June/July

William Adam

As my Instagram followers and posts can attest to, I haven't had much time to go out photographing in the last month. In what was probably the best month of weather that Scotland has ever seen, with included spectacular sunsets, I have been busy moving to a new apartment.

As much as I enjoy building furniture from IKEA after hauling it up three flights of stairs and then having to spend over a week building it, my body decided that it was not much fun. Never before has a bowl of Swedish meatballs cost so much.

Now that I have been in the apartment for over a week I am starting to get myself into a routine where I can balance working with some web design and some photography. After the world cup has finished I'll start appreciating this summer weather before it disappears again.

Sunday Wanderings

A few photographs from a Sunday wandering around Stirling and Bonnybridge. Accompanied by @alycoste who managed to lose her phone in a nettle bush, while the phone was on silent. Our trips are never dull. On our last trip she lost her gloves at Stirling castle, in the pitch black; the gloves were also black. To be fair at least both items were found again :-)

You do the math

I was reminded about the closing scenes of the film "The Martian" today. 

"You just begin. You do the math. You solve one problem and you solve the next one, and then the next. And If you solve enough problems, you get to come home."

Today I was faced with something that I had never done before and it involved solving many problems, even though I knew what I wanted to achieve it, it seemed like an unsurmountable task to figure it all out. I have noticed that I often become extremely frustrated when I can't figure a task out, so much so that I can't think in a balanced way. 

You solve one problem, and you solve the next one and then the next.

I have been told that I am stubborn and I got to find out how stubborn today, as I would not leave the task until I was totally satisfied that the solution worked, and that I understood why. I also found a tremendous amount of joy in solving the last problem that allowed me to go home. Because hell was freezing over before I left without finishing the task.

I won't bore you with the details of what I was doing but it involved, Ordnance Survey data, GeoServer and a whole lot of data management. I had to "science the shit out of it".

I have taken this kind of approach to situations for a while now, it has taken me to new places and got me out of situations that I haven't wanted to be in. I think the hardest part is sometimes identifying what the problem is.

Dumfries House

I took the opportunity to have a quick visit to some of the gardens in the estate of Dumfries House. The house is of Palladian architecture, built in Ayrshire, Scotland. The large estate and house still contains much of its original 18th-century furniture, including specially commissioned Thomas Chippendale pieces. The house and gardens are listed as significant aspects of Scottish Heritage. I would encourage you to find out more at their website Dumfries House.

Unfortunately my visit coincided with rather unpleasant weather which made photography difficult, but it did whet my appetite for going back on a more pleasant day. I have posted some photographs below and one on instagram that I had a little fun with before posting.

Update: Click on the photo below to see more :-)