A tough life

Today was the first proper day of my career hiatus. Since I left my job at the end of July I've been surrounded by family, kids, holidays, festival and a lot of noise. Although the kids went back to school yesterday Rach was here for half of the day - most of which I spent on a huge bike ride in any case, so it really didn't feel any different to the holiday days that preceded it. But today was different - the family were all otherwise engaged and I had the whole day to do whatever I wanted with. So what did I do? Filing, laundry, grass-cutting and bike-fettling. It was a day of blissful mundanity. To celebrate the glorious hum drumness of it all I went for a swim in the sea before picking up the kids from school. The water's still warm enough for it not to be a balls-out masculinity test every time you jump in and the sun was beating down when I got out, so I dried myself on the beach and took photos that made my feet look odd. It's official: I'm happy.

More aerial shenanigans

It's not every day you get the chance to take some photos from a basket hanging under a crane nearly 200 feet above Brighton beach so I'm sure you'll forgive me for using one more from the weekend's bungee shoot (get me, I'm calling it a 'shoot'). In fact I reserve the right to use more of these if the mood takes me and I don't find anything fresher to offer. I very much look forward to spending some time really getting to know the new camera properly and then practising with it. Right now I feel somewhat out of my depth - both with the camera and the new wide-angle lens - but I'm seeing this as an opportunity to learn stuff, once the pesky job is behind me.

Snapper's delight

I went to a Brighton Flickr group beach barbecue last night and had a great time. There were many good photographers there, some very interesting cameras, and some very nice actual people too. I didn't take many photos for some reason - not sure why really, perhaps I was intimidated by the sheer weight of photographic experience on that beach. Or perhaps I was just having too good a time. I did get this one though - that sky was a truly amazing colour and the clouds were swirling in the most extraordinary patterns. This doesn't do it any kind of justice but it still looks pretty good. It takes a lot to persuade me to photograph anything sunset related on the seafront these days because it's all been done before so many times, but this one seemed justified. I hope you agree.

Lachrymose pebble

It's tough being a pebble sometimes...

Beach volleyball

It took me ages to choose this image. It's not the best one I took today - I think this one's better (if the seagull was in focus and I'd framed it a bit better it would be a no-brainer) - but this shot shows Brighton beach in such a summery light that I couldn't resist it. You'd think you were in Rio or Antibes or somewhere similar in the height of summer wouldn't you? Well you're not. It was relatively chilly when I took this shot - probably no more than 12 or 13 degrees - and there was a brisk south-easterly blowing sand into the players' faces. And they say us southerners are soft!

Pebble gull

So, day two and I'm already cheating. I took this one yesterday, not today, but life was easier yesterday, the weather was better, work less demanding. So I'm forgiving myself. This pebble sculpture was made by a homeless Irish guy on Brighton seafront as a way of earning himself a bit of beer money and some self-respect. He said it took him days - I'm guessing hours actually, but I don't want to take anything away from his achievement. He reckons he's the only pebble sculptor in the country and it seems churlish to argue with that. We spoke for 10-15 minutes and he was very happy for me to take pictures of his work. I'm slightly irritated with myself that I didn't take his picture too - rapport was definitely established and I don't think he'd have minded - but it never occurred to me to ask. Perhaps a proper photographer would be staight back the next day to ask...perhaps I'm not a proper photographer.