Salute to 2008

Just arrived back from a night of jonesing with a friend. Nothing hardcore just a fest of maynards sours, pastilles, and winegums. All this laced with a couple of episodes of "Flights of Conchorde". We were like pigs in shite, literally. Anyhow, I sit here feeling too queasy to go to bed due to the excessive over-indulging. I think I may have developed a jelly-induced stretch mark on my belly. Sheer agony, the pain is too great for me to sit here and articulate a summary of 2007 so I leave you with these images.


Took this shot on Christmas Day it reminded me of 2007


May we welcome in the New Year with the inclination that we shall all be lavishing in hope, peace and happiness. We all deserve this, don't we!.....In some Asian beliefs the figure 8 represents the infinity sign and luck. So therefore, I am blindly hopeful that 2008 will be a year of great changes. We can only pray that these changes will draw in positivity around us. If I am wrong I shall challenge you's all to a Maynards Jelly Consumption Competition at the end of 2008. Salute, to a good year.


Taken on Christmas Day 2007, it stemmed from the same tree as above, only this one looking more hopeful! Fingers crossed that this one represents 2008


Have just discovered that if you click onto each photo you will see the full effect and details of each photo.

Visitation of Depression

At some point in our lives we shall encounter with a brief visitation with depression. Be it personally, within the family and throughout our friends. Without ruining the festive season, I thought it would be of great importance not to forget these people and post this image up as a mark of respect to them. This image has a strong impact as the life-ring represents the hope in everyone of us, and the rope represents darkness and the loss due to this terrible illness. Both the life-ring and the rope bears equal weight and are equally powerful objects both congruously and in isolation. I would like to think of it as the hope embracing and encasing our darkness and loss.




"More than any time in history mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly." A quote from Woody Allen himself.

I really like this quote as it tells you alot about Woody Allen. He is not all about humour and sarcasm. It makes you wonder does he raid his medicine cabinet for anti-depressants, along with his big stash of aspirin. We can only hope that he never cuts himself as he would only bleed to death due to the large aspirin consumption.

Random Rambler

I don't know why I like this shot. But I just do. It probably goes against the rules of basic photography. It was a non intentional accident, like all the photos I have taken. My editing abilities is not the greatest either. So I must suffer in silence and spoof my way through photography.
Do you remember those books that people write about, like a guide to bluffing your way through philosophy or how to learn a language in two hours. Well my photographic abilities is somewhat similar. Like buying a camera on impulse, having it constantly wrapped around your neck like a noose at all times, and voila you have moved from amateur to professional photographer overnight. Ach aye, if only it was that easy. Honestly, I don't intend to go anywhere with it, but I just enjoy the sound that the camera makes, click, click, kodak. I immensely enjoy the freedom you have at staring at your subject and been granted an unlimited pass on time to stare or observe. For me the greatest thing I achieved from my short time with photography is that easy access to escapism. Perhaps there are many downfalls to photography that I have yet to experience but I find when I have taken my shot and that clicking sound comes to an end, so does that split second escapism. Then the emotional rollercoaster starts again in search for another image to stir the minutest emotion or stimulate that long degenerated nerve that leads to the window of our perception.


You see what I mean, in a photographical sense I am not sure which one would be better. But I still like the darker one. But perhaps if I got myself a photography book and read up on the technicalities I may just well understand why I like the initial photograph. Then again I may look at it again in a few weeks time and ask myself what the hell was I contemplating about. They are both equally as shite (pardon my unsophisticated language). But the one thing I can extract from these two photos is how they both appear so different even though they were taken seconds after each other. The weather in both picture depicts dark clouds with threatening outburst of rain and thunder. I am in a less sleep deprived state so things aren't that obvious to me.




This photo really stood out, as I was rambling around searching for berries. Waiting for opportunity moments to take a photo, of course there would constantly be some form of obstacles. Be it people, branches, Santa Claus himself or the rain. I kept getting herds of people rushing towards my direction and only when I whipped out the camera. I got slightly frustrated so I mentally started categorising people. At this moment in time to me there were only two types of people: those that were non-territorial and the territorial ones. The non-territorial ones can be identified with distinctive traits in personalities. To me they possess a gentle, caring, nature and would be considerate to their environment and the people enclosed in it. They hovered around me and patiently waited till I have perfected this shoot. Little did they know I am only a seed to the photography world, so their patient quality may be for a futile cause. In contrast to this group were the territorial bunch. They reminded me of an ungodly avatar, but more in the sense of a descended cross between man and animal. Arbitrarily, they would urinate all around me to mark their territorial space. They would be quiet aggressive in their approach to life and their environment. They would grunt and utter nonsensical under their breath. But being an extremely silent lip reader I understood each and every breath. Each breath would vaporise and formulate their marked distinctive character to me.

After all this pontification, I decided it would be best if I got out of the ready made pathway and into the muddy wilderness alone. It was the best decision I have made all day as I never got to find the berries but found a place where it was easy to take a photo as the scenery was already carved out for me. All I had to do was automatically go into autopilot mentally, choose the easiest option on the camera which is auto and click away till my little soul is content.




Apologise for randomly positioning the photos. The title is afterall random rambler, and also I have just discovered this new invention called no choose, left, center or right positioning of photos. Hence the indecisiveness of the location of each photo. What can I say about this photo except the life ring sang out like a punk tune at a retirement party. There was no-one around, and the air was so still that the life ring had no reason to be there. Only perhaps if a retarded individual with no swimming abilities decides to go for a cold December dip in the man-made lake. Shiver! Shiver!


Due to the size of this photo. You probably can't make it out but there is a branch stuck to the centre right that appeared to be levitating in mid-air. Much to my amusement I had to take it. Oh! I did finally manage to find cranberries on my rambling adventure but I had to buy them in the market so much for personally selecting the natural wild ones.






THE END

Oh! The Hills of Donegal

Not so long ago a friend and I was feeling claustrophobic with city life so no better place then a trip to rural Ireland. We wanted to immerse ourselves in the mystical beauty of a place everyone rants and raves about, and discover the true essence of Donegal. My expectations of the place was to see snow white beaches, hike the Blue Stack Mountains and divulge in rural living culture.

It took an eternity to get out of Dublin. Cars honking at each other, M50 traffic was as swift as an American highway on pause. I was simultaneously stressed and excited about leaving Dublin behind for a few days. Stressed due to the traffic and excited with the notion of freedom. Free from inner city life, the hustle and bustle, and free from the materialistic society that created us into the epitome of stress. We drove through the night across numerous counties. Dimming and dipping of lights continuously for four and a half hours, I may have hypnotised myself without realising. So we stopped for a coffee in Ballinahub petrol station. I immediately noticed the cashiers accent, he had a pure country accent. Initially I found it difficult to register the tone in his voice, I thought the guy said that we were in Ballina. I let out a premature excitement, just to discover I didn't hear the hub part of Ballinahub. Everything was gradually going into surreal mode. One minute we were stuck in Dublin traffic, the next we were edging towards a much slower pace of living were people spoke and behaved differently. It was immensely refreshing to observe. Oh! it was great being in the country.

We finally drove into Donegal town. There was a great Friday nite atmospheric buzz in the air. It engulfed us immediately, followed us round the roundabout, and to our accommodation. We exchanged a few words to the woman from the accommodation, dumped our bags and scowered around for the nearest pub. We stumbled upon the Forge Pub, it appears to be an important landmark as it possessed a front door that can convert into two halves. This was amusing as all the locals always mentions this highly significant door. Its significance I have yet to discover. We ordered our first drink, absorbing the quaint and relaxing new environment of ours. However, this came to an abrupt halt when a plethora of men from the nearby village came sauntering through the half-way door. A bus load of them, this was pure humour. I was internally laughing at this, it instantly cured my humour constipation I have developed over the years. We met a guy called Mr. Irwine amongst the mist of men from the busload. He suggested that we head off to Teelins Cliff, albeit the roads are seriously narrow and dangerous. Well perhaps in hindsight, we should have taken the Columba boat trip to Teelins Cliff.

Enough is enough, too many men getting off the magic bus so we left for another pub. We came across the Reel Inn where they played traditional live music. The wind blew the door open, myself and my friend were like John Wayne characters making our entrance to the bar. I now feel the origin of the term "blow-ins" or perhaps flatulence in the breeze would be more accurate. We nestled ourselves comfortably at the bar. I looked across and found a man sitting contently alone at the other end. I think I was gaping with astonishment. A black man (can I say this or would this be deemed as a racial comment) in Donegal town. I know we have become a cosmopolitan country over the last few years. But are people worldwide still migrating to Ireland. Why! may I ask? It was even more surreal to see this black man in Donegal Town and in this live traditional music bar. We got chatting away to him, harassed him for his lighter and christened him the Nairobi Man.

We drifted away from Nairobi Man and followed the music. A two man band was on live performance tonight. A gregarious Johnny Cashman was strumming away at his guitar playing in harmony with a grossly malformed type of guy (without meaning to be cruel) who was co-ordinating the piano accordian. While we were listening to the music a gin and bitter lemon William McTell sat down beside us and uttered alot of aarrgh, bleugh, aargh which I hadn't the faintest idea in what he was trying to say. So I offered him another gin and bitter lemon. Because I am finding the blogging concept very tiredsome, I had to assinate alot of the characters that we met on the journey. Even the ones I have just mentioned, I feel slightly guilty as they offered an awful lot and I have just axed them. Severed characters, how very bad. But one thing I will say I had fun times being around these convivial companions, and the Rural Irish certainly do possess a famous ability to find good craic. It surely is different to city living.



The scenery out of Donegal Town and en route Teelins Cliff



Sunset at Teelins Cliffs


Apparently the highest cliffs in the world

Tribute to the Trilby

A Trilby hat is a soft felt men's hat with a narrow brim and a deeply indented crown. Traditionally it was made from rabbit hair felt, but now it is sometimes made from other materials, such as tweed, or wool. Trilbies are softer then Homburgs, and have a flexible brim instead of a curved one. They are similar to fedoras, but with a narrower brim. The hats name derived from a play based on George du Maurier's 1894 novel Trilby. A hat of this style was worn on stage during the play's first London production. The Trilby has been a symbol of chic elegance and class, and has been associated with jazz, ska and soul musicians.

The trilby was also often worn by Inspector Clouseau, the character portrayed by Peter Sellers in the Pink Panther film series. According to Sellers, he already owned a trenchcoat when he created the character, and he bought Clouseau's trilby from a shop in London, because he thought the hat just naturally completed the outfit.

My one and only ever possession of a Trilby was last seen at a Spanish party. Trilby was manoeuvring around on the dance floor to some hardcore techno tunes. Trilby being a socialite passed herself around the crowd. Mingling intially to some tall lawyer dude. Then the Spanish crew took possession of Trilby for a short while. Next I know Trilby has now gone awol. Perhaps into the vortex of the abyss. Her presence is now gone forever. But I live in hope that she may return one day.

Memoir of Ruby

Woke up this morning with my brain screaming at me for marinating it with alcohol the night before. So I decided to punish the brain by creating this blog. I positioned myself in front of the computer trying to collaborate with my thoughts and ideas for this new blog page, but nothing is coming. I sit here alone embracing the void. Its like being inside a circus tent with no audience, no clowns nor animals. Only yourself and the tamers whip. Whipping away at the brain.




I am trying to post a picture of my deceased dog called Ruby. She passed away just a week ago from today. Age just crept up on her and brought along a friend called death. They both seduced her to another world. They promised her dog heaven, unification with her sister Pearl. Usually when I called her name she would jump out of her kennel. Each leap she made there would be the rhythmic sound of her wicker basket rubbing against her kennel. It was hilarious to watch as she would have to carefully dodge the radiator that always obstructed her leap out of the kennel. Unbeknownst to be me, she successfully came out unharmed. However, I have witnessed Ruby colliding her head off the rooftop of the kennel. Once she escaped the kennel she would run as fast as her little legs would take her to the front door. Waiting patiently for someone to let her out.......