Driving, Sunsets & Extreme Weather

Wednesday, 27 March, 2024

A day of driving, sunsets and extreme weather :)

Llanrhidian Marsh

Tuesday, 26 March, 2024

A beautiful evening down at Llanrhidian makes up for a tough day at the house. What's more, some of the images I've taken over these recent evening returns to the caravan park will come in handy later in the year when I put together my next Explore Gower book, Tidal Gower.

A Seeming Standstill

Thursday, 21 March 2024

What can I say? Two weeks on, countless thousands of £££s worse off, and we are in no better position.

We are still at the caravan, but the prices are rising dramatically as Spring draws the holiday-makers to the site. The landlord is still unsure what his insurance will pay for our temporary accommodation. We also found out we should not really be clearing the house, given all the toxic soot, which apparently gets worse as time progresses. But there is still a lot for us to do despite the conditions being unhelpful to my already compromised health. Right, I got that out of my system. Let's move on...

Chilling by writing about fictional drama

At least the day ended on a brighter note than it began 🙂.  God bless the sunshine. The drive home towards our temporary accommodation:

 

On the Road

Friday, 16 March, 2024

It seems like we are continually on the road these days. The commute from our temporary accommodation to the house is becoming a chore despite the scenery en route. The landlord wants us to empty the house of our belongings so he can start work on the place, so we have to box up anything thing that is remotely salvageable and take everything else to the dump. Despite masking and gloving up, our chests are beginning to suffer, and we have had to remind the landlord that we can't "spend every spare minute in the house clearing things"  as he would like. We have our health to think of, as well as laundrettes to visit, rubbish dump trips to undertake, food shopping etc. I can feel my resilience lowering with each successive day...

Anyway, here are some road videos and photographs I've tried to entertain myself with today.

The daily drive to our house:

Pics taken en route to the rubbish dump:

Driving home:

At least there were two rays of sunshine to lift our moods today. The first was meeting a couple of friends from my work, who gave us an amazing gift to help us through our trying times - thank you, I love you all. Secondly, there was the more literal ray of sunshine. For the first time since all this nightmare started, the sun came out:

Moving On and Settling Down

Wednesday, 13 March, 2024

We have now moved into this trailer, which is located very close to my childhood home in Penclawdd:

Carnage

Monday, 11 March, 2024

Here are a few pictures of the carnage. The worst part of today? Having to throw shelf after shelf of signed books, collected over many years and at great expense, into the bin!

Burnt to a char and still a smile on his face. I'm gonna be keeping this
fella no matter what he looks like after a scrub.

The cause of the fire - faulty electric socket wiring

Our digital clock

Our once bejewelled bedroom ceiling light

Our bedroom TV

The view from the bed

Our telly

My old Jaws shelf, videod here just the other day

Our bedroom fan

The plants in the front porch, however, loved the burst of heat.
I've never seen this Jade looking so good!

Caught the highest tide of the year briefly as we drove back to Mumbles after house-sorting:

We saw something strange as we approached the Airbnb then. Dont Ask! But it ended with a furious dog chasing me from the scene:

Been a busy day but can't complain when there is still time to chill with fudjcat and a good film - The Black Phone. It's our last day in this Mumbles holiday let tomorrow. On Wednesday we relocate to a cheaper caravan/trailer down Llanrhidian for a couple of weeks. Our landlord reckons it will take at least 6-8 weeks to make our house habitable again...

Stehen King - Salem's Lot (Lego Version)

Sunday, 21 January, 2024

My lego version of the scariest scene ever filmed - the floating vampire boy in his pyjamas scratching at the bedroom window in Salem's Lot. Scroll down through the photos to see how I achieved the effect of floating and how I managed to leave enough light through the side of the piece to give the boy an ethereal glow.

Also, to add to the effect, click play on the media below:

Cat Balance Training

Friday, 12 December, 2024

One of the neighbour's cats practising their balancing skills on our Sumac tree.

Guy Photohoot Prep

 Friday, 10 November, 2023

With my Guy N Smith reading year coming to an end next month, I'm already starting to collect items to make GNS character photoshoots, including Lego versions of some classic GNS covers. The photo below represents just a few of the props I already collated. The book covers I can so far reproduce as Lego Covers are Werewolf by Moonlight, The Slime Beast, Bats out of Hell, Satan's Snowdrop, Doomflight, Wolfcurse, Accursed, Throwback, The Walking Dead, Alligators, The Reaper and Deadbeat. More to follow as I source more suitable Lego parts...These will feature in my book about Guy's works and the fun that can be had reading and collecting his books. This should reach the shelves late next year. #guynsmith

Kew Gardens

Sunday, August 06, 2023

Heading home day, but not before a family visit to Kew Gardens:

Two particular highlights I simply had to share from the Gardens was the Pagoda and the giant lily pads:

The steps to the top of the pagoda were not a particular challenge, but I think the video of my descent (albeit sped up) just how the building is. Definitely worth the extra fiver they claw from your pocket to undertake the climb and the view of Kew and the distant London cityscape are outstanding.

I'll close this series of holiday posts with a short video of the popular giant lily pads. I hope you enjoy:

'Twas time for a teary farewell then as my daughter and her partner headed back to Norwich and the rest of us returned to rainy ole Swansea...