Human Family

I heard this poem on the television this evening.  I'm not sure of the significance because I wasn't actually watching the television but just heard the words and Googled them. I had to share them.

Human Family

I note the obvious differences
in the human family.
Some of us are serious,
some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived
as true profundity,
and others claim they really live
the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones
can confuse, bemuse, delight,
brown and pink and beige and purple,
tan and blue and white.

I've sailed upon the seven seas
and stopped in every land,
I've seen the wonders of the world
not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women
called Jane and Mary Jane,
but I've not seen any two
who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different
although their features jibe,
and lovers think quite different thoughts
while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,
we weep on England's moors,
and laugh and moan in Guinea,
and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,
are born and die in Maine.
In minor ways we differ,
in major we're the same.

I note the obvious differences
between each sort and type,
but we are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.


You can listen to her reading this poem here.

  © by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes

The iPhone as a Camera

Adrian commented recently on one of my posts that "It looks great but a pity you used a camera phone and not a camera. Age comes to us all."  I wasn't clear what age had to do with the price of tripe because I would have though the youngsters rather than oldies like me would be the phone camera generation. I suspect, though, that Adrian has a misconception about modern camera phones. I use my iPhone as a camera all the time: usually for matters of record and for things I want to share with family and friends via WhatsApp, Telegram or iMessage or the like. Most of the time, though, I use my Canon bridge camera or my Pentax K-3.

I'm not suggesting that a phone camera will produce the best photographs but then many of the photos I take with my K-3 don't come up to Adrian's exacting standards (or even my less exacting ones).

However here's a selection which demonstrate what is possible using an iPhone even with my limited abilities.

Flats in central Wellington, New Zealand

Probably the Ground Beetle Carabus clathratu. Grimshader, Isle of Lewis

Glowering clouds over the mouth of the sea loch at Grimshader

The tip of my Parker ball point pen

A Diptera. I wouldn't even know where to start trying to identify which one

The same Diptera

?

Can anyone guess, or does anyone know, what I photographed in the last image? It's not something obscure. I'd be surprised if readers don't use them frequently. 

Chester

Someone recently asked what my favourite city is. I don't have one specific place but Chester is certainly one that holds fond memories and has played quite a part in my life. It is also a beautiful old walled city. I've blogged before about the beautiful old buildings so today I'll just mention that, on Monday, CJ and I went to Chester and decided upon a whim to visit the Chester Cathedral Falconry and Nature Gardens. I've been to a few falconries in my time and I've not been a great lover of birds in captivity. 

However the visit to the falconry (CJ's blog is here) changed my view considerably. It was quite clear that the falconer, Sophie Pegg, had an amazing rapport with the birds. Instead of being poor unhappy captives I saw the birds as rescued or reared and, if a bird is capable of happiness or contentment, then the birds we saw seemed to be content or happy.

I thought  that I was pretty knowledgeable about raptors and, perhaps even vultures. However the talk that Sophie gave was not just entertaining for the children and parents but also for the relative oldies like CJ (sorry CJ) and I. It also completely altered my view of vultures. They are amazing and, of course, necessary creatures.

Sophie with the vulture named Tinker.

I also managed a rather fetching head of a Golden Eagle.

The Wales of Our Youth Revisited

Yesterday, Sunday, my brother CJ, aka Scriptor Senex, and his partner-who-drinks-tea went to Wales. Between us we have spent a lot of our lives in that country and I have particularly fond memories of youthful visits and stays. 60 years ago North Wales wasn't the half hour drive from Liverpool that it now is. River crossings (by tunnel and bridge) were a greater barrier and, of course, there were no motorways and cars were slower. None of us live in Liverpool now and the journey from the family's home on the Wirral into Wales took no time at all.

Many of our visits both for annual holidays and Sunday trips were to the area near Mold and Pantymwyn and Loggerheads in North Wales. It was accessible from Liverpool by bus and we could walk along The Leete (which until now I thought was spelt Leet) between Loggerheads and Pantymwyn or up Moel Famau.

I've walked up Moel Famau many times but my maternal Uncle Eric surpassed that to see the New Year in one year (I think they used to have a bonfire on the top) by riding his motorbike up the mountain. That was probably the late 1920s. Now there is a wide properly maintained track up the mountain: in fact there are many.

We stopped at the top of the Old Bwlch Pass:

The path up Moel Famau from the top of the Old Bwlch Pass

The Old Bwlch Pass looking down into the Vale of Clwyd with the town of Ruthin in the top right of the picture

There seemed to be as many cyclists as cars on the road

but sheep definitely outnumbered the people

Moel Famau ('the mountan with the pimple on the top' we called it) from the road between Ruthin and Denbigh.

The remains of the monument on the top of the mountain which was built to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of George III in 1810.
Photographed by CJ from the same place as the previous photo was taken.