I have to admit that the first way I showed you to increase your all-important UK list was a bit over-technical. Actually, it was dead boring. This one is much more practical.And entertaining, if you like watching the suffering of others. It's based on the Tax and Welfare Systems ... you are awarded points for various reasons ..... for a start, having children gets you points. Well, I've got 2 children ..... and there's absolutely no doubt whatsoever that they've had a deleterious effect on my UK list. Oh yes. Absolutely disastrous actually. CALAMITOUS A BLOODY SHAMBLES Not only that ... they're twins. Oh no !! And what's more ... we didn't know they were going to be twins until they actually appeared. Double Oh No !!! I think I should get points for that. Lots of points. That's worth at least 5 ticks a year..... maybe more ..... I'll be fair, and say that it would only last until they were ,say, 21 or so. That's 105 extra birds on my UK list. Woo ! R'arglwyd ! Jings !! Maldita sea ! But, you might ask ..how did they have this drastic effect ? Let me count the ways ... I hardly dare think about the 1000's of hours spent trundling them around in prams, push-chairs, cars, buses, trains etc. You can't get much birding done that way. For a start, their interminable screaming buggers up any chance of flyover migrants getting picked up, and you can't fit your bloody telescope into a pram, especially with two of them in it. And when you pick them up, they're always sick all over you... and even better, if you carry them in one of those back-pack things, they're sick all down your back. Sometimes they do it shops... oh yes. These things stick in the memory ... and to your back. I reckon I should get at least 20 ticks for all that. Then there's all the extra work ... I've calculated that I've changed about ... hold on .... 5 x 365 x 4 x 2 = 14600 nappies in my life ..... and at a conservative 10 minutes each, that's 2433.3 recurring hours = 101 and-a-bit days. That's a lot of days. It must be worth 10 ticks at least. And of course there's all the ferrying about when they're older .... every blasted holiday when my kids were at university, I had to spend 4 days bringing them home and taking them back. Over 3 years ( more actually) and three sets of holidays a year that's 36 more days. That's 10 ticks. Maybe more. Plus all those trips to the doctor, to hospital, parent's bloody evenings ... grrrr. My son had a special propensity for buggering up our holidays by getting injured on the 1st day. He broke his toe on the first day of one of them, and his wrist on the first day of another one. The first bloody day !!!!!! That was my "notional" free day to go birding." Not any more it wasn't. I was going to twitch a Lesser Grey Shrike. That went straight down the tubes. And I've never seen one since. Ouch, Aaaaargh and Bugger. I reckon that's 1 tick each for those. Yes ! And then there's the drain on our meagre incomes. They reckon that bringing up even one measly child costs oodles of cash ... so I got 2 x oodles = well, I reckon with all that extra money I could have jetted around the UK and racked up at least 20 more ticks. Plus ... if I'd had that money , think of all the huge telescopes I could have bought ..... and the fortnight-long holidays on Scilly and Fair Isle and ,er, other places. With a really big telescope, think of the stuff I could have spotted. Oh, the agony ! I've still not recovered. And nor has The Significant Otter Personally, I blame her for the entire thing.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
|