The Bag's Blog: 2020

A New Year's Wish!

Just been reading over last year's New Year's Eve blog. The gist of it was that if we all spent a bit more time being kind and looking out for one another in 2020, nothing could go that wrong for us!

Obviously the gods of fortune mustn't be avid readers - as being kind or looking-out-for-one-another certainly wasn't on their things to do list this year! Perhaps sending us a strongly-worded letter advising us all to concentrate on other things, maybe on repairing the world we've set in flames was more on their minds.

Or, maybe, they were just pointing out that no matter how presumptuous we get about our 'infallibility' as a species, they will always be there, hangin' round our works with their spanners at the ready.

On reflection, as I was writing that piece, I think we could all sense that something was amiss in the world - the news from Wuhan, a place I'd never heard of 'til then, was becoming more and more ominous. But even so, at the time, few of us could've predicted where it was all leading.

Certainly, little did we expect that, in the space of a few months, all hope would be dry-coughed out of Pandora's Box and all the replacement bread-baking and road-running and diary-keeping and bird-watching and Zoom-calling that social-distancing required of us, wouldn't be coaxing it back in a hurry!

Most of all though, little did we know how being denied the sensation of human touch would come with the callous side effect of breaking the human heart.

For many it was bad, but for many more it was unthinkably worse - yet all of us are scarred by it. And as a result, nothing can really return to what it was before, no matter what happens in the year ahead.

Still, it is the human way to use our past experiences to forge our vision of the future. And that bridge between the two is what normally forms the basis for our hopes.

But I wonder tonight, on this New Year's Eve, if the opposite is really what we should be wishing for in 2021? I wonder should we all hope that 'what the future brings' will be the very thing that leads us back, not necessarily to our past, but to our essence and to the things we've lost?

So, here's praying that hope will spring eternal this coming year and with a leaping enthusiasm that comes with knobs on! And, that we'll all see again what Emily Dickinson once saw. That ...

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And sings the tune without the words

And never stops - at all

All the very best for the coming year and beyond, good friends.

More soon ...

Onwards and upwards, me hearties!

Beginning to look a lot like ... ah, yaddy yah!

Well, seeing as there's not much in the way of great cheer surrounding this year's run up to Crimbo, I decided to take a wee trip down the lane of lost time to witness an era when there was nothin' only ceoil, caint agus craic to be had round this time of year!

Funny, no, I mean sad, that, what was once so routine, ritual almost - a night on the razz with friends, music and good cheer - is now seen as a moral outrage, a reckless, irresponsible disregard for the greater good of humanity which would only be tolerated in a bygone age - like the 14th century!

But, what the hell, it was all good fun and a fond memory worth remembering - which in these dull times feels at least as good as an evening in front of a lo res webcam drinkin' flat beer from a can 'with' yer mates on a Zoom!

Jeez, it's all go isn't it!?😕

Nollaig Shona daoibh go léir!

More soon ...

Onwards and upwards!

Rust Never Sleeps!

Recently, I passed the old dock crane that stands on the port side of the Great South Wall, just a few metres from the red lighthouse at Poolbeg.

It was the first time in a long while that I stopped to take another look at this old artifact from a forgotten past and ended up wondering how long ago it was when this antiquated aul' contraption was state-of-the art?

Certainly neither today nor yesterday!

Yet, there it still stands, the ole crock on the dock, built to shift and heft cargo onto and from the ships that came and went from here way back in the blurry past of the 1800s, its role then pivotal in keeping the burghers of the town fed and watered, clothed and shooned, moneyed and up-to-speed - and/or the very opposite of this - as history would suggest.

But even so, it is now just an old yoke, a relic of forgotten times, its purpose purely nostalgic for people at best, a perch for a hungry gull or two its only real function.

The point? All things must pass.

As I looked at ye auld crane, I noticed there was a padlock attached to it. Though it had rusted away a lot, anyone could tell that it wasn't really that old, a handful of years ... tops! I reckoned someone might have put it there as a love charm maybe, a lot of young people lock padlocks to things for that reason these days.

But, if the besotted lover and his or her beloved saw their lock now, disintegrating to nothing in the salty air of the sea winds, they might do well to run a bit of an audit on the relationship it supposedly symbolises. Only joking!

No, as I looked at the little padlock rusting away to dust on the rusty ole crane, it gave me hope, especially in this period of lockdown, the one where we all think that things will never get better and never end!

My point? The shackles that are designed to contain and harness are, themselves, at the mercy of time and of tide and therefore can't hold things down for good.

Nothing lasts for ever, after all. Not even this pandemic. Which is a small comfort to know.

More soon ...

The crock with the lock on the dock!

The Trill of it All!

Well, first night of winter is tonight - but at least the winter birds are arriving and that's always a welcome sign - especially in these harrowing times.

I love birds for thousands of reasons but mostly because, to me, they have always represented and reflected the idea of complete freedom - that notion, long lost to us, of what it is to be untethered to and unfettered by any rule of artifice or law or by the madness of illusion.

And, visually at least, to simply spread your wings in a second and fly away from adversity and into safety is the finest way of demonstrating the wild abandon of effortless freedom that I can imagine.

But, I love them all the more for their moral intelligence - and the sense of realism, pragmatism even, they possess about being free. To be free carries huge risks which they face up to and face down every day - every day is a new challenge as invigorating and as dangerous as the one before. They are under no illusions about this.

There are no rules attached to complete freedom after all, no degrees of it - it does exactly what it says on the tin for better or for worse.

Yet, these creatures confront it with courage beyond expression. Every minute of the day.

I am, indeed, grateful for my humanoid bodily incarnation, it's good to be alive after all, and rules and decorum have purpose for sure, but, at times, I too wish I were a bird - or as free as one anyway!

Especially in these harrowing times!

More soon ...

Free as a bird ...

The Redshank Redemption!

Today's pic comes with a story attached - one of high octane derring-do!

Well, maybe not!

I was homeward bound after the morning stroll along the bay at Sandymount when I noticed a murder of hooded crows making an almighty fuss on the wet sands about fifty metres ahead of me. I hastened to the scene and arrived to see them going hammer and tongs for the chap you see below, clawing and pecking him to within an inch of his life.

Naturally the poor chap was terrified.

All I could do was try and frighten them off by cursing like a sailor and waving the camera at them, but, thank the Lord, it was enough and they squawked off within seconds, cursing me as they went - and leaving little Redser here alone, forsaken, in shock - but alive!

Thankfully he didn't look too bad either, no cuts or breaks that I could see, though I do have a suspicion that it was a bad leg that got him into the situation in the first place. So I thought that, just in case, I should really hang around a bit to see if he'd be okay - he may not be out of the woods yet, he could need a vet, or worse - the crows might even come back for him!

So, for the first time in my life, I then spent a good half hour talking to a Redshank! And as I did I could see him (or her, not sure which!) relaxing a little more as the fear inside it began to lessen - or maybe as it started to get a couple of my better gags!

Either way, I have to say as a bird photographer, I was never happier to see this wee bird up and fly off on me - even if I was only half way through the one about the bear and the rabbit!

But I reckon the darn crows have my cards marked now!

More soon ...

Stone the crows, I say!

Time Slips Away ...

... but nothing seems to have progressed during this damn dementing lockdown since it began. I do wonder how long a whole planet of bored, giddy, distracted homo sapiens can tolerate being told that doing nothing for months on end is a responsible and rewarding way to behave. To me it sounds completely counter-intuitive to the human condition - and that it just can't last.

Because, yeah, it's good to put your shoulder to the greater wheel by taking your shoulder off your own smaller wheel but the all wheels are connected in the end. If they weren't, then the clock wouldn't function. And if the kilter isn't even, then something always gives!

I suppose we could drag out the metaphor here but I'd prefer to do that over a pint!

Still, and thankfully, other creatures have no such restrictions imposed on them these days and good luck and more power to them. It certainly is nice to be able to go out and observe them going about their business in their own world ... even if that can be a perilous place for them.

But, as they say, constant vigilance is the price of liberty!

The birds know this anyway but it's a hard lesson that we'll now have to learn quickly.

More soon ...

Let me ride in the wide open country ...

Life During Covidtime!

As we continue to slowly trudge through these depressing Covid days - these apparently never-ending disaffected, disinfectant days - I continue to scour that fenced-off, 'within 2Km of home', tract of land for sight or light of any feathered fellow who might be so courteous as to stop and pose for a pic ... and, thus, shine a light!

Thankfully, there have been plenty of obliging passerines passing about this week, so here's another 30-odd second epic for you all - one that will paint a fairly succinct picture of the kind of bird life busying itself in the postage stamp-sized quadrant that is my mini-section of Dublin's parklands! :)

I post this, as I know everyone has had their stresses and traumas these past few weeks and my treks in the park have been the main thing to help me to cope with this really awful phase of time. I do hope you've also found your way of weathering the storm.

Musical accompaniment here is from ours truly, zee Ukeristic Congress, a sound that echoes better days! God, 'twould be nice to play with them again and anon.

Stay ... safe and sound, amigos!

More soon ...

"I wanna ride to the ridge where the West commences ..."

The Greatest Story Ever Told! :)

I was in my attic office this evening, the dormer window barely open but wide enough to hear a helluva racket going on in one of the gardens backing on to mine. I looked out and saw and heard a pair of Robins who were really agitated 'zitting' and 'tikking' from post to pillar as if trying to ward off something menacing.

Seconds later a pair of blue tits joined them, and the racket intensified. Then I noticed the four of them were working together to drive away a lone magpie who was obviously the source of all the bother! They succeeded. So, panic over, I went back to my desk but within a minute I was back at the window distracted by the faintest but continuous 'tik' sound that seemed close by.

I looked down onto the kitchen roof - and there was this poor little mite (pic1) looking sad, lost and afraid. Of course, when he saw me it made things worse and he flew to the next house across (pic2).

The pair of Robins were, meantime, going mad trying to call and find him him but his 'tik' was too faint for them to hear, I reckon. How do I get them to come to me so I can direct them to him, I wondered?

Well, I'm hardly Dr Dolittle so it must've been a brainwave! I loaded up the UK Bird Sounds app that I have uploaded onto my phone, selected the Robin's song from the list and played it at full volume.

Two seconds later, one of the pair was beside me on the roof! Two seconds after he or she spotted the lost bambino and lo and behold the family were reunited!

I don't normally write tales like this - but Lordy, was I delighted with meself! Yay! Nitey nite folks!😊😄😄

More soon ...


Lost wee craturr!

Corraggio, mio amico!

Blow those Coividian Blues ...

The Covidian Trauma. Might be a good name for a book - or rather one of the millions of books currently being written about this collective out-of-world yet intensely personal experience felt by nearly everyone alive on the planet.

So, indeed, there'll be plenty of reading to be done when all this is said and done.

I've been doing my own bits and things of stuff to ward off the boredom and face down the lethargy that too much time with your own shadow brings - to the extent that I might come across as a bit of a tool. But, hey, tools rock in these times!

The restriction zone imposed by those who know-all-things, is 2 km. I've been sticking to it and, as always, have a camera on my shoulder for the just-in-cases. So, each time I go out, I snap what I can of what's about.

In 100% of cases it is my avian pals who provide all of the subject matter and all of the joy!

So, from Irishtown and Sandymount with love ... here are my Covidian Birds of the Month for March 2020 - one we will never adequately process but will certainly never forget!

And, as for the ole aves, I reckon they couldn't care less ...!?

More soon ...

"Give me land lots of land under starry skies ..."

I always find ...

Covid days, nights and weeks and months! Never ending it seems. The merits of isolation are few but, sometimes, it's just nice, and thankfully, eh, justifiable, to throw caution to the wind, and just do something you want to do to, to play a tune for pig iron, but which, hopefully, communicates to others that you are thinkin' about them all and that, yeah, we're all together in this and we'll all come out of it together too - 'bigly'!

I've seen loads of vids of everyone doing their piece - so here's my tuppence that I hope will make you ... well ... that's over to you! :)

More soon ...

The stars are brighter ...!

Time for an ole tune ...

Covid days. Synonymous with utter boredom and not having a clue what to do from one moment to the next. Has your life become as unedited as a bag of loose pages thrown on a skip!?

Welcome to the jungle!

Well, to pass the spare time bequeathed to moi, of which there is plenty, I've been up in the attic playing more uke and writing bits and pieces of new songs and bringing back those that got away in the past - to beat an idea for a stage musical into shape.

Straight up!

I suppose it could be a uke musical as all the songs are written on the self-same flea but I'd like to think that it could be a bigger extravaganza than just ukes - I mean brass, strings, wood, kettledrums, xylophones and crazy maestros, high-end theatrical effects, explosions, laser lights, troughs of greasepaint, dancing horses, chorus lines, unicorns doing dressage, trapeze artists, the leading roles played by, say, Ryan Gos ...

Ooops, I get carried away on Covid days.

Anyway, here's a bit from Daisy, one of the songs from the show, working title The Aviator!

Stay safe fellow Covidians! :)

More soon ...

... and when yer not near to me Daisy!

Salutary Reminder!

Wrote this at the start of all this ... and yeah ... still think the same way .... stay safe ... but know what piece you really are in the jigsaw!

Yeah, blogness doesn't really have much point at the moment, folks. Nothin' new to add. Everyone has already told everyone else to stay safe, to wash their hands, to remain indoors, to love from a distance, to let on virtual intimacy has meaning, to claim loneliness is a moral duty ... and it is in theory ... so I'll run with it so.

But a thought. I never put myself in the mind of someone whose time was at a premium before, whose essence, so crucial and defining, is nearly out of charge. Yet, now, we have this ugly thing hurrying things along!

Leaving us with thousands of people, people like you or I, with minds as bright or brighter as yours and mine, with bigger ideas and dreams too, thinking - worse - knowing, that, for them, there really is no tomorrow!

...

So, this might thing be a collective nudge to all of us to be more sensitive to and grateful for the time that we have, that each one of us individually has, and the circumstances and inevitabilities that will take that time away in the end.

A late night thought in straitened times, brought about by a scourge of a virus.

So that in mind, stay safe, clear the airways that allow the hopes and the dreams to freely flow, and godammit wash yer hands!

More soon ...

Yeah, Godwits ... all!

Gettin' Doddery!

My how time flies. 2020 marches onwards, slowly and gradually tuning itself to the rolling momentum of time's unstoppable arrow. A scary notion.

Yet while it's been a pretty dull and cold and wet and windy beginning to the new decade, it hasn't all been an utterly depressing trudge.

That's mainly because we've been out and about with the Brownie and its new addition, the Big Lens, more than a few times so far in 2020 and have snapped a few interesting birds to date - most splendidly, of course, the wonderful Kingfisher which we spotted along the banks of the Dodder River in Dublin this past week. (These pursuits are certainly good for the soul.)

Indeed, I've been spending more time along the Dodder than in any other location around the town this year, so, as I'm here now on the blog, what better to do than run a few shots of what's to be found along its course - particularly around the Seven Arches, Milltown and Rathfarnham.

Jump the Luas and try it out. If nothing else you'll most certainly enjoy the walk.

More soon ...

Dramatis Personae - in (soon abandoned) alphabetical order ...