Enjoyed a few hours of aimless wandering around East Yorkshire today, starting with North Cave Wetlands. Not many waders about, but the air was full of birdsong: chiffchaff, blackcap, blackbird, sedge warbler, cetti’s warbler, plus the mournful piping of a pair of oystercatchers. The highlight was three common terns – slim, graceful, agile – flashing across the water and diving in for fish.
Pic of common tern: Creative Commons…
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I can’t say I’m heartbroken that Jerry Springer died today. Everything about his ‘show’ was cynical and life-denying, especially in the way he tried to promote himself as part of the solution rather than part of the problem. Instead of helping people to address their personal problems, with empathy and compassion, the Jerry Springer Show was just a bear-pit, with a psyched-up audience revelling in every slanging match and choreographed punch-up. Springer would stand to one side, pretending to be appalled at the mayhem… as though he wasn’t responsible for what was happening.
Something must have happened in Petworth too, because I’ve sold half a dozen pix this month of Lombard Street: hopefully a gallery opening rather than a brutal murder…
As an elderly republican I seem to be out of step with my fellow ‘oldies’, with 78% of them believing that we should continue to have a monarchy…
In respose to claims that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people all suffer from “racism”, Diane Abbott has written a letter (pubished in today’s Observer). “They undoubtedly experience prejudice. This is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable. It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice. But they are not all their lives subject to racism. In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus. In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships”.
Racism is still a ‘hot potato’ in civil discourse, and we can’t even agree what race and racism actually mean. For example, does the word ‘Jewish’ indicate a race, an ethnicity, a belief system or a set of cultual norms?
Keir Starmer has acted swiftly. Diane Abbott has lost the Labour whip, and there are calls for her to be expelled from the party altogether…
Licensed today: the Regent Hotel and Regent Court, Leamington Spa in Warwickshire…
Enjoyed a couple of hours today at Blacktoft Sands. Last week’s highlight was a flock of about 250 black tailed godwits. Today they were nowhere to be seen; they may have headed off for their Icelandic breeding grounds. Instead there was just a solitary bar tailed godwit, an uncommon migrant. The highlight was a little gull, possibly the smallest gull in the world, and another unusual sighting. It was much smaller than the black headed gulls, and had a very different flight pattern, almost like a tern…
Todd Boehly, the owner of Chelsea football club since last May, has spent an eye-watering £600m in the transfer market, plus hiring three managers (and sacking two of them). It’s obvious that having a squad of 40 players creates more problems than solutions. I don’t actually care about the footballing fortunes of Chelsea, or any other football club. However, it’s good to know that money doesn’t necessarily buy football success, otherwise we might as well dispense with leagues and trophies, and just give all the prizes to the club with the deepest pockets.
Howden is expanding...
Goole comes to a standstill a few times each day, whenever a train arrives. Warning lights come on, the barriers come down and all the traffic lights in the vicinity turn red. It’s a stereotypical Goole experience to be sitting in stationary traffic, going nowhere, while other people, gazing from their carriage windows, are heading for more dynamic hotspots, like Doncaster and Hull.
I don’t mind the interruptions. I’m not in much of a hurry these days, and my trips to Goole are seldom governed by appointments or deadlines. Apart from stocking up with supplies at Morrisons, or mooching around the charity shops, the purpose for my visit to “the Venice of the North” is usually a writing session at Goole library. I have a seat which offers a panoramic view of the toings and froings beyond the picture windows. Six roads meet here, at a roundabout topped with a clock-tower; this was the town centre when Goole and the docks were declared open in 1826. I’m not sure the town even has a centre any more…
I photograph almshouses – these are the Pickering almshouses in Hull, today – but no one ever seems to buy them…
I don’t have many pictures of Wigan, but this is one of them: licensed today…
An interesting observation yesterday from Frank Lampard, who has now suffered 13 defeats in his last 16 matches as the manager of Everton and now, in a short-term capacity, with Chelsea. “Special things can happen at Stamford Bridge”, he said. “We have to believe”. Of course, having to believe is not quite the same as believing; it sounds desperate rather than reassuring. In the context of footballing failure, this is what magical thinking looks like.
More concise messaging from Rupert Murdoch who, we learn today, divorced his fourth wife, Jerry Hall, by email. According to a report on the 92-year-old billionaire, he wrote “Jerry, sadly I’ve decided to call an end to our marriage. We have certainly had some good times, but I have much to do. My New York lawyer will be contacting yours immediately”.
Licensed today: Upper Swaledale from Kisdon Hill…
“I wonder how you see things. With your eyes? With your mind? Obviously, we see things with our eyes, but we see with the mind much more quickly than with the eye. We see the word much more quickly than the eye can ever perceive. So we see with memory, with knowledge, and when we so see things – that is, with the mind – we are seeing what has been, not actually what is” (Krishnamurti)…
Licensed today: fishing boats in Whitstable harbour, Kent…
Two examples of religious stupidity have been reported in the Guardian today. According to the Easter Sunday sermon by Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, “those who oppress and subjugate others will face divine justice”. He cited “the power of the resurrection” as being “infinitely greater than they are”. Divine justice? Spoiler alert: there is no such thing.
The police in Iran are planning to use smart technology in public places to identify and then penalise women who violate the country’s strict Islamic dress code. According to the head of the judiciary, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i, “removing hijab amounts to enmity towards values and people who commit such abnormality will be punished”.
The 'dress code' for the black tailed godwits I saw this morning, at North Cave Wetlands, is this beautiful rust-red head and chest (pic: Creative Commons)...
Licensed today: Benthall Hall, a National Trust property near Broseley, Shropshire…
I am bored by Donald Trump’s antics, even as I am fascinated by them. The world seemed to stand still yesterday while he flew from Mar-a-Lago to New York, sat in a courtroom to plead “not guilty” to the 34 charges he faces, and flew back to Mar-a-Lago again. I don’t expect he will spend a single night in jail, for his many crimes and misdemeanours, but I live in hope.
Licensed today: a man cleaning his boat in the Windermere Marina…
White Cottage, in Hornsea, where, according to the blue plaque, aircraftsman J H Ross (AKA Lawrence of Arabia) was a regular visitor, between 1932 and 1935, when he was stationed at Bridlington Harbour...
Where the road ends, at Skipsea, today. The couple's caravan was here last week; now they're wondering where it went...
Had a couple of hours this morning at North Cave Wetlands. Saw the last of the winter visitors – a flock of noisy fieldfares - and the first of the summer visitors: chiffchaffs and at least fifty sand martins swooping down over the water. Highlights: a male goldeneye and a great crested grebe, both in immaculate breeding plumage.
Great crested grebe (pic: Creative Commons)...
