Shiny Shiny

We have made good use of the sunny days by washing and polishing the Airstream. It looks gorgeous. It always looks beautiful but now it's as buffed and glossy as an Oscar nominee.

As for us, we are expecting to feel the after effects in our shoulders and backs for the next couple of days.


The wildlife around us asserts itself, emboldened by signs of the approaching spring. I have been observing some crows attempting to build nests. I picked out a pair at the tree's extremity so that they would be easy to identify.

For a few days I watched as they worked together. One would fetch, the other would manage to balance a few twigs in the crook of the branches. For about a week they made little progress. Each morning I would think that I could see the beginnings of a nest and the next day it would have disappeared, they would be starting over. I felt sorry for them. I worried and pitied their failure to do what I thought should come naturally. I guess they have to learn by trial and error.


By the weekend there seemed to be a twiggy structure holding itself together. It was clearly stable enough for a crow to sit in, for a day at least. For the last three days a neighbour has been frightening them off with some sort of loud banging device. I thought it was the sound of countryside pursuits involving shooting things. Apparently if he doesn't send them on their way now he will have about fifty nesting pairs pooping in his garden all spring. My incompetent pair will have to keep trying somewhere else.
T