Bills Posts

The picture is of one the Clarence Gates at the western end of the high street. I managed to get the sun through the glass globe at the top of the gate.

I made a slight change to my route this morning, so that I walked the length of Spring Garden Lane. I am trying to identify which house was Grove House. Located on Spring Garden Lane, it was a centre of the community and played a significant role in the life of the town.

Walking down the road, I was looking at all of the houses to try and gain an indication as to where Grove house was likely to be. There is a patch of open ground Nicholson Gardens – I wonder if that was the location of the house.

It was a last minute change to my normal route, which I sometimes make and adds a bit of variety to the walks and indeed as i got on to the High Street I knew that I was within my normal time frame, because I saw Smoking Lady, at a point where I might normally see her had I followed my normal route. Also, the change in route made little if any difference in the distance that I walked.

I didn’t find Grove House, but I haven’t given up.

Frustratingly none of the pictures I took on this morning’s walk really inspired me, this is perhaps the closest. It’s the blue in the sky and the water and the green of the grass.

When I was at college I did geology. I’d never done it before. But I haven’t forgotten how much I enjoyed it. When I was a kid, I set up a laboratory because I wanted to do chemistry. Is still have the experiments book. I bought some of the glassware, some of the chemicals, I even tried to do some of the experiments. It was all a bit heath-Robinson really. Then Astronomy discovered me, I read about it, and can remember avidly following the Apollo programme.

Geology intruded briefly, along with geography, physical rather than economic (ox-bow lakes and that kind of thing), then computers arrived. I can’t think of a period since 1974 when I haven’t had a computer of some kind. Photography was probably the least scientific interest, but was technical in it’s way, that has lasted quite a long time as an interest. I’ve had several microscopes. Mostly toys, but my latest acquisitions are for an interested amateur, and of course I can’t go without mentioning my love of amateur radio. The thing is though what to do with it all? Well, I think that locality may provide a framework. I’m going to think about this as I head towards 366/366.

From the picture it’s obvious that there were some clouds about, but the blue sky was as striking a blue as the grass is green. It’s just sad that the tree is a victim of the winds over the weekend.

The weather can really dictate how the walk feels. It was quite cloudy as I left the house. By the time I reached the waterfront the sky has cleared apart from a few clouds low in the south. There was a bit of a chill in the air, but not much wind. I was a bit concerned that it might rain, but that didn’t happen. The walk ended up feeling good.

I must admit, most of my morning walks end up feeling good. There’s a degree of righteousness that I’ve done it and the pleasure of being out. There was only one lady whom I see fairly regularly out walking her dog, we usually exchange pleasantries. There’s another lady I see nearly every morning, I’ve never spoken to her. I call her the smoking lady because whenever I see her she has a cigarette on the go.

I’m curious now that I know the reason why the cockleponds have been emptied to know when the weed is going to be cleared, and the re-filling start. There’s a lot of mud in the bottom of the pond, so I’m also wondering how they are going to do the clearing. Lots of questions, not many answers. All makes for interesting walking.

It;s not that the weather has been all over the place, it hasn’t. It has been windy and wet, and occasionally a bit cold. To me, this isn’t rough weather, it has character. I enjoy it.

Walking westwards along Stokes Road I was walking into the wind. It’s been very brisk all weekend. We had the branch episode at the Weald and Downland, and yesterday , there were bits all over the garden. When I went for today’s walk a big tree had been blown over near Walpole Park.

I’m trying to work out how they are going to fill the cockle pond. I now know the reason why it has been emptied, and it makes sense. What I don’t know is how the pond is filled.

There wasn’t much going on in the harbour, the Victoria of Wight came in, and there were a couple of yacht’s moving about. The stretch from the waterfront back home is not the most interesting part of the walk (I went anti-clockwise).

It was a very pleasant walk.

Just a minor apology for yesterday’s article, a couple of mis-types, now corrected. Once again, rushing to publish, but all sorted now hopefully.

Yesterday was a very windy day. The house in the picture, if you were to look at the map of the Weald & Downland Living Museum is R4 – The rural farmhouse house of Pendean. Alongside it’s garden. I said yesterday that the museum would have been so much more alive if all the houses were able to have tour guides, or actors within. They weren’t able to because of Covid, so please don’t take that as a criticism. There were members of staff outside each house, who were more than happy to discuss any aspect of a display. I do wonder what people will think of us in several hundred years time. Will they curse us for our profligacy?

I’m featuring this particular house because as we were walking away we heard a very loud crack, and then a crunch. It turns out that a very large branch had come down off a tree, from quite a height and had hit the corner of the house breaking and dislodging several roof tiles. This became one of several exhibits to be have damage caused by the wind. I confess we were a bit nervous walking through the wooded areas. It didn’t take away from our enjoyment.

There was one actor who was mostly in character, I think he was an Apothecary or a physician, he had medicines for treating ill people. It seemed like he quite relished telling us about plagues through the ages.

Today, the only time I have left the house was to do an run. apart from that it has been a lazy day. Not a lot more can be said about that really.

Firstly, I need to apologise for last nights post. It really was quite a dreadful piece of writing. I was supposed to write about the weather. I wanted to make it an article about meteorology rather than just the weather, but I lost it completely.

It was a case of just get something published. I usually try and write between 7 & 8 in the evening, like tonight, things had intruded to defeat me. I’m determined that tonight’s epistle will be of a better quality.

In terms of writing, apart from last night, it has been a good week. I had the episode of the trolly, let alone the emptying of the pond, which I found out last night was being emptied to be cleared of weed. Apparently, the Cockleponds are on a national list of model boating lakes, and the weed interferes with the boats, so it has to be cleared. Which is obviously a good thing, and is very good to know.

There has been a visitation of ships;

Of course, the emptying of cockle ponds meant the loss of “my pets” I know they aren’t, it I have enjoyed watching them and it has become entertainment amongst my amateur radio friends, so the loss is being sorely felt. I emailed the council to ask what was going on with the ponds. I might have had a reply today, I haven’t been able to check yet.

I had another problem with the book of the week. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, first published nearly 1,300 years ago, is a remarkable piece of work for the view it gives us of lives in the centuries leading up its publication, where Bede drew upon the resources available to him at the time. I got myself well and truly ied up in there religious aspects, rather than the book.

And we ended it all with last nights seriously feeble piece. I’ll try not to let that happen again.

Today we paid a visit to the Weald & Downlands Living Museum, north of Chichester. Very interesting, and I think it would be even better if Covid had affected operations, and there had been more people living in character – not a criticism of the museum, it has been an unfortunate victim of circumstances. I’m glad that we contributed even if only a little bit to it’s operation.

I don’t know what kind of clouds these are. I know they aren’t cirrus or stratus, they’re storm clouds? I think Cumulonimbus Nimbus are the high thundercloud.

What all of this is leading up to is that I am a member of the Cloud Appreciation Society, because I always look at and admire the clouds. Like a lot of things I need to beef up my knowledge on cloud types.

Clear blue skies are nice, but boring. I’d much rather have some clouds to watch.

The weather has been very up and down all week. There was one morning when rain was pretty much a certainty but I have a more than adequate rain coat, luckily I didn’t need it but it was nice to get out.

At the moment it is blowing a bit of a gale.

I spent a bit of time today, every time I went down stairs watching the starlings. We seem to have out own family of up to 20 baby starlings who have adopted our garden as their home. They are striping the bird tables which are there for that. They are beautiful to watch.

I’ve said before that I am reading Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Written in the year 731. I have to confess, that for the first time since I started this blog project, I am having major problems writing about a book that I am reading.

For the time being, I think I am going to read into it a bit more before commenting, if I do comment at all here. I have to say though, that it is a fascinating book, that gives you an opportunity to think about how things were in the times leading up to the 7th & 8th centuries. Where the focus of life lay, if you were in a position to write about it at that time. In some respects it parallels the history of Art, and what the subject of most pictures were before artists realised that they could and should paint what they want rather than what was expected.

In parallel with Bede’s book I also have a available volume 2 of the Oxford History of England, which deals with Bede’s time and the period from 550 – 1087. It gives the modern interpretation of the available facts. It is of course a fascinating counterpoint.

Given that Bede’s book is an Ecclesiastical history, the focus is naturally upon religious events. Whilst it is as already said a fascinating read, I’m not quite ready to discuss that aspect of it yet.

The walk to the waterfront usually takes me just about 10 minutes. I follow the same route most of the time. As I leave the house, I look up at the sky, to see what it looks like. I’ve looked at it once already out of the bedroom window, but that was 10 minutes ago, and things can change quickly. I don’t mind if it does change, the only thing that would stop me going out would be heavy rain.

As I walk down the road, I’m listening out for the birds. I can only recognise some birds, magpies & blackbirds, Doves obviously, and a couple of others. But nowhere near as many as I want.

On my route, I walk past places of history; St Georges Barracks, The Masonic Lodge. As I am walking I usually see the same people, some I don’t say anything to, some I say good morning. There are one or two with whom I’ll stop and have a chat.

Before leaving home, I always check to see what the tide is doing, and what the temperature and pressure are – the pressure I get from a local website, I compare with the reading on my handheld anemometer. If the tide is really low, the ramp down to the Gosport Ferry pontoon can have quite a steep slope on it. Before the lock down, there was a lady who would take a bike with a large facility on the front for making coffee. I often wondered how she managed to get down the slop without crashing as the bike was probably very heavy. Obviously, that all stopped with the lockdown. I do hope that when things ease, she is able to come back.

when I arrive at the waterfront, I always look to see what the sky looks like behind the Spinnaker, I like a good dramatic sky as that makes for an exciting picture.

It’s not very often that the water in the harbour is really rough. In fact, the largest waves I see are the bow waves of a ship coming in, typically one of the Brittany Ferries. I was advised by a captain of a ship that when the water has slow calm look to it, with an oily texture, and indeed, it can be called oily.

I know it’s the same walk every day, but I do change it especially at the weekends, although it’s easy sometimes to just do it, rather than go somewhere else. But, I really should do more of that – going somewhere else that is. Difficult during the working week though.

The main thing is, I enjoy it.

If I am going to devote tonight’s piece about the latest issue of Black & White Photography, I really should have a B&W photo at the head. I must admit that of the photos I took today, this I thought would be the least worst picture in B&W. But actually, it’s not too bad, even if I say so myself.

There were two articles that attracted my attention the first was a piece by Homer Sykes, there’s an exhibition on his article at;

http://lucy-bell.com

This was a piece about British customs, now admittedly some of them may seem a bit wierd, like the chap who covers himself in Burrs and tours the local pubs, being given his drink via a straw because he is wearing a back-to-front balaclava which is burr covered. I cw joy reading about the oddities of our country. I’m willing to bet though, that there are places in the world that are equally strange.

The next piece was by Jamie Johnson;

http://jamiejohnsonphotography.com/bigcartel.html

This was about how new book, Growing up travelling. Jamie has become firm friends with an Irish Traveller family and has been photographing the family over the years.

The thing about both articles is that the photo’s are of people. Flash may have been used but no studio work. This feeds two aspects of photography; one that pleases me, and one that doesn’t. This isn’t really street photography, but it is people mostly outside in a relatively every day setting. I have spoken before about my love of this genre. The second factor is that this isn’t studio work, formal portraiture. Now that I don’t enjoy. When I was a member of a camera club, we had a couple of portrait sessions. I never enjoyed any of them. I think it was the attention to detail with the lighting and backgrounds that was needed that I didn’t enjoy. I think the immediacy of the “spontaneous” street shot is more interesting.

Once again, I enjoyed the magazine, and can now go back to the two books that I currently have on the go, The Ecclesiastical history of the English people, and On the Trail of Stardust. Two books fast the opposite ends of time. The later the book of my latest obsession; more on that later.