Trips Archives - samuelshoesmith.uk

February 2024

February 2024

Dear Diary, As with January, I have decided to review February and put some photos of the month here. It gives me a reason to reflect on the many photos I take. The way I have done it before with the yearly review means that because of the hundreds and hundreds of photos I have […]

My 2023 review

Wooah. That took a while. I have spent some time on the very last day of 2023, and in truth a few days after, reflecting on the year gone by. The main way this was done was by looking at all of the photos I have taken from the year. There were a lot of […]

My 2022 review

If only I could understand how my mind works.  I posted an incredibly late review of my 2021 on the very last day of 2022 and thought to myself that with this new “do it” attitude it would mean that within a few days I would then upload the more recent photos from the year […]

Everybody’s Talking About Jamie

Last week I read about how they were turning ‘Everybody’s Talking About Jamie’ into a film and it is due to be released early next year.  I was very excited to read this.  And just yesterday the trailer was released and instantly my friend Seb sent me it.  It looks wonderful. I can’t wait to […]

My 2019

My 2019

Happy New Year 2020! We enter a new year and a new decade. May it be a good one! As I reviewed my photos from 2019 I realised just how eventful the year has been. I’ve just read the piece I wrote back as we entered the year and I prophesied that “2019 will be […]

UNISON Reception in Parliament

My blog posts are like buses. You wait for ages for one to come along and then two come along at once. Like my previous blog post, I went to Parliament again. But this time to attend a UNISON reception to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the introduction of the minimum wage and to launch […]

Watching PMQs

During the first month of any year, I have this feeling that I am not going to do enough. I know exactly where this feeling comes from. For the last handful of years, I have put up a fresh wall planner as we enter the New Year, so being able to see all the crossed […]

Happy New Year 2019!

I often start my Happy New Year post by saying the year just gone has been “great”, “special” or even “wonderful”, but 2018 has been marked by a devastating loss and it has overshadowed the good times. However, these good times do need to be revisited as now is the time to reflect on the […]

January 2018 updates

On the last day of every year I write down my New Year’s Resolutions.  The list is usually quite long.  Most of them are quite vague – such as “be happy”, “be content”, but some are more direct.  “Make more videos” – although still slightly vague – the fact is, more than 0 is 1, […]

Mobikes in Manchester

Dear Diary, Back in July, I had a couple of days free so decided I was going to make the most of it. Usually, I catch up on emails, watch some films, some programmes and do some “paperwork”. My definition of “paperwork” is wide reaching but amongst other things, it includes reading articles, writing them […]

London Gay Pride 2017

This was my third time at London Pride, where I watched the parade and absorbed the atmosphere. It is a wonderful event. I think it is the ambience and the sprawling crowds. One is free to be how they want to be, to wear what want to wear and celebrate who they are. Wider society […]

Torremolinos – take me back

A month ago today I landed back home after a week spent in Torremolinos in Spain.  During this past month, I have spent too many minutes looking through the photo album and re-living this wonderful holiday.  I wanted to briefly document the trip.  Here are some photos: It was a much needed rest.  I finished […]

Protest, crawl and ppaaarrttayy

I had a bloody good time. On Saturday 11th February I was scheduled to work and did everything I could to get the day off. I managed it. The week before I had met up with Tom who had said about the idea of doing a Spoons bar crawl. That Saturday was also the day […]

Two cities

I meant to write this last year. Opps. I never got round to it. I went to Paris on my own back on November 21st. The accompanying photo album was waiting on my desktop to be uploaded here along with an article. Then it went to the front of the queue. It was joined by […]

Happy New Year 2017!

Happy New Year everyone! 2016 was a pretty great year for me. A huge thank you to everyone who made it wonderful. Life can be taken so fast so it’s important to grasp it and enjoy it. Live it! Carpe diem. YOLO. I shall make 2017 a special one. The plans on how to do […]

Newcastle a few weeks ago

For too long it has been the same; I go to a few different places and become comfortable with the familiarity.  I frequent them, have a great time as always but do not seek anything new. I decided to change that.  I wanted to go somewhere different.  In conjunction with my friend Seb, we decided […]

Consecutive weekends and coincidences

I meant to finish and publish this piece soon after the 2nd October.  It is now November 10th.  Ouch.  I kept putting off finishing it and eventually it fell down my to-do list and almost fell off.  Ohhhh.   I thought to myself as I began composing this post over a month ago, that you […]

Gay night out in Manchester

I am not quite sure how much I managed to miss writing a blog post after my gay night out in Manchester. It was a moment of brilliance. How? Anyway, back on August 6th I got the train with Seb to Manchester. After a quick stop off in Nottingham, we arrived late afternoon and walked, […]

Cycled 74 miles from Wellingborough to Nottingham

Whilst studying at the University of Nottingham, I became a cyclist. My daily “commute” to university was initially on a mountain bicycle which was replaced a few times and eventually became a dropped handlebar, thinned tyre pedal machine. Towards the end of my degree, I set myself, at the time, the adventurous challenge of cycling […]

Air pollution

It’s killing you. Two of my interests are the protection of our environment and cycling so one particular topic that pops up on my radar time and time again is that of air pollution. A year ago I went on a protest against the wider issue of climate change entitled “Time to Act“.   It […]