I’m going to extend the Eternal Maker Giveaway to Midnight Tuesday 31st to make up for any time you may have lost trying to leave a comment over the last couple of Blogger meltdown days …
I’ll announce the Melody Miller winner as soon as I get some time this weekend. Promise.
Yesterday was a weird day.
I got up at about 6am and pottered around making coffee, grunting, doing a bit of barely-conscious sewing. At some point I noticed the sky go that lovely yellowy grey dark, and I could hear a a little rain spattering, so I thought I’d take a picture out of my back window.
It’s not a great photo, it was only meant as a memory prompt.
I thought I’d go out and take a photo of the wet on the stone.
I like things like that. I love the lush green and ridiculous size of the fern too …
I pulled on my boots and went out the back door …
and then there was a
THWUMP!
<warning – you did read the title, right?>
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How weird is that?
Obviously it didn’t land neatly at my perfectly centrally positioned feet like that, this is one of those arty blog feet photos … but it was only about six inches away.
It was already dead when it landed. Not stiff but definitely dead. It had ceased to be.
I still had to do that poke-it-with-the-toe-of-your-boot thing, just to make sure it wouldn’t flap its wings when I picked it up. Judging by the eye, he’d had a bit of a dogfight in the sky. He was a young adult.
Then I picked him up and my whole concept of ‘seagull’ dissolved.
I have lived in Brighton for 16 years. Seagulls are part of our lives here. Love them or hate them, we can’t help but study 'em.
I don’t love their bomber command scavenging … I’ve had a sandwich whipped out of my hand on the beach once or twice ... bastards … But I do just love their bird-ness.
They are so stout and bolshy. I have this thing about wanting to squeeze them, … I always imagined that they were quite bulky. like when you pick up a cat, I mean, they’re huge, they must be quite weighty, right?
Well, wrong apparently. Of course, if you think about it, which I obviously hadn’t, birds have the finest of porcelain-like bones, and are full of air pockets to keep them buoyant and aerodynamic. Oh, and covered in feathers … But so floaty light?
It was like picking up a candyfloss seagull.
It was profoundly moving.
So this is my shot of the wet on the stone
