Month: January 2017

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Good Bye Honda Deauville NT650V

This week we said good bye to our Honda Deauville, we had the bike from new and have toured all over England, Wales and Scotland, have gone to France several times and even gone as far as Spain.

With all the the hard use, we bought the BMW R1100S to reduce the millage somewhat.  Once we had two bikes then we could go on camping trips together

That bike has now gone after 32000 miles and we replaced it with the GS which we have now done over 50000.

But its tours two up we will remember most.

With panniers, top box and a tank bag, you can tour in comfort.

Its with sadness we have sold her but it will not be the end of our Deauville adventures.

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Building Works in Lincoln

Building the New Lincoln Cornhill Quarter – Leica M8

There is a lot going on in Lincoln at the moment.  More university builds are going up, we have the new transport hub being build and the whole market and Cornhill area is now being redeveloped.  I’ll be interested in what they do with the latter.  Under the Cornhill they used to be a bar in the cellar, good drinks, good music; it was an odd place that attracted quite a mix of people from students, to rockers, punks and business men in their suits grabbing a decent drink before heading home.

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Which Leica M

If the rumours are true then this month is when Leica will finally announce the new M rangefinder, and i’ll have a key decision to make.

Leica M4 35 Summicron, Fuji Superia – Time for Tea
Currently for my Leica shooting, I use a Leica M4 for film work (see the first two photographs), and a Leica M8 with the M8.2 updates and upgraded shutter for Leica digital work (see example shot three).

Leica M8
Once its announced I have to decide what I want to do.

As I have said before on this blog, I want a new M for full frame, better high ISO performance and live view for situations that require critical focusing.

  • New M10 (or what ever its going to be called)
  • M Type 262
  • M Type 240

The new M is likely to be at the top of my list and I expect it to tick all the boxes; the surprise for people is the Type 262, this is for some people a budget and cut down Type 240, it lacks live view, has no movie mode but is smaller, lighter and has a better shutter.  Last in my order of preference is the M240 or even the M240-P with the bigger buffer.  This again ticks all the boxes but is a heavier camera.

 

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Gardening Planning for January

So last month we dug over one of the four beds and planted out the onion sets.

Last week I dug out some of the gardening books and in full ‘Monty Don’ mode starting a bit of planning.

It was easy work as it was all theory, checking out websites and making lists of veg we wanted to try and grow this year, but we will have to do some work this month and at least dig over the last three vegetable beds.  I also need to make a final decision on the potatoes and whether to plant ‘First Early’ or ‘Second Early’ or like last year go for straight main crop.

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macOS Sierra 10.12.2 released

I see Apple released macOS Sierra 10.12.2 last month, I did not notice at first as I am running macOS Sierra on an unsupported laptop, a late 2008 unibody machine maxed out, it was not until I sat down at my more modern desktop machine I saw the update.

A minor hack of the installer enabled the install but I have for now unsubscribed from Apple updates to prevent them from upsetting this machine.  You can use AUSEnabler” tool to subscribe to their already hacked updates if your willing to take the risk.

 

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Lunch Time Walk in the Winter Sun


It was a little warmer yesterday so on the commute into Lincoln I decided to go without the heated waistcoat underneath my biker jacket.

Caroline and I both had reasons to be in town but for different purposes and as Caroline had to head home at lunchtime we went on separate motorcycles.

Because of that I had plenty of room in the BMW GS’S top box, so took my Leica M8 (with M8.2 upgrades) with me.

After a very busy morning, and it was after one o’clock before I thought I had better get some fresh air, so I grabbed the camera and did a little street photography.

With its CCD sensor and extra sensitivity to infrared the M8 is the next best Black & White camera next to real film or a Leica Monochrom.

I took the time to take a few snaps before heading off to my favourite coffee shop.

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a new Motorcycling Year ahead

Llagollen

Last year was a quiet one for us on the bikes, no biking holidays just trips in the car.  We might try for a few days out this but that depends on a number of factors, like Dog Sitting, and getting Caroline a new bike.  At the moment a Honda NT700V as a straight replacement to the NT650V she currently has is likely to be the choice.

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New Year Jobs – Garden

I really want to get on top of the garden this year.  A couple of months ago we cleared and pruned hard the east border along side the east wing extension of the bungalow.  Which was a good job or the house would never have gotten re-rendered and painted in the week before Christmas.

We need to continue down to the garage and then we can target the west corner.  At the moment this is like a jungle, bushes over 3 meters tall tower over that area, and its going to get seriously cut back as this is the area we are intending housing the bee hives which will get built sometime.

 

In order to get a bit more organised I checked out the garden handbooks to see what next jobs we need to be ready for.  We did well last year for potatoes, marrows, onions and garlic.  We even grew some elephant garlic which was a great success.
We have already planted the onions so will start planning the next step.  It was extremely satisfying last year to be eating quiche and salad, knowing that the eggs, potatoes and salad all came from our own garden.
Heres to a great gardening 2017.