The family that prey together, stay together.

I spotted this interesting looking vehicle when walking the dog through the retail park. There are a number of fast-food outlets, and because of the way the leftovers from these feasts are discarded, it supports a large population of rats. Shhh! Don't tell the shoppers. My little dog loves bounding through the undergrowth, chasing our four legged friends. One thing that I have noticed since the opening of the retail park, is that visiting this shoppers paradise, seems to be a family oriented occurrence. I suppose that in these hedonistic, secular days, any opportunity for a bit of family bonding must be applauded. Getting back to the artwork on the van, which looked like it may have been inspired by the film Cars. The van was from Poland, and harking back to my youth, if we had seen a reg like this, we would have told all our friends about this find. In a similar vein, as a child, whenever any of us spotted an aeroplane, we would stop what we were doing and gaze open mouthed about this wondrous site. Since the growth of the E.U. we now see vevicles from all over Europe, and probably wouldn't even give them a second look.
Whilst at the show yesterday, I spotted a very sweet scene, a young lady, with a tiny dog, which was tucked up in the pocket of her cagoule. After all the rain, I thought that perhaps she was making sure that the pampered pooch didn't get full of mud. I asked if I could take a snap, which she agreed to, and her friend started laughing. I noticed they had a similar look, and so asked if this was a friend, or sister. This was greeted with what I can only say was a guffaw. It turned out this "friend" was indeed her mum. Now I have heard these corny old lines before, but can assure you, that this was not the case, it was just that mum was so youthful, and was pushing a pram herself. I have another flickr project going at the moment, my 100 strangers, where you ask permission from a stranger, to take a portrait shot. Katy agreed, so two birds with one stone, no pun intended. This morning I received from over the pond, a critique of my snap, saying that they would have avoided including the lady in pink with a stroller. I took the shot on the hoof, with a large crowd milling past. If you have ever attended an event like this, as soon as the sun comes out, so do the locals, and at 4pm on a sunny Saturday afternoon, it was heaving. Forgive me for mentioning this again, but my love for photography, stems from the idea that we can encapsulate a microsecond of time for eternity, warts and all. I have seen the work of these artists, and notice that a week or more may pass between the image being taken and it appearing on the site. Now one of the things I like about blip, is what you see is what you get on the day. I don't edit. Or should I say, I can't edit, I am a complete technophobe. Apart from a little cropping I don't do anything, and I have developed a phobia about cropping. If I crop, and then print a pic, the image never turns out the way I want. If I get the job I hope, I am going to join a local photo club and hopefully learn some of the skills required. Forgive me, little rant over.Back to the young lady, I asked why she was carrying the dog in such a fashion, and mum replied that the dog was petrified of the large crowd. Isn't it lovely when the right dog gets the right owner. We used to breed labradors, and received a call from a very nice man who had bought one of our yellow labs. The poor chap, Brian had been ill, and had a leg amputated, which meant that he had to move into a council bungalow, where pets could not be kept. He asked if we could possibly re-home the dog. We always told customers, that should there be any problems to always come back to us. His wife tearfully returned the dog, and told us that the dog, called Shane was spoilt, and would sleep next to her husband in a dog bed at the side of her husband. 20 minutes later, we received a call from an elderly gentleman, wo was now on his own, and wanted an older dog for companionship. We told him the story, and he asked if we could deliver. We did, and when we delivered the dog, my wife and I wondered how we would broach the subject of Shane's former sleeping arrangements. He showed us his bedroom, and on the floor next to his side of the bed, was a big fluffy blanket. Myself and janet exchanged a quick look and knew that the right dog, had gone to the right person. The chap gave us a token amount for the dog, and we phoned Brian and told him the outcome, and sent him a cheque. Kismet.
Adios.