A Sunday Ramble – allergic?

After about ten days of constant rain we seem to have a little sunshine today. The smarter people will be scraping the rust of their barbecues and planning days out. I’m planning a day out taking more photos. In England we tend to not plan too far in advance or spend too much money on events in summer, because the weather is so unpredictable. There are people who go out in the rain and wave flags, buy ice creams and do all kinds of weird things. I have even seen them wearing sunglasses in the rain. Are they trying to keep the rain off their eyes? I don’t go out in the rain very often, but if I did, I would wear a coat, not tee shirt and shorts. We are now into the pollen season of course…

The street that I live in was lined with a sort of pink dust yesterday, it was everywhere, on pavements and cars. It was pollen coming of the trees with the rain. Much of it seems to have washed away now, but I was sneezing all day and my throat was getting sore. My throat feels horrible today, my head is full of cotton wool and my nose feels like it’s full of ready mix. This is my usual annual allergy to that tree pollen. I remember last year when we were out taking photographs, in one place it was coming down like snow from the trees. I think woodland photography is an option to avoid today. So too are parks and anywhere else that there are trees. It’s a shame because the blossom makes the trees look really great for photos.

It’s not just trees and particular varieties of trees that can cause problems, but grass pollen and other plants can cause problems too. It would seem that the more common the pollen, the more likely we are to be allergic to it. Those yellow fields of rape in the countryside cause misery for many people. Once you have a reaction then you seem to become sensitive to other irritants and pollens.

You can be allergic to other things of course, like additives in foods, colours and even the foods themselves. There is some evidence that allergies can even cause mental health problems. This allergy is driving me nuts today! You can actually die from a serious nut allergy! It would appear serious allergies to nuts and peanuts in particular is becoming more common. I saw something on TV about peanuts being used in Chinese cooking and peanut oil is used more and more in cooking and so you have to know what you’re eating. Monosodium glutamate or taste powder is a kind of salt that improves taste and added to many products but it is also very popular in Chinese cooking. That allergy is sometimes called ‘Chinese restaurant syndrome’. 

I was looking through the best of my photographs on Facebook this morning. I managed some good photos all through the year and the ones when everything was frozen in winter were interesting. I like recording the change of the seasons in photographs. We tend to get better light in summer, but not always. We had some really sunny days in winter, but it gets darker much earlier. We are fast approaching the summer solstice now when we have the longest day, so we have more opportunity to take a few interesting pictures over the next 10 days.

The picture at the top of the page is interesting, because it features the 18th century canal. That seems to contrast with nature and the bridge must be 18th century too and contrasts with the 20th century steel railway bridge. I think the electricity pylons would also be 20th century and the Metro running over that bridge is late 20th century. That canal is popular with walkers, joggers and cyclists and I have even seen narrow boats on the canal near by. The canal could be an option for today’s photography.

We have to make the most of the breaks in the rain and make the most of summer. In some parts of the UK they have flooding and so they have to try to recover from that and clean up. Is climate change the cause? It is difficult to say, the weather has always been changeable for as long as I can remember, but the April rain did break records.

Enjoy your summer and do please comment. For those now into winter down under in Australia, you can enjoy that too; I got great winter pictures on the dry sunny days! Please comment and tell me what the weather is like where your are. There are more amazing blogs on the Home Page.

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