Happy New Year!
I began the week and year as I hope to go on with a trip to the coast and a photo ramble.
My son’s Christmas present from us was a contribution towards buying a ‘proper’ camera, and it’s turning out to be a bit of present for me as well as it’s already getting us both out taking photos and more importantly doing so together.
We headed over to Felixstowe as the drive there is straightforward if somewhat dull, which isn’t a bad description of Felixstowe itself. In future I’ll do the extra miles and head to Southwold, it’s a nicer town with better walks and more refreshment opportunities. Having stayed there so many times over the last few years I suspect it will feel odd to leave at the end of the day.
Inspired by my friend Garret C I’m going to do Photo 366 again this year. Photo 366 involves taking a photo every day of the year, of which there are 366 this year with 2024 being a leap year.
The last time I attempted Photo 366 was 2012, I made it to day 126 but then on day 127 I forgot to take a photo, although I was having a lovely day out in London with my wife so I don’t feel too bad about forgetting.
I’m uploading my 366 photos to an album on Flickr in case you want to follow along.
I returned to work on Tuesday with half my team and my boss off sick it was a very quiet few days.
Yesterday I took delivery of (yet) another Apple Watch.
Over the last few years I’ve bought, sold or returned almost every generation of Apple Watch and several Garmin watches – they just haven’t gelled with me. I suspect this is primarily because I am, as my daughter described me, ‘a watch guy’ – I love real watches from G-Shocks to Swiss made mechanical watches. I find it difficult to wear a smartwatch every day and leave my Legend Diver sitting in a drawer.
So why, I hear you ask with a well deserved roll of the eyes, have I bought another?
Well, in the week before Christmas I experienced a number of days of ectopic heartbeats, at first I thought this was due to a particular coffee, but changing coffees didn’t improve things. I think it was possibly stress combined with my diminished fitness.
So I’m committing to wearing the Apple Watch for the year to both monitor my heart – the Apple Watch has a strong focus on AF – and to motivate and remind me to move more. As a nerd I do love me some data so it will be good to track my improvement over the next months.
Last night we watched James May’s Our Man In India, three episodes really is not anywhere near enough to do justice to such a large and varied country but enough was covered to make me want to return in the future.
I was amazed how busy the Taj Mahal was, it was pretty busy when I was there necessitating a little creativity to get this photo – read the full story here.
Today my daughter and I visited the first Bicester Scramble of 2024. After the traditional priorities of a bacon roll and coffee were procured we had a very pleasant wander around the Scramble enjoying everything from a Peugeot 306 GTi to Polestar’s latest concept car.
As we left the relative shelter of the buildings to check out the car park – a highlight of any Scramble – we were met by the kind of wind only an ex-airfield can deliver, a wind so cold it made my sinuses hurt. We agreed discretion was the better part of valour and headed straight to my car and to home. I look forward to sunnier Scrambles later in the year.