What a week (and a half for photos)

I always say that we get good luck and bad luck in equal measure and sometimes things go wrong with my photography which is not all down to me.

And sometimes I get lucky too. How on earth did we get two fantastic days for photos on Christmas Day and Boxing Day when the weather was so awful either side? But there were so many opportunities to put my stack of cameras into action from the warmth of a house or bar.

It started at the Cave Reunion Christmas Party night at the Villa Marina when we met a few friends on the Friday before Christmas.

And continued the next evening at Mike Byrne's 70s disco at the Woodbourne Hotel. Marian and Graham Young had gained a lot of hair since I had last seen them!

We went to a private party on Christmas Eve and I got nearly as many good photos of friends as I had glasses of red wine - and that was quite a few. Although I promised not to share the photos in public, I don't see why the same rules should apply to the one taken of us.

I didn't feel like pushing it on Christmas morning but I took my compact camera with me for a run along the promenade and around Douglas Head.

I had, literally, been running late and within an hour I had collected Robbie and we went for a walk around the quay and the promenade before picking up Marie's mother (not literally this time) from the Ellan Vannin Home, into which she had moved the week before.

Our Christmas lunch photo turned into a definitive family image - except that I am not in it! We were so pleased that Mollie was able to join us in her 90th year and Robbie had bis best Christmas for some time. Jenny and Ben had a couple of days off from their work as junior doctors at Nobles Hospital and stayed in the apartment. Even Marie's dog, Alfie, gets into the photo.

We left Mollie and Alfie behind as we headed for South Barrule and gate-crashed Noel Cringle's annual Christmas walk. I even got Scottish Under 21 international rugby player, Phil Cringle, to take the photo.

I was really nervous about the photos at Manx Harriers' SCS Boxing Day Relay at Stewart Clague's Ballannette Park - the photo opportunities were beyond belief. This one is of international cyclist, and also a former Northern 10 mile winner, Christian Varley. Some of the family "hand me downs" changed hands when he was little when Marie worked with Christian's mother Mary, from an office in our old house, for a time.

And here another photo from Ballannette with someone who has visited our current house plenty of times, Ben's long term friend Adam Killip, now an advocate, with the Laxey and Maughold backdrop.

It was virtually a stay indoors day the following day but we did have a visit from Andy Garrett, home from his role as Doctor of Sports Science at Hull University.

I've been promising Robbie a walk up Greeba Mountain on Saturday for a while but although the winds had dropped a little this Saturday was not the day for that. So we headed for Langness.

Having done a 12 mile run a 7 am and a walk with Robbie before lunch I was suitably handicapped by the time Marie had completed all her tasks and was also keen to get out in the open air. A fantastic walk from Port Erin around the coast to Fleshwick and back, mainly on the roads but including a track on which I had never been before, followed.

This afternoon we had the Eairy Beg Plantation at Glen Helen to ourselves, apart from Alfie, but we didn't quite make the summit of Beary Mountain, which I had rehearsed twice recently with Robbie, as Marie's foot was too sore.

I've sorted out loads of miscellaneous photos from my cameras, charged the video camera batteries ready for the New Years Day Fell Race at St Johns, produced a video from Boxing Day and, camera wise, I'm ready for New Year's Eve, New Year's Day and my first trip off Island for more than six months from Thursday to Sunday.