Bills Posts

One of the people I follow on FaceBook, goes by the name of The Dorset Rambler. He posts every so often (not every day). He takes some lovely photos whilst out on his walk, and has the right kit to get some lovely pictures of local birds as well as sunsets.

Now, I do have the opportunity to get some lovely sunrises, and if I was inclined to go out in the evening, I could get sunsets as well, but what I don’t get many chances of are pictures of small birds. I’d go so far as to hazard that this is not entirely because I don’t have the right kit. Mostly I think it is opportunity.

In order to get those chances, I think you have to make them. I have been sat at the waterfront and in particular starlings are not massively afraid of people, nervous and wary yes, but not afraid. I’ve had a couple of nice pictures.

What frustrates me are birds like sparrows. I like sparrows. There are several places around town where there are bushes, and and you know this because you can hear them. It’s like either a massive family argument or like a 1950’s housing estate with everybody leaning on their fences talking at the same time.

You know there must be dozens of them hiding in the bush, but can you see them? Do you think there’s any chance of getting a picture of them? And of course as soon as you get near them they fall silent, only to resume their shouting when you are walking away from them!

I must have done the route that I follow on my morning walk a few hundred times. Nearly every road I walk along has some history. At the beginning of this blog, I intended to write more about the history and I have done to a limited extent.

Part of my problem is that I haven’t done much research. Oh, I’ve read a few books and pamphlets, my write-ups haven’t followed any academic standard. And actually, I don’t want that. I’m happier with the lighter narrative.

What I would like to do is be a bit more disciplined in the structure of my writings. My blogs are very much of the night, I would like to have a plan of posts such that I would have an idea of what I will be writing next week, or even two weeks ahead. I’d also like to have a number of threads. I’d almost say that I would find it very difficult to apply academic discipline to the research on two or three different subjects and develop and maintain a blog list up to two weeks ahead.

It’s a nice idea though.

We have just had a really lovely weekend at Heythrop park. It’s been on the cards for a few weeks. There are some things that want to comment upon;

I phoned the hotel and asked about the charging points. I was confidently informed that they were Tesla chargers, and didn’t have type 2 sockets. I was very pleasantly surprised to find a whole bank of podpoints not Tesla at all. All I needed to do is download the app, top it up and we were good to go. It didn’t matter that they weren’t fast chargers. We weren’t going anywhere. It was impressive that there were a lot of them, and that they were always some free. Very nice.

We had a problem with the room, not the room itself, but the noisy fan outside, which would disturb our sleep. A quick word with Miles on reception and we were sorted out with a new room, and an upgrade no less. Delightful.

This is the second hotel in the last few months where there has been good wifi coverage in the rooms. This was excellent, no problem at all. Very nice to see.

The entertainment was very good. With the singers and musicians all of excellent standards. The selling point for the weekend was The Pink Floyd experience. Excellent.

It was seriously lovely to be with our friends Mark and Helen. We always have a good time when we get together. It really was a lovely weekend.

I didn’t explain the title. It was 100 miles from home to Heythrop. On the return journey we started with 100% on the battery and didn’t stop to recharge. On arrival home we had used 80% and had taken 124 miles.

We went for a walk today, not a long one, but it did involve a couple of steep-ish slopes. We got to the point, a gate where I had initially suggested we walk to, and as we were on it seemed reasonable to carry on to what we hoped might be the top of hill. Luckily it was.

At some point I think it was Mark or Helen had spoken to somebody who said there was a zoo a bit further along. The first encounter was with this slightly Eeyore-like cutie, that just stood and looked at us rather uninterested. Eeyores partner wandered over and showed a bit more interest.

It turns out that was a company that trains animals for parts in movies or appearances in photo-shoots.

Who’d have expected to a group of these in the middle of Oxfordshire? We certainly didn’t.

Anyway, it made for an interesting stroll, and I was very glad to get back for a cup of tea.

Nothing quite like it.

We went for a walk through the woods today. It was really quite pleasant. We saw a muntjac deer in the distance, was a fleeting glimpse of one or two seconds as it slipped into the undergrowth, and quite a few yards away, but it was quite distinctive. Lovely to see.

We had been on a solid path, but as we progressed it turned into a dirt track, then a wet dirt track. It wasn’t so bad that I though I would have to turn back, but it could so easily have done.

Because, I had wholly inadequate footwear to walking on a muddy path. Trainers no less. the annoying thing is, I so nearly brought me walking shoes with me, but didn’t in the end. Tomorrow, I have said that I will only walk on solid track. We’ll see how that goes.

The really frustrating things about ev charging revolve around when you do it away from home. Perhaps the biggest bugbear is whether the charger is working. My view is that it must be a legal requirement that who ever owns a publicly available charging point must have a response plan in place for when it goes out of service. Now the question then arises as to the service level requirement.

Now, I have seen charging points that have been reported on zap maps as being out of service for more than a day. Totally unacceptable. But, is that because they have not been reported as having come back into operation? I admit I have no idea what are the reliability requirements. It may be that actually, they are more stringent than i’ve already advocated. I think I need to do some research.

There is no doubt though, that whilst there are nowhere near enough charging points around, the situation is improving.

And the beer? I had two pints of lager tonight. I think it was Māori. It was very smooth, and not only did it go down very easily, it went straight to my brain. Need to be careful with that.

During a conversation this evening, was reminded of a couple of visits to places that at various times I had always wanted to go. One of the first library books I took out of hte grownup section of Wareham Library was the story of the construction of Jodrell Bank, at the time, I think it was the largest sterrable radio telescope in the world. I had alwayus wanted to visit, but as it was up near Manchester I never thought I would have a chance. More on that in a bit.

First though, I spent a couple of years working in Newquay in Cornwall. That gave me a chance to visit Goonhilly, site of the ground station for the worlds first deep space communications network. I visited there in the mid 1980’s. I can remember being so impressed by the vast array of impressive dishes. It was fascinating to see, and of was still operational at that time. I am sad to see that it is , apart from very special occasions, completely closed down, a quick look at google makes it appear that the facilities are still in place.

Back then to Jodrell bank. In 2011 I was working in Warrington. Everythursday, I would drive back home to St Neots, this one particualr day I decided that I would make a diversion and visit this famous site and have a look at the telescope built by Bernard Lovell, starting in 1945, the large steerable dish became fully operational in 1957.

I am so pleased to have hadd the opportunity to visit both of these famous locations.

Just ten days short of two and a half years ago is how long since I started numbering this blog. I suppose to be strictly honest there will be a couple of days when things went a bit astray, but I think for the most part I have gone with the schedule.

I reckon if I were to go and look at the 500th post I would be talking about achieving 1000 not too far from that now and like any venture, I have had my rough patches; writers block, feeble posts. Please don’t think I am ever happy with those.

I don’t think that doing the blog has become such burden that I don’t want to continue doing it. But I must admit, that especially recently it has been difficult to keep going, but not because of a loss of desire to write. I think that is still there. It was worse, I think when I had that period where I stopped the morning walk. I seriously ran very low on inspiration.

I think that at least the walks give me some thoughts.

I think it was just before Christmas we bought a ninja foodie. We haven’t been using it much. The odd batch of chips here and there. Why bother?

I’ve been thinking about it, so tonight I did some pork steaks, with a breadcrumb coating, and actually, they came out not too bad, even if I say so myself. I’m going to have another go.

Whilst the moon itself is not very well exposed I wasnt expecting this picture. There’s something almost mystical about it. I caught it on this morning walk as I was walking down the High Street.

This mornings chorus was particularly tuneful as I was walking along Mumby Road. I didn’t use the app I have that identifies bird song. I’m not sure that I trust it, and you can’t export the list of identified birds, which I find a bit frustrating. I should really see if there is a better app, the one I have which is more than a couple of years old.

Partway down the high street there was a bit of a face off between a cat and a young fox. They were dancing around a waste bin. I left them to it.

I didn’t see anybody to say good morning to, but it was a nice walk nonetheless.