Today was the day the A1GP crews stopped off in Regents Street - London to display their cars ahead of the A1GP race at Brands Hatch on Sunday. Despite the poor weather I managed to get a few shots of the cars and Pit Girls as they were lined up along the street.

A1GP Motorsport

A1GP Motorsport Pit Girl

A1GP Motorsport Car

More photos from the A1GP Pit Stop can be seen here

City of London Skyline - Greenwich Park, Greenwich

It’s not often you get the chance to sit back and relax while looking over the marvellous skyline of the City of London, and there certainly aren’t many places where you can see the whole thing all at once.

There is much debate about the historic London views that will be ‘ruined’ by Mayor Ken Livingston’s deregulation of the planning rules in the Capital, however, while the historic buildings are known the world over and are an important part of London and English Heritage in general, in my opinion people come to London to see Buckingham Palace and St Pauls Cathedral up close, not just look at it from a distance.

London, like every other city has changed over time, I’m sure the same was said about Canary Wharf back in the late 80’s when it was being constructed, but like it or not the need for more and more buildings and the limited amount of space available means that there are going to be trade-offs, a more developed skyline is one of them.

I’m looking forward to the new buildings, there should be a few good photographic opportunities.

Let’s face it, most of the people who attended this years MCN London Motorcycle show went for one reason - the girls. Sure we all pretend it was to see bikes, but most just wanted to see the girls wearing very little clothing….admit it.

In true event fashion it appears once again that I was in the right place at the right time and in one of the best places at that.

As soon as we arrived there was a must photograph event, the MCN Babes were coming on stage to introduce themselves before the competition to select an MCN London Motorcycle Babe 2008. Naturally nothing but 15cm from the stage would have been good enough - so that’s what we did. After it was time to take some photos of the bikes before taking the same position at the front of the stage to take more shots of the MCN Babes.

MCN Babe Winner and Runners up posing for a photoshoot

MCN Babes introducing themselves on stage

Motorcycle Model

Motorcycle Model

It pays to be in the right place at the right time. The rest of the photos I took can be found here

I’ve always questioned Jessops, their product range seems a bit limited and most of it can be bought elsewhere for a lot less than the price they charge. It’s always funny when the staff ask you if you need any help and you know that you probably know more about the product you’re looking at than they do.

For a while now Jessops has been going down the pan but they don’t seem to be doing much to stop it, they still aren’t competitive and they still seem to have incompetent staff, but what makes it even worse is when they manage to completely mess up things that are so simple.

I decided to buy a Manfrotto 728B Tripod, the places I found online were cheaper than Jessops but I decided to go with them anyway because it saved bothering with delivery etc - So I reserved it on the Jessops website and was told I could pick it up from the Kingston shop today (Sunday) between 11.00am and 5.00pm. Sunday came and I got a phone call - from none other than Jessops telling me that they didn’t have it in stock, and neither did any other store in the area - despite the fact that the website had let me order it and reserve it in store.

How can Jessops sell items and offer them for collection in store when they don’t actually exist in their inventory? Why does jessops.com let people buy things that aren’t in stock….It’s a joke.

No wonder why they’re going bust, they can’t get anything right.

2007….another year, another story…another chance to look back.

It’s hard to believe that another year has gone by, another 365 days have passed - each day bringing its own unique set of challenges. It has been one of those years where a lot has happened, yet nothing has happened at the same time - coming off the high of America it was difficult to accept that it was over - and still is.

Although I would like to point out the bad I won’t, because although the year wasn’t spent across the Atlantic it was still a better year than some - just not as good as the previous.

There are a few things that started in 2007 that will continue into 2008…the Kingston University Student Ambassador role being one of them, there are a few of them scheduled so far this year and I hope more will be in the ramp up to September. More photography sessions are being planned at different locations - probably some more air shows too.

The work placement is going ok as well, by mid this year i will have completed 12 months in the big ‘ol world – just one gruelling year to go until graduation.

Overall 2008 shouldn’t be that bad, it’s just a wait and see game.

Having used both Google and Live Search Webmaster Tools, it never ceases to amaze me how different each search engine can be, You just have to look at the screenshots below.

Live Search Ranking Results

Google Ranking Results

Google.com gives my main site (mylesnoton.com) a page ranking of low - Yet I seem to get a lot of traffic from a lot of different keywords where I am top / on the first page of results.

Live Search Ranks my site as having a high rank (5/5), yet I only get a few clicks from live.com searches.

Having said that, there is something that Live Search Webmaster tools has that Google Webmaster Tools does not - a keyword Performance Analyser. It shows you the current ranking of certain pages of your site based on a keyword you enter. Below are some of the results:

New York Keyword Ranking Results

Photography Keyword Ranking Results

North Carolina Keyword Ranking Results

It looks like my pages are ranked quite high for some of the keywords, the good thing is that now I know where I can improve.

NPL Fireworks Display, Teddington

The O2, London

The advantage of using three machines at once is that you achieve 300% more productivity than you do with a single machine with a single monitor…or at least that was my excuse.

Remote Desktop has its uses but nothing beats 3 screens to make yourself look busy

As most of you know, I have a few issues with Torbay Council, not only are they incompetent, but they are also stupid. That much should be apparent to anyone with a pair of eyes and an invalid minimum wage form. So I was naturally delighted when I read a news story which again throws light on Torbay Council’s failure of management.

This story was reported on BBC News:

A Devon council has become the first authority to be fined for not providing the right minimum wage information to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC).

Torbay Council was found guilty and told to pay £1,000 for failing to produce the correct records for workers in the parks and leisure departments.

First employee data, now minimum wage information, does anyone in the ‘council’ if that’s what you can call it actually have eyes? How can they make the same mistake? This can’t be the first time they have had to do it, and it sure won’t be the last so how can they mess it up so spectacularly?

Jane Kennedy, Minister for HMRC, said:

“The majority of UK employers are honest and responsible. Those who refuse to help with enquiries or to comply with the law could face criminal prosecution.”

Now, I’m reading between the lines here but that would make Torbay Council both dishonest and irresponsible as they themselves have faced criminal prosecution, am I right?

Ms Raikes, from the council, added: “I deeply regret the failure of the council to provide the information.

Unfortunately she stopped short of apologising for the council being a joke and a waste of space.

So there we have it, another reason Torbay Council should be reformed and the Management fired.