Category: Birds

Strawberry Vodka – 9 August 2015

Posted on by Zogman

A day of doing lots some of the things I’d been planning to do and adding some lots more things to my to-do list.

No painting today, but I did get a painting framed. It was actually the sketch for my latest watercolour. Quite often I find that the sketches are fresher and more interesting than the finished product. That was the case here. One of my problems with framing when working from an existing picture frame is doing the calculations for positioning the aperture in the mat card. Today I spent over an hour writing spreadsheet that would solve that particular problem for me in Excel on a Mac. After it was done and shared on the excellent Dropbox, I tried loading it on to Excel on the Samsung tablet. What a surprise, Excel refused to format it properly and wouldn’t allow me to add numbers into the cells. It also wouldn’t allow me to save anything without me logging in or registering. As if I was going to do anything as stupid as that. Microsoft? Stick a fork in them, they’re done. Thankfully I managed to get a totally free app Free Office Plan Maker Mobile (you need to do something with that name folks) to load it and present it as it was on the Mac. It worked perfectly fist time. It only took me about two hours to go from opening Excel on the Mac to getting the margin sizes for the mat from the Samsung. If I’d done it with pencil and paper it would have taken me about 15 minutes max, but where’s the fun in that? Much better to use technology to simplify things … I think.

DSC_3247- blog--221Photography took a bit of a back seat, but I managed to get some shots of DSC_3254- blog--221a dunnock in the garden in the afternoon. I first saw them a couple of years ago and now they seem to be quite common visitors all year, only feeding on the ground, never attempting the bird feeders. Also started a new batch of strawberry vodka – a great summer drink. Basically it’s strawberries soaked in vodka. Keep in the fridge for three days, stirring daily. After three days, decant and drink (responsibly 😉 ) with lemonade.

Warning! DON’T ATTEMPT TO EAT THE STRAWBERRIES!!

Hopefully I’ll remember to take a photo of the finished product, DV.

The evening was spent trying to repair a dodgy old Sony camcorder with refused to accept the video cassette. Thanks Sony for a wasted evening and a realisation that your company has lost a lot of it’s reputation for solid workmanship.

 

The day that the rains came down – 27 July 2015

Posted on by Zogman

Sometimes after a particularly busy weekend, like this one was, we just want to relax on a Monday.  Today that relaxation was somewhat forced upon us.  From when I woke at 7.45am until now at around 10.00pm it has rained non-stop.  What’s worse, is that we have the same to look forward to tomorrow apparently and little let up on Wednesday.  On Thursday the rain will halt for a while to allow the entrance of northerly gales.  Oh what fun, and this is summer?  Personally I blame the Tories and Nicola Sturgeon.  Probably Alex Salmond is in the mix somewhere too, because there isn’t a pie he hasn’t got his finger in.  I’m hoping against hope that we’ll get an Indian Summer.  Some lovely balmy breezes in late September and early October.  We’ll probably need them to melt the snow.

The only photos I got today were these ones of sparrow scuds (young birds) waiting impatiently to be fed.

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Burds – 19 July 2015

Posted on by Zogman

Despite it being colder than normal last night, I was too hot and couldn’t sleep.  So about 4.00am, I got up and had myself some cereal for a very early breakfast then went back to bed.  Even at that early hour, the birds were singing.

Finally woke around 8.30am and made real breakfast (more cereal) for us both.  While I was waiting for my tea to brew, I threw out a couple of stale slices of my lovely homemadeDSC_2969- blog--200 bread, for the birds.  This immediately attracted the corvidae population.  These scavengers are really taking over this year with crows, ravens, jackdaws and the ubiquitous magpies which I detest.  This is the first year I’ve seen so many of them.  They seem to arrive in masses to roost on rooftops all around us and, of course, grab any food that’s going.  I’m thinking of making a cage DSC_2966- blog--200that will cover the bread scraps with a mesh big enough to allow the smaller birds through, but prevent these black rogues from stealing any.  One of them sidled along the fence until it was within snatching distance, or so it thought.  Thankfully, I only have to grab the door handle and they are off on a sortie around the houses before returning for another look.  Actually, I don’t mind them as much as the pigeons.  The crow family are at least wild.  The pigeons live in a pigeon loft a couple of streets away and if left to it, can hoover up a whole loaf in no time.  Big fat rats with wings.  Not the brightest lights on the tree either.  My brother used to shoot them with an air rifle and said it took two or three slugs before they noticed that they were dead!

After the pigeon and crow watch, I restarted my painting, this time with oils.  I just painted on top of the acrylic (which was on top of a watercolour!)  As far as I can remember, you can paint oil on top of acrylic, but not the other way round.  If I get up tomorrow and find that the whole thing has slid down off the easel onto a pile on the floor, I’ll know I’ve got it wrong.  Anyway, I think it looks better and it’s has a much more tactile painting with oils rather than painting with acrylic – it’s like painting with soft butter – a strange analogy, but that’s the way I see it.

Salsa in the Garage tonight and it was really good and very hot.  We surely lost a kg or two at least.  Lots of people from our class there as it is Fair Monday tomorrow and the STUC is closed.  So no salsa classes this week unless we go to help with the beginners on Wednesday.  We’ll see.

Hoping to try out the bike carrier tomorrow if the rain stays away.