more bridges >> this time it's the humber

In a week of bridges I thought I would put up some pictures of crossing the humber bridge a week or so ago, makes the tamar bridge look very small. I like the way the bridge sweeps up over and on a slight curve across the humber estuary.
just in case you where worried I didn't take the pictures while I was driving.
carol took them on her phone.

whooops I missed a day

I can't believe how time can just disappear I have been busy with all sorts so didn't manage to get a chance to do write here on thursday.
will be back later.

wash your hands

for some reason I was quietly looking my computer while checking some stuff on the internet, and planning some teaching stuff. when I saw this photo.

I am not sure if I consciously remembered that I had a tee shirt the same as that when I was a similar age. unusually I followed it to find that it was used in for a promotion to get people to wash their hands which led me on to reading a whole load of stuff about washing hands and how infection is/can be controlled by doing this.
perhaps it is so simple that so many people take it for granted especially in northern europe. but in a short time today I noticed that most people didn't wash their hands as often as I do. even after using the loo, and before and after eating.
so easy to get obsessive as I always used to clean my hands before I could draw anything (I would be worried that I might make the paper dirty) I still find myself washing them before I use a computer. not such a strange thing especially in an educational setting as most computers are used by many different people through each day.
before I get paranoid I will stop and go wash my hands.
leaving you with a few links I followed while simply checking a good picture, (who ever was the picture editor for the campaign certainly caught my attention).
guardian
timesonline
telegraph
foodlink
dept of health

concise today, its my birthday >>

concise, something not normally associated with me just ask any of the students I teach.
I am of the; why say it with 10 words when you can say it with 20, I believe.
well when I am in teaching mode anyway. (in short I am told I talk a lot, but I am learning to keep my mouth shut sometimes).
yet another year gone by, and has much changed? I would love to say yes.
thanks to all those who have sent their wishes, all very much appreciated.

crossing the bridge

it is not very often that I have the chance to watch as I cross the tamar road bridge out of cornwall (coincidentally is the same age as me) as I am normally driving but this morning as a car passenger I did. I didn't really think about it until I was on the bridge so I could only record the short crossing with my phone. the mist was low over the river making it feel as though the bridge was above the clouds.

the pictures I have put up here don't really show just how spooky it was. I cross the bridge so often that I had stopped even thinking about it. but the brunel railway bridge (the last picture is still an amazing thing to see.

so often the things we see often are east to take for granted.

the story of the fig tree & the sunrise

by chance today I was talking with a colleague who had asked if any one I knew had a fig tree in their garden, they had even been calling garden centres and other horticultural places to see if they could borrow one. in order to photograph the sunrising behind it. which would have been, if the weather conditions were suitable a good thing to see. but they had a time scale and it's february and we are in the UK.

the image/animation is needed as a backdrop for a stage production and will be back projected so I offered to produce something that would do the job. below are just a few pictures from an animated sequence that I put together this afternoon.

I didn't get up early in the morning or even took any pictures in anyones gardens.
please don't misunderstand I am not saying that doing everything digitally (even just using a single picture) and not going outside is better not at all. I would have loved to have got up early in the morning for a few weeks, to get the right pictures to animate but time and money was not on my side.

two views of the same thing >>

seeing things from different views.
I took the two picture above on the same day about 10 minutes and about 200 metres apart.
(scarborough last week).

I didn't realise >> more than a year!

I didn't realise until today that I have been doing this blogging malarkey every week (almost every weekday) for more than a year now.
when I started this blog 'dgthekneelo' in early february 2007 it was my third or fourth try at posting to a blog rather than a web site, I am pleased that I stuck with it.
I continue to be inspired by other many other bloggers, especially those in the design areas. but more importantly still draw so much from the creative areas of the internet and even more perhaps the real world.
so many thanks all those who have commented, emailed and read this blog over the last year and a little bit. I hope to be doing it for a while longer.

it has been a strange, busy day >>

the day seems to have just run away with me getting involved again in more enterprise education took the normal working day. tonight my hours have been used trying to set up more awareness and public profile for ellie's haven.

with the introduction of two new fund raising events that need an online presence. both of them treks/the inca trail and the pilgrims way from south west france across the north of spain to santiago de compostella. I will be setting up blogs to channel the information for each of the respective fund raising trekkers in the coming weeks. so make sure to follow them.

back from north yorkshire >>

back from our trip to the north, managed to see quite a lot. the picture above was taken in whitby I really like the combination of colour and architecture, obviously helped by the strong sunshine. the top picture was taken facing south bay, scarborough over looking the harbour in the early evening. we were lucky with the weather, only there wasn't any surf.

notes >> off to the north yorkshire coast

notes from a meeting this morning. I liked the way they looked.

I will be away from this blog for next week, I am off to the north yorkshire coast. I have never been before I might even get in the water (to surf) if there is any swell coming through & I can cope with the cold. (big difference in water temperature between cornwall and north yorkshire).
see you in a week or so.

Go2 february - march issue 2008

just thought I would give an extra plug to Go2 magazine, not simply because I write a surfing column for them & have done since the launch in may 2007. but it is a good magazine and if you live in cornwall you can pick up a copy for free at most newsagents, music shops,surf shops as well as supermarkets, if not just go to the Go2 web site and read it online.

more morocco >> from moby

with such a good reaction to yesterdays post I have found some more morocco pictures from moby to bring to you.
they look so good that its make the dull february weather in the UK so much easier to cope with.

more morocco photos >> from moby

it is over a month now since good friend moby sent me through a whole load of photos taken from a (surf) trip he made to north africa/morocco just before christmas 2007.

at the time I posted a couple but thought it a good time to post some more. I could give these picture a whole bunch of explanation but I won't as I think they capture the trip on their own.

more pictures from moby will appear here soon. for more surf shots have a look here

glubble >>

I have been using glubble for a couple of days and have to say that with children in the house it so far seems a very good tool but better still they like it.

conference >> stayed longer than usual

well it is unusual that I actually choose to stay longer than I have to at a meeting especially when it is a friday and I have to drive over the moor to get home in cold icy/snowy conditions. but strangely this time I stayed a bit longer (not because I had bought a ticket in the raffle I didn't, they had sold all the tickets; have to say it is a great way to stop people sneaking off early). but I was actually very interested in what was being discussed.

in my real work (the stuff that pays me) which this was part of. I have to really think sometimes whether things are actually worth doing. is the amount of work needed to get something done worth the trouble (after all I could simply bumble along) .
today I saw/listened to things that both inspired me as well as made me realise that what I can do is/can be important. even make learning and a students educational experience better. it takes days away from staring stuff in the face to realise this. unfortunately I don't think I get enough or make enough time for me to do this. so I have made a promise to myself to take a step back as much as possible in order to make sure that I don't loose myself in the day to day nonsense of tiny detail without realising the importance of the bigger picture. not that detail isn't important it is something to come back to at a projects conclusion.

sorry for an uninteresting post but hopefully the fruits will be here to see in the coming weeks and months, as I get back to what I know.