Category Archives: memes

memes

Listography : Christmas

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Kate’s Listography this week asks that we write about five things which make Christmas, Christmas for us. So …

King’s College Carols. The traditional service of Nine Lessons and Carols has been broadcast from King’s College Chapel, Cambridge on Christmas Eve afternoon since before I was born. There will be very few years when I’ve not heard it. For me this is the real start of the Christmas festivities and is always associated in my mind with the smell of baking mince pies!
Fairy Lights. There have to be fairy lights. As a very minimum fairy lights on the tree. But these days we usually indulge in a few more, depending on our fancy at the time. And I like to see twinkly lights anywhere and everywhere at Christmas. Somehow they bring out the spirit of happiness.

Royal Institution Lectures. Every year the Royal Institution in London puts on a series of science lectures for children (really aimed at young teenagers) and over the years just about every respected scientist in the UK has presented them. Each year is a different theme, by a single lecturer. And for many years now they have been televised; I remember some very early televised lectures by Prof. Eric Laithwaite on engineering! This year I’m delighted that they are once again being televised by the BBC; although they are now only three lectures (there used to be five or six) hopefully this means they will have been less dumbed down than of recent years when commercial TV has broadcast them.

Carols. I like carols. I always have done. Yes, I like a good sing, but I also have fond memories of singing carols in the choir at school and of carol singing. Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas with out some good carol singing.

Opening presents round the fire on Christmas morning. This is a childhood tradition which Noreen and I have kept. Christmas morning sees us sitting round the fire, usually with a large gin & tonic, opening our main presents. Another present tradition from my childhood which we keep is having small (in size and value) presents under the tree which we open after tea on Christmas Day evening.

These are just some of the essential ingredients of my Christmas.

Happy Christmas, Everyone!
amusements, memes

Amusing Meme

One of my Facebook contacts has posted a curious and amusing little meme. It may be an old one, but I’ve not seen it before. It goes like this …

  1. Your real name: Keith Marshall
  2. Your detective name (favourite colour and favourite animal): Yellow Cat
  3. Your soap opera name (middle name and street you live on): Cullingworth Ennismore
  4. Your Star Wars name (first 3 letters of last name, first 2 of middle name, first 2 of first, last 3 of last): Marcu Keall
  5. Superhero name (Colour of your shirt and first item to your right): Null Mouse
  6. Goth name (black and name of one of your pets): Black Harry

Well the last three work fairly well; I have reservations about the rest.

Anyone else dare to try this and post the results?

memes, natural history, photography

[50/52] Ring-Neck Parakeet

Ring-Neck Parakeet
Click the image for a larger version
Week 50 entry for 52 weeks challenge.

Ring-Neck Parakeet this afternoon on one of our seed feeders. We seem to have two or three visit several times a day; I’ve no idea if they are the same birds all the time, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they have their own defined feeding territories.

I know a lot of people don’t like these birds, but I do. OK they’re not native but they are colourful, brash, noisy, intelligent and incredibly comic to watch. Their body isn’t a lot bigger than a blackbird, but they’ll stand their ground against a magpie, which is noticeably bigger. One bird will be respectful of a magpie but won’t give in to it easily. Two birds is more than a match for a single magpie. I’ve noticed this recently as our magpies have decided to try raiding the seed feeders, which they don’t find easy but they’re determined birds! Two parakeets on a feeder beats one magpie. One parakeet will give way, but not by a lot!

I also discovered recently that there is a big (like 2500 birds) parakeet roost at Wormwood Scrubs (the open ground and trees just north of HM’s hotel), which is only about 5 miles away as the parrot flies. I suspect our birds belong to this roost as we often see them and others flying in that direction around dusk.