♫All of Me♫

What would I do without your smart mouth
Drawing me in, and you kicking me out
Got my head spinning, no kidding, I can't pin you down
What's going on in that beautiful mind
I'm on your magical mystery ride
And I'm so dizzy, don't know what hit me, but I'll be alright

 
My head's underwater
But I'm breathing fine
You're crazy and I'm out of my mind

Cause all of me
Loves all of you
Love your curves and all your edges
All your perfect imperfections
Give your all to me
I'll give my all to you
You're my end and my beginning
Even when I lose I'm winning
Cause I give you all of me
And you give me all of you, oh

How many times do I have to tell you
Even when you're crying you're beautiful too
The world is beating you down, I'm around through every mood
You're my downfall, you're my muse
My worst distraction, my rhythm and blues
I can't stop singing, it's ringing in my head for you

My head's underwater
But I'm breathing fine
You're crazy and I'm out of my mind

Cause all of me
Loves all of you
Love your curves and all your edges
All your perfect imperfections
Give your all to me
I'll give my all to you
You're my end and my beginning
Even when I lose I'm winning
Cause I give you all of me
And you give me all of you,oh
Give me all of you

 

Cards on the table, we're both showing hearts
Risking it all, though it's hard

 

Cause all of me
Loves all of you
Love your curves and all your edges
All your perfect imperfections
Give your all to me
I'll give my all to you
You're my end and my beginning
Even when I lose I'm winning
Cause I give you all of me
And you give me all of you

I give you all of me
And you give me all of you, ohh

~John Legend~

A  very beautiful song to accompany the elegant courtship dance of a pair of Great Crested Grebes. We have been very lucky to get a front row seat of one nature’s great water ballets. We watched in anticipation of them performing a beautiful and intimate courtship dance. The pair were now in their stunning summer displays with their striking head feathers forming a ruff. We have heard them calling to each other with their cackling “kek-kek-ke-ke” or a harsh howling “ker-ker-ker”.

In the middle of the lake, the male approached underwater and emerged suddenly. Mutual head shaking followed, mirroring each other. There was a lot of head shaking and fluffing out their head crest feathers, where the black crests and chestnut and black tippets came into display. The male dashed away, the retreat display, only to suddenly turned and faced its pursuing partner. They performed synchronised dives and emerged holding a clump of pond weed in their beaks. The courtship ended with both lovers rising up on the water, chest to chest, feet paddling like crazy, presenting each other with the pond weed. If the dance was successful, the pair formed a lasting bond and will find a private corner to mate.  I could watch this again and again. I was so engrossed that I’d forgotten to take any photographs. These amazing sequence were taken by Babe. Thanks, darling.

I took a day off to celebrate my birthday.  Another candle on the cake and I think I needed a bigger cake to fit all these candles:-). I am thankful to be blessed with good health, a job that I enjoyed and a wonderful husband. Life was good. Syukur alhamdulillah. We started the day with a trip to the beautiful Victorian spa town of Leamington Spa. After parking at our favourite spot, on the top floor of the Parade, we walked along the wide boulevards admiring the stunning Georgian and Edwardian architecture. Our first stop was the London Camera Exchange because Babe wanted to send his Sigma 120-400 lens for repair. We crossed the road to photograph these stunning floral displays which had earned the town three consecutive medals in the Heart of England in Bloom competition.

Then we walked towards the shopping district  because I wanted to check out the eclectic emporium,Blighty Bazaar. We were searching for a metal pot-stand but I was lost in the vintage, retro, handmade nostalgic and yesteryear memorabilia. I was blown away by the veritable feast of loveliness housing over 90 individual stalls with a tearoom brimming with dainty vintage china under one roof. Babe sat down in the tearoom while I browsed the labyrinth of rooms. It was like taking a walk down memory lane, an Aladdin’s cave of British social history. We didn’t find any pot-stand but I did came out with a box of vintage buttons and an adorable retro brooch. It was impossible to leave empty-handed. I will definitely come again.

As we were walking around the town, we were accosted by beggars, Big Issue sellers and chuggers at every corner. It was a turn-off for us. I was searching high and low for the Gaia Co-op because I wanted to get some environmentally friendly stuff. Unfortunately we couldn’t find the place which was a pity. The statute of Queen Victoria outside the Town Hill caught our attention. The statute was moved an inch off its plinth as a result of bombing in WW1. Queen Victoria visited in 1830 and gave the town its ‘Royal’ prefix in 1838. A busy market was on and we bought a few bits and bobs for lunch.

We strolled to the Grade II listed Jephson Gardens at the bottom of the town situated beside the River Leam. As we reached the fountain, a flock of pigeons flew towards us because they thought we were going to feed them. It was quite an experience to feel the close brush of the wings as they flew past us. We sat on a bench and had an alfresco picnic in the sunny afternoon keeping an eye on the marauding pigeons. A very friendly squirrel came bounding begging for some scraps. After our lovely lunch, we enjoyed a horticultural experience and walked past the sensory garden, temperate glasshouse, refurbished boathouse and the stunning weir from where the river was cascading.

We crossed the beautiful Grade II listed Victoria bridge towards the other end of the town. We glimpsed the All Saints Church with its Gothic revival architecture and made a promise to check it the next time we were here. As we walked past the magnificent Royal Pump rooms, a wedding entourage spilled out. Traffic stood still to allow the happy couple and family cross the road to the Jephson Gardens. They were posing by the fence and it was an opportunity for us to take some photographs. We wished warm congratulations to the lovely couple. May you always find in each other the love, laughter and happiness that only partners in life share.

But I couldn’t help thinking of this quote. It was priceless :-).

Attending a wedding for the first time, a little girl whispered to her mother, “why is the bride wearing white? “Because white is the colour of happiness, and today is the happiest day of her life.” The child thought about this for a moment, the said, “So why is the groom wearing black"?”

~Unknown~

We checked out Ashlawn Cuttings again to see if the frog-spawn had hatched. It was another sunny afternoon and the reserve was full of bird-songs and butterflies. Brimstones and Commas were fluttering past, too busy to strike a pose. Colourful Goldfinches with black and yellow wings and red face were twittering rapidly above us. We were surprised to see that quite a lot of spawn had disappeared. There was less than half in the pond. I hoped no one had taken them. It would be very sad if that was to happen. There wasn’t that many frogs too and they’d stopped croaking. I just loved it when they come close to check us out. 

There is no place in a city that can’t be better.

There is no toad that can’t be a princess,

No frog can’t become a prince.

~Jaime Lerner~

Then a quick stop at Draycote Waters to check out one of my favourite summer visitor and passage migrant, the stunning Northern Wheatear. It was an adult male. Check out the blue-grey above with black wings and white below with an orange blush to the breast, a black cheek. In flight, it showed a white rump and a black ‘T’ shape on its tail. They wintered in Central Africa. and make one of the longest journeys of any small bird, crossing ocean, ice and desert just to be here. They appeared in Britain during March, making it one of the earliest summer visitors.

The Anglo-Saxon origin of the name ‘Wheatear’ was believed to mean ‘white arse’ and referred to the conspicuous white rump displayed in the bird’s flight. Their clear ‘wee-chat-chat’ call could be heard as it moved jerkily along the ground, wagging and fanning its tail on occasion. We could see the bobbing of the head as a robin approached.  It was hunting for morsels among the pile of rocks that had been dug by the rabbits. 

“The wheatears come in early spring

And sits on tufts of higher ground

Bobbing smartly as they sing

Synchronously with the sound”

~Robert S. Morrison~

We also checked out Brandon Woods which was just across the road from our favourite playground. There was an open day at the reserve and we knew that they were very popular with the local community and the hides will be full. As we squeezed past the styles, we could hear the cat-like mewing of a buzzard. When we looked up, a pair was soaring above us riding the waves. They were circling closer and closer to where we were standing and all you could hear were our cameras rattling away.

We crossed the bridge over the railway line as a Virgin coach rattled below us. We spent sometime trying to interpret the map which we think was pointing the wrong way. Brandon Wood was quoted in the Doomsday Book as woodland in 1086 and was now a designated Planted Ancient Woodlands Site (PAWS). We walked through natural broad-leaved woodland with carpets of bluebells poking out of the soil. These would looked amazing when they flower. Pussy Willows and Blackthorn put on a fantastic flowering display with the large yellow male catkins proving very popular with the newly emerged Commas, Peacocks and bumble-bees.I would love to walk further but Babe was feeling the heat. We will definitely come again especially when the Bluebells flower. The explosive ‘gergock’ calls from the male pheasant greeted us as we crossed the railway bridge again. It was hard to believe that these birds were introduced to the UK, since they were now so much part of the countryside scene. We walked past a field where a herd of horses and Shetland ponies were grazing by the fence. We’d a good laugh when one of them was rubbing its bottom against the fence.  Aah….

At work, my coleagues and I had a heated discussion about setted sets of books. They were a series of volumes either by an author or about one subject. As information specialists, we arranged the books according to their subject headings unless they were published in a continuous numbered sequence. But, the Maths Institutes requested that all lecture notes regardless of subjects be given or dumped in one class number QA9 which was for general works, treatises and textbooks. Unfortunately, mathematics was not a subject solely for one department. It was also used by other departments as well and it will be confusing for them if we allow this to happen. In the end, the Maths Institute agreed that we classed the books according to the subject headings. They have their own library and will shelved the lecture notes all in one section for their users.

I’d been off work for 2 days due to a flu-like symptoms. I was feeling a bit stuffed when I got up in the morning but I still went to work. As the morning went by, I began to get worse. I was sneezing like a trooper and had a very busy wood-pecker in my head. I croaked to my manager that I am going home before I passed my goodwill to everyone else. In fact, a few of my colleagues had fallen ill earlier in the week. I called Babe and was home before lunch. I spent the days recuperating on Babe’s reclining chair with Paracetamol, vapour rub, lots of water and a hot-water bottle for company. I left the patio door open to let in some fresh air and fall asleep to the tweets, chirps and cheeps of my feathered friends.

“Some days there won’t be a song in your heart. Sing anyway”

~Emory Austin~