Res per industriam prosperae ... don't make me laugh

To no-one's great surprise BHS is to close after years of having money syphoned out of the company by its previous two owners. So there's yet another empty store in the heart of town... looking good for the you know what next year. Res per industriam prosperae is the ironic motto running across the store's impressive mural.

Light and shade

Trying something different with the Spurn lightship.

Dangerous Waters

Hull's marina sparing no expense on health and safety ...

When you're in a hole ...

Jameson Street is really under the knife as the makeover makes over.

The guys who are doing all this wonderful work have made a little video of the full extent of their efforts. It appeared in the local paper recently; I'm sure they wont mind too much if I share it here. If the video doesn't work here's a direct link.

Media morte in vita sumus

This old tree, I think it's a lime tree, is huge, not tall particularly but wide; some of its branches must be forty or fifty foot long. And by all that is right and proper it should be dead. Quite apart from this massive gash where a branch has fallen off, three quarters of its branches  are clearly dead and bare. The saprophytic fungi have moved in already. And yet ... and yet there are still leaves sprouting from  a few branches. Clearly not going to gentle into that goodnight.

The weekend in black and white is here.

Hazy with buttercups

I made a brief sojourn to Beverley Westwood on a hazy June day. I don't think I've ever seen so many buttercups. The cattle that roam about this place must have read that buttercups are poisonous and are carefully avoiding them ...

Sailing By

This odd little installation in Bridlington features a transparency of an oil painting, the Great Gale of 1871 by local artist J T Allerston. If you are not from these parts you may not recognise the names surrounding and underneath the picture. These are the shipping forecast areas and to anyone who has listened to BBC Radio 4 as it closes down for the night they will be only too familiar. The forecast was (probably still is, I haven't listened for a while) usually preceded by a piece of light music entitled 'Sailing By'. That tune and the almost poetic recitation of the forecast following was enough to send most people off to sleep; a kind of national lullaby. Some, however, found the shipping forecast altogether more invigorating ...