"I don’t see the feathers in the wings, I just count the wings" Charley Harper

I like Charley Harper's philosophy, I got one of his calendars today for the princely sum of £1 - money well spent for some great pictures. A perspective I find rather easier to comprehend than the third year particle physics I had to gird my cerebral loins for earlier on in the week. Much of the lecture was beyond my ability to understand, but  what I have found out is that quarks can be up, down or strange, and can also be red, green or blue. I suspect the colours are not literal, but if they are, then could the Hadron Collider  become a Hadron Colliderkaleidoscope? Maybe it is fun being a quark (or even an antiquark), especially perhaps in the strange state.

Today, it has been electronics and the amazing world of silicon chips. I have learned that a single silicon chip can contain up to 3 BILLION transistors; mind boggling stuff. Well, I was amazed, but looking round at the students in the lecture theatre, I seemed to be in a minority of one. It was 9 in the morning I suppose; also, the words "this topic is not examinable" prefaced the lecture, so I imagine that was enough signal for most of the brains to shut down and think of more important stuff, like the weekend.  I think the use of biological molecules in today's technology sounds fascinating, and were I a student today, it would be the area I would be interested in studying.

Elusive bitterns

When we were in Australia, one of the pictures I took was this one. Just leaves under a multi stemmed (rooted?) tree you might think.

Having arrived back in the UK the pictures were perused  in more detail and we were amazed to find that a snake had been lurking in the leaves that I had been nonchalantly thrashing around in!

It was while we were wandering in Leighton Moss at the weekend that Q remembered this wild life spotting technique and wondered if we could apply it to our (so far) totally ineffectual efforts to actually see one of the reserve's famous inhabitants, the bittern. That we have failed to see a lot more of the reserve's inhabitants seems insignificant in comparison to our lack of tick against the bittern box.

So ... the idea was that we take LOTS of pictures of the bittern's natural habitat (reeds, reeds and more reeds) and then come home and scrutinise the results for that give-away profile.

Hmmm. it doesn't seem to have worked, or else we are not looking closely enough.  That said, we did as always have a great time.