Monday, February 28, 2011

I'm Up To Date!

I just realised... this is the first time in probably 2 years I have been up-to-date with my photos online! My latest Flickr uploads were my latest photos, and I have nothing left in between. Maybe... this is the start of something good. Maybe... I'll actually keep it this way. Maybe... people will even actually look at them?! Who knows! But I'll give it a shot if you will?

Sunday, February 27, 2011

Adventures

When I first moved to London I was introduced to bar in Battersea called Adventure. This was mostly due to the fact my friend, already in London when I moved down, used to live with the co-owner. As it was near our respective flats it became a popular meeting place, and still is amongst a much wider circle of friends.

Nearly 4 years later and the bar has now developed into a chain of four. Our usual place is very small, but there's a bigger one in Balham where I have spent an extremely intoxicated birthday. I have (sadly?) never been to East Dulwich; but to complete the four they now have one in popular Covent Garden. It seemed apt that we'd go to the new bar for the aforementioned mate's birthday.

The style of Adventure is, certainly at the weekends, loud and busy. It's a cocktail bar with an insanely large selection of cocktails, served by fun, chatty, and sometimes a little drunk, bartenders. There's also bottle and spirits if cocktails aren't your thing. We went armed with a tonne of vouchers courtesy of Living Social, meaning we got 65% off when buying 4 cocktails; perfect for drinky-fun party-times. The site offers different deals each day designed to generate business for bars, spas, restaurants and the like in the form of cheap and one-time-only deals.

We had fun, and many drinks, and I'm sure we'll be meeting there again soon. For more reasons than the fact I still have 5 vouchers left...

So, we went to Windsor

Being a teacher, my girlfriend had the last week off. Being in need of a short break, I also took a couple of days off. Being a nice day, we wanted to go some place new and take photos and such. Being a little short on cash we decided to go somewhere which was only a short journey from the nearest train station. So, we went to Windsor.

First off we visited one of those touristy places which has always been there but seemed to be ignored despite it being 45 minutes away on the train: Windsor Castle. It was very photogenic in the sun along with its well-kept greenery.

Greens & Blues

We then enjoyed a long walk down "The Long Walk" before crossing the bridge to Eton, where we had a nice pub dinner.

Windsor & Eton Riverside

Suffice to say the sun was a welcome change to the grey and damp which has been prominent in the UK in 2011 so far. I for one can't wait for it to start actually giving us some heat as well as nice skies and good light.

Friday, February 25, 2011

Christmas & New Year: Stateside

I've been catching up with the photos I took over the festive period; a time which I spent between New York City and Wisconsin. I was at my company's New York office and apartments up til a week before Christmas, before jetting off to spend Christmas with my girlfriend and her family in WI. Then it was back to New York for New Years eve! Well, sort of - there was some crazy snow, fog, and flight problems to make it all seem a lot more hectic than it actually was.

I managed to get 3 distinct sets on my Flickr out of the best photos. The first of these includes the week up to Christmas Day and the few days after. Everything was beautifully white and I was in the middle of some delightful countryside and farmland.

A Wintery View

The second covered Christmas Day - which was spent with a large portion of my girlfriend's family - which was really nice as I missed my own family terribly having never spent a Christmas away from them before. They all made me feel very welcome!

Family Gathering

This also marked a change in my (thus far) fairly amateurish photography. L and her parents gave me my first DSLR camera! So I apologise for the first few sets of photos as I get used to the wealth of features suddenly at my keen fingertips...

Thirdly, I have a few snaps from New Years eve which we spent in Central Park. Mostly I took pics of fireworks, but the lighting and snow seemed to enjoy my camera so there's a few shots through snowy trees and such. However, I was just glad to spend a fun time of the year with L in her homeland!

Shadows of Us

Happy 2011 :)

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Well, hello there.

I've never had a blog before, nor a website to myself. I enjoy Flickr and Twitter so have decided to make a "proper go" of it and start rambling and posting stuff and things on here as well. Let's see how it goes and, indeed, how long it lasts...