Tag: rain

January 26th – Awful commute. Chilly, headwind. Then the rain started – the kind of rain that’s so cold onto your forehead that it physically causes pain. Luckily, I was close to the canal in Walsall, and took refuge under the Bridgeman STreet canal bridge until it passed. As I got to work, the sun came out, just to take the mickey. Great.

January 19th – A wet, miserable commute. It rained as soon as I left the house, and stopped just as I got to work. The new Ring Road in Walsall was living up to its reputation – drains all along the stretch between Littleton Street and Pleck Road were blocked, and the road surface was awash with standing water, particularly opposite Smiths Mill. This led to a liberal dousing of spray with every passing vehicle. Remind me why I do this again?

December 29th – Now do you see what we have to put up with? This weather is awful. Heading into Brownhills, yesterday lunchtime. Waterproofs on, resolute into the rain. Watching for the traffic, which goes a bit silly in these conditions. Come on, weather, give us a break. Leave the rain if you must, but please, please, please drop the wind. Thanks.

The music is ‘Il Pleure’ from The Art of Noise, a lost classic from a sadly overlooked album ‘The Seduction of Claude Debussy’.

December 29th – Chasetown as ever, seemed to be slumbering peacefully as I passed through at lunchtime. Wet, wild, stormy, a filthy day all round. I remember this town before it closed – but there is some great architecture here; the first church in the UK to be lit by electric light, the Old Mining College – run by the wonderful Steve Lightfoot, and this house, Chase Lodge. I have no idea of its history. Great chimneys, and a sympathetic extension. Look at the brickwork at the tip of the gable. That’s a bricky showing off, that is…

December 23rd – Quite simply horrible. One of the nastiest days of bad weather for a good while, and on a day when I had stuff to do. Taking a shortcut over Chasewater, the driving rain, wind and air of desertion made for a very black mood, which worsened somewhat later in the day when I dropped, and fatally wounded my trusty Panasonic camera. A duff day all round, but at least on the positive side, Jeffrey’s Swag and Chasewater seem to be filling a little. Heres to better times, and a more careful grip on the camera.

December 19th – Monday was a busy day of dashing about in frankly awful weather. It was a horrid day, and the Christmas spirit utterly eluded me. Finally getting on the bike at 8pm, I shot round the wet streets of Walsall Wood for inspiration. It was coming up the Lichfield Road towards the church that I noticed these views; they’re really, really festive, yet there’s little hint of Christmas in them. Despite the downbeat mood and wet weather, I felt much better after spotting these. Tomorrow was going to be better…

November 22nd – Oh look, another station. This time, it’s Blake Street near Sutton Coldfield at about 7:00am, after what must have been the worst commute in four years. I saw data recently that suggested a very low percentage chance of ever actually having to commute in the rain – which, in my experience, stacks up. Today, however, it rained solid and heavily into my face for 30 minutes. I was wearing good waterproofs, but I was still damp and dejected when I got to the station. Still, it wasn’t as bad for me as it must have been for the guy I passed pushing a stricken motorbike up from Mill Green towards Shire Oak. He looked really, really pissed off…

November 8th – Oddly, a few minutes later, I found myself stood in the rain and dark, experimenting with long exposure shots of the A461 Lichfield Road. I’m not really happy with any of the results, but some are interesting. It’s actually very difficult to catch the essence of traffic at night, and I’m thinking hard about ways to do it.

November 4th – feeling smug at having missed most of the rain this week, it finally caught me in Lichfield on Friday evening whilst shopping. In 30 minutes, the city was transformed from a buzzing market town on the interregnum of day and night into a glistening, rain-soaked ghost town, in which hurrying people huddled into their coats. The combination of night, lights and a gloss coating to the cobbles proved too much for me, and I just had to capture this moment. You can see more from the rainy city on my main blog.