ohmygodz

look at this!

I took that photo, I am now a published photographer and that, muahaha!

snowy day activities

In the spirit of those "rainy day" activity books that were always shoved at me when I was younger and bored, I took the oppurtunity of a snow day a couple of weeks ago to MAKE SOMETHING.


Oh yes that's right- a decorate your own mug kit. It involves two of my favourite things- making a mess and drinking tea. Can't really lose here surely?

So I began by preparing my workspace and adhering to the strict rules laid down in the instructions (put down paper on your workspace, don't consume the pens, only bake your mug between 2.30 and 3.45 on a thursday but not if there is a full moon the previous night) .

(Here is where you would expect to find a "before" shot of my mug. I forgot to take one.)

So... I carefully coloured in my mug, making sure to stay within the lines and all that, and then left for 24 hours to dry. After this I baked my mug :)


So... The results. Well it was a good use of snowy day time, and did produce an adequate tea-holding vessel (surely half the point of this activity).


However, the green and brown colours have come off a bit since washing it for the first time, where the pink and yellow seem to be fine. I think I will need to give it a second coat, but as a stuck-indoors activity and bearing in mind the final product I will give it... 6.5/10. I would have given it an 8 if Percy's friends were Aardvarks. The cow looks a bit evil to me :-/

snow day :)

I suppose you noticed it was quite snowy today then?
I woke up to this sight and decided not to bother trying make my way across to camden, which turned out to be a good decision as the zoo was closed, with only emergency staff coming in (lions still need feeding and all that...).


Birds in the garden were performing nicely in the garden, particularly three long tailed tits who hung around all day. They can be very photogenic when they want to be... Also some very confused blackbirds hunting leaves amongst the snow, and bizarrely a blue tit checking out the nest box by the window (note to self- clean out nest box).


We ventured outside a bit later to see my grandparents, make some snow angels, chase around some ducks in the snow and build a snowman. Some awesome views of blizzardy goodness :)



We have at least 7-8 inches of snow on the ground this evening, so may well be facing snow day: the sequel tommorrow. We will see...


Meanwhile, here is a nice photo of a long tailed tit in flight :)

tortoises are awesome

Especially giant ones.

This is an Aldabra giant tortoise (Geochelone gigantica), the Seychelles equivalent of the Galapagos tortoise.


She lives next to the komodo dragon, and so maybe somewhat overlooked. I am now officially a fan of her though, and thought you should be too.


I've always liked tortoises, but these damn reptile enthusiasts have even almost convinced me to get a snake. Worrying.

Now I am going to go watch some program about Darwin. See, topical and everything...

window birding

The best kind of birding in my opinion is from your window. Low effort, but everything you see is always a surprise. You don't really expect much more than a few starlings, a noisy woodpigeon and the odd robin, so I find pretty much anything in my garden to be hugely entertaining.

Take this little guy:


One of those WOODPECKERWOODPECKERWOODPECKER *runs upstairs and scrabbles for camera then dashes to nearest window* moments. They're pretty awesome looking things really, especially when they turn up in unexpected places.

Then this week there was this:


(credits for this go to my mum as I don't get to see our garden in daylight until the weekend...)

Now all I need is a lesser and I have the full compliment of British piciformes (ignoring wrynecks)...

This Week I Went to The Seaside...

And surprisingly it was quite sunny.


Turns out unless you like walking around the countryside, there isn't much to do in Dorset in January, as most places are closed for the quiet season. This didn't prove too much of a problem, apart from it taking quite a long time to find anywhere to get food, and a failed attempt to reach Brownsea Island. For future reference, don't bother getting the Poole ferry to pick up the Brownsea boats until March.

Anyway, we saw some pretty cool things while we were away. One of my favourites was probably , and a female peregrine hunting off the cliffs at Durlston.



Me and this person spent Friday on Portland Bill which is a very strange place. Three prisons, a whole pile of quarries and winds strong enough to knock you off your feet all year round doesn't really strike me as the ideal place for a holiday destination, but the holiday camp begs to differ. Had some nice views though...


We found this on the way there too- quite famous I hear?

(chalk horse, not a real one)

On Saturday we retreated to Arne after our failed attempt at getting to Brownsea Island, thinking at least that way we could gaze forlornly across the harbour at it. Very busy, lots of birds, but also some other awesome stuff. We stood around and watched a whole field full of deer ruunning around and leaping over fences which was pretty awesome. Usually the best view of a deer you can hope for is an ear poking out from behind a tree half a mile away.

(real cow, not a chalk one)

These posts take ages to put together. Hopefully in future I will bother to edit my photos a bit more and say actually say something interesting.

Camera is coming to work with me tommorrow, to see what I can find.

99 on my year list so far... The challenge continues :)

I don't know why I've started this...

Seems like all the cool kids are making one of these things and so thought I may as well jump on the band wagon.

After getting more into the walking/nature type scene last year I decided to treat myself to a proper camera to see what I can come up with, especially seeing as I have so many potential photo oppurtunities where I work, so this should be a good way to start sharing some of them.

Don't expect particularly amazing photos or regular updates, but thought I should give this a go.

I have just spent the past weekend in Dorset, so once I've gone through these pictures I'll upload a few.

More later...