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Published: April 13th 2011
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“I’ve got a feeder for you to perch on” I found out in a recent family get together that the first word I ever managed to speak was not ‘mama’, ‘dada’ or any of the usual baby words. It was ‘pigeon’. You could probably conclude from that small fact that I do, as the title of the song suggests, like birds. I suspect though, had I been able to say more than one word at the time, that I would have probably been saying “keep away from my rusks, pigeon vermin!”
Pigeons aren’t on the top of my list of favourite birds, but there are plenty that I do like. Of course, the events have been chosen by the music, and in this particular case the music has chosen an event for my sister. She likes puffins. Indeed, she was very excited when I talked about our plans for a trip to Iceland a couple of years ago when I said we would be visiting the island of Heimaey, a place famous for its thousands of puffins. Sadly, we went after they had all flown south for the winter, and I could only show her the next best thing:
Shrink wrapped puffin chopped and ready to cook in the local supermarket.
We did stumble on a puffin chick in the end, but it wasn’t the thousands that normally whitewash Heimaey’s cliffs every summer, so with a song about birds picking an event right in the middle of puffin season it seems ideal timing to make amends. Unlike seagulls and pigeons, you don’t find them stealing your chips as you wander around Wolverhampton (not that you would wander round Wolverhampton with a bag of chips, some uncouth would probably hold you at knife point for them), in fact you don’t find them much in England, so we will be heading to the foreign soils of Scotland. Ideally, the far north of Scotland would be the place to go, but with one eye on the budget and one thought on not spending an entire weekend in the car, I found a place much further south, and, as luck would have it, only a 45 minute drive from Edinburgh, so that is where we are going.
Staying in Edinburgh works out pretty well, as it means that we get to have a normal city break with one of my quirky destinations slotted in the middle, and I’m already well aware, only 3 events in, that not everyone is entirely taken by those quirky destinations. If it turns out that puffins are, in fact, a bit like pigeons with funny coloured beaks, we can always hit plan B: drink a whole heap of whiskey, eat a haggis and walk around flashing our kilts to unsuspecting tourists (assuming the locals have seen it all before). It’s going to need a day off work to make it a long weekend, otherwise it will be all driving, no bagpipe-playing, and nobody wants that (except maybe the locals). My suggestion is to head up to Scotland on Friday June 10th, and work our way back on the 12th, so a two night stay in Scotland’s finest city (possibly 3 nights if everyone is agreed and we can get the time off work), but as always I will go with the majority, so if anyone wants to change the dates shout up.
The song itself is about getting away from the big noisy world we have created for ourselves and taking in a bit of peace and quiet and a little bit of nature, which couldn’t be more appropriate. A famous Scotsman once said “There’s bin a murrder”, but luckily that was in Glasgow. Where we’re going it’s going to be a nice relaxing weekend. Assuming those birds don’t use us for target practice.
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Michelle
non-member comment
on my swanky phone
This sounds awesome! I'm honoured to have been invited and I'm wandering what date I am going to need to book off? Also are you intending to drive up to scotland? Did you know it takes 1 hour on a plane from Bristol to scotland for £50? I may consider meeting you up there and boycotting the hideous amount of time I'd spend sitting in cars (between me driving up to you to begin with I'd pretty much be driving the entire length of the country :s) ^_^ YEY!!