Natural highs and lows

There's still precious little to report due to having little appetite for walking or wildlife watching in horizontal rain. Since I returned to work, every job which was outside has been carried out in the wet. And every indoor job has been accompanied by sunny skies. Go figure. For example, this week we have had: Monday (outside and dreich), Tuesday (indoors and glorious), Wednesday (outside and dreich), Thursday (was supposed to be outside but ended up being indoors and glorious), Friday (today, outside and dreich). On the plus side, tomorrow is Saturday and should be glo... nope, I'm not going to say it, just in case. Last week I had the good fortune to be working in Shetland (sorting out wifi and connectivity problems in the home) on the day that the whole county had an internet outage thanks to a fishing boat. Smart phones were just paperweights, I couldn't contact a soul. I thought I might have to go all Victorian and write a letter, then remembered that Royal Mail wer...

What with being ill, then trying to valiantly catch up with a fortnight's work, followed by some rather dreich weather into the bargain, there's not been much to write about in the way of wildlife. Unless you count last night's rodent-inspired scritching and scratching in the walls, but let's not go there. Here's some random images from the past wee while... Just before my Covid 'holiday', I spent half a day monitoring a couple of transects for signs of Orkney Vole in a volunteer capacity for the Orkney Native Wildlife Project. These cows were very interested in why I was furtling about in the grass next to their field. Deep in the throes of Covid and boredom, I decided to image a single virion to pass the time, using only a cardboard tube from some kitchen roll, four shot glasses and some sticky tape. No, not really, this is what happens when you put potatoes covered in earth into a colander. Mocha, one of our cats. At thirteen, she's still way too cute...

Today, Saturday 8th October, sees the 2022 World Porridge Making Championship taking place in Carrbridge, as competitors from around the globe compete for the Golden Spurtle .  Carrbridge is a village in the Badenoch and Strathspey region of the Scottish Highlands. For the past week, I have been having porridge for breakfast, not so much in the hope of qualifying for the Championship, but more because Covid has finally caught up with me and I've had a sore throat from Hell. My usual muesli didn't seem such an attractive dish when compared to a smooth, warming bowl of sweetened oat-based slop. I would normally eschew any accompaniments with my porridge, be they sweet or savoury, but the 'vid meant I needed a bit of cheering up.  What with the cost of living crisis and all, as an economy measure, I had already opted to finish off every open jar of compote, jam, jelly and marmalade in the cupboards and fridge before buying any new ones. This is the preserve of the thrifty. So ...

There's plenty of things to keep a chap awake at night   and worrying about the state of the world at the moment. For me, perhaps unsurprisingly, chief amongst these are ecological anxiety and grief: sadness at the thought of what we have lost in terms of habitat and biodiversity, as well as the predicted disastrous consequences of climate change. Further down the list comes war, the cost of living crisis and the fluctuating fortunes of Durham County Cricket Club. So, in the wee small hours, with gales thrashing the trees outside and rain lashing at the bedroom window, one's mind veers off tangentially to all sorts of distracting thoughts. None of them useful, and all seemingly perfectly-engineered to keep a body in a state of paranoid alertness, rather then pleasant slumber. One recent night was a case in point, and it must be said that this particular sequence is a recurring one, bringing with it yet further worries of ageing and the possibility of dementia. Isn't it just...