Photos from the last two months

Finally got around to looking at the few photos I’d shot on my phone since Xmas. I like a few of them, but not all.

Cork, visiting Meadhbh
Cork.. far too early am.

Cork.. far too early am.

Salthill sunsets again – I’m obsessed. The light is different every time.
Salthil sunset
Salthil sunset

Boo reading …
Boo reading

Boo reads Agatha Christie

Intended on having a shot of Boo reading all the books I’ve read, but I missed taking shots of Overqualified by Joey Comeau, Liquor by Poppy Z Brite and Written On The Body by Jeanette Winterson. The last two are two of my favourite books that I decided to re-read instead of tackling the rest of my “to read” pile that is sitting by my bed. I’ll get around to them.

Snow days

Snapped some more photos of the snow, and low solstice sunlight over the last day or two.

Here’s a few of them (click to see bigger versions, as per usual) :

St. Nicholas’ Cathedral and one of my favourite lines of trees in the city:

The grounds of NUIG

They were just snapped on my HTC Desire, not anything snazzy. ;) But it’s handy to have on me when I don’t feel like carrying around a camera. You can get decent shots with it too, every so often.

Snowy Galway

I snapped a few shots out and about around Galway over the last week or so, while we actually had snow again for the second winter running. (we’re not well used to that kind of thing. Wind and rain? Sure. Snow for a few days in a row? That’s rare.)

And one more, just because. The children’s carousel at the Galway Continental Christmas Market. The bright lights make me happy.

I got a new phone.

I just recently switched to an Android phone – the wonderful HTC Desire, and have been playing around with the camera on it, and two different camera apps so far. I was interested in seeing how it would compare to my old iPhone 3GS which gave me some great shots, and the Hipstamatic App was good for some interesting filters and the like.

But, I’ve been mostly pleased with the Desire’s camera, though the colours aren’t quite as vibrant as the iPhone’s camera were it seems. But the RetroCamera and fx camera apps have been really fun and versatile too, and add a lot of fun to the camera.

Here’s some shots of a beautiful sunset in Salthill, Galway this weekend:

It definitely gives good lens flare (which I happen to like. I also like taking photos into the sun as I have a soft spot for silhouettes.) I’m no photographer or anything, but it’s nice to have a portable tool that can record things I see with a decent quality for me.

There’s no-one here, and tulips everywhere.

i travel
all around the city
go in and out of
locomotives
all alone
there’s no-one here
and people everywhere

only if a ship would sail in
or just someone came
and knocked at my door
or just (or just)
SOMETHING

Parts of Björk’s Crying rather aptly describes my days lately. It’s been weird. I have to travel to Dublin to spend any time with people it seems. I don’t think I like that. I’m spending way too much time alone I think – so much so that I don’t even realise how much time I’m spending in just my own company. Most days I’ll say maybe three or four sentences to someone who’s not serving me in a shop or café or something. I guess I make up for it when I do go to Dublin and hang out with people there, but it just makes the return to Galway each time more frustrating. But I guess that’s what happens when there’s a big exodus of people from a town.

I do like my own company, and I’m very used to it, and it is making me write so much more. I wrote lyrics for a whole new song today that was sparked off by two short lines I’d noted down in my phone a few days ago. I even have a rough idea of how the melody should go. I’m at a point where I have way too many songs not recorded even in demo form – more than half of them aren’t recorded in any way at all. I need to get more on top of that.

I spent this evening post-Doctor-Who looking at tweaking little tiny things on my website, which just drives home the fact that I need a proper, better design for it, which is something I’m not able to do. Then I was doing re-takes of the demo vocals for “friday night friendships” which I’d sketched out quickly a while back with terribly off guide vocals. I’m getting more used to recording myself, but it’s still not ideal, and I’m finding it a bit of a pain sometimes when a good take is messed up by shitty recording, or whatever.

The thing I wrote today I’ll take a look at again tomorrow and see what I think of it. I’ve another two half-written lyrics sheets in a notebook, and a few more songs kinda half sketched out. I really have been on a big writing spate over the last year or so. I think I’ve written more in the last year than in the last 20! I’m not all of it is any good, but I’m gonna try at least demo everything so that I can listen to them from outside of the performer space, and see what I think.

Anyways, while I was in Dublin recently, I got to enjoy the beautiful tulips that are in the park in Merrion Sq. Dublin City Council were taking submissions to rename that park, which is currently named after Archbishiop Ryan. I don’t think I ever called it that in the first place – it was always just Merrion Sq to me. Or the park with the Oscar Wilde statue and beautiful tulips:

tulips tulips and daffodils tulips in the park tulips and daffodils

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