The Cygnet Committee

It's been yet another grey day today, with intermittent rain, but I have been out both walking and running, buying some fabulous Aldi Converse knock-offs, and a new Millets rucksack to replace the one I have that has developed an alarming hole in the medicine compartment.

The October migrants have been reported as starting to arrive, the nightime passovers of cheaping redwing, but I haven't heard anything yet as I have done in the past at my old flat. We tend not to see them until after Christmas anyway in town, unless conditions are really hard. Likewise the winter waterfowl such as goosander and the occasional pochard that visit Balderton Blue Lake, which I haven't visited in a while since I moved.

Today, the swan family on the trent were up at the lock, the water level very high again. Cygnet Committee by the way is a song on David Bowie's "Space Oddity" album, but only listen if you have a bit of time handy.

It is nearly ten minutes long.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 07.10.19

Following my Own Advice

Today has been a day of days.

The first thing I did upon waking up this morning at about 7:45am was to pick up my mobile phone. The moment it was in my hand there was a bleep, and a vibration.

A message? A twitter notification? No, it was a Guardian news headline, informing me that David Bowie had died of cancer at the age of 69, a mere two days after his birthday and the release of his latest, and now last, album.

As a David Bowie fan since the age of zero, the news was a terrific shock, and saddened me greatly. As a teenage kid growing up weird with undiagnosed Tourettes, he made it OK to be different, a sentiment shared by many LGBTG folk on twitter today who probably had a much rougher time than I did.

His music played non-stop on Radio 6, it was time to follow my own advice, and treat my sadness with a dose of the open air, looking for goosander on the two lakes - and finding none - and winter thrushes on the Coddington pastures.

None there either.

Still, it was a good 13km run, with Bowie music in my ears the whole way, and it at least was a positive way to end the day. I'm not sure David himself would have enjoyed a run like that; it's hard to light a Gitane on the move - but I hope he knows how much me and many many other people have enjoyed listening to his music today, before, and forever.

Si

Everything was a feeding frenzy today

Ducks are at it too

A glorious sunset duly ensued