We decided to play " Bird Scrabble" last night ....we're mad us .... the idea is, you can do ordinary words in the usual way, but any bird you make gets a 20-point bonus ! Well, this time it went amazingly well !! Now you might think ... hold on ...how could they get Starling on the first go. Well ..we didn't. The Significant Otter did "Star" as her first go, and then jammy old me stuck LING on the end of it to get Starling !! Hah !! And, for the first time ever, every "go" after that was a bird. On the way, a few other words were made as a side-effect ... he, on, ya. But that's OK. And we got 17 species altogether. We've never got anywhere near that before. I mean, what are the odds ?? The S.O. didn't know about Willets and Serins ...but she did get Hobby. She could hardly forget that, because we once had a big argument when I spotted one low in a tree as she was driving along a Norfolk road, and she wouldn't stop ! Pa! Jings !! Crivens !!! R'Arglwyd !!!! But that game got me thinking. What's the most birds on the UK list you can get in a real Scrabble game, if luck is with you ? Can you beat 17 ? Surely it's do-able. Just look at all the letters we had left over at that point .... we did go on to complete the game, but we didn't get any more birds. By the way, we don't allow plurals to count as well, and some of you might have noticed we could have made DOVE onto the E of Smew ... but we don't allow generic bird names like Tit/Finch/DoveThrush/Gull/Warbler etc. Swift just scrapes into allowability .... just. That's why we couldn't/didn't make the available RAIL either. Too generic. Can you spot where it could go ? Dodo and Rhea were available ... but there's no extinct birds allowed either. You can have them... but no bonus. So .... can you create a feasible Scrabble game and get › 17 different species ? After all .. a dark, probably cold and wet weekend is looming. Unless you live in the Softy South. So .. the music. " I don't want to stay well-behaved" is a literal translation. The "paroles" are a bit creepy actually ...
Le mal est entré meilleur ennemi Il sait m'abandonner Me ramener près de lui Je n'veux pas rester sage J'aime le souffre et l'envie Abuser de mon âge Je n'veux pas rester sage Le mal est ma lueur Son ombre est ma couleur Le mal est ma lueur Mon parfum son odeur Prend ton mal en douceur. Le mal est entré Et je sais qu'il détruit Qu'il pourrait me faire crever Que reste-t-il ici? Je n'veux pas rester sage J'aime le souffre et l'envie Abuser de mon âge Je n'veux pas rester sage Le mal est ma lueur Son ombre est ma couleur Le mal est ma lueur Mon parfum son odeur Prend ton mal en douceur Prend ton mal en douceur Prend ton mal en douceur Le mal est entré Meilleur ennemi Il sait m'abandonner Je brûlerais avec lui Le mal est ma lueur Son ombre est ma couleur Le mal est ma lueur Mon parfum son odeur Le mal est ma lueur Son ombre est ma couleur Le mal est ma lueur Mon parfum son odeur Le mal est ma lueur Son ombre est ma lueur Le mal est ma lueur
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Some of my more memorable Norfolk holidays have involved plagues. Genuine, impressive, amazing plagues. But of what ? The worst ones were greenflies. We got those in two separate years. So immense were the numbers of the little beggars , even in big shops like Woolworth's in Cromer (that dates me a bit ) there were huge numbers infesting the air. Lots had bought those little portable rotary fan things to keep them away from their faces, and visibility was terrible. Even in the open everyone was covered in them. And then, of course, car windscreens got plastered with them too . Even more impressive were the huge heaps of dead greenflies on the beaches. The insects were piled up for miles along the tideline, at least a foot high and the same width. ... an amazing and sad sight. Who knows how many millions/billions of them there must have been. The birds did quite well out of it all.... heaps of easy-meal-opportunities. It was all very biblical ! But not so drastic. There have been attempts to explain the sequencing of those biblical plagues .. here's how they reckon the first three came about, and why.... Blood To unleash the first plague upon the Egyptians, Moses struck the river Nile with his staff, turning its waters to blood. At the same time, his brother Aaron performed an identical transformation in the canals, tributaries, ponds and pools throughout Egypt. After the water turned to blood, "the fish in the Nile died, and the Nile stank, so that the Egyptians could not drink water," according to the Bible, Exodus chapter 7, verse 21, English Standard version. The sudden appearance of red-hued waters in the Nile could have been caused by a red algae bloom, which appears when certain conditions enable a type of microscopic algae to reproduce in such great numbers that the waters they live in appear to be stained a bloody red. This phenomenon is known as "red tide" when it happens in oceans, but red algae are also well-represented in freshwater ecosystems. And these algae blooms can certainly be harmful to wildlife, as the algae contain a toxin that can accumulate in shellfish and poison the animals that feed on them. Fumes from densely-concentrated algae blooms can also disperse toxins in the air, causing breathing problems in people that live nearby. Frogs What do you do next, after turning a nation's water supply into blood? If you're following Moses' playbook, you inundate them with frogs. For the second plague, Moses allegedly conjured vast quantities of frogs that swarmed into people's homes — even finding their way into the Egyptians' beds, ovens and cookware. As it happens, the phenomenon of "raining frogs" has been reported multiple times throughout history and in a range of locations around the world. A report published July 12, 1873 in Scientific American described "a shower of frogs which darkened the air and covered the ground for a long distance," following a recent rainstorm. The account was one of dozens of similar anecdotes collected in "The Book of the Damned" (1919), though its somewhat skeptical author suggested that the frogs may have simply dropped from trees. And in May 2010 in Greece, thousands of frogs emerged from a lake in the northern part of the country, likely in search of food, and disrupted traffic for days, CBS News reported. Lice The third plague, lice, could mean either lice, fleas or gnats based on the Hebrew word (Keenim). If a toxic algal bloom led to the first plague, and a pile of dead frogs followed, it's not surprising that a swarm of insects of some sort would have followed. That's because frogs typically eat insects; without them, the fly population could have exploded, Stephan Pflugmacher, a climatologist Leibniz Institute for Water Ecology and Inland Fisheries in Berlin, said in a television special about the plagues that aired on the National Geographic Channel in 2010. Interestingly, both body lice and fleas can theoretically transmit the bacteria Yersinia pestis, which causes bubonic plague, according to a 2010 study published in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases. If so, then an infestation with lice could have set the stage for the later plagues, such as boils, a 2008 review of plague science found. Scientists have also argued that the sickness that killed the beasts of the field for Egyptians in later plagues might have been Bluetongue or African horse sickness, both of which can be spread by insects from this plague, according to a 2008 Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine. If you want more, and who doesn't, look up The Science of the Ten Biblical Plagues. But it does seem that there was no "magic" or "mystery" to the sequencing of those plagues. What a surprise ! Science 10 Superstitious Nonsense 0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What could be a relevant song ? Well, there might have been a plague of Robber-flies .... there are such things ... That's a Palmchat that is ... surely an ideal name for a mobile phone. It looks very confident does it not. Important. Imperious. Maybe it's just lonely . Moving on ....... Here's a thing ...well... several things ... Emu Whale-Headed Stork Secretary Bird Cagu Swallow-Tanager Palmchat Plush-capped Finch Sharpbill Courol Oilbird Crab-Plover So ... what is unique about them ? What do they have in common ? Ha ! ..you're all thinking ... isn't he going to ramble on meanderingly for 7½ paragraphs ? No ..but I do need to mention a few things .... things wot I've found out in my extensive research ..... [1] The Sharpbill is only sometimes included in the list. Apparently. [2] Ostrich and Osprey were in my initial list ...but now they're not. [3] Cagu also stands for the Cambridge Amateur Golf Union. (!)( It's big !) No. But here's a thing ... there IS a band called Palmchat !!! But that is not (NOT) what those birds all have in common. Well...it might be ... I haven't checked. Crumbs ... what if they were ? Briwsion ! But anyway ... Palmchat ( the band) were crap and boring, so they're out. Now this is NOT boring. When I saw the name of the song, naturally I thought it stood for "Fils de pute" but is seems it doesn't. Bah. Anyhow, it might not be the pinnacle of the music world, but it is entertaining. Maybe this would have been a better choice ... at least it's in English ... This is a very simple rule, and it's going on right now. Right under our noses. Can you remember when you used to twitch Little Egrets ? I know I can. But now they're hardly worth a glance. Can you remember when Great White Egrets were rare. I know I can. But they're not any more. You spend oodles of money on petrol. You spend hours of your valuable time whizzing around the country. And you see a rare bird. And wouldn't you just know it .... A few weeks later it's not blasted rare any more ! Ouch. As you know, all "rules of birding" are named after places. It all comes from that " The Meaning of Liff" book. And I have gifted the birding world with such rules as " Far Rockaway".... 158-the-lesser-known-rules-of-birding-1-far-rockaway.html And more ... but at the minute I can't find the stupid things ! And now we have " S********N" .... it's fairly obvious why . ( My computer didn't "like" its full name. McAfee warned me about it ) ( I wonder if he's related to that MacGonagall person) "Sooner or later, all your rare birds will stop being rare ." Well, quite a lot of them anyway. I wonder if there's a "relevant" bit of music to go with this rather scatalogical theme ? Well, yes there rootin' tootin' is ! Before you go any further, here is one of William Topaz McGonagall's truly awful , and therefore famous, poems ... you might as well hear what you're in for .... but the good news is, the "poem", if you can call it that, stops after 3 minutes, thank the Lord ...... more sensitive readers should probably just skip it and go on to the sensible stuff underneath ! Here's a poem I found tucked inside an old copy of " Scilly Saunters" ....... surely it must have been written either by the "poet" Mcgonagall himself or by a clever imitator. But who would do such a thing ? This afternoon I met The King of Bryher and yes ... it is the truth ...I'm not a liar. He wore a crown engraved " The King of Bryher" so there was no need at all at all for me to inquire and throughout the sultry afternoon I called him " sire." Oh how I wish I was The King of Bryher in that role I would never retire from being the The King of Bryher and there's only one way to be The King of Bryher. Your "Bryher list" must be remarkably higher which can take a considerable time to acquire. But to be The King of Bryher is rather grand for Bryher is indeed a lovely land surrounded by the sea on every hand as islands are, as all must understand. He rules the isle, its rocks, its birds, its sand, its hedgerows, outcrops, hilltops, hillocks and some do compare it to fair Samarkand which is truly a remarkable and distant foreign land and undoubtedly surrounded by considerable hinterland. And when I am The King of Bryher when I pass by, the people will inquire who is that man who wears the princely crown ? Surely a man of worldwide reknown who will forever wear his kingly crown till Bryher's sea uprises, whence he'll drown. And on his gravestone, from rock of Bryher made his list of Bryher ticks will be displayed and he, interred beneath with knightly crown flesh gone to dust, resembles most a clown ! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I wish I'd written that... but maybe when its true provenance is affirmed as the work of William Topaz McGonagall himself, I will be acclaimed as its discoverer. And probably earn a few quid on chat shows with that Lauren Laverne and actually I reckon much much more I might be able to earn what with her and that other one, is her name Fern ? .. and what about The Antiques Roadshow ? That can't be bad. ... and here's the Pythons taking the piss ! Surely they can't be parodying the wonderful McGonagall himself ? Anyway, here's an entirely unrelated but funny Python Piss-take ... ..and here's the "must-have" books ...
Once again, here's a short, brisk sort of thing to make up for all of the long, shambling-around things ... off we go then .... Very few people know about these films you're about to encounter. The truth is, a lot of famous films were originally about birds . But they got "beefed up" to attract a wider audience. Oh yes ... and here's the evidence ... here's what they used to be called .... CITIZEN CRANE RHEA WINDOW RAIDERS OF THE LOST AUK YOUNG FRANKLIN'STEIN RAGING GULL STARLING WARS THE EM(U)PIRE FIGHTS BACK RAGING BULLFINCH TIT ANI C ( that's two !) THE REDSHANK REDEMPTION ALL ABOUT REEVE THE PASSION OF JOAN OF LARK BATTLESHIP PITTAMKIN WOODPECKERLYPSE NOW STORKER BICYCLES REEVES METRHOOPOELIS IT'S A WONDERFULMAR LIFE SAVING PRIVATE VEERYAN TROGON WITH THE WIND THE EMPIRE SHRIKES BACK A CLOCKSTORK ORANGE JURASSIC LARK THE SEVEN SAMURALOWLS FROM THRUSHIA WITH LOVE DIAMONDS ARE FOREEVER I'm sure you've got a few of your own .... then maybe you could tell me about them..... [email protected] ..or as a comment. [ I've only ever had 1 comment .... but it wasn't from The King of Bryher.] and then I could put them on here. But why did they feel the need to do that "beefing-up" thing ? They looked pretty good as they were. And here's a musical example of that same "beefing-up" trend ... this song was originally titled "Whinchateau" but ...well, you know all about it now.... they probably thought "Whin" was a bit too whinsome !..so they dropped it....... Well.... when we went to bed last night it was totally 8/8 cloud ... and bloody cold as well. So I thought .... Lunar Eclipse ... forget it ! That's Spode's Law that is. But .... I just happened to get up around 4am ..... and there it was. Woo !! I took some terrific photographs of it too ! ... but that wasn't one of them .. no ..that was on the morning news. Here's one of mine ..... or rather .... here's one of mine ... ..but ... fair do's .... it was taken with a tiny tiny camera in the freezing cold in my pyjamas (23 pairs)* and socks without any of those fancy-pants long lenses. Not the socks .... the camera. Getting all the proper stuff would have woken The Significant Otter. That wouldn't be a good idea. It was well worth seeing. And you can always blow it up by holding down the CTRL thing and whizzling the mouse-wheel .... well, it works on mine. I'm not sure about "macs". ( I've never had one since the moment I noticed it was "scam" backwards.) Alternatively, you could buy one of those huge ginormous screens and mount it on the wall and then the moony bit would be a lot bigger. Well worth it. Here's a "top astronomer" who was on't news as well ... I'm not surprised that she's got such a silly name ... but who would call their daughter "Minnis Bay" ? .... but the presenter-bloke referred to her as an "astrologer" which didn't go down very well. You can see she's a bit pissed off. One important rule of life is ... don't annoy anybody wearing a pointy hat. Oh no ! Here's another, completely different picture taken by me ! Enjoy !!!!! But ... it was all very serendipitous. And now, here's French "Bad-Boy" Damien Saez with " Jeunesse leve-toi "one meaning of that is " young people, awake" which is probably some sort of attempt to get them out of their sordid pits to see that moon wot I saw. Obviously. * You can easily work out the number of pairs of pyjamas you should wear ... just before going up the Wooden Hill to Bedfordshire, you check the thermometer in the garden. Then you subtract the temperature from 25, and that's how many pairs you need. Last night it was 2° ... so 25-2 =23 ... and that's why I was wearing 23 pairs. Simples. This is a good way of reminding yourself that - - 2 = +2. So if the temperature was -7°, you would need to wear 25 - - 7= 25 + 7 = 32 pairs. I don't why why they don't do it that way in schools. I've been reading Pete Dunne's brilliant book "Small-headed Flycatcher" ....rather, I've been dipping into it. It's the perfect dipping-into book. Lots of short chapters full of birding common sense, uncommon sense, adventures, expeditions, frozen moments (In both senses of the phrase), odd experiences and good humour. This morning it's been the chapter entitled " With love and squalor" ... and here's why it cheered me up immensely ... because it is all about his car ..or rather, what's in it. Everything's in it. Basically. It has taken him 5 years to get it into its current state .....and it's called Pete's Pit. I think you get the idea. Here's a summary ... "..it's the latest in a proud line of dumpsters on wheels.Everything ...I mean everything ..I might ever need in the next five years is stashed in that car." His previous car .. "Pig Pen" is described thus .. ...... "whose deposition of tracked-in debris was so thick come trade-in time tha it had formed geological strata. The top several layers were dry, desert-like. But the underlying sediments, from middepth down to metal core, had characteristics consistent with you basic Pleistocene swamp." Well... you'll never guess. Mine's like that too ... except that it sometimes gets sorted out by The Significant Otter. .. and I hope yours is. And where I'm writing right now, I'm surrounded by massive heaps of ... well, I've forgotten what a lot of it is. We're back to geological eras here . It's the "logical" part of that word that I like. But the good thing is ... that Significant Otter can't get up here ... the stairs are too steep and dodgy.... so it stays as it is. Ha !! And anyway, she can't argue ... because quite a bit of it is hers .... she hoards things like ancient black-and-white TVs ... there's at least 3 of them up here .... and I suspect they're breeding.... and boxes and boxes of kid's stuff from way back when they were 3...4...5....12...and boxes of old NME's and vinyl records and .... and it's ME that has had to cart them all up those steep and dodgy stairs to put them here. And sometimes, down again. And of course, an hour later, up again. So ... if you, dear birder, have a nice neat car ... that's fine. But ..... I like mine as it is. As you know, it is now heading for oblivion.... .... and no doubt I'll be finding lots of interesting stuff deep down in all the layers of junk when I empty it out for its last journey. .... and the same process will no doubt happen to me just "down the road a way." Just down the road a way as they say in the USA there's a land that's full of unexpected birds that we can watch all day. They'll all be bright and colourful like the Jabirus, the Juncos and the Jays and though we're all dead we won't dwell on that, instead we'll scope and bin and tick for all our days ! Readers ... I thank you for your attention. So ... if you are thinking of tidying up your car ... you don't need to right now ... because ... it's never too late .... Well ... on the news this morning there was an item about a BTO Tawny Owl survey . So of course I looked it up...... and I found that it has been running since 30th Sept last year.(!!) And it finishes on 31st March this year. I can't help feeling that it might have been better to tell us a bit earlier. I also get the feeling that not many people are doing it so they're panicking a bit. Surely not ! Maybe they did tell "us" about it earlier. ... but I've never heard of it. Anyhow, here's the video all about it ... ...and here's what it says online ... Why we need your help Are there Tawny Owls calling in your area? By listening out for them in your garden or nearby green space you could help us to understand their calling behaviour and distribution, and to discover the impact of urbanisation and artificial lighting. We need your help, whether you usually hear Tawny Owls or not. Knowing where owls can't be heard is just as valuable as knowing where they can be heard. Learn about Owls...... Visit our resource pages It takes just 20 minutes It's easy to take part - just listen for 20 minutes during at least one evening between now and 31 March 2019. You can listen from your garden, local park or woodland. You can even listen whilst lying in bed with the window open! All information is valuable, even zero counts (you'll be a #zerohero!). If you enjoy taking part you can repeat your survey in subsequent weeks. The more weeks that you can listen the better, but you can do as many or as few weeks as you are able. Gaps between weeks don't matter. You can listen for their familiar 'hooting' and 'kee-wick' calls any time between sunset and midnight. All we ask is that you tell us the date, start time of your survey, an estimate of cloud cover and importantly whether or not you hear an owl. If you hear a Tawny Owl at another time of the week outside the survey period you will also be able to record this. You record your weekly results online. Download the Tawny Owl Calling Survey Instructions(PDF, 1.03 MB) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Well.... there's just one thing really. It's a problem with all surveys done by the "general public." ( And not just them ) And that is, they tend not to report negative results. If they don't hear any, they probably won't send it in. And that biases the results. They've tried to get you to ..by calling them "zero heroes." But it won't make much difference. I'm not getting at anyone ... it's just human nature. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The other "big thing" on the news was about the Total Eclipse of the Moon in the early hours of Monday 21st. Here's what the net has to say .. ... but don't forget .. it's bound to be cloudy. On 21 January 2019 there will be a total lunar eclipse, also known as a blood moon, visible from the UK in the very early hours of the morning. The last total lunar eclipse was on 27 July 2018. How to see the lunar eclipse in the UK 21 January 2019 On 21 January 2019 a total lunar eclipse will be visible over most of North America, South America and parts of west and north Europe. The rest of Europe and Africa can witness the end of the eclipse. Those in the UK will be able to see every part of the eclipse as long as they are willing to stay up all night! The Moon will start to enter the Earth’s shadow just after 2:30am GMT and the maximum eclipse will occur just before 5:15am. The entire eclipse lasts for more than five hours, ending at 7:48am. The optimal viewing time to see the eclipse is between 4:41am – 5:43am. This is the period of totality, where the moon lies entirely in the Earth’s umbra (full shadow) and will appear red. Time Event 4:41 am Mon, Jan 21 Total Eclipse begins Total moon eclipse starts - completely red moon. 5:12 am Mon, Jan 21 Maximum Eclipse Moon is closest to the center of the shadow. 5:43 am Mon, Jan 21 Total Eclipse ends Total moon eclipse ends. So .... owls and eclipses ..... good luck to all of you ! ( Pob lwc i pawb !! ) But ... maybe before getting up at 3 in the morning, you might just PAUSE ...... Here's an ancient cutting I've found ... from The Guardian, March 22, 1986. Yes, I'm a squirreling-away old Hector ! But this one is a smasher .... top tree expert Alan Mitchell writes about strange examples of trees he damn well knows have done some very odd things ...as you will see.... please excuse the overlappy bits ... the article is quite a long read ...but fascinating too..... well worth it. I was especially interested in all that because at that time I had already had a similar experience myself ..and I've had another one since then. Both were rather disturbing. Remember, I did tell you about that UFO I saw ... assuming that's what it was. I didn't feel "disturbed" by that though. And at some future time I'll probably tell you about a ghost I saw a few years ago while I was out birding... in broad daylight. There have been others too. They were a bit disturbing, but not as much as those bloody trees. I expect most people have experienced these sorts of things. But ..let's move on to some uplifting music ... here's a wisp of a song spun out of nothing .... Noir Désir ... " Bouquet de nerfs" Journée de la pleine lune
Au sommet de la dune A caresser de loin, ton chien T'oublies or not t'oublies Les ombres d'opaline Au rendez-vous suivant, j'attends Au fond d'une autre limousine Qui ne vaut pas plus cher Que ce bouquet de nerfs A frôler la calanche Les étendues salines A perte de vue on s'imagine, en Chine Trompe la mort et tais-toi Trois petits tours et puis s'en va J' opère tes amygdales Labyrinthes, que dalle Ne m'est plus rien égal Je sais je n'ai offert, que des bouquets de nerfs Rubis de Sade et jade, déjà je dis non Diamant, c'est éternel Des fleurs, des bouts du ciel, immense La liste des parfums Capiteux, capitalistes c'est bien Mais olfacultatif Liste en boule, au panier Finalement j'ai offert, quelques bouquets de nerfs Agendas donnez-moi De vos dates à damner Tous les bouddhas du monde Et la Guadalupe S'il arrive qu'un anglais Vienne me visiter Dans la métempsycose Je saurai recevoir je peux lui en faire voir de la sérénité Et même lui laisser un certain goût de fer Et ce bouquet de nerfs |
AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
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