Sloe Learner

Just a digi-snap of what it looks like out the back of my house at the moment. -18C last night, and quite a shock for these usually temperate parts! You know something unusual is happening when people are building igloos in South Manchester...

Being snowbound - and the turn of the year, natch - tends to induce reflection about the year just gone. And, for me, the biggest thing about 2009 was upping sticks and moving to my new house. It's been strange to move much closer to the centre of Manchester, and simultaneously feel like I can have a quasi-rural experience thanks to the huge areas of open country, woods and river just out my back door... One of the products of this has been sloe gin:



A lot of people had bottles of this for Christmas from me this year! As well as the sloes that grow everywhere I've also been able to pick - either growing wild or at communal orchards - apples, pears, blackberries, gooseberries, plums, damsons, cherries and hazelnuts. Hopefully there'll be lots more of this in 2010...

And, as for the whole photography thing... I know 2009 has been, for various reasons, a bit lean in terms of new work, but this year will definitely see a conclusion to the Radium Street project, and at some point some pictures from new series that I'm working on starting to appear here.