Walk around Victoria park this afternoon. Warm and quite sunny. Lots of small damselflies out on the pond.
#SilentSunday #flora #bees
Belonging
Read Belonging By Amanda Thomson
ONE AUGUST, WALKING HIGH ON the Cairngorm Plateau, small groups of swifts came and went up and over us, slicing and screeching the air, moving north to south, arching, spiralling up and over, on their way again.
It is estimated that there might be as many as 90,000 seabirds on Mingulay during the summer, and on the day I was there, there were perhaps thirty people on the whole island – our presence so fleeting. It was clear that everything would go on, whether or not we were there, indeed despite us being there, and as a gust whipped up to unsteady us and we found ourselves suddenly too close to the edge, or on a bank down to another cliff edge that was slippier or steeper than we’d imagined, we knew how vulnerable, how remote, how isolated we were.
A wonderful book. Touches on so many things, some I know a bit about, trout flies, others new to me, the process of etching. Travels, walks, bird ringing & ecological surveys mix with family history. Lists of old Scot’s words for weather, gpx tracks turned into art. Capercaillies, hares and moths.
Read: The Savage Landscape by Cal Fly ★★★★ 📚
Travelogue & wide ranging exploration of the idea of wilderness. Indigenous people, conservation, history, fiction & religion. The author digs through idea & puts herself in the picture, questioning her own ideas & coming up against lots of contradictions. Lots to think about. Curious & surprising details.
Travelogue & wide ranging exploration of the idea of wilderness. Indigenous people, conservation, history, fiction & religion. The author digs through idea & puts herself in the picture, questioning her own ideas & coming up against lots of contradictions. Lots to think about. Curious & surprising details.
Read: The Mighty Red by Louise Erdrich ★★★★ 📚
IN SOME PLACES, lambsquarters is considered the Prince of Greens, one of the most nutritious greens ever analyzed; it was one of the earliest agricultural crops of the Americas. It also resembles amaranth, but the brothers rarely spoke of that. The rough-cut men were preparing to eradicate one of the most nutritious plants on earth in favor of growing he sugar beet, perhaps the least nutritious plant on earth. Evolution thought this was hilarious.
A very mixed up novel, romance, farming, ecology, a series of bank robberies, local gossip & lots more. Often hilarious, enjoyable & thought provoking.
#SilentSunday
TIL copy all tabs in iOS safari. On mac, I have a nice wee AppleScript that copies to the clipboard links to all my open tabs in Safari’s top window. I’ve always been a bit frustrated that I couldn’t do the same on iOS. But I can. Tab view then the ellipsis at the top right, copy n tabs.
Sunday Morning on the Braes
Walked out to Dumcolm on Sunday morning. A quiet day, although it looked as if it was getting busy later. Lots of birds singing, lots of flowers showing. Warm, sunny until 9am or so, then light cloud.
As I came back to Loch Humphrey from Duncolm an osprey was fishing over the loch. Didn’t get a great look or photo, exciting anyway.
Green Woodpecker calling from the trees below the muir. Lots of cuckoos all morning, finally got a half decent snap along the fence around the native trees before the Loch. Butterflies, from about half eight lots of green-veined whites & orange tips. Less when the sun was behind clouds.A painted lady on the muir and then another on the paths above the wood. A small cooper sunning on the paths, while I watched it left and flew low over the herbage beside the path, a green hairstreak came up out of the grass and they circled around. Didn’t manage a snap of the hairstreak, first I’ve seen here. I stepped off the path to avoid a cyclist and saw a wee lizard wriggle away in the heather & moss at my feet.
Despite being a holiday weekend the paths were relatively quiet. There seemed to be some flora or fauna of interest all the way. lovely morning, 15 minutes drive from the city.
Map, notes & photos: walkmap
#SilentSunday
Likes Pixabots
I made a tiny pixel character creator called Pixabots. It generates 10,752 unique combinations from four categories — eyes, heads, bodies, and tops — all bouncing on a little idle loop.
This pack is a curated 2,000 of them, ready to use. Free.
Not sure where I saw this, there is a live editor at Pixabots — Pixel Character Avatars which is fun. Could be useful in class I think. Perhaps in Scratch when an uploaded gif is turned into a sprite with a costume for each frame.