The Jump...

By the time the rain had cleared, a severe case of lethargy had set in and instead of anything photographically adventurous, it turned out to be a day of the first visit to a supermarket since the 22nd, so a fair amount had to be bought. I treated myself to a Tesco's Finest Panettone, a fancy 750g box with a posh ribbon and reduced from £9 to £3.50! Even if it is horrible (it's Italian and has chocolate on top, so how is it going to be at all horrible?) I've already convinced myself that it's worth it...

After unpacking that lot, I went out back down to town, with my very old and battered manual focus Nikkor 135mm f2. Not really sure what I was going to snap, possibly some fancy shallow focus-effect bokeh shots of the Christmas lights...

After all my recent people pix recently I still had that in mind and saw and heard this group of youngsters congregating on the Guildhall steps. They do have, of course, their own dedicated skateboard and BMX complex, but that is some way out of the centre and in the dark corner of a park.

The 135mm lens gave me just length to keep a comfortable distance, not that teenagers would care too much anyway - and I could always pretend that I was snapping the Christmas tree just to the right. I took a few, this being the best by a long way and the fast f2 aperture allowed a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the action. Look in LARGE to see this better! I also liked how the big fat old columns of the civic building mixes with the slim energy of youth.

Tomorrow night, I'm official snapper for the New Year's Eve, Altar Club back in November. I get there at 8.30 and finish at 2 a.m. There's an after party til 6 a.m. But there'll be six bands instead of the usual five so it is going to be one long haul - and of course, I won't be imbibing, unlike all the others.

Until then, I fully intend to do almost nothing and will post one image from it before midnight and one for the next day, on New Year's Day. So, there won't be a blip from me until next year, now, the one for the 31st will be back-blipped.

So, everybody have a truly super Blippingly Brilliant 2014!!

A lot of superb Blippers are celebrating their Blip Birthdays about now, as they had, obviously, made Blipping a New Year's resolution in previous years - let's all hope that a whole new group of Blippers join our wonderful, happy community as well - and let's make them feel truly welcome, eh??! Nice one.