Wednesday, November 25, 2009

The Wind and the Willies

You hardly ever see a leaf actually being plucked from the branch by the wind, like the way you hardly ever see a bird die but you know it must happen, (unless they're all immortal apart from the ones that end up squoooshed on the road) today the air is alive with the leaves, watch almost any tree for a few seconds and you'll see it reluctantly parting with one more of it's food providers in this wilderness that became suburbia (a fact that no one has yet told to the wind). There is a child's buggy stuck up a tree on the balgaddy road too, unless it grew there, like the one that's growing just on the green off the coldcut road. This morning it was shaking threateningly in the wind, and made me worry a little more than normal about what will happen when the bough breaks, it might happen harmlessly at night, because the worst weather always happens at night, when darkness gives permission to the elements to do what they like, unwatched by anyone. I still felt a stirring of something communityish, unselfish, to do something to prevent someone (who happened not to be looking up as they walked along, day or night) from getting squooshed. So I rang the gardaí, but think maybe you should too, because much as the man at the other end of the line sounded like he was taking it seriously and assured me they would look into it in a few minutes time, I think I'd have hung up and laughed a bit, and maybe muttered something about catching real criminals.
In other news - the new version of Word is giving me the Willies - everytime I try to type the word wellies - it mischieveously changes it to willies, automatically, creepy eh (In ireland some of us say something gives us the willies when we find it a bit scary - for my millions of international readers)
On the odd one out quiz of yesterday, no one has yet guessed correctly, so keep those guesses coming, and I thought ye knew me!

8 comments:

Totalfeckineejit said...

When our young son was constantly ramming his buggy into fences and cars and trees and concrete posts we always admonished him to be careful telling him that they didn't grow on trees.Clearly I am wrong, I have failed him as a parent ,who knows what deep underlying psychlogical trauma is going on within him now.

beedlemama said...

My non existent willy is frankly fecked off with this never ending storm. I love a bit of wuthering heights drama but weeks on end - enough already.

Niamh B said...

hmmm if that's all you did wrong you didn't do so bad TFE.
BM - I know what you mean, my non existant verruca is positively throbbing.
Buggy Update - I think they've taken it away now. YAY gards - will tell ye for sure tomorrow

Batteson.Ind said...

I've often wondered why you never see a bird die... though, you can when they fly at the window at a billion miles an hour. Prams in trees!?.. blimey! the city sounds dead rough, worst we get around here is a bit of ole bailing twine, or a pallet!

Matt Bolton said...

The wind is making a lot of noise and it is confusing the cat. My non-existent wooden leg almost erroded due to the rain!
And you never do see a bird die, just dead.

seanoneillsongs said...

Having a dog who needs a daily walk, I've enjoyed this long late autumn and seen on or two leaves leave the mothership.

My dog is a retriever/collie cross and, while she brings things back, she would much prefer to collect them than give them up. Throw a ball and, unless you have another one - maybe even a squeaky one, you won't get the first one back.

'Pinball up a tree' is a game we've jointly come up with. I throw the first ball as high as I can up into a tree - preferably not a Deodar Cedar as they seem to steal balls - Clara will watch and listen while the ball bounces about in the tree and usually catch it in the air, dropping the other one at the last possible second and we start again. All incredibly boring t oread about even if you like dogs.

Last week I thought I'd disturbed a wasps nest as, when the ball was making it's way down, it seemed to be surrounded by about 100 flying things. As these came nearer and I prepared to make a hasty exit, I realized that they were what I called 'helicopters' when I was a kid - and when my kids were small. Maple or sycamore seeds that had been waiting for a ball to hit their branch until now.

Dominic Rivron said...

Not so long ago I was stood in our back garden when a bird dropped out of the sky, dead, and landed next to me.
I never remember it happening before and I doubt it'll happen again. (It's true! I should have put it in my list of ten! Drat!)

Niamh B said...

Watercats - the buggy has been up there a while - perhaps a poetic statement, don't think it was blown up there, but did you hear about the apartment block that lost its roof today?
Matt - poor cat, and your poor wooden leg.
Sean - thanks for that - think i'll have to try that game - and that sounds like a magic moment with the helicopters, hope your dog appreciated it.
Dominic - that should have been in your list alright, not such a magic moment, but at least you're a witness to it, we can now believe it happens.