Whoo whoo!
Good lord, that was a huge steam rally! All traction engines (steam vehicles that don’t run on tracks, for you non steam geeks). We’ve not been to this one before.
I wouldn’t like to say how many engines were there. Thirty? Fifty? I like the two in the picture because the size difference. The one in the back is a German engine. Probably the biggest one at the show, but it was broken down for the whole day. Poor bastards; I don’t know how they’re going to move it out of there if they can’t get it going.
The one in front isn’t anything like the smallest, though.
There were so many of them zooming around, I’m amazed nobody got squashed. At the end, they tried to gather them all together in the arena. It was a sight to behold, but completely unphotographable.
At least, with the little camera I took with me. I’m holding out hope Uncle B’s came out better.
Happy Monday – here we go!
August 8, 2016 — 9:57 pm
Comments: 9
‘Merica intensifies
Yes, that’s a bald eagle. No, I don’t suppose most falconers are allowed to keep one, but these guys breed all kinds of endangered hunting birds. Though I’m happy to report that old baldy is no longer endangered.
Another pic from the fete over the weekend; a falconry exhibit. Cool stuff, but I realize these things are repetitious. That’s partly what I like about them; they’re the same every year.
This was the fete that has the miniature horses and the guy who herds Indian runner ducks with border collies. If that rings a bell, this one always happens on the same day as the one with the really good boot sale (read: flea market) and we dash to get to both of them.
It was followed on Sunday by a music festival we’ve never been to, and we haven’t been to it again. We got there and the whole village was full up. No place to park.
This weekend we have a steam rally and an event in aid of the RNLI. Can I take the pace? Good weekend, all!
August 5, 2016 — 9:36 pm
Comments: 10
Getting gay with the Freemasons
Oh, way to secret society, you guys.
Yeah, the Freemasons had a booth at a fete we went to this weekend. You can’t tell, but their logo is rainbow handprints, turned outward like a flower. Somebody done gayed up the Masons.
The slogan in the panel on the left says “honesty, kindness, respect, compassion, tolerance, benevolence, family.” Those five things in the middle are mighty close to the same thing, aren’t they? According to their English website, “Members are expected to be of high moral standing and are encouraged to speak openly about Freemasonry.” Huh. Since when?
I mean, “secret handshake” came from these guys.
I did not know this. Wikipedia says, “While the number is not accurately known, it is estimated that between 80,000 and 200,000 Freemasons were killed under the Nazi regime. Masonic concentration camp inmates were graded as political prisoners and wore an inverted red triangle.” But ‘pedia doesn’t say when they stepped out of the shadows.
Anyway, I know all the old societies and clubs are having a hell of a time maintaining any kind of membership. Several of our retired neighbors are Rotarians, whom we’ve had to rebuff (noooo thank yoooo). It’s just weird seeing the Masons hand out flyers.
They better not have jettisoned all that secret symbolic shit, or they’ll be just another boring wasteful charitable organization.
August 4, 2016 — 9:36 pm
Comments: 12
Geography lesson
Once upon a time, there was a giant bubble of chalk all around where I’m sitting now. Eventually, the top of it wore off and left a broken ring of chalk hills, now known as the North Downs and the South Downs. ‘Down’ from the Old English dūn, meaning hill. This terrain is now mostly soft, undulating chalk hills covered by a thin cream of short grass.
The white cliffs of Dover you know — that’s the chalky terminus of the North Downs, where it enters the sea. Along its length there are various hill figures made by scraping away the grass to reveal the chalk underneath, like the Long Man of Wilmington.
In the middle of the Downs is the Weald, another Old English word, means ‘forest’ (but it’s not, as you might expect, the related to the word ‘wood’). Most of it was cut down thousands of years ago, but the word “Weald” is still used to describe the area and is incorporated into many local placenames. It must have been a hell of a thing.
All of that was a completely unnecessary setup for this lovely view Uncle B shot this weekend (he’s got a little point-and-shoot camera that does especially good panoramas). It was kind of on the edge of the North Downs, looking due West across the Weald.
The way these country lanes work, there are hedges on either side. Sometimes you can drive for a very long time and see nothing but hedge. And then there’ll be a gate or a break and suddenly — a view! We stop and gawp at this one every year.
You probably have to be there.
July 19, 2016 — 8:24 pm
Comments: 11
Uneasy lies the head that wears the goose
Shhhhh…Gromulin is on vacation this week and we’ve promised not to harsh his mellow with current events and filthy politics.
And so I give you: the Goose Master.
It was a three fete weekend, and the last of the three was in a village noted for its flock of geese. They peck around the village green and occasionally impede traffic and somehow have managed to avoid Meester Fox all these years. Or, at least, made babies quicker than he can eat them.
The highlight of this village fate is therefore naturally goose-related. To wit, goose-shit bingo. They don’t call it that. I’m not sure what they call it. We used to do something similar with cows back in Rhode Island, but a goose is more exciting as it generally shits itself shortly after being placed in the arena.
Mark the field off in a grid, sell grid positions, release the goose, the square he poops in first is the winner.
But this grid has upwards of a thousand positions, I heard someone say, and the prize is the not inconsiderable sum of £500. Serious bidness.
So enter the Goose Master, whose word is law. That’s him. In the hat. With the goose on it.
It’s more exciting than it sounds, at least the first-catch-your-goose phase. They aren’t tame. The poor goose always looks completely gobsmacked to find itself in an arena ringed with clapping humans.
And it shits almost immediately.
But that doesn’t necessarily count — only the first whole and proper poop counts, not some panicked half-hearted evacuation. This year, the poop fell across grid lines and the prize was split.
And a lovely weekend we had for it, too. We’re having a spell of warm weather (at last! We had the heat on repeatedly in June and early July). In a little while, we’re going to crack open a bottle of wine and sit outside under the stars. We can see the Milky Way out where we are.
*raises a glass to Grom*
July 18, 2016 — 8:49 pm
Comments: 9
The 9 types of combs recognized by the American Poultry Association
Heyyyyyy wait, that’s only eight! I was robbed, random internet article!
I know what you’re thinking: what is that there purty Satan bird with the wicked horns and where can I get me one of them? From the link, I guess it’s either an Appenzeller, Crevecoeur, Houdan, La Fleche or Sultan. Yeah, I dunno either.
Not obvious in the picture: the strawberry comb is more of a raspberry comb, with a deep indentation in the middle. Couldn’t help thinking about all the shit that would get in there and get infected and stuff.
Chickens have the best resting bitchfaces in the aminal kingdom, don’t they?
The Labour Party is descending into farce. Jeremy Corbyn is a bugfuck-crazy Marxist Bernie Sanders type. He won party leadership by a huge margin because the chirruns love him, but he’s electoral poison. The other Labour MP’s have tried in vain to kick him out of the nest, so they put his deputy up to run against him for leadership. In fact, they weren’t even going to put his name on the ballot at all, but they lost their nerve on that. The chirruns would kill them. They’re already throwing bricks through his challenger’s headquarters window.
I’d enjoy the hell out of this if the Tories weren’t such shit right now.
See? I’ll make you beg for chikken blogging!
July 12, 2016 — 9:40 pm
Comments: 13
She’s no Maggie
Ladies and gentlemen, our new Prime Minister. After a firehose of yellow journalism was turned on any competitors until they all dropped out, there will not even be a vote of the party faithful. She will be installed this week.
By way of introduction, this is the woman who coined the term “the nasty party” for her own party — and it wasn’t a compliment. She often sounds more Labour than Tory. She speaks approvingly of taxes as “the price we pay to live in a civilized society” (like they don’t pay taxes in the world’s shit-holes). She’s been our Home Secretary for the past six years, and has made a reputation as an appeaser and squish.
In short, a dreadful choice.
And my bike is still busted. But my new video card is on the way!
July 11, 2016 — 9:57 pm
Comments: 23
Freeeeeedommmmmmm!
Happy Independence Day, my fellow liberated colonials. Which I guess includes my British neighbors now.
Early afternoon was lovely here, which makes a great change (we’ve had the most miserably cold, gray Summer so far). We sat in the garden with a couple of books and a bottle of wine and grilled burgers and corn on the cob and hummed Stars and Stripes Forever.
And then fell asleep, because wine, and had terrible dreams, because sleeping in the daytime.
Hope you had a wonderful Fourth. I’ve vicariously enjoyed the parades in my FaceBook feed today.
You remember that pic, of course, Weasel Attempts to Murder Woodpecker. From the header of the photographer’s Twitter feed, it looks like someone made him a ceramic one.
July 4, 2016 — 9:54 pm
Comments: 5
Did I mention the tractor show?
Yes, this is a regularly used airfield. There’s a wonk in it halfway down that tossed the little planes back up in the air on landing. I’m amazed there wasn’t a bird strike, as clouds of gulls ascended every time a plane went over.
Well, of course I’m going to give it to you in color. Bonus cloud shot. Those skies! All images courtesy A. Badger.
So Corbyn is hanging in there, despite losing the no confidence vote 172 to 40. More than 50 people in his cabinet have resigned.
He was elected leader by a large majority of party members — sixty percent, I think — and he’s insisting that has more legitimacy than a vote by MPs. Which may accurately reflect the current populist mood of the electorate.
Orrrr…it may be that he’s hanging on until the Chilcot Report is published next week. He’s vowed to use his position as party leader to push for prosecution of Blair for war crimes, if anything in the report will back it up. Many of the MPs voting to oust him are, at the least, Blair sympathizers if not actual Blairites.
Wheels within wheels, eh?
June 28, 2016 — 7:40 pm
Comments: 9
I’m a little teapot
Saturday we went to an airshow. Well, no. Not an airshow, really. A small country show at a little airfield way out in the boonies. We ran ahead of a terrible storm the whole way getting there, paid our £5 to get in, just started a wander round and the heavens opened. I mean, pissing down with rain.
Uncle B and I got separated and I was zipped into a tent with a man selling WWII memorabilia. I passed over the spiffy Nazi dress dagger in favor of this teapot. It celebrates Victory over Hitlerism and it’s chipped so I probably overpaid, but it seemed like a thing I had to buy right then.
The media here is still losing their freaking minds over Brexit. Ditto the political classes. I don’t think there’s any way they can roll it back without facing a wall of torches and pitchforks, but they’re going to give it the old college try.
In and among the wailing and gnashing of teeth, there are some good articles, too. Like this one from the Spectator. I particularly like calling the opposition Remainders. Remainiacs sounds ooo scary and dangerous and powerful. Remainders sound like leftovers.
In the end, the rain stopped (for a while) and some planes got up. In the half hour before the heavens opened again, Uncle B got some spectacular shots of prop planes against enormous banks of cloud. And then it rained again.
I love heavy weather. Just as well, really.
June 27, 2016 — 9:28 pm
Comments: 15