Folk off!

Just a quick trip out today to Holmfirth for their annual folk festival weekend.

For those that don't know, Holmfirth is a "village" that seems to hang quite firmly from the coat tails of "Last of the Summer Wine" which is a British sitcom that you watch once you've retired (because you recognise your friends in the various characters).

Holmfirth is awash with references to the show.  Wrinkled Stockings tea rooms.... Sid's Cafe..... Compo's fish and chip restaurant......

A friend once told me that (after Bill Owen the actor that played the character of Compo in LotSW) they were renaming Compo's Cafe...... to De-Compo's Cafe!!  Boom boom!

I've never been a fan of the show, nor have I embarked on any themed ride or event that goes with it.  I suppose it's alright for the comers-in and the old folks....

They DO have some cool things that happen in and around Holmfirth though that don't tip a nod to this heinous sitcom.  One such event is the annual folk festival that's been running this weekend....

Really it was just a chance to head on up there.... and drink a couple of local ales.... watch a few street performances (all the free stuff for my shallow pockets) and have something to eat.  All of which happened in glorious sunshine.

We saw some samba drummers.... a few troops of morris dancers..... some street theatre about St. George and some crazy battles and a strange horse creature..... and a sketch involving two chubby guys dressed as Olympic athletes doing some sort of routine that was actually much more amusing than it sounds.....

Good clean fun for all the family.

I've said it before.

It never pays to drunken blog... drunken phone.... or indeed drunken text message. I generally fall foul of all three even though I try not to do any of them.

Suffice to say my drunken antics that meant I didn't spend the night with Dawn as per our previous "sober" planning, have not had any serious or long lasting repercussions other than to make me look like the idiot that I so often can be.

I conclude.... I love eating food, and often wish I didn't get full because the food tastes so nice and I could eat it all day if I didn't fill up. I also love drinking beer but am rarely happy with the end result.... I honestly don't drink beer to get drunk, or at least not to get as drunk as I do!!

We've had a good weekend though and enjoyed a little outing to the Huddersfield Festival of Light which ran on Friday and Saturday nights in town. I don't think it was as good a spectacle as last year, but the cold winter evening followed by a quick pint at the Grove in town was a rare pleasure.

This season I have been mostly pissed off at O2 broadband's DNS problems that have kept me off the web all weekend!!!!!!!! GRRRRRRRRRR



Slightly out of sharpness due to the crazy long exposure and no tripod - nice example of the light and fireworks though. Somewhere in there is a soldier with some sort of firearm that was dangerously spewing fire and brimstone. We were (rather hilariously to me) warned at the start of the show that "these are real fireworks and real Spanish people".

Foot off....

Foot off the pedal and onto the leaf litter.

I've had a couple of walking days. These starkly contrast with the couple of drinking days/nights that preceded. A sojourn into the boozy boundaries of Brighouse and a lighthearted look at Elland's finest hostelries, complete with the Barge and Barrel's beer festival have left me with a desire to walk some of it off.

Saturday night and for a change we stayed in and had a curry. Having taken Stevie the wonder dog out on a suitably strenuous hike during the day, I was neither in the mood nor were my paws of sound quality to make a hike out to yet another establishment to sample more beery wares.

An indigestion inspiring vegetable madras and a peshwari naan (and potatoes and peas.... pilau rice.... chapattis.... onion bhajis..... you get the idea!!) with Harry Hill's TV Burp and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, made for a classically Novemberish night in on the sofa.

I love Autumn.



The playground of my childhood - Rocking Stones Quarry - used to be on the left on this picture, but since work resumed and has ceased again, is now on the right of this picture. You can see on the left where they have flattened over their workings and nature is gradually reclaiming the scoured earth. Nice gatepost, and a fine illustration for Maxxo that it was in fact a lovely day here yesterday - sorry buddy!!

Happy Diwali.

Regardless of the mythological explanation one prefers, what the festival of lights really stands for today is a reaffirmation of hope, a renewed commitment to friendship and goodwill, and a religiously sanctioned celebration of the simple - and some not so simple - joys of life. - Times of India editorial.

..... The festival of light is upon us. Lights, fireworks and sweets!! Every kids dream come true!! Forget your Halloween and your trick-or-treat nonsense.



Effing technology!! I tried to upload this very photograph a squillion and odd times, but for some bloody reason it kept rotating the image (anti-clockwise) by ninety degrees or 270 degrees (clockwise) whichever you prefer!!

Anyhow, this is an image I shot at the Huddersfield Festival of Lights last year during a performance by the Plasticiens Volants group. Catch a short video of it here (it's not my video).