Paul Grand

2010-02-23T04:03:00.001-08:00

lost and found ~ Halloween story ~ part one

2009-10-31T10:59:00.001-07:00

lost and found, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

The Trikes Return

It was the first time we had returned to the coast for several months,
the last time was in the autumn when that strange mist had rolled in from the sea.
We like to take our dogs as often as possible, they love frolicking about in the waves,
and it gives the smelly old things a good freshen up!

We've been together for 15 years now,
we have no kids, no room for them in our tiny terraced Mortlake Cottage opposite the old children's workhouse in S.W. London.
We just have the one bedroom up a very steep staircase.
Micheal had often remarked that it wasn't a very child friendly house, and as events turned out it would never be because 'Mich' as I affectionately call her, developed breast cancer and had to go through a year or so of grueling treatment. Thankfully that was several years ago and now she's clear and over the worst of the treatment, except now after the chemotherapy she'll never be able to have children...
I expect the dogs are now our surrogate kids, we're always getting ribbed about it by our opera singing neighbors,
but we make one handsome family, the two big gray Afghans and Mich and I both being blonds look like we were made for each other in a strange kind of way.

Back at the beach the dogs were having a ball of a time, we had their favorite red 'ladybird' ball,
which we threw into the sea for them both to fight over!
Mich got worried in case they got too overtired so we brushed the dogs as best we could and had a flask of hot milky coffee,
sitting in the Volvo looking at the sun glancing off the slate gray sea.
The dogs in the back on several old towels, fell into a pleasant exhausted sleep wrapped around each other.
I noticed Mich was very quiet, not her normal quiet, but with a lost, 'far away' look in her eyes.
I asked her what was wrong?, and she said "I wonder if that little girl we found is alright"?
I started to say "Sorry?" And caught myself, of course, the little Girl on the trike.
"Of course she's alright, its lucky the address was printed on the seat or we'd have had a real job of finding the parents"!

I remembered back to the last time, we were walking with the dogs through this thick sea mist along the promenade when we heard this god forsaken high pitched weeping coming towards us.
We stopped in our tracks, the dogs hid behind our legs with their noses in their legs, obviously afraid of the sound.
We then heard a squeaking followed by the appearance of a little fair haired girl with bright blue button eyes wearing a pink peaked cap on a trike.
She'd been bawling her eyes out, and was obviously quite lost.
As she approached we could hear her blubbering that she couldn't find her Mommy and Daddies house where she lived.
She said she'd lost her trike on the beach and had been looking for it, and couldn't return home until she's found it.
Now she had been reunited with the little yellow bike she couldn't find her own house!
Mich was bewitched by her, I could see they would have made a perfect mother and daughter, and that old lump in my throat returned, as I knew it was the one thing she could never have.

Mich was wonderful with the girl, she calmed her down in moments and had a reasonably cohesive conversation,
the girl was bright and seemed older than her years as she spoke very well for a toddler who had lost her way in her own neighborhood.
Mich found the address as soon as the girl stood up, it was an old ex-libris paper book sticker on the saddle, number 9,
Regents Terrace, just a little way on from where the girl had come from.
She told Mich her name was L i l - l y, after her mothers favorite flower. And cheerfully chatted away as if we had always known her,
Mich could do that with kids, it was uncanny how easily she made friends, and I'd always been proud of her talent as I was in contrast, quite shy.

We found the house in a couple of minutes, the white regents terrace rose up like the nearby white chalk cliffs,
which added to the mysterious reflected sunlight through the ethereal fog.
The dogs were having to be pulled,dragged even, as they were scared of the child, I put it down to them not being used to kids.

We rapped the nautical brass knocker on the white painted door and all stood expectantly.
The girl looking up at us smiling like it was Christmas morning.
A moment later a thin pale women wearing a long knitted kind of white dress answered the door;
"Oh, there you are you silly child"! Putting her arms out and lifting her to her chest, hugging her as if she had been lost for days!
The women thanked us profusely and offered us a cup of tea or something, as she pulled the trike around her, into the hallway,
it was the least she could do, but the for the dogs, we'd have loved to have accepted.
They were madly pulling to get away, perhaps wanting to go back into the sea, which was still obscured by the thick sea mist.
So we made our goodbyes and left.
Mich remarked on the pearl 'Lilly' broach the women was wearing, that you don't see people wearing those old broaches any more.
Mich recognized it as being a collectible 'Hatty Carnegie' retro design as Mich sells jewelry on Portabello Road once a month.
Of course, she added, Pearls are considered bad luck by some, her mother always said they stood for tears..

That was last year, its now early March, spring.

I turned to Mich in the car and asked her if she would perhaps like to call at Number 9 again?
She smiled and said it was a great idea, I inwardly groaned as meeting the little girl again might set off Mich's depression again,
which had lasted several days after the child in the fog.
This time, as the dogs were sound asleep we opened all the windows a few inches, although they were fine as we were under the shade of tree. We then locked the car and walked across the road towards the distant terrace. Whilst walking a strange thing happened, another sea mist gently came as if from nowhere, blocking out the sun and bringing the temperature right down, I wished I'd brought my coat, but as we were almost there, we continued, Mich clearly delighted to be going back, and not feeling the drop in temperature so I let her light mood continue.
At the door, we recognized it immediately, the nautical ships wheel knocker, quite kitsch to a Londoner's eyes, but had a charm about it, I liked the way its polished verdigris had stained the white gloss of the surrounding paint finish a very pale sea green, It brought to mind the Mausoleums bronze doors in Highgate, a favourite dog walk of ours.

A moment later the door flew open, this time a harassed young man answered, dark haired, wearing a'V'necked sweater,
with holes in the sleeves and covered in flecks of paper.
This threw us for a moment, thankfully rescued by Mich's charm, she asked if Lilly was Ok? as we were just passing.
The man looked genuinely puzzled for a moment and said, "I'm sorry but we have no 'Lilly' here"?
But we're sure it was this house we returned the child to?
Just then we heard the voices of two kids and two little dark haired heads popped around each side of the man,
"Who is it da"? The twin boys asked in unison.
"Its nothing, just a mistaken address", he said, as if to end our conversation.
He began to close the door when Mich Blurted out;
"But I'm sure it was this house, I remember the printed label on the Trike seat, Number 9?"
The mans face lit up, "Ah! he said, so you are the people that returned the trike, thanks for that".
The boys are always leaving it on the promenade, he swung open the door and there was the little yellow trike in the hallway under the coat stand.
"We thought we had lost it and gave up looking. It was last October, half term wasn't it boys?
The twins made themselves scarce, as if acknowledging past faults.
We had gone to our house in the south of France for their half term holidays.
When we returned it was back in the hallway.
We assumed the cleaner had found it and brought it back, so I must thank you for that"!
Our faces where blank and he could see we were quite lost.

Mich continued, very quietly, almost desperately, "But we had returned the trike with a little blond girl and had been met by a blond lady who offered us tea, but had to refuse because the dogs were too much to handle", gesturing back towards our obscured car..
The man, not wanting to be unkind, listened to the story.
Mich continued, she remembered the girl was called Lilly, the Mothers favorite flower.
Suddenly the man looked up and said;
"Actually, I'm stripping the old nursery upstairs at this moment and white Lillie's were the pattern on the wallpaper,
I've also uncovered an infants writing around the bottom of the walls in crayon under the wallpaper, It looks like she was practicing to write; 'L i l - l y' he slowly pronounced".
He added, "The Trike came with the house when we bought it a few years ago,
so I wonder if you've possibly mistaken when you last came here"?
We looked at each other, could we?
The man continued, "We've had the devil of a job getting this house into a livable state again, it was locked up for several years after the last owners died quite suddenly".
Mich looked at the man with an incredulous expression.
"Yes, he continued, the mother, father and child were cruelly wiped out on the motorway whilst driving through thick fog, the child was never found, they assumed it was thrown into a fast flowing, deep river which runs into our nearby sea "..

By Paul Grand
Copyright 2009

La tour romane

2009-10-27T04:50:00.001-07:00

La tour romane, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

On Sunday 'Beziers central' had a bit of a cloud hanging over it.
So, I got the dog into the car and headed north.
From the road to the mountains I spotted this remarkable tower sticking out of the sunlit vines.
I took a right and investigated, Leo, the mountain dog, had a great time, and I was happy to see the clouds
as in the photo, left behind in the distance.
This 10th century Franco Roman tower is just outside the medieval village of Puissalicon.
Its just a short 10 min drive north from my coastally situated Beziers.
Its known as a veritable masterpiece of Romanesque art in Languedoc.
Its 4.3m wide and stands at 26m.
It was built as a bell tower for the church of Saint Etienne de Peazan priory.
These buildings are now lost in the mists of time, probably during the wars of religion.
All that remains is a fragment of an arch top, left on display at the base of the tower.
This is one of the most precious monuments of the region of Beziers.

I was very lucky to find this 'Tour' bathed in a biblical light,
seeing this site much as the original 10th century Gallo-Romano people saw it.

The Mac ness of it all!

2009-10-17T01:15:00.001-07:00

nights backdrop, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Thursday night I had meltdown with my 24" Imac, I'd maxed out on both my HD internal memory and externals. I was just going through old pictures on the externals and viewing each one when everything froze, nothing was click-able, though the web worked fine.
I rebooted and cleared out the cache etc several times and then left it overnight, but not before having discovered I had 300GB of memory left on my Ex HD, so I turned on 'Time Machine' and left it a couple of hours backing up.

Next day after finding it was all still frozen I decided to bite the bullet,with Re-formatting...O_O
This time I clicked on an option that said 'Save your old system files' and then left it an hour or so to see If I'd lost all this years work....
After a restart I was amazed to see all the file crap on my screen reappear and was once again working! :-)
Thus, I then checked the backed up files on the external to find to my relief it had indeed backed up:-)

So just to cover myself I'm now backing up all important files of finished work onto a third external HD before deleting and have so far, recovered 80 gigs of space back on the mac...When everything is backed up,
I'll re-format again but this time a full reformat, to get the Mac back to its newish-old self...

PS.
The first page flickr explore winning picture, shown above, was just one that could have been lost forever, had the 'Time Machine' malfunctioned and the Mac having had a full reformat.

Paul Grand ~ Carved with pride!

2009-10-11T00:38:00.001-07:00

Sunflower landscape, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

I feel as if I've been raging at art critics all my life,
in my infants school when I was about 6 years old I did a crayon drawing.
As the sky took over most of the page I was sent to see Miss Winterton, the headmistress who brought her corgi dog with her into school each day, a witch of a women who I remember would take great delight in reading out a long list of children killed on the roads every morning at assembly, I digress. She took one look at my picture (a landscape, not unlike the above) and said it was 'all wrong' I'd used too much space!
I cant remember the punishment but I do remember coming out of her office in tears.
This is where I wish I could go back in time and give that evil women a good talking to, ask her;
" Why she was such a power tripping anal hag"?
Going on to tell her;
"People like her shouldn't be let anywhere near children, let alone manage an infants school full of fresh,
innocent kids to have her 'old school' sadistic Victorian, uptight values screamed at them".
I'd also love to ask her, (as it used to fascinate us in the playground)
"What was it with the one big toe always bent upwards"? - In her over-tight, brown leather pointy shoes"?
I think we came to the conclusion that it was her 'starter foot', for the broomstick!

Several years later I grappled with the Golden section, I often use its formal 'suggestions' to this day.
Just last year I heard of the 'Rule of Thirds'. What a great little rule, I see many people follow it to the letter and thus I see many boring photographs...
If you knew the history of the Royal Academy in London, you'd know it was run by the worst kind of establishment snobs, who detested any kind of new art movement until it was coincided safe by the art critics in newspapers,
this place was where the Rule of Thirds came from.
The over-sized, bewigged statue of Sir Joshua Reynolds still stands in their courtyard, bizarrely, he was an ugly, squat and pugnacious little man, but his statue is of a tall, handsome fellow.
I expect its how he saw himself after the application of his rule of thirds?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_thirds

Only yesterday somebody said, about the picture above; "lovely field. i would have loved more field than sky i think"
So I took a look at his photographs in flickr, just to confirm that this guy 'knows nowt about style'
And true to form I saw; boring boring, same, same.. he'll go far!:-)
Ironically, this picture is probably 'The Picture' that most closely follows the rule of thirds that I've ever done!

A year or so after seeing Miss Winterton, I was brought to account again whilst still in the infants,
this time I received a slap across the face for decorating my white wallpaper backed book,
It was something like 'Wood-chip', and I had shaded it with my pencil, I thought it was cool, but she didn't and said;
"I was the type to carve my name into trees" Ouch!

In secondary school I did something similar and "overdecorated a lovely painting"
- she said, and was similarly told off, though mercifully without the slap.
So what did I learn? - I guess I never did, because I'm now helping to produce textures to be sent around the world,
to 'pollute' (their words) other peoples images!
Oh, and I never did carve my name into a tree! :-p

Circles of your mind

2009-09-19T08:38:00.001-07:00

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Circles of your mind, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Round
Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning
On an ever-spinning reel
Like a snowball down a mountain
Or a carnival balloon
Like a carousel thats turning
Running rings around the moon
Like a clock whose hands are sweeping
Past the minutes of its face
And the world is like an apple
Whirling silently in space
Like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind

Like a tunnel that you follow
To a tunnel of its own
Down a hollow to a cavern
Where the sun has never shone
Like a door that keeps revolving
In a half-forgotten dream
Or the ripples from a pebble
Someone tosses in a stream
Like a clock whose hands are sweeping
Past the minutes of its face
And the world is like an apple
Whirling silently in space
Like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind

Keys that jingle in your pocket
Words that jangle in your head
Why did summer go so quickly?
Was it something that you said?
Lovers walk along a shore
And leave their footprints in the sand
Is the sound of distant drumming
Just the fingers of your hand?
Pictures hanging in a hallway
And the fragment of a song
Half-remembered names and faces
But to whom do they belong?
When you knew that it was over
You were suddenly aware
That the autumn leaves were turning
To the colour of her hair

Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning
On an ever-spinning reel
As the images unwind
Like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind

With Thanks to Alan Bergman.

origin of scuba diver found roasted in a tree?

2009-09-10T00:16:00.001-07:00

origin of scuba diver found roasted in a tree?, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

The scuba diver in the tree urban legend

The story: While assessing the damage done by a forest fire in California, authorities were startled to discover the body of a man dressed in a wetsuit, complete with a dive tank, flippers, and face mask, in the branches of a tree. The strangely placed victim had suffered severe burns from the forest fire, but an autopsy revealed that he had not died from the flames, but from massive internal injuries. Dental records provided the victim's identification, and investigators contacted his family in an attempt to learn how a man who was dressed for scuba diving could possibly have ended up in the branches of a tree in the midst of hundreds of acres of charred forest.

According to the horrified family, the victim had been diving in the ocean some 30 miles away from the forest on the day that the fire had gotten out of control.
As the investigators pieced together the grim details of the man's death, it became apparent that he had been accidentally scooped up along with thousands of gallons of water by one of a fleet of fire planes that had been called in to help the firefighters.
Caught up in one of the huge under tanks, the unfortunate scuba diver had been dumped along with the sea water in an attempt to put out the forest fire as quickly as possible.

Why?

2009-08-28T08:28:00.001-07:00

The big eat ~ close-up, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Made with

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Why

doesn't Tarzan have a beard?

Why do we press harder on a remote control when we know the batteries are flat?

Why do banks charge a fee on "Insufficient funds" when they know there is not enough to pay it?

Why do Kamikaze pilots wear helmets?

Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?

Whose idea was it to put an "S" in the word "lisp"?

What is the speed of darkness?

Why is it that people say they "Slept like a baby" when babies wake up every two hours?

Are there specially reserved parking spaces for "normal" people at the Special Olympics?

If the temperature is zero
outside today and it's going to be twice as cold tomorrow, how cold will it be?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we
figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and
then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Did you ever stop and wonder......

Who was the first person to say, "See that
chicken there... I'm gonna eat the next thing that comes outta it's bum."

Why do toasters always have a setting so high
that could burn the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?

Why is there a light in the
fridge and not in the freezer?

Why do people point to their wrist when asking for the time, but don't point to their bum when they ask where the bathroom is?

Why does your Obstetrician, Gynaecologist leave the room when you get
undressed if they are going to look up there anyway?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They're both dogs !

If quizzes are
quizzicals, what are tests?

If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, then what is baby oil made
from?

If electricity comes from
electrons, does morality come from morons?

Do illiterate people get the full effect of Alphabet
Soup?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him on a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

Does pushing the elevator button more than once make it arrive faster?

why???????????

(arrived in my mailbox!)

out of the blue

2009-08-10T01:58:00.001-07:00

lone bather, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Its funny how blog stories come to fruition.
I've not written a word for ages, then several ideas come all at once, like those English buses in the rain!

I was innocently taking pictures of underwater textures for Martine, whilst standing in our glacial sea the other day. When this guy on the horizon kept creeping into my shots

Previously my sister emailed me from her holiday in the Tropic's during the monsoon (she was out there trying their new house, out of season) to tell me my other sisters husband had almost died.
He's awoken in the early hours with a big sweat, not feeling at all well, my sister in the UK phoned for an ambulance and he was taken to the local hospital.
She drove home, two hours later he had an enormous heart attack, had to be re-booted on the table and revived from death.
Turned out his heart was full of fatty cholesterol, had to be flushed out, I expect the rat poison they use for blood thinning caused all that bruising that my sister noticed..
He's only around 44 years old and looks a bit like the guy in the image, 6'4" like me, but a 'big ex-rugger player'.

So here we are, a man on a horizon facing his mortality after a bolt from the blue. After all, we die alone..

Overheard at the Pont du Gard visitors center;

2009-07-01T05:48:00.001-07:00

Pont du Gard, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Rich American tourists speaking to German Tour Guide:

Guide; "We're not going"
"Why cant we go to Monaco"?
Guide; "We cant go, Now"
"But we have personal invitations to visit the Palace from the Grimaldis!"
Guide; "Yes, but all the Grimaldis will now be going to the Jackson funeral"

roads in the South of France

2009-06-24T00:43:00.001-07:00

Beziers after the wind storm, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

When I first arrived in France back in 2000, I asked a French friend about speeding on the toll roads, if they were monitored for speeding?
He said; "No, ze French would never stand for zis", going on to quote; "liberty, fraternity and equality."
Just a year or so later, after the most horrific death toll in the whole of Europe, the cameras arrived. So much for my French friends belief in 'Liberty, fraternity etc..

The French around here, near the border with Spain, often blame the tourists or Spanish truck drivers arriving on French roads already drunk.
But if this were the case, why do I see so many French cars on their backs, smashed into trees, driven into fields etc, every Saturday morning?
They do seem to go just a little bit crazy on a Friday night..

The national mobile police often set up speed traps at the edges of Vineyards, hiding their motorbikes behind vines etc.
Friendly passing motorists despise this practice, and will often flash a warning to oncoming cars of a speed trap ahead.
The correct etiquette is to acknowledge thanks by giving a quick wave, but never let the cops see you flash, as it's illegal.

Recently, cops have started surveillance in cities, following the UK model on a tiny scale by just using the odd camera for a short while.
The other day, after countless night time arson attacks on big council Wheeler bins, the police put cameras on a square, thinking they might capture some hoodies,
but were surprised to find another strange crime.
A mother with a pram and couple of kids were seen near cars, the cops thought they had dropped something, but no, it turned out they were tampering with the parked vehicles.
The police gave chase and found instead of a baby snuggled under fluffy blankets, a several gallon container filled with freshly siphoned petrol...

irony and poppies

2009-06-17T15:07:00.001-07:00

poppies, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that if you are brought up surrounded by irony you'll probably see it everywhere.
On the other hand, if you've had an irony free upbringing, the opposite will generally apply.

Once as a favor, I did a set of wedding photographs, for an American painter friend and her partner, an English novelist.
I happened to capture a glum faced girl in several shots at their reception in the large poppy filled garden.
The same girl managed to maneuver herself in front of several other groups of similarly, glum faced relatives.
On seeing the photos the cynical, newly published groom accused me of being ironic!
He'd made a classic gaff in mistaking coincidence as a form of irony.

The Bride, thankfully saw no such hidden meaning,
however, and perhaps ironically, the marriage failed and she flew back to the states shortly after the honeymoon period was over.

Personally I find it quite a difficult task to read irony into a shot of a field of poppies, however for many, poppies symbolise all kinds of strange things.
From chocolate box pastoral Monet paintings to "..Flanders fields the poppies blow.."

Most wont see any irony in that famous patriotic poem. However I think the general consensus, after much Googling,
is that if you read it and then re-read it with say a more... 'cynical eye'
You just might have an ironic epiphany and conclude the poem is in fact trying to say the opposite it at first purports.

Getting back to this image, poppies I gather generally grow best in disturbed soil.
Thus the fields of WW1 were ideal sites for seeds to be released after many years entombed underground, seizing their chance of freedom and quickly flowering amongst all that mud and carnage, these opportunistic weeds thrived.

I understand the location of one of Monet's beloved poppy field paintings, painted many years before poppies became sad ironic symbols is now a factory strewn urban wasteland. Few will know that Monet's first wife as pictured tragically died shortly afterward's from supposed cancer. The money he made from those paintings barely covered the cost of medicine for her..

Lets hope with the demolition of those old factories, one day the seeds from those very poppies he painted will be released to grow once more.
Ironically Monet painted these idyllic scenes as a form of direct protest to the onward advance of the modern industrial world.

As for this field, it is sited next door to a large building site. And this field was an old vineyard just one year ago..thus the grubbed up vine roots disturbed the soil.
On one side a new housing estate is being built and the other, stands huge gray prison watch tower overlooking an unfinished high security prison..

When more is not enough

2009-05-24T05:26:00.001-07:00

temple during rain, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

On the coast, below Bangkok, grows a very strange wooden temple structure.
It was conceived and started by an eccentric billionaire known as "Khun Lek" just 20 years ago.
Sited near Pattaya, he named it 'The Sanctuary of Truth'.
He has since died but the project still continues and is expected to be completed within five years.

The shape follows traditional Thai architecture, decorated with wood carvings depicting the four major philosophical and artistic influences that can be seen in Thailand: Hindu, Khmer, Chinese and Thai.
A team of 250 woodcarvers are at work on the sanctuary at any given time.

We'd only heard about this (not so famous) edifice the day before on the net and so time was short..
When we visited it was raining, but as it was our last day we ploughed on through the mud and sand with several cameras in weather that even the guides were unwilling to brave!

We were astonished by the size of the thing, with its huge carved four faced Buddha's heads and many over-sized elephants.
Whilst inside the stygian gloom sadly hid most of its treasures, with warnings posted that the interior was off-limits for photography other than personal snaps.

We both found it over decorated, verging on the Disney-kitsch, and thus came up with a new name for it; 'When more is not enough' !
However, it keeps many woodcarvers and related industries in employment, so it must be a good thing in an area almost devoid of cultural sites other than the sleazy go-go bars and several Thai Kick Boxing bar venues.

Thus, I recommend hiring an air conditioned taxi for a day from Bangkok and spread the cost between a few friends for a visit and avoid the next door resort if possible.

The cheaper bus is a false economy as they will drive you the slowest (cheapest) route and take you to a tourist trap factory outlet..
The trip is about seventy five minutes @ 25 euros per day, (per car) via taxi on the motorway. Up to four hours and 10 euros each (one way)by bus!

Travelers tales

2009-05-22T04:24:00.001-07:00

Ayutthaya ruins in old Siam, originally uploaded by Paul Grand.

Last night we dinned with the old friend of Martine at her outdoor restaurant, the same French restaurant patron I'd written about in the previous funny blog last year, about the bicycle accident
As Martine and I have just returned from a months touring vacation of Thailand, she amused us again, this time with her travelers tales from her 'hippy' trip to Thailand 40 years ago.

She was staying on Phuket's Patong Beach when it was only a little fishing village and had a little rented private sleeping hut on stilts on the beach. The nearby James Bond (Man with the Golden Gun) on Phi Phi Island was yet to be filmed, and thus renamed James Bond island. She said it was then 'Paradise'. Of course there are no longer any huts on that beach at Patong, the Tsunami (or 'tiramiso' as she jokingly referred to it) swept them all away along with several thousand unlucky people..

She also visited 'Chang Mia' in the north as we did and took the generic 'Golden Triangle' walking tour of the Jungles along the borders of the joined neighboring countries and found to their mounting horror,
they were lead by a native bush guide who was continually drinking as he walked, leading them in huge circles until they'd had enough 'daja vu' for one day
and all decided to abandon him.
They left him sitting cross legged, Buddha's lotus style, on a flat rock, calling down;
"You might not like me, but I still like all of you" !

In those days as it still is now, this trip can be dangerous, at one point the inebriated guide told them all to lie down in the long grass-fast, whilst a troupe of heavily armed gorilla soldiers marched by..

Whilst traveling with a small group friends, they one day became intrigued by the thought of seeing a huge mythical glass Buddha, 300 kilometers north of where they were staying at the time.
So they all hired an old car and drove several hours along mostly unsurfaced roads to reach this Monastery of the famous glass Buddha.
Upon finally reaching this nirvana they found the temple doors locked!
After banging for what seemed like hours, a minion monk finally arrived from within and opened up temple.
He said "It's not possible to visit today, please come back tomorrow"..
Thus they all groaned and began to beg to see the relic as they had made this arduous several hour pilgrimage especially to see this mythical Chrystal Buddha.
Finally having melted the gatekeepers heart he disappeared within to speak to the head monk. A while later an elderly Monk arrived at the door with a little bungle in old newsprint.
He said they had been lucky and had been granted a little peep at the blessed icon. Whereupon he started unraveling the newspapers, finally bringing out, cupped in the palm of one hand a every small, boring glass Buddha!
Their collective hearts sank, and turned around after politely cooing 'How lovely' it was, set off back to the city and their several hour nightmare car trip in the broiling afternoon sun...

She also did a lot of traveling by train, she said in those days the sleeping bunks were at either side of the train, a passage separated the two sides and personal curtains in front of all the sleepers.
A tea server or 'Char' would walk the corridors all night with boiling hot tea, fresh leaf Green Chinese tea, quite unlike the dried green tea we find in the west.
To obtain this refreshing brew one would simply stick out ones hand holding their metal cup through the curtain for it to be refilled as many times as you wanted. She added that the trains were nice and clean.
However things change, as we read in the Thai press just last week, that the continuing Thai railway bed bug infestation was now under control and all the countries trains were in the process of being stripped and renewed in Bug repelling plastic or leather upholstery.
Thankfully we chose not to cross Thailand by train but gleaned the information while cruising in air conditioned, bug free comfort at a height of several thousand meters!

she lived above a shop

2009-02-26T15:03:00.001-08:00

she lived above a shop
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Here is a transcript of an interview published today in:
The World Through My Eyes

1: How long have you been involved in photography?

I did extra photography during the evenings whilst at art college, I didn't specialise because finally, whilst doing very well in the subject, I found B/W photography in those days was too limiting for me.
Then, when high quality digital photography and manipulation came about just a few years ago, I jumped at the chance to get back in there!
To answer the question, I recently sold an old College B/W photograph to a magazine and it was featured on the front cover. so, I guess it took over 20 years?

2: Equipment you use?
Sony alpha 350.
I've been using the combined 18 -70 kit lens and I'm just upgrading to a new "vacation lens" - an all round, wide angle to zoom lens.
I'm also on the market for a nice strong wide angle. (offers?)
The great thing about the Sony Alpha is the back tilting, upwards or downwards LCD screen, I always use it to shoot from the hip, it fools people and helps to keep them relaxed,
because as soon as I lift it to my eye, (being tall doesn't help) everybody runs or scowls. I really like it just for that, plus its 14 + Megapixels!

3: Mac or PC?
Just changed over to Mac last summer, I have a 24" Imac with an upgraded powerful ram card.
So far, I'm very happy with it. I could never go back, Just the HD screen alone knocks spots off the old PC. When I use the old PC these days, I feel like I have gone back about 10 years into the past,
everything seems so dated and clunky in the PC format. Sorry, PC diehards! :-/

4: What inspires you?
Normal things like raindrops on roses, whiskers on kittens, but no, really, great light, deep blue skies, interesting locations.
The golden hour in an ancient Mediterranean graveyard, that really does it for me!:-)
I started out with a cheap plastic Dianna camera in a dark sooty Yorkshire graveyard aged 14-15. And here I am, still lurking about them in other countries!
I'm also naturally inspired by my flickr contacts images, I'd love to list them all but it would be too long:-(

5: Preferred subject matter?
Coming from a depressing northern "Rustbelt City" and escaping to London as soon as I could, I go for classical painterly subjects and antique stone buildings, I despise industrial red brick and I'm not too fond of cheap modern buildings and structures like the ghastly new wind turbines that despoil our ancient landscapes, which I wished were all sited off-shore.
I do however admire the magnificent and very useful, nearby Millau Viaduct designed by a fellow Yorkshireman, Norman Foster (and partners).

6: Name one thing you haven't caught with the camera that you REALLY want to capture.
A tornado? Failing that I'd love to capture an erupting volcano, from a safe distance of course, with the red hot larva flows, visit Pompeii, do the pyramids and perhaps Easter island and the Galapagos islands, etc,etc

7: When in doubt about your art, who do you confide in?
Easy, I confide in Jill aka Borealnz and Martine aka Petite Chose mostly. They are both experts at what they do, and I admire artists who really know their own pigeon.

8: Qualifications/training in anything? ie: Photoshop
I'm self taught in Photoshop, or rather, both Martine and I discovered it together.
At College I graduated at distinction level in Fine Art.

9: Plans for the future?
Lots of travel, and I'm off to Thailand next week!:-)
I'd like to sell much more and try to make a living from my images..

10: In one word, describe your photography.
Its not for me to say, but perhaps... 'Illustrative'?

We hope you enjoy Paul's wonderful photos. It would be great if you could leave a little congratulatory message here for him and once again I urge you to visit his Photostream I know you won't be disappointed!

*APPLAUSE*

pathos of the quarter moon

2009-01-15T01:53:00.001-08:00

pathos of the quarter moon
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Thought It was about time I got back into the swing after a several
week absence due to a badly cricked neck!
My Christmas image for the Man Ray contest had been put on hold. I'd had several ideas and over the weeks had already made each one in my
head, so, by the time it came to close the contest,
I felt as if I had already exhausted the subject!
Thankfully new inspiration came from a 150 year old Tin Type I'd just acquired from America.
The metallic tin type feel went perfectly with the metallic moon. A marriage made in heaven!
Thus the image came together, but I wanted to give it that rich toffee wrapper glow. So I had to learn some new colouring techniques fast!
I searched on the net and finally found one I could learn from easily.
(turn your speakers off!) Here
Martine, who is an expert colourist, gave me a few additional tips and encouragement.
I then added the star backdrop which came from one of my old Victorian wallpaper photos and popped in the full moon photograph, from an old French postcard.
Additional grunge texture was applied, coming from the smooth stone texture as before and Voila!
A melancholic quarter moonface, 'mooning' for the full face.

The image was launched and attained a respectable 4th place in Explore.
It died in the contest however and didn't get a single vote!

A few days later I'm told my image has been stolen and reissued under a different name on a different site!
The whole story unfolds under the stolen picture on flickr

The result being that I now only issue small size images and I'm exploring a watermarking system for the future.

This infamous Moon image of mine is now on the front cover of my new 2009 Calender, available here

Girl on a shore

2008-12-14T09:23:00.001-08:00

Girl on a shore re-do
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

I was standing in the sea with the camera in a plastic bag as it was so sandblasty on the beach. The dogs were playing and just left the view when the girl looked up at me and smiled.
The people in the background are packing up and that's a lifeguards stand you can see.
There's something a little bit 'Botticelli' about the girl don't you think?

After being asked how I got this earthy effect a few times and seeing as I've not updated in a while
I thought it might be good to purge!
These days I'm into starting off with a fine stone effect texture. I make sure its BIG because this is the size you'll end up with, so if you're serious about saving your images to sell, its worth baring this in mind. I then drop the image or landscape in this case onto the texture.
You'll need to duplicate your applied image a few times.
Each one is clicked off whilst you play with one at a time, varying the opacity and filter effect. To finish, I add a faint silk texture, again playing with the filters. This helps pull out the contrast.
Finally I always tweak the colours in CS, I like to up the yellow slightly, but not too much or you burn out the highlights.

To finish I had to cut out the girls face etc and drop it on top of her now very grungy, shaded body, then up the brightness and contrast and voila!

To get this effect you can download my famously popular 'sun on stone' or this texture from my 'grand textures' set. However its only just over 1500 pixels large at the moment;
http://www.flickr.com/photos/63263430@N00/2220974786/in/set-72157603864272396/

French revolution party ~ London ~ end of ~ part I

2008-11-18T14:26:00.001-08:00

French revolution party ~ London ~ end of
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

"Its not the years, its the miles!"
A 'me' moment at the end of our French revolution party. I made my own shirt, waistcoat and pants. Most other people hired costumes, I was too poor but, ahem, 'creative'.
We are sitting on the stairs, as it was a basement flat.
Its several years after college, whilst working in London. This is in 1989 for the French revolution 200th anniversary. Little did I know I'd end up over here!
I was in with a crowd of law students. I even met my new girlfriend that night!
Thats Rupert behind, wearing his court wig. He was a law student.
He's now a London high court judge..(I expect he'd not like this going on the world wide web!) Or perhaps he would?

French revolution party ~ Marmite @ 4.am ~ part II

2008-11-18T14:22:00.001-08:00

French revolution party ~ Marmite @ 4.am
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

French revolution party ~ Marmite @ 4.am

Just having a conversation about 'What is Marmite?'
"Wow, you've never had Marmite?

Quite simply, its just a Victorian/Edwardian devised torture used to feed nursery kids.
Mary Poppins would have served it to her charges as a savory toasted snack at 4.00 pm - tea time.
Its made from a vegetable based yeast extract, originally invented by a beer brewery as a way of using the left over yeast by-product from their fermentation process
Its really good for vegetarians because its provides all the B vitamins they don't acquire from their diet.
Wikipedia says it is sold in the US.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmite
You just put a tiny bit onto hot buttered toast, its very salty, so beware not to go mad if you try it.
Its the best thing in the world to eat when you've been out clubbing, because it helps to lessen a hangover, next day.
The lawyer girlfriend I met that night would 'try' to kiss me when she was eating it overloaded on toast, the vision of her large marmite coated teeth still haunts me to this day....o_O

Lightbox idea

2008-11-05T03:09:00.001-08:00

Lightbox idea
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Just before I moved to France, I gave away a professional light box, I've kicked myself ever since.
So, I'd been pondering how to get another, cheaply, when I came across this new nest of three lamps on sale at Ikea.

They are just a few Euros or USD each, and the biggest one is around 14" high, perfect when turned on its side,
with a cool energy saving light bulb inside, or it would be dangerous and could crack..

The illustration shows large glass antique negatives I'm viewing for the next Man Ray Contest.
Its a real godsend when its dark and raining outside as holding negatives up to our gray winter light doesn't help.

Times Carapace

2008-10-28T10:00:00.001-07:00

Times Carapace
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

I'm reading 'The Time Traveler's Wife'
by Audrey Niffenegger.
Its not like most time travel stories, as this novel is character driven and doesn't rely on the usual science fiction angle.
Its written from both the time traveler and his wife's perspective.
I see its been made into a feature film and should be opening this winter, so I had to read it first.
Another great little Time Traveling film, 'The Butterfly Effect', has already had a sequel made,
but I've yet to see it.
It also deals with the physical danger's inherent in jumping from one situation and climate to another, without clothes.
Suggesting a kind of 'body carapace' is needed, as things like clothes just don't transmit.
This is where my image comes into play. Ive made many versions, and frankly, even I was beginning to run out of time...
I chose an ancient linear sundial rather than a clock face,
the flocking autumnal birds support seasonal change and the telegraph poles to show kind of low tech communication..
I'd like to think that Hitchcock would approve!

Doing a Rod Hull

2008-10-13T15:51:00.001-07:00

eye2
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

This weekend I finally cracked, and have thrown in the towel with French TV.
It was talking to Jill that did it, she's in New Zealand but seems to get everything that I was missing about England whilst living here in the south of France.
I've been without the Sky box for several months,
as I left the dish etc. at the old pile.
We both love those foodie programs, those garden to kitchen bacchanalian visual feasts, Jamie Oliver pottering. O_O
Not him, the Garden!
Its stupid, but its those little things I miss, especially now that I no longer have the back yard..

So, getting on with the subject, I was on my roof, erecting the satellite dish, trying to get it high enough above the crumbling chimney to pick up the astra satellite signal from above the surrounding roof skyline.
I had it up, loose, way above my head and was maneuvering it around, when horror of horrors, the whole thing shot down the metal pole, guillotine like, hitting me squarely on the brow and upper nose.
Chop!
Boy, did I see stars!

Visions of Rod Hull came to mind, the following night I even dreamed of him plummeting to the ground, wrestling with Emu, twisting, trying to land on the Emu's padded part, but Emu finally getting the last laugh!
When I heard about the original accident, several years ago, I was doing faux finishing in a US lawyers apartment, next door to the British Museum in London's Bloomsbury.
He saw the daytime news and said;
"There's no fool like an old fool". I was freaked at the time because he was always a big treat to watch, attacking celebs, from way back and here I am several years on, doing the same, Yikes!

I guess 'Doing a Rod Hull' will unfortunately become quite popular over the coming winter. I've already heard that somebody I know has lost a million US dollars in investments.
Thank goodness I laughed when they suggested putting your money in property wasn't 'an investment', its a typical stock market conceit to look down on all other forms of investment.

Now, when I walk the dog, I see people looking at my cut and bruised brow and nose, edging slightly away, and see them thinking;
'He's one of those bad boys,
drinking and fighting on Saturday night and rolling in the Beziers gutters'.
I've attained a kind of grudging respect with the local petty drug dealing youths,
'Yeah, one of da 'beauf'!

Thankfully, I lived to tell the tale, unlike poor Rod Hull who died on impact.

Oh, and yes, I now have all the UK channels I could ever wish to see.

Rod Hull?
See: Here and Here

Ratty

2008-10-12T13:29:00.001-07:00

Ratty
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

When I start out with one of these animal's images I took a few months back from this provincial French museum,
I think;
"How can I help bring this poor stuffed antique creature back to life"?
Most of them are well over 100 years old and looking quite sad and moth eaten. Some are so old that the original taxidermists had no real idea of how they looked in life.
Those are around 200 years old, probably Napoleonic.
The lions have the wrong shaped eyes, their stance and aspect are all wrong. Still, I'd rather have these antique figures as wrong as they are than a new kid on the block, that would be all wrong too, both morally and aesthetically.
This little guy was with the Monkeys, I don't have a name but he is a mammal and not a rat, as I've affectionately called him. Martine called him simply; 'mon pauvre petit ' - 'Poor little thing'.

The story doesn't end, because just this morning, on flickr, in the pictures thread,
I had this message from a fellow flickrite, Ian;

"Ah -it's an aye-aye. I think.

Those fingers- they are really creepy.
Wonderful and misunderstood nocturnal primates from Madagascar:
"The Aye-aye is often viewed as a harbinger of evil and killed on sight. Others believe that should one point its long middle finger at you, you were condemned to death. Some say the appearance of an Aye-aye in a village predicts the death of a villager, and the only way to prevent this is to kill the Aye-aye. The Sakalava people go so far as to claim Aye-ayes sneak into houses through the thatched roofs and murder the sleeping occupants by using their middle finger to puncture the victim's aorta."

Is man an ape or an angel? Darwin~

2008-10-09T12:58:00.001-07:00

Tamarin dore singe
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Darwin and I ~

It's said, there are only five degrees of separation between everybody on the planet.
Well, my humble connection with Darwin is quite straightforward.
I once spent a couple of weeks in southern Italy at a friends house party with his great great grand daughter.
She's a tall, slim amazon of a lady and handsome to boot! (I know that's an unfortunate choice of words)
I vaguely knew her as a fellow artist through friends in North London.
I have a strange picture of the party, all sitting gannet like, on the black volcanic rocks, below the villa, Miss Darwin at the top and the rest, ranged in their various social positions below her, all facing the same way, reading... Naturally I didn't even make the base of the rock,
but was happy to record the moment from a lesser mound, across the way..
O happy days!

Strangely, in those days, Darwinism was never contradicted. Just as nobody would contradict his great great grand daughter.
Everybody just accepted the fact that man came about through natural selection, survival of the fittest and all that..

Then we heard, just yesterday, on Sky News that natural selection had stopped, man is now to stand still or even, horror of horrors, go backwards.. Really, quite stupid.
Didn't we hear a similar thing a few years back saying history had also stopped?
(The following 9/11 outrage put the lid well and truly on that theory)
If history had stopped, the banking system wouldn't now be in free fall. Iceland would still be a cool place to invest in and sea levels would be stable..

Which brings us back to Darwin and his beloved Galapagos islands, which are also under threat from mass tourism, as everybody wants to visit and 'crap' on the little volcanic rock landmass.
If only everybody followed the backpackers maxim...
"Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints, kill nothing but time".
Darwin would be a very happy, great great grandfather!

Ghost Cafe

2008-10-04T14:38:00.001-07:00

Ghost Cafe
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Sometimes glass reflections are enough.
I do get a bit peeved when people assume that everything one shoots is somehow a 'Photoshop creation'.
Of late I've had several pictures up on flickr which were totally camera sourced.
Not that I mind anything photoshoped.
The 'Racing Dogs' magazine cover was shot whilst still at art College, Over twenty years ago! - Long before Computers had any real processing power.

This is just something I noticed today whilst passing a 'sort of' friends cafe; 'La Part des Anges', I say 'sort of' because he threatened to stab me once,
just in jest, with a fork,
when he ran the popular nearby restaurant,
"Le petit Montmartre"
I'd asked for a vegetarian Salad, " La Chevre Chaud" Which means;
'Hot goats cheese salad'. Naturally Chef's don't much like Vegetarians, we're nothing but trouble for them.
He's a real Basil Faulty type and likes to surround himself with glamorous Parisian opera singers and famous actors who frequently perform within the red and gold rococo interior. But that's another story.. Well worth visiting!

This image is a straight photograph of the new tea rooms outdoor seating, as reflected in a derelict building's window opposite.
It was a sunny Saturday afternoon, when normally these outdoor chairs would be full, but today with the cold winds of economic change 'a blowing' Beziers city center seemed almost deserted.

storm bathers

2008-09-13T05:37:00.001-07:00

storm bathers
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Autumn arrived,
with it came stormy skies and huge waves, though the sea is warmer now than during mid-summer!
This mostly happens when we get the grec wind, or the 'mad wind' as the locals call it, because its so very warm and horribly humid.
The sea current also changes from the west and we get the warmer sea current from the east.
The bathers shown above were risking their lives because of a dangerous undercurrent. The danger multiplied because a thunderstorm was approaching with no available life guards!
They close for the season on the 1st of September..

The image is an example of Holga camera photography following on from my last post.
I believe anybody who's jaded by today's smooth, high quality digital photography might learn to love the photographic medium again by returning to basics, with a toy Holga or Diana camera and trying the wet process again.
I continue to develop my own because, here in France, I was quoted 10 USD to develop the 120 film negatives only, with a waiting time of two weeks!

holga's from Hong Kong

2008-09-06T03:21:00.001-07:00

holga's from hong kong
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

After a two week wait,
I received my Holga camera's.
Purchased from an Ebay store, the same place I'd already bought 120 B/W film stock.
This shot was taken just because I loved the green packaging, on my winding stone staircase.
Interestingly, before I saw these pictures, hadn't noticed those antique numeral markings on the steps rise behind the parcel..

The first Holga is the Classic 120 GN model, without a flash.
The second is the wide angle pin hole camera. It takes about two sections of 120 film per shot.
So, you only get about 6 shots per roll. Normally you'd get 12 square format shots.

You need to use the wide angle on a firm tripod, as the exposures are several seconds long.
It also comes with a free remote cable release, to help stop those camera shakes.
Although these cameras are called 'toys' I can vouch that the loading and unloading and even worse, the film developing are not for
nervous types. As winding the floppy 120 film onto a developing spool in pitch darkness is tricky thing to master.
Even more so after a glass or two of red wine...

Taking pictures with the 120 GN is very easy to master. My friend Jill warned me to remember to remove the lens cap first.
Sound advice, though in practice, not so easy to remember.
Next time, I'll remove the lens cap and leave it in the car.
Then I cant put it back on by mistake.
Always wind on after every shot, again easy to say, but in practice, hard to implement on location..

Choose subjects with a strong graphic quality, such as billboards, buildings and people.
Fairgrounds are all the rage.
Fair ground big wheel holga's have become a kind of background wallpaper on Flicker, so I'd shy away from them.

Finally, I recommend you take your normal dig camera with you, and try to duplicate any great shots, just in case you get a dud exposure.
You can then try recreating a Holga effect in Photoshop!

Fire fighters

2008-08-29T02:07:00.001-07:00

Fire fighters
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

After a long days photographic shoot in the Aude hills I saw this huge plume of smoke along the distant coastline.
Naturally, I had to investigate and take pictures.
People were pulling up all along the narrow country lanes, Staring up in awe. It was like something from a
Ray Bradbury story, 'Rocket Summer'.
Where the heat from Rocket plumes change an icy winter's day into a warm summer, albeit a short lived one.

Driving closer the plume, we could see it widening by the second, fanned by fast changing winds, it was the maritime pine forest burning along the Massif Fontfroide.

Eventually I came to a village called
St Andre de Roquelongue, where a huge garrison of fire fighters were preparing to engage the fire.
Red fire trucks were filling their water tanks outside the huge wine co-operative and leaving in groups of a dozen or so. A helicopter relayed information.
It was a massive undertaking. Strangely, the country lane up to the fire wasn't blocked, so, I drove up, only to be turned back by a group of serious looking French police at at another junction.
Before leaving I took a few more pictures, which I'll upload later.

Today, reading the local paper, I see that 130 hectares of Corbières maritime pine forest were consumed by the flames, along with two fire engines.

One hundred and thirty firefighters, six Canadair firefighting planes were employed plus two water planes and four trackers.
It still burns, virulently.
The cause, unknown.

summers end

2008-08-26T00:05:00.001-07:00

summers end
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

I just had to stop the car on the edge of Beziers and capture this strange golden netting.

The sunflowers are normally planted after an old, spent vineyard has been grubbed up, as they have to plant other crops for 4 years or leave the fields fallow.

The netting is there because we get huge flocks of migratory
Starlings that can and do strip a field in just a few hours.

The wine harvest has already started, mechanized grape picking machines will be working night and day for a few weeks, thus most grapes are already gone by the time the Starlings arrive.
They do however, get the very sweet, over ripened grapes that are left on the vines, and boy do they love them!

Facing the void

2008-08-19T08:08:00.001-07:00

Facing the void
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

This one was a hard one. Firstly its a redo of a simple image I made two years ago.
I started this version last year and got bogged down with too many people facing the void!
So, on re-discovering it just yesterday on my external hard drive, I could see with my fresh eyes that it needed a pruning, so, out came the other three people and in went the sky.
Taken the other night from Beziers Bull ring.. after the fight, thankfully, but they had left their iron doors open, and it was a lovely moonlit sky..
Fitting really, after the modern day pagan horrors!

Swimming pool horrors

2008-08-18T08:19:00.001-07:00

Swimming pool horrors
Originally uploaded by Paul grand whilst

Whilst having lunch this weekend, Martine and I talked to the owner of this little outdoor restaurant in Capestang.

She was telling us about a particular visit to a mutual friends chateau swimming pool.
She'd fallen asleep under the shade of trees at the edge of the pool, but was surprised on awakening, to see a clump of leaves she'd not noticed floating on the surface that seemed to have come from no-where, so, being the good visitor she got out the pool skimmer and started skimming the leaves.

Suddenly, a huge wasp stung her on the cheek, it must have been drinking from a floating leaf and was pissed off at being disturbed.
Her attacker continued her assault (she called her a she) buzzing
around her face and so she put a towel over her head and ran up the steps to the chateau doors.
The maid answered and let her in, thus locking the still angry she-devil outside.

The maid shrieked when she saw our victims face, which was by now hugely swollen.
Our friend then decided that it was probably a good time to depart, through the back doors.
She mounted her bicycle and headed for home, unfortunately she could no longer see clearly as her eyes were streaming and so she failed to see a rock along the drive which she hit,
causing her to unbalance her bike into the deep drainage ditch full of very spiky brambles.

She eventually managed to get out, but her arm was now bleeding badly as she'd cut a blood vessel which was spurting blood down her arm, so she kept flicking her hand to be rid of the blood, unfortunately thus occupied, not seeing a low branch, struck her just above the eye, swiping her off the bike, yet again!

Then, whilst freewheeling down into the village, she managed to swallow a fly..

Upon finally entering her village she saw a circus sign saying they were opening that same night, so, she ran to her house and locked the high iron garden gates behind her, her neighbors,
also in their front garden noticed her state and all the blood and asked what was wrong?
She said, "If the Circus lions escape today, it will be me they will be eating"!

runways in the sky

2008-08-08T07:03:00.001-07:00

runways in the sky
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Do you see aircraft runways in the sky?

We used to live under the low flightpath of the Concord aircraft
in the south and afterwards in north London.
I suppose we were just lucky..

This image is inspired by several things, firstly the German art house film by Wim Wenders;
"Wings of Desire"
In the opening scenes the recording angel, played by Bruno Ganz, stands sentinel like on a broken spire of Berlin church ruin looking down upon human life.

Children passing, notice him but not the adults.
A baby in a pram looks up at a passing aircraft.
We are then inside the aircraft with the angel listening to various passengers thoughts.
He smiles at a child.
Moments later we drift through gray European clouds, back to the black stained walls of the ruined city, the story continues..

The other element arrived when I heard about the airline company who were proved to be responsible for their metal aircraft parts being left on the Paris airstrip, are being sued by the German families of the victims who perished in the Concord disaster.

Bullfight ad and protest.

2008-08-07T04:49:00.001-07:00

Bullfight ad and protest.
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Bullfighting season arrives..
Its here again, high summer and the onset of the bullfighting in our local area.
I'm famous for my outspoken anti-bullfighting beliefs, so, I'll not bang on about it here.

This huge, permanent Ferier ad is on the Narbonne hill overlooking that stormy valley.
I just snapped this whilst driving past other day, through the windscreen.
I'm not too sure about the cross and the heart, but I like to think its a Christian anti-bullfighting symbol?

New Rolleiflex !

2008-08-04T01:32:00.001-07:00

New Rolleiflex !
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

I've been so Baad!
I went and bought another camera in the local outdoor flea market, its A Rolleiflex! The guy wanted 350 euros but I played it cool, though I was bursting to buy it in reality, I'm sure my eyes were as big as plates! O_O

After he told me the price I put it down and started looking at his little lens parts for sale, just to show my interest had moved on..
He then asked me; "Well, what do you think about the Rolleiflex?"
I just said, dismissively, "Too Much"
He came right back and asked; "Well, what were you thinking?
I said "200euros",
He thought about it and said; "280"?
I came back with 250e, the original price I was willing to pay and he said;
"Yes, its a deal",
Voila, both happy!

So now after seeing the quality of the image on the frosted glass, I have to say it was worth every penny. I later found out on the net that this is a pre-war model made between 1934-1938
It has a great Carl Zeiss lens and in its original leather case.

I've yet to use it as I need to find a users manual. "Hints?"

Weegee

2008-08-02T02:01:00.001-07:00

WeeGee
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

Whilst visiting Montpellier, here in the south of France yesterday,
I came across a huge Weegee exhibition at the Pavilion.
Inside they have a mock-up of Weegee's famous car boot developing studio!

For more info, here's a short history from the net:

Fellig's nickname was a phonetic rendering of Ouija, due to his frequent arrival at scenes only minutes after crimes, fires or other emergencies were reported to authorities. He is said to have named himself Weegee

He is best known as a candid news photographer whose stark black-and-white shots documented street life in New York City. Weegee's photos of crime scenes, car-wreck victims in pools of their own blood, overcrowded urban beaches and various grotesques are still shocking .

He maintained a complete darkroom in the trunk of his car, to expedite getting his free-lance product to the newspapers. Weegee worked mostly at night; he listened closely to broadcasts and often beat authorities to the scene.

He had no formal photographic training but was a self-taught photographer and relentless self-promoter. He is sometimes said not to have had any knowledge of the New York art photography scene; but in 1943 the Museum of Modern Art included several of his photos in an exhibition. He was later included in another MoMA show organized by Edward Steichen, and he lectured at the New School for Social Research. He also undertook advertising and editorial assignments for Life and Vogue magazines, among others.

His acclaimed first book collection of photographs, Naked City (1945), became the inspiration for a major 1948 movie The Naked City, and later the title of a naturalistic television police drama series and a band led by the New York experimental musician John Zorn.

Weegee also made short 16mm films beginning in 1941 and worked with and in Hollywood from 1946 to the early 1960s, both as an actor and a consultant. He was an uncredited special effects consultant credited still photographer for Stanley Kubrick's 1964 film Dr. Strangelove His accent was one of the influences for the accent of the title character in the film, played by Peter Sellers.

In the 1950s and 1960s, Weegee experimented with panoramic photographs, photo distortions and photography through prisms. He made a famous photograph of Marilyn Monroe in which her face is grotesquely distorted yet still recognizable. For the 1950 movie The Yellow Cab Man, Weegee contributed a sequence in which automobile traffic is wildly distorted; he is credited for this as "Weegee" in the film's opening credits.

stargazing

2008-07-25T04:51:00.000-07:00

Stargazing

2008-07-25T03:38:00.001-07:00

Stargazing
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

I think we all had a teacher whilst at school, who like "miss Jean Brodie" from "The prime of" inspired us. Mine was in the last year of junior school, I was aged ten. He was called Mr Kelly, thin, gray haired, old fashioned and tweed wearing with those leather patches on his sleeves and cuffs. He was a an accomplished artist and drew little pencil sketches of some of us.He'd also copy old 1920's French cartoons onto the blackboard and we'd all have to draw our version, every week.

The class was divided into two teams, Romans and Greeks, Red and green. I was a geek, er..I mean Greek! He had a silver cup on the high Victorian windowsill. We'd get points for the week and the winning side had their own colored ribbon around the cup for a week, it was awarded every Friday afternoon. Course, this dividing the class would be frowned upon these days..

One day, he asked the class "What is the white ribbon that you see across the night sky? Quick as a flash, I raised my hand and said, "The milky way Sir?" "Good lad, I suppose you would know that doing a lot of star gazing, Grand?"
Give yourself a ten points, he said, whilst handing me the chalk. I walked to the front of class. He then said, "And give yourself another ten points, Paul, for having the straightest back I've ever seen, Wonderful posture!"

Looking back on the conversation, I see his sarcastic remark was regretted and he'd just tried to temper it with a complement, it didn't matter to me. My day was complete, I was a triumph for once and Mr Kelly for me,ascended to the stars!

Here it is !

2008-07-21T06:06:00.001-07:00

Here it is !
Originally uploaded by Paul Grand

My new Duoflex 2 and a couple of reels of retro film from 1974!
I bought it at a local flea market a few weeks back, I'd been looking for these things for about two years without any luck, then during the same morning, I came across two of these types of cameras!
I bought the reels of film on ebay, quite cheaply for a just a few euros within France. They arrived just this morning.
I cant describe how much reverence I opened the first package with.
It had no smell and no degradation as far as I could see, but I did notice a bit of rust on the spools.
Sorry for the anal description, but I had to share! O_O
So, now for the hard bit, using such a cumbersome contraption!

There was no beating Martine!

2008-07-20T08:19:00.001-07:00

This one was inspired by Martine's ice skating prowess.
I've never seen her ice skate, but she assures me she's good at it,
or used to be.
I'll just have to take her word for it,
as there are no ice rinks around my area..
So, the idea of trying to ice skate, in between a rock and a hard place took root!
Those rocks were on my desk and the figure is an antique one.
The shadow was stretched in CS2 and warped around the rock.
Thus, pulling the objects together.
The sky was a sunny coastal afternoon.
The idea behind the dedication was a tribute to Martine's hard work, doing a daytime job and managing to also do her photographic work, like spinning plates, but here she's ice skating whilst balancing three huge rocks.
Who needs the addition of ice!

Fear of falling through the ice

2008-07-20T07:08:00.001-07:00

I know, I have strange dreams...o_O
This was another winner of a Man Ray contest.
With big dollops of help from my NZ friend, Jill and her ice skators fragment.
The cracks are way ott here, I guess they ran away with themselves,
joining up and forming a kind of loop.
I think I made this one in a hurry, there was a deadline, see!

Crow Hill

2008-07-20T06:15:00.000-07:00

Jeepers creepers, this one was fun to do!
I'd been cycling with friends in the spring and we spotted this just outside the old village.
It's not had much done to it, its warmed a little, enriched with antique layers and my famous crackle glaze.
The Crows were kindly donated by Katherine and the skull from our
Textures for Layers, objects group, in Flickr.
I suppose it looks like a movie poster.
Must be the illustrator in me trying to get out!

Sunset from my French window

2008-07-20T05:59:00.001-07:00

This is the view from my bedroom window in the old house I just moved from.
It faced south but if I looked South/West in winter, this is the kind of view
I sometimes had at sunset.
It took 3000 hits and I think its one of my most popular images.
I'd not done much to it, just a little colour tweak and the addition of a TTV layer donated by every bodies friend, Nesster!
I don't miss the old house at all, as I'd been there several years and just had to move on.
I now know that I much prefer city life to country village living.
Just an urban kind of guy!

face

2008-07-20T05:48:00.001-07:00

I created several versions of this image or visage as the French would say..
I wasn't entirely happy with the outcome, limited quality of the original images imposed restrictions, but I think I did okay in the end.
Its made up from several layers, chiefly being a graveyard statue, and a stone layer.
Not forgetting the eyes, of course!
O_O

Feeling Crabby?

2008-07-20T05:39:00.001-07:00

"I love this little guy" said Julie..
So did I.. He was captured in a French Hypermarket fish tank,
so I guess he had much to feel crabby about,
I mean, those poking people!
O~O

Volney Lilliputians Joy

2008-07-20T05:19:00.001-07:00

Yikes, its been a year since I updated the old blog!
So, here's playing catch-up.
This picture was a long time in the making.
The final element being the big corkscrew.
In real life this thing is around two feet long and is used in the wine trade to take large corks out of huge barrows of wine..
Kind-of fitting, really!

Cream of Man Ray

2007-07-25T07:07:00.001-07:00

This is a poster I designed for our first group show way back in jan.
I never really had it on my threads as I didnt want to confuse people.
I now think it was a shame as it was a great portrate of Martine..
Here's the burb from the exhibition thread:

After several months of great images posted, we thought it would be a nice idea to pull a few of those historic postings into one big group show.
All the admins have chosen, some of them were even wisely chosen!
Some of us like dancing veg, others are into classic Dada..what can I say, its an organic thing!
One thing that units us all is our expert surreal vision, we view each entry with our green shades firmly fixed to our noses, as the above picture shows! o_O

The Little Prince's flower

2007-07-23T08:44:00.001-07:00

“At night I want you to put me under a glass globe”
The little Prince said “I ought not to have listened to her,”
he confided to me one day.
“One never ought to listen to the flowers,
one should simply look at them and breath their fragrance.
Mine perfumed all my planet.
But I did not know how to take pleasure in all her grace.."
Antoine de Saint-Exupery.
Extract from: The Little Prince
Created for the Man Ray contest.

The Eiffel Tower

2007-07-23T08:27:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everbody that left nice comments, thanks also to Chris in Philly,
'A Colossus' was just the word I was looking for,
I will use it in the blog, Thanks!

Viewed nearly 3000 times, up to the top 3 in interestingness!
It has to be my most popular image to date in Flickr...

I do hope the name of Algeria isnt taken in an anti-French way, It just happend to be on the retro globe below Europe! o_O

Chris in Philly said:
'The Tower as a colossus. It's also cool how you did the sky then the stratosphere and the top of the tower goes off into space! Great stuff.'

The Walrus and the Carpenter

2007-07-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

The Walrus and the Carpenter
Were walking close at hand:
They wept like anything to see
such quantities of sand:
'If this were only cleared away',
They said, 'it would be grand !'

'If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for a year,
Do you suppose', the Walrus said,
'That they could get it clear?'
'I doubt it,' said the carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear,

Extract from 'Through the looking Glass' by Lewis Carroll
(thats a cicada on the Carpenters nose - not my doing!)

Mannequin Lighthouse..

2007-06-12T04:37:00.000-07:00

Winner of the Surreal Phare Design Competition ~ Sadly now forgotten..

Yes its French, it ended up on a French Beach in the the Languedoc-Roussillon area,
the Government lost its nerve at the last moment and tried to hide it in the most remote (in those days) part of France..

These days its quite a headache for the local council, they are sick of cleaning the linen covering and washing off the grafiti..
Thanks for your raves!

I lost this image in my computer for nearly two days, I had a glitch.
Thankfully I found it and finished it just in time for the close of the Man Ray competition...it came 2nd.

I thought the addition of the clothes line, gave it a touch of the 'real life'. Strange, but they now look like gappy teeth! O_O

twas brillig says:
Great idea Paul! My mother used to be a fashion designer and we had something like this in our garage for fitting clothes. As a result I used to have nightmares as a child as my mother would be missing arms and legs and her head. lol

Tempest Gull.

2007-05-31T23:32:00.002-07:00

We've had loads of thundery weather over the past few weeks, must have given me the idea for this 'stew in the sky' as said by someone on flickr.
"Quite a potboiler", I replied!

Astonishing meetings!

2007-05-29T08:24:00.001-07:00

you never know who or what you'll bump into
on your beach walks!

Thats the Spanish coastline on the horizon, just an hours drive from us here in the south of France.
However, we dont need to go to such great lengths to find strange new sights!

Henkel's new clock had so much kick..

2007-05-24T01:52:00.000-07:00

he was booted out of the inventors club..

Redo for Flickr's Das Kabinett.

I made this image ages ago, I was in my Bauhaus period, and was asked to put it up into the new
'German expressionist group', 'Das Kabinett'.
Kind peeps have said:

"Love the disoriented eyeball, as if the earth's magnetic pull is only working on that part of his body! these portraits, with the obligitory 3/4 ness and tilted head are so ripe for reconfabulation. this makes my day".
And:

"he should definitely appeal the ouster - lies and innuendo, I say!
love the roving eye too (I agree with pinkyhonor, it has to do with gravity or magnetic poles)"

I do believe Henkel is working on other things these days.. to be continued!

Almond moon

2007-05-24T01:39:00.000-07:00

This one was a huge success on my Flickr site.
I had several people asking if it was real, well the parts are real but let's says they were 'moved around! Here's what I said:

Thank You's!
Yes, its real, when I took it I thought about the moon and made sure it was in a good spot.
I took the picture and enhanced it in ps.

The blossom really did seem to glow in the setting sun..
Only the stars are added!
Some kind soul said:

"wow! I love it -- looks like the moon has dropped all those petals. what a beautiful, artistic piece".

The setting is on a hill just outside our French village, I really wanted to capture the feeling of Spring this year, as I shall be back in the city in a few months after we sell this house. I've been here several years and really need a change..
I'll miss being able to just walk into the countryside whenever I like...

Colossus

2007-05-24T01:31:00.001-07:00

Having sat for several thousand years, the colossi no longer cry at dawn..
So how do you bring your holiday snaps to life?
Put them in CS2 and add a little magic..
I reprint some things said about this image from my Flickr site:

This image really speaks to me of the heights that mankind is capable of reaching, yet at the same time how we are just specks on the grand scale of space and time..

This works really well, time has jelled around eternity.

If only we could all carry our scars and history with such presence, beauty and gravitas.... Wonderful use of light and dark. Wonderful use of photography!

Imaginary Garden Labyrinth at nightfall

2007-05-24T01:11:00.000-07:00

Ian said: "Intriguing and menacing- there is an ominous atmosphere here. The texture of crumpled paper and the tones of sculpted granite hide some sinister secret. Don't go into this labyrinth without a ball of string"!
I said:
"Yeh, because i'll be behind with a pair of big sharp sissors cutting that string into bits!
Did you ever read MR JAMES short story about a Labyrinth?
Creepy"!

Daisy #2. She really wanted Edelweiss but I thought it too risky.

2007-05-24T01:05:00.000-07:00

Well, you didn't think I would leave my poor little sis like That, did you?

We were afraid the occupying forces might think she was somehow trying to contact the allies with the sewing ring acting as a crazy kind of portable radio transmitter and reciever!

So, I managed to sew on some lovely petals from my mothers silk flower collection, they were light and easy to wear.

She really wanted me to try for the then fashionable 'edelweiss look' after fond memories of our Matterhorn hyke, but I thought it might send out the wrong signal
in these troubled times, you know, a risky 'Swiss Neutral stance'?

The Daisy effect was really popular, we found her loads of work doing the Christmas Panto season. She really loved the stage and so, after the plastic surgery to remove the soiled petals and correct my poor stitchwork, she became a huge Hollywood star. I think, in my small way, I helped her find herself..
Besides, 'edelweiss' would never have worked as a stage name...

We would get So bored

2007-05-24T01:00:00.000-07:00

We would get So bored waiting for the new World War to begin, television was just coming out, but only the rich could afford it. And then only in London, we lived in France...
My sister, bless her, was game for anything to fill those endless rainy days whilst my mother and father were outside digging the Maginot Line for the government.
We were left to our own devices, my sister would allow me to stretch her face on her sewing circle.
Naturally, I later became a plastic surgeon and was able to put her face back, but she'd never be quite the same. I don't know, perhaps we all just went too far..

Pantheon of Starfish

2007-05-24T00:32:00.000-07:00

After seeing some old Man Ray films, I decided I had to work with those starfish guys!

Trouble was, no starfish were available to photograph..What to do..?
So, I fished through my old prints and found these guys in a 1980's photograph of mine.
I scanned them and superimposed them onto a ledge from a photograph of Rome's Pantheon dome. Taken whilst on my first vacation to Italy.
The light shining down from the vent hole worked a treat, spotlighting the Starfishes dance. Pure sepia, surreality!
I threw in a few layers into the background to add depth and textural atmosphere..
Then finished editing in photoshop, creating this
Sepia toned and slightly out of focus effect.
It was a star-lit-hit!

Browns Midnight dip became a nightmare..

2007-05-24T00:14:00.001-07:00

Thankfully a passing clump of lillies saved him from becoming fish food..

This was the winning entry in the Man Ray group contest, on Flickr last week!

I'd been wanting to do a an underwater image for a long time, its the holy grail of Photoshop users, how to make water look natural and interact with an alien object.

This finished work is far from perfect, I wont bore you, dear reader, with the fine points.
But it is a 'surreal' picture, and hey, it won first place!

Kathy Kite

2007-05-24T00:01:00.000-07:00

From Now on I shall use this Blog to display my latest surreal images

Thank You all for taking the trouble to comment, thought I should say a few words about how this came about.

Firstly, 'The Tree Man' by Hieronymus Bosch must have been at the back of my mind and another line drawing print by Hogarth about impossible 'paradoxical' perspectives.

Then on the romantic side with the french lighthouse, the image of "Kathy Kite" remembereing holidays in france, this comes from the French movie,
'Diva' With its cool Zen music and dream scenes of flight.

The tree top view is from my bedroom window which faces the sea,
I can't quite see it though!
The little girl was from a french antique snapshot, in which she was originally, fishing!
There are six differing layers, plus copies of layers.

The Text with this image is:
Katherine's Past is foreign country..they do things differently there.

Paul Grand: ghost in the shell

2007-01-22T03:39:00.000-08:00

Paul Grand: ghost in the shell

ghost in the shell

2007-01-22T02:14:00.000-08:00

The local limestone around this area is chock-o-block full with fossils,
I've just started a new flicker group called ghost in the shell so its brought these fossils into focus and opened up a whole new subject for me to photograph.

My aim is not another boring collections group but a back to basics, organic, timeless surreal group. I want our objects to be beautifully lit and photographed in such a way as to convey an atmosphere, such as the atmosphere of the of awe of discovery, an Indiana Jones type revelatory moment when the object is bathed in golden light!

I've already found out through the net that my area is famous for Dinosaur eggs, there is a whole field full of them, closed to the public because its so important. Then yesterday I found this Swiss boys site, Click on the French title to get his local photos about this site open for just one weekend a year where you can dig up things like trilobites!
http://home.tiscalinet.ch/ckrebs/index.html
Its between Roquebrun and Cessenon.

On the little hill above our village floodpans, the grounds around the vines are littered with Oyster shell fossils, too common to be of value, but where there is one type There are more!
Its also where I found the Limestone rocks with the small fossil shell voids in the dry stone walls.
I've also seen locals selling fossils in our village Brocant market, One Dutch man said;
"Nobody is interested around here..."

I have heard that this area is very important geologically, the rock formations are rare.
I read there were massive upheavals in the rocks which caused internal voids where the local famous red marble formed.

By the way, our house frontage is made of huge local, dressed Limestone blocks, Completely Full of Shell fossils!
Photo's above show local dry stone wall with olive grove and vines where the fossils came from.

Truffle

2007-01-03T06:09:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

Truffle
Just as I lived in London for nearly 20 years and never visited St. Paul's, I've now lived in France for several years and never tasted a fresh Truffle!

Last night we finally ate half of a truffle Martine brought back with her from her fathers famous truffle selling village in northern Provence.

He'd given it to her as a Christmas present, but because we both have terrible head colds we waited before eating it as I didn't want to risk missing the full taste of the fabulously expensive, French, black diamond!

Truffles grow in several areas in France, firstly our truffle comes from The Drome area, then there are Perigord, Charente and Angouleme, also our area in the Herault, the Tarn, the Vaucluse, Lozere and the Jura.

The high season for selling and buying Truffles is in January and february, normally in little back street village markets from open car boots. Taking photographs of these markets isn't really recommended as the sellers tend not to like being seen selling such high priced, and normally, black market goods!

I did manage to take some pictures a couple of years ago and if I find them will post here.

Getting back to our Truffle, we served it on fresh pasta with salted butter, creme fresh and parmesan cheese, the truffle was cut into fine slices and mixed into the completed sauce as any cooking seriously impairs the subtle flavor.

As for the taste, how do you describe the taste of heaven?
It was a wonderfully light dish and a real novelty for us to eat.
It had a taste all of its own, it didn't taste at all like a mushroom, which was a surprise!
I would say it had a creamy, buttery, chocolate/malt taste with a faint savory after scent of slightly sulfurous gas!

Oh, and by the way, its rubbish for curing head colds! We both continued to suffer the next morning!

Top Picture by Martine Roch

2nd two pictures by me at a truffle Market, Drome, North Provence, France

I loved James Brown

2006-12-25T01:49:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas!

I loved James Brown

He has just died after many years on the stage. I was lucky enough to be snubbed by him whilst working voluntarily as an Admin. for an International Aids education charity at The Montreux Jazz festival in 1993.

I was in charge, backstage, for making sure all the stars were issued with Red Ribbons and smoothing the way..

He had a large family of musicians who had all agreed to wear the ribbon despite being warned by Mr Brown that any one wearing one would be sacked for doing so!
The group leader said, “Well, he cant sack us all”?
They were all very supportive but Mr Brown had refused to have anything to do with the Shows educational Aids support.

I was in a very tricky situation as my fellow workers wanted to get Brown on-board and wear a ribbon at any cost..

James Brown had just been released from Prison the year before for some drugs offense in America, adding to his kudos and so this was the hottest ticket of the entire show.

The Town was buzzing with the news that he’d turned up. What wasn't generally known was Brown had turned up as expected but had demanded a suitcase full of cash before he'd go onto the stage! Naturally this was a real task for the organizers but I heard he always did this so perhaps they should have been ready.. but still, a real pain to have your star double his appearance fee just before performing!

Well, they managed it, as I was on the top floor of the building outside his dressing room before he came out to go to stage. I met the organizer, the charming and helpful, world famous 'Quincy Jones' who told me he'd tried to get him to don a red ribbon but had been refused point blank and so it was a hopeless cause, but I stood my ground and as Brown's door opened I held up a ribbon as he came towards me.. He wearing this shocking old, shiny red nylon crimp suit, he just put up his hand in a 'NO' gesture and walked by.

I’d failed, but what a magnificent failure! His whole group were onstage wearing the ribbons, and Brown looked like a life size Red Ribbon, as I saw when I’d rushed around into the auditorium to see the show.

It wasn’t a very good show, Brown's performance was a half hearted one, I’d seen videos of his heyday and knew he always did the same things, pretending to be overcome by excess and his old servant putting his cloak onto his shoulders, Brown comming 'to' and returning to sing, he'd normally do this several times in a good show, but this was'nt and so he did one return only. It seemed that Brown was just running through the paces, not bothering to act, he just wanted to get off stage. Dispite this the Swiss and international crowd of rich supporters loved the show and it became the highlight of the season. I believe the band members didn't get the sack after all, just for this, I loved James Brown!

I may add more as and when I can, with Montreux Jazz fest pictures...

Picture above: Myself behind Geneva Art Gallery

London Bus outside Jezz Fest hall, Our Red Ribbon H.Q.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/63263430@N00/