22/12/2016

The best day of 2016

I think we can all agree that 2016 was a truly shit year. It started pretty rough for me personally, but I will look back at it as the year when I got the chance to reset myself. It was simply time for me to learn a new way of being, and of setting myself on the right path for the next half of my life, and for that I'm grateful for what the past 12 months have taught me. I don't think I can usually say which day was the best of the whole year, but I can this year. It was on my 41st birthday, which also happened to be the hottest day of the summer. We jumped in the car and brought Oomoo's cousins along for a day trip to Margate, and managed to cram in so much that it felt that we'd been away for a couple of days and not just 10 hours. The first place we visited was the Shell Grotto, a series of underground passages discovered in 1835, where someone has covered the walls in 4.6 million shells.  The comments of awe from the kids as we entered were priceless. It was truly amazing and I can't recommend it enough if you ever go to Margate. Selfishly I then wanted to go to Turner Contemporary (pics 2-4) thinking that the kids would get bored, but they had a cool exhibition on with different artists' take on the humble circle. Plus the place had air conditioning, so no one was complaining! We then headed to Dreamland, and got seriously ripped off, but we made the most of the retro rides. The others then managed to get a quick cooling dip in the sea in before we had dinner (I chose to guard our bags and take pictures instead, hehe). As we walked back to the car on that hottest of days, I thought that we'd all agree that it had been a brilliant day, regardless our age, and I'm sure that we'll speak of it for years to come. As for 2017, please be a better year for all of us. Please.

21/12/2016

The last night

Sigh. I can't wait to go back. I just had a quick look to see if there were any other pictures worth posting, and it made me want to fast forward until we go back. It was such a hassle-free and relaxed holiday (am I repeating myself?) and those are so good for you! I really want to take Oomoo to a different part of the world, to broaden his horizons, but that type of holiday is not one where you just rock up and wing it. It'll take a lot more planning, and a lot less relaxing, but I think I can deal with it :)  Where to next...?

13/12/2016

Letters and windows in Annecy

Oh hi there! If you follow me on Instagram, my last (maybe ever??) post was about how IG is starting to feel like a graveyard (just like Flickr did when we all deserted it for Instagram - oh the irony...), with it's insane algorithm that cuts us off from each other, and decides for us what we want to see and in what order. It's made me seriously think about whether I still want social media to be a part of my everyday life. In a world where people get their news from Facebook, and politicians vent on Twitter, I'm starting to feel that I no longer want to partake. This here might be a better spot to "hang out" as it's quieter, and as I'm still reading blogs, it makes sense to start posting more as well. But I'm quite behind (five months - gaaah!). It would take many days in front of the computer to get back up to date, and I'll try my best to catch up. So, as far as the blog is concerned, it's still July, and as the sun has been absent from the London sky for days, I savour seeing some pictures from the summer again.

These are from Annecy (the town), and the French do signage so well. Something the Brits are terrible at. I'd love to tour France and just collect pictures of their typography. Now there's an idea!