Nothing wrong with men having long hair, but you have to know when to stop.

Jesus had long hair, but he didn’t have a hair drier.

In celebration of this year’s Superbowl, here are some images from the 2008 NFL game held at Wembley between the New Orleans Saints and the San Diego Chargers.

The fans were in fine mood.  Unlike many spoorting events, the crowd was unpartisan.  The ages of the London crowd went from school child to pensioner and the atmosphere was great.  There seemed to be shirts from every NFL team and lots of college, World League and Britball teams as well.

This is New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees taking the snap.

One of the issues with the UK broadcast of the Superbowl is the international commentary you often get.  As broadcasters believe that lots of new people who don’t know the rules will be watching, they use a dumbed down play by play which explains what’s going on.  The biggest game of the year and you get told what a forward pass is.  Can you imagine watching the FA Cup and the commentator tells you why the referee has a whistle?

Also, you tend to get ’special guests.’  All year long, the TV company has coped with two men in the studio but now it feels the  need to bring in an ex player or two to change the atmosphere.  Even worse is the guest without football experience.  Don Johnson springs to mind as an example of a guest who spent four hours in the Sky Sports studio with only his experience of Miami Vice to see him through.

Gone but not forgotten, the Jesmond Picture House.

 It was active between 1922 and 1993 and was raised to the ground last year.  A cinema has been lost to an office development because, it is claimed, old cinema buildings with balconies are too expensive to redevelop.

Admittedly, the building had become an eyesore over the last two decades.  Part of the roof had collapsed and it was full of pigeon droppings.  Perhaps its out of town location counted against it in the era of multiplexes but it was right next door to a metro station.

Shame buildings like this don’t seem to fit anymore.

This is actually the bridge from the car park to Selfridges in Birmingham and the rest of the Bull Ring which has undergone a massive rebuilding programme over the last ten years or so.  Designed by the late Jan Kaplicky, it’s a fantastic landmark but a bit disappointing when you find out its only a shop. 

Perhaps it’s an example of pre-recession celebration of commercialism, the shopping experience as a work of architectural art, rendered an extravagence by the economic downturn.   In any case, it looks fantastic and its the sort of building which often needs justification if you build it outside of London for some strange reason.

I’m not incredibly happy about the crop on this image, mainly because I clipped her head a little bit.  There was a lot of movement at the scene so I had to set the shot up quickly.  The image appears to give her a detached air but she was very involved with talking to people about the birds.  It’s the freeze frame that creates this effect.

I am pleased with this picture of a falcon because I managed to keep its eye in focus while the wings were moving.  Apparently, these birds can spot the ultra violet glow of a trail of mouse urine from the air and then use it to hunt.

Unusually for me, a colour picture.

A dancer taken at last year’s Chinese New Year celebrations.  The cloth is a stark contrast to the rest of the costume which is quite ornate and the striking make up.

This year it’s the Year of the Tiger starting on 14th February and festivities can go on for up to fifteen days in some parts of the world.

Reflected on the waters of the Tees is the Middlesbrough Transporter Bridge.   This Grade II Listed building was erected in 1911 and is one of the few bridges of its type in the world still in daily operation although it frequently gets shut by high winds, bad weather and just about anything else.  The bridge is 851 feet long and the passenger gondola, which also takes cars, travels on steel cables160 feet above the water.

It’s an icon for the Tees region and visible for miles around and built out of two halves which lean into each other across the river.

To me it looks like a giant dinosaur stretching across the river.

As the temperatre plummets across the UK, there is four inches of snow in my garden, foot long icicles hanging from my roof and the car can’t go anywhere without a shovel.

The problem is that I can’t be bothered to go and buy snow tyres and then jack my car up four times to fit them and then do the same in reverse when the snow goes.  The whole country is only ready for a few days’ snow not four weeks and we just don’t want to spend the time and money on grit, ploughs and whooley hats.

It’s only frozen water but it can close roads, make snowmen and it’s fun to throw at people.

The reason angels can fly is because they take themselves lightly.  ~G.K. Chesterton

In Heaven an angel is nobody in particular.  ~George Bernard Shaw

I’m no angel, but I’ve spread my wings a bit.  ~Mae West

Appearances can be deceptive.  These dice are actually five foot high concrete blocks painted red and white.  I photographed them on the beach at Bamburgh with my Canon EOS5.