Tag Archives: humour

CSE, TVEI, NVQ, GCSE: I talk to B and E over a BLT

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Okay, now then, first of all, let me introduce you to B and E. We’re having lunch in a cafe in Westfields, the huge shopping centre in Shepherds Bush. They are both on BLTs and coffee while I am re-arranging the currants on my sticky bun to resemble a ‘Happy Face’. Retired now, B and E have spent the bulk of their working lives in the teaching game. Not only that, but  specifically with some of its most difficult and challenging individuals. They did this (and moreover did it extremely well) by being well-organised, stimulating their charges’ interest by approaching topics or subjects from a point of view which allowed them the opportunity to engage, and by treating their students with respect.  However, I don’t want any mental images of ‘bearded (both of them) yoghurt-knitting, wet, woolly-thinking liberals’. Far from it. Snappy-dressing Rock ‘n’ Rollers, they approached the classroom with principles and attitude and certainly didn’t suffer fools gladly. I’m making them out to be a bit of a double act, but of course they weren’t. Apart from a brief spell when they taught in the same school, they did not work together.

The first story is from E and is a cautionary tale for all those with a calling to work in the schools’ inspectorate (still known, as far as I am aware as OFSTED) and comes from the time she worked at Chantry, a special school for ‘maladjusted’ children as it was known then. She had a particularly difficult group. Almost impossible to get settled and concentrating on anything. That was until she introduced them to a bit of sewing or perhaps more correctly, needlework.

For miracle of miracles; when she got out the sewing kit and once they had got bored with trying to jab each other, they simmered down and got into some basic techniques. It must have had some kind of therapeutic effect.

Well, it was into one of these lessons one jolly morning that a school inspector purposefully strode and took up her position to observe the lesson.  Apart from making ‘V’ signs behind her back, raising their eyebrows a lot and huffing, coughing, sneezing and ‘hiding’ swear words in them as they did so (Bbbbhhhbitch!  Aahhaahhaahhaarsehole!!)  the kids completely ignored the visitor. Meanwhile, E explained to the students what they had to do, and they got started.

A relative calm descended. E went around, helping out. As she did so Mrs. Inspector takes it upon herself to poke around and give the students the benefit of her expertise. She stood and looked for a long time over the shoulder of one of the boys, which had the visitor even the slightest scrap of awareness of body language and the intimate classroom dynamics of such a teaching situation is the boy she would have made a point of steering well clear of.

“Oh no no no!” said the inspector. Silence. The students looked from one to another, open-mouthed.

“Oh no no no! That won’t do. That bit there. It isn’t straight ..” You could hear a pin drop.

Without looking up the boy replied: “Yeah? Well you’ve got a fucking big nose, but I wasn’t gonna say  nothing” 

And so you have it. The fundamental flaw in the process of inspecting and reporting on schools, their teachers and the students in their care. Employing inspectors with Fucking Big Noses.

And for those of you who haven’t worked it out yet, ‘B’ is ‘Bill’ as in My Mate Bill, and E his wife Eileen. 

Notes:

CSE: Secondary Certificate of education

TVEI: Technical/Vocational Initiative

NVQ: National Vocational Qualification

GCSE: General Certificate of Secondary Education

BLT: Bacon lettuce and Tomato Sandwich

© Andy Daly  2010

McEnroe and Borg

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On the afternoon of one of the great McEnroe/Borg finals,  me and My Best Mate Aky spent a side-splitting  afternoon in the off licence he ran on Seven Sisters Road,  coming up with the definitive tabloid headline for the following day’s editions.

Winner was (I’ll never forget it)

                          “Ice Borg sinks Mac the Strife in Titanic struggle”

© Andy Daly  2010

Yet Again

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Yet again, ‘Good Friday’ turns out to be a bitter disappointment. It wasn’t ‘Good’ at all. In fact it was bloody awful most of the time.

There was one Golden Nugget, however, which made me laugh like a drain. My eldest, 18 years old, fit as a butchers dog, is vacuuming the room, giving me a hand tidying the house. As he works he is listening to his I pod: Loud. Mainly to drown out my Aswad CD: Even Louder.

‘That’s interesting…’ I thought. ‘Why is he doing a ‘dummy run with the vac?’ I motioned to him to stop, which he did. Sarcastically, I said: ‘It works much better when it’s switched on’

Immediately, he pulled off his headphones: ‘Oh no! How long has it been like this?’

 ‘I haven’t heard any noise for about 15 mins’ I said.

“Bugger” it. said As he bashed about in the cupboard, that means I’ve got to do it all again!

He had ‘hoovered’ almost the whole of the downstairs of the house without turning it on!

Bless him! Now if only he would do something about those soppy jeans he wears halfway down his arse …

Learning to Drive

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Me? My dad gave me lessons on the beautiful country lanes (deathtraps) round Seascale  In the Lake District. One day, after sitting in the car for a few minutes, looking out of the windshield at clear blue skies, listening to a grinding, whirring sound as it slowed and faded: The sound (I think you’re there before me) of  front wheels that no longer have contact with a road surface, but which are running free and gradually losing momentum. They were able to do this as the fuschia Hillman Avenger .. It was the 70’s! ..  that we were sitting in had come to rest, yours truly behind the controls, at an angle of 45 degrees after taking on a dry stone wall and fence. My Dad turned to me, stiffly – It may have been the whiplash – and said. “Right! I think that’s enough of that!” We swapped places, he reversed it back onto the road and he never mentioned it again. It was however the end of my father’s tuition.

Avenger – almost the same colour!

 So it was at the age of 26 while living in Bromley by Bow in the East End of London that  I eventually learned to drive. The streets of Whitechapel, Mile End, Old Ford and Stepney being my training ground. I must confess, I had my doubts about my instructor: not because she was a woman, but because one memorable lesson she told me (This is true!) to drive up the off-slip of the A12, Blackwall Tunnel road just to the north of East India Dock road. All my instincts said ‘This doesn’t look right’ and I voiced my concern but she wouldn’t have it; till we got to the apex of the tight loop that the road makes to find two lanes of traffic bearing down on us. I think it probably prompted the quickest three point turn I’ve ever done.

My first car was a 1971 1.8 Marina coupe: GLD 967J. It was like shit off a shovel that car…. I tuned it: well fiddled with the carb jet and float – as if it made any difference. It still did what it wanted. I remember the day I bought it and went to pick it up. An icy December morning, I was also moving flats from Bow to Sudbury Town, Wembley. I had to tube it at what seemed like the crack of dawn, from Bow to Ickenham to collect it, then drive (my first solo drive!) down the A40 into and through central London back to Bow to load up, then back  through central London and A40 again to Wembley.

Look at that! 1.8 Coupe. Like poetry in motion. Sorry that should read pottery in motion

Incidentally, you know the stretch of road that runs from Kings Cross, past Euston, Baker Street and finally onto the flyover at Edgware Road? Well I’d not been driving long when one night, coming back from Hackney I managed to get from King’s Cross onto the A40, without a single red light! (Okay some were a bit amber, even slightly red-tinted…) But, honestly I stayed within the law. Mind you, I didn’t look at my speed. Couldn’t do it now of course. Too many new sets of lights. Like I said: shit off a shovel.

© Andy Daly  2010

Waxing lyrical

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Cynically adapted by Y. T. (as in ‘Yours Truly’ ) from a news item about Crayola. You remember them from school? The crayons in the little tins.

Crayola ‘wax lyrical’ over the celebration of its 50th year with the introduction of a commemorative 64 crayon box. To celebrate the anniversary, Crayola introduced eight new colors selected by children to tell a story about what’s important to today’s youth: knives, guns, cheap skunk.

© Andy Daly  2010

Marc Forni

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Congratulations to Marc and his wife on the birth of a baby girl at 2:10pm today.

To mark the occasion, published here, for the first time – giving a real insight into the complex dynamic between Newly Qualified Teacher, Observer, and Students is a copy of the observation record of Marc’s groundbreaking Art lesson 15/07/04

Lesson Observation Form for Newly Qualified Teachers

 Name              MARC FORNI

Date    15/7/04                   Subject: Art                                   Lesson/Class  P.1

Teaching Group          YEAR 8 M/A

Planning and preparation

Good. Your lesson was meticulously planned and prepared. Your written documentation clearly highlighted the importance of making sure I got a cup of tea beforehand. (The omission of brandy is put down to pre-observation nerves: but remember, this could happen for real with ofsted. So be prepared)

The lesson was divided into 3 parts and involved

  •  Looking into the kiln (at a temperature of close to 300 degrees C) and forlornly exclaiming ‘We didn’t have enough time! They are a bit hot’
  • Making paper folders
  • Looking at students wandering around aimlessly.

The objectives were met and satisfy the school’s criteria for an ‘excellent’ lesson.

Seating plan would have been used had there had been enough stools.

Teaching content – style and strategies

The first 25/30 minutes was taken up with trying to clear mess left by the Head of Department, which although impressive, was over – long and meant that many students lost interest. You did not take the opportunity to pose questions or allow the students to question you. Try to break this aspect of the lesson down into smaller ‘chunks.’

Communication skills

Good classroom presence. Clear voice. I particularly thought you got through to the students in a very special way with the middle finger to Student X and the no-nonesense ‘Yes girls, I’ve got 4 earrings, now piss off’ comment. Sadly however, these are both approaches which although effective, are not fashionable these days.

Learning environment and use of resources

No resources were prepared in advance: A sign that you have truly found your feet at this school.

Classroom organisation and management

Students lined up outside the room and took off their coats in an orderly manner on entering the room. (I think, I was still drinking my tea)

Pupil response

  •  Minimal. Their response to your lesson did, frankly not reflect the time and effort you put into it. (Why was this?)
  •  You have reservations about your ability to meet the needs of all pupils. You are right. On the whole you don’t meet any.
  •  However, you are teaching Art, so no one gives a toss.

 Use of prior assessment to support pupils’ learning

What?

Subject specific comments

 You clearly have good subject knowledge in Art and are confident with it.

Recommendations

  •  Try to make your teaching a little less didactic. Encourage more active learning. For instance, students could have been given the initiative to use blue, or even black paper for their folders.
  • Use questioning more. For instance: ‘Why am I here?’
  • Finally have you thought of teaching a more popular subject, say RE or ethics for example?

NQT signature………………………………                                       Date……………….

Scruckshelishelcquerlup

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It is morning, and whilst lying in bed, awake waiting for my tablets to kick in, I hear my youngest son in the bathroom (next door) going through his daily gargling routine, This lasts for about 4 minutes:

“scruckshelishelcquerlupwaschushashushscruckshelishelcquerlupwaschushas hushscruckshelishelcquerlupwaschushashushscruckshelishelcquerlupwas chushashushscruckshelishelcquerlupwaschushashushscruckshelishelcquer

lupwaschushas hushscruckshelishelcquerlupwaschushashushscruckshelishe

lcquerlupwaschushashush  …..aaaahhhhgglllleee aaaahhhhgglllleee

aaaahhhhgglllleee  (this is the back of the throat bit)

Wuwwulllmmnllleeeaaaahhhhggwuwwulllmmnlllleeeaaaahhhhgglwuwwulllmmnlll

Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!…………..pwryyyrrtt! (this is the spit)

……………….Heeeeeeeuuuugh! …. pwryyyrrtt!” (another spit)

I am thinking, I’ve got a drum and bass line that would go perfectly with that!

He’s got a routine for everything: a brushing teeth routine, the mouthwash routine (as you now know) the anti-perspirant spray routine (not one to be caught in the middle of !)  The ‘don’t care hair’ routine. You know, I never knew it took so long to perfect that ‘Just dragged through a hedge’ look. Still, …. He is worth it!

Meanwhile, back in bed, I practise my rigorous exercise routine. I open and close my right eye five times, then repeat with the left. As they say: No pain, no gain. That done, I cast one of the aforesaid eyes (the left – as it happens) to the other side of the room and it alights on my walking frame. Okay, it’s a zimmer frame, but it has got ‘Go Faster’ stripes, metallic paint and polished chrome.  I don’t use it much; as you can see by all the washing hanging off it.

I can just imagine it:  The Harrow and Hillingdon Area Health Authority enquiry:

“Mr Daly, would you care to explain to us once again, exactly how you came to break your hip. On the day in question you didn’t use the walking frame that The Health Authority provide you with, because it was (He refers to his notes) ‘Full of washing’ “

“Yes Sir, that is correct, Sir, I …………”

 © Andy Daly  2010

The Things We Say. The day I met Noddy

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Well, thank goodness Diff was awake – I knew he’d get it, and first too.

He did.

Dear reader, let me introduce you to Mr. Douglas Futers, Popular Music aficionado extraordinaire. He knows everything about everything and  has been to more gigs than we’ve had collective  hot dinners. He’s seen Hawkwind (‘Silver Machine’ Remember?) 742 times and is now deaf as a post.

Of course! It was Noddy Holder, the band was Slade and the record, the evergreen ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ a hit for the band first time around, Christmas 1973 (Flares, Strikes, ‘For mash say Smash’ and Advocaat)

If you didn’t know, and although you probably really couldn’t give a shit, I’m going to tell you anyway; the story is that this seasonal ditty which has etched its way into our national consciousness, along with Turkey, old St. Nick and Dicken’s ‘Christmas Carol’ was in fact recorded over a blistering hot week in New York, late summer of that year. Apparently, Lennon (that’s John, Liverpool, musician not Aaron, Spurs, winger) was in the next studio recording ‘Mind Games’ at the time.

The song was a hotch-potch of snippets that Nod and Jim Lee had lying around. They were given the final touch, it is reported when (I love this …)  Nod “After an evening out drinking worked through the night at his mother’s house in Walsall to write the lyrics, which he completed in one draft.” You see? a genuine slice of British Popular Culture. Bowie, meantime, earnestly doing his Willliam Burroughs’ ‘cut-ups’ must have been wondering where he went wrong.

Anyway, it just so happens that last week I had occasion to be in Birmingham. We took our eldest up there so he could attend an Open Day at Aston University, which is, in case you don’t know slap-bang in the centre of town. Wouldn’t have been my choice personally, it has to be said. To me, Brum has always been where people speak with a speech impediment rather than an accent; A place to be avoided at all costs, using one of the myriad motorways which appear designed expressly for such a purpose.

Anyway, we drop Laddo off, and from where, when we’ve turned the corner, he makes for the lecture theatre to hear all about International Business with Spanish. Or, if he were more like me at that age, make for the nearest pub, to really start ‘getting the taste’ for the West Midlands and the good folk therein.

We’re left with a couple of hours to kill, and as we’re over the road from the ‘Bullring’ Birmingham’s infamous shopping centre we decide to nip in and take a look. Well: pleasantly surprised is the reaction. They’ve made a damned fine job of re-inventing the ‘old’ Bullring which I last saw in about 1979, and was, let’s face it not only an eyesore, but an earsore, armsore and legsore it was so bad. Not so today. In fact it looks like every other modern shopping centre in whatever city or town you care to mention.

I was still pondering this transformation in the Bullring gents toilets, whilst drying my hands. I was using one of these new-fangled blown air hand driers. Similar to,  but not the Dyson airblade, it looked like an open letterbox in the wall. And, it was pretty pathetic: a brief vision passed before my eyes of the Facia of this thing being removed to reveal two wheezing old men blowing through it from behind. This nightmarish thought was soon banished by an awareness that someone was standing behind me…

I turned and looked. It was only Noddy Holder! The owner of the best pair of lungs this side of the Mississippi Delta!

What to say? I can’t come over all fawning fan – I’m nearly 50: No, no, no that won’t do. What about a ‘cooler’ approach? Drop in a ‘Blokey’ comment which might initiate a conversation.

That’s it! I figured.

Of all the things I could have said or asked him – such as ‘What was it really like to work with Dave Hill?’

‘Why the Mirror Hat, Nod? and how did you keep it on?’

Failing that, ”Ere Noddy, you know when Don Powell lost his memory, were there ever things you told him that hadn’t happened, just for a laugh?

No, of all the things … What do I venture forth with?

    “These hand driers are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard”

He looked at me and snorted a snort which was somewhere half way between ‘Yeah’ and ‘What the **** are you talking about?’ – I’m still analysing it.

….and made his way out.

Moral of the story: Be prepared! Get a notebook, list everyone famous you would like to meet. Add 2 or 3 questions for each and carry it round with you at all times!

© Andy Daly  2010

Wildlife Photography

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In which a family of kingfishers manage to trick a former Art teacher into rejecting a process-led model as a metanarrative of a discredited Modernist formal orthodoxy. It also features some spectacular stunt flying, courtesy of the Red Sparrows.

It has slowly become apparent to me that I’ve been had. Done over.  Hook, line and sinker, I have been stitched up like a kipper by … a family of kingfishers

Why? Because I have failed to listen to my own best advice and have allowed myself to be seduced by Product at the expense of Process. I know! …  Me! The Process Kid! ….Me! who has spent a lifetime  teaching a process-based model (I’m getting more and more angry as I write this) Me! a signed and fully paid up champion of a process-led aesthetic. I can’t believe it. Tricked, out-witted and out-manouvered … by a family of bloody kingfishers. I mean, they’re only 6 inches tall with a brain the size of a pea!

The Readers Digest Book of British Birds describes them as ‘mainly sedentary’ and confines the bulk of its entry to an almost obsessive interest in the spectacular colouring, superlative flying, and dramatic diving. Ha! Where are the warnings that this orange and blue – alright – ‘turquoise’ critter will quite happily lead the unwary out onto one of the most treacherous visual arts battlefields of the Modernist era and leave you beaten and bloodied for your troubles? Where does it suggest that it might be wise to re-aquaint yourself with Walter Benjamin before you go birdwatching?

Here is my story.

I take my bike from out of the shed and leave the house I share with my wife and two children, at work and school respectively. And why do I do this? … well … it’s because  we’ve got the bloody builders in. They have just ‘knocked through’. Any sign of a dustsheet? No! Any respect for personal space? No! Any interest in the fact that I too may have some objectives I’d like to acomplish –  preferably before sunset and so therefore really cannot  spare the time to make another cup of tea and listen to another ‘Clumsy Tony’ anecdote. No!

So I’m going for a bike ride to escape, because if I hear that fucking dopey roofer sing ‘Karma bloody Chameleon’ one more time I swear I’m going to pound his brains to mush with one of his own roofing tiles.

And so to the park (tip) at the end of our road.

Just listen to that … Silence! … (Well silence that  is if you filter out the playground noise from the school, the trains passing on the Met. line, the plane landing at Northolt, the coarse chatter of the jackhammer from … Oh gawd!..  Our house by the sound of it)

And so I’m off. A quick three lap burn up of the ‘Nature Reserve’ This presents a major test of skill and nerve as you try to avoid the dog crap everywhere, and today? … well, let’s head off down past the park and along the brook (sewer) and back again.

I’ve got to say, all joking apart, that in the dappled sunlight under a flaming canopy of Horse Chestnut, Ash, Hazel and a couple of Oak and Beech, it is extraordinarily beautiful down here … and quiet. The Parrots look a bit out of place though. There’s a … (collective noun for parrots? a squawk? –  sounds alright) There’s a squawk of parrots, about 6 in total who divide their time between the park and the big old tree behind our house. Escapees, I guess. A novelty at first, they are now right up there with the dopey roofer on my hate list courtesy of the bloody awful racket they make: that’s all seven of them.

I am just imagining what roast parrot might taste like and indeed how it might compare with roast roofer (I suspect a parrot, no matter how well fed might present a challenge in feeding a family of four. The roofer, on the other hand has been nicely looked after and …)

Bloody Hell! See that? A kingfisher! Brilliant!

Wonderful! One of my favourite birds as a child. Not that I ever saw more than about three. Seeing a kingfisher gave me an electric thrill (and still does) as the streak of sapphire and orange flashed past, seemingly unconcerned, but busy nevertheless.

Who would have thought it?  On smelly Yeading Brook. I saw it again the following day and again and again. I was surprised talking to local dogwalkers, regulars along the brookside path, that although ‘vaguely aware’ of the bird’s existence at some time or other, no-one had seen it (or them) this season. Yet I, having begun to observe the bird’s pattern of behaviour and favourite branches on which to perch, saw it two, sometimes three times a visit.

I resolved to bring my camera, which I did (oh how I rue the day!) There was a lot of activity that morning: I’d seen it two or three times – It had of course occurred to me that there could be more than one: a pair? I was on the verge of leaving when right out of the blue/turquoise/saphhire whatever you want to call it, close by the lower entrance to the park it landed on a branch overlooking a bend in the brook. It was about 70 yards away. Against all odds, which included a standard 50mm lens – no telephoto and uncontrollable shaking as I tried to focus (In fact, if the truth be known, I had a quite incomplete grasp of the procedures for focussing my Canon 450D for having had it for two months, I was too lazy to have read the instruction manual) The shot was an accident: I was pressing the button for a meter reading and overdid it. I got another one in, but with a shutter sound like a skoda car door slamming – that was it. The kingfisher was off!

 

Can you spot it?

 But I had it! After thoroughly testing the image manipulation giant that is Photoshop CS3 (Extended) I had it!  Okay, it wasn’t exactly David Attenborough: but then I wasn’t on his kind of money.You had to look hard deep into a mess of trees, riverbank, undergrowth but there it was the unmistakeable shape of a kingfisher. Ha! I was about to prove to everyone that this was no fig roll of my imagination…

But it was also to prove my undoing … My dissatisfaction with the quality of my kingfisher picture,  which despite all the power of Photoshop was still grainy and fuzzy, began to be replaced by a growing conviction that here was an opportunity to extend my range as a budding photographer. Yes! It was time to move on from those interminable artsy ‘coffee table book’ guitar pictures( http://www.andydalyphotography.co.uk/  in case you’re interested. I accept Pay Pal and all major credit cards) Let’s face it, any clot with a serviceable camera and a spotlamp could do them – you just had to remember, Do ‘em in black and white and don’t forget: Loads of shadows! No: this was real photography: wildlife photography.

And here, dear reader is where the wheels began to come off. I can hear myself thinking, althoughI never actually uttered the words, but sure enough, like so many of my wayward students over the years I thought them. Words which are enough plunge even the most experienced, hard-bitten, battle-scarred Art teacher into a trough of despair:

“But I know exactly what it’s going to look like”

I know, I know …. Me, the Process Kid! As I sit now staring at words on the screen I can barely believe it. But there I was, a week later, armed with a telephoto lens (courtesy of E Bay. Incidentally, I picked up a delightful plaster cast of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and a complete Morris Marina workhop manual at the same time. Who says it’s a Global Car Boot Sale eh?) and assorted camouflage garments, more usually associated with members of fanatical paramilitary active service cells: ready to do battle with the kingfishers for the ultimate Kingfisher photograph ….

[A small hollow in a sandy bank overlooking Yeading Brook and a family of Kingfishers are sitting around, reading the morning papers and childrens’ comic supplements]

Oh God! Here he is again!

Who’s here again, Darling?

That idiot. You know, the one with the camera.

The one with the wooly hat? You’re too hard on him. You should stop teasing him and leave him in peace.

Leave him in peace? What about us? What about him leaving us in peace? I’ll leave him alone when he stops invading our privacy. Three times last week…three times. You know what I’m like about my fishing –

[The children pipe up] Oh yes! We all know what you’re like about your fishing. We’re not allowed to talk..

We’re not even allowed to breathe!

Now, you two, come on…What your father is saying is that he just enjoys his privacy..

Exactly! Alone. So I can think and unwind and relax. Without having some half-baked would-be ‘wildlife photographer’ sticking his zoom lenses into my beak. And anyway, where do you think your meals would come from if I weren’t allowed to ‘dip this beak’ unhindered?

I caught one yesterday!

That was not a Minnow.

What was it then?

Well, it wasn’t a fish … Now let’s leave it at that … Oh God!

What is it now? You’re ever so tetchy these days…

It’s those bloody parrots, again. I wish someone would sort them out…send them back to where they came from.

But Dear, you can’t say that…

I just did. Okay! So who’s coming to have a bit of fun with old ‘David Attenborough’ then?

Me!

Me!

Me!

Daaad?

Yes, sunshine?

Do you think he knows there’s five of us?

Hmmmmm…Difficult to say… I think he knows there are at least two.

Remember yesterday, when you and Mum had already gone up to bend in the river with the wooden platform, but when I flew past, he went in the opposite direction?

Yes, that was odd. I just don’t think he’s very observant.

…He’s always half asleep

Yes, I’ve noticed that, Dear. I don’t think he gets enough rest…

Rest?! Oh for pity’s sake woman, we need to get rid of him, not mother him. I want my peace and quiet back.

Dad! Let’s try and get him to drop his big camera into the river

Yeeeaah!

And how are you going to do that?

Oh it’ll be well easy … Did you see when he dropped his hat in the river?

That’s right:  So far …Let’s see …  His gloves went in….

… his hat …

… (Twice) …

… His lens cap …

… and he got bitten by a dog! …

[Together] Twice!

It is easy! All you’ve got to do is make him wait till he starts to get tired…

It’s best to sit quite high up

… and behind him. He still thinks we only ever fly or perch low along the course of the river.

Watch him. Watch his shoulders.  After a while he starts to go into this position and his shoulders hunch over.

What’s ‘hunch’?

Y’know, go all rounded

Then it’s time to fly… Straight at him if you can

Yeaaaah!

He goes all shaky! It’s dead funny.

Okay? We all ready? You staying here, Love?  Oh! Before I forget, I’ve left an article out for you… might like to read it. I thought it was quite good. It’s a frank new appraisal of Benjamin’s ‘Work of Art In An Age Of Mechanical Reproduction’ In fact, I think it will throw more light onto the near polarisation of the visual arts and the acendency of a Post Modern,  pluralist aesthetic for the end of the twentieth century. See what you think. Okay kids? We off?

Chocks away!

[Some weeks later. The Builders have now gone]

                                                               …. ready to do battle with the kingfishers for the ultimate Kingfisher photograph.

 [Reader]: So?

What?

[Reader]: So where is it?

What?

[Reader]: The ‘Ultimate Kingfisher Photograph’?

You see, people don’t realise just how difficult wildlife photography is. They just think that the photographer turns up, whips out their camera, Click! Click! Home in time for tea and crumpets. No way! It requires methodical planning, deep knowledge of the habits and environment of the subject and consumate camera skills. Never mind thinking … aperture?… exposure?… focus? … ooops, lens cap off … when there’s a kingfisher flying at you. It needs to be instinctive … it’s raw!…It’s man versus beast in an extreme and hostile environment.

[Reader]: ‘Extreme and hostile’? What? Yeading Brook? In Roxborne Park?

Yeah … err … it’s pretty hostile. I came close to losing my hat in the drink on one occasion.

***   Kingfishers 1 ‘David Attenborough’ 0   *** 

 [Reader]: So how long have you been waiting for this ‘ultimate photograph?

Let’s see, where are we now? March .. That will make it uhmm …  Five months … it’ll be five months

***   Kingfishers 2 ‘David Attenborough’ 0   ***

 [Reader]: And how many pictures have you taken?

Oooooohhhh loads!

[Reader]: Of kingfishers?

Two

***   Kingfishers 3 ‘David Attenborough’ 0   *** 

[Reader]: So your original image and two new ones?

Ahhh ..  No. My … errr…original shot and one new one.

***   Kingfishers 4 ‘David Attenborough’ 0   ***

 [Reader]:  It must be spectacular … the other one? It must be if it’s your ‘ultmate kingfisher photo’ Can you describe it? I’m fascinated by the notion of it being a battle between man and nature in order to wrest the image you want exactly as you thought it was going to look. That must be some result eh? The suspense is killing me … Thanks … No, don’t see it. Ahhh! That’s because I’ve got it upside down … no wait …. No, Still don’t see it ……..what the hell am I looking at?

Well … can you just see behind that branch…?

[Reader]: You mean that blurry brown line?

Hmmmmm…It’s that spot of blue …. Juuuusssssst ……. there!

*** Game Set and Match: Kingfishers ***    

Epilogue

Never has the pursuit of artistic endeavour so exausted me. Never has so much time been invested for such little reward. How could I let myself walk into such an obvious trap? One which, because of my training and experience I should have spotted from the outset.

My ‘Ultimate Kingfisher Photograph’ hangs on the chimney breast (I tell people it’s one of a series of abstract paintings I’m working on – sort of diffused spatial enquiries … ‘Yes, they can sometimes look like out of focus photographs. I’m glad you spotted that’) My misery is complete when the Dopey Roofer decides he likes it and offers to buy it.  It reminds him of the lighting effects used at last year’s Ministry of Sound New Year Party. ‘It was sick man, I’m tellin’ yah I was well out of it’.

I let it go for £5:49 with which I buy a new wooly hat. The house is cold and lonely, the wind whistles through the gap in the front door, making a sound like a maddened wailing banshee. I’m beginning to miss the builders … they weren’t that bad after all.

 

Cause of all the trouble

  

‘The Ultimate Kingfisher Photograph’

 HELPLINE

If you have been affected by any of the issues in this post, call 0800 4746 4746 to talk in confidence

© Andy Daly  2010

How to avoid giving someone a lift

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The other day a friend asked me how they might avoid having to give a lift to someone whose company they did not particularly care for. I suggested:

1.) Play Captain Beefheart/Iggy Pop/Sex Pistols/Residents/Pere Ubu (any will do) CDs VERY LOUD the whole way. I guarantee you won’t hear a single word and you will never be asked for a lift again.

2) Say you’ve got a job finding locations for a re-make of ‘The Exorcist’ and there’s one or two places you want to check out on the way.

 3) On arrival at their house, ask if they happen to have about 4ft. of narrow gauge wire to hand (preferably in a rubber sheath)  as you could do with replacing your accelerator cable. It keeps sticking, usually somewhere about 60 – 70 mph.

© Andy Daly  2010