Photo found here
Photo found here
Photo found here
Photo found here
Where do you wish you were today?
Tuesday, 31 August 2010
Wish I Was There Tuesday
A friend of mine has just jetted off to a Greek island for a fortnight's holiday - I am very jealous! I really want to visit Greece someday, and that's where I wish I was today....
Where do you wish you were today?
Where do you wish you were today?
Monday, 30 August 2010
Not-So-Scary Scarecrows
Today is a Bank Holiday (public holiday) in the UK, and I took advantage of the free day to get out walking. One of the neighbouring villages was hosting a Scarecrow Festival....
"Dick Turpin"
"Over The Rainbow"
"Tree-fellas"....
...and their Safety Officer!
"A Knight On The Piste" (Night On The P....?)
Cricket Batsman In Action
And One At Tea
More photos from my walk to follow soon...
Thursday, 26 August 2010
On Penis Pumps, Incest and Cannibalism
Faithful readers, fear not....Nat’s blog is not descending into a cesspit of debauchery just yet (that cowboy picture of yesterday aside of course!). Today, I’m going to tell you about the slightly unsavoury goings on in my household....or rather, in our tropical fish tank.
Tropical fish make excellent pets....they’re pretty to look at, calming to watch, and can just be left to their own devices most of the time. No need to walk them or entertain them, no vet bills and when one of them decides to pop their clogs and swim off to the great big aquarium in the sky, there’s not much standing on ceremony...a quick flush and they’re A for away, although I do insist on a short rendition of The Last Post, ‘air bugle’ style (it’s a bit less naff than an air guitar and more subdued). Going on holiday, which you may have noticed we do fairly often, is no hassle... they could probably survive quite happily without fresh food for at least 2 weeks, but we do have a nifty rotating auto feeder and a friend who is happy to pop in a few times to feed them, in exchange for a couple of bottles of wine.
And the greedy little chaps are very fond of their food....so much so in fact, that I’ve renamed them “The Pigs”. People say fish have a memory span of a few seconds....rubbish! Our fish quickly learnt that someone coming up to the tank invariably means food is imminent, and they will start amassing at the surface, slapping the water with excitement and gasping greedily in anticipation of the falling flakes of fish food (now say that last bit again quickly!). Sometimes, just to wind them up, I first pretend to be dropping food, and watch them flailing about and fighting over invisible food...yes, I do have a cruel side!
But that’s nothing compared to the antics the fish themselves get up to... incest, infanticide, cannibalism....you name it, they’re into it! Woe betide any fish feeling a bit under the weather...I think the technical term is “green about the gills”... as the other, more robust ones will quickly spot a weakling and hasten it on its way to the aforementioned great aquarium in the sky. They have a real taste for sushi too...often not even waiting for the poor fish to gasp its last before they start snacking on its sorry carcass. Unless we’re home to rescue the corpse in time, we could be left with just a skeleton and tail....that’s provided the bottom-feeders and scavenger shrimps don’t find them first. Sometimes a fish just vanishes...
Incest...it’s been said it’s a game the whole family can play, and it’s certainly not a taboo topic when it comes to tropical fish. We started with a group of Mollies – a couple of males, four females. They had some babies (yes, Mollies are born live, not hatched from eggs). Some of them survived, the rest were a tasty snack for the flamboyant Siamese fighting fish (Elvis)...and then the two alpha males died. The fry grew up, the sons started making eyes at their mommies and sisters... and hey presto, we had a whole inbreeding experiment going on. We also had a population explosion in the tank...Elvis ate himself to death (quite literally he ate and ate baby fish until he died), but even he couldn’t keep up with the rate the fry were popping out. Now we’ve just decided to let natural selection take its course...inbreeding will eventually out, and there are already a couple of wonky-looking fish in that tank. Unable to swim very well, they are not long for this world....
But in the meantime, that many fish means an awful lot of fish poop....and someone’s got to clean that up...which brings me nicely onto the headlining act of this sordid little tale: the Penis Pump! Mind in the gutter I may have, but I bet you would have been thinking exactly the same if you were presented with what is apparently a siphoning pump for cleaning the surface of the gravel, that looks something like this....
But which I reckon is more like this....
Whatever, all I know is that once a fortnight that “Penis Pump” comes out of storage, there’s an awful lot of sucking and blowing going on... and sometimes there’s a big wet patch left on the lounge floor.....
A Den of Iniquity
Tropical fish make excellent pets....they’re pretty to look at, calming to watch, and can just be left to their own devices most of the time. No need to walk them or entertain them, no vet bills and when one of them decides to pop their clogs and swim off to the great big aquarium in the sky, there’s not much standing on ceremony...a quick flush and they’re A for away, although I do insist on a short rendition of The Last Post, ‘air bugle’ style (it’s a bit less naff than an air guitar and more subdued). Going on holiday, which you may have noticed we do fairly often, is no hassle... they could probably survive quite happily without fresh food for at least 2 weeks, but we do have a nifty rotating auto feeder and a friend who is happy to pop in a few times to feed them, in exchange for a couple of bottles of wine.
And the greedy little chaps are very fond of their food....so much so in fact, that I’ve renamed them “The Pigs”. People say fish have a memory span of a few seconds....rubbish! Our fish quickly learnt that someone coming up to the tank invariably means food is imminent, and they will start amassing at the surface, slapping the water with excitement and gasping greedily in anticipation of the falling flakes of fish food (now say that last bit again quickly!). Sometimes, just to wind them up, I first pretend to be dropping food, and watch them flailing about and fighting over invisible food...yes, I do have a cruel side!
Funny fish 'foto' found here
But that’s nothing compared to the antics the fish themselves get up to... incest, infanticide, cannibalism....you name it, they’re into it! Woe betide any fish feeling a bit under the weather...I think the technical term is “green about the gills”... as the other, more robust ones will quickly spot a weakling and hasten it on its way to the aforementioned great aquarium in the sky. They have a real taste for sushi too...often not even waiting for the poor fish to gasp its last before they start snacking on its sorry carcass. Unless we’re home to rescue the corpse in time, we could be left with just a skeleton and tail....that’s provided the bottom-feeders and scavenger shrimps don’t find them first. Sometimes a fish just vanishes...
Incest...it’s been said it’s a game the whole family can play, and it’s certainly not a taboo topic when it comes to tropical fish. We started with a group of Mollies – a couple of males, four females. They had some babies (yes, Mollies are born live, not hatched from eggs). Some of them survived, the rest were a tasty snack for the flamboyant Siamese fighting fish (Elvis)...and then the two alpha males died. The fry grew up, the sons started making eyes at their mommies and sisters... and hey presto, we had a whole inbreeding experiment going on. We also had a population explosion in the tank...Elvis ate himself to death (quite literally he ate and ate baby fish until he died), but even he couldn’t keep up with the rate the fry were popping out. Now we’ve just decided to let natural selection take its course...inbreeding will eventually out, and there are already a couple of wonky-looking fish in that tank. Unable to swim very well, they are not long for this world....
'Elvis' - found here
But in the meantime, that many fish means an awful lot of fish poop....and someone’s got to clean that up...which brings me nicely onto the headlining act of this sordid little tale: the Penis Pump! Mind in the gutter I may have, but I bet you would have been thinking exactly the same if you were presented with what is apparently a siphoning pump for cleaning the surface of the gravel, that looks something like this....
Dubious contraption found here
But which I reckon is more like this....
Not My Bag Baby - found here
Whatever, all I know is that once a fortnight that “Penis Pump” comes out of storage, there’s an awful lot of sucking and blowing going on... and sometimes there’s a big wet patch left on the lounge floor.....
Wednesday, 25 August 2010
Just A Bunch Of Cowboys
Cowboy Eye-Candy found here
Phwoar!
Unfortunately, the cowboys I came across in Canada weren't anything like this.
They were quite wooden, really.....
Stampede Park - Williams Lake, BC
And these guys were pretty two-dimensional....
Cartoon cowboys on a walkway in Calgary
Hee-Haw!
Soliciters posing as cowboys - now usually that would be....
Happy Hump Day, y'all!
Tuesday, 24 August 2010
Wish I Was There Tuesday
The weather in the UK at the moment can be summed up in one word:
SOGGY!
So, today I'm dreaming of being somewhere dry and sunny....and it doesn't get much drier than the Sahara Desert! In one of my earliest blog posts, I wrote about my adventures in Egypt....if you're interested, you can read more over here. Today I'm going to share some more of my photos from this trip with you.....
The pyramids at Giza
The Sphinx
Ship of the desert
Felucas on the Nile
Temple of Hatshepsut
Temple of Hatshepsut
Temple of Karnak, Luxor
So where do you wish you were today?
Sunday, 22 August 2010
An English Country Garden
This weekend, I was down in the Sussex countryside, and visited the gardens of Michelham Priory. It was a bit of a showery day, but I managed to take a few photos....
Hope your weekends were fun!
Friday, 20 August 2010
But Is It Art?
A selection of sculptures from my Canadian Collection....
Happy weekend everyone!
Jaume Plensa’s WE in profile - Sunset Beach, Vancouver
Gillian Ley's 'Floribunda' Orca at The Victoria Regent Hotel
'Maximilian' by Sara Gifford, Jane Van Sickle & Michael Hofmann - Victoria Inner Harbour
Hupacasath Welcome Figure - Port Alberni BC
Hupacasath Welcome Figure - Port Alberni BC
Woman with eagle - Ucluelet, Vancouver Island
Port Hardy Carrot Campaign monument
Sign reads: "This carrot, marking the northern end of the Island Highway, is a symbol of government road building promises, dangled in front of north island settlers since 1897. The successful late 1970's "Carrot Campaign" was aimed at making the government keep promises of a completed Island Highway."
Inukshuk on Whistlers Mountain - near Jasper
Big Head - Canmore, Alberta
Happy weekend everyone!
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
And The Weather Forecast Is.....Rather Funny
I've mentioned before that many Brits are more than a tad obsessed with the weather.... but recent antics on the BBC News Channel are enough to get everyone paying attention to the forecasts.
Weatherman Tomasz Schafernaker was caught live on TV flicking a bird to his off-camera breakfast show colleagues.....
That just made him look like he was trying to pull a two-up instead!
Meanwhile in other weather-related news......
Why does it always rain on me?
Is it because I lied when I was seventeen?
No, Travis...it's because we live in the UK! Apparently our summer is pretty much over, thanks to the jet stream (the fast-flowing ribbons of air in the upper atmosphere that move weather systems across the northern hemisphere)....the same phenomenon is thought to have contributed to the devastating floods in Pakistan, mudslides in China, and killer heatwave and wildfires in Russia.
We can expect temperatures to start dropping and rain showers to ensue. But, come rain or shine I need to keep moving.... in just over three weeks' time I'll be walking a charity half-marathon, so I need to step up my training plan.
Walking boots, ipod, phone, brolly.... check!
And blue sky thinking
I've heard that a good way to get fit is to carry extra weight as you walk...I'm pretty sure that means in my backpack and not on the bottom of my boot....
Ain't nothing gonna break my stride
Nobody's gonna slow me down
Oh no, I've got to keep on moving
Ain't nothing gonna break my stride
I'm running and I won't touch ground
Oh no, I've got to keep on moving
[Men At Work - Ain't Nothing Gonna Hold Me Down]
Photos ofnaughty boy weatherman found here.
Weatherman Tomasz Schafernaker was caught live on TV flicking a bird to his off-camera breakfast show colleagues.....
Realising his gaffe, Tomasz quickly tried to cover his rude gesture by pretending he was just going to scratch his chin....or perhaps smoking an imaginary cigarette...
That just made him look like he was trying to pull a two-up instead!
Meanwhile in other weather-related news......
Why does it always rain on me?
Is it because I lied when I was seventeen?
No, Travis...it's because we live in the UK! Apparently our summer is pretty much over, thanks to the jet stream (the fast-flowing ribbons of air in the upper atmosphere that move weather systems across the northern hemisphere)....the same phenomenon is thought to have contributed to the devastating floods in Pakistan, mudslides in China, and killer heatwave and wildfires in Russia.
We can expect temperatures to start dropping and rain showers to ensue. But, come rain or shine I need to keep moving.... in just over three weeks' time I'll be walking a charity half-marathon, so I need to step up my training plan.
Walking boots, ipod, phone, brolly.... check!
Rainy days
I've heard that a good way to get fit is to carry extra weight as you walk...I'm pretty sure that means in my backpack and not on the bottom of my boot....
Meanwhile, the local farmers are making hay while the sun does actually shine....
Ain't nothing gonna break my stride
Nobody's gonna slow me down
Oh no, I've got to keep on moving
Ain't nothing gonna break my stride
I'm running and I won't touch ground
Oh no, I've got to keep on moving
[Men At Work - Ain't Nothing Gonna Hold Me Down]
Photos of
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