. It makes funny noises. I’m worried it’s turning into a hoover!”
