London – Page 4

B283 – NOT AGAIN!!!!!

January 12, 2018January 12, 2018 joshfspear1 Comment

its now Friday and its mid day, im writing this post after one of those mornings that I think has destroyed me and also taken a big stress of my shoulders. It all started at like 7am this morning, I woke up and was kind of excited to get outside and start running again, not going fast or trying to beat my record but just to ran in the mornings around Victoria Park, its that time of day when its still a bit chilly but it feels fresh and everything think is just starting to wake up.

well that exactly that time and at exactly 0.62 miles into my run, I realised that my leg is still not fixed. I tried to carry on for another hundred meters but then remembered that I should listen to my body not that part of my head that tells me to man up and carry on. It was at that point that I decided its time to stop sit on a park bench and google groin stretches. I tried them all, and nothing it still hurts. so I’m pretty much back to square one, only this time I’m not on crutches.

I admitted defeat, and slowly walked home. where I ran a hot bath and tried to think of a way to sort this mess out, after a quick phone call to my mum and maybe a little tear, I decided to have a nap. I had officially been chewed up and spat out by life. Exercising to me is that one thing that no matter what your situation is it will always tell you the truth about your self, and make you work harder. not for money or a promotion but just to do better than what I did last time. thats whats most annoying about this situation, I create goals in my head for running, and now I cant reach them. I need to go back to the drawing board and figure out how I can get there. My main goal in running is to run an Ultra Marathon, I want to reach that target of running an 70 to 100 mile race and was kind of hoping in the back of my head that could be a 2019 thing. but now I really need to think about my body and options.

Sorry this post is a bit of my plabbering on and sorry if I sound like a hypochondriac recently, I just want to blame that all on the worst month of the year. January. It wouldnt have been write if there was some sort of sloppy post, and this is just going to be it.

heres some more photos from that gig the other day, its worth the post and I like them.

B282-1-12 — – looking forward to getting back to their next gig –

B282-1-18 — – playing the guitar with a index finger wrap up cant be that easy –

B282-1-14 — – Tayne Band, give them a listen –

B282 – ABOUT LAST NIGHT

January 11, 2018January 11, 2018 joshfspearLeave a comment

I kind of fell like my idea of posting these each day at 10am has completely gone out the window so far for 2018. but todays post is late again, not because I was laying in bed asleep, but mainly because I’ve been sat here editing photos from last night and time just ended up getting away from me.

Last night I was at a gig over in Camden at a kind of famous venue, The Lock Tavern. If youve ever been to the round house, then the chances are you would of walked past this venue. its a small pub on the left hand side of the round if your walking up from camden high street. Its a venue that is so easy to walk past, its literally on the corner of the road and just looks like any normal pub, but if you were to walk upstairs is a completely different vibe and always seems to have really interesting bands playing.

Through the powers of instagram and email, for the past few months Ive been speaking with a band called Tayne, the are a kind of an experimental, noise, pop genre that kind of make up there own rules which makes them so much better. One minute there setting up and getting ready to play, next the lead singer Matt Sutton has taken his shoes and top off, and they are absolutely slashing the guitar and syncs. Its refreshing to hear a band just get up there and do exactly what they want, no holding back. Its a shame that all I can do to show you what last night was like is post up here some photos, they play pretty heavy music but it all seems to work out, nothing is about them just being loud or over powering. they create songs that work.

Im happy that I’m back on track with this project that I’m working on and looking forward to all the future gigs that I’m planning on going too.

Here are some of my favourite photos from yesterday.

B282-1-3 — – One of my favourite photos from last night –

B282-1-9 — – really good gig, Wednesday night should always go like this –

B282-1-17 — – cut his finger open, plays on… –

B282-1 — – really worth the trip, next gig is on feb 1st. be there or be square –

B280 – NEXT TIME BIG BEN WILL RING WILL BE 2021

January 9, 2018 joshfspearLeave a comment

Last night I decided that my iphone photos from the day time weren’t quite up to scratch, no way if I’m (fun)employed at the moment should the photos I take not be “sick”, so yesterday night I made the decision to travel over to the south band when it was nice a quite and take some slow shutter speed pictures of the London Eye and Parliament. I don’t think you can be a photographer in London and not have taken slow shutter speed shots of the river thames, it has to be one of my favourite places to go an explore. I know it might sound a bit weird but who doesn’t love going to on the banks of the river thames at low tide to see whats happening. It almost feels like your breaking some sort of law or something.

This week I was supposed to be working but at the last minute the job fell through, so now my January has become a proper freelancers January, where you just wait for February to come back around. Being a freelancer can be a bit of a lonely existence, you can literally spend weeks at a time watching Netflix and scrolling Facebook waiting for that email about work. I try and do the opposite, my aim is to completely forget that works quite and just keep myself busy with ideas and photography, the amount of stupid ideas Ive got written down or saved on my laptop is crazy, but as long as it stops me from watching day time TV I cant complain.

Today I have a plan to head over to the British Library. One because Ive never been there before and it looks like a pretty cool place and Two because I want to read up on a idea that Ive been working on for a while and sometimes google isn’t the best place to start.

oh and if anyone knows whens the best time at night to get a photo of the London eye spinning, please let me know. I cant work it out.

Heres my photos from yesterday. enjoy.

B280-1-3 — – The next time youll hear big ben will be in 2021 –

B280-1-2 — – I wanted to go a photo of it moving but unfortunately I think I was a bit late –

B280-1-5 — – South bank, pretty cool place –

B280-1-6 — – just ignore the metal gates, otherwise this would be a pretty nice shot –

B275 – I CANT MOVE

January 4, 2018January 4, 2018 joshfspearLeave a comment

Day three of being ill and im no better to feeling normal, i really think I need to spent some time watching Netflix and doing nothing. i thinking about it ive kind of been ill for the past month or so on and off, and then last night I ended up trekking out to a 24 tescos to try and get hold of some medicine at 2am, so right now I’m trying not to do anything to much and just chill in bed and watch some junk tv. Its days like this when doing this photo challenge becomes even harder, I wanted to get up and go swimming but then I didn’t think it would be fair on all the other swimmers if my boogies where all in the pool.

I do want to have a little goal for today though, I want to try and find a dish that I can cook which will help me get better, is there any recipes out there that I should try and cook that will help me get back on my feet? will spice help? garlic? ginger? that kind of thing.

On a different note yesterday while at tescos getting some food, (literally tescos has been the only place ive been too in the past few days). I had to pick up some random fruits for an idea that Amy and me have come up with, its kind of like a mini 2018 project that we want to work on, I cant say any more than that at the moment, and as soon as I can then ill let you know what we are up to.

I really hope this blog post isnt too boring and my photos are amazing today, but this time in bed should really help me plan a few blog posts and get some better material out there too you. I might just spent this time writing up ideas. who knows.

Anyway heres my photos from today, i hope you like them.

B275-1 — – a photo from my 2:30 am trip to tescos –

– trying to find the weirdest fruit I can –

– checked a local off license too, thought I picked up a dragon fruit, it was actually a pomegranate –

B274 – BACK IN LONDON AND COOKING UP A TREAT!

January 3, 2018January 2, 2018 joshfspear1 Comment

Before I get back into the main part of this post I’m going to give a bit of an overview on how today has gone. At 10am this morning Amy and myself woke up in our Amazing hotel room and instantly realised that we were both destroyed, I was ill and for some reason Amy’s legs wouldn’t work. Turns are both sick, me a bit more ill than her, but ill non the less. I think its just a case of us crashing, Christmas is normally a time of resting up but if anything its been the complete opposite, im not moaning about it, I’ve had the best two weeks.

The plan was originally to checkout of our hotel and going and have a look around Bristol and take in all the signs, well our plan quickly became to get on the first train we could and get back to the flat. Once we made it onto the train the next mission was to start editing the Go Pro video I made the other day, there’s no better way to make a train ride go quicker than to start editing a video, but well rendering took a bit longer than expect. The whole train ride really so I did manage to get a little sleep.

That leads me to the next part of my blog, what we did for dinner. We needed spice and a lot of it, when you’re ill nothing is better than spice, it cleans your nose and almost gives your body a kick start which is just what we need. Amy came up with the good idea of having a curry, making it from scratch and also learning a new recipe. If any of you are in need of a new dish and what to add a bit of spice in your life, then please feel free to give this recipe a go.

Ingredients

4 tablespoons oil

4 cloves garlic (crushed)

1 onion (Large, chopped)

3 red chili peppers (‘s, chopped)

4 teaspoons Madras Spice paste

1 tablespoon turmeric

2 tablespoons mango chutney

1 can coconut cream

1 tablespoon sweet chili sauce

1 tomato passata (large carton around 600ml)

1 bunch coriander (chopped)

4 tablespoons greek yogurt

2 chicken breasts (chopped)

Instructions

Step 1: In a large pan, heat the oil then fry the garlic, onions and chilli for about 5 minutes stirring regularly.

Step 2: Add the curry paste and turmeric and stir in.

Step 3: Add the mango chutney, coconut cream, sweet chilli sauce, passata, coriander, fenugreek and Greek yogurt and leave in a low heat for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Step 4: While your curry simmers on a low heat, cook the chicken and once its white the whole way through dump it all into the pan with the rest of the curry

Step 5: let that all simmer till your 30-minute timer goes off, I decided to add an extra chill 10 minutes before the end of the timer just to add a little extra spice.

I managed to get two good sized meals out of it and some left overs. Thank you too the App Yummly and also http://www.jamandclottedcream.co.uk/ for the recipe, I’ve tweaked it a bit but I cant take full responsibly for this dish.

One last thing, my goal for this blog is to reach 500 subscribers, so if you are reading this and haven’t yet subscribed. Please can you subscribe and ill be sure to follow your post.

Heres my photos from today, I hope you like them! and im sorry if I keep moaning about being ill!

B274-1 — – trying to get the timeline rendered by the time the train pulled into paddington didnt happen, I literally had my laptop open on the tube –

B274-1-2 — – arriving back in Bethnal Green –

B274-1-5 — – the Curry apperently smelt amazing ( my nose is blocked so I didnt know)

B268 – RUNNING AROUND LIKE A CHRISTMAS CRACK HEAD!

December 28, 2017 joshfspearLeave a comment

Its that weird time of year between christmas and new years where you still have to run around like some sort of christmas crack head trying to get your fix of family and chocolate and that exactly what amy and me have been doing, yesterday after waking up at Anders house I was on the move back to my flat for a 10 minute pit stop to meet amy and grab some clothes before heading back to see Flo so Amy can give her, her christmas presents. so naturally we stayed for a bit and played hide and seek and all those other games that a 3 year old likes to play. Flo was typically took control of my camera and decided to take a photo of us, so as you can expect I have included that photo below.

its now 10:37 on the 28th of December and we are sitting on my parents sofa getting ready to have a productive day of dog walking, car cleaning and hairdressing. a lot of activities but Im ready to rock n roll and get this show on the move.

theres something I want to write about on this blog today to make it final and then I have no excuse if I fail and that is a bet that I have put together my a good chum anders, we are going to be doing Dry January, No drinking alcohol for the whole of January and if we do then we have to give the other person £30. Im determined to fail and get back to track with my running, this time last year I was training for an ultra marathon and now I want to put those running shoes back on and start training of another race, my leg is in a good place and I’m sure with a bit of swimming and my a gym session or two I can get back to a good place and start running fast times.

Here are my photos from yesterday. Enjoy.

B268-1-2 — – just flo sorting out Amy’s hair –

B268-1 — – my arty shot from a coffee shop in crystal palace –

B264 – UP AND DOWN THE COUNTRY

December 24, 2017 joshfspearLeave a comment

Well… where to start. I just wrote a whole post and then pressed delete by accident, well done josh.

I’m writing this post as I navigate my way around London with a million bags and just try to get to my cousins in one piece. I don’t really know how to write this post, but I suppose I’ve just got to give it ago and see where we end up.

Yesterday I had a Christmas meal in Norfolk with all of Amy’s family and friends, as per usual they put out an absolute spread and a good amount of cheese, but by that time I’d had a few beers so forgot to take any photos, but I did get one of the pre dinner snacks. I don’t think I embarrassed myself at all last night and pretty sure I was sensible, so that’s also a pulse.

As I said I’m now on the train to My cousins on the other side of London, I’m a place called Petts wood to see my family. It’ll be good to see everyone, Christmas is a good time of year to catch up with people you haven’t seen in ages so that’s what I’m most looking forward to and also giving flo all the presents I got her.

I’m also going to a pub tonight with my mates, so I’ll try and take some photos of that but I’m not sure if they’ll be any good.

also for some reason WordPress won’t let me add captions to these photos. So the top one is from a dog walk yesterday afternoon along the beach park cliff bit.

2nd picture is of the pre dinner snacks, Christmas food is the best food.

3rd photo is from a quick pub drink we had after the dog walk. I love country pubs.

And also I want to say thanks to Amy Family and co. It was a really good food and an pretty fun evening.

B263 – SHE DOESN’T WALK… SHE RUNS!

December 23, 2017December 22, 2017 joshfspear3 Comments

Christmas has kind of officially started I think, for some reason today was just about ticking jobs off my todo list from having to wait nearly two hours to get my hair cut, no joke I was there 10 minutes before my barbers had opened and already it was a two hour queue, how is that even possible?

After getting my hair cut it was time to take a trip over to the city to see my favourite little human, she comes in the form of a 4 year old who literally cannot walk like a normal person, she’s either running, skipping or up to no good. Her name is Flo and she’s my niece. I tried to get a good photo of her but the best I could get was of her running towards another shop looking for a place to hide or climb. but she’s family so i suppose I’ve just got to love her.

anyway enough of the ranting I’m now sat on my sofa, beer in hand watching movies and basically being a slob.with all my christmas shopping done and wrapped I can safely say that I am off to a flying start. tomorrow I take the on the mission of getting to Norfolk with all the train cancellations and bus replacements. I’m sure it wont be too difficult, my question is just about how good this whole bus replacement service is going to be but I suppose Ill just have to take what Im given. so as the french would say “C’Est la Vie”

My thinking for todays photos was not three photos from my running around and then sitting on the sofa being a slob but to use one from the day and then show you some more photos from my trip over to the Barbican. I was thinking about this earlier and I take quite a few photos when I go to those types of places and it silly not to show you more photos from my trips.

so please see below my photos from the other day and also a photo from today!

Merry Christmas to all of you.

B261-1-6 — – you see that little platform in the middle of the river, I really want to try and get a photo from on that, its not as easy as you may think from this photo –

B261-1-9 — – this place is just cool to walk around –

B261 – THERES NO PLACE LIKE THIS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD

December 21, 2017December 21, 2017 joshfspearLeave a comment

last night I decided thats its been too long since I last spent some time playing with a slow shutter speed at night and theres also one place which I really need to explore and spend some time at, obviously im talking about the Barbican Centre next to Liverpool street, this place is called “Brutalist” or something because of the crazy amounts of concert and sharpe edges it has, its literally like a hipsters oasis in the middle of the financial district.

built in 1982 and designed by Chamberlin, Powell and Bon architects it was designed to be a brutalist styles and with lines on the floor to help people work there way around the housing estate and also the creative arts centre fully equipped with a theatre, music collage and also some weird rainforest room with loads of cool plants and stuff oh and in the water are Koi Carpe, that surprising haven’t been stollen yet and are still there to this day. its literally the coolest places to live, what used to be a housing estate where the upper classes wouldn’t even think to live has changed and become a place to be.

My plan for today was to try and get better at symmetrical photography one thing that I just cant seem to figure out, my eyes seem to lye to me and when I get home to edit the photos I notice that my photos just aren’t symmetrical. I was trying to measure the sides and even use the rule of thirds but its still not proving easy to get that perfect photo. Im not giving up just yet though, I will the perfect symmetrical shot. On the other hand though I did take one of my favourite photos today, its one I’m really proud of and its of a side on shot of the staircase in the Barbican with the guy walking out of the light almost likes its ET and we are all inside some new Steven Spielberg remake of ET.

One thing I would like you guys to know just so you can see how much its changed in 20 years. Frank Harris a local estate agent is currently selling an apartment in Blake Tower which is one of the iconic Barbican towers for £3.7m. I just hope that one of the original owners that probably brought it off the council 20 years ago managed to get a fair portion of its current value. but hey if I had that kind of cash I would probably splash out on that apartment, its located in the best looking ugly building that you can find in London and its actually a pretty sick apartment.

Heres my photos from last night, I hope you like them as much as I do.

B261-1-4 — – this is my favourite photo from tonight, the guy in the background makes this shot so much better –

B261-1-3 — – my trying to be symmetrical –

B261-1-11 — – this shot feels like something out of a movie –

B260 – IVE WANTED TO SEE THEM FOR YEARS

December 20, 2017December 19, 2017 joshfspearLeave a comment

Last week I went to a gig that I had wanted to go to for a while, it was for a band called Mellow Gang, they’re this band I discovered while in America and was that band I would listen to on the long plane journeys and extra long passport queues, well this band are probably the reason I’m still sane. The gig was at the famous Seabright Arms on Hackney road, you’ve definitely read about me going to this place before, its like 2 minutes from my house and actually plays really good music most weeks. and even better a lot of it is free which makes the whole gig a no brainer.

I find it a bit weird writing about a gig I went to last week as its not that fresh in my head and I cant really remember all my favourite parts, but unfortunately Im really not able to post any photos today as Ive spent the day running around different Disney stores trying to get hold of this Doll for my niece (don’t worry she’s too young to read so no chance of her finds out through this blog what I got her), well anyway that didn’t go to plan as no disney store had the right thing so I just brought as much stuff as my bank account would let me and moved on to the next task, which I cant really talk about on here but I can say that even that didn’t go smooth as I had realised after being in the store for an hour trying to get everything completely perfect to the point where I had to ask for a tape measure, well I went through all that to realise I had left my wallet at home. but luckily after a short phone call to Amy for her card details we were up and away, I just need to go back tomorrow morning and collect it. I have to say this year I have really pulled it out the bag with my christmas presents!

I really hope you like me writing and photographing gigs around London because I actually enjoy it quite a lot. So if you don’t like what I write and photograph let me know why and ill see what I can do to make it better!

Also don’t forget I still have prints for sale, so dig deep and buy one. Ill even send you a christmas card!

B255-1-5 — – Mellow gang doing there thing –

B255-1-3 — – Seabright arms on Hackney road, have a look at the Dice App for re gigs, trust me it is actually a pretty useful tool –

B255-1-10 — – this was Phundo Art, a rapper from South Africa –