The Christmas Day posting

I haven’t been out photoing a lot lately, so here are some Christmas-themed photos picked out from the archives, taken during about the last five years or more.

There’s two dozen in all that are ready to go. Here are the first dozen:

Another dozen tomorrow.

I hope your Christmas is going well, with some of the right people with you, and not too many of the wrong people.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Renzo Piano’s new Genoa Bridge

Here is Renzo Piano’s design for a new bridge in Genoa to replace the one that collapsed:

Nice, I think. Does the job, with no fuss and much elegance.

A lot of the “photos” make this look like the Millau Viaduct. However, the spikes on the top are light fittings, not structural columns. All the load bearing is done by the columns under the roadway.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

St Paul’s interrupted

Today, it is once again tomorrow, and almost the only thing I can think of to say here is that I once again managed a posting at Samizdata, concerning some graffiti.

But here, for today, is a rather fun photo I took in October, from a train, of St Paul’s Cathedral, with lots of rather bulbous South Bank modernity in the foreground, modernity which is blocking the view of most of the cathedral:

If you think that it would be better just to see St Paul’s, well, Google image should solve your problem. But if, on the other hand, you were wanting a photo more like the one above, how else would you come across it?

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

I’ve kept it going at Samizdata – so far – just

So now, it’s five Samizdata postings by me in the last five days. And the last two (this one and, posted moments ago, this one) were done the following morning. Hurrah for backdating.

And hurrah for me backdating this one also.

The way I see it, the day ends when I go to bed.

I note that the Radio Times, one of my favourite publications, follows the same rule.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Forget those electric sheep

The book. The movie.

And the label:

Another Facebook “friend” (also an actual friend) found this, in another part of Facebook.

I don’t know the answer. Let’s ask this guy.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Dolphin on Jupiter

Indeed:

NASA took the photos, but it was Sean Doran and Brian Swift who spotted the dolphin and “visual artist and citizen scientist” Doran then Tweeted it.

I’m guessing that this dolphin is not a permanent fixture, but an accident of cloud formation. I’m guessing it will soon be gone. But what do I know? About dolphins. On Jupiter. Or anywhere.

See also, these two galaxies, which resemble a penguin looking after its egg.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

From ridiculous to sublime

Ridiculous:

Octopus shorts. Photoed by me in the Kings Road.

Not so ridiculous and just a little bit sublime:

It’s this shop, in the Fulham Road, a few hours later.

Sublime:

Sublime compared to the Octopus Shorts anyway. If Jeff Koons did that, it would change hands for millions.

Not photoed by me. A friend featured that photo at her Facebook site recently, she having photoed it. My friend says that this unicorn is something to do with fundraising for Great Ormond Street Hospital, despite not being close to that Hospital. More the Gloucester Road area. But even given all that information Google could tell me nothing about it.

I’m guessing that, what with unicorns being very big business, this unicorn, even if it is on the www, is buried under a million other unicorny images and products and general nonsense, which have all paid Google to put them first. Such is the internet. If you aren’t paying, you’re the product.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

What a day for the @Parliament official photographer to be in the Commons

Here. Like.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

But will I be able to keep it up?

Well how about that!?!? You wait months for a Brian Micklethwait posting on Samizdata, and then two come along. This one, and this one, in the space of two days!!

The theme of the most recent posting, today’s, is that when it comes to architecture, I like both the modern style and the fake-antique style, and especially when they sit right next to each other.

Like this, for instance:

That was taken in the vicinity of Victoria Station.

The reason I bang on more about architectural modernity here is that I know more about it, and it keeps changing so very interestingly, and for all sorts of other reasons I am too tired to remember just now. But I like antiquity also, even if it is being faked.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Exit 60 coathangers

Today I continued with chucking stuff out, including these sixty or so coathangers, which have been accumulating in my clothes cupboard, for no reason other than they seemed like they might one day come in handy. For a sculpture perhaps? But I’m not a sculptor.

I say chucking out. These coathangers are still in my living room. But, they are in a black plastic bin bag and ready to go. So, nearly.

That’s it for here today. But I did manage a posting at Samizdata, after what I suspect may have been my longest gap there since I started in 2002. This posting started out as something for here, but then I thought: no, there. I really want to do more for Samizdata. I know I keep saying that, but I do. Thank goodness for Natalie Solent, who seems to be responsible for well over half the Samizdata output these days. Here’s hoping I can alter that ratio a bit.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog