Dust – a Rant!

I hate dust.

It gets everywhere.

It gets onto your sensor and it’s a nightmare to get rid of.

To be honest, it’s the one downside of owning a DSLR. When “out in the field” I try not to change lenses, make sure, if I do, that the body is pointing down and that I’ve tried to blow the dust from the top of the lens, but the darn stuff still gets in.

When I came back to photography after a 15 year break I bought a Fuji All-in-one, an FS100 – Great zoom lens capability, but just too slow. The benefit was not having to change lens though.

So cleaning materials have been ordered and another clean will take place.

Sorry for the rant!

 

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Photos

Just playing around as I’m planning to start a new Photography blog in the new year. I’m hoping to publish something every week, maybe new stuff, maybe old stuff. Let’s see how it goes.

In the meantime, here’s a few i’ve taken in the last year. Hope you like

Microsoft – An Update!!!!!!

Had a tweet from those ever so nice people at Microsoft:

Nice try Dave!!

Well done to Bill Gates Steve Ballmer’s Empire for getting back to me, they didn’t have to.

If you actually want to see me reviewing some IT stuff, Gadget Geeks is being repeated on Challenge TV (Yes I can’t work that out either) on Monday nights at 10pm. Can’t remember what episode we were on (5 or 6 I think) so I’m sure you’ll be hearing about it.

This time it’s on Freeview, there is no escape!

Microsoft – Yes you can help improve my experience

Last night i posted a comment on Twitter about having the opportunity to buy an Apple product at 0% interest. Only problem is that I’m pretty broke and dont have the spare cash to afford such a luxury at this moment in time.

I got the usual joshing off the usual suspects and I happened to mention in one of my replies that I wasn’t really impressed by Windows 8. Now I must explain that I haven’t fully explored a new PC using Microsofts one-size-fits-all operating system, but on the times I’ve played with it whilst passing the time of day in PC World (as you do) I havent been that impressed.

I’ve been a windows user since the very first version of that platform came about way back when an Ipad was something that a hospital dished out to stupid kids who poked their eyes with pencils. My two, yes two (i’m not showing off honest) laptops have vista and Windows 7 installed. I’ve stuck with vista on the family laptop as I couldn’t be bothered to update it and probably because it would cause that PC to blow up. I have Win 7 installed on my smaller, slightly bigger than a netbook PC and, overall, the “experience” isn’t bad. Apart from the fact that the laptop is as underpowered as a Ferrari with a Fiat 993cc engine.

I’ve recently crossed over to Apple and find OSX easier to use, no regular multi updates interrupting you, doesn’t take a year or so to boot up and its’s fairly intuitive (Where have I used that term before?) Therefore my aim is to, when I can afford it, replace my existing Mac and my Win 7 laptop with a Macbook. I use my Mac to do all my photographic processing and it’s been an easy experience if I’m honest. You can see the results on my Flickr feed

Back to my tweet last night, imagine my surprise when MicrosoftUK tweeted me earlier today and asked me how they could improve my experience? Cheekily I tweeted back and said they could send me a top spec, high end Windows 8 laptop for me to test and see how I get on with using their all singing, all dancing, flat, metro (though we cant call it metro) styled Windows 8 operating system.

Surprisingly, they never got back to me. I have to ask why tweet someone, out of the blue, and offer to help when, in reality, you have no intention of actually helping that person?

So Microsoft, if you really want to help improve my experience, and want to help me and stop me turning to the dark side forever then how about it?

What have you got to lose?

It’s not as if I haven’t had past experience of testing stuff is it? 😉

Healthy?

Prior to last nights disappointment I found myself in the company of a nurse.

“Wey hey” you may say, we’ll don’t as my partner in crime on Charlton Live, Pete Finch, was also in tow, with a microphone.

NHS Greenwich, in partnership with Charlton Athletic Community Trust, were inviting Greenwich based Charlton supporting men to have a health check. The caveat being that your age was in excess of 35. Being slightly in excess of that figure I fell right into their target category. OK I don’t live in Greenwich anymore, so a little fiddling of the address (sorry Mum and Dad) and I was in.

You can hear the results on this coming Sundays show, including Nurse Tina stabbing me twice. Needless to say most of my “so called” friends and colleagues had a field day at my expense, as will many others when the package is played out. The main thing for me is that it highlighted a few home truths.

Yes I am overweight, yes I need to exercise more. Hopefully it will focus me a bit more, eat even healthier and go for more swims.

So if you are a bloke over 35, find out if your local NHS are running a similar scheme (they probably will), face up to your demons and take action. You’ll be doing yourself a favour.

This is a test…..

Yep, just testing, nothing to see here. Move along now……..

A bit of a change

I’ve not used this blog for sometime, as you can probably see, so i thought it time for a spring clean and a revamp.

I’m not going to solely concentrate on Charlton, other people write far better blogs on the subject. So I’ve decided to write about any old thing that takes my fancy.

One thing I am going to do is to publish some pictures I took the day after the Great storm of 1987. There from the Plumstead Common area, so look out for them in late October as we remember that horrific night 25 years ago.

In the meantime, here is a Photo I took back in the 80’s – The place has changed a bit.

Buy that man a watch

I’m not usually one to criticise but I thought the referee got it spectacularly wrong today.

There should have been at least another 3 minutes added time and what about that shove on BWP in the box?

Still, at least we’ve kept the five point gap between us and the Wendies after Huddersfield fought back to draw at Hillsboro’. Shades of Dec 2009 when we faced Millwall?

I was proud to have been able to lead the minutes applause for a true gentleman and Charlton Legend, Peter Croker.

We interviewed his son’s Paul and David for Charlton Live. They spoke so warmly about their father, it really was great to speak to them. They were both saying what a humble man he was.

They brought in clippings from papers and letters from Jimmy Seed to their father. A complete world away from modern football. One thing they did say was how much their father rated Chris Powell.

The cherry on the top was when they produced their fathers FA cup winners medal. Have to say that Terry, Pete and me were like kids in a candy store.

It was an honour to hold that medal.

Oh and the less said about halftime the better. OK?

Hello

Not done this for a long long time.

Still, good excuse to put the new toy to test.

Back home

Somehow the gloomy weather over London hasn’t bothered me today. I’ve walked with a spring in my step and had a big smile on my face. It could have snowed, Southeastern Trains could have had another crisis, I wouldn’t have cared. Chris has come back home.

Suddenly the clouds have lifted over the Valley and for the first time in probably five years we have a reason to feel optimistic. Charlton fans have a reason to smile again. One of our heroes has returned.

I hope that fans are patient though. Not expecting miracles and the team to go and thrash the opposition by six or seven goals. Certainly not expecting champagne football week in week out.

We know the squad we have is capable of great things in this league, look at the aways games against Peterborough and Swindon. However we’ve yet to see that form at home.

Sitting and reflecting on todays events it’s kind of like how I felt after we beat Ipswich in the play-offs all those years ago. Excited, proud but that feeling of a little knot in the stomach, we’re almost there.

Patience is the key.