Easter Circus

The Moscow State Circus arrived in the park yesterday morning.



This morning they've begun to put the tent up.
It will probably take most of the day.
Is that the same red car?

a de-lurking post

That Day Happy New Year! I already like the look of 2009, even though, as you can see it's a bit frosty this morning. Since this is a new year, new broom and whathaveyou, how about we have a de-lurking post? I received a nice email from someone called Macey in Maine USA a couple of days ago who'd already been reading for a few weeks so I know there are a couple more of you out there. Who are you, when did you start reading and why? In the comments, please...

disconcerting but brilliant

Liverpool Life Liverpool: The Souvenir is a new book of photographs published by the Liverpool Daily Post which perfectly captures the atmosphere in the city during this capital of culture year. The images were selected from their flickr group and every page is bursting with life and colour even when the shots are in black and white, and if you turn to page 53, you’ll notice this:



The original image is here. I am very pleased and honoured to be sitting alongside such talented company, and I can’t recommend the book highly enough. And yes, I would still be saying that even if I wasn’t in it.

It seems to be on-sale in all good bookshops and newsagents around the city, including the place were I buy my morning paper, which is disconcerting but brilliant.

Elsewhere The inevitable photographs of the park with my new camera.

The view from my window three hours ago.

The view from my window three hours ago., originally uploaded by feelinglistless.

When I was a youngster, Boots was the place to have your photographs developed. I very much remember being confused by a shop which dispensed yucky medicine and could also turn the little tubes of plastic into pictures, but much of time I'd accept anything I was told. Mum used to call said cure 'Mickey Mouse' medicine so that I would take it, and even in my teenage years I thought there was some kind of endorsement in the pharmaceutical industry from Disney. Every so often my Dad would bring home one of the little blue Boots envelopes and inside would be photographs of recent holidays, our back garden and family meals.

It just seems right then, that I've just bought my first digital camera from the same place. I did shop around first though. The inevitable flick through an Argos catalogue, the squinting across the counter in Currys, the listening to a lecture or standard sales pitch from the man in the bright yellow shirt roaming around Comet (how can a company live with themselves making their workforce have to damage their eyesight every morning putting on that bright yellow uniform?). In the end though I returned to Boots and I was convinced by one thing in the end. Customer service.

After glancing through the cabinet, I asked at the photo counter about the cameras. A sales girl who looked not unlike Audrey Tattou appears and guides me back there. I ask the boring questions you have to ask when you're spending that much money on a consumable and she answered them but at no point was there a hint of sales pitch. She was straight and honest and had a sense of humour, and unlike the man in Comet didn't spend any time at all boasting about holidays enjoyed in Paris and the Philippines.

In other words I was talking to a real person, who happened to resemble Amelie, who was willing to warn me off buying a camera that took AA batteries because they didn't last too long, ruling out the original camera I was looking at. She thought it was funny as I did that some of the camera manufacturers had jumped on the new media bandwagon and were boasting that their wares had 'blogging features' and were 'You Tube' ready which told you nothing about the quality of the camera. Did you know lithium batteries were rechargable?

In the end, I bought a display model, at a discount, and was very happy about that. It's a Fujifilm Finepix F47fd (for those who know about these things). Even as I paid for it, I marveled at the list of features on the box and we laughed at the reason which spurned me into buying -- the Superlambbanana which have invaded Liverpool, because she'd been out hunting too. And as I sit with Mr Fuji in the palms of my hands it feels like my camera in a way I'm not sure it would if I'd simply picked it from a catalogue and waited for it to appear at a slot. Thanks Nina.