Pig Sty Avenue

It gets you sacked , even if it's your job to talk about them.  "The home secretary's action is a bad day for science and a bad day for the cause of evidence-informed policy making." Silence is the code.

This should have been disconnected yesterday...

We sacked those bastard Murdochs, from who we were getting phone, broadband and telly. And what a chore that was, just giving them a month's notice over the phone. You've got someone trained to piss you off and talk you out of it. Which was the cherry on the cake. Anyway, usual long story short. Bit of a fuck up with getting the new lot (AOL, probably another shower of bastards,) in, so I'm more or less offline until (they say) 6th November. Until then, or wtf.

With Herself at Work, and The Bairn at nursery, I was able to give my Tetenal C41 kit its first outing.  I'd lost the instructions, but got the basics here , and a whole lot more here .  I used a plastic bowl in the kitchen sink, and warmed the chemicals there first,  (I made up 500ml of each - developer, blix and stabilizer, and put the first in an elderflower cordial bottle, the second in a tomato sauce bottle, the third in a brown sauce bottle).  I used an electronic thermometer, the sort you use to see if you have a temperature, so it was very accurate. It was 39.5C when I started.  The developing is the most temperature crucial part, but it's only 3m 15s, so it wouldn't have dropped by more than a degree or two, I'd guess.  The counter-intuitive part comes when you add the blix straight after the developer, but then, heigh ho.  Then the rinse, then the stabilizer, and then...  no final rinse.  The stabilizer is a bit sticky, so it seems to take the negs longer to

I didn't realize there was a new editor thingummy.  Maybe that would explain why I've had to edit in photos manually in the last few weeks?  Anyway, sorted now.  Gawd bless 'er!  

You know, every team has a bad day once in a while. But let's keep a sense of proportion, we've had three iffy games. It's not the end of the frigging world. We're only second on goal difference.

This is the best photo I've seen in ages. The way the sun illuminates her lower face, (the eyes can take care of themselves), and then again the cross, whilst the watch is in darkness. And then the middle ground, the hands writing the bill... And the old lady at the back. It's a peach.

For that long winter night when I start to take lenses apart, there's this . And I've not seen Commie Cameras . Thanks to Macredeye for pointing the way. The camera landed yesterday. It is quite heavy, but it's not going to give anyone a hernia. The light meter works, and so does the PC flash. Enough blether. Photos!

I got a FED4 on eBay, mostly because it had an Industar61 lens attached to it, and was therefore a bargain. And, I'm hoping the flash will synch properly. AND it has a light meter, which is said to work. This is the manual. I was wondering about the actual mechanics of the shutter curtain, and this has the craic, here . There's lots more useful stuff at SovietCameras . It's said to be a "beast". Would come in handy for street photography, if set upon.

An appropriate title, perhaps, for the first post of a new MA-done-and-dusted era. (NB, whilst at Durham I was delighted to hear from my mate Ben an Australian take on that phrase, home-and-hosed.) Anyway, I'm re-collecting the 60s music. The latest thing is the Stones' eponymous first album , the remastered version, which is the US version. It's great fun - Molly loves dancing to it. NB: there's a glitch with the picture uploads on this blog. I added this one manually. I don't know the HTML for insetting, though.

zawiya garden , originally uploaded by Pig Sty Avenue . I sat in this chair, in a garden in Libya, whilst reading for the first module (methodology) of the MA. Spring of 2005, four and half years, for goodness sakes, and I've just finished the final dissertation in the last hour. I'll do a final proof and then submit it tomorrow, but, essentially, that's it.

Editing. Fine-tooth comb job.

The tape is not just in sight, it is almost touchable. Mind you, I'm not coasting along to it: there's still a lot of heavy-duty conceptualizing to be done.

I've got three, solid (hopefully), days to write up the Discussion section, tidy it all up, proof it... And, voila! Four years of lost weekends will be at an end. Meanwhile, last night I relaxed by getting the chemicals from the press to make up some fixer , and some Beutler high acutane developer . The fixer and Solution A for the Beutler was straightforward. Solution B is simply washing soda, or Sodium carbonate. But the recipe says anhydrate, whereas the stuff from the shop is decahydrate. I made it up proportionately as directed in a 750ml wine bottle, and it hasn't dissolved properly. I'm trying to puzzle out the an/deca difference, and to see if I can make anhydrate from decahydrate. This APUG thread might hold the key, but I need to get back to the Dissertation. I've skimmed the first two or three pages. Perhaps I can make it from bicarb? Or just heat up the decahydrate? In the bigger picture I think I'll swot up on basic chemistry, and get that

By this time next week, I should have finished the dissertation. I need to check this out later...

Avivamagnolia this morning blipped this: Splendid. I need to check these lads out.

I got this from via the Flickr Glasgow Photo group: A map of greater Glasgow , which references demolitions. Future photo opportunities.