Carlton Marshes...

Licensed today: Carlton Marshes, a Suffolk Wildlife Trust nature reserve, near Lowestoft, Suffolk…

Car dealership...

Licensed today: a Vauxhall car dealership in Wakefield, West Yorkshire…

The way to Wetwang...

“We never see anything totally. You never see the cloud totally because when you look you are thinking of something else. You look at a flower and say how beautiful it is, and go on, because your mind isn’t there. You listen to your wife while thinking about your work. You are occupied with your daily occupations, and you never give attention. You really never give attention to anything” (Krishnamurti, from public discussion in 1962)…

Licensed today: a sign for Wetwang, a village in the Yorkshire Wolds...

Lavenham...

“I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: Oh Lord, make my [religious] enemies ridiculous. And God granted it” (Voltaire, from a letter to Étienne Noël Damilaville, May 16, 1767)…

Licensed today: crooked, half-timbered houses in the village of Lavenham, Suffolk…

Out for the count...

A brief visit to Coventry yesterday, which included lunch with Chas, Lenzo and Max at a pub with a help-yourself carvery. Having cleared my plate, I felt dizzy and passed out. When I came round, Chas, bless him, was phoning 999. As the paramedics were checking my ‘vital signs’, I felt calm and stoical: “what will be, will be”. I thought I’d had a minor stroke, but it seems not.

When the landlady printed out our bill, it was blank. There was nothing to pay (no doubt there would have been a lot of paperwork to fill in, if a punter had died on the premises, and the sight of a comatose diner stretched out on a banquette can’t have been good for business). We went back home and played a game of Risk, thus ensuring that my petit mal wasn’t the worst part of the day. There’s nothing like a fight for world domination, decided by throwing dice, for putting things into perspective.

Licenced today: cottages in Morcott village, Rutland (a village which, coincidentally, I drove through today, on my way back from Coventry)…

Blackwell...

Licensed today: the dining room at Blackwell ‘arts & crafts’ house, near Bowness, Cumbria…

The only way...

I read in today’s Guardian that Archbishop Justin Welby is calling for “unity between British faith communities”, because Britain is witnessing a spike in antisemitic and islamophobic attacks and reprisals. Good luck with that, archbishop. Compare and contrast the archbishop’s witless bleating with one of the best-known and least controversial verses in the Bible. Jesus said “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”. Please remember, archbishop, that whenever you reference John 14:6, you are essentially condemning the followers of other faiths to an eternity of conscious torture in the fires of hell. Just thought you should know.

Licensed today: Parkside cemetery in Kendal...

Time is money...

These are tough times for the makers of luxury watches, now that the correct time is displayed on the screen of every mobile phone in every pocket or purse. What will appeal to the aficionados of fine and precious objects – the “more money than sense” brigade – who may no longer be impressed by gold, silver, platinum, titanium or diamond encrusted watch-faces? Well, makers of the Slow Watch are hoping to persuade well-heeled punters to pay more and more for a timepiece that does less and less. Their watches have one thing in common: they have one hand which rotates once every 24 hours, thus transforming the simple act of telling the time into a guessing game. Slow Watch wearers should expect to miss trains, appointments and important meetings. Visit the website to discover how slow watches will change your life for the better. 

Long Meg...

Licensed today: Long Meg and her Daughters, a stone circle near Little Salkeld, in the Eden Valley, Cumbria… 

Running repairs...

Two guys 'winterising' their boat, from a dinghy, in Goole marina...

Sunny Scunny...

I was in Scunthorpe yesterday. If anything the town centre is even more dismal and desolate than Doncaster. Half of the stores are shut, even in the Foundry Shopping Centre, and the shops still open look empty. Only the pawnbrokers, loan-sharks and betting shops seem to be doing much business.

As I browsed in Boots, the staff went into what looked like a well-rehearsed drill. They barred the doors, to stop anyone leaving, and a fellow browser – presumably a plain-clothed store detective - leapt into action and apprehended two guys and a girl, who he accused of shoplifting. Within 30 seconds three uniformed policemen had arrived, and that’s when I left…

A figure of authority...

Licensed today: a cardboard cut-out of a policeman guarding the entrance to a Spar store. Supposed to deter pilfering, it certainly worked on me. My days of shoplifting (or urban scrumping, as I prefer to call it) are probably over…

I Heard Love is Blind...

I was reading about Amy Winehouse this morning. People may only remember her short and tragic life, but she was a terrific singer. My favourite song of hers is ‘I Heard Love is Blind’, which she also wrote. As a justification for her own sexual infidelity, it’s both heart-breaking and hilarious. The first two verses…

I couldn't resist him
His eyes were like yours
His hair was exactly the shade of brown
He's just not as tall
But I couldn't tell
It was dark and I was lying down

You are everything
He means nothing to me
I can't even remember his name
Why're you so upset?
Baby, you weren't there
And I was thinking of you when I came…

"An insult to human dignity"...

These words, by Steven Weinberg, a theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate, seem particularly resonant now, as war erupts in what we used to call the Holy Land. “Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion”…

Licensed today: the wetlands at Leighton Moss RSPB bird reserve in Lancashire…

Last orders...

A sign of the times, licensed today. Even the pubs which aren’t closing for good are changing hands, because landlords and landladies are finding it so hard to make a living…

The Old Workhouse...

Licensed today: The Old Workhouse, in the village of Lund, East Yorkshire…

The AA man...

The AA man doesn't salute any more...

Birds in flight...

Had my Covid booster jab this afternoon, and rewarded myself for my bravery with a couple of hours at North Cave Wetlands. What a peaceful scene: snipe and lapwing on the water margins, with flocks of linnets and goldfinches attacking the weed seeds. A couple of swallows dipped and swooped over the lake. This is very late for swallows; who knows, maybe some will over-winter here. 

I took my camera along. Sometimes you just get lucky...

Polling day...

Licensed today: the Riley-Smith Hall in Tadcaster, used as a polling station in the Selby & Ainsty by-election of July 2023…

Fieldfares and redwings...

The seasons overlapped at Spurn Head yesterday. Starting the day wearing a fleece and jacket, I was in a t-shirt – and still comfortably warm – by late afternoon. Five swallows swooped over the water at Kilnsea Wetlands, and I saw my first fieldfares and redwings – arriving here for the winter, from Scandinavia and Russia – as they feasted, in huge numbers, on bright red hawthorn berries.
 
Fieldfare pic by Arnstein Rønning (Creative Commons)…

Goole docks...

Goole docks, and the tom pudding hoist, yesterday evening...

Pintail...

Had an overnight stay at Sammy’s Point, near Spurn Head, alongside a couple of campervans. It’s the perfect place for an uninterrupted kip, with no light pollution and little danger of being disturbed in the night (except maybe by the calls of migrating geese). My early morning session at Kilnsea Wetlands was a bit of an anti-climax. The few waders were mostly far away: a sight shared with half a dozen taciturn twitchers. The highlight was probably the pintails, which were just coming out of the summer ‘eclipse’, when their feathers are dull, to become a very handsome duck indeed.

Pic of male pintail: Creative Commons...

The Ashes...

Licenced today: the women's Ashes, June 2023, at Trent Bridge Cricket Ground in Nottingham. A good memory from the summer (and a license fee which paid for the tram, my ticket, the fish ’n’ chips, and all the beer I supped)…

Rat poison...

A rare outing to Doncaster today, for a precautionary visit to the clap clinic. No sign of any ‘levelling up' in Donny, with the town looking particularly depressed and down-at-heel. I overheard a guy talking loudly into his phone: “Get me a big bag of rat poison and I’ll give you the money when I see you”.

Sea-watching at Spurn Head... where the birders are just as interesting as the birds...

Messing about in boats...

For the last few years I’ve kept an informal record of ‘firsts’ and ‘lasts’ for our summer visitors. The sight of the first swallow - and some while later, the first swift – always gladdens the heart. Also the contrasting calls of the first chiffchaffs and willow warblers, which arrive in late March, even before the trees are in leaf.

The last sightings of summer can sometimes come and go unnoticed. I thought I’d seen the last swallows and house martins last week, flying low over the water at North Cave Wetlands. But today, against a grey and gloomy sky, I saw three house martins circling over the Old Sunday School.

Licensed today: narrowboats negotiating locks on Leeds-Liverpool Canal near Gargrave, North Yorkshire… 

Same-sex unions...

Because the Catholic Church holds that marriage is an indissoluble union between a man and a woman, the Vatican has traditionally been opposed to gay marriage. In 2021, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that the church could not bless gay unions because “God cannot bless sin”. Today, however, Pope Francis is suggesting there might be ways to bless same-sex unions, as long as the blessing is not confused with the sacrament of marriage. That’s like saying “You can come to church… as long as you wear a paper bag over your head”. One day, I hope, the world will pay no heed to whatever the current pope may have to say, on this or any other subject... and that day can’t come too soon.

Licensed today: a man walking past houses in the Mile, a new housing development by Persimmon Homes, near Pickering...

Keighley...

Licensed today: a street scene in Keighley, one of the least photogenic towns in West Yorkshire…

Fishing in Thorne...

Licensed today: an angler at the Delves fishing lake, in Thorne, South Yorkshire…