I’m a big follower of this blog: https://www.becomebetty.com/trader-joes-carrot-cake-spread/ I’m slightly addicted to Betty’s take on all the stuff she buys from Trader Joe’s which is a large supermarket chain in California ( and may be elswhere ). Looking at what our American cousins eat might give an insight into how they behave. They certainly are n’t short on creativity. In the case above they obvoiusly dropped a cake in the baking department and shovelled it into jars. No need to worry, I’m sure it was all in a controlled environment, though nuts might have been present. In fact that exactly … Continue reading Put that on your sandwich!

September evening on the plot, only me there. Complete peace and quiet. Perfect evening. Worth sharing. I’d rather be… #allotments #gardening #plottage #vegetables #sheds Continue reading Why I’d rather be…

Off I go for a haircut. One of those days where you think things might go well, but the signs are that all is not well. Subdued barber, lady barber that is, she obviously thought she’d rather be doing something else than mowing my head. Very pleasant, but not a lot of “connection”. The usual opener ” Got a lot on today?” I suppose it’s better than the dentist in that their questions and what I call “dental gibbering” can rarely be answered when they have all thier metalwork and suction pumps in the answer box. Then a thought occured, … Continue reading I’d rather be…

It’s the only place I know in the UK with an exclamation mark in the name. As part of my series of ‘proper drawings’ this is just one of a big series drawings. This is the original and is from this photograph taken some years ago. It would lend itself to one of those Cohen brother films as a poster. I only ever did one poster for cinema and that was when the props ( a house ) were more important to the director than the then leading actor who was Tom Hanks! A very long time ago. The job … Continue reading Westward Ho! At a cinema near you soon.

  Everyone knows that the tea fields of Yorkshire are just outside Barnsley in a secret location. Here you will find repurposed mine workers earning an honest living picking the tea at night ably assisted by cloth headed women with a leg in each corner. Flavour is enhanced by night picking. It’s as likely as coffee from Italy, there is none. So when they call it Yorkshire Tea it’s bending the truth. Makes a good brew though. #yorkshire #tea #barsnley #teabags #brew #marketingbollocks     Continue reading Yorkshire Tea, it’s tea but it’s not from Yorkshire.

There are far too many first world problems that get me generating heat, but a recent bill from the bailiffs for Scottish Power really did take the shortbread. I owe Scottish Power nothing. Despite that, they continued to send letters from their bailiff company insisting that I do. I made my feeling known to them and they advised that they would get the bailiffs to desist and that they would pay me what they had demanded as some sort of recompense. I’ve since had two more letters from the bailiffs. In Scottish Poer’s cheery ‘customer service focussed’ response they recently suggested : … Continue reading Power ranger…och aye.

Here’s another drawing from my recent selection of ‘proper drawings’ It’s actually a view from my allotment plot. The original photo was taken some years ago as I was just in the process of ‘restoring’my patch from some previous neglect. There’s no big story here, it’s just a drawing of some sheds. There’s work to do here, both in the drawings and on the plot. Here’s the original photo. Continue reading Sheddage

I’ve been doing some more of my ‘proper’ drawing recently. Building up a collection. Some of these as finished pieces are viewable on my alter ego site: the unknown artist The same ones are available as prints from here On a recent posting, one of my friends said that they deserved some explanation. So here goes. The images are all from my own photographs of my travels and holidays. Many come from walking holidays where I can usually found bringing up the rear of any walk while looking for images. Some are a little more local to me here in … Continue reading Where do they come from?

Off we go, walking in the Cotswolds again, perhaps to sing the odd song under a canal bridge. This is what we did today, my friend Robin, the singer, and me. Quietest place on the walk and the best place to burst into song. The Canal is overgrown right here but is part of the Stroudwater Canal running from there to here and beyond, here being towards Frampton Mansell. We did not reckon with the runner coming into view, and she probably thought it odd that someone was singing under a bridge. From here we wandered down the tow path … Continue reading Singing under a canal bridge, but don’t mention the cheese.

Hopefully, they were all out getting a good walk in which is what we did, but nobody dropped into here yesterday. It’s flattering when anybody calls by to my blog and even more so when they like or say anything. Why do we do it? Well, I think it’s a little like going to the pub and bending someone’s ear at the bar. Not something I’ve ever really been prone to doing as I rarely visit pubs these days, or any days really apart from my long gone student times when I successfully managed to make myself ill every time. … Continue reading No visitors on a Sunday

OK, that’s enough of these. This one is a little more local and is from a picture taken down by the River Severn. It’s a meadow and it was another bright blue day. It’s sometimes only after you’ve taken a picture and looked at it again that you realise what a wonderful day it was and exactly how lucky we are right here to live in such a wonderful landscape. This series has featured places as far away as Canada and the Orkneys, but this one is literally just down the road. The other factor here is that we can … Continue reading The last of the series. Did I hear a sigh of relief?

Some years ago we went walking in Crete, with olive trees at every turn I took loads of pictures. This is from one of them. That black sky on the top right will be blue, leaving me to get the rest of this to look as it should, baking hot with cool shadows. The truck below was on the same walk, but I won’t be drawing that. The plan is to make the truck a photoprint version. I think it’s a volvo! Continue reading One of the few from Crete