Everyday Life

Everyday Life: Pigeons, Pies & Positive Vibes

It seems I rarely have time these days to sit down and write to you (yes, you!) Life is busy and full, and it appears to take a bone breakage or a surgical procedure to slow me down for a moment and give me sofa typing time. So, here, these recent things that aren’t so recent, but perhaps they are, in the grand scheme of things.

I must tell you first, I have a growing love for pigeons. I mean my love for them was strong, but now my heart is full! This might perhaps be a pigeon themed post. Get over it!

One of the highlights of my working year is FORMAT International Photography Festival, it’s a chance to meet up with my extended photography family for a few inspiring and joyful days. This year was no exception. This year was the best year yet! (I knew it would be, because, upon arrival, I saw a dog run gleefully down the road with a huge traffic cone in it’s mouth. You know that’s a fortuitous omen.)

On the Friday I had to miss Martin Parr’s talk due to a dodgy lunchtime burrito, but then the most wonderful thing happened. There was a man and he had a pigeon upside down with it’s head in a glass of water – he was dunking it in, lifting it out, dunking it in, lifting it out, and it was having a little drink.

Robbie and I went to speak to the man, he said the pigeon was tired and taking a rest. He let me stroke the pigeon. It was a racing bird, three years old, he knew because he had kept pigeons for sixty years. Lovely man. Beautiful. Made my day. We had our photo together and most of the time the pigeon was looking at the camera because it could see it’s pigeon self, and it was glossy and beautiful, and I think I got mites off it.

On the Saturday I gave portfolio reviews, and that evening I awarded the Shutter Hub FORMAT Photography Award. Each year I do this, I stand on stage and imagine what it would be like to sing, but this year my imagination took over me.

Ours was the last award to present, given to Isabel Flores for her photography and for her energy. Once I’d got her on stage I tried to get her to sing. ‘We can do a duet. What do we both know? Happy birthday?!’ I said. Isabel had a look of surprise on her face. I don’t know if she sung along, I could see her out of the corner of my eye, attempting to sidle off. Luckily it turned out it was somebody’s birthday after all.

Later I text Robbie, ‘Embarrassing?’ he replied, ‘I think you spelled triumphant wrong!’

We went to a cat show and I touched a naked cat. We also tried to adopt a cat from Cats Protection, a squishy Persian boy called Duke, but on the day he was due to go for neutering they decided to give him to someone else. I was so sad. We had waited for weeks. They admitted they were at fault, they said they’d not followed their own rules, but they weren’t willing to do anything about it. I will never put my trust in that charity again.

It was hard to get Duke out of my mind, I kept looking online, I could match the names and faces of hundreds of available cats across the UK.

Then one Friday evening, as I was surfing the internet eyeing up cats, I spotted this big grey girl.

I set an alarm for the morning so we could get to Wood Green for as soon as they opened.

She was beautiful. She came over to see us, and I tried to get a touch of her through the cage. Then her next-door-neighbour Merlin meowed and she turned round and punched the wall between them. One inch punch, Bruce Lee style. I knew she was for me!

The people at Wood Green Animal Charity were so, so kind and helpful. She had to have some teeth out before she came home, we picked her up on her 10th birthday, and we called her Tutti Biscotti!

I’ve been writing about my Foodie Finds for Surf 4. Each month I gather together a bunch of food related things and share them. It’s a great excuse to eat biscuits. I reviewed the new menu at Yuu Kitchen in London (that ice-cream bao is a thing of beauty to behold!) and had a little jaunt out to Newmarket for Pie Weekend (I really did want my beret to look like a pie crust!) I also worked with Carine Ottou, the chef behind Marie’s Little Jar.

It’s not all sunshine and treats though, just ask Adam about those fishy mussels at Brown’s in Cambridge the other week. Gah! I tried to find something positive to say but I just wondered if their theme of ‘the return of the golden era’  was a euphemism for a ‘detox meal’!

We sprinted with the LCUK Speed Championship at Cadwell Park. My first sprint of the year, and such an awesome, awesome track to drive. It was great fun. Alan Day went berserk – his words, I’m just repeating them (as often as possible!) My best time was 1:42.45, and Adam’s 1:35.97, he was 6th and I was 8th, out of 9. It was an ace day, I wasn’t fast, but I was happy.

The chickens are now back out in the garden, enjoying the sun, digging in mole hills. Margaret laid a massive egg, 125g of GIANT egg. She laid it on the lawn and all the other chickens gathered round to have a look. They must have been impressed. It’s not a world record, although I think she was going for it.

I attended the Visit Holland Dutch Tourism Awards evening at The Hoxton in Shoreditch and fell more in love with the Netherlands.

And then I attended the Sony World Photography Awards at the Hilton, Park Lane. I was introduced to the Photo Editor of British Vogue as the founder of Shutter Hub and a racing driver. I shuffled in my old dress and cheap shoes and then rushed off to take photographs of carpets.

Team Shutter Hub worked with Accumulate and The Photographers Gallery to help homeless photographers put together portfolios and select work for their exhibition at the Guardian. (You can read more about this here.)

We launched two new photography exhibition calls for entry. The Shutter Hub OPEN 2017 will be at Retina International Photography Festival in Edinburgh (enter before 7th June!) and we’ll be working with Cambridge University later in the year on an exhibition called Artificial Things.

We also headed to the sea for a team retreat and some serious project planning, chip eating and pigeon rescuing.

Thank goodness I wasn’t in charge, my contribution to the food was three bottles of wine and a pot noodle. I got the king size bed with the carpet headboard and metallic pampas grass wallpaper. I felt like I was winning at life.

We wandered the streets in search of chips, distracted by shadows and light, by gulls that sounded like chimpanzees and goats that sounded like seagulls.

Laura spotted a stuck pigeon on top of a building, caught in chicken wire. I made a half-arsed attempt to climb on a bin but then I worried that I’d fall in the bin, so we got a man from the bingo hall with a broom. The pigeon had lost a foot, it was waving its stump at us in distress. The foot was on the pavement below (as a mark of respect to the pigeon and the rescue team I didn’t photograph it). Eventually the pigeon was free’d and flew off into the sunset. It was a glorious moment of great joy, we cheered. Go team!

I guest lectured at Anglia Ruskin University and managed to get the room we were in condemned because… yes…. pigeons!

And, drum roll…. Shutter Hub won Best Photography Blog at the UK Blog Awards… hooray! Fwaah haaa! (That’s supposed to be some kind of celebratory trumpet call).

Now, for your final pigeon fix. Becky and I met up at Bletchley Park for a jolly day out learning about the codebreakers. It was an interesting day in many ways. One of those ways being that an old man approached me, whooping, and shouted ‘Yeah! Brexit!’ in my face, as the educational film showed Hitler’s defeat. Flabbergasted (what a word, hey?) I turned to Becky who also had a look of shock on her face. We were unprepared, we decided that if it happened again we’d just speak in another language, but what language did we both know? Polish, it turns out. And not much of it. In preparation we managed to muster a short conversation of ‘Two beers please’, ‘Your mother’s a whore!’ before giving up on it as a bad idea.

Aside from that we had a lovely day, and it was with utter joy that I discovered the Pigeons in War museum. Oh, my heart! Did you know that pigeons can fly at 60mph? And during the second world war they saved thousands of human lives, and won medals for their bravery? One of those pigeon heroines was Mary of Exeter – she survived being shot, attacked by German hawks, had over 20 stitches in her body, and had a little leather collar made so she could keep her head up. What a bird!

It just goes to show, whatever your size or stature, you’ve got the strength within you to do great things, and if Mary of Exeter can do it, so can we!

Thank you to Blossoming Gifts for the lovely ‘Brighton Rock’ flowers (top). Apparently the roses are called ‘Miss Piggy’ roses. I’ll not take offence! This is not a sponsored post. This post may contain PR samples and affiliate links.