Favourite corner #2

This is my next favourite corner of the house. Its in the new office space set up in the study where I can work from home.

Its not my favourite corner because it means I can work from home, but because the photos that were put on to canvas were taken by daughter before she really knew what she was doing with a camera. She went on to study photography at university.

I used to have these on the wall in my office at work but since I don’t currently have an office to myself, and I’m not always there, I didn’t want them getting lost or taken by someone else. I thought they would make something lovely to look at whilst I am working from home and after some inspiration. They also remind me of my favourite person.

If you Google “good things about corners,” you get a plethora of ideas about how to decorate awkward or empty corners, or design ideas for corner shelves. You also get quotes about turning a corner and such like.

I’m not sure that I’ll manage 10 interesting corners in my house as most of them are full of stuff and either untidy or uninteresting. I might have one more before I might have to move on to the next 50 by 50 thing.

Life expectancy

Out of the list of suggestions that were offered when I asked for ideas about things to do before I hit 50, one of them was to do a life expectancy test, then see how many years have you got left and write down five things you’d really like to do in that time. This isn’t something to be morbid about, rather that it should inspire you to do other things.

Obviously there’s no real science behind something that only asks about 10 questions about your age, gender, health and status. According to my age, height, weight, marital status, income and ethnicity on the particular online test I found, I should be expected to have an estimated life expectancy of 87 years, with a 75% chance that I’ll live until I’m 79. The site then gives suggestions on how to increase life expectancy with more exercise, less drinking, and how to put financial matters in order to fund retirement.

So part 2 pf the suggestion then was to come up with 5 things to do in that time. Some of the other suggestions I received could come in handy here.

Pay anonymously for a strangers coffee. Capture a moment every day in a photo or painting. Take photos of strangers and find out their story. Send a message in a bottle. Put £5 in a place for someone random to find. Write and post a handwritten letter to yor child. Take photos of 10 favourite corners of the house. Pick a random novel, read the first paragraph then do something triggered by those words. Try an alternative therapy like rieki or reflexology. Amongst others.

These all seem eminently doable so I shall tick some of the off. For starters, here’s a photo of one of my 10 favourite corners in my house.

Christmas gadgets

I had the opportunity to play with my new Christmas gadget on Sunday. C bought me a Hohem stabilising gimble to help record some epic videos on my phone.

I took it up the tower when we went #bellringing to record C and me doing our socially distanced ringing on two bells.

I’ve been recording our ringing for several weeks and uploading it to my YouTube channel, but taking it just on my phone, meaning it was on selfie mode, so it looks like the bells are hung anticlockwise.

I set the gimble up and set it off. It recorded well and the sound quality was good. The bells are even the right way around.

I tried several modes like the panoramic view and tracking a moving image but I was just randomly pressing buttons, without knowing what I was really doing, so it didn’t quite work. I need to watch a tutorial or two to get the hang of it.

I’m looking forward to improving my video skills and it would be interesting to record something when we have all the bells back ringing.

In the meantime you can watch my efforts at https://youtube.com/channel/UCwuReeDAGWikaBD3ZbRxkyQ

Good news: watching cute animals is good for you

Those of us that are connected to multiple social media sites will not have failed to have been spammed at some point by video clips or memes of cute animals doing cute things.

According to goodnewsnetwork.org a study by Tourism Western Australia and University of Leeds we don’t actually have to see the real deal in order to feel a sense of reduced stress levels.

To be fair their sample size was only 19 participants who were students and academics at the University and about to sit exams or had declared feelings of stress at work. They were shown a 30 minute slide show of cute stuff.

Heart rates were reported to have dropped and blood pressure went from 136/88 to 115/71. Anxiety levels dropped by 50%. One of the conclusions was that video was better than still image and therefore the expectation would be that physical closeness would be even better.

Quokkas found in Western Australia are little rodent type critters who have a cute smiley face and now apparently have their own TV station where you can watch them all the time.

I think the nearest thing we’ll be allowed in the office is a few posters, although we did have a visit from Sam the Therapy dog once.

Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards

I love looking through the finalists in this annual photographic competition. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/in-pictures-54118899

I wonder whether the photographers intend to find an amusing shot, or its happy circumstance, or they just rattle off so many shots that one of them is bound to be funny.

This year’s finalists were a smiley fish, photo bombing giraffes, a bear waving hello, a violin playing Tern, a really unhappy turtle, parakeets keeping socially distanced, a bored gorilla, silly brown bears, a fox and rodent having a very intense debate, a puking penguin, a butt scratching baboon, smiley mongoose, an egret having a really bad hair day, a laughing seal, a sarcastic kingfisher, a boiling snow monkey, magical pelicans, a cute red squirrel, a racoon sticking put of a tree, and swinging langurs.

I think my favourites were the smiley fish 🐟 as it looked like it was having a great time and was bright and cheerful, and the photo bombing giraffe 🦒 that looked like it was trying to cheer up its more serious looking friend, and the rather displeased turtle 🐢

Behind the giggles the competition has a serious message to support wildlife conservation and is partnered by the Born Free Foundation. The winners will be announced on 22nd October.