Events, dear boy. Events.

I was all set to be a good little blogger this month. i.e. Actually posting something. Unfortunately we had a little collapsing in the garden drama, ambulance action, and hospital visiting, which resulted in the Old Man getting unexpectedly equipped with a pacemaker.

Someone explain to me how its battery will last years without the need to recharge by plugging him in at night until his nose stops flashing. And why can't we use it for cordless drills?

Anyway, there we are. He seems a lot better for it, once they sorted out the clash between his natural samba rhythm and the newly installed 3/4 time... Frankly, though, it's a rather too stressful means of receiving BUPA-speed service via the NHS for my personal taste.

In the meantime, ponder the wisdom (or not) of Plymouth University splashing the cash on some Makepeace chairs. As an educational establishment, I can't help feeling it's a shame they're not encouraging a newly qualified furniture maker or student rather than the old guard. (And as someone whose experience of sitting in a Makepeace-designed chair for any length of time was a painful one, I can't help wondering if the faculty's collective behinds may rue the decision as the graduation ceremonies drag on...)

Focused

Hey, amazing news! I bought a tool.

I know what you're thinking. Swarovski crystal handle, hand-hewn from the crystal mines of... No? You weren't thinking that? Oh. You were thinking "What have you gone and done now, Alf"? Ah. Well, yes, fair enough. As it happens this elegant example of the screwdriver manufacturers' art was not the primary goal.

It was the 30-odd pieces of black plastic and an assortment of screws and springs.

Oh, and some instructions. In Chinese. Not Chinglish, for which I have an inexplicable fondness, but actual hanzi. Thank goodness for the interweb, where I could find not only the instructions in English but also several articles on and additional photos of the building process. The end result is this:

A 35mm Twin Lens Reflex camera. (Stick "Recesky" or "Garraflex" (or both) in Google and you can learn all about it.) It's something between an Airfix kit and an Ikea flatpack, both of which I have some experience with. Such as checking you have all the parts and counting the screws before you start; I had a couple of spare washer head screws at the finish, which could have caused worry had I not known they were extras. A couple of very similar parts were transposed in their tray locations too, which held me up a little. So no, I didn't make it within the suggested hour, but it was less than two.

And it actually works. I put a test roll of film through it and got it developed yesterday in my local independent camera shop (Pause for a moment and dwell on the excitement that there is a local independent camera shop. Actually there are two. Amazing.) They all came out, all in focus, and no light leakage. Really pretty impressive, and bags of character. (That's code for "tiny area actually in focus" and "dark corners/vignetting") My previous camera use has been purely means to an end stuff; this is more "Have camera, what can I photograph?" Different experience entirely, and seeing the familiar through the reverse image viewfinder adds a Through The Looking-Glass aspect too. All in all a fascinating thing. Ridiculously satisfying too, especially making the shutter work. click click click click click

 

 

The scanner elected to make them a little redder than they should be, but you get the gist. The double exposure was unintended - although I did plan to try one anyway, albeit not quite like that... You know those Easter Island heads? Look at that sundial and tell me you don't see their extremely flat-headed cousins.

Arms and Legos

Zoicks! How can it already be the fourth of the month? Is it me, or has 2014 flown by on wingéd feet?

As you may gather from my helpfully numerically-equipped little plastic pals, some of that time has involved sorting through a very old box of Lego. (Sorry, not "old", but "classic", apparently.) It wasn't actually as horrific an experience as I'd feared, and I was mildly amused that my Lego collection accumulation is actually quite revealing. Although, no, I never actually wanted to be an astronaut or fireman... More telling were the following:

1. The alteration of production parts to fit own requirements is widespread. Cracked helmets have been carefully cut down to make bandanas, for instance. (I felt a tiny glow of pride in my younger self for that one).

2. One of the very first sets I ever had was the Fire Station. It has two pairs of rolling garage doors, which can only be described as little plastic tambour doors. So that's where the fascination probably started.

3. There are no fewer than three parrots. In real life arguably two have proved two too many...

4. Boats feature heavily. Fire boat, galleon, rowing boats, etc.

5. The only non-Lego thing in the entire box was... an ink cartridge. Honestly, I kid you not.

Alas, Lego has always rather shunned the woodworking fraternity, otherwise I'd have expected to find lots and lots of short brown flats, just too good to throw away but of no practical use for building anything... ;)

Anyway, all very well, but boy, was the stuff dusty. So a good deal of washing of bricks has gone on. Which is the easy bit; drying it all off again takes time. And in some cases, a towel:

Oh, how I loved these little Technic guys. Not quite the spookily mindless smile of the original mini figures, but also not the contorted gurning and grimacing of the modern figures facial expressions either. And flexible, too. Although, having said that, their ankles are a definite weak point, and worse...

Someone lend this poor fellow a hand.

Okay, so nice idea, but that's not going to work. More a case of a transplant (from an aforementioned weak-ankled colleague).

And ready for the slopes once again. But what are you doing, Trev? What's that? Haven't I seen the Lego Movie? Well, no, I... Huh? Cracked helmets are fashionable? Oh, for...

Right, right, sorry. Enough Lego. I apologise, but also fair warning - they may well return here and there, now I've liberated them from the box.