Seagull breakfast

After the extreme cold of the last two winters, the recent mild conditions have taken us by surprise. (Tomorrow’s forecast, for instance, is for a virtually tropical thirteen degrees Celsius!)

We’re not the only ones to be confused though. The local seagulls, who never show their beaks around here till the first hard frosts arrive, turned up around mid-November, and have looked–and most likely felt–somewhat out of place ever since.

Forget what those wiseguys on BBC Springwatch are always saying about not giving seagulls, or any other birds, bread, because it has no nutritional value for them: most birds, and seagulls especially, will ignore the ‘decent’ food (such as small bits of fruit) and go straight for the Warburton’s crusts–although not if I get them first!

Jackdaws, magpies, crows, and even pigeons will hunt around for things to eat; I know, because I’ve watched them often enough. Urban gulls, however, make zero effort. They simply sit on a nearby roof till someone chucks something out, and only then will they make a move. If you’re being charitable you could say they are sensibly conserving energy, but I prefer to think of them by the affectionate Aussie slang name of ‘bludgers’. (FYI, I have no connection with Australia and have never been there, but I did watch the Aussie soap ‘Home and Away’ a few times many years ago.)

A good wheeze is to wait till there are a couple of dozen gulls lined up on the roof opposite and then, with no intention of throwing out even a single morsel, just open the window a tiny bit. Those gulls will be down on your front lawn before you can so much as think ‘greedy goblins’. Well, that’ll teach ‘em not to be so keen, won’t it?

Sometimes I like to catch the eye of the alpha male (if gulls have such things) or Number One Beak, and mouth the words ‘Actually, I prefer crows!’ You don’t half get some filthy looks back, I can tell you. Or maybe I’m just anthropomorphising again.

If I’m feeling bold, though, I might mention the Scottish isle of St Kilda. The islanders (Kilda was evacuated in 1930) used to live on a diet of mostly seabirds and seabirds’ eggs, so I like to remind the gulls of that. I do this by standing at the window and announcing that all those gulls flying around those stale bits of the downstairs neighbours’ discarded Mighty White ‘look like a St Kilda breakfast’. Shana says I’m a bit mean, but I’m only joshing really. Just to be on the safe side though, I think I’ll stay this side of the double glazed windows while those birds are about. Oh, and if you think it’s going a bit far, wearing a hard hat indoors, well, you can’t be too careful, can you?

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Uninjaversity Challenge

Can’t wait for 2012 to get here. Not because of the Olympics, but because University Challenge will return from its Christmas break, and it has, as ever, been not only educating us (too late for me now though, alas!) but entertaining us hugely.

One outstanding character from Uni Challenge this year has been one James or Jamie Karran, the team captain of UCL, who has big hair and a fine line in wit. In the most recent round, Paxman asked which bird family owls belonged to. The apparently clueless Karran grinned sheepishly and, giving the Paxmeister a double thumbs-up gesture, replied ‘Buntings.’ This elicited a classic comedy moment, with Paxman’s reply being a double thumbs-down sign, along with the answer that owls are Strigiformes. (Yep. Like anyone cared by then, but thanks anyway.) We’ll be joking about that for a long time to come, I’m sure.

One post on the UK Gameshows site revealed that Karran was wearing a Naruto headband. After a little searching, it seems that Karran’s headband–worn as a pendant–bore the symbol for the Village of Grass, aka Kusagakure. Naruto is a popular mange or anime series all about ninjas (surprise surprise) and different locations each have their own identification symbols. If you want to know any more, go and read the wiki in the link above. And pay attention, because, as we are fond of saying, you never know when it might crop up as a question on Uni Challenge.

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Dandruff

If you’ve just arrived here, sorry to have woken you up. It was just a title I thought of off the top of my head. Nothing to read here. Move along…

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Mop

Shana’s been splashing the cash again–or rather the Clubcard points. This time (just before Christmas actually but I thought I’d wait for the excitement of Chrimbo to die down a bit before revealing the news) she got me something practical. ‘It’s a mop!’ I said, admiring its delicately wrought plastic construction and microfibre technology. Shana soon set me right though. Apparently it’s not just a mop: it’s an exercise mop. I’ll try it out soon (promise). I’ll probably pretend it’s a punting pole. Our galley kitchen floor can stand in for the Thames or the Cam. And just to mix my nautical references, I shall mime the refined art of punting with the yohoho of a hearty sea shanty. I might look like a reject from the Gondoliers, but I’ll tell you what: by the time I’m finished you’ll be able to eat your dinner off that floor, and I’ll be ten times fitter too.

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