Biker’s Night Before Christmas

The Biker’s Night Before Christmas

Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the pad,

There was nada happenin’, now that’s pretty bad.

The woodstove was hung up in that stocking routine,

In hopes that the Fat Boy would soon make the scene.

With our stomachs packed with tacos and beer,

My girl and I crashed on the couch for some cheer.

When out in the yard there arose such a racket,

I ran for the door and pulled on my jacket.

I saw a large bro’ on a ’56 Pan

Wearin’ black leathers, a cap, and boots (cool biker, man).

He hauled up the bars on that bikeful of sacks,

And that Pan hit the roof like it was running on tracks.

I couldn’t help gawking, the old guy had class.

But I had to go in — I was freezing my ass.

Down through the stovepipe he fell with a crash,

And out of the stove he came dragging his stash.

With a smile and some glee he passed out the loot,

A new jacket for her and some parts for my scoot.

He patted her fanny and shook my right hand,

Spun on his heel and up the stovepipe he ran.

From up on the roof came a great deal of thunder,

As that massive V-twin ripped the silence asunder.

With beard in the wind, he roared off in the night,

Shouting, “Have a cool Yule, and to all a good ride!”

Christmas Party

Well tonight was the works Christmas Party.  An evening of fine food, a couple of comedians, disco and live band.

A chance to let your hair down and relax.

Hope you all have a good Christmas and your Christmas parties go well.

Harry Potter

More snow and a forecast of more to come.   This made us decide to commute to work in the car again.  Not our favourite form of transport for the trip to work.  The journey was accompanied by heavy snowfall so the right decision was definitely made.

After work, we went to a local restaurant for a meal, followed by a short walk in the snow to a good coffee shop.  Cinnamon Latté of course!

Then off to the cinema.  We had been promising ourselves a visit to see the new Harry Potter film since it was released in November, but it was not till tonight we managed to find the time.

Overall a fun film and a nice night out.  As always the film had its good parts and as always for us book lovers, it missed out parts we wanted to see.  A film is always a compromise, certainly I would hate to be a screen writer, but overall it was well worth seeing, and has whet the appetite for the final part of the series.

Lunar Eclipse

This morning was a luna eclipse, this one being a little more special then most as it was the first in 400 years to occur on the winter solstice.

Heres the luna eclipse I photographed back in 2007.

This provides a good photographic challenge, all thats needed is a long lens, a typical consumer 70-300mm telephoto zoom will do the job.

Metering for exposure can be difficult, the moon is brighter then you might expect, that together with the black sky will trick you meter into the wrong exposure.  Use manual and your histogram to judge, shoot in RAW if you can not jpeg, and use a good tripod.

You will find you need to adjust the composition regularly as the moon moves quite quickly across the frame.

See bbc.co.uk for more details about the eclipse.

Update:

Chris Bennet managed to get some photos of this mornings elipse, you can see them here.

Hoar Frost

Another bitterly cold day, the ride to work was -8°C, I don’t even want to think what the wind chill factor was.

It was a foggy ride in, but as the fog cleared it revealed a beautiful view of hoar frost encrusted trees illuminated in golden sunlight from the low winter sun.

With days like this I wish I had more time for photography.  I always seem to book indoor studio shoots during great photography weather and if I am on location the weather is awful.  Thats fate I suppose!

Birthday Post

Another Birthday passes by, unfortunately I had to work and it was quite a busy and hellish day all told.

Tonight was a nice meal out, good food, good drink, finished off at home with a rather nice bottle of red wine I had for the occasion.

Thank you everyone for the presents and thanks to my dear wife for the wonderful weekend photography course last week.  It made a lovely birthday present.

The Cold Returns

The weather in Lincolnshire has improved massively in the last couple of days, allowing the normal motorcycle commute to recommence.  Yesterday still had icy roads leading to the village leading to an interesting and challenging start to the commute.  Caroline decide to walk down the first road while I slowly road along the ice covered road with my feet down on the ground sliding along.

Once into the village it was an easy commute into town.

This afternoon the cold snap returned and it started to snow, luckily it was not too bad and we got home safe on the motorcycle.

Its been good to get back on the bike, you really miss it, and this has been one of my longest breaks off the bike.

Final farewell of Harrier Jump Jets

Lincolnshire is very proud of its RAF heritage, its known as bomber county.  Since the end of the second world war bases have gradually closed but we still have many airfields and RAF bases.

Today was the final flight from RAF Cottesmore in Rutland for the Harrier jump jets based there, but to say good bye the squadron took a final flight over Lincoln and the Lincolnshire airbases and towns.

Unfortunately I missed the fly pass but did manage to catch there practice flight yesterday.  It was an impressive flight, and an impressive demonstration of formation flying.  As a part time pilot myself (wish I had more time to fly!), I certainly appreciated the fly past.

The Harrier jump jet was a truly great demonstration of British technical achievement, but was retired early due to the financial crisis and the need for defence cuts to save money.  The Navy is also losing its Harriers and its aircraft carriers.

Lets hope we have no war, or major humanitarian disaster that needs a British aircraft carrier.  I know we need to save money but sometimes the choices made, do seem potentially fraught with danger.

Good bye Harrier, you proved your worth, in the Falklands, Iraq and the Balkans to name just a few.  I salute you, the designers, engineers and aircrew that worked with you.  Its the end of an era.

Hands on with the Sony NEX-5

Well today I finally got my hands on the Sony NEX-5.  This is not going to be a review, I am sure you have read many already, just a few first impressions.

The big advantage of the Sony is the size of its sensor, as its APS-C, its the largest sensor yet fitted to an EVIL camera.  Yet its the smallest interchangeable large sensor compact yet released.

I have to admit, it does look odd with the oversized 18-55mm lens it comes with, but it does feel surprisingly good in the hand.  The ergonomics are surprisingly good, and I was certainly expecting worse.  While not as pocketable as a ‘normal’ small sensor compact, it would certainly fit in a large jacket pocket.

With the size of the sensor, I would hope a few nice wide angles soon appear.  This is an area where Sony potentially have an advantage over micro four thirds, but currently the lens selection is limited compared to the micro four thirds system.

The controls were reasonable and certainly much better then I expected from reading other reviews.

Sony NX-5
©Andrew Jordan

The biggest issue I find is the lack of a true viewfinder.  I want a camera with a proper viewfinder, so once again the camera that still leads the pack for me is the Panasonic GF-1, as at least it has an optional EVF.

Chris Bennett has recently purchased the two lens NEX-5 kit, and I am sure a a true review will be appearing soon on his photography blog.

As you can see the quality is easily as good as any of the current DSLR’s.

How to Test a WordPress Theme

If you new to WordPress and blogging then your possibly having fun playing with different themes, customising you blog to get the look and feel you want.

Playing with your live site and affecting your visitors is probably not the best idea.  You need to be able test without impacting on your visitors.

A quick google round the internet soon found the answer, a plug-in that enables the admin user to test a different theme, then what the other users are seeing.

http://www.dnxpert.com/2010/05/26/how-to-test-a-new-wordpress-theme-without-affecting-live-site

Check it out you might find it useful.