What a lovely surprise. Two great days of sunshine and not a drop of rain in sight. At last I can dry my socks out on the window sill and watch the birds splashing around in their little bath. You cannot imagine how much joy I get from watching the activity in my back garden. Nature is a wonderful thing and it never fails to fascinate me. I find birds very intriguing, by their almost too simplistic way of living. We all dream of being a bird and flying high and free. In fact we have a saying in English; "free as a bird."
However Mother Nature can be a bitch sometimes. My garden plays host to many species of bird including, Blue-Tit, Sparrow, Starling, Black Bird, Magpie, Robin and even a family of Great Spotted Woodpeckers drop in for a bite to eat from my selection of nuts and seeds that I regularly put out for them. However things took a nasty turn last week when I looked out from my window and saw a horrific sight. A collared Dove was being ripped to pieces by a very large bird. It did not take me long to recognise the assailant. It was a Sparrow Hawk! A ruthless bird of prey who's single goal each day is to catch and eat....another bird! It gave me a new perspective on the whole chain of life which I had forgotten all about. I know we see these things on TV in wildlife programmes, but to see it first hand in my back garden gave me quite a turn I can tell you.
If that was not bad enough, later the same day I saw another bird being devoured at the end of my lawn, by either the same or a different Sparrow Hawk. Pretty unlucky for me to see this twice in the same day, but even more unfortunate for the bird being eaten. The hunter did not stay long in the garden. It grabbed the victim in its claws and flew off, leaving behind a few feathers. The only trace left of the carnage that had just taken place.
Back to today...I'm currently making lesson 37, which is proving to be quite a big task, due to the fact that there are many different costumes involved with this one. It took me two days just to complete the filming and that has never happened before. On the first day of filming I did not stop until 1am! So now I sit here in front of the computer monitor with 40 clips of video staring back at me, which now must be viewed and edited. Ah well, no peace for the wicked!
( Misterduncan )
2 comments:
Hi misterduncan
How's it going ? Great??!!! I hope so
Here in Morocco we have whole time the sun shining, though today it start to rain.
However I hope that you enjoyed your two shining days in England.
Your faithful student
Nabil from Morocco
Dear James,
I would like to thank you for your English lessons. I'm a Chinese woman from Shanghai, studied in the United States and now works and lives in Paris. I'm teaching my 12 year-old son English and found your videos on YouTube. I've now progressed to Lesson 10. We like your lessons a lot. My son thinks you're terribly funny and associates English with your name. Your English videos are worth gold! I learnt my English in a much more austere fashion in Shanghai Foreign Language School.
Keep up the good work!
Sarah Ren Chen
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