Archive for August, 2010
My Year in Photos – August 16th – “Boring photo #12″
The title of today’s photo was chosen by my lovely wife, who couldn’t understand why I’d taken a photo of a traffic island bollardy thing (what ARE they called?) on a path. She’s got a good point I guess, though I thought it was quite interesting seeing as how it shouldn’t really BE there.
I guess this is what people refer to as a slow news day…
My Year in Photos – August 15th – “Riding the rails!”
Today we went to celebrate my nephew’s 3rd birthday with a garden party. I think this would have been my sixth toddler birthday party in as many weeks, so I’m getting to be quite a pro now. Though it didn’t stop me from getting the name of the Chuggington character immortalised in this cake though – Wilson, in case you’re wondering.
My Year in Photos – August 14th – “Henry and the chocolate fountain”
My Year in Photos – August 14th – "Henry and the chocolate fountain", originally uploaded by henweb.
Today we headed over to Wokingham to attend the wedding party of some friends of ours, where this chocolate fountain was one of the central attractions. Well, aside from the happy couple, obviously.
I’m slightly ashamed to say I got quite, quite drunk – though even more disappointed to reveal that this photo is the closest I got to the chocolate fountain in question. For some reason I opted to stand on the veranda drinking beer all night. Total #FAIL on my part.
My Year in Photos – August 13th – “Are they wearing funny glasses?”
Due to a funny joke which I won’t bother to bore you with, a couple of us at work decided to make a Tamar version of the game ‘Guess Who’ today – a game we already had a version of due to previously pitching a digital version to a client. Our Tamar business cards feature very cheesy (but effective) shots of all of us, so we used them to make the cards, and tried it out with a few games!
Our version worked reasonably well – we found it was even more fun if you asked work-related questions, like “Do they work in X department?” or “Have they been here longer than Y”.
But most fun of all were the silly questions: “Do they talk too much?”, “Would you?” and “Do they get a bit funny if you put them under pressure?” being three of my favourites! :D
My Year in Photos – August 12th – “Another side of Chiswick”
Due to a strange lack of parking spaces in the street I usually park in during my work day, I found myself parked in a whole new area of Chiswick today – and subsequently got to walk through a new suburb of town on the walk in to the office. It was a lovely area, lots of very nice looking houses – but also a few scuzzy bits, like the above. Knowing what the prices in West London are like though, I suspect even this garage has a rent of £3,000 per month!
My 12 best celebrity sightings [Photos]
Despite being the sort of person that gets a little bit excited about seeing celebrities, I’m usually far too slow to get my camera out of my pocket and snap a picture. Chiswick, where I work, is a virtual mecca for celebrities – recent sightings include Ant and Dec, Kirsty Gallagher, Richard Herring, Clare Balding, Louis Theroux, Adrian Chiles and that mad one who licked milk out of George Galloway’s hands in Celebrity Big Brother. But none of these were caught on camera – not by me anyway. So I thought I’d showcase a few of the celebrities that I HAVE managed to snap a picture of – not in a stalkery way I hasten to add, mostly just random happenstance! Here’s 10 of the best (!?)
Probably the oldest and definitely the most high-profile of these photos – Reece Witherspoon, shooting Vanity Fair in Bath. This picture was actually used in several magazines, and better still, I was paid to take it! One of the many benefits of working for a movie-magazine publisher, as I used to.
This one is a sad-but-funny favourite – partly because it actually proves I was there! Sarah Beeny was on the same train as we were, on the way to a client meeting. I was happy to just remain quietly excited by this, but my colleagues Robin and Jeremy forced me to go up and say hello, threatening that if I didn’t they would stand up and shout “My friend is really excited that he’s seen you!” at her. So I introduced myself (to a very pregnant Beeny) and had a chat about baby stuff, since my wife Sara was pregnant at the time. I even made my ‘Beeny Babies’ gag. Win!
TV presenter and all-round lovely Twitter celebrity Jenni Falconer. This was taken at the Prince’s Trust event in the Odeon, Leicester Square. I was too chicken to go over and say hello, despite having a valid reason to do so at the time. I was also too chicken to speak to her at another Prince’s Trust event we went to, so perhaps I’m just a big girl’s blouse.
Taken at the same event, this is Chris Evans and his beautiful wife Natasha, entering the Odeon. Probably the most tenuous of all these photos, but also one of my favourite alternative-angles, ha ha.
Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich were the brains behind Finding Nemo – and many other Pixar classics. I had the pleasure of sort-of meeting them during an interview (or group interview) I was invited too in my old job. Despite louder and ruder journalists meaning I didn’t actually get to ask much, both signed a magazine for me at the end and were very polite and friendly.
Three-for-the-price-of-one – Alias stars David Anders, Melissa George and Bradley Cooper, seen here at a very nerdy Alias convention in London. I’m not a big convention fan, but Melissa invited me down to spend the day since it was in London and she wasn’t in town for long. Anders and Cooper were both lovely, and Melissa forced me to eat most of her lunch and as well as my own, not realising that Sara and I had snuck-out for a Big Mac half an hour earlier. D’oh!
This is a blurry one, but I think that encapsulates her character quite well – journalist and Twitter-funny-lady Caitlin Moran, standing outside 10 Downing Street after the ‘Downing Tweet’ Christmas party I went to.
Another Downing Street photo – this time of TV’s Kirstie Allsopp, who was also at the event and who I was also too chicken to talk to. She seemed very nice though!
The last Downing Street one – singer Beverley Knight. There were actually loads of celebrities at this party, but Downing Street security take everyone’s camera before they go in, so the only snaps I managed to get were either outside afterwards, or – like this one – from the official selection that they took. Unlike most of these pictures though, I did actually chat to Beverley – just before she burst in to song. It was rather surreal, but she was lovely – she even gave me a hug and called me ‘big man’ at the end. Random!
Another celebrity that I managed to ‘snap’ at a Prince’s Trust event – Alesha Dixon, in the basement of the River Island shop in central London. She wasn’t posing for me, sadly, but for their proper photographers, ha ha.
Pixie Lott, at the very same event, perched on a sofa. She stayed for about ten minutes, presumably before dashing off to another exciting party. I also dashed off soon after, to catch the last train home. Oh, the glamour! :D
Brett Anderson of ‘Suede’ fame. I guess this one doesn’t really count as ‘random’, since we were at the after-show party of their ICA gigs back in 2003. Shortly after this photo was taken, Brett stood on my foot. FACT!
So there we have it – yes, I really am a saddo, but what can you do?
My Year in Photos – August 11th – “It’s the birthday tree”
I spotted these sad-looking birthday balloons in this tree on my way to work today. If I remember correctly, I posted a similar-looking photo around Valentines Day earlier in the year.
If I wasn’t so bloody tired, I’d make some heart-felt or poignant comment about them. But I won’t…
My Year in Photos – August 10th – “Wet, wet, wet”
oday was a very wet day, so opportunities for pretty photos were limited. Hence I snapped many shots of a rain-soaked Chiswick, this being the least-bad of the lot of them. It’s taken just down the path from our building.
My Year in Photos – August 9th – “Another shard in the wall”
I took today’s photos by holding my camera (phone) above the wall next to where I parked my car. The lovely looking scene on the left is the grounds of Chiswick House. Separating that from the street is a VERY nasty looking glass-shard-topped wall – though admittedly the glass looks like it may have seen more menacing days. The silly thing is, just down from this point there is a VERY large opening in the wall and a very small gate….
My Year in Photos – August 8th – “A little bit of New York in Berkshire”
My Year in Photos – August 8th – "A little bit of New York in Berkshire", originally uploaded by henweb.
We spotted these concrete table-tennis tables in Prospect park in Reading today – the newest features in what is already a very well-equipped site. They reminded us of the sort of thing you see in Central Park, though I’m pretty certain they won’t stay this nice for long.