I CAN’T be the only one who imagines a glittering and magnificently successful career doing something completely different in the future.

The realisation of a childhood dream perhaps or maybe just a total change of tack that is rewarded by worldwide adulation.

Even the passing of years and the advancement of age hasn’t managed to diminish the hope, nay the expectation that I will soon be crowned world snooker champion or appointed poet laureate at some, admittedly unspecified, time in the future.

At the careers advice lesson we had, such as it was, at Watford Grammar School in 1978 I put down as my three preferred job options 1. Cosmonaut 2. Triple Jumper 3. Bullfighter. I could be accused of perhaps not taking the exercise seriously.

However, out of curiosity, I took the quiz for government retraining that has recently been made available to see what my options were.

Having genuinely filled in all the prompts with my truthful answers it appears that, should I wish to, I could look forward to a fulfilling career as a stuntman. Incredible really. I’d never given the option any consideration until it pinged up on my screen. Now I’m already planning the simple switch.

Monty Python featured something similar in a sketch where accountant Herbert Anchovy asked if he could become a lion tamer. His qualifications were, that he had a hat. With lion tamer written on it. When he realised that what he thought were lions were in fact ant eaters, he chose to make the move more gradually. Through banking or insurance.

Among us mere mortals though there are actually those who, massively annoyingly, appear to be supremely gifted in more than one sphere. You’d think just being a brilliant novelist or some such thing would be enough wouldn’t you, but no. In looking for an Italian poem to read as part of my daily poetry project, I discovered that the painter of the Sistine chapel Michelangelo, no less, was also a very gifted poet.

Where is the fairness in that? When the good lord was dishing out talent you might have thought he’d been rather generous in the slice of cake he’d already given him as a painter, but to heap on his plate another ample portion for writing and poetry... ? It seems a bit greedy to me. No wonder he did such a nice painting of him.

Ditto our local Colcestrian Mr Dan Sceats. Now some might argue that placing young Mr Sceats in the same bracket as Michelangelo is, maybe, somewhat of a leap. But to those doubters I simply say think again, gentle readers, think again.

Most of us know Dan as a supremely gifted drummer from a large number of great bands including of course the reliably raucous Salt Dog. Placed behind the traps he is a blur of wizardry setting the beat and raising the pulse of all who witnessed him in action. In hushed tones we whisper his greatness to be akin to that Taj Mahal of the drumming universe… Cozy Powell.

And now we find out that this colossus of rhythm turns out to be a magnificent photographer as well. Where’s the justice in that? His eye for composition and colour behind the lens are an absolute delight. His rendering of local scenes vividly captures the detail of his subject yet also offers a sense of ancient ritual and mystery.

As a source of comfort to the rest of us, I can reveal, after extensive further investigation into the phenomena of these multi talented individuals that to my certain knowledge, Michelangelo was an absolutely rubbish drummer. And as for Cozy Powell’s poetry…..

Dan Sceats’ website is dansceatsphotography.co.uk