Stock pix...

Looking for twenty more image sales before the end of the month, if I am to beat last year’s total. However, even with a flurry of sales, total revenue will be down by a few percentage points. It’s not that the market for stock photography is contracting. Quite the opposite, in fact. But the supply of imagery is outstripping demand… with predictable results. Everyone's a photographer these days.

Licensed today: The Bear pub in Crickhowell...

Fallon Sherrock...

Darts isn’t really my game. It should be; I’ve certainly practised enough, over the years. But I’m still rubbish…

The PDC World Championships are currently in progress at Lakeside: an event which wouldn’t normally engage my attention. But this year’s a bit different. In beating Ted Evetts 3-2 last week, Fallon Sherrock became the first woman to win a match in the competition. And she repeated the feat yesterday by beating the 11th seed, Mensur Suljovic.

Having watched the highlights of her matches on YouTube, I can see that her victories were no fluke. She’s only 25; can she become the first female world champion?

Ted Evetts shouldn’t worry. Whatever he accomplishes in darts, he's already written his name in the record books!

Licensed last week: boats for sale...

Shovel...

Bought a small coal shovel today. At this time of year you have to take your pleasures where you find them. The shovel is great. It doesn’t need batteries, or a power cable, or an instruction manual. It won’t need upgrading. I won’t have to go online to register it, or download a patch to resolve some software issue.

Licensed today: the rather splendid interior of All Saints church, Northampton...

Tan Hill...

Licensed this shot today. The Tan Hill Inn is, at 1,732 feet, the highest pub in Britain (not the “tallest pub”, which is what a couple of American tourists insisted they were looking for, when, years ago, they asked me for directions)…

Pontification...

More than twenty years after the Catholic Church was first engulfed in the scandal of clerical child abuse, the Vatican has finally decided to abolish the rule of pontifical secrecy.

The Catholic Church has traditionally seen itself as above the law, protected by a wall of silence. Because of the secrecy rule, church officials were not obliged to share information with either state authorities or the victims of sexual abuse. Instead of being reported to the police, abusive priests were more likely to be moved from one parish to another, where, of course, their offending behaviour could continue unchecked (and, worse, with new victims). Those who suffered at the hands of paedophile priests were treated by the church more like perpetrators than victims. The church imposed on them the obligation of silence, in the hope that the problem would just go away.

I can’t bring myself to celebrate this apparent change of heart by the Catholic Church; the Pope only abandoned the rule of secrecy because no other course of action was available. The church has consistently put its own reputation before the welfare of victims. Instead of abandoning the rules on pontifical secrecy, the Pope should be begging for forgiveness.

Questions remain. Predatory priests seem remarkably unconcerned about the posthumous destinations of their own immortal souls. Don’t they believe in heaven and hell… and, if not, why not? Or do they know that their entire religious project is nothing more than a cynical sham?

Another twilight shot: The Sun Inn, in Kirkby Lonsdale, taken exactly five years ago and licensed today...

X-ray...

Went for an X-ray on my knee today at Goole Hospital. The nurse looked askance at my facial tattoo - which features the sinking of the Belgrano and the taking of Goose Green - and told me to remove all my piercings. That’s twenty minutes I’ll never get back.

Licensed today: the railway station at Letchworth Garden City...

Leek...

Licensed today: a shot of Leek at twilight...