I'm alive. I'm well. I'm here. The best place - home.





I hang out with my dog.

I go foraging with mum.



(I eat my greens)





I see clearings and frogs and so slip behind.


I photograph dad paparazzi-style since he hates having his picture taken.



And I eat home made foods and relax... Don't miss me yet.

I know there's been a lot of Sweden talk these past few days and it won't stop for a while as I'm going back there for a little holiday tomorrow. I can't wait! Will go to Malmö, Gothenburg and Värmland. Hopefully I should have access to internet for most of the time so will update you with pictures of my frolicking and blueberry picking.

Lately my camera of choice has been the Nikon D700 and I love it, don't get me wrong, but after a while of nothing but digital you start gagging for film so I'm bringing a Mamiya 7 with me to the homeland. I've never used one before and am quite excited, not used to the 6x7 at all so will be fun to play around with.

Here's a shot of Eusebio from the test roll I took and I don't know if you can tell (click to enlarge) but the quality is sooo much better despite it being quite a shitty scan. Oh film, oh medium format, I love you both (and you too Eusebio) !

Now I must really start packing as my things seem unwilling to pack themselves... lazy bastards.

So time for part 2/2 of the Stockholm weekend. Me and Saga-Mariah followed this little fishy...

... to his home amongst other little fishys and pine trees.

I tried his Tyrolese hat (had to google that one). Note how sexy SM is hiking up her skirt whilst licking her lips in the background. It's the Tyrolese hat effect. Also wearing this hat prompted the continuous singing of this song:

The lyrics translate to "YOU OUGHT TO BUY YOURSELF A TYROLESE HAT, JUST TO MAKE PEOPLE LAUGH! JUST TO GET A BIT HAPPY" and it gets very tiresome after only a short while.

After dinner we were full and comatosed in the sofa for a while before heading back into town. Stockholm is such a beautiful city; everyone should go visit. Especially in the summer.

* * *

Sunday brought breakfast/lunch at the Dibinger family and then a swim in a nearby lake before heading to the airport. Kevin I know you danced with wolves but did you try swimming with ducks?

No matter how nice it was I didn't go to Stockholm to look at the Pride parade; I was there to shoot images for Luxsit (<---link) the lovely organic skincare. Saga-Mariah's designed the labels and there is no crap whatsoever in these products, only good-for-you nature things. What's not to like! The shoot was great fun and wonderfully styled by Saga-Mariah and Rose-Marie Lybeck.

Woop!

After watching the parade me and Saga-Mariah went to edit the Luxsit pictures we'd taken the day before (hope this is not getting too complicated - you're still following?).

1. SM outside her office.

2. Her lovely artwork.

3. SM inside her office.

Anna Havanna was in town and stopped by for a coffee....

... and after a while she was joined by Stina. Malmö ladies in Stockholm; what a luxury!

Then there's a part two to this day when we went to Sebastian's but I'm off to a BBQ with some friends now so that'll be posted either later tonight or tomorrow. What a cliffhanger eh..?!

I missed the Pride Parade in Brighton but I saw the one in Stockholm. I loved it. But then I'm easily swayed by happy gays and bright colours.

This guy tricked me and Saga-Mariah into dancing for [the conservative] Centerpartiet; we got carried away by his outfit and happy moves. Damn these electioneering geniuses!

For the English speakers; the blue boob-lady in the bottom-left corner is called Dominika Peczynski. She's a celebrity in Sweden and now you know.

These guys were very badly co-ordinated; literally like a flock of chickens.

I think the bearded man looking at the camera looks like Björn or Benny (no-one ever knows who's who) from ABBA so let's pretend that it is, it ties in well with the previous post as well.

Bye-bye pride ! (<-------- I make clever links like these sometimes and they need to be checked out so I can be as smug about this as I ought to be. I will point them out every now and then to make sure you're following me deep into the depths of this blog. Don't worry. It's all good)

Ok time to catch up - I'll start with the culmination of three years... Graduation. As a Swede I found this pomp & circumstance ceremony amusing. Especially amusing was the Mayor of Brighton and Hove in some sort of medieval robe and loads and loads of bling. No pictures of him though. I'm sorry. You can google him. He hasn't been Mayor for very long and therefore seems quite keen to wear his bling a lot.

Aaanyway....

Sinclair & James

Kayla

Brighton Dome (Swedes, this is roughly what ABBA would've gazed upon when they won with 'Waterloo' in 1974... roughly. Maybe less hats but then again it was the 70's so who knows)

Josh & Tom

In the evening we went out celebrating but I didn't drink and I didn't bring the camera so you'll just have to imagine what it was like.

So, bye-bye to 20 years of almost consecutive studying! Hello, Real (Scary) World!

This weekend was Pride weekend. I like how the sign says "Pride gay" and also that it's directing people to the wrong park... Most people seemed to have managed to find the right one though - Preston park, not Stanmer park - judging from the amount of people there. Apparently it's estimated that 160,000 people found their way to Brighton, more than doubling the population. Whoa! I hung out with my friends and made some new ones. Gay times!

(Everything you do is a balloon...)

Please please click this donna to enlarge. She's amazing.

There's a Swedish lullaby about sleeping bears...

(Jeff spotted and shot the middle hottie)

Managed to find Nick too (or well, he found me) which was a treat. Robin was having a retreat (ha!) in the Cowley sofa after no sleep whatsoever.

And in the evening we went to the street party. Cat and I were among the few straight people (and most likely the only straight ones in this blog post apart from Robin) in the village...

Woo to great weekend!