Dumbfunk

27//52

2008-07-09T18:19:00.001+01:00

27//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty seven // July 6
• Home, England
• This week the official paperwork finally came through on a job change at work and as well as all the daily stuff, it has sealed three interesting changes to my home life. Firstly, my working day has shifted about 4 hours forward so that I can be on a similar time to my colleagues in "the D". This is a great thing. Working into the evening is a tiny, tiny sacrifice to pay for once and for all escaping my hatred of early mornings. I know it's healthy and has the best light but frankly if I never see pre-8am again in my life I won't shed a single tear. Secondly and largely because of this, I now mostly work from home. I love the freedom but it's a double edged sword. With everything I need right around me it's a constant battle not to let days slip by without stepping further than the porch to collect my morning milk. Right now I'm hard at work devising a regular excuse to get at least some fresh air every day. The final change is the house itself. When I bought the place a decade ago it felt like a massive and terrifying achievement and the freedom from rented accommodation filled me with a seemingly unstoppable zest for renovation. However, after re-buying it five years later in a shoddily thought out personal stability plan, I discovered that this motivation had also packed up, slammed the door and left. But that was then and being here all the time there are hardly any excuses left - which is why I'm breaking the only self portrait rule I had and showing you a glimpse of the horrifying pink bathroom I inherited. That way I'll have to fix it right? I mean seriously, look at that tile!

26//52

2008-07-05T22:12:00.001+01:00

26//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty six // June 28
• Jodrell Bank, England
• It was my birthday this week. I got what felt like a million best wishes messages, some very cool gifts and for just a couple of minutes ... it even stopped raining. I took this opportunity to lure an international visiting team up to see Ron and Ronet in Manchester stopping off and the ridiculously impressive Jodrell Bank radio observatory in Cheshire. I remember coming here as a child and the 250' diameter Lovell Telescope looked just as massive today as it did to my reduced vantage point back then. Please know that I did try so hard to get a "here's a photo of the dish" type joke in here but frankly lost enthusiasm for the project after seeing my squinting sun-blind face. Anyway, another reason for the trip was the couple of Radiohead tickets that my amigo Carl counjoured up for Sunday night. Whilst not having been a massive fan in the past I was hugely impressed and had a great afternoon lying in the sun and listening to absolutely the best sound I've heard at an outdoor venue. Something confirmed back at Ron Towers where apparently you could easily hear the gig from a couple of miles away across the city.

25//52

2008-06-24T14:52:00.001+01:00

25//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty five // June 22
• Home, England
• Spent this week mainly catching up on sleep and e-mail after my time living out the back of a Land Rover and it has seemed to fly by. I was delighted to see that every single piece of flora in my garden had quadrupled in size whilst I was away which as the World's least enthusiastic gardener potentially presented an issue. My plan however, is to use a combination of hired hands and dangerous machinery to regain control ... that or just tip a gallon of Round-Up over it. A method used to great effect in my Basra inspired rear garden project. Also showing absurd growth potential is my hair which despite (or maybe because of) having worn it long for many years as I succeeded in failing as a musician, now annoys me intensely whenever I go more that 4 weeks without cutting it. Rest assured it'll be fixed by the next 52 shot - if only because I need to submit a new passport application this week and fully understand the implication of 10 more years with a ridiculous photo.

24//52

2008-06-19T23:32:00.001+01:00

24//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty four // June 15
• Le Mans, France
• This year's pilgrimage to the World's greatest motor race was a little different from recent times as due to reasons of budget, priorities or work commitments our 8 man party was reduced to just 3. To help our reduced team spirit and with recent photos of the camp site under feet of water fresh in my mind I took perhaps the first mature decision of my adult life and left the yellow car at home so that the three of us could travel together. Whilst this was obviously a huge personal sacrifice, my feelings were eased somewhat when the hugely opulent new Land Rover we were travelling in revealed itself to have armchairs for front seats, a boomin' HK hi-fi upgrade and a fridge full of beer installed in the centre console. Seriously, 4x4s are not my kind of car but if there's an more comfortable way to cruise in traffic I haven't found it. In this picture the time is 5:25am and the rain clouds are reducing the near spiritual Le Mans dawn moment to a dull process of "getting less dark" and I am also wearing, without exaggeration, every item of outdoor clothing I brought with me. The other guys both being outdoors experts were wearing some kind of thin NASA stylée coats and warm as toast - nevertheless in my mind this was clear vindication of my "t-shirt per day" packing method!

22//52

2008-06-10T14:19:00.001+01:00

22//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty two // June 1
• Home, England
• I spent what felt like an age setting up a movie watching shot for this week because I've recently joined an on-line rental company. They let me borrow an unlimited number of films, two at a time, with free postage all for the price of 2 Blockbuster flicks and a small bag of popcorn. The first task was to make up my rental wish-list and this started easily with all the Blu-Ray stuff I can't seem to find anywhere else before moving effortlessly on to the latest DVD releases that I'd missed in the cinema. Then what? The remaining rentals after that are essentially free so I was interested to find myself hunting out the films I've seen a hundred times but suddenly wanted to watch properly. Ted Demme's "Beautiful Girls", the original 1960 version of H.G.Wells' "Time Machine" and "Almost Famous" from Cameron Crowe all made it straight on to the list, as did "Tom And Jerry - Collector's Edition" which unbelievably the on-line reviews tell me has had to be censored before release! Tonight however was going to be the German Language movie "The Counterfeiters" of which I'd read great things ... obviously having spent most of the evening pointing cameras, tweaking lightroom and writing these words it's now half past ten and too late to start watching it. Just as well really, I didn't have any popcorn anyway.

21//52

2008-05-29T13:07:00.001+01:00

21//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty one // May 25
• Birmingham, England
• We had a couple of days where it actually did not rain this week. I know that sounds incredible but it's true. I even wore shorts at one point but thankfully the combined efforts of an English climate and the fashion police were on hand to get me back into something warmer in time for the bank holiday weekend. Faced with needing to entertain house guests in this meteorological lottery I went with the old favourites: movies, pubs, camera stores and rooftop photo locations. It probably wouldn't work for everyone though so to avoid disappointment I'd suggest you need to find your own formula.

20//52

2008-05-19T01:28:00.001+01:00

20//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twenty // May 19
• Home, England
• I really need to start planning my weekend nights out better. Now that many of my friends are scattered around the country and the globe, the 4pm Friday afternoon just doesn't cut it any more. Did it ever? I spent the resultant evenings watching movies from my fabulous new on-line rental place, drinking Spanish beer and eating pizza ... at least I didn't waste them right? Then on Sunday I helped to empty the contents of my Mother's garage into a large metal skip and amongst the incredible quantity of "oddments" that my hoarding Grandfather and his equally hoarding son had left for us was a small cloth case. It had my father's name written on the inside in blue ink in the kind of hand writing that only Grandmothers can perfect and inside was a Bakelite Kodak Brownie 127 camera. I remembered it immediately as the one she would make me stand statue still and upright in front of on special birthday and Christmas occasions. Occasionally she would let me take a photo but not too often because as she explained, film was expensive. Despite dating back to the mid-50s it looks literally just a couple of years old. Now I need to find out where to buy 127 film and how the devil to get it processed. That's why in this photo I look proud and confused in equal measures. Either way, I'm sure that my Nan would not have approved of my posture.

19//52

2008-05-11T22:43:00.001+01:00

19//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Nineteen // May 11
• Trimpley, England
• I arrived home on Sunday evening after an easy drive from Amsterdam. My house had clearly missed me and planned a few surprises for my return. Firstly the lawn decided to punish my absence by growing at a rate never before logged by botanists and when I braved the planet's most spidery shed to find the mower, discovered the ceiling had collapsed in the heavy rainstorms I'd avoided by being away. Finally my car that had been left alone in the garage for over a month repaid my lack of attention with a flat battery that lead to me bump starting it outside the most expensive shopping arcade in Birmingham. This was a stylistic low point. But it wasn't all bad news. The 759 frames I'd shot around Europe over the previous three weeks turned out well and I made my first ever video that I am absolutely and childishly proud of. It took me over ten minutes so please be gentle ...

You can find it here.

18//52

2008-05-08T18:20:00.001+01:00

18//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Eighteen // May 5
• Otterlo, Netherlands
• After three weeks, two thousand miles and seven countries I found myself back in Amsterdam for what will certainly be my last visit as an almost-local. Thanks to the unimaginable generosity of Ron and Ronet I came to think of the city as my second home as I lodged with them and commuted to my office near the airport one week per month for nearly two years. I engineered a re-location deal which fell through just as I was putting my house on the rental market and then, when the day job stopped paying for me to visit, I carried on coming as often as I could just the same. Virtually every European holiday Ive taken in 8 years has either begun or ended with us toasting good times in Amsterdam. I loved feeling part of the most relaxed yet vibrant and entertaining city Id ever visited. I loved that I knew the place well enough to be asked for cool bar and restaurant recommendations, even from Dutch friends. And I loved that after a twelve year relationship ended, this city was the only place where I didnt feel alone - even if I was just kicking my heels against the ramparts of the Film Museum bar watching people stroll through the Vondelpark in the warm sun. This place helped reinvent me as a stronger, more adventurous, more fearless version of myself and whilst Im delighted to have my local guides living nearer to me, I still felt the second enormous sense of loss in as many weeks fall across me as the early Sunday morning streets slipped by the window of my homeward bound car.

17//52

2008-04-30T10:26:00.001+01:00

17//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Seventeen // April 26
• Timmendorfer Strand, Germany
• The plan was to drive from Slovenija to Hamburg but an emergency back at the day job forced me to dive into an internet equipped hotel room in Wurzburg for an unscheduled afternoon's stopover. Fires put out, I ventured in search of dinner and after struggling with the local menu specials and texting German speakers around the globe for support, I discovered the the bar owner was in fact from New Jersey. Forgetaboutit. Hamburg turned out to be like no other German city I've visited packed with cool little restaurants and buzzing outdoor bars. It was also packed with four of my favourite people in the flickrverse which was why I didn't mind stopping traffic on the main pier at this Baltic seaside town to stand like an idiot in front of a row of tripods and cameras for 30 minutes. Yet another expected surprise was that Keks very nearly won the Hamburg marathon the morning after ... well, that's what it felt like to us.

16//52

2008-04-30T10:25:00.001+01:00

16//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Sixteen // April 20
• Ljubljana, Slovenija
• We left home at a lazy morning hour and wound our way through the English traffic to Dover where £28 secured us a one-way crossing to Dunkerque. From there is was an easy ride down to Bonn where we grabbed the last hotel room in town thanks to the Star Trek convention about to kick off the next day. It may have been Star Wars but as I didn't see anybody in costume I can't be sure. Travelling through Bavaria the next day instilled the usual immense sense of national jealousy in us both as we safely cruised at what would be jail-time speeds back home amongst the light traffic. When we eventually arrived in Slovenija I found that everything was just as I'd left it ... almost.

15//52

2008-04-14T09:50:00.001+01:00

15//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

15//52

Fifteen // April 13
• Home, England
• I love road trips more than I can possibly express. There is something about travelling very long distances by car that makes me elated. The more spontaneous and ill organised the trip, the better. It's just me versus the world and I become consumed by the feeling that with every mile, I'm a bigger person than I was at home. Travel rush I call it. This coming week will hit all those buttons but sadly for the wrong reasons as I return home to Slovenija for my Grandmother's funeral. Its a journey I've made by car maybe twenty times having resolved to visit as often as I possibly could after she moved into her eighties. Naturally, I had no idea that she would remain defiantly healthy and indestructible for another 15 years! From the first time I watched my father stubbornly drive his then new salesman-spec 1983 Ford Cortina the entire 1000 mile each way in one go, it just seemed like such a superhero thing to do. Back then it was the only way we could afford to all travel and whilst nowadays I realise that air travel costs next to nothing and that time is apparently money, come on ... where's the superhero in that?

14//52

2008-04-07T12:08:00.001+01:00

14//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Fourteen // April 6
• Clent, England
• I have an irrational love for the way you realise there is snow on the ground when you first wake up. There's always something different about the light in the house that you can't quite put your finger on until your brain throws off the covers as well and catches up. Today it was more difficult than usual to comprehend as it's April and the weather should have looked more like this. In a rare moment of outdoorsness I braved the elements to bring you this shot. Not pictured are the thermal gloves I forgot to bring nor the blue shutter fingers that thankfully were wrapped around mugs of coffee shortly after. Fortunately I was able to perfectly capture the expression of a man who half wished he'd overslept instead.

13//52

2008-03-30T21:21:00.001+01:00

13//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Thirteen // March 30
• Home, England
• This week I went to my first live show in what seems like an age. At a really small club in the city not only did I again get to see the incomparably excellent Buck 65 but I was also introduced to his fellow Canadian support act C.R. Avery. He was a kind of beat poet who played harmonica, sang and beatboxed - not especially unique in itself except that he did all three simultaneously. Seriously, a few hundred years ago we'd have burned him as a witch. In other news, yesterday my old mate BigJob came over for a catch-up evening. The plan was to go for a quick pint, grab fish & chips for dinner and check out a movie ... as it happened we are both such startling conversationalists that by the time we left the pub they had finished serving for the night and all the chip shop had left were pies. Finally today we met up for an advanced Le Mans planning meeting at a pub near Leicester and we we may have bored even ourselves with dull boy-talk about engines and new cars and motor racing. Nevertheless, entrance tickets are booked, dates are set and it's all unimaginably exciting.

12//52

2008-03-24T12:36:00.001Z

12//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Twelve // March 21
• Birchover, England
• I caught up with a flock* of my fave visiting flickr people this weekend and drove up to the Peak District for lunch and fresh air. As it turned out we all ended up with a little too much of each and were eventually beaten back by a horizontal hailstorm and winds that were officially ranked as "frickin' ridiculous". I'm sure that I must have been colder at some point in my life but I couldn't tell you exactly when. Just before our meteorological kicking, we climbed up on to Rowtor Rocks, a stone formation that some people believe was once used by Druids as a ceremonial worship site. Having forgotten to pack either a goat or a virgin, I chose to sacrifice a 52 shot instead.

(* - All and any suggestions for an alternative collective noun are invited but please note that both "a geek of ..." and "a nerd of ..." have been taken by the IT industry and viewers of motor racing)

11//52

2008-03-19T15:09:00.001Z

11//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Eleven // March 16
• Home, England
• So it's mid-March, it's 4:32am and I'm awake drinking strong coffee. This can only mean that the Formula One World Championship is under way again. It's the only sport I watch and every season I enjoy it more, especially now that there's some actual driving going on following the banning of electronic driver aids. In other news I waved goodbye to my trusty black car this week. In the past three and a half years I've driven 75,000 miles, visited nine countries, eaten hundreds of meals and slept countless hours in it's optional sports seats. Not at the same time obv. I know I'm a sucker for this but it's not the metal that's important - it's the adventures and memories that it puts you in mind of that matter. Replacement with a younger, hotter, sportier version has eased the pain considerably ... I'm guessing that's not the first time that sentence has been used.

10//52

2008-03-19T15:08:00.001Z

10//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Ten // March 8
• Bromsgrove, England
• It's been ... emotional. One of my oldest friends is leaving to live and work in New Zealand and so we decided to have a quiet lunchtime get together with some other old friends. You can see where this is going right? Anyway, it turns out that Gaz is a little more popular than we all knew as the constant stream of "celebrities from the past" kept us all amused for somewhat longer than the anticipated early evening end time. After a solid nine hours in the same venue the last remaining few of us decided that Indian food was essential to complete the waving-off process. You can see how importantly it's all being taken by the closeness with which they're studying their menues. I'll take questions now ... Yes, we did all laugh until our faces hurt. No, of course they're not erm asleep. Yes, naturally they insisted on going to another bar afterwards. Yes, absolutely we'll miss this kind of selfless dedication to mischief. Good luck mate.

09//52

2008-03-02T17:59:00.002Z

09//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Nine // March 1
• Kinver Edge, England
• A combination of hosting foreign guests, wasting money at camera shows and sleeping on people's floors created a level of exhaustion that made today's photo somewhat of a struggle. Fortunately a family lunch came to the rescue and gave me the strength to fix some leaking taps for my Mother and to spend 30 minutes trying to teach my nephew to say my name before the word "daddy". Only one of these projects was successful. I was also able to detour my journey home to hunt down some photo opportunities and having spotted this scene from the road it only took four locked wheels, a little frantic reversing and pinch of tripod wielding to bag it.

08//52

2008-02-26T10:07:00.001Z

08//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Eight // February 23
• Birmingham, UK
• I had a house full of international guests this weekend so had to conjure up suitable English entertainment for everyone. Friday was easy, plenty of locally brewed real beer in a proper "drinking pub" followed by take away fish and chips. Saturday required a high-brow approach so after meeting up with in the city we checked out the tremendous "Diving Bell and the Butterfly" at The Electric, apparently the UK's oldest working cinema. After that there was just time to snap a 52 before an important date with Indian cuisine. Frankly I was glad for the excuse to sit down - being the host with the most is exhausting work! Do you think I could be a tour guide for this kind of stuff? I reckon I could totally carry off the hat.

07//52

2008-02-17T19:47:00.001Z

07//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Seven // February 15
• Brugge, Belgium
• I left Frankfurt at 3pm and thanks to the German autobahn network found myself crossing the border into Belgium just a couple of hours and one coffee stop later. During the journey I travelled legally at speeds far in excess of 70 mph and can report that despite what the English government and media would have you believe, I was not killed instantly. Who knew? To celebrate this fact I dumped the car, checked in to a hotel and headed out looking for food and entertainment. Sadly, the incredibly cold weather meant I only scored one out of two. Unless you count the lobster fight obv.

6//52

2008-02-11T14:13:00.001Z

6//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Six // February 10
• Malvern, UK
• I think that Spring may actually have arrived today. After a week that involved a little office politics, a 2 day mad dash around France for a 4 hour meeting, an awful lot of Parisian traffic jams and an extensive programme of guest entertainment, I found myself stood on top of the Malvern hills below the first warming sun in months. There was blossom on the trees and I did not lose my ears to frostbite during an hour of al fresco motoring so I'm hoping this is a sign that summer will actually span more than 3 afternoons this year.

05//52

2008-02-03T18:37:00.003Z

05//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Five // February 2
• Birmingham, UK
• I think that I had a very quiet week. The reason I'm not sure is that undertaking the "terrible 365 project" all through last year has led me to completely forget what I've done each day unless I photograph it and make notes. Yes, I do so miss it since you ask. Anyway, today was Saturday and I woke up feeling like a man who'd told too many bad jokes, drank too many fizzy drinks and eaten too much of my host for the evening's reheated chicken chow mien. It's not a course of action I'd endorse or encourage but ... oh, I've got nothing. In other news, this is Sarah and here she's doing a ace job of cutting my hair. In the 9 or so months that I've known her this is the absolute first time I've seen her with the same hair colour on two consecutive occasions. I'm guessing there's some kind of discount scheme in place.

04//52

2008-01-27T18:37:00.000Z

04//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Four // January 27
• Sheffield, UK
• I think my vacation away from photography may be coming to an end this week. I'm feeling finally recharged and the more obscenely good shots I begin to notice appearing in the "... from your contacts" section, the more it makes me want to contribute something. So, I've decided to embark on a combined programme of inspirational book buying, weekly photo roadtripping and rolling mini-projects. I started today on the way back from Sheffield when from the motorway I spotted a church sat very high on a single hill top. Just 30 minutes of random detouring later and I was there - a couple of hours early for the good light but it shows promise right?

03//52

2008-01-21T12:08:00.001Z

03//52
Originally uploaded by Dumbfunk.

Three // January 20
• Birmingham, UK
• It never ceases to amaze me how far Birmingham has come as a city in 10 years. I mean, it's still full of violent drunks in the early hours of any morning but sadly that's true of any English city (incidentally, if anybody has an explanation about the Anglo Saxon drunk fighting gene I'd be happy to hear it). Any other time however it's a city I'm shocked to actually be happy to show people around. The bars are good, there is suddenly a huge choice of places to eat in every world food group and the whole canals, museums and shopping thing is a winner. As usual I'm all out of sync and back when I lived just 2 miles from the centre I could never find a good enough reason to visit.

02//52

2008-01-13T23:59:00.000Z

Two // January 13
• Sheffield, UK
• It's been a quiet week with almost no photo activity, probably a reaction against the terrifying 365 project and I've enjoyed the break. What I have missed however is just the act of thinking about photo opportunities everyday and always, always carrying my camera. So this weekend, photo vacation finished, it was up to Sheffield to share a birthday beer and talk pictures with Carlito. This is an old church near his house that has been derelict for years and that for once, is not surrounded by barbed wire and warning signs. All the better for the 52.