Well, here we are again, a year older and another fabulous Bournemouth Writing Festival is well underway.

We’ve been a supporter of the festival since its inception three years ago. We love the vibe, we love the community for this community. We love the enthusiasm and we love the love.

Writers are a solitary bunch, so to get this many local writers together, learning from one another and having that free flow of information from inspirational person to inspirational person, well, the Bournemouth Writing Festival should bottle the joy it brings, it’s invaluable, especially in this odd world of ours.

And it's so addictive too. Buzzy even.

We started this year at the Old School House in Boscombe, where Kevin Bales from Tricuro Care and his team ran a very popular workshop for adults with additional needs.

A wonderful thing to see and a more heart-warming thing to photograph you’ll never find.

Then off to the Pavillon Dance South West right on the jolly old front (‘front of what’ Bill Bryson once asked), a few sold out sessions, just to get us warmed up, and they were very well received by the attendees.

A couple of lovely headshot session oh and I was told by a complete stranger, on retrieving some forgotten kit from my car parked in a reasonably priced car park, that ‘Jesus loves me’. As the car park was right at the very top of an annoyingly steep hill, I doubted it. Anyway, I thanked her and also told her that he loved everyone. To which she agreed.

I’m a humanist, so saying 'I loved him too' was a little too much for me, since you were wondering.

Then, as if by magic, the day had vanished, so only one thing left me thinks, off to Flirt for some super fun networking and lager.

Tomorrow? Well, that’ll be much more intense. Baily will be joining me to cover the next batch of 100 sessions the festival has to offer, and we have three students, Megan, Aysha and Poppy from Poole and Bournemouth College who are going to have a bash at this photography lark.

The silly fools.

Jon

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