Week 187, Unidentified waterfowl

In lieu of any form of decent photographic representation I have here a Google 'auto-awesome' panorama created from my attempts to get an image of this floating-wildlife which I'd captured for later identification.

It is too small for any practical purpose.

Even the original makes it hard-pressed to identify - unless of course you are knowledgable in this realm.

The realm of wildlife identification that is.

There were a pair of them, black face and beak/bill, a lighter bit on the top of the head, white body, darker (grey/pink, who knows, I'm red/green colour blind so haven't a clue) along the wings and much darker at the tail.*

They refused to answer my question "what are you?" so are probably non-native monoglots and didn't understand what I was saying.

That is all.

* A bit like a black headed gull but with a different coloured hat and not as distinct towards the rear.

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Week 186, Moon shot

It was a beautifully clear night yesterday evening, I noticed that the moon was visible through the upstairs window so I thought I'd see if I could get a rapid shot of it. I'd just heard that Alan Bean, the last of the astronauts from the Apollo 12 mission, had died. I'd followed all of the moon landings, one of my earliest memories is watching the Apollo 11 landing at nearly 3am UK time after my parents got me out of bed and there's a fascination in it that still remains.

Twelve astronauts from six Apollo missions walked on the moon and there are now only four still alive. I'm not convinced we'll go to the moon again, given the nature of the cost and funding, not unless the peculiar anti-science stance in certain sectors of leadership changes. So their twelve sets of footprints will be an out-of-sight memory of those events. And I'm not sure what there is to be gained by returning unless it is used as a jumping off point for further exploration.

Whatever happens, the moon will outlast us all, and if it doesn't we'll be in serious bother.

Hello Moon!

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Week 185, Training walk pole-dance

I went for a short walk on Thursday in preparation for The Big Walk, a charity event due on 22 June. This was essentially a dress rehearsal or 'walk simulation' as it might be dubbed, and I set off along Rivelin Valley away from the city.

After an hour I was already starting to feel tired, I was pouring with sweat and it occurred to me that there was no way I was going to make the distance I intended, that of 24km (15miles). At the ninety minute mark I sat down for the only time during the walk, this was a break of 2 minutes at the top of Wyoming Brook where I took off my Camelbak and my t-shirt (to give it some air...) and ate a banana. I put everything back on and continued with my march and within 10 minutes the banana, a fruit that I'm not particularly keen on, had taken effect and I felt reinvigorated. I suspect the glasses of wine the night before, and the single Weetabix covered in natural yoghurt and honey I'd had for breakfast, weren't the ideal training diet. I ate an energy bar as I carried on and picked up the pace toward Stanage Pole.

My feet had been feeling sore since about the hour mark, but as I approached 2 hours in it was obvious that what I thought earlier were potentially walk-ending blisters were nothing more than just general foot heat. This heat was somewhat surprising as walking isn't new to me. There was quite a bit of interesting wildlife, I saw the head of some strange creature that I assumed was a type of fancy chicken until the whole body appeared, I checked later and it turned out to be a lapwing.

It was quite windy approaching the pole and there was what looked like horizontal rain blowing across in front of me. This was dust from dry weather on the moors and from where one of the Redmires tree plantations had been chopped down.

Walking along Stanage Edge it was very windy, quite a few walkers were wrapped up like it was midwinter, but as they'd walked up from being parked on the road they weren't keeping warm from the fire generated by calorie burning - they looked at me as though I was mad for wearing a t-shirt and shorts. There were a few climbers up there and one person painting a watercolour of the valley below, their canvas was well held to their easel by numerous points and was weighted down. There was little to see due to the dust but the painter had probably been there from before the visibility had gone, they certainly had a more detailed image than was currently available, maybe they were painting from memory.

I clambered around Cowper Stone and dropped down and made my way to Burbage Bridge. At this point I didn't fancy the road and a walk to Ringinglow so I turned and retraced my steps to Redmires and then back to Crosspool along the road. The walk came to 30.1km in total (18.6 miles) and for the last couple of km I was definitely feeling as though I'd done a bit of exercise. I thought it was a decent test and have a good idea of where to tweak my footwear, clothing and what I take with me in the bag (no camera next time, too bulky, too heavy, no point), so next time out I'll see what differences those changes make.

This is what it's for -

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/andy-horne-tbw

In the heart of the dust storm stands a muppet headed man

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Week 184, Post-millennial angst

Listening to The News Quiz on the Home Service - or wireless 4 as I know it, or indeed BBC Radio 4 to anyone born after Thatcher - I discover that I have now been moved, evicted from Generation X to that of the status of Baby Boomer.

Sod that.

I'm the very definition of a 'latchkey kid', disaffected youth with the characteristics of that of a slacker and being influenced by hip-hop and grunge.

For goodness sake I couldn't afford to buy a house until I was in my forties, come on now, how un-Boomer is that?

So who falls for this categorisation? - well, me clearly as I'm mightily unimpressed by being moved from the way more hip sounding X generation to the frankly staid Boomer...

Obviously, being of the X generation I have great cynicism about this type of arbitrary demographic categorisation. However, Wikipedia has this to say about Generation X:

Guides regarding managing multiple generations in the workforce describe Gen Xers as: independent, resourceful, self-managing, adaptable, cynical, pragmatic, skeptical of authority, and as seeking a work life balance.

In the United Kingdom, a 2016 study of over 2,500 office workers conducted by Workfront found that survey respondents of all ages selected those from Generation X as the hardest-working employees in today's workforce (chosen by 60%). Gen X was also ranked highest among fellow workers for having the strongest work ethic (chosen by 59.5%), being the most helpful (55.4%), the most skilled (54.5%), and the best troubleshooters/problem solvers (41.6%).

And who am I to argue with the amassed knowledge and accuracy of Wikipedia.  Just be sure not to put us X'ers in the wrong category, otherwise we will rise up against you, and your authority will be tested severely.

...if we can get round to it.*

Me in grunge mode, too poor to afford sleeves

* The slacker instinct is still strong.

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Week 183, Piet Mondrian delivery

As much as the Spanish Inquisition was generally expected, this pastiche of Piet Mondrian was unexpected.

The delivery of the avant-garde.


Fun fact number one - 

After Mondrian moved from the Netherlands to join the Parisian avant-garde he dropped an 'a' from his name.


Fun fact number two - 

These boxes contain a type of fastener referred to as an 'anchoring system', colloquially they are Hilti bolts.


Fun fact number three - 

Aardvark is not the first word in the modern dictionary, and neither is Mondriaan.


Fun fact number four - 

The avant-garde may be considered modernist and 'old hat' yet it continues to appear when unforeseen.


Fun fact number five -

People almost always already know most of the 'facts' on those website lists of 'things you didn't know'.


Bonus fun fact - 

'a', the indefinite article and the first item listed in the dictionary, has more than a score definitions.

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