July 2021 Favourite Uploads

[Alan Beastall]

Can anybody remember using these black, sorry red telephone boxes? Before iphones or even a home telephone you would have to walk to the nearest one to use these phone boxes. One of the worst experience would to wait outside in the winter in pouring rain for someone to finish then use the handset when they had been smoking or had coughs and sneezes. How would we cope today with covid?

 

[Jill Morgan]

Father and son fishing.

 

[Betty LaRue]

My old iMac sitting beside the new on my desk, with the wrap still on the new. This was before I used the Migration Assistant to transfer from old to new.

Behind it, on the wall, is a framed image of the truss bridge near where I used to live. I had done some artistic things to it.

The dark blue wall is a statement wall, the other three are pale blue.

 

Edited July 1, 2021 by Betty LaRue

[gvallee]

19 hours ago, Sally R said:

 

Nice image Alan. I do remember using telephone boxes not so long ago here in Australia. I remember waiting for ages for someone having a long social chit chat. I also remember going into one where someone had left all the chicken bones from their takeaway meal. Every suburb used to have a few of them but there's very few about these days. My Dad actually worked for payphone services here and got to travel around the state checking the conditions of phones and phone boxes.

 

I remember in the Amazon, Manaus, Brazil, calling my son in France for his birthday. We had to go to the telephone Exchange to book a call. We had to fill in a form with the details. Then the call would be placed through Rio. There were numbered booths when the call came through. After 3/4h of waiting and sweating like a pig, I was called in a booth. That was Germany. Not my call. Mine had been forgotten.

[Ed Rooney]

On 01/07/2021 at 13:58, Alan Beastall said:

Can anybody remember using these black, sorry red telephone boxes? Before iphones or even a home telephone you would have to walk to the nearest one to use these phone boxes. One of the worst experience would to wait outside in the winter in pouring rain for someone to finish then use the handset when they had been smoking or had coughs and sneezes. How would we cope today with covid?

 

 

Can I remember the red boxes? I remember when we used to use smoke signals. 

Edited July 2, 2021 by Ed Rooney

[Jill Morgan]

On 01/07/2021 at 08:58, Alan Beastall said:

Can anybody remember using these black, sorry red telephone boxes? Before iphones or even a home telephone you would have to walk to the nearest one to use these phone boxes. One of the worst experience would to wait outside in the winter in pouring rain for someone to finish then use the handset when they had been smoking or had coughs and sneezes. How would we cope today with covid?

 

 

I certainly remember phone boxes, used them many times as a kid and young adult.

 

I remember when I was working a dog show and my cell rang and it was my son calling me from inside the Chunnel as he was taking the train to Calais and from there Paris.  It blew my mind a bit.  How times have changed (and generally for the better).

 

Jill

[Ed Rooney]

 

After Big Ben in London, this Chester Eastgate Clock is the most popular in the UK. 

 

[Jill Morgan]

This little Purple Finch has become quite a regular to the feeders.

 

[Marianne]

1 hour ago, Jill Morgan said:

This little Purple Finch has become quite a regular to the feeders.

 

 

Really fabulous capture! Love the angle. 

[Marianne]

I always though the British phone boxes were so much more attractive than our utilitarian ones here in the US. To me, they were as much a symbol of the UK as the Union Jack. Sad to know they're all but gone...wish I'd taken a better photo of one when I visited Edinburgh in 2007. By then, though I didn't have a cell phone with an overseas plan, my daughter and I (I was chaperoning her acting troupe at the Festival Fringe) used a Google app to "chat" with my husband using the community computers at our hostel. I remember in summer 1975 and  winter 1979-80 trips abroad having to line up to use one of a bank of special phone boxes to make an overseas call to my parents from Rome, London and Paris to let them know I was safe on 2 different month+-long trips in high school and college. Now I'd just use my iPhone. Our $20 per phone per month plan includes free overseas calls. Back then the calls were quite pricey. 

[Alan Beastall]

I thought these British icons would bring back sweet memories from the past but do not despair you can still come across them, mainly in villages across the UK. Not for phoning in most cases but for book loan schemes, flower seed exchange, defibrillators, etc. I even came across one that had a fish tank in it with live fish. The image used here B&W was take last week in a small Derbyshire village of Ilam in the Peak District in full working order, card but no cash and the colour image below from Milldale along Dovedale in Staffoldshire.

 

Edited July 2, 2021 by Alan Beastall

[sb photos]

On 01/07/2021 at 13:58, Alan Beastall said:

Can anybody remember using these black, sorry red telephone boxes? Before iphones or even a home telephone you would have to walk to the nearest one to use these phone boxes. One of the worst experience would to wait outside in the winter in pouring rain for someone to finish then use the handset when they had been smoking or had coughs and sneezes. How would we cope today with covid?

 

 

An excellent image. I certainly remember the older black phones with button A and B. When a young boy I would often walk with my father to a phone box on Sunday evening to phone my Grandmother in Wood Green, London. If the phone box was in use the caller would sometimes take for ever. We would alternate between the two closest. Now we see old phone boxes used to house defibrillators or book swaps. Times have certainly changed.

[Ed Rooney]

15 hours ago, Jill Morgan said:

This little Purple Finch has become quite a regular to the feeders.

 

 

You've captured the charming personality of that little bird.

[gvallee]

18 hours ago, Sally R said:

Ah yes, what a rigmarole for a phone call! You have reminded me of a story a work colleague told me. His parents were travelling as a young couple in the 70s. They'd not been in communication with their parents for months. They were in the Middle East and their travellers' cheques had been stolen. They managed to find a phone they could call one of their parents on. It was a poor line and they'd managed to say the sentence "Something terrible has happened" when the phone cut dead. They were referring to the travellers' cheques. The phone line would not work again and it was another 6 months before they spoke with their parents. So the poor parents had no idea what the terrible thing was and just had to hope for the best until they heard from them again! Now we are so connected we might worry if we haven't heard from someone in a week. Life seemed more of an adventure back then.

 

6 months!! Imagine the anguish of the poor parents!

[Jill Morgan]

8 hours ago, Ed Rooney said:

 

You've captured the charming personality of that little bird.

 

Thanks Ed.  I now have 5 purple finches that come by, 2 males and 3 females.  They quite often eat together.  Today I got some shots of 2 downy woodpecker fledglings, but not sure how good they will come out.  Had to use 3200 ISO so might be too grainy, even with help from Topaz DeNoise.

 

Jill

[spacecadet]

1 hour ago, Jill Morgan said:

Had to use 3200 ISO so might be too grainy, even with help from Topaz DeNoise.

I've often done OK at 3200 with just the NR in LR. As long as they're not too far under. Then resize to 3250 long side for here.

Edited July 3, 2021 by spacecadet

[Jill Morgan]

3 minutes ago, spacecadet said:

I've often done OK at 3200 with just the NR in LR. As long as they're not too far under. Then resize to 3250 long side for here.

 

I will certainly be trying.  But I do find with bird feathers, reducing noise removes some of the detail in the feathers.  There is so much detail on birds, you can't denoise too much, unless it is quite close up and you can downsize the image.  These fledglings are a small part of the image, so I double I'll be able to downsize a lot.  But I shall see.

 

Jill

[Ed Rooney]

This is what has replaced the traditional red box. 

 

The red phone booths and the double-decker bus were two details that said Great Britain with no need for a caption. 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 4, 2021 by Ed Rooney

[Colblimp]

Just now, Ed Rooney said:

This is what has replaced the traditional red box. 

 

The red phone booths and the double-decker bus were two details that said Great Britain with no need for a caption. 

 

 

It's just not the same.

[Colblimp]

Rather topical and Ian loves the limelight!  2G64K15

[gvallee]

Wolfe Creek Meteorite Crater, Western Australia 

 

 

[Mr Standfast]

E-scooters in Bristol.

 

[gvallee]

Pink sunrise at the iconic Pentecost Crossing, Gibb River Road, Western Australia

 

 

Road train at the Pentecost Crossing, Gibb River Road, Western Australia

 

 

Pentecost Crossing and Cockburn Range, Gibb River Road, Western Australia

 

[gvallee]

23 minutes ago, Sally R said:

 

I really love these Kimberley images Gen. I particularly like the last one with the vehicle crossing and the ranges in the background. I think it's something to do with the various layers of perspective. The truck is great too and the sunrise is beautiful. They all have a really nice light quality about them.

 

I also really like your Wolf Creek Crater images, including the plant life and lovely to see the mulla mullas flowering. My Dad lived and worked at Halls Creek in the early 1960s. I don't know if he ever visited the crater and wish he was still around to ask. I do have a vast quantity of boxes of slides of his to go through as he was already a super avid photographer then, so I'll probably find out eventually if he has any crater images.

 

Funny you should say that Sally, the woman driver of the car stopped and asked me if I would send her the picture, which I dutifully did. I was joking that I could run a business there as it also happened the last time we were there. It was a tour minibus then.

 

There are so many fascinating destinations in Oz, our motto is 'every day something new' and it never fails to happen. We're hanging out in Broome right now, just back from Cable Beach. What a relaxed atmosphere there. Everyone on the beach with their 4x4, BBQ or sunset drinks or on the lawn around cafes/restaurants under palm trees. There is an atmosphere of 'not a worry in the world'. And of course there are the camels.

 

[gvallee]

Our campsite by the beach at sunrise. Dampier Peninsula, Western Australia

 

 

Sunrise at Pender Bay, Dampier Peninsula, Western Australia

 

Pindan cliffs at Pender Bay, Dampier Peninsula, Western Australia

 

View from the lookout at Pender Bay, Dampier Peninsula, Western Australia

 

 

Edited July 5, 2021 by gvallee