It's weird to review photos of the time covering a blog post. I could have sworn we'd led a pretty quiet life, hunkering down at home in the early part of this year, enjoying the summer months, having regular catchups and dinners with Valerie, visiting mum in her home or in various hospital stays and generally leading a very simple existence. I suppose I don't think to document the regular day to day happenings as much as I did in Taipei: that relentless weekly pressure of blog posting had me photographing anything of questionable interest!
We did have irregular catchups with friends and family (apart from our mums) in this time, as evidenced by the selection of shots above. We also attended the much vaunted farewell show of Elton John held right here at our own football stadium. It was a real blast for us as we remembered our last EJ concert in a Taipei soccer stadium. The Taipei one was notable for "Rocket Man" booming out and nearly being drowned out by a low flying jet making a final approach to the city airport just beyond the stadium. This one had no such drama, but somehow, I suspect through modern sound technology and excellent musicians and backup singers, Elton put on a better show 18 years later!
That's a neat segue to Jeremy Oxley from the Sunnyboys performing at miraculous levels in his own recent farewell tour. We snapped up tickets, yet held no great expectations for the aging rockers' performance especially considering Oxley's well publicised battles with mental health. They dazzled with hit after hit with the aplomb and energy they displayed 40 years ago...it was quite the show!
Various birthdays, anniversaries and dinners out were celebrated and we had Christmas at Jen's as well as Boxing Day at our place. We'd long planned and booked an exotic holiday to the Middle East for the entire month of March, so travel-wise we were essentially marking time until then. Covid restrictions were nearly all extinguished and we felt relatively safe venturing out. In saying that, I'd convinced Cassy to break out of our comfort zone and go to places that were not on our usual itineraries (to put it mildly!)
So Egypt, Jordan, Israel and Turkey here we come: I'm going to do a separate post for each country!