Landslide

Removing the small but deceptively heavy and sticky landslide.

Stormy weather (again)

We should stop talking about global warming and start talking about climate change - it could be wetter and colder in Ireland according to the IPCC

More Gruesome critters

No flies on him!

Urban Fox

Caught sauntering up to the front door - it didn't see me standing in the shadow, camera in hand, until it heard the camera focussing.

Vico Dipper celebrates 75th birthday

Click here for pictures:

http://picasaweb.google.com/vico.rocks/FrankS75thBirthday#

A good advert for taking bracing dips in the briny!

Sharing lunch with juvenile Redshank

Amazed at how close this young redshank (at least I think it's a redshank?) approached me while having lunch at Blackrock seafront on Friday. Almost ate crumbs from my palm, quite remarkable for a wild bird.

An Irish Times article on the green lights in the water can be found here.

And a Wiki article on the Noctiluca scintillans can be found here.

Stalactites on the East Pier

This shows the effect on a rainwater hopper of rain trickling through the blocks of stone (presumably they are limestone blocks or the lime is from the cement between the blocks).

Storm victim

Storm on Friday, and a victim (possibly a Black Guillemot)

East Pier battery open day

There are plans to refurbish the East Pier battery and put a cafe there.Here are a couple of 'pre-touristification photos.

Here is some history.

Lisbon?

The great Lisbon debate

It's Poem Time Again

The Lost (Vico) Pleiad

Not in the sky,
Where it was seen
So long in eminence of light serene,—
Nor on the white tops of the glistering wave,
Nor down in mansions of the hidden deep,
Though beautiful in green
And crystal, its great caves of mystery,—
Shall the bright watcher have
Her place, and, as of old, high station keep!

Gone! gone!
Oh! nevermore, to cheer
The mariner, who holds his course alone
On the Atlantic, through the weary night,
When the stars turn to watchers, and do sleep,
Shall it again appear,
With the sweet-loving certainty of light,
Down shining on the shut eyes of the deep!

The upward-looking shepherd on the hills
Of Chaldea, night-returning with his flocks,
He wonders why his beauty doth not blaze,
Gladding his gaze,—
And, from his dreary watch along the rocks,
Guiding him homeward o’er the perilous ways!
How stands he waiting still, in a sad maze,
Much wondering, while the drowsy silence fills
The sorrowful vault!—how lingers, in the hope that night
May yet renew the expected and sweet light,
So natural to his sight!

And lone,
Where, at the first, in smiling love she shone,
Brood the once happy circle of bright stars:
How should they dream, until her fate was known,
That they were ever confiscate to death?
That dark oblivion the pure beauty mars,
And, like the earth, its common bloom and breath,
That they should fall from high;
Their lights grow blasted by a touch, and die,
All their concerted springs of harmony
Snapt rudely, and the generous music gone!

Ah! still the strain
Of wailing sweetness fills the saddening sky;
The sister stars, lamenting in their pain
That one of the selectest ones must die,—
Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest!
Alas! ’t is ever thus the destiny.
Even Rapture’s song hath evermore a tone
Of wailing, as for bliss too quickly gone.
The hope most precious is the soonest lost,
The flower most sweet is first to feel the frost.
Are not all short-lived things the loveliest?
And, like the pale star, shooting down the sky,
Look they not ever brightest, as they fly
From the lone sphere they blest!

William Gilmore Simms

Gulls

Here is a group of gulls in Scotsman's Bay. - three Mediterranean gulls and one Black-headed gull. The Mediterranean gulls were rare in Ireland until quite recently. Their Irish headquarters is at Sandycove.
Our resident black-headed gull looks a bit drab in comparison.

Solstice repair works

Where's the hat and safety tape?

Jellyfish and strange creatures from the deep

A bit too many jellyfish were on patrol this morning, and on BBC TV springwatch tonight there was a feature on leatherback turtles in the Irish Sea brought here by the numerous jellyfish!

There was an even stranger visitor to these shores - from Lappland?

Mourne Mountains from Dalkey

The Mountains in the North were exceptionally clear tonight.

These were taken through a 26x telescope

. . . and the terns have arrived

This is the first tern I've seen this year. OK, the picture is bad zooming-in reveals a tern. And it was diving for fish.

Brent Geese

The brent geese will be leaving soon - returning to the tundra via Iceland and Greenland

They dropped in today to say goodbye.

In praise of wild swimming

An interesting article here from the finacial times weekend (there were a few copies left in John's newsagent in Dun Laoghaire).

Sparrowhawk

This sparrowhawk perched on a tree stump for almost an hour,   not far from Hawk cliff.

Sewage ends blue flag hopes of popular beaches

Indepent newspaper article of interest

A blast from the past! 1934 actually.

Water Temperature

today at Vico: 3.5 degrees Celsius....

Buoys

New sewage outfall? New databuoy?

Winter pastime - Moooooooooooooooses!

Enjoy throwing snowballs on mooses while winter - might suit chickenpoxey swimmers in quarantine!

http://admdesign.ch/game-corner/aelgar-Elche/aelgar.htm

Use mouse to shoot moose :-)
Enjoy famous winter game :-D

cold Judge's wet the Point

"I fish my Carrageen moss and all the high tide floats Dermot;
I encourage my tourists and all is believe again.
(I keep going I winter swimming you up inside my sea.)

The Brens go brushing out in freezing and slippery,
And misty brush reads in:
I smoke my waves and all the Vico hits concrete.
I drowned that you swimmed me into steps
And dive me sunny, struggled me quite dry.
(I keep going I winter swimming you up inside my sea.)

Rope walk s from the ginger tea,
flasks's jellyfishs jump:
talk kayak and seal porpoise:
I smoke my waves and all the Vico hits concrete.
I brushed you'd drink the way you get dry,
But I have tea hot and I sunbathe your sun.
(I keep going I winter swimming you up inside my sea.)

I should have skiped a moon instead;
At least when planets drives they build back again.
I smoke my waves and all the Vico hits concrete.
(I keep going I winter swimming you up inside my sea.)

Mermaid & Sylvia Plath (using poem generator purpleglitter)

Mercury Falling Further!

Temperatures at 4pm today of -1C and 6.5C were not an immediately obvious combination for pleasant swimming, but nevertheless provided this vicover with two wonderful swims - requiring an intravenous transfusion of a thermos of tea afterwards however!

"Cult to Mermaid". By Vogon Poem Generator

See, see the swim sky
Marvel at its big yellow depths.
Tell me, JimJudge do you
Wonder why the Dermot ignores you?

Why its foobly stare
makes you feel invigorated
I can tell you, it is
Worried by your Vogon facial growth
That looks like
A ginger tea.

What´s more, it knows
Your concrete potting shed
Smells of seaweed.
Everything under the big swim sky
Asks why, why do you even bother?
You only charm seals.

Poetry Competition:

I reckon some of the Vicover body of work would have a good chance in this competition!

First Swim to JudgeJim!

JudgeJim is hereby logging the first (hopefully!)  swim of 2009 at 12:30am, independently witnessed by vico intelligence & covert observation department official, Gerry!