blogs killed the e-mail star
Today is that kind of day. A day that makes you want to just close the windows, crank the thermostat all the way up, don a warm jumper, sit at the computer with an endless supply of oolong tea, and view old photographs whilst listening to chill music on speakers. The only thing missing is snowflakes coming down and painting everything white.
My mood dropped when I saw the new roof leaking after the first heavy rainfall since it was put up last week. Granted the problem is less bad than with the old disintegrating roof, its reappearance is still disheartening. As the job was paid for cash-in-hand, I have little recourse to seek reparation from the handyman. I could call him back, but I think he already delivered the best he could manage. Besides, the results of my online search showed that leaking roofs are common even for new sheds built by professionals, and therefore it would be rather unfair of me to expect perfection from the local odd-job man.
So, today once more I set to work on the shed. I inspected the inside, looking for gaps through which water could enter. Seeing no obvious pathways, I climbed on to the roof to examine the felt. It was mostly dry, except for a wet patch along the line where two pieces of the material were joined. It was nailed down securely, but the overlap of the sections was narrower than the recommended 150mm. Thus, it was possible for water to seep through and come down the joists in to the shed.
Luckily, I had some leftover felt from my first attempt at repairing the roof. I used it to cover the problem area, making sure to hammer enough nails to press the felt firmly on to the roof. The proper fix is to completely replace the felt, but until the longer summer days enable me to do that, I have to contend with this hack.
When we bought our sofa, almost a decade ago now, the salesman explained that the leather needed nourishing at every turn of the clock. I nodded knowingly and, for my foolishness, ended up buying a pack of overpriced leather wipes.
Anyway—
Today we turn back the clock, switching from British Summer Time (BST) to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Like every year, my first task was to change the times around the house. Luckily, with other devices getting their times from Internet, there were only the clock in the kitchen and the radio alarm clock in our bedroom to adjust. Using as reference my Casio G-SHOCK watch, which synchronises with atomic time broadcast from radio towers, the pedant in me made sure that the times were precise to +/- 5 seconds.
Also as usual, P had forced me out of bed early, insisting that we should make the best of today’s extra hour. Her reasoning made little sense, but I knew it meant extra work for me.
First, I had to remove super glue off a switch plate, which in her unfathomable wisdom, P had chosen as the base for a wall hook to hang her bread bags. The hook had come off, leaving hard dried glue, and now I had to clean it so she could—sigh—do it again. Neither acetone nor WD-40 made the job easier, and I ended up using a sharp blade to pry off the glue millimetre by millimetre.
My next task was to attach stringed lights on to the shed, which we finally had repaired two days ago. That job was easy, and I genuinely enjoyed the outside chill. However, when it was all done, the lights did not come on. We’ll have to wait and see if they work after the batteries have charged up from a full day of sunlight.
As I was already in the garden, I decided to replace the rubber seal on the kitchen window. It had dried up and was falling apart, leaving a draughty gap. That job, too, was quick: remove the length of cracked seal, measure a length of new seal, and use the adhesive backing to fix it to the window frame.
I skipped lunch and had some jasmine tea and a piece of moon cake in the afternoon. Then, P coaxed me into taking a nap to recover from the early rise. As I said, unfathomable… Later, invigorated by another hot tea and more snacks, I opened an old laptop that we had found in yesterday’s attic clear-out and removed the reusable parts before it is recycled. Afterwards, I sent a payment and a thank-you note to the handyman who fixed our shed. And now, I’m typing this post whilst waiting to be called for dinner.
P bought me the book Stop thinking, start living by Richard Carlson. Perhaps I’ve been the picture of misery to her, but nevertheless I like the gesture and truthfully think I could do with a little optimism. Coincidentally, yesterday I saw one of those social media “top 5” posts about happiness. The item on the list that stuck was this: Practise gratitude. It isn’t just about being thankful to others but also about recognising one’s own efforts and accomplishments.
I’m grateful for today.
When I bought my Nikon D850, I ordered a 128 GiB CFexpress card to go with it, assuming that the camera’s high-resolution output would demand substantial storage. Yet, because of my approach to digital photography, I rarely fill more than a fraction of the card while I’m shooting. I seem to be as frugal with the shutter button as I am with a film camera.
For example, when these pictures were taken, I shot identical number of frames with my Nikon D850 and my Nikon FM2, resulting in similar digital and film images. Here are the scans from the FM2 for comparison.
With film, I am not only limited by the length of the roll—12, 24, or 36 frames—but also by the actual cost of each exposure. In comparison, with digital I can shoot as many images as will fit on the CFexpress card, only constrained by the time I’m willing to spend on post-processing. Still, I continue to take photos with the same intentionality with both systems.
The picture below is a good example of my intentional approach. On this occasion, I arrived on location 30 minutes before sunset, set up the tripod, and composed the shot. Then, I waited for the light to fall on the barracks. I took only four exposures: f/11 @ 1/30s, f/11 @ 1/60s, f/11 @ 15s, and f/11 @ 30s. These were the only four images I chose to capture on a card with a capacity for more than thousand.
Recently, I found an envelope containing film negatives with candid pictures of P, taken between 2008 and 2010 when I was beginning film photography.
Given the reset brought about by COVID, this discovery feels almost archaelogical—you can even see P holding a Blackberry phone.
The negatives were badly scratched from sitting at the bottom of a pile of junk. I somehow managed to get some decent scans from them.
You’d think that, with more daylight, summer is ideal for outdoor photography, but it really isn’t. Trees turn into green masses dotted with bright reflective spots and put everything in shade. The sun rises too early – four o’clock, really? – and sets too late – around dinner time with P. And when I drag myself out of the house for a walk, it turns into a long and hot uncomfortable march.
Last Saturday, I waited until the outside temperature was cool enough to go for a wander in the neighoubood. I took a shortcut through the retail park on to Farnborough IQ business park. Despite my usual duck-and-dive routine, I was spotted on CCTV by security staff, cornered, and told that it was “a private estate” and that Heritage area was not the same as National Heritage. However, I was allowed to take photos as long as I didn’t loiter.
I brought the Minolta X-300 loaded with Fomapan 200. It hadn’t been used for a long time, so I wanted to excercise its mechanics. As I took pictures of the disused buildings in the Heritage area, I relied solely on the internal lightmeter.
Back at home, I developed the two rolls with Rodinal 1+50 and was utterly pleased with the results.
Some pictures from a photo walk around the neighbourhood.
Shot with a Nikon FM2 on bulk-rolled Fomapan 200, developed with Rodinal 1+50 for 10.5 minutes.
The unexpected 14th frame…
I see this tree in my rear view mirror every time I drive back from the supermarket. I’ve seen it countless times since the beginning of spring when it was pollarded and when its bare branches started to grow leaves, gradually becoming more beautiful. Then, its allure peaked and it began to turn into just another tree. So, tonight I took a photo of it before it turns ordinary.
It still looks much prettier in the rear view mirror.
I pass these two sights every evening when I walk back home from the station. The tree top is usually the roosting place of two or three pigeons and is also usually bathed in sunset colours. On cold winter nights, the Topps Tiles entrance door is striking by the glowing yellow lines on either side and their reflections on the tarmac.
I tried to capture those, but the conditions were not ideal: too much cloud cover blocking the rays of the setting sun and too much cloud cover messing up the twilight.
Nevertheless, I waited more than 90 minutes to shoot those, so I’m going to post them anyway.
I’ll try the shoots again another time.
