As 2018 draws to a close, I take the time to look at the past year. As usual, I look at the photos that I’ve taken and frame my thoughts around them.

January

I started the year with ongoing efforts to reduce the pain in my joints and then visited America for CodeMash in Ohio. This was my second consecutive year speaking at CodeMash and I really enjoyed it. As I was in the US, I popped in to see my family in South Carolina which experienced really cold weather for the few days that I was there! I also spoke at LeedsPHP user group and got my first set of reading glasses as I’m no longer as young as I once was…

February

February was a conference-heavy month. We had our annual trip to FOSDEM and then I spoke at Sunshine PHP where I also spent a day at Miami Beach with Michael. I also spoke at PHPUK in London.

March

It snowed in March, so I took photos of trains in the snow! I also attended Seiden Group’s CIO Summit in Dallas & GrumpyCon in Canada. While in Canada, I popped in and saw my family who live nearby in London, ON.

April

In April, I spoke at PHP Yorkshire and popped into the NRM while I was up in York. My youngest practiced for his Duke Of Edinburgh Bronze trip & in contrast to the snow in March, we ate ice cream in April. I also attended Tech Edge in Leeds where Kevin was speaking – not a common event!

May

I started thinking about a product idea with Stuart Herbert in May. I also received a Lineside Photographic pass for the SVR and took my favourite railway photo of the year. It even won approval from my wife as it has horses in it!

June

In June, I spoke at Laravel Live UK and Romania PHP in Cluj. I particularly enjoyed the tour of Cluj the day after the conference . I also got out my old Minolta X-300 film camera and put a roll of black and white film in it. Didn’t get the pictures back until December though!

July

JeffConf was renamed Serverless Days and I spoke at the London event where I met a couple of the OpenWhisk contributors. I was also in London for Coed:Ethics: a conference on ethics for developers and technologists. On the last day of July, I was delighted to speak at the inaugural PHP South Wales. July was also the month of the family get-together which is always fun, though the younger generation spent more time watching the World Cup!

August

This year, we went to Disney World, Florida and also visited Kennedy Space Centre! Fantastic holiday, although I needed another holiday to get over it… We also followed the Worcester Giraffe Trail, a temporary art installation in our home town which was lots of fun.

September

We visited the South Coast and saw the pebble beaches when visiting our family in September. I also took photos of big engines at the SVR Autumn Gala and tried my hand at action photography.

October

In the autumn, I visited various universities around the country with my eldest. The SVR held the Fiftis at Fifty event to celebrate 50 years of the introduction of the Class 50 diesel locomotive onto the UK railways, I took this opportunity to attend my first private railway photoshoot and intend to do more. The Hackference conference was up the road in Birmingham this month and my eldest passed his driving test, which drastically increased the cost of our car insurance!

November

My memories of Bonfire Night this year revolve around very sticky marshmallow covered hands! It was a busy month for travel as the following day, I flew to California to work with a client with Roave. Upon landing back in the UK, I spoke at Serverless Computing London and then a week later at TopConf in Tallinn. While in Tallinn, we took the opportunity to catch up with friends.

December

December saw the PHPSW Christmas social where there were Lego robots. We also met up with our online gaming friends in Croydon as usual and Christmas was notable for some rather awesome jumpers. At the very end of the year, I borrowed a Fujifilm X-T10 camera from a friend to see how I get on with its ergonomics. Of course, I took some more railway pictures!

It’s very easy for me to forget what happened during the year, which is why I take photos. Here’s to 2019!

Another year has passed which gives me an excuse to to reflect on what’s happened. As usual, I look at the photos that I’ve taken and frame my thoughts around them.

January

I started the year with one of my favourite pictures of the kids. I also spoke at CodeMash in Ohio. This was a new conference to me and I knew no-one there. Fortunately, I was introduced to Mo, so had at least one person to talk to! She also introduced me to more people :)

February

We had our annual trip to FOSDEM in February. It was also quite windy.

March

My Nintendo Switch arrived in March! Great console, I’m still loving it. I also visited the North Yorkshire Moors Railway to see Royal Scott.

April

In April, we celebrated my parent’s 50th wedding anniversary & my sister ran the London Marathon! Conference-wise, I spoke at the inaugural PHP Yorkshire conference and also spoke at Craft conference; both great events.

May

May is the month of birthdays in our household. I went to Turkey for PHPKonf and then to Serbia for PHPSerbia.

June

I was really happy to speak at the Lead Developer conference in June and then immediately afterwards spoke at PHP South Coast, filling in for a speaker that couldn’t make it.

July

July started with DPC and I also attended the inaugural JeffConf.

August

We were on holiday in August and I also saw a Land Rover on wheels at the Severn Valley Railway.

September

As is becoming a tradition, we started September with a family gathering where we discovered that my youngest cousins once removed have gained personalities! I reorganised my office so my desk was no longer in the afternoon sunshine. At the end of the month, conference season started up again when I spoke at APIDays in Zurich and then CodeTalks in Hamburg.

October

We visited our friends in Tallinn, Estonia in October; it’s cold there, but a lovely city! I photographed steam trains twice in October, visting the KVWR in Yorkshire and taking my favourite railway photos of the year in Worcestershire: Royal Scot on the mainline.

November

November is Fireworks Night in the UK which we celebrated with friends. Again, we contributed wood for the bonfire and also delivered wood from Kevin as I visited with my car a few weeks earlier. I spoke at muCon in London and attended CodeMotion in Milan.

December

December saw me geeking out about cameras at the local Beers & Cameras meetup. My friend Alex visited the UK from New Zealand, so I was especially happy to get to see her too. We also found time to get down to the annual get together with our online gaming friends in a pub in Croydon which is now into its 17th year.

All in all, a great year and I’m looking forward to 2018.

I’m proud to be a part of the European Union, a group of countries creating something bigger than the sum of the individual nations.

Today, all I feel is a sense of loss.

It’s that time of year again where we look back at what happened over the past 12 months. Obviously this is mostly an excuse for me to look at the photos I’ve taken over the year and share some of them as I’ve done previously.

January

At the very end of January I visited Phoenix, Arizona to see Evan, Priscilla & other friends. I also attended FOSDEM again and spent a tourist day in Brussels.

February

I was fortunate enough to speak at PHPUK again in February.

March

The highlight of March was visiting the NYMR to see Flying Scotsman.

April

In April, my eldest drove a Lamborghini and now intends to buy one! It’s important to be able to dream when you’re 14. I also visited the NRM.

May

May is the month of birthdays in our household. I also attended the StatusCode event in Nottingham

June

Two conferences in June. I spoke at PHP South Coast and took my favourite photo of Andrew Smith ever! I also attended Lead Developer.

July

July was the inaugural UK edition of REST Fest in Edinburgh. We also went on holiday where I attempted sunrise photos and ate lots of ice cream.

August

Worcester Comic Con happened in August where we got to meet “our” Doctor! Unfortunately this was also the month when my dad was taken ill.

September

September was about family and friends with an extended family gathering and a trip to Leeds to see friends. Dad was transferred to a closer hospital too and started to get better. September was also the start of conference madness that lastest to November, with a trip to Dublin for DrupalCon.

October

October was the month of conferences when I spoke at PHPNW in Manchester, attended OSCON Europe and spoke at the Software Architecture conference, both in London! The other welcome news this month was that Dad came out of hospital.

November

November is Fireworks Night in the UK which we celebrated with friends. This year, we contributed wood for the bonfire as we’ve been tiding our garden. I also spoke at Velocity in Amsterdam as did my friend Kevin.

December

As usual, the final month of the year found me in a pub with some of my oldest Internet friend from our MMORPG gaming group that I’ve been part of since 1999. I visited Northern Ireland for the first time. Family from America also visited; I haven’t seen my cousin Leigh in 28 years and so had not met her husband or children, so this was very much a highlight.

All in all a good year, though I will try and space out my conferences a little better in 2017!

In 2015 I again managed to take at least one photo every day!

All the photos are on Flickr and I’m quite happy with them. As with previous years there were a good number of days when I didn’t think about it until late in the day and the photo is almost a “throw away” as a result, just to keep the habit up.

I see no reason to stop the habit, so intend to take at least 366 photos this year too!

It’s that time of year again where we look back at what happened over the past 12 months. Obviously this is mostly an excuse for me to look at the photos I’ve taken over the year and share some of them as I’ve done previously.

I attended a lot of conferences this year, though one thing that was different this year was that I attended more than I spoke at. I also spoke at a lot of user groups which was lots of fun.

January

At the very end of January I went to FOSDEM and for the first time ever, I was accompanied by my wife who is currently studying for a degree in computing.

February

I spoke at the PHPUK conference in February and have some good memories from this event.

March

I stepping into the unknown in March and attended a WordCamp! It was a good experience and I got a new scarf!

April

In April, my friend Alex visited from the Antipodes so I went up to Leeds to meet up with her and other friends. I discovered Fluxx the board game last year when at OSCON, and this was the time that I first played Fluxx the card game. I also visited Glasgow to speak at the PHP user group which was a bit of trek, so I took a couple of days off and photographed railways in the North of England while I was up that way.

May

May is the month of birthdays in our household. We visited the Happy Potter studios in Leavesden to celebrate! I also visited Belgrade, Serbia to speak at SOLIDday.

June

Seeing friends was the highlights of June.

July

July was the inaugural PHP South Coast conference and the first time that 19FT has sponsored a conference. Very well organised first event and I’m looking forward to the 2016 edition.

August

August is all about holiday! While in Spain this year, I tried to take a good sunrise picture.

September

In one trip, I spoke at PHP Hampshire in Portsmouth and then attended the Lead Developer conference in London. Lead Developer was different type of conference and I’m going to be attending again this year.

October

October was the month of two fantastic conferences when I spoke at PHPNW in Manchester and attended OSCON Europe in Amsterdam! The hackathon at PHPNW particularly notable for joind.in as we received many pull requests! I also met my cousin’s new twin daughters which was another highlight of a very enjoyable month.

November

November is Fireworks Night in the UK which we celebrated with friends. I also went to Washington for the php[world] conference. It’s always good see boundaries between different PHP communities being broken down.

December

The final month of the year found me in a pub with some of my oldest Internet friends: We’ve been playing MMOPRGs since 1999 and are suitably irreverent around each other! I also spoke at the first meeting of the PHPMiNDS user group in Nottingham and we released Slim Framework 3!

Looking back, I have had a really good 2015 and have some very fond memories; Let’s see what 2016 brings!

2014 is coming to an end, so as usual, let’s look back at the year as highlighted by the photos that I’ve taken. This year, I took at least one photo every day, so there’s been plenty for me to choose from!

January

As usual, there was flooding in Worcester, but clearly the biggest personal event of the month was breaking my elbow while skateboarding with my son at the end of the month. This clearly impacted my business for February and March as I could barely type for a good six or so weeks.

February

My wife and I celebrated her birthday in Barcelona and we discovered Licor 43!

March

A quiet month where my cast was removed. I also attended the PHPNE 14 conference in Newcastle.

April

In April, we went to the Insomnia Gaming Festival where the kids got to test out new games. We also sold our caravan.

May

May is a month of birthdays as both kids and myself celebrate.

June

The highlights of June were watching Great Britain play Belgium at basketball (and win!) and attending DPC.

July

I was very pleased to speak at OSCON in Portland! It’s an amazing conference and I would very much like to go to the European edition in Amsterdam next year.

August

In August, I went on holiday with my family and, at the end of the month, we celebrated my cousin’s marriage.

September

I attended and presented at the inaugural Endpoint conference where I learned much from Ben Longden. I also attended the Hackference conference day which was filled with interesting content.

October

By October, I was heavily into conference season and presented at both PHPNW and ZendCon. Sandwiched between them, I also attended the All Your Base conference. This month, we also bought our own squat rack and cancelled our gym membership.

November

I was privileged to be be invited to speak at PHP Argentina! An very well organised conference with a number of well known community people that I was delighted to meet and spend time with. How can you not love a conference where there are deck chairs in the hallway track? I also attended PHPEM’s unconference; It turns out that I have opinions on how to give a good talk too! This was a good event and I hope they hold it again next year.

December

My eldest son finished building his remote control car kit this month. This was a great project and very enjoyable. At the close of the year, I bought a new camera, so I expect that I’ll be taking lots of photos next year too!

I’m looking forward to 2015!

As 2013 finishes, I continue my tradition of showing off some photos that recap my year. Last year I discovered that I didn’t take many photos at all, so this year I’ve published at least one photo every day! A lot of them were rubbish, but a good number are shots that I’m very pleased with.

January

It rained in January. I liked this picture of Worcester racecourse:

January also saw me visiting Belgium for the PHPBenelux conference, where I took a very good picture of Chris Hartjes:

February

February was a quiet month, with the highlight of visiting our friend in Swansea. There was also a history event in Worcester which the kids enjoyed:

March

We had snow in March which seemed a little late in the year. Also, Tornado came to Worcester, so I got a photo!

April

I started Nineteen Feet in April. This was the month when creating paper models of Minecraft items became a thing in our household:

May

in May, I returned to the excellent php[tek] conference where we celebrated Liam’s birthday:

June

By June I realised that I really need a desk as I was now working full time at home!

July

The highlight of this month was a trip to the National Railway Museum in York to take photos of some A4s:

August

In August, we go on holiday and this year we went to Devon. It was surprisingly warm who was nice. The highlight was a trip to the aquarium, but I also got to go on a train!

September

September was the start of a busy traveling time for me. In September, I went to pfCongres followed by a trip to Colombia to consult for a client. I particularly liked Michelle’s talk on open source:

October

In October, I spoke at the fantastic PHPNW conference. During the hackathon the new version of joind.in’s Android app was released by Rich. The talks were really good as usual and I was not the only one who paid attention in Ross’ talk on models:

November

I went to two conferences in Novemeber: CodeConnexx and ZendCon Europe where I got my hands on a Red Elephpant!

December

I visited Colombia for a followup visit with my client which was great fun. The team introduced me to Aguardiente:

My company also did well enough to allow me to purchase a new retina MacBook Pro and monitor which arrived in the last few days to round off a very good year!

As another year draws to a close, I continue my tradition of showing off some photos that recap our year.

January

January 2012 was a quiet month. I released Daily Jotter 1.3 and started using Sublime Text as my editor of choice for programming. Photographically, the highlight of the month was the Worcester Flickr Group’s scavenger hunt.

February

It snowed in Feburary and I started publishing articles on ZF2. Again, a Worcester Flickr Group outing to the Panorama Tower, Croome D’abitot in Worcestershire provided the only interesting photographs that I took all month.

March

I was very much into Instagram and didn’t take any photos with my DSLR this month!

April

In April, I went to the inaugural Whisky Web conference as an attendee, which was fun, especially as Josh used one of my photos in his keynote.

May

Both sons have their birthdays in May and a big family get together were the highlights of my May.

June

Nick and Kerry were married this month.

July

A quiet month. I visited the PHPNW user group to see Jenni’s first talk.

August

In August we went to the Isle of Wight on holiday and I managed to visit the steam railway.

September

Eldest’s first day at high school!

October

October saw me speak at both the PHPNW and ZendCon conferences. I gave a tutorial with Evan Coury at both events which seem to be appreciated by the attendees.

Whilst in California, I managed to take a photo of the Golden Gate bridge.

November

After the busyness of October’s travel, I had a quiet month in Worcester. I also got some Toyella business cards!

December

Last month of the year and the last month that my company’s offices were in Birmingham as we moved to Worcester for the start for 2013. There was also a lot of rain!

All in all, another pretty good year. Next year, I intend to take more photos with my DSLR though.

As I did last year, I thought I’d continue my tradition of showing off some photos that recap our year.

January

PHPBNL 2011 happened in January. Also, my Mac OS X application, Daily Jotter was released onto the Mac App Store.

February

The first PHPucEU happened in Manchester which was great fun and, of course, the PHPUK conference in London. The biggest news for us though, was that we moved house in February!

March

I went to Canada for the rather excellent Confoo conference and watched a snowball fight!

April

A relaxed month after 3 months of conferences and a house move. There was a Royal wedding in the UK which resulted in a lot of merchandising!

May

May was the busiest month ever. Both sons have their birthdays in May and DPC in Amsterdam and php|tek in Chicago are back to back conferences! So many good photographs this month, but I have gone with this one of Jeremy Kendall as he took many excellent photographs at tek!

June

Our trip to the zoo this year was in June when we went to Twycross Zoo.

July

We went to the beach in July.

August

In August we went to the Fleet Air Arm Museum.

September

Jon achieved his Grade 1 classical guitar certification this month.

We also went to a friend’s wedding.

October

October saw the very excellent PHPNW conference return for its forth year and I was very glad to be asked to do a ZF2 tutorial which seemed to go well.

November

November was the month that John Arnold held his creativityex project. I particularly liked my effort for negative space:

December

Last month of the year and as part of the Worcester Flickr group, I got to take a photograph in a studio!

All in all, a pretty good year. One interesting thing I did notice was that I have a lot more good photos sitting in Aperture than I published. I think this is because Aperture is so slow to use on my old Macbook Pro. I was better at publishing photos with Capture NX2 and I thought that was slow; Clearly it wasn’t that bad!