The body does slow down with age, and weekends can often drip by with routine household tasks. When most tasks are accomplished it’s threatening dark and that’s mostly because of your  late start. So on a rain besmirched day, like today, Sunday 24th, I lit the wood burner early and settled into some bird mags and then my newly purchased twin volumes of  Birds of Scotland. It fired me up and lifted the “cabin fever”, it reminded me of the days when I was 18 and keen on fly fishing, my mate (big Gordon) and I would eagerly await the 15th of march, the ides of March, the start of the brown trout season. Flies had been researched and clumsily constructed and casts made, the river had been walked at least twice before the Ides, and large trout imagined in dark whirling eddies.

I don’t fish any more but the anticipation is the same and lifts the cabin fever that can descend in the dark days of winter. I should of course be out in wild weather on the Fife coast looking for ring billed gulls and long billed Dowitchers, but heh I can lift cabin fever in front of my wood burner. I should frequent Loch Leven more often particularly as sea Eagles are around, public viewing of birds is OK but not the best experience. Mind you when you find something exceptional, my instinct is to share, like the time I spotted a Pair of black throated divers in Loch Turret in breeding plumage, not the place for these shy birds. As my telescope is trained on them along comes a walker with a serious pair of binoculars, after a few words I am relaxed enough to confide with him. I don’t announce what he is about to see, I say take a look, he then looks, looks at me and I confirm, yup, black throated divers. If I hadn’t shared that moment the experience would have be less.

wilderness and wildness are important for everyone to experience and to hopefully understand their own connection in the biosphere.

http://gregpytel.blogspot.com/

try this blog spot for a very interesting view of the financial crisis (don’t think it’s over) and bankers behaviour.

I obviously would never make a banker as I cannot see how a bonus can be paid until the taxpayers money is paid back. But we are shareholders so the money will not appear as a debt, but if we are the major share holders then surely we can veto these payments when management meetings are held, I understand major shareholders are present at some of these.

It is apparent that bonuses will be paid, with the banks paying the extra tax, well done Mr Darling, our money going round in circles!!

If you haven’t heard Billy Bragg’s stance visit;

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/7012775/Billy-Bragg-in-protest-against-bankers.html

The post title is a book title by Joe Moran, not finished it yet but can still recommend it to you folk interested in our roads’ history. This author is not dilatory when it comes to detail, it is crammed with it. I did have to point out through his blog spot that a central reservation is a central reserve, mere pedantry I know but how often can you correct a University lecturer?

Hope he doesn’t read this as I will no doubt have made several grammatical errors.

It’s

decorative, particularly on trees

land smoothing, blanketing

mouldable, a plaything

represents Christmas to those of us in the north

is like breaking a spell when you are the first to walk on it

Cornices, don’t be the first !

Is easy to shovel

puts superior smiles on 4 x 4 drivers

brings neighbours together, in mutual car shoving, complaining and snow moving

increases wellie sales

Increases bird numbers and variety to your feeding table

makes it very important to feed and water the birds

makes driving “interesting”

bonus time for gritter drivers

nice for a couple of days…….

add your own snow feelings in comments

Well how were 192 countries ever going to agree?  the developing world had their hand out and the developed world need to look after their economies, this, that puts money in the hand of the developing world. I never liked the stance of the G77’s  Sudanese chairman, I heard a long interview with him on the BBC’s world service, and he was clearly educated, erudite, and entrenched in his views. Anyway he doesn’t matter, as he represents the nations with the hand out, those of you who have read most of my posts will remember the “golden rule” he who has the gold rules.  Nowt changes.  So Mr Lumumba Stanislaus Di-Aping I would be very interested to hear what you say to those 77 countries you chaired what you achieved for them.

China’s people and the politicians know they are polluting the rivers and their air, and I believe they will react to this, in a market place way, they amongst  the polluting regions can react very fast to generating new non polluting technologies, they are communist and a dictatorship. The clumsy democracies will react much more slowly, unless and I suspect (hope) this will happen,  a “clean power” race, develops in the market place between China and America. Europe has the lead on this but the market place is Europe it needs to be America, China and India. Russia the worlds third largest polluter is difficult for me to understand, I am not sure anyone can predict it’s stance?

Anyway the science stood resolute, no well read sensible person  can say the climate is not changing, some flat earth people say it’s just a normal cycle, Mr Milankovitch, I think they refer to, tell that to the people whose houses are built on Tundra, ask the people in Cumbria, ask the sub-Saharan people in Kenya, ask the Italian border patrols who now have to move the border poles ever year as the glacier they are in moves.

Copenhagen worked in certain ways, It  recognised, and put front stage,  that the climate is changing and for most people this  is a very serious concern. For the business aware there is a huge market place for less polluting energy methods from recognising that the concerned people of the planet will change their behaviours given a market place alternative. The politicians need to act to encourage this behavioural change.

Also a climate change event in America that is country wide, and not in California, would be very appropriate. Something like a large blanket of snow, needs to be the worst on record sweeping down the East coast,

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/2009/12/20/blizzard-hell-as-america-is-struck-by-worst-snowstorms-for-six-years-86908-21911055/

only six years ! let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

try this connection too

www.avaaz.org/en/after_copenhagen/?cl=419385382%26v=5072

and here is a truly encouraging tale, imagine this industrialised, what you don’t have to imagine is human ingenuity. Like green power it just has to be politically harnessed.

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/10/05/malawi.wind.boy/index.html

Pictures today of Gordon Brown kitted up with all the protective gear in Afghanistan, well why not give him a taste of what the troops have to endure by sending him out in less than the best vehicles that they have, to Helmand province. Be more than his defect eye that would be half shut and shut. And the great perpetrator of our entry into the illegal war in Iraq, Mr Middle East peace maker, Mr Tony Blair, is making blaa blaa about WMD’s I would have found another reason to invade, he declares, this dictator (Saddam) bombed and gassed his own people, he espoused. Yeh well what about China and Tibet? how about Burma? How about Russia? How about Zimbabwe?

Seems like when you get to the top, as an earner and or politically, you become bullet proof as the establishment gathers round and protects you. How many times has Fred the shreds house windows been panned in? well just the once I’ll warrant, there are probably web cams on his street paid for by you know who.

So if GB is bullet proof why was he wearing all that gear? Oh yes, real bullets from the real world !!

Can you believe the absolute brass neck of these egregious bankers? going to resign as they can’t represent the whole of the shareholders to their benefit. Well they blooming well should have resigned when they were representing the whole of the shareholders when the share price was 20p. Was that to their benefit? Call their bluff Mr Darling, on behalf of the majority shareholders, us! How can they say this top talent needs rewarding, this is the top talent that brought the bank to it’s nadir.

Take the one point something Billion quid and give it to the retail side of the bank and to the RBS people made redundant, if Charles Dickens were alive today I feel a novel would result given the iniquity of the behaviour of the board of the RBS.

I bet this all ends in a political fudge, well that might just be the last straw for many Labour voters.

Finally I have added a post to Ian’s site.   

[View with PicLens]

I do have some good photos but as for great, I am not so sure.  As a beginner to DSLR photography I am still finding my way and experimenting; after a year there are still many functions on my camera that I have no idea what they do, and many of my photos are down to luck.  As a beginner to photography I have probably chosen the most difficult subjects – wildlife and in particular our avian friends.

Two weekends ago myself, my wife and two of our friends spent the weekend in Dumfries and Galloway with the intention of seeing some geese.  At this time of year the Solway Firth provides a wintering ground for tens of thousands of geese, the majority of which are Barnacle Geese along with Canada, Greylag and Pink Footed.

We arrived at our hotel on the Friday night with severe weather warnings in place and the prospect of a miserable day on the Saturday.  True to the forecast, the weather on the Saturday morning was wild with very high river levels on the River Nith and strong winds.  Full waterproofs were donned when we arrived at the WWT Caerlaverock reserve and five or so hours were spent ducking from hide to hide through the foul weather with plenty of geese to view but few other birds were braving the storm.

I had resigned myself to the whole day being a washout, when at 3pm it was as if a switch had been pressed – the wind dropped and the sun came out.  As the sun came out we saw a female Sparrowhawk hovering on the wind – she was promptly mobbed by a crow and landed on a fencepost not far from the hide – unfortunately the light was still poor but I managed a couple of mediocre photos.

On the way back from this hide after the sun had come out, I was dodelling along hoping for a good photo opportunity as the others left me behind.  My dodelling did prove a good opportunity.  As I was wandering down the track I spotted a hare sitting ‘drookit’ on an embankment only a few metres from the track and by far the closest view of a hare that I have had.  I expected him to dart off as soon as he saw me but instead he wandered slowly across the path allowing me to take a few snaps.  When I caught up with the others they had seen a flock of redwings which I had missed, but I was glad of my encounter with the hare.

We  made our way back to the hide nearest to the visitor centre as the sun was setting for good views of many ducks and waders.  A sord of Mallards floated by, lining up for a good photo and a pair of Roe Deer came out to feed.

After a warming cup of coffee at the visitor centre we made our way back to the hotel past a spectacular sunset for a hearty meal and a few pints.

On the Sunday we had planned to visit the RSPB centre at Mereshead, but were scuppered by flooding on the access road.  We decided to drive to the nearby town and walk along the beach to the reserve which turned out to be a round trip of 15km, meaning that we had limited time at the reserve.  The detour did have a silver lining in that we saw a pair of Brent Geese bobbing on the sea – a new bird for me and taking the goose count to five species.  The other highlight on the Sunday was approximately 200 Pintail on one of the ponds at the RSPB reserve.

A good weekend was had with a count of 52 species  even with the poor weather.

Below is an excerpt from the internet, adding to my sparse folklore knowledge of the magpie, this by a chance remark from a colleague who stated his wife saluted a lone magpie and issued a greeting. Well we knew he was / is dithering on a delicate edge of sanity but his wife also?

Seems not, she is following an age old superstition that I and her still borderline husband were not aware of !!

Magpie Superstitions

There is an age old rhyme regarding magpie superstitions, brought to the fore in the 1970’s, by the children’s programme named after the birds, which implies that if you see these birds in numbers you will have varying degrees of fortune. The magpie superstitions rhyme goes: “One for sorrow, Two for joy, Three for a girl, Four for a boy, Five for silver, Six for gold, Seven for a secret never to be told. ” Never been quite sure what to expect if I ever saw eight or more!

The majority of magpie superstitions however, revolve around the lone magpie. There are some curious customs associated with this. It is the most common of the magpie superstitions, and throughout the British Isles it is believed that it is unlucky to look upon a lone magpie and there are some interesting regional beliefs about what you should do to ward off any bad luck. For example: In Scotland and Northern Ireland one should salute the lone magpie; whereas in some parts of England one should wave or doff your hat! Magpie superstitions in Yorkshire suggests that the bird is associated with witchcraft and therefore an ill omen – one should make a sign of a cross or take off your hat in respect to ward off any evil. Another from remote parts of the White Rose County, suggests that an individual should imitate the lone magpie’s missing partner – and loudly; although I‘m not sure I can recall what noise one makes! Apparently the magpie has significance overseas as well – in Korea, one of the more popular magpie superstitions, has folk believing that the magpie is a bird of inspirational instinct, which can foretell people that they will have visitors or house guests in the near future.

http://www.superstitious-minds.info/Magpie-Superstitions.html

Poem? I found

Magpie #1

Magpies are the
Park bench drunks
of the bird kingdom;
They hang about all day,
Screech at each other
And everyone else.
Nothing to do,
Nowhere else to go.

They feed from rubbish bins;
The mangled remains of Saturday’s
Discarded donner
Is their idea of a Sunday roast.

They steal
For the sake of it;
A piece of foil,
A priceless diamond,
They’re not really bothered,
So long as it sparkles.
Their nests must be
Boudoirs of bling.