Tag Archives: animal photography

Innovative pie fillings

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There was a time when I suspected that Juno used to spend time plotting her escape…

Plotting an escape

But, with a Science Plan diet, that she experienced as being no more than a bowl of crunchy rocks…

Science plan      … I came to realise, that all she surveyed, was indeed an imaginative fantasy of pie fillings that could have been!

Juno was a lady of fine taste, so I have no doubt that fast food would be out of the question…

Squirrell [2]

Then again, anything that looked too oily was best left out of the pan, and would be safe and slick in the local canal (or dock feeder, as I am occasionally reminded by local aquatic aficionados)…

Bird in canal

Some of the potential fillings might be a little on the tough side. It might be a little difficult to have a stomping meal, if the meal is doing the stomping…

Seagull on binstore

While other ingredients just might require a larger oven…

Heron @ Atlantic Wharf

But, just once in a while, a game of hide and seek will provide an entertaining appetizer to the main feast. This morsel thought it was carefully camouflaged from the prying eyes of predators…

Can't see me

Until it decided on the old head above the parapet technique…Now you can

Maybe some of the best meals were the ones that just got away!

Now I'm off

Until we speak again, don’t forget to spit out the beaks… the crunching puts off your fellow diners!

Searching for credible alternatives

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With local elections just around the corner, credible alternatives to a noxious Tory controlled government are becoming difficult to find. The Labour Party are about as credible as an alternative design to those urine-stained lifts in so many tower blocks…

Students lift?

As for Plaid Cymru... they might well see themselves as a smooth alternative to the Scotch whisky market, but offer little credibility in the independence stakes when compared to the rampant Scottish Nationalist Party…

Welsh Whisky

And the Liberal Democrats, well they are still trying to work out how they got decimated in the last General Election…

Difficult choices

The UKIP fraternity are coming to terms with weekly losses of so-called prominent representatives, as well the machinations of their new leader…

Bartley

Which leaves the earnestness of the Green Party, committed as they are to limiting the number of wheels polluting the environment, they never quite seem to get their full message properly coordinated…

Bikes on pitch

Meanwhile, down at the Cardiff City Stadium a credible alternative has emerged from the team that in October 2016 was languishing at the bottom of the Championship table. Cue the time for totally unreasonable expectations for next season…

City 1 Forest 0

Until we speak again, Bella offers no particular enlightenment regarding credible alternatives from the broadsheets. With expected turnouts to be nearer 20% in many places, it seems that most people probably don’t give a urine-stained lift for any alternative…

Reading paper and books

Cheap tricks

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There was a time, not long ago, when the UK Labour Party tried a nice little trick of charging £3 for people to become a member. The bonus attraction was the opportunity to vote in a leader, out of a duck shoot of particularly charisma-lite alternatives. And the newfound masses managed to locate the one who would have the least chance of amounting any possible credible opposition to the incumbent public service wrecking crew. In fact, this might just be the lost soul trying to curry favour with people he would need to protect him in the most unlikely event he were to taste the power of government…

Police horses

However, the new leadership, if that is indeed not misrepresenting the definition of the term, took to flaunting the engorged numbers of new members in their party. Clearly mistaking a bunch of misguided activists to be representative of the masses needed to return the forlorn party to the governing benches. A cheap trick that seems to keep on giving to the very people it is supposed to be opposing!

Talking of horse shit…

Horse shit

… Birmingham City FC were in town today, to take on the mighty Bluebirds.

City v Birmingham

And it seems that the home team are trying to learn from the aforementioned beleaguered Labour Party, by selling off loads of tickets at £5 a pop, so that they could then boast of the great numbers they amassed to support them (normally about 13-14,000). A cheap trick perhaps…

Match attendance

But, it seems that just like the Labour Party, until Cardiff City FC can mount a credible opposition, they are doomed to fall short of the promised land. For the record the match finished Cardiff City 1 Birmingham City 1.

However, perhaps the highlight of the day was the ranks of seagulls perched on top of the Canton Stand. Rumour has it they were gazing at the away fans at the other end of the ground, wondering what people who don’t live by the sea actually look like! [Note: for my reader who didn’t know, Birmingham is about as far away from the sea as you can get in the UK].

Seagulls

Until we speak again, don’t get fooled by cheap tricks, and take a leaf out of juno’s book… the ‘wake me up when it’s all over’ edition.

Fighting fit [3]

Trump’s first nightmare

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Take a picture of this… it’s a quiet afternoon the night after the celebrations, and ‘the Donald’ is looking for something to eat. His innate tendency to seek a confrontation draws him towards the promise of a grilling at ‘Mesopotamia‘.

mesopotamia

Not one to let any reference to the cradle of civilisation cloud his own vision of personal greatness, he accepts the perceived challenge and grumbles his way through an astonishing menu. A mesmerising presence of Iraq is peppered with Lebanese references, and an unexpected Mexican insurgency…

menu

As thoughts drift towards the need for building walls, he realises that the incumbent occupation has already created a tasteful arrangement of bricks, tiles and wood without the need to create any semblance of a barrier.

restaurant-1

The food is fit for any self-elevating despot. Starters of Vine Leaves and Halloumi Salad were preceded by complimentary bowls of a tasty broth, and accompanied by Ayran (a yogurt based refreshing drink). Who needs alcohol when the world is already laid out before you?!

starter-of-vine-leaves-and-halloumi-salad-and-ayran-drinks

While ‘the Donald’ reels in amazement at the strange collaboration of Iraq & Mexico the taste buds are further assuaged by a Mixed Kebab and Okra combination…

mains-of-mixed-kebab-and-okra

The overall mirage is completed by what appears to be a cocktail crescendo. But this is the peak of non-alcoholic consumption… so it is the taste of a full flavoured Virgin Mojito that satisfies the feast.

virgin-mojitos

To any self-respecting, world-appreciating, liberal-minded individuals, this is an experience to open the mind and satisfy the soul. If you are ever strolling along the infamously diverse City Road in Cardiff you are advised to pay a visit. ‘The Donald’s’ of the world need not apply; they deserve little more than a wall building around them, within which they can indulge their own nightmarish visions of the world. Bella would have been first to supervise and contain the nightmare from encroaching on the ordinary people.

x-ray-eyes

Until we speak again, may your culinary excursions be mind expanding.

What could possibly happen?

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So 2016 has gone, and you are no doubt left wondering what on earth happened there? It was a year when some of the great seats of power were reduced to simply spinning the wheel…

city-hall-and-big-wheel

Across the world the light touch paper was ignited, as populist decisions set off fireworks under the seats of the so-called western democracies…

fireworks-2fireworks-3

And, with all of the celebrity departures leaving so many sobbing into their record and film collections, there was always the great reassurance that shopping never dies…

royal-arcademorgan-arcade

So, what will 2017 bring? Who knows, just try asking Bella and see what reaction you get… ready-to-eatUntil we speak again, Cardiff sends you the very best of wishes in whatever happens across the next 12 months!

A White Witch at Christmas

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It’s that time of year when raucous party going crowds cram into garishly lit and decorated venues to indulge in over-consumption. So, here is the antidote, with a warmly seasonal scene… a Burnley brew (Moorhouse’s White Witch) found in a quiet corner of Carlisle.

the-griffin

Meanwhile, Bella could always be distracted by the thought of a Duck in the vicinity…

duck-in-carlislerear-view

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Until we speak again, enjoy your Christmas festivities, raucous or otherwise.

The politics of slaughter

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A clear summer’s evening in Cardiff earlier this year provided the backdrop to centenary commemorations of the start of the Battle of the Somme…

the-field-5

So, it was fitting that another field, that of the Cardiff City Stadium, fell silent for a minute in memory of the ending of the colossal loss of life…

remembrance

Thus began another epitome of futile gestures! As generals stand on the sidelines, barking orders for younger men to throw themselves forward in attack. All who bore witness had nothing less in mind than slaughter of the opposition.

With all guns blazing, there was little to separate the two sides as the time arrived for the site of battle to fall silent…

city-v-huddersfield

 

As the respective generals present their politician-styled banalities dressed up as post-match punditry, the locals claim the bragging rights from a Cardiff City 3 Huddersfield Town 2 victory.

reading-the-paper-2

 

Until we speak again, it might be useful to take a leaf out of Bella’s studied approach to political reportage.

Lib Dems of football

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A brief taste of the power that comes with a place at the top table; a collapse of confidence throughout the natural support base; recent glimmers of hope of a revival, or maybe even a new dawn; only for the gloom to descend as familiar failings re-emerge…

gloomy-skies

Am I talking about the recent travails of the Liberal Democrat Party, as they pick themselves up from an electoral pasting in 2015 with flickers of hope in a recent by-election? Or am I talking about a Cardiff City FC team having fallen from a brief sojourn in the Premier League, to recently occupying the bottom position of the Championship, only for a new messiah to raise that thing called ‘hope’ with a couple of wins and a draw?

right-hookCardiff City 0 Wigan Athletic 1 is the kind of unwanted result that brings a sharpened perspective to those who wallow in a land called hope. Juno offers a right hook as a wake-up call; and Rich Hall recently reminded us that “hope lies somewhere between wishful thinking and performing a rain dance.”

Until we speak again I guess I had better get dancing!

Tales of the river bank

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ducks-at-14-1Some of us are nature loving cats who need to live in a rural setting to feel alive; and some of us are urban cats, but who like to see a little bit of the natural world within our city centres. Juno and Bella were glad I was an aficionado of the latter camp. They would not be short of triggers for the imagination, particularly for dreaming of exotic meals.

Who said this year of Olympic dreams was already over? The Quack Olympics are thriving down at Atlantic Wharf, as the contestants line up on the edge of the water ready for the 10 yard free-style race. For Juno and Bella it is an opportunity for dreaming of being aquatic cats, reclining on their backs just beneath the water, mouths wide open (I know it doesn’t make any sense, who said this blog was about reality?), waiting for tasty morsels to just drop in…

ducks-at-14-2

But, sometimes the opportunity might just be a little too big to manage!

heron-atlantic-wharf

Cautious cats know, that sometimes there is the danger of the hunter becoming the hunted!

grey-heron-2

 

ready-to-eat

 

Until we speak again, Bella might well look ready for dinner, but the local wildlife can rest assured she will only be getting the veterinary formulated science plan (aka ‘rocks’).