Sweet Dreams

 I never did find out what the Sweet Dreams were in Central Station, Newcastle:

A grand old station building in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne
Olympus mju-1, HP5+ on Foma 313 RC paper.

Imagine Peace

The Millennium Bridge in across the River Tyne links the city of Newcastle to the town of Gateshead.  Missy and I walked across it a couple of weeks ago and I snapped this one up with the Olympus mju-1 on HP5+:

Foma313 paper
The 'Imagine Peace' building just across the river houses the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art and a fine place to visit it is.  When we passed through, there was a superb exhibition of the photographer Frankie Raffles.  You can read about it here and I will write more about it in another post.  Did I say it was superb?  It was!

I have to say again how much I'm enjoying the mju-1 and so far it seems pretty faultless for a (very) compact point 'n' shoot camera.  It's a DX camera, so reads the barcode along the bottom of the canister for film speed, number of shots and film latitude.  Since I bulk-load from 100' rolls I needed to remember to use suitable-coded canisters, although it isn't too difficult to make up your own DX barcode if you feel so inclined - there is plenty of online help available. 

Our daughter is in the first semester of her Masters and had a bit of wobble a few weeks ago - a good excuse for me to drop everything and fly over for a few days.  The flight from Belfast takes about 40mins - so that's about 2 hours and 40mins given the amount of time you need to leave for airport security these days, which is so hard to predict.  Once in Newcastle, however, it's a doddle - the metro takes you from the airport to the centre of town in about 20mins.   Anyway, we had a good few days together and talked everything out, so I think she's going to be OK.  It was harder for her than she thought, what with being in a new University, a new city (much larger than what she was used to with Oxford), and not being particularly close to her undergrad pals or her boyfriend.  To be fair, I think the transition from undergraduate to postgraduate is a big one.  At Oxford, she was surrounded by her pals 24/7.  Moving four hours north, knowing no-one and living pretty much on your own in a strange new city was all proving a bit much for her.  Completely understandable.  Your undergrad days are rather special and unique, I think - it does take a lot of adjustment to come to terms with the fact that 'those days are over' and that actually this next stage of life is going to be very different.  Fingers crossed she has weathered the storm.  

Waiting

These punts on the River Cherwell were waiting for, well, punters, I suppose.  I snapped them from Magdalene Bridge:

HP5 via the Olympus mju-1; Kentmere fixed grade paper
A bridge has been here in one form or another for a good while - apparently the first reference to one was in 1004. Eh, I bet it could tell some stories.

Just to the rear are the glass houses of the Botanic Gardens - worth a dander around if you are ever in the area, very peaceful.  

London-bound

Travellers from Oxford heading to the Big Smoke:

Olympus mju-1; HP5+ on Kentmere graded paper
These days the High Street is off-limits to normal cars during the day but that doesn't mean it's a pedestrian's (or cyclist's) haven.  Far from it - taxis, buses, coaches and emergency services all have access, so it remains a busy street, albeit one with a lot less pollution as the City Council move towards zero-emission streets.

I like the reflection above the door of the bus, showing some fancy stonework on the building opposite.  I think we were just beside All Saints Church on the High Street, as we made our way towards Cowley Road for something to eat.  Cowley Rd lies just past Magdalene College and bridge (the College is just visible in the distance at the end of the High Street).  I guess you could say Cowley Road marks the start of the 'real Oxford' - where ordinary folk live and eat.  There are lots of interesting places at which to dine - we had an excellent Indian that evening.  Next door was a fruit and veg shop.  Not that I recognised most of the produce on offer - certainly not what we are used to here in Northern Ireland.  Pity, really. 

Cowley is synonymous with the car industry - Morris Oxford and Morris Cowley were two very popular cars - the Cowley was the name given to various cars in production from the around 1915 through to the '50s and I suspect most families had a Morris at one time or another back then.  Today it's the location of the BMW Mini plant which was just across the road from where our hotel was.  You quite often see  Mini Plant coaches around the city as they bus workers to and from the factory. 

Gentleman, in Oxford

One from my last walk around Oxford City Centre for a while:

HP5+ in Ilfotec HC, on old Kentmere fixed grade paper

I didn't look too closely at the gentleman before taking the shot and when I saw the print it made me wonder about his situation.  He is very well dressed, complete with long overcoat and rolled umbrella.  But he does have a lot of cases with him and what appears to be a can of beer on the ground beside him (and a coffee cup). If he wasn't so well dressed I might think he was a 'gentleman of the road', but that doesn't go with his attire.  He shall remain an enigma.

I took a little Olympus Mju-1 point 'n' shoot with me this time, to see how it would fare.  The answer was it fared pretty good.  These are tiny wee slide-across-clam-shell cameras, auto-everything with a 35mm f/3.5 lens and it worked a treat.  A contrasty lens which focusses down to 0.35m, which is rather useful at times. It's so small you can stick it in a coat pocket and not notice it, so it was perfect for this trip.

I should have read up about the camera a bit more than I did before taking it, as I've a nice date-stamp on all the negatives.  This feature can be turned off, I now know.  

Wesco

An old oil can, via the macro/fisheye extension lenses:

On Kentmere VC paper.

Better news on the kitty front.  Maisie's leg has still got the bandage on, but the wound is starting to heal over, so hopefully the bandage can come off soon.  She's doing well, eating and drinking normally and starting to put weight back on.  Still has a bit of a limp, but that's improving too.  She's getting frustrated, or bored, with life on the inside though - keeps going to look through the patio doors and then crying up at us to get out.  There's no way she is well enough to go out, though - there are too many potential problems for a kitty with a weak leg: foxes, cars, trees.  We're thinking her wandering days might be over for good.  So we need to get her more stimulated inside the house - a cardboard box might do the trick for a while, something new to explore.  And cheap, which after the vet's bills is no bad thing.  

Tractor Grease

 You never know when you might need it:

HP5+, HC-110, Kentmere VC Select paper
Another one from the OM4ti/50mm combination, with close-up and fisheye attachment.

We're not long back from graduation and a very pleasant time it was.  The weather was kind to us and it all went smoothly.  It's been a tough week though, with poor Maisie and her bad leg meaning we cut our trip short.  We ended up driving from Liverpool to Oxford on the Tuesday morning, graduation on the Wednesday and than back to Liverpool on the Thursday.  Lots of early starts and short sleeps on the ferry means we are all pretty exhausted.   Maisie wasn't in great shape when we got home - her leg did not smell good at all and the vet confirmed an infection had set in.  With antibiotics she has improved a good bit since then, but she needs a lot of attention and comforting.  She's started to eat and drink which the vet said would be the best thing to fight the infection.  It's back to the vets later today (Monday) to get an update.  She's not putting the leg down properly yet but she is beginning to move it a little.  If we can get the bandage off I think it might help with the movement side of things, but I guess it depends if the wounds have started to heal or not.  Hopefully it will be good news.

And here she is, The Graduate of 2024 (phone snaps):