My Photo of the Day

Allt - y Rhiw [middle of photo] from the South- photo taken last July. There have been many changes since and the new owners, Mr & Mrs Whitthread have now moved in. This picture was taken for comparison purposes as I plan to visit again soon.

My Photo of the Day

Clifton Suspension Bridge from the Leigh Woods side looking towards Clifton Village.

Our Village - by Thomas Hood

Our Village -
"By a Villager"


Our village, that's to say, not Miss Mitford's village, but our village of Bullock Smithy,
Is come into by an avenue of trees, three oak pollards, two elders, and a withy;
And in the middle there's a green, of about not exceeding an acre and a half;
It's common to all and fed off by nineteen cows, six ponies, three horses, five asses, two foals, seven pigs, and a calf!
Besides a pond in the middle, as is held by a similar sort of common law lease,
And contains twenty ducks, six drakes, three ganders, two dead dogs, four drowned kittens, and twelve geese.
Of course the green's cropt very close, and does famous for bowling when the little village boys play at cricket;
Only some horse, or pig, or cow, or great jackass, is sure to come and stand right before the wicket.
There's fifty-five private houses, let alone barns and workshops, and pigsties, and poultry huts, and such-like sheds,
With plenty of public-houses—two Foxes, one Green Man, three Bunch of Grapes, one Crown, and six King's Heads.
The Green Man is reckoned the best, as the only one that for love or money can raise
A postillion, a blue jacket, two deplorable lame white horses, and a ramshackle "neat post-chaise!"
There's one parish church for all the people, whatsoever may be their ranks in life or their degrees,
Except one very damp, small, dark, freezing cold, a little Methodist Chapel of Ease;
And close by the churchyard, there's a stone-mason's yard, that when the time is seasonable
Will furnish with afflictions sore and marble urns and cherubims, very low and reasonable.
There's a cage, comfortable enough; I've been in it with Old Jack Jeffery and Tom Pike;
For the Green Man next door will send you in ale, gin, or anything else you like.
I can't speak of the stocks, as nothing remains of them but the upright post;
But the pound is kept in repair for the sake of Cob's horse as is always there almost.
There's a smithy of course, where that queer sort of a chap in his way, Old Joe Bradley,
Perpetually hammers and stammers, for he stutters and shoes horses very badly.
There's a shop of all sorts that sells everything, kept by the widow of Mr. Task;
But when you go there it's ten to one she's out of everything you ask.
You'll know her house by the swarm of boys, like flies, about the old sugary cask:
There are six empty houses, and not so well papered inside as out,
For bill-stickers won't beware, but stick notices of sales and election placards all about.
That's the Doctor's with a green door, where the garden pots in the window is seen;
A weakly monthly rose that don't blow, and a red geranium, and a teaplant with five black leaves, and one green.
As for hollyhocks at the cottage doors, and honeysuckles and jasmines, you may go and whistle;
But the Tailor's front garden grows two cabbages, a dock, a ha'porth of pennyroyal, two dandelions, and a thistle!
There are three small orchards—Mr. Busby's the school-master's is the chief—
With two pear trees that don't bear; one plum, and an apple that every year is stripped by a thief.
There's another small day-school too, kept by the respectable Mrs. Gaby,
A select establishment for six little boys, and one big, and four little girls and a baby;
There's a rectory with pointed gables and strange odd chimneys that never smokes,
For the Rector don't live on his living like other Christian sort of folks;
There's a barber's once a week well filled with rough black-bearded, shock-headed churls,
And a window with two feminine men's heads, and two masculine ladies in false curls;
There's a butcher's, and a carpenter's, and a plumber's, and a small greengrocer's, and a baker,
But he won't bake on a Sunday; and there's a sexton that's a coal merchant besides, and an undertaker;
And a toyshop, but not a whole one, for a village can't compare with the London shops;
One window sells drums, dolls, kites, carts, bats, Clout's balls, and the other sells malt and hops,
And Mrs. Brown in domestic economy not to be a bit behind her betters,
Lets her house to a milliner, a watchmaker, a rat-catcher, a cobbler, lives in it herself, and it's the post-office for letters.
Now I've gone through all the village—ay, from end to end, save and except one more house,
But I haven't come to that—and I hope I never shall—and that's the Village Poor House!

My Photo of the Day

We need a bright photo today, to make up for the miserable rainy and windy weather outside! Don't ask - I have no idea who the man on the left is, but he seemed lonely and had been sitting there a long time.

My Photo of the Day

Mallard duck and ducklings on the pond behind Dunster beach

My Photo of the Day

The little Norwegian whalers' Church at Grytviken on South Georgia. November 2005

My Photo of the Day

Cader Idris 2006

Someone has left a woolly jumper behind!

Happy New Year!

1. Limestone Pavement - Malham Cove

2. Butterfly Bush - Kettlewell, Yorkshire, September 2006

Review of the year 2006

There is no better day than 31st December to review the old year and make, if not New Year Resolutions, neccessary plans for adjustments to one's life bearing in mind the experiences of the past. Plans too, for the coming year, where to go for holidays, who would appreciate a visit, who could be invited to visit me? These questions can wait even though some entries in the diary are already pencilled in.

2006 has been a year of mixture and mixed emotions. My work at the Pearce Group has been busy and happy with the number of projects growing steadily to the situation now when I am needing assistance to provide support for all the different teams who rely on me to provide updated drawings and other head office support. I particularly like giving the training support for staff and also to our partners such as architects and contractors in the use of the Pearce Extranet - 4Projects and training and familiarisation for our own people in the use of Microsoft products, mostly Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

During the year I have joined the Bristol Ornithologists' Club and the Avon Bat Group as an active member of both. Several bird and bat excursions have been made and I hope to fill the diary again in the coming year. The geologists will not be neglected either, and at the moment WEGA - the West of England Geologists Accociation has its monthly winter lecture programme ongoing.

On personal matters, By Easter, Viki with whom I had gone on the wonderful cruise to Antarctica at the end of 2005, and I, decided for various reasons that our relationship was going nowhere. We are still good friends [I hope!] but are no longer visiting each other. To some extent, the flurry during the summer in joining in new activities was because of the gap in my life that had been left after Viki was no longer in the picture.

In September as reported earlier here, I enjoyed a tour to Yorkshire which was a wonderful break from the routine and which also gave me the opportunity to build up more experience in using my new Nikon SLR digital camera. I am still learning of course, but have had some pleasing results. Also as reported earlier, I went to the International Wildscreen event at Bristol's Watershed, where I was mixing, as an interested amateur with some of, if not a majority of the World's best wildlife photographers. I have yet to assimilate much of the excellent information I was given at that symposium, but if I have one new year resolution it is to do more photography.

New friends at home and abroad have been made during the year, and again some of those have been mentioned in here before. The ability to use virtually free telephone and text messaging using the internet services of Skype and Googlemail has proved invaluable. One of my special friends from Hungary is planning to visit Bristol in June and at the moment we are in the early planning stages for what must be seen and done.

I haven't visited my parents' old cottage since July, but gather from the neighbours that the new owners have finished all the renovations and have now moved in. It will be interesting to see what they have done and I plan to go and see them in a few weeks time. My brother and I still own the land, and so I do need to visit the tenant farmer from time to time and make sure that all is well with him.

Christmas - has been and gone, Stephen who is thriving and living in London, came up and stayed with his mother at her new house in Portishead before coming to visit me on Boxing Day. I wish a very Happy New Year to all visitors to my blog. Please drop by again and if possible leave comments.

Galaxy

You will need the sound on to get the full effect of this neat and amusing bit of cosmology.

Boldly go to GALAXY

Good Man - Sir David

Sir David Attenborough has called for a "moral" crusade against wasting energy.
Sir David, 80, the presenter of the Planet Earth television series, told a Commons committee the wartime slogan "Waste Not, Want Not" should be used to persuade homeowners to switch off electrical appliances instead of leaving them on standby.
"I grew up during the war and it was a common view that wasting food was wrong," said Sir David. "It was not that you thought you were going to defeat Hitler by eating a little bit of gristle but that it was actually wrong to waste food. There should be a moral view that wasting energy is wrong," he added.
Sir David said he was convinced global warming caused disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. "I have just come back from Australia. People accustomed to living in hot temperatures in the Outback are saying, 'It has never been like this'."
He said climate change was a "political hot potato" but he was glad it was being grasped. He refused to be drawn on whether Gordon Brown had gone far enough with his pre-Budget report in tackling climate change.
The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs select committee is investigating how the public can do more to combat climate change.

BBC Link

Addressing Climate Change

[Photo shows the Power Station at Ironbridge Gorge - Shropshire - birthplace of Britain's Industrial Revolution!]

On Saturday I spent a very interesting few hours at Bristol University attending a day school at the School of Earth Sciences:

"Addressing Climate Change" The main speakers were Colin Palmer CEng and Pam Gill BSc(Hons) BEd PhD. An enthusiastic and knowledgeable audience considered whether technology alone can remedy the situation attributed to climate change, or if fundamental changes to our behaviour will be a necessary part of a solution. A question and answer session was followed by us having to prepare a written assignment and I for one, came away thinking positively that there are some people out there who are dedicated to doing something positive about the issues. Lessons are being learned but sadly the ice caps are still melting and we still burn fossil fuels as if they were an unlimited resource. The build up of atmospheric carbon may slowly lessen over the next decades, but sadly we are far off seeing real improvements in my lifetime. An awful legacy we are leaving for our children and grandchildren. A new Google Group has been formed for the participants of the day school and their friends and I commend it to any of my visitors who may be interested!
http://groups.google.com/group/lowcarbon

Famous Grouse!

Trying out various effects with my photo imaging software and have given this little fellow some chocolate box treatment! Original photo taken on my trip to Yorkshire in September.

Most Strange - Through the Trees

I could have sworn that I had published my poem here last week - but it seems to have disappeared! Anyway, here again by popular demand together with a photo - (of Llyn Brianne) is the poem I hurriedly wrote last Friday morning.

An appreciation


Through the Trees

With me but not with me
My cheeks afire
my eyes welling with tears
as I glimpse the lake
Feeling your presence
supportive in my loneliness
The resin of the trees
like your perfume
heady in the breeze

Moving on
Constant reminders
Ground, soft as a mattress
Clatter of pigeon wings
disturbed by my arrival
A downy feather left in air
dropping finally to the litter of leaves
From pinewood into beech
Woodland autumn odours
Woodland autumn colours
Lake shimmering

Rustle of my footfall
Cheeky grey squirrel
circling the tree trunk.
Above, a vapour trail,
high, flying East
Who are they?
I’ll never know
Dry beech-mast
to a woodland matriarch
already bark scarred
years ago with the words:

.....J P.....
...Loves...
......?.......
All in my heart.

Show of Hands

This week has been memorable in several different ways for me, but I will concentrate on a concert that I went to on Wednesday evening. An old friend of mine who is very knowledgeable about various kinds of music but particularly in folk music and musicians, had asked me months ago if I would like to join him to see Show of Hands at Bristol’s St Georges. I had no knowledge of Show of Hands, previously being only vaguely aware of the name. They are an internationally known group and my friend Godfrey had seen them on their previous year’s tour at the same venue. And so tickets were bought, and we joined the full and appreciative audience in the former church on Brandon Hill, which is well known not for its architecture but its acoustics. Show of Hands has recently published a new album Witness and the songs from that and from other albums familiar to many in the audience were performed with great gusto and to much applause. There was laughter too, as many of the songs have comic elements and local references. Show of Hands are very much local west country singers, hailing from East Devon but are now travelling all over the UK on their autumn tour. They perform at different venues five nights a week from October to the finish at Exeter in early December. Earlier this year they had a very succesful tour to Canada.
I would be hopeless at describing the band in detail and so will let them describe themselves in the e–link above and their Longdogs fan-site. All I will say is that I thoroughly enjoyed the concert and suggest you listen to a bit of their music which is available free on the website. I forgot to mention that Show of Hands had a guest artist with them on Wednesday - Michael Joseph who was also excellent and his act blended in well.

On the March!

Last Saturday morning I took the train to London to join in the Stop Climate Change march to Trafalgar Square. Many thousands of people from all over the country and in other capital cities around the world were marching in solidarity to highlight this simple message to the world leaders now meeting in Nairobi. "Act now before it is too late"
It was a fun march for a serious cause, just maybe, the leaders will now realise the groundswell of public opinion will cost them votes if realistic plans and actions are not put in place very soon.
I joined a group of Liberal Democrats outside the School of African & Oriental Studies at London University and from there we marched with police escort through Covent Garden to Trafalgar Square. I couldn't hear much of the speeches from where I was standing but enjoyed the music and the general camaraderie of the event.
In the afternoon I walked back through Covent Garden and to quench my thirst, went into a little pub called the Lemon Tree which I remembered from my student days. Little had changed, though it now serves Thai food - unlikely in 1963!
Then later I arranged to meet my son Stephen and some friends of his. A nice old pub - The Dog & Duck this time, and standing in the crowded little bar we had interesting conversations about people, life and the universe and enjoyes a pint or two of Timothy Taylor's fine Landlord ale.
After that, I took Stephen to a restaurant I had seen many times before but had never been in. For over 50 years and a long time before the word Gay took on other meanings, The Hungarian restaurant, The Gay Hussar has been serving excellent food to discerning visitors to London. I was not disappointed and we had a very good meal. This visit and having been sent a large quantity of excellent Paprika pepper by a friend in Hungary, I am now fired with enthusiasm to cook goulash and other tasty dishes this winter!
Staying overnight at Stephen's flat, I returned to Bristol on Sunday morning.

Going back to the theme of the march - I should point out that I am not at this point, an all doom and gloom person, far from it and I read with interest the article by Mike Hulme, Professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia, and Director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, who advocates a more measured approach, and warns against media hype. Well worth reading!
If you click on this link and view the Lynne Featherstone film, if you pause it at exactly 50 seconds - there's me in the red parka and green cap on the march!

In memory of the grandfather I never knew

I should not need to make excuses, but just in case one or two of my regular visitors have wondered about my lack of posting, here first is a summary of the reasons: -
Busy if not a little stressed at work, lack of sunshine in my life, some worry about a special person in my life (which is slowly getting better and will resolve soon I hope), a busy time writing for other things and people unconnected with my blog, and generally spending time on things which I do want to write about, but I need to allocate good relaxed time at the PC in order to make some sort of decent composition. So, today Saturday the 11th November I will try and relax and make some meaningful contributions to my blog - starting from NOW!

My father's father George William Phillips, though listed here as a Private, was in fact a Corporal in the Royal Garrison Artillery. He was killed instantly by a direct hit on his dugout on February 25th 1918 and so had survived almost four years of that terrible war, only to be killed in its final months at the age of 27. My father was then aged 4. This day - 11th November is of course Armistice Day - Peace having been declared today in 1918 and I always remember the grandfather I never knew on this day.

What a View!

Very busy and it has been ages since I posted - far too long, but this morning I just want to share two wonderful photos that have been sent to me.

Of my two stepdaughters, one lives near Manchester with her husband and two daughters, Niamh and Lara. They are planning to emigrate soon to Cape Town where the other stepdaughter has lived for several years with her husband and one daughter Lola. The Manchester family visited Cape Town earlier this year and the photos of Lara [1st photo] and Niamh were taken on Bloubergstrand beach on that visit.

Thank you for sending them Lyndsay !

Wild Photos

I have had a busy few days and this post is the first of at least two planned. I had marked in my calendar for Friday to go into Bristol to join in a day at the biennial Wildscreen Festival, specifically the WildPhotos symposium. I make no pretensions for being a wildlife photograher or even a good photographer, but I do want to improve my techniques and was not dissappointed with my day. I learned a great deal, was in the company of the best wildlife photographers in the world - some famous names even, and everyone was made welcome. I came away with my mind buzzing with ideas and also with the stunning images that had been projected onto the theatre screen. I doubt that I will make money with any of my photos, but at least I can aspire to make better use of my Nikon and to explore its capabilities.
Here are a few more links to wonderful material that I collected during the day: -
Nature Picture Library
Xpanding Horizons
ARKive - Images of Life on Earth
Steve Bloom
Staffan Widstrand - Images with an Edge
Niall Benvie - Images from the Edge
Wildlife Pets Environment - Ardea
Plenty of photos to see in the links above but just one of mine - a contented bull Elephant Seal - St Andrews Bay. South Georgia - November 2005

Bird Migration

Today I have been investigating one of the mysteries of bird migration. As a member of the Bristol Ornithological Club, I joined five other men on the sea wall at New Passage, just to the North of Bristol. On arrival I realised that I knew Brian the leader, as he works for the same company as myself; I had not previously known that he is a member of the BOC.

The weather was clear but cloudy with some small patches of blue sky. The tide was out and there was a fair breeze. We saw many small birds, mostly flying up-river in a Northwesterly direction. I asked why this was the predominant direction and found out that no one really knows. The majority of the birds are flying South for the approaching winter, but it seems that they have flown down the West coast from Scotland and Northern England but have then turned inland, West up the Bristol Channel when they reached South Wales. The general trend though, is presumed to be South.

I have been interested in watching birds for as long as I can remember but am a novice when it comes to small bird recognition. My fellow anoraks seemed much more knowledgeable and were able to name the birds from their calls or their “jizz” [size, attitude, manner of flight]. So by the end of the session and having seen thousands of birds flying overhead we had a considerable tally. The most abundant were Chaffinches, of which 2,000 must have flown over in the two hours divided up into large or small parties. Other parties of birds, or single birds that we saw on migration at New Passage were:- Siskin, Greenfinch, Redpoll, Pied and Grey Wagtail, Starling, Reed Bunting, Redwing, Meadow Pipit, Song and Mistle Thrush, Goldfinch, Brambling and Chiffchaff. So no particular rarities or surprises were seen. Now home again after an excellent little excursion, which was followed by a warming breakfast at the Motorway Services at Aust. The photo shows the distant Severn Bridge, looming out of the mist from where we were standing.

Nobel Peace Prize

Many congratulatuons to the Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus who has been awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize not for giving to the poor, but for helping them to help themselves. Here is the article from Time Magazine. It is really good news that against much opposition from right and left wings of the Bangladeshi people and initially from the Muslim establishment, his ideas have been put in place. Now many of the poor, because of these ideas, have now lifted themseles out of poverty. The whole country benefits.

My Photo of the Day

Sunset over Almondsbury, South Gloucestershire - Tuesday October 9th

Even more to worry about

Cataclysmic Events as reported in the October issue of Scientific American may indeed be exacerbated by mankind's poor stewardship of the Earth.

New geochemical evidence is coming from the bands of stratified rock that delineate mass extinction events in the geologic record, including the exciting discovery of chemical residues, called organic biomarkers, produced by tiny life-forms that typically do not leave fossils. Together these data make it clear that cataclysmic impact as a cause of mass extinction was the exception, not the rule. In most cases, the earth itself appears to have become life's worst enemy in a previously unimagined way. And current human activities may be putting the biosphere at risk once again.

How long have we got? How long have these two Cape Petrels got?

+One degree and we are done for

All very worrying to read this in last week's New Scientist: -

"Further global warming of 1 °C defines a critical threshold. Beyond that we will likely see changes that make Earth a different planet than the one we know."
So says Jim Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. Hansen and colleagues have analysed global temperature records and found that surface temperatures have been increasing by an average of 0.2 °C every decade for the past 30 years. Warming is greatest in the high latitudes of the northern hemisphere, particularly in the sub-Arctic boreal forests of Siberia and North America. Here the melting of ice and snow is exposing darker surfaces that absorb more sunlight and increase warming, creating a positive feedback.
Earth is already as warm as at any time in the last 10,000 years, and is within 1 °C of being its hottest for a million years, says Hansen's team. Another decade of business-as-usual carbon emissions will probably make it too late to prevent the ecosystems of the north from triggering runaway climate change, the study concludes (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol 103, p 14288).

My Photo of the Day

Chinstrap penguins (Pygoscelis antarctica)
My personal favourite! Just 10 months ago I was sitting on a rock admiring the view when this little fellow came out of the sea and waddled past me on his way to the nest. Aitcho Islands - Antarctic Peninsula.

El Condor pasa

One of my friends has sent me the Simon and Garfunkel song El Condor pasa, it means much and connects with the general theme of my blog.

I'd rather be a sparrow than a snail.
Yes I would.
If I could,
I surely would.

I'd rather be a hammer than a nail.
Yes I would.
If I only could,
I surely would.

CHORUS
Away, I'd rather sail away
Like a swan that's here and gone
A man gets tied up to the ground
He gives the world
Its saddest sound,
Its saddest sound.

I'd rather be a forest than a street.
Yes I would.
If I could,
I surely would.

I'd rather feel the earth beneath my feet,
Yes I would.
If I only could,
I surely would.