Coming home ..

Football's coming home, and so is Tim Peake! Well, one out of two ain't bad! Welcome home, Major Tim, and congratulations on one hell of a fascinating mission. Now there's somebody whose autograph I'd ask for ..

.. which is more than can be said for the lads in the England football team. I know they scraped a win on Thursday but man, they play such an uninspiring game. I've learnt a lot though, watching the Euros over the past week. First of all, I now know it's very important to say that a team plays "on the front foot". That makes it sound like they actually hop around the pitch, but there ya go. Secondly, everyone on a team must speak with their hand over their mouth. This is vital. Thirdly, if you're stuck in traffic on the way home from work, it's helpful to know that most games actually only achieve anything in the last 90 seconds of extra time. You should know too that players spend more time on their hair and beards than actually training. This is also vital. Ooh, such pretty boys! Finally, and most fascinatingly, I learnt that, in every game, each player - on average - covers the turf with approximately one and a half gallons of spit!

So now you know ..

Ps; Today's shot - and I know I've shown it before - is another from my archive, circa 1980. 

The working week ..

I finally edited last week's Wedding down to 874 shots .. and now I need a drink! Here's a screen grab from my website - click to see it larger!..

The more mundane side of photography is kicking back in again this week. I have a passport to shoot and a photo-restoration to start on and then I'm off to check out two venues - one for a Wedding in February and another for a PR shoot I have coming up next week. I'm also acting as a 24 hour dial-up Nikon camera manual, as a pal of mine has bought the same camera as I use and keeps phoning me up to ask me questions about it! And all this as Tim Peake prepares for his first space-walk next week!..

Christmas catch-up..

I suppose I should call this my 'Post-Party' post as it is now the morning after the night before, and that's another freelance photographers' Christmas booze-up done and dusted! As usual there was lots of catching up done, and much toasting of each other's success in making it through another year and still being a photographer. Shock revelation of the night was the fact that a photographer we'd all known from about twenty years ago had been found dead in his flat after lying there for a week undetected. Oh yes, we're a chirpy bunch when we get going!..

On with the show now and this last week before Christmas seems to be all about last-minute portrait sessions. The studio's going to be heaving with families flying in for eleventh-hour gift ideas, and Santa's sack's going to be bulging with gorgeous family photos...

Speaking of Santa, here's a nice juxtaposition of Father Christmas and the fairy lights lined up with the moon over Manchester's Christmas market. I managed to shoot it on my 'phone without spilling my Gluwein and I do believe - if you look very closely - you can just see Tim Peake in the top left hand corner!..

To Bury, and beyond ..

Well, it's a big smiley sky for Tim Peake today, heading off to the International Space Station and the start of six months flying around our l'il ol' planet!
How exciting!..

As a kid I was spell-bound by the Apollo moon missions, glued to the box as grainy spacemen bounced around a monochrome moon in what was the most exciting adventure .. ever! Tim Peake was born in 1972 - just as the Apollo project was nearing its end - so he might not have been around to experience the excitement of seeing a Saturn V lift off from Cape Kennedy, but the lucky bugger will certainly be a lot nearer to the action today than I'll ever be! Safe flight, Tim ..

As Tim heads off to space I'll be driving to Bury! Not quite as glamorous, I grant you, but I like to think we're working towards the same goal today, Tim and I. I'm off on a PR job, photographing children involved in the promotion of household recycling and so, like Major Tim, I like to feel I'm doing my bit to enthuse the next generation's interest in science and technology and the ultimate security of the Earth!

To Bury, and beyond ...