Miss Muffet

It can be amazing what one finds when going through old papers and so on. I am completely useless at drawing and rarely attempt anything which vaguely requires an artistic hand - like writing my name! However I came across a sketch I'd drawn (presumably copied knowing me) back in the early 1960s and it amused me so I thought I'd share it:

I assume that my warped sense of humour was thinking of the following nursery rhyme at the time:

Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet
Eating her curds and whey,
Along came a spider,
Who sat down beside her
And frightened Miss Muffet away
(or, in this case, didn't!)

Now Ain't That The Truth

All Creatures Great and Small

I'm definitely having a few days of involvement with the feathered and furry creatures in the neighbourhood.

Yesterday started with two cats from the area having a really massive battle in the garden leaving it covered in fur. My attempts to separate them before I had to take one home to an owner in a black sack were not proving fruitful and were exposing my uncovered legs to potential excessive brutality (not that even a thick pair of jeans would have afforded much protection had they turned on me). My eventual solution was to turn the high pressure hose on them. Water is always a great favourite with cats!

Then, as I was idly watching the world, a rock dove kept circling the house sometimes very close. Suddenly I realised that it's 'companion' was not in fact another rock dove but a bird of prey with a significant white throat area. At one point it became difficult to know which was chasing which. There are Merlins in the area. Merlins are similar in size to pigeons but, so far as I can see, don't usually take them. However they do take their prey by flying with them (compared with Peregrine Falcons which tend to swoop down on their prey). So it looks very much as though this was a particularly enthusiastic Merlin.

Talking of rock doves they and the starlings are becoming a nuisance again. The Study roof is covered in their droppings and the starlings are driving the sparrows away from their feeders. As I write this there are 25 rock doves and countless starlings on the feeders and ground around them and one sparrow braving the starlings' beaks. Hmmm.

Now if anyone thinks that pigeons are bright let me disabuse them of that notion. I have a pond. It has a 'beach' area so that the birds can easily have a drink or bathe or whatever. This morning I was distracted from the computer by a splashing on the pond. A solitary collared dove was standing on the surround to the pond and trying to lean in (a drop of about 4 inches) to have a drink. He (or she) kept falling off the edge. After a while he realised this was not going to work so he tried to land on the water. Pigeons are not equipped for this task. He didn't know that. Time and again he tried and time and again he failed to manage to walk on the water. Eventually ie by the time I came to my senses and managed to power up the camera, he realised the error of his ways and flew off. I've not seen him since.

I wonder what other exciting things will happen today.

But I'm Already Old and Boring!

This is not a book review. In fact it's not really a reviewable book anyway. CJ left it on my computer when he was here. I'm not sure whether it was just to look at or a gift or whether he was trying to tell me something. Anyway I seem to have inherited it. Perhaps I should take it as a compliment; the implication being that I'm not yet old and boring despite what it says in my 'About Me' at the side of this blog. OK whilst having breakfast I've just read some of the things one is required to do. The first, and very obvious, thing is that this is NOT aimed at someone of my advanced years. It needs to be re-written for people who are so that we can show that we don't have to be boring when we are old. I thought that it might help me escape this label I've had to live with.

Mind you in recent years I've whitewater rafted over the highest commercially run fall in the Southern Hemisphere, hellihiked up a glacier, paraglided off a mountain top (ok it was just a very high hill),
climbed up (and down into the crater of) a volcano (ok it is a dormant one), taken the decision to live my life in two halves on opposite sides of the world, learned to play croquet (and if anyone thinks that's for old softies they are very much mistaken), and entered blogland. Awe come on. surely that beats camping in the garden, starting a secret society, playing a computer game to the end and, wait for it, making a unique milk shake.

Perhaps I'm not quite so old and boring as I thought.