Another Weekend Almost Over!

Why is it that my weekends seem to go far faster than the working week?

This Off Friday came at the end of a busy and quite frankly shitty week at work, more endless planning of the new phase amongst tears and abject frustration. Why do management only hear what they want to hear?

So Friday, Julia had the day off and we moseyed up to Bluewater for some much needed retail therapy, thank goodness for pay day! In fact that's the only good part to work right now 🤣

We shopped till we dropped, had buffet lunch at Pizza Hut and shared mini pancakes from Stacked, ten little bundles of heaven slathered in Nutella and sliced banana 😋

Saturday and Sunday have been lazy days spent around the house, interspersed with a visit from Dad to drop off some meat pies and natter over a coffee.

I have been looking at collages, the software I have available to create them, PhotoScape X and Adobe Express, and why in both instances it's not always as easy as it should be. Not least in trying to determine what size to export the original images in from Lightroom.

There are times when I can knock a collage together in minutes, if that, other times where I seem to have to faff for ages to produce what I want. Each piece of software has it's pluses and minuses and never all the features one would like. Even the online variety seems to expect you to sign in with an account (a recipe for stacks of junk email) or sign up for a trial.

Still it's Sunday evening, bags readied for work tomorrow, another trip into the office, rubbish bagged up for the dustbin men.

Another week in Paradise (not) looms 😭 Roll on home time on Thursday!

The Yard & Dad's Birthday!

 

Friday saw Dad, me and Tedster head back to the Yard for the first trip of the year and it was Dad's birthday too so it was an opportunity to spend some time together. We had a lush lunch in the Mess Deck restaurant and spent the day mooching, snapping on the cameras and chatting.

Sunday and Darren, Jo and the boys came down to visit and we had Sunday lunch @ Toby Carvery 😋

So this is a quick collage of all of us snapped on the M50 and Dad blowing out his candles on a lush salted caramel cake. My 'bro was quick to point out that we could have reversed the candles for my 58th birthday ;-)

It was a good day and great to see everyone again.

Medway Lights 2023

 

So Saturday evening saw Dad, me, Julia & James plus Annie head down to Chatham for this years Medway Lights Fest. Until the day I'd assumed the festival was based in Rochester again, although equally we'd wondered why a park 'n' ride had been set up in the Dockyard???

Decided on a whim to download a map and realised it was being based in Chatham this year - doh!

To be honest I think it was a mistake, Chatham isn't the best place to be in broad daylight let alone at night, full of noisy drunks and all manner of undesirables. Plus the exhibits were too spread out and some involved queuing which we didn't bother to do and some were indoors which we had to skip because of Annie. It was an experience but not necessarily in a good way.

Got some photos which was the main reason for going and if it's not back at Rochester again next year then I probably won't go but we live and learn!

Moving Anniversary & Amaryllis

So this Off Friday marked two years to the day that Julia and James moved into their new home only a stone's throw from where I live. How time flies! And it transpires that their new neighbours, following the passing of the old lady who lived next door to Julia & James, moved in today also! How weird! Apparently Julia was about to challenge some "bloke" rummaging around in the garage next door and then realised it was the new neighbour ;-)

It's also been another long week, all of it this time spent in the office prepping the plan for the next phase of the project. A laborious job not made any easier by the eagle eyed scrutiny of senior management who seem to think it can be done quicker - as always they are wrong but it doesn't stop them micromanaging us. Copious amounts of sweets have helped keep us sane 🍬🍫🍬

On an upbeat note the Amaryllis is flowering at a steady rate now, a couple of the original set of flowers from the first main stem are now dying off and the second stem is now flowering. Decided it was high time I took some proper photos of it so dug out the 77D and 50mm and 35mm lenses plus my ring LED light and spent the morning snapping away. Below is a quick phone transfer to make a collage for my journal app:

And here is probably my image of the day although it was hard to choose:

This variety is Christmas Star, a vibrant red and white, never had one of these plants before so being guided on its upkeep and subsequent preparation for storage by Dad who's managed to resurrect the bulbs for future flowering. Normally I'm not an indoor plant kind of girl, I'm all famine or feast on the watering and so they rarely survive. There are times when I wonder how I managed to raise my daughter 🤣 Still it appears to be thriving so must be doing something right!

Off to #MedwaysLights tomorrow evening with Dad, Julia and James, have a look around the illuminated installations albeit based in Chatham this year rather than Rochester. M50 fitted with a 22mm pancake lens will be the order of the night, it's an F2 lens, so fast enough for night photography although equally I'm not precious about using high ISOs if it gets me what I want - that's what JPEG and Canon built-in noise reduction is for. After all, who knows their cameras better than Canon??? Certainly not Adobe that's for sure. Looking forward to seeing how the event measures up against last year, certainly for me Rochester is a nicer area for this sort of thing and to be honest, until I'd randomly decided to download a map I'd no idea it had moved location this year. No wonder they decided on a Park & Ride based at the Yard. So yeah we'll see what's on offer this year to "showcase" the Medway Towns 🤔

Up and Down Week

 

So this week has been up and down, the down bits mostly work related as we strive to set up the next project phase and senior management do their usual thing of suggesting we can all do it harder, faster blah, blah, blah. Quite frankly it's an insult and they are rapidly getting on my nerves. So much so one evening in particular called for some alcohol...

So here is the Archers and lemonade poured and ready to drink post my dinner. The last few mouthfuls were a little strong, so they ended up down the sink but it had the desired effect. Not a drinker by any means but sometimes needs must.

This Off Friday saw me take a mooch along to the Crem for a "chat" with Mum. Really wish this could be a proper natter over a cuppa but sadly it's very much a one-way conversation 😭 But the snowdrops were peeking through the ground, an early sign of Spring and hopefully much better weather and better days ahead. Also took a mooch on Saturday up to the local nature park with the TG-6 and snapped a few bits and pieces that caught my eye...

Love a piece of wood and these two parts of some of the natural fencing were no exception. Not much sprouting out of the ground just yet, and I guess the cold snap which is due in the next few days isn't going to help anything that's already broken ground but looking forward to seeing some more signs of Spring soon - daffodils, crocus, blossom on the trees.