I think you'll like these ... they're so true ! Here's the non-birders having their say .... ..and here's The Incredible String Band doing two songs on the Julie Felix show. I saw them about 1000 years ago. Good times ! I'm still car-prospecting by the way ...and it's eating up a lot of my time.
However, I did get a fine low-flying Buzzard at one of the "outlets" we visited.
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Here's that Cosmo Sheldrake again. This is an unusual video about an esoteric topic. But what I ( and you) want to know is ... what sort of Pelican ? There's not that many species .. 8, to be precise .. Spot-billed Dalmation Pink-backed Australian Great White/Rosy/White Peruvian Brown American White Come on Cosmo ... let's get specific ! Plus ...we have the odd situation of a man named after a bird singing a song about a bird. I don't expect that that has happened very often. Have Robin Williams/Taylor Swift/Mike Heron/Rogers and Swan had a go ? Any examples will be received gleefully ! ( [email protected] ) So ..you've had your music ... and your quest .... sorted. When you're in Ulster, you come across a lot of earnest-looking, besuited young men who ought to be enjoying themselves, who instead seem to want to try to convert you to some religion or other. It's not just Ulster either. Oh no. Now I'm perfectly happy for them to spend their time not enjoying themselves with the usual male pursuits of fornicating, drinking, lying, fighting, being sick and the like. It means I've got easier access to those very pleasures that they're denying themselves.......they're out of the game, they are. Many of them,who believe in celibacy, are actually " genetically dead" ! Hah ! That'll teach them ..... genetically dead. So .. I have got a special tactic which I recommend to all those who are like me. I always have with me a pocket-sized bird book of some sort. One of those Macmillan guides is good. As soon as they start waving their bibles at me, or their "tracts" printed on custard-coloured paper, I get out MY book and wave it back at them, informing them that I actually spend my time in the real world, watching real things, and enjoying it. Yes, I know it's only 93% true ... but their stuff is 0% true .. so I win. And it spooks them ..... excellent !! They don't like it. Ho-ho. They see that MY book is bright and colourful and full of life. And they might think ... maybe he's right ! Feel free to try it for yourselves. Having sorted that out, how about the music ... Bob Dylan .. " It's not dark yet" Shadows are falling and I been here all day It's too hot to sleep and time is running away Feel like my soul has turned into steel I've still got the scars that the sun didn't let me heal There's not even room enough to be anywhere It's not dark yet, but it's getting there Well my sense of humanity is going down the drain Behind every beautiful thing, there's been some kind of pain She wrote me a letter and she wrote it so kind She put down in writin' what was in her mind I just don't see why I should even care It's not dark yet, but it's getting there Well I been to London and I been to gay Paree I followed the river and I got to the sea I've been down to the bottom of a whirlpool of lies I ain't lookin' for nothin' in anyone's eyes Sometimes my burden is more than I can bear It's not dark yet, but it's getting there I was born here and I'll die here, against my will I know it looks like I'm movin' but I'm standin' still Every nerve in my body is so naked and numb I can't even remember what it was I came here to get away from Don't even hear the murmur of a prayer It's not dark yet, but it's getting there .... although, on second thoughts, I think this is the song to go along with today's theme ... by the gloriously named Cosmo Sheldrake ... I went on a long, late muddy, fairly birdless walk this afternoon ... this was the highlight ... no pun intended ... Hey ...we all love a graph ... do we not ? Especially if it's about something useful. And this is an absolute corker of a graph. It cost me a £0.55 postal order back then. It's from The Handbook of the British Astronomical Association 1972. So all that planet stuff is totally out of date ... but the sunrise-sunset stuff is still bang on. I'm sure you've all started to notice that the evenings are ...very slowly ...starting to get lighter. They've been doing that since mid-December. If you look at the bottom right of that "sunset" graph you'll see that it "bottoms out" so the sunset is at its earliest around 13th-14th of December... and after that it very slowly gets better ...slowly slowly accelerating the not-being-so-dark-so-early thing. By now it's been getting lighter in the evenings for around a month. But you've also noticed that the mornings haven't shown the same keenness to lighten up a bit..... they don't start to improve until the first week in January.... and again, this only improves very slowly at first. Take a look at the top left bit of the sunrise graph to see how it goes ... by now it has only got a few minutes lighter. Maybe this will help ... "There are two reasons why the length of the solar day varies, the first being the fact that the axis of the Earth's rotation is tilted - 23.5 degrees from vertical - and second, the Earth's speed varies because it moves in an elliptical orbit around the sun, accelerating when it is closer to the star's gravitational pull and decelerating when it is further away. The sun therefore in effect lags behind the clock for part of the year, then speeds ahead of it for another. "As you can imagine, it would be complete chaos if our clocks and watches had to cope with days of different lengths," continues Hurley. "So we use 24 hours, the average over the whole year, for all timekeeping purposes. "So, as the solar days in December are on average 24 hours and 30 seconds, while our clocks and watches are still assuming that each day is exactly 24 hours, this causes the day to shift about 30 seconds later each day." This cumulative shifting explains why the evenings draw in towards their earliest sunset a couple of weeks before the shortest day, and why the mornings continue to get darker until a couple of weeks after." ............... and maybe it won't. But now you know. And now, a glorious bit of music from the brilliant Vetusta Morla ..... it doesn't matter if your Spanish is a bit rusty ... it's a glorious song anyway...... ..and this "con letra" video will encourage you to sing along ... a truly sensual experience .. There's been a lot of rambling ... but, of course, excellent ... stuff on here lately ... so here's a quick one ..... This top birder was wandering along one fine day out in the countryside. He raised his bins to his eyes ( where else ?) And then, in a voice of sheer amazement ,said " Ooaa " Now tell me .... what part of the world was he in ? Yes ! Another reader has sent me in a problem ... but unlike the previous one ... 289-mini-birding-problem-page-1.html .... this one is much less, er, intimate. Embarrassing... that sort of thing. He seems a bit narked, but I've sorted it all out with a helpful and supportive answer..... Here's the problem .. in his own words ... Dear Mini-Birding Person A while ago you set us readers a problem .... you told us a story about being stuck behind a car with NNN on its number-plate .And you wondered what bird it was the "ghost" of .... and you then went on to think about AAA, and BBB, and CCC all the others.... could you find a UK bird to go with all of them ? That was your question .... Well, it's been driving me and my so-called friends barmy. I mean, CCC is easy enough ... Cream coloured Courser !! And WWW ... Yellow-browed Warbler And even DDD .... Red-throated Diver And some are, I think, pretty impossible .... JJJ, QQQ, VVV (?) .... etc. But what about NNN ? ..... the very one that set you ... and us ... off . ... and I wish you hadn't. I'd still have a car, for one thing. That was your " example" for God's sake ..... but none of us have managed to find it. It's driving us mad. Even worse is MMM. We've had arguments, we've fallen out, it's been awful. And we blame you. You should have given us the answers, hidden away somewhere in post 86 or something. There ought to be a law ! Or, more simply, you could have owned up to the ones even you couldn't find. Fair do's. Have I mentioned FFF ? No. That's another one we haven't got. Because yesterday I was so engrossed when I approached an actual "FFF" car that I drove into the back of it and wrote off my beloved vintage Austin Allegro. So that's another thing .. all this " in-car games" thing is a danger to the public. If I knew who you were, I'd sue. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Here's my helpful and sympathetic reply..... Thank you for the feedback ..... yes, there are a few that look do-able, but don't actually seem to be. But I can inform you that NNN is do-able ...... so ... eat that, loser !! But I will proffer you some hope .... The obvious thing to do, is to look out for any recent additions to the UK list and see if they work ... I'm sure ,for example, that the Rufous-Fronted Fantail will eventually turn up in the UK to solve your FFF dilemma, so it's just a matter of time. A bit more of a wait might bring you a Mid-Mountain Mouse-Babbler at the end of your street ... that'll be a double bonus seeing as you won't need your Austin Allegro to go and see it !. ...and your MMM mystery is solved. So ... with all that Global Warming we're promised .... bring it on !! ..say all us avid listers .... we could do well with this vital matter of cracking those MMM's etc. I've written a lovely, informative poem about it to cheer you up ...... If only we warmed up a bit Our birding would be ace not shit Trogons, Parakeets and such Would turn our rubbish into much more interesting sorts of birds described in such exciting words Resplendent Quetzal ! White-naped Lory ! Wood-hoopoes in all their glory Mrs. Morden's Scops-Owl too and the Tropical Bou-bou Yellow-mantled Widowbird (That's Euplectes macrocurus) Rarely seen but often heard. Hawks, Broad-winged and Ferruginous would be skimming all aroundous and Ovenbirds and Chuck-wills-widows flying past our kitchen windows whilst the brazen Caracara eats a passing Chachalaca and the local Smooth-billed Ani snoozes in the Frangipani while Bewick's Wrens and Sparrows ( Chipping) slowly in the heat are slipping into their usual midday naps As we, exhausted, then collapse. But then, I think we soon would see It wasn't all it's cracked up to be They produce some crap prediction But we know it's mostly fiction. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ..and here, to remind you of when you DID have a car ... This got given to The Significant Otter for Christmas ...... it's a tea-towel really. Well... it was OK when I was just keeping in in the house.... but while those two mutually antagonistic sets of birders ( see previous post) were having a " midday truce dinner" in a "car-park-by-the-sea" I stupidly showed it to some of the assembled throng of both "sides" .... the relatively civilised Flintshire Bird Club and the rather dodgier " Flintwitchers" lot. Well ! I should have known better .... talk about "meltdown " .... there ensued 5 minutes of mayhem as arguments flared into open hostility ! After 20 seconds or so of argy-bargy, things escalated to the "feeble-floppy-fisticuffs" phase and would have got a lot worse had it not been for the towering colossus that is "Mac" .. of Trogs fame. Bravely, he strode into the melee, grabbed the aforesaid tea-towel which was generating considerable megatons of ID disputes and ripped it to shreds in his beefy , 7-inch- single-sized hands. And that was that. No more disputes about that stripy-winged thing on row 2, or the spotty-backed item in the middle of the bottom row...or any of the others. There was no real harm done ... and it was time to resume our "Big Day" anyway. By the end of the "day", about 6pm, we all met up again and sorted out the scores .. and we ... the Flintshire Bird Club team, had won. 68-64 ! Which, of course, was all that mattered. And much to their credit, both sides shook hands, rather shamefacedly in some cases, and we went our separate ways the best of enemies . You all know what I mean. Rangers and Celtic.... Man U and Man C.... The Hillies and the Billies. It's all tribes in the male world ... they're bloody ubiquitous. Here's a little something that fits nicely ..as the Bishop said the the Actress. Ah .. I almost forgot ... have any of you got any idea what any of those birds were intended to be ? I'm fairly sure about, er, 1 of them ! I've also just realised there's a far far more appropriate song about all that ... and here it is ... Yeah
Ha When two tribes go to war One is all that you can score (Score no more, score no more) When two tribes go to war One is all that you can score (Workin' for the black mask) Comrad number one A born again poor man's son (Poor man's son) On the air America I modeled shirts for Van Heusen (Workin' for the black mask) yeah When two tribes go to war One is all that you can score (Score no more, score no more) When two tribes go to war One is all that you can score (Workin' for the black mask) Switch up your shield Switch up and feel I'm walkin' out, lover hey I'm givin' you back a good time I'm shippin' out, out I'm workin' for the black mask One is all that you can score When two tribes go to war When two tribes go to war One is all that you can score We got two tribes (We got to part, we got to part) yeah Somethin' this good died Are we living in a land Where sex and horror are the new gods, yeah When two tribes go to war One point is all that you can score I told you all ages ago about how most Bird Clubs have their opposite, antagonistic, rivals. I've already shown you one of them .. the SRPB ...... you can read all about them and their weird ideology here ... as an extra bonus, it starts with one of my lovely drawings ... (?) ... 122-the-srpb.html For many years there's been two warring factions in Cumbria .... the only thing is, it's one person versus everybody else! I won't reveal his name ... yes, of course it's a "he." Obviously. It's in the nature of the male to create a heirarchy, climb to the top of it and then create two ( or more) opposing "armies." And those two factions are sometimes quite scathing and vitriolic ... they can really hate each other. But, oddly, they wouldn't be without them. And when I lived in Lancaster there was the LDBWS ( Lancaster & District Birdwatching Society ) and the subtly-named LDPB ... Lancaster and District Proper Birders. Oh yes. They're both still going strong. Quite a few people are actually in both !! How odd. But I wasn't in either of them for long. I got thrown out of one of them, and left the other. Don't ask ! When I lived in Widnes, if you can call it living, there weren't any bird clubs, because there were no birds. Everything was cloaked in a thick coat of slag,grime and sludge. Including me, our house, my school and everything else. But there was the excellent Merseyside Naturalist's Association (MNA .... which if you move the letters one letter up the alphabet becomes NOB ) which, of course, has its long-term rival, "Scousebirders" ... I think it's still going, but it has no internet presence. Hardly surprising really. They can hardly read, let alone write. And now, here in Flintshire, we have the Flintshire Bird Club, and there's another anarchic bunch called "Flintwitchers" which I must admit, is a neat name. BUT ... although we are arch-enemies most of the time, we do have two sorts of " mutual events" each year, where old enmities are forgotten for a few brief hours. One is ... we invite each other to our " Annual Meetings" ... which usually go OK. But one piece of advice is ... don't meet in a pub. AND ... yesterday (Saturday ) we did our annual " Big Count" where we act as two separate teams, and we each do a Big Day confined, of course, to Flintshire. Needless to say, we often meet two or three times during the day, and each team also has one person from the "other side" in their midst throughout the usual 10-12 hours or so . In some years we've had some members who were in both, so we didn't need to. It went pretty well this year, but it wouldn't be the same without a few "tiffs" along the way. And we won !! ( FBC that is ). You might be surprised to find you have this sort of set-up where you live. It's not always obvious, as the " Anti" version often keeps pretty quiet as far as "social media" are concerned . It's a big male thing, secrecy. What ? You haven't noticed ? I'll bung the music on in a bit ... I'm actually, I think, not going car-prospecting this morning .. I'm going to go out and spot a few birds. Crumbs. It is , of course, cold and wet, but there you go. And there I go . There's no "relevancy" for this choice of music .. I just like it ...... Monday Tuesday Wednesday I hope you don't come home from your birding endeavors and lay your binoculars down the same way every time. The same way up each day. No! Not Never !! Crumbs .... you mean ... you didn't know .... cor blimey !!!! You must store your binoculars a different way round every time. But why, oh why ? I thought you'd never ask. Well, glass isn't really a solid at all ... it's a supercooled liquid. You've prob noticed that when glass smashes, there are little shell-shaped concavities on the surface of the bits. That is caused by the random arrangement of the constituent molecules. It's called conchoidal fracture ... they look like little glassy shells. (I wrote "she-shaped" the first time ... lucky I looked back ... Freudian Slip or what !) ( Hell-shaped would be interesting ... but what shape would it be. .... ? ........ Mobius Band/Klein Bottle is my guess ... nasty and devious ! ) And glass , over time, flows. It's a "WELL-KNOWN FACT" that window glass slowly flows down, so the top gets thinner and the base gets thicker. This means ..if you put your bins down the same way every time, your lenses are going to distort over time. It may be only slight .... but it will make a difference. It might make a Wren's bill look a bit more curved, or a Wrybill's bill less so. So beware. Now ... all that sciency stuff is what I was taught at school. But I have read recently that all that stuff about glass flowing is a load of old shite. But what I say is ... why risk it ? Plus ... maybe you should put those lens caps on and/or store your bins in their case ... because just think of all that light that's whizzing through the lenses and "wearing them out." I often lie awake at night thinking about it. But on the other hand, case or not, every second thousands of cosmic ray particles are zooming through your bins and scopes at high-energy speeds. " Messing with the Molecules" And of course, through all of us. Cripes. I'm going to have to think about the music ... Philip Glass perhaps ? Pete Shelly ? He's good. I bet there's a song about "going with the flow." I'll ponder and ponder and come up with something ... but later. We're off car prospecting again. AGAIN. AGAIN.. Maybe a little "Pause" would be a good idea .. Here's some of those "mystery birds" ... I've done them before ... but these are a bit more exotic .. this all stemmed ..as have various other ideas ... from me getting, for the princely sum of £1, that " Checklist of Birds of the World." ( ..or was it a "pricely" sum ?) And don't forget, I have the ( almost unique?) record of having a World List which is 1 ( one!) more than my UK list..... So .... here's 5 of them ,for the moment ... [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Good luck to all ..... I'm off car prospecting" again ...... in a car which is terminally ill ... This bit of music is tangentially/slightly relevant to today's stuff .... a moody " Dolly" song .... " Les Bulles" C'est le mieux que l'on puisse faire
Envie de dormir au soleil Envie de croire à l'infini Envie d'horizons à paillettes Je rêve donc je suis Heureuse d'une goutte de pluie Heureuse d'un rayon de lune Éclater les bulles dans l'eau Les bulles de colère Un peu d'amour sur la terre Cadeau C'est le mieux que l'on puisse faire Who's gonna make it for us Envie de m'éparpiller dans l'air Envie de me voir scintiller Envie de croire au paradis Je rêve donc je suis Heureuse d'une goutte de pluie Heureuse d'un rayon de lune Éclater les bulles dans l'eau Les bulles de colère Un peu d'amour sur la terre Cadeau C'est le mieux que l'on puisse faire Who's gonna make it for us C'est le mieux que l'on puisse faire N'avez vous rien à offrir ? Musicale |
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October 2022
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