Tonight was competition night. This time for prints. Elayne and I both put in three prints. Today’s header picture is one of my prints. It did reasonably well, gaining a respectable 8.5 / 10.

I am as proud as anything to be able to say that one of Elayne’s pictures was initially held back as were a number of others. What usually means is that it is a potential candidate for an award (1st, 2nd 3rd or Highly Commended).

Once all of the prints had been critiqued, the judge went back to those he had asked to be held back. The judge looks again at the picture (the process is the same for prints and PDI’s) and decides on a score. Anything awarded 9.5 or less is returned to the general pool. Any print awarded a score of 10 is bound to get one of the awards.

It can be a nail-biting time for the authors of any picture held back. You can imagine then, how we were feeling then when Elayne’s picture was held back – there were about 12, which meant that 8 to be returned to the pool, and 4 for awards.

Elayne reached the point where she was one of the four remaining pictures. The Highly commended went, and then the Third. And so there were two. The judge pointed at a picture and said “Second” at this point, Elayne and I could have jumped up and cheered. Elayne was first!!

I am so proud of her!

It started yesterday with a call from Alex. “Fancy a carvery tomorrow”? When Alex asks that question, it always means one place; The Chairmakers at Worldsend. In our view, it definitely does one of the best carveries in the area. So, no problem with that, an easy yes.

We went to the pub, and as usual had a delightful meal. Everything was perfectly cooked.

After lunch, we went back to theirs so that we could entertain our granddaughter, which is always a delight and a pleasure, especially when she laughs, which she does a lot.

I think it was just after 1700 that we decided it was time to go. Of course, it had started to rain. But this wasn’t a gentle shower. The drops weren’t falling, they were being fired out of the cloud and hitting with a force strong enough to hurt, and with an intensity that put the sun’s production of neutrinos to shame.

There were some really quite large puddles (mini lakes, really) on the way home, and the threat of aquaplaning was a real and present danger.

We arrived home safely, the journey taking slightly longer than usual – I had really been moderating our speed. Unlike some people.

An observation: if you have a cat. shut doors are a no-no, I’ver just opened the office door to ours, she promptly jumped up on the desk and all over the keyboard. Luckily I was able to correct her typing.

As it was the last day of the month, we had our usual Camera Club outing. Slightly different though. Like last year we visited Salisbury to go to the Southern Counties Photographic Federation (SCPF) Annual Exhibition.

What makes this exhibition a bit special is that we are able to see the best of the different clubs in the federation. And, what a bunch of talented people they are (ignore the header photo, that isn’t one of them, just something a bit different to my normal stuff). The exhibition was delightful, although we were disappointed that the Salisbury CC had taken their exhibition down literally minutes before we arrived (we saw it last year, and it was good).

After our visit to the exhibition, we looked for a place to have lunch. We ended up at the same place as last year, which was fine – a nice burger and chips went down well.

After lunch, we split up as a group. I had a bit of a wander around (I didn’t visit the cathedral this year). including a visit (of course) to the main bookshop, which was nice.

All-in, it was a very nice day out.

I had started the day with good intent. OK, perhaps a bit lazy, and a slightly late (relative to what – when I used to work, I guess).

I had intended to go to The Shed but after I had done a few jobs and got the car cleaned we were heading toward lunch.

I didn’t feel that hungry, having had breakfast later than normal so I missed lunch out.

I then made the mistake of lying on the bed to catch up on some news, and of course, promptly fell asleep. That kyboshed any visit to the shed. Oh well. At least I am committed to attending the Monday meeting.

It being the first week of the month, Wednesday will see the monthly U3A meeting. I’m hoping to attend my first one.

We’ll have to see how next week goes.

Mottisfont as a building managed to survive the demolition of Monasteries conducted by Henry VIII, Nowadays, it is owned and run by the National Trust (we are members, so free entrance).

The grounds are wonderful, and well worth a visit at any time of the year. They also put on various displays.

In january, they have a large part of the garden devoted to Snow Drops, I think it is one of our favourite flowers. This years display was lovely. It was a real delight to see them.

Whilst the Snowdrops were a delight to see, our main reason for visiting today was to take our GrandDaughter to see the trail of the Hungry Caterpillar, based on a book by Eric Carle’s book The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

It was a little bit muddy, but that was OK, she had wellingtons, and of course, she fell over, but there were parts of the trail where she was screaming (literally) with delight. In particular, the tunnel towards the end that represented the chrysalis – she must have gone through it about 50 times.

We had a snack type lunch, which was OK, and then had a slow drive home so that she could have a good sleep.

It was a really nice day.

We’ve had a long day today, and we are both tired. I am really sorry for not doing a decent post, but i am just too drained.

I hope to have something better tomorrow.

For some reason I can’t explain, I have been really stressing ove what pictures I was going to put in for next weeks competition (subject Architecture), of the three chosen, I really happy with one, wished another had been submitted in black & white, and mildly indifferent to the third. But they have been submitted now, so out of my hands.

On to the evening, members nights are a bit random, sometimes the topic for the evening is chosen in the week before, but actually that is OK. As it happens, tonights topic was set a while ago; Audio Visual presentatios (AV’s). Just in case you don’t know, these are a sequence of still picturesset to, usually, music but if the circcumstances are right a narration would also work.

Several members of the club had put AV’s together. They were all really good, and they definitely make me feel that I would like to do one. The problem though, is one of what subject and what music? That is when my brain freezes.

I had a really interesting day with U3A. I had two sessions booked; Stargazing and Philosophy.

The first session, Stargazing, was held in The Vine, a Cafe (former pub). There were four of us at today’s session. We had a good discussion about constellations that we know. We looked at the books that the group use for stargazing – I’ve bought them now, they should arrive tomorrow. We set a mini project for each of us. Mine is to find the star Capella and the constellation Taurus. I stuck my head out the door tonight, cloudy and rainy, so not this evening.

The second session was held in Gosport Art Gallery & Museum. the subject was philosophy, now it was interesting, but what I had found out at the morning session was that Philosophy collides with History. That is a bit of a dilemma for me, so I told the admin person that I would be going to History next month.

I really enjoyed the first session, the second was OK, but I think I might be more interested in the alternative. So, I’m going to give it a try.

Apologies for the quality of this image. The little beauty it shows a Grey Wagtail. We have had one of these visit us every year for at least the last four, if not five years. This is the female, the male has a distinctive black throat.

They are beautiful birds, and I am so proud that she honours us with her presence. but I do fear for her. There are so many cats around. But it is lovely to see her.

We didn’t have anything ready for dinner, so at 6AM this morning, I was booking a table at the Inn By the Sea in Lee-on-the-Solent for Breakfast. A good breakfast will do us for most of the day. Our visit to the pub was the first sinnce November, they have had a fairly major refurbishment and it does look good.

The breakfast they served up was of course to the expected standard – excellent.

We went and did a bit of shopping, Elayne likes to have a good browse. I had a quick check, bought a paper and went back to the car.

I would have gone for a walk, but it was raining. You might say, it’s been a lazy day.