® Andy’s blog of blogs

An interesting new prototype from Casio. Not quite sure what I’d use 60FPS for when shooting pictures, but I’m a huge fan of “bridge cameras”. They give a single device with most of the controllability of a DSLR, a lense that goes from wide to very telephoto, and importantly they also record videos too. When I’m exploring I can’t be doing with having multiple devices or lenses, and so my Sony DSC-H1 meets pretty much all my needs while giving pictures that most can’t tell from DSLR shots.

Perhaps you visited a huge industrial site and got covered in dust and grime, or maybe the flying rats got the better of you and you stink! What do you do? Well you could get out your trusty baby wipes (which typically get dried out by the heat of my engine where they live in my exploring bag in my boot) and maybe some anti-bac handwash. Or howsabout you have a quick shower?

… but how about this for an alternative take on transport!!

I first visited Jacksons Farm back in April. It’s somewhere I’ve driven past regularly for many years, and I’d been watching it slowly fall to pieces before ultimately being abandoned. On my last visit the large farm house, that I’ve always admired, was well boarded. However, as I knew would probably happen in the end, somebody has now pulled the boards off and started ripping the place to pieces in search of copper and the like. Reckon it didn’t take them long to discover that actually there wasn’t much of value.

So up at 5:15AM, a brisk walk a mile down the road and a small battle with some brambles, and I was able to spend an hour mooching. I’d been hoping that the farm house would still have evidence of its previous occupants, but actually it was totally stripped of everything apart from the curtains and some carpets. Hence after all the waiting, ultimately it was a rather soulless shit tip! Light was pretty crap too at that time of day, but at least I can consider it now completely “done”!

All the pictures from both visits are here.

Get your cuppa just how you like it. Thankfully my diet coke always comes out the bottle to my preferred strength :-).

We, the UE community, are forever troubled by badly written narrow minded sensationalist articles that misrepresent our exploring pursuits. The Daily Mail approach to news. Far too often we’ve seen our pictures stolen by local papers who then write hatchet jobs on how explorers have “broken into” local buildings pertinent to their readership and call upon their local emergency services to comment on our “crimes” and “irresponsibility”. Ironically the crime that is most regularly committed is the flagrant copyright theft that they undertake.

However, occasionally there are exceptions, and here’s a great example of one. A beautifully written piece from the San Fran Chronicle reproduced via SF Gate accompanied by some stonking pictures too.

… which is how come I wear a red LED watch on my wrist, just like the one my buddy Tony at primary school got for his birthday back in 1977 (along with a Starsky and Hutchy Corgi model car as I recall it). Anyhow, Nooka make some interesting looking watches but not so sure about these latest ones.

… yet I always try not to display derision towards other peoples’ academic choices but come on … a degree in Fashion Buying or Outdoor Adventure with Philsophy!? People will be telling me next that A-levels really are as hard as they were 20 years ago ;-).

Watched the Transformers movie with my older two boys yesterday and enjoyed it thoroughly. However, their post-movie constructions in KNEX, whilst excellent, couldn’t quite match up to this masterpiece.

… which also should have the side effect of getting Flog on Facebook to automatically update when I blog something. Fingers crossed and night night!!