I have a friend who works in a roving medical practice in Canada. She visits the remotest of places. This week Arctic Bay.

Eat your heart out Escher.
Minato. Tokyo. 2025
35.65495° N, 139.75696° E
#スナップ写真 #白黒 #モノクロ #photography #classicmono #eastcoastkin #blueskyartshow #UrbanGaze #railways
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

The wheat is ripening in Kagawa.
香川県の農家では麦が熟れ始める頃にサワラ料理を親戚の人々に振る舞う「はるいお」という慣習がありました。
押し抜き寿司に刺身や塩焼き等々、たくさんのサワラ料理を振る舞ったそう。香川県では江戸時代から昭和初期迄、タイやイワシと並ぶ主要な魚だったそうです。

Some striking Pater Luminum in Paris this year. Église de Saint-Germain-des-Prés.

The first Apple blossom has emerged.

Seventy years ago...a plan of where the various units of the British and Commonwealth occupying forces were based in June 1946. (Found in the National Archives London.)

From a series: flowers in the garden.
@botanical.bsky.social
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

Sometimes it's just the chaotic brutal ugliness of Tokyo that catches the eye. In this instance the edge of the railway tracks at Shinagawa.
2024.
#スナップ写真 #白黒 #モノクロ #photography #BlueSjyMondsy #eastcoastkin #blueskyartshow #UrbanGaze #railways
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

Takanawa Gateway. Tokyo. 2024.
#スナップ写真 #白黒 #モノクロ #photography #monochrome #BlueSjyMondsy #eastcoastkin #blueskyartshow #UrbanGaze
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#OTD Suginami, Tokyo. April 2022
#Japan #urbangaze #classicmono #EastCoastKin
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#OTD 2024. Timeless. A trackway running across the top of the Wolds in Gloucestershire.
#England #classicmono #photography #EastCoastKin #スナップ写真 #白黒 #モノクロ #monochrome #blueskyartshow
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#OTD 2025. Grab a quick supper at a stand-up counter in Shinagawa.
#Tokyo #Japan #urbangaze #Street #BlueSkyArtShow
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#OTD 2024. The modern Tokyo street tout or hustler now uses an electronic illuminated board. #Japan #nightlife #clubs

I did indeed enjoy the Enjoy Spice Day event in Konzoji Zentsuji where a friend was volunteering. The temple is #76 on the 88 Shikoku Henro.

The proportion of Japanese employees working more than 60 hours has fallen from 23% in 2004 to 11% in 2020 (last official figures). Another 10% of workers do 50 - 60 hours.
However in 2024 there was a record 1300 instances of karoshi - a record.

Taiwan Travelogue | The Booker Prizes A bittersweet story of love between two women, nested in an artful exploration of language, history and power

Far East soft power #3. And not forgetting Taiwan, who has an author in the 2026 Booker Prize shortlist.
thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-l...

World Snooker Championship: Zhao Xintong beats Liam Highfield in first round at Crucible China's reigning world champion Zhao Xintong defeats England's Liam Highfield on an emotional opening day of the tournament at the Crucible.

Far East soft power #2. There are 32 finalists in the World snooker championship. 11 are Chinese.
www.bbc.co.uk/sport/snooke...

South Korea's female authors become bestsellers against anti-feminist backdrop A quiet revolution is unfolding as women writers carve out space in the wake of an anti-feminist backlash.

Far East soft power #1. Women writers in South Korea now dominate the book market domestically but they're making inroads overseas.
Japanese authors still remain the most popular but Koreans are catching up fast.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Strawberries and cream comes in many forms in the Great British tea.

Breakfasts of the world: Continental. British, Japanese, American.

The Spread Eagle, Thame. This is not a lengthy history of the Spread Eagle in the market town of Thame but rather a snapshot when it was owned by John Rowland Fothergill in the 1920s. He, if the reader is unaware, wrote a …

Waugh was a member of the infamous, odious and dreadful Hypocrites Club, along with Henry Green, Anthony Powell and the 20th century’s greatest travel writer, Robert Byron, and the Spread Eagle was one of their haunts.
grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com/2022/02/11/t...

The Spread Eagle in Thame The Inn was immortalised in Brideshead Revisited. Waugh had Anthony Blanche take Charles Ryder to dinner where they had Spread Eagle’s famous Mavrodaphne Trifle,

"We are going to Thame…. There is a delightful hotel there, which luckily doesn’t appeal to the Bullingdon."

Roppongi in the 1990s: sex, booze, and some dancing. Roppongi Crossing. ©grahamthomas. During the daytime Roppongi slept, recovering from the excesses of the previous night. Some claimed it was the twenty-four-hour district but that was untrue. In th…

Some claimed Roppongi was Tokyo's unrelenting, twenty-four-hour district but that was untrue. In the morning, it was hung over and smelt of slopped beer, unemptied ashtrays, and stale grease. A pall of tiredness hung over the shabby ruffled buildings. grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com/2026/01/06/r...

Béziers. 2023
43.34290° N, 3.21462° E.
#スナップ写真 #スナップフォト
#スナップショット #ストリートスナップ
#キャンディッドフォト #大阪
#classicmono #BlueSkyArtShow
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

In flower. Japan. 2022.
@botanical.bsky.social
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

Tunnel near Mitoyo. Shikoku. Japan. 2023.
#スナップ写真 #スナップフォト
#スナップショット #ストリートスナップ
#キャンディッドフォト #大阪
#classicmono #BlueSkyArtShow
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

Rough #edge. 2026.
Abstract works fall foul of David Hockney.
"Photography can’t replace painting at all, but painting has to be of something....there’s too much abstract painting being done now.”
#スナップ写真 #スナップフォト
#スナップショット #ストリートスナップ
#キャンディッドフォト #大阪
#BlueSkyArtShow
@bskyphotos.bsky.social

The #edge of darkness. Paris. 2026.
#BlueSkyArShow #classicmono #EatCoastKin
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#Edge. 2017
#BlueSkyArtShow
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Petroleum derivatives are immensely critical. Did you know the baby catheters used in hospitals depend on a petroleum product for sterilisation.
The problem is that substitutes have not been developed because of the belief that oil will not run out.