The Streak.

IMG_1760, originally uploaded by melvinheng.

I went through the first 44 years of my life only managing to see two; more recently I began to notice flashes of colour out of the side of my eye, now I can barely look at The Irwell between Peel Park and Boddies without seeing Kingfishers. It reminds me of the time when my mother-in-law was slightly obsessed with those magic eye 3D images that were all the rage a few years back. I looked and I looked and I couldn't see anything. One day she said, just defocus your eyes while looking at one. I did. WOW! A 3D cowboy on a horse. From then on whenever I was looking at one I'd just go 'doink', and defocus my eyes. Two seconds later, there was the image in full effect.

It's like that with the Kingfishers, as if my eyes and my brain suddenly worked out how to go 'doink' so I could see them. This has meant over the past three or four weeks I've been seeing them almost as often as I see the Grey Wagtails, and more often than the Goosanders. Best of all was this morning when I was looking from inside Peel Park towards the opposite bank of the river and heard the now familiar twitter-gargle they make - a bit like a more high-pitched finch song. My eyes went 'doink' and I found it heading up towards Castle Irwell, low above the water. When it reached the gated and locked footbridge, which no longer takes students over the river between Salford University campusses, it turned and headed back, landing about twenty feet in front of me on the concrete riverbank. I tried to get a better look with the binoculars but the movement must have disturbed it and it flew off.

Earlier, I'd been looking from the bridge described above and heard a commotion among some carrion crows in trees on the far bank. Some swooped out and swooped into the foliage, again and again, calling angrily. They were obviously mobbing something. I tried to see clearer what it was, but as I only use a pair of 10x25 bought from Walmart in Canada purely functional compact binoculars it was difficult, but it looked a crow with a thin white stripe along each upper wing. I couldn't get a clear enough view as it, and they, kept moving, but I can only presume it was a crow with a few stray, mutant white feathers. Further along, and now opposite the tree, I looked again, but this time they seemed to be working out their anger on a smaller, brown bird, possibly one of the sparrowhawks which can be seen along there.

Following on from this blog's first anniversary at the weekend I've decided to post a few more of these longer, more city centre nature-focussed pieces, and also to source more photographs from Creative Commons (as I'm never going to get good wildlife photographs). So, thanks to Melvin Heng for the usage of the photograph.

Up Against The Wall VIII: Slates, Slags Etc.

Up Against The Wall VIII: Slates, Slags Etc., originally uploaded by mithering.

"Slags go Prestwich! haha", back seat of The Village Bus.

Male slags...
In the cold nearly old ska Jamaican dawn
Dead publisher's sons
Material hardship pawns
The Beat, Wah! Heat
Male slags...

The first Village Bus of the day runs past the bottom of my street at 7.55, the last one leaves Shudehill Interchange at 17.27. A single fare is more expensive than a single fare on the other buses which get me home, or into town, but a day pass is notably cheaper. Ho, and also Hum, you say, but the good thing about The Village Bus is that there's only one an hour, which takes a lot of the randomness and pain out of journeys into and out of town. I have to be in the Interchange at a twenty-seven minutes past the hour, or waiting on Heywood Road at five-to. Previously, when I took the 135, "Bus of the Stars", I would turn up at a bus stop and wait, sometimes for up to twenty minutes, whereupon one, two or even three would turn up at the same time and stutter into town, picking up and dropping off at virtually every stop along the way.

In more recent times, before I discovered the mono-glory of The Village Bus, I had started getting the 137, the 135's shorter, less glamorous cousin, from a stop near Blackfriar's Bridge. This runs every twenty minutes, which was good for organising my life, but less good when it didn't turn up. Which was often.

Now, I take The Village Bus as far as the site of the old Boddies Brewery cross Great Ducie Street and head onto New Bridge Street to stare at wildlife from the runtish bridge which crosses The Irwell there. It's a fairly deserted spot - most of the activity along there comes from cars heading towards the crofts of car parks - and I've been lucky enough to watch an American Mink climb up and down the bankside vegetation, searching for something or other, herons fishing, fish-jumping and bizarrely, but weirdly appropriately, a moorhen chasing a rat.

Chewing Gum Wrapper

Pirate Treasure., originally uploaded by mithering.

Faded plenty and corroded some,
I saw the chewing gum wrapper,
I picked it up just like a bum,
Cruddy little, cruddy little, cruddy little thing;
Full of dirt and it was full of grit,
I saw the chewing gum wrapper;
But colors like that you can't git,
Cruddy little cruddy little cruddy little cruddy little.

Jonathan Richman's hymn to the aesthetic qualities of rubbish appeals to me greatly. Out in Heaton Park with The Kids on Saturday we happened upon this archaeological find. A fragment from a Walkers Crisps packet from the time after the clear window in the front had vanished, but before the advent of foil and the current logo. So when does that date it from? I should ask Paul Heaton, who I interviewed once, in his terraced house in Hull and, on hearing of my interest in 'trash' aesthetics, introduced me to his collection of crisp packets. All neatly flattened and placed in a convenient drawer; tactile evidence of ancient potato and maize-based commerce from around the globe. I wonder if he still has them?

The Streets of Your Town II.

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I originally thought this idea, to walk along streets in town that I’d never walked along before, would be pretty straightforward, but in reality it’s been difficult to find appropriate thoroughfares. This morning, however, I was off pounding the streets, looking into something else, when I saw Oswald Street across Miller Street from me, running between The Ducie Bridge Pub and The United Yeast Company Limited building. I dodged between the cars across Miller Street and set off down it. Somebody else was coming the other way and looked surprised to see me. We avoided one another’s gaze. It seemed to be the right thing to do.

On the right there were the backs of the offices of the Community Foundation for Greater Manchester. On the left a low wall, covered in crap graffiti art (I suppose everybody needs somewhere to practice), bordering a car park. On the floor, the usual random bunch of shite. Nothing interesting. Not like the time I stumbled upon a bunch of kids and a bloke burning the plastic off bundles of wire in the middle of a street in Liverpool.

At the end was Munster Street. Hooray, another street I’d never previously walked down. In front, further up Corporation Street away from town was The Crown and Cushion, a hidden gem (albeit a refurbished one). Left onto Munster Street was Corporation Street with Parkers’ Hotel opposite, which I noticed for the first time, had been built by the Co-Operative Society. At one point it seems the whole area was populated by the Co-Op; a more benign, aspirational, nineteenth century predecessor of Media City.

Pictures of Match Stick Men III

Grafitti Guy, originally uploaded by mithering.

I'd passed this fella a few times as I headed down Back King Street in town, on my way to work, and finally decided to get a picture of him. He's not a blatant rip-off in the way the previous posts of comic art have been, but I like him on a Roy 'Trailer Trash' Tompkins or Kaz level, particularly the attention to detail on his shirt.

Closer scrutiny of the text below reveals a quote from Jubilee by Derek Jarman which, once placed into the giant cardfile known as Google, takes you to Kingdom of Muin . Which appears to be the site of a particularly active set of Glasgow-focussed artschool wackoes.

What The World Is Waiting For.

Manchester Peregrine Falcon, originally uploaded by coxy.

Another blog. From Manchester. Well, strictly speaking from Prestwich, but with work in the city centre. I've ummed and ahhed for a long time. I've created, typed, launched and pulled two previous attempts as I couldn't focus down on the why and the what. Now I've decided to just write about what I'm interested in. Or, more likely, what I've found interesting, stimulating or uplifting on any particular day. Like the Manchester Peregrines, who I saw on an almost daily basis, usually perched on the 'E' of ARNDALE, during the summer, but haven't seen for a while. They must, as their name suggests, have wandered off. Eyes peeled for their safe return.