Notice Board: the Honey-buzzard Season in Northumberland 2017 as it happened – Nick Rossiter

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This is the blog for the 2017 season, now closed, except for a limited number of updates to the season's records.

Significant events in the Honey-buzzard season as it unfolds in Northumberland are given here. Seeing Honey-buzzard in their breeding areas is facilitated by reading about their jizz, knowing their calls and digesting the three BB papers updating Honey-buzzard identification (bottom of page). Listen to these wise words from a former prophet: “to try and identify them from plumage I think is a loser to begin with ... you’ve got to identify Honey Buzzards from their shape and structure”. The Honey-buzzard is rapidly increasing as a migrant in Britain with particularly major movements in 2000 and 2008. The analysis cited indicates that a continental origin for the migrants is very unlikely, with various studies on the continent all indicating that the Honey-buzzard is not susceptible to drift while on migration. Focus is now on the significance of orographic lift in the choice of migration routes for birds from more northerly areas where thermals are weaker. The breeding status of the Honey-buzzard in Britain is surely less controversial than it was. Migration totals in the UK have risen in the past decade and attempts to attribute these movements to a Scandinavian origin are in conflict with both 1) the underlying physics of broad-winged raptor migration, and 2) the actual details of the movements. However, migration movements are generally thought to be understated because so many observers struggle with the identification of juvenile Honey-buzzard. The status of Honey-buzzard in the UK has been highly politicised, as in the climate change debate. A close examination of the Honey-buzzard review performed by the Northumberland County Records Committee is in progress: start with part 1 and follow the links through to later pages. A worrying development in early 2015 was the modification of migration data in a Scarce Migrants paper in BB; while the Editor has promised not to repeat the manoeuvre, erroneous data in the literature is extremely difficult to erase. Fear is the path to the dark side; fear of not being able to identify Honey-buzzard leads to anger; anger leads to hate of those that can; hate leads to suffering in the UK birding community (with apologies to Star Wars!). For full details of the 2012 season see the study area Report 2012 with hyperlinked Appendix containing all field observations. Full details for other seasons are contained in the annual blogs, cited above, with an overall summary in Population of the Honey-buzzard in SW Northumberland.

Some recent publications provide strong support for the thesis above. Forsman (2017) provides detailed information on the prevailing Misidentification of Juvenile Honey-buzzard. Maybe unwittingly the last report on Scarce Migrants in Britain by White & Kehoe (2016) admitted that in general migrant Honey-buzzard in Britain are locally born and bred, finally bringing to an end the idea that they were Scandinavian migrants. Therefore Honey-buzzard Migrants are British Born and Bred. Finally from central Scotland an exceptional breeding season for Honey-buzzard was reported by Shaw et al (2017) in 2016, suggesting a continued expansion of numbers in northern Britain (Scotland).

April 25th 2018: the Notice Board for 2017 is now closed. The 2018 season will be covered in Notice Board 2018 here. If the Honey-buzzard home page is refreshed, NB 2018 is called from the updated version directly.

(December 31st 2018): Some more detailed results, including gender and gangs, for the 2017 breeding season are given in Table 30.

Table 30 gives a breakdown of the numbers of males, females and juveniles in each part of the season. The male:female ratio declines through the season from 26:19 (1.37) in display to 15:14 (1.07) in the rearing period and 18:23 (0.78) in fledging. Because of extra time spent outside the study area in the display period, the adult totals are lower than usual in display and relatively high in the rearing period with extra effort to find sites not found in the display. The number of juveniles seen, reported as 79 in Table 30, differs from the 81 in Table 29, because of the 2 hidden broods (recorded as >0). It was a very good year for the appearance of gangs of locally bred juveniles, gathering before departure. Five gangs of juveniles were noted from 24/9-29/9 at 5 sites with a total of 24 juvenile: 6 at Bywell (Tyne Valley W) 24/9; 5 at Dipton Wood (Devil's Water) 26/9, 4 at Great Heaplaw (upper South Tyne) 27/9; 5 at Sinderhope (Allen) 28/9; 4 at Riddlehamhope (Derwent) 29/9. Only in one area, Tyne Valley E, were no gangs seen in a visit to Wylam on 25/9. The gatherings are transient, hence not easy to locate with a very brief time window.

Table 30: Number of Male, Female and Juvenile Honey-buzzard found in each phase of breeding season in 2017

(December 30th 2018): The overall results for the 2017 breeding season are given in Table 29.

The study area was maintained at its 2016 level. The results were very similar to those of 2016 with 49 occupied sites (49 in 2016) with the number of confirmed breeding pairs at 48 (48 in 2016). Productivity was again very high with 32 pairs raising 2 young (34 in 2016), 13 pairs at least 1 young, 2 pairs one young and 2 pairs greater then 0 young, giving a minimum fledge of 81+ juveniles (83+ in 2016). In terms of known successful nests, 47 pairs raised 79+ young, that is a minimum of 1.68 young per pair (in 2016, 82+ young from 48 nests, 1.71 young per pair).

Weather report for England:

May started with some rain or showers in the south, but otherwise the first third of the month was settled with mainly easterly winds, warm and sunny in the north-west but often cool and cloudy in the south-east.  The second half was more changeable but mostly warm. There was a notable hot and sunny spell from the 23rd to 26th, followed by significant thunderstorms across many areas on the 27th and in the south-east on the 28th/29th. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/may

The first ten days of June were changeable, with mainly westerly winds, but rather warm, especially in eastern counties, and it was quite windy at times.  After that came a dry, sunny and increasingly hot spell which affected much of the south between the 13th and 21st, and spread to cover all areas between the 17th and 19th.  This spell brought the highest temperatures in June since 1976.  After a thundery breakdown for some, it was generally cloudy from the 22nd onwards and turned very wet in many areas in the last few days. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/june

July was a generally unsettled month but it was often warm, especially in the south-east, until the 20th.  There were brief hot spells with widespread thunder on the 6th and the 17th-19th.  It was cooler from the 21st onwards, and there was some heavy persistent rain at times. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/july

August began unsettled with rain or showers and mainly westerly or south-westerly winds, and this pattern continued until the 18th.  It turned warmer from the 19th, and it was often warm and sunny, particularly in the south-east, between the 25th and 29th, but the month ended cooler and showery. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/august

September started with a weak ridge of high pressure which brought relatively quiet weather, but the rest of the month was generally unsettled with an unusually high number of rain days.  It was often cool until the 19th with frequent north-westerly winds and belts of persistent rain alternating with brighter showery weather, and it was windy at times, especially around the 10th-13th.  It was warmer from the 20th onwards with mainly southerly winds, but often cloudy with some fog patches. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/september

October began unsettled with westerly winds and near-average temperatures, and this regime persisted during the first week.  South-westerly winds prevailed for most of the month, and there were some notable high temperatures at times, notably the 16th (associated with ex-hurricane Ophelia) and 23rd/24th.  It was often cloudy, especially in the north-west, but rainfall amounts were generally modest.  It turned colder with overnight frost in places during the last few days. https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/2017/october

The overall impression was of a damp and mild summer with no long spells of rain or sunshine.

Survey effort was maintained throughout the season but there were 2 absences of 7 days each in May (Wiltshire/Cornwall), 1 of 7 days in July (Azores), 2 of 5 days in August (Hampshire) and September (London) and 2 of 4 -5 days in Furness and Sidmouth (mid-October-early November). So each period of activity was affected to some extent; monitoring the display period in May was the worst affected, with the number of sites found occupied at this time being 32, down from 40 in 2016. No new sites were found this year; the lower coverage during the display period will not have helped here as the first sign of fresh occupation is often displaying birds.

In the target area in 2017, 10 sites were observed for nests (10 in 2016) with 100% success again this year. Scots Pine (5 nests) remains the most popular tree with Hemlock Spruce (2), Oak (2) and Norway Spruce (1) some way behind. There was no change in the sites visited from 2016. Each site was visited twice, the first visit between 19/6-1/8 in the sitting/rearing period of the season and the second between 15/8-29/8 in the fledging period of the season.

Table 29: Results for the Honey-buzzard Breeding Season in SW Northumberland by area in 2017

(December 29th 2018): Table 31 shows the migration picture for Honey-buzzard in 2017. It was again a good year with large numbers of juveniles noted in October: the juvenile total at 27 was equal to the record for that age class in 2012. Good breeding seasons in Scotland are suggested in 2014, 2016 and 2017 with a poorer year in between in 2015.

Table 31: Visible Migration Movements noted for Honey-buzzard in SW Northumberland in 2017

April 24th: vast amount of work done today on Shilford nest visit 24/8 (7152) and very pleased that finished it around 22:30 (see below). So all August data, all round 2 visits and Red Kite and Hobby now fully documented. Will move onto NB 2018 very soon and catch-up on 7 remaining data sheets over next month; no research will be lost. Funds +4k so far this week to new record but tensions rising again in NY with large fall (2%) in DJ this evening as LT bond yields rise above 3%; inclined to take some chips off the table! Made N4c4l where good to watch the world go by; had gr8 catch-up with former colleague at unn!! Looking for intersections at the moment between busy schedules: can see some to focus on!! 2moro is back to homeland!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 23rd: completed processing Farnley records from 24/8 (7152a) and working hard on Shilford nest visit 24/8 (7152), probably giving the richest haul of results from round 2 visits. Will then move on to Noticeboard 2018 for the new season, with a note at top of page of outstanding data sheets from 2017. Made S4 intro to new season by TD/NH and rehearsal in FH. Upcoming programme looks very impressive: strong artists, good themes and some novel ideas; need to book by 3/5 for priority. Will purchase a large package; need to put a lot of the details into a spreadsheet to keep track of calculations and the potential ones into Google Calendar to check for feasibility. The rehearsal had LV in the chair. We were treated to Shostakovitch's Chamber Symphony, a marvellously dark work breaking out dramatically into shrieking strings, and a piece by Weber. Turnout of pp was virtually complete; hope long Japan tour goes well. Caught 18:24 train NCL-RDM, bit nostalgic as that was the one I usually caught back from work; some familiar faces! Had a pair of Red Kite displaying while taking a comfort break in Dipton Wood E: late for this, might be migrants recently returned. Also had 1 Swallow in same area and 3 at Newbiggin. Did make G4g4s where 4 of mates out for good chat. Had grand highlight to day: very welcome: she's gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro is preparation day, then very busy with CT at DH with M, maybe t+5!! xxxxxx

April 22nd: catching up on activities – concert below and footy here. Think Gloucester and Oxford are the furthest N, the Gulls will come next season: next drop is Southern League West! The owners of the Gulls in Torquay, a property company, want to redevelop the ground at which they play. The owners of the pitch, Torbay Council, have refused permission. My feeling is that the property company is driving the football team into oblivion so that the Council will give up on having a significant football team and allow building on the ground, which is in the centre of a prosperous urban area near the cliffs at St Marychurch. All sounds very bad but without the support of the property company, the Club would have entered administration. Everything's politics (and money!). One footnote, on the train passed Stadium of Light twice; it was so quiet you'd never have guessed a Championship game was on, sentencing Sunderland to relegation. Made C4c4l, studying FT: every columnist has different views: 2 more years of fun, crash coming, crossing of yield curves major warning: you take your pick but think combination of short-dated bonds and oilies is probably about right for now! Decided need some new clothes so went into Edinburgh Woollen Mills in HEX: need to be 10 years older to appreciate their stock fully but did buy an armless fleece for £16. Much later made G4g4s where good crack with everyone. 2moro it's S4preview/reh; may linger but will take it as it comes!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 21st: the wake for Torquay United was duly held at Victoria Park, Hartlepool, as they drew 1-1; they needed a win to keep our faint hopes alive of staying in the National League. So did witness the historic relegation to National League South. We should have won; we missed a penalty in the first half and had many opportunities in the last 20 minutes but poor finishing and star work by the 'Pool keeper kept it as a draw. Travelling was efficient with 12:54-14:13 direct RDM-HPL on way out and 17:02-18:23 direct on way back; cost was £9.20 on train and £20 for the game; did leave 5 minutes before end to ensure I caught the train. Did take laptop and get some work done on train, labelling and indexing piccies of Honey-buzzard, all for 24/8 (7152/7152a). Final event of week was HYI dinner/dance at Hexham Abbey Great Hall with attendance of 62; that cost £40 for 3 courses but well worth it as the 'youth' will have plenty of money now and be less reliant on organisations such as R. Will have 2moro free before S4reh on Monday afternoon and trip towards the Gulls mid-week. It's a good thing I know what's going on; helps a lot with the intrigue, as well as being involved!!! 2moro will be C4c4l, catch-up and G4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 20th: an exciting day at S, attending both rehearsal and concert. Really like Alexandre Bloch as conductor: he was quite particular in the rehearsal but that paid dividends in the actual performance which went off really well. Been reading about articulation: it's a good example of adjointness I think: may be worth a ps! AB did introduce verbally the one 'new' work, which was quite substantive --Thierry Escaich's Baroque Song – and we also had an encore, which was a bit irregular for RNS! Thought some players shone in enhanced roles!! Had plenty of chat with other pp and it will be good to get the flavour of the new season on Monday afternoon. BC had chance to dazzle in Brahms' Hungarian Dances 2, 7, where he did a little improvisation in the rehearsals, which had a few players baffled! He behaved himself in the actual performance (in his element!). Two pieces by Ravel, Tzigane and Le Tombeau de Couperin, were a natural for the conductor and they came off well. In 2nd half we had Brahms 4, which came over beautifully with strings, woodwind and the heavies all combining admirably. In absence of BC from front row, we had a very able deputy!! Could not stay for Spotlight: passion calls!! Told N later at W4g4s about BC's effervescence: he looked disapproving: but surely we can have some fun! Had an adult Mediterranean Gull near the Tyne Bridge. Had 2nd butterfly today, another Peacock at Riding Mill. Funds also shone this week at +24k, making new record high and bringing gain on year to 59k after 7.1k of withdrawals. At last oilies are catching up with the rising PoO; feel there's further to go here! Day finished on a high: a little pent-up perhaps: she's very stylish: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's RDM-HPL to see the Gulls; might have to leave game a little early as going to HYI ball. xxxxxx

April 19th: from recent trips on train on Tyne Valley from 16/4-18/4, the Goosander population is very healthy with breeding at Riding Mill, Prudhoe and Wylam, and counts of 6 and 2 drakes at Wylam E and Newburn W respectively. Sand Martin numbers at Wylam increased from 10 on 17/4 to 15 the next day. A female Blackcap was at Corbridge Station on 16/4 and a Common Buzzard was at Farnley on 17/4. Today made Allendale village in East Allen for LAF meeting from 14:00-20:30 at the village hall. We had a walk around nearby Deneholme to look at access issues in a wooded area near habitation. Weather was beautiful and very sunny with 1st Willow Warbler of season singing continuously. In afternoon the North Pennines trust gave us an informative presentation on developments in access and activities, with much to say on Isaac's Tea Trail. In the evening we had the business meeting, where I presented WG1 report on updating the RoWIP, which went down well. The most interesting item was the countryside after Brexit. Evidently the landowners are insisting on a bonfire of regulations and forms. Whatever the perception given to the public by Gove of improved opportunities for them in the countryside, the drive at the moment is apparently to maintain subsidies and grants without the paperwork while giving landowners almost absolute ownership of their land. We had a new County Councillor rep on LAF: he was a backwoodsman and looked at us with withering contempt: how dare they discuss walkers' rights over our land! Expect some fireworks! After meting made Allendale Inn for a quickie g b4 stopping off at Catton to add to the bird list (Curlew, Tawny Owl, Grey Heron), which totalled 17 types. Had 1st butterfly today, a Peacock at Ordley. Made HoN4st4s with the techy gang b4 taking A back to S and home for sleep of the innocent!! 2moro it's RDM-NCL12:54, S4reh and S4con followed by W4g4s!! Funds comfortably reached all-time high today. lok2t beauties!!!!

April 18th: down by train HEX-LDS and back to hear a chamber recital by ON's woodwind from 14:30-16:10. It was a varied programme with works by von Zemlinsky, Walthew, Klughardt, MacDowell, Grainger, Milhaud. All very polished: favourite was August Klughardt's Quintette, which had extensive use of leitmotifs! Quite chatty there: think I'm getting my feet under the table! Work well on trains as not many distractions so completed processing Featherstone/Haltwhistle 1/9 (7159/7160). Think I'm going to do one more, Shilford 24/8 (7152), before being diverted to summaries of migration and other aspects, as that's the only one left for August. Back in NCL met GG (ex LAF member for forestry) outside VctCmt, wondering whether to go in for a meal; I persuaded him to do so and we had good catch-up!! He was waiting for train to CAR. After a while left him to make a small delivery but did catch-up with him again on 21:18 NCL-CAR. PoO reached almost $74 today on stock draw-downs in US and indications from Saudi/Russia that they are now aiming for $100 a barrel and will continue to cut supplies to get there. Funds 4k short of all-time record on 23/1. Got back on time: it had been a gr8 day out!! Was a nite for inspiration: la dolce vita: she's gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's LAF from 14:00-20:30 at Allendale followed by HoN4st4s, then S4con/reh on Friday and Monday, Victoria Ground ('Pool) on Saturday afternoon for probably last look at Gulls in NL, ball in HA on Saturday evening in aid of HYI (Hexham Youth Initiative). xxxxxx

April 17th: added below for 15/4 details of the interesting trip to Derwent Reservoir, including 2 Osprey. Summer visitors are arriving; more records to add from 16/4-17/4. Dental check-up in Corbridge went fine, including routine X-rays of the jaws; was new young lady dentist H – very loquacious – she's pulled 6 teeth out of N in major overhaul job; N switched from a Consett dentistry to my one; I have all my original teeth bar 1. After meeting N at Sh4c4c for good chat, we moved on to AF looking for bargains; he bought 2 watches for £7 and £2; I bought a moorland scene watercolour, painted in 1930s by Scottish artist Frank Prosser for £20 (listed at £25). Now starting a blog pushing Prosser's prilliant art! This Windrush scandal is horrific: the Home Office has obviously been reading about the registration systems used by the Nazis to persecute their Jewish and gypsy populations. Think T May, as architect of the scheme, should bring forward immediately cast-iron protection for the people involved; she cannot be trusted on immigration policies, having an obsessive desire to bring down the totals, whatever the personal costs. EU nationals over here might be having 2nd thoughts about staying. Funds +8k so far this week on growing support for medium-sized oil producers; LON:PMG have soared with a temporary stock shortage; not sure they'll hold all of their big gain this week by Friday; however, sentiment is changing for the better towards such stocks which are typically still near the bottom, 75% down from 2014 levels, in spite of PoO recovering ½ the losses from 2014. 2moro it's HEX-LDS for afternoon concert by wind quintet of ON at their base; tight connection on way out but back in NCL on the 17:44 from LDS on advance single; might loiter for s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 16th: R was serious business: there was a drive to steam-roller through the new strategy. P & I wanted the plans to be put on the web for everyone to study for 4 weeks and forced it to a vote but we lost 10-8: think we're branded as trouble-makers! Caught 14:50 CRB-NCL and then through to LDS. Went to Town Hall to see dress rehearsal of Salome by Opera North (ON). It was brilliant with Richard Armstrong as a great conductor for such heavyweight pieces. Jennifer Holloway had a very strong voice for the Salome role and got a huge cheer at the end (she's performed the role internationally several times); at the Sage on 5/5 we have Giselle Allen (N Irish) as an alternate Salome, maybe she's the understudy. The Gallery at Leeds Town Hall gives very good views and was almost full of supporters. The story is of course thoroughly decadent and the Dance of the Seven Veils very sensuous: most enjoyable for some!! It was always going to be tight for the early train back home and found I'd missed it as performance closed but never look at watch in such circumstances, just enjoy the music. Did have open return. Have agreed to upgrade my associate status with ON to top level at £60 a month (from £30); they deserve support for the way they're keeping opera at the top level in the north of England. I'm still way below the top levels of supporters (patrons, gold, silver, bronze): opera is expensive with orchestra last nite c100 strong: from the vanity point of view, now get my name in the programme! Completed the report for LAF on the train, got approval for the draft and will submit that version for the meeting on Thursday at Allendale. Very memorable nite: some novel thoughtful adjustments: she's so hot: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's dental check-up, Sh4c4c, AF with N. Going to ON on Wednesday again at LDS to inspect woodwind but this is an afternoon concert, for supporters. xxxxxx

April 15th: hazy sunshine for most of day was followed by heavy rain at teatime, when back home listening on CD to Act 3 of Tannhäuser with Daniel Barenboim as the maestro: superb!! Fog again tonite: it's ages since we were plagued so much! Summer visitors are starting to appear: at Derwent Reservoir (Ruffside) from 12:55-14:30 had 3 Sand Martin arrive from S, 1 Swallow moving through N, a Chiffchaff feeding and (yes!) a pair of Osprey. Details are: local breeders - Greylag Goose 31, Wigeon 6 (3 pairs), Goosander (1 drake in territory), Great Crested Grebe 1, Oystercatcher 4, Lapwing 5, Curlew 7, Redshank 2; summer visitors – Sand Martin (3 arrived from S), Swallow (1 N), Chiffchaff 1; migrants to Norway – Common Gull (31 (24 adults, 7 1s) floating E); raptors – Osprey 2 (at 13:28 1 flew from S of water, aggressively mobbed by Common Buzzard, to N side, clearing the N bank. A few minutes later noted at considerable height a pair of Osprey moving W, using orthographic lift in the S breeze over the S facing ridge, towards their nesting site 1  2  3  4  5  6  7), Buzzard 3 (3 separate sites, one bird hanging over each, suggest one bird sitting; 1 bird chased away an Osprey aggressively), Sparrowhawk (male mobbing Common Buzzard). Total was 29 species of bird. Completed compiling Byerhope visit 11/9 (7170): what an amazing afternoon that was! Now on to Featherstone/Haltwhistle 1/9 (7159/7160), leaving 8 sheets still to do: August 1, July 6, June 1. Am going to compile Honey-buzzard migration totals and butterfly records for 2017 before returning to those 8. The Honey-buzzard for the new season will be on their way, 3 weeks to here perhaps! Following Saturday's results, Gulls still have very slender chance of the great escape; a lot rests on Barrow's game at Guiseley on Tuesday, weather permitting; will be going on Saturday to 'Pool anyway, a game we have to win whatever!! 2moro it's R @ B4m4l, CRB-LDS, LTH4con, LDS-NCL (midnight); have dental check-up at 10:45 in CRB on Tuesday b4 meeting N at Sh4c4c, followed by AF. lok2t beauties!!!!

April 14th: the sun came out today and it was much milder (13C) on light SW breeze – amazing! Walk today was along the Tyne at Prudhoe Riverside from 16:50-18:40. No Sand Martin, Swallow, Chiffchaff or Blackcap – incredibly late for that state of affairs. Only summer visitor was a LBBG adult. Looks like 2 pairs of Herring Gull and of Oystercatcher are breeding on the paper-factory roof with another Oystercatcher territory on the Tyne. There's also a Goosander territory on the Tyne, with a drake present. For raptors had 2 male Sparrowhawk: 1 being mobbed by Jackdaw over ½ way and the other mobbed by Crow to E of Spetchells, far enough apart for 2 territories. Later at Ordley at 20:00 had 25 Fieldfare assembling for flight to Norway and 150 adult Common Gull returning to Derwent Reservoir to roost but surely off tomorrow morning. At Hexham Wentworth at 15:00 had a pair of Marsh Tit, which seem to be staging a revival. Did make C4c4l where very pleased to meet the smart rhwso!! Catch-up was mainly on share dealing records, where have automated capture of dealings from my client accounts into my personal records in a spreadsheet, and on Byerhope 8/9 (7170) where have found in the many piccies a family party of 3 Common Buzzard (adult, 2 juveniles), a juvenile Red Kite at Sparty Lea, bringing sites to 29, a female Honey-buzzard (with the 2 juveniles reported already) bringing total of females in fledging phase to 23 and a family party of 5 Raven. Those records need compiling tomorrow when just 1 data sheet will be left for September. 2moro sees walk in morning at Derwent Reservoir at Ruffside (looking for Osprey!), C4c4l, catch-up and G4g4s!! Finally found the Aletti Palace's reply to my March email in Bulk Mail: gave them some card details and reservation made for Vichy visit in June for Unilog; that's 6 nights at heavily discounted rate of €101 a nite; should be very comfortable, room for 2! lok2 beauties!!!!

April 13th: busy day making NCL a little after noon for CT4s4l and L&P in afternoon, where finally sorted out final publication copies of our 2 ANPA papers with the editor Anton Vrba; the proceedings ANPA 38/39 are going to the printers next week. Also finished compiling Sinderhope data from 8/9 (7169). It's the Byerhope data that's very interesting, indeed much more so than realised at the time in the rush of field work. Met N at MP4m4t, after quick refresh at Br4g4t, where we had good 3-course meal and catch-up. Concert was brilliant with BBC Scottish Orchestra conducted well by Van Pascal Tortelier. Loved the Ravel Piano Concerto in G, played by Steven Osborne, who's really at home with jazzy classical pieces. Movement 2 is so gorgeous, always brings tears to my eyes! That was my favourite piece. While enjoyed Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique, didn't find it as moving as the Ravel. Pleased to see CA as chief flautist; she's played with RNS on a number of occasions. Funds have done well this week on geopolitical concerns (posh speak for war!) about the Middle East, boosting oil prices with PoO up to $72.56 tonight. North Sea oil producers may benefit. Change was +14k on week giving gain on year of 35k after 7.1k of withdrawals; now 18k short of the short-lived peak in January. Gr8 end to nite: fitted so well with the adagio: she's gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's C4c4l and catch-up. xxxxxx

April 12th: completed Whitechapel/Morralee visit on 8/9 (7166a/7166b). Started on Sinderhope/Byerhope on 11/9 (7169/7170) where some very interesting material on Honey-buzzard, which will take a little while to process! When done that will leave just one September visit to do, that on 1/9 to Haltwhistle North Wood. Did make RC's in morning from 11:00-13:10 where was shown fantastic collection of Northumberland scenic photos, mainly of Roman Wall, with many tips on how they were obtained. Then popped into N4c4l b4 going home to sort out the visits on 8/9. Weather continued abysmal with heavy rain today on cold NE breeze at 6C; no sun since 9/4; but expect an improvement to set in Friday afternoon. Refusing to get wet & cold at this stage in the season. Made G4g4s where 5 of Monday crowd out; very pleased to meet the pt Ch (from SS, sees well) who's very fond of dogs, strokes well!! New bar lass on - E: can hardly keep up! PoO Brent held around $72: if military action is rather nominal, then sanctions on Iran affecting their oil supplies look more likely. The new phrase for proof is 'highly likely' or 'secret evidence': pretty desperate stuff! 2moro it's RDM-NCL11:52, making CT4c4l, L&P, MP4m4t, S4con!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 11th: murk continued with max/min same at 6C and humidity 97%; fog again tonite in the 'Shire but it's starting to improve slowly from Friday afternoon. Completed compiling visit to Slaley Forest Trygill on 22/9 (7184); now on Whitechapel and Morralee and 8/9 (7166a/7166b). Also busy with LAF notes from meeting on 6/3 at Wylam, needed for meeting of LAF next Thursday. Made N4c4ll where met an amazing number of people, including 2 from Forestry Enterprise who were on LAF, GB from FoDM (Friends Discovery), CM of SS fame (Samling Singers, based in Hexham), my hairdresser Jd who made some strange smoothing gestures with her hands!! Went home to get house straight b4 S and her family arrived for weekly sprucing-up (of the house that is!). Did make G4g4t where talented H was on!! B is still missing with new knee settling in. 2moro visiting Roger C in morning to learn a bit about his photography; then it will be N4c4l and G4g4s with Monday nite crowd as computing mates are both away. PoO moved above $72 today as Middle-East situation deteriorates; that's highest since December 2014. The Gulls after last nite's defeat home to Fylde look doomed to relegation to NLS (a regional league, what a disgrace!); I've supported them since I was 14. Last chance to see them in the north will be at Hartlepool on Saturday afternoon 21/4; it's in my Calendar! Next week things are hotting up: lok2t beauties!!!!

April 10th: compiled results from yesterday's visit to Lilswood and started on visit to Slaley Forest Trygill on 22/9; should complete latter tomorrow. Made C4c4l where met P/J for good crack. Booked up trip to Totnes for late April, staying at Dartington Hall for a few nights; M is delighted as will give time to convert the monadic design paper to AI. Going by train at cost of £150 so will get plenty of time for study! Might even get a very early Honey-buzzard! Spent some time optimising cost and convenience as might become a fairly regular trip with M's mental health continuing very sharp but his physical health not so good. Dartington Hall's a great cultural centre, perhaps best in Devon! Funds doing better this week at +5k with PoO up to $71 a barrel; have completed ISA subscription of 20k for this year already. Made BH4st4s where it had been the quietest nite of the year, blamed on football and the weather. Still had good chat with the regulars, including Wylam N. Weather has been terrible today with heavy rain on NE breeze at 7C, turning later to fog on higher ground; couldn't see very much at times, find dense fog quite unsettling!! 2moro no T4c4c as M away but should make C4c4l and G4g4t; later, Wednesday might become Friday when fog clears!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 9th: completed compiling data from Dukeshagg visit on 3/9 (7164/7165), leaving just 5 data sheets to process for September; can then compile Honey-buzzard migration picture for 2017. Today's walk was on Hexhamshire Common at Lilswood Grange from 16:50-18:20: getting fitter! Weather was sunny, light S breeze, dry, mild at 12C. Had quick visit to pond at Steel at 16:30. It's lovely walking in warm spring weather. Bird types on the Common totalled 18 including 4 types of wader: Golden Plover (single flock 120 on in-bye), Oystercatcher (4), Lapwing (10), Curlew (10). Summer visitors included a Meadow Pipit W and a LBBG adult. Game birds included Red Grouse (9). 2 Mistle Thrush were singing. The only moth species was Dark Tussock, for which a cocoon was found in the heather. At the pond 3 types of wader were seen: Lapwing (2), Redshank (4), Oystercatcher (2), making total for trip of 5 types of wader. Earlier made R @ B4m4l where AGM. Booked up visit to Leeds Town Hall next Monday evening (16/9) to see dress rehearsal of Salome by Opera North from 19:00-20:45; going by train and may not get back to HEX! Other trips on the horizon are a few days in Totnes, Devon, to discuss CT with M and a week in Norfolk with N in May (latter booked already). Forgot that I'd arranged to meet R on Thursday in HEX for a chat on photography so will be coming in early on Friday before MP4m4t and S4con. Very satisfied with the decision to raise the profile of prostate cancer in the UK: have contributed £250-400 per year to Prostate Cancer UK, who I think are doing a great job in removing the stigma attached to the disease and looking for reliable ways to perform early diagnosis. My paternal grandfather died of the disease in 1947, aged 69; the stigma at that time was far worse than today, some families refusing to call it by its name and some even calling it moral judgement! 2moro will make N4c4l and BH4st4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 8th: had 18 moths of 9 types at MV trap last night: 5 Oak Beauty, 3 Early Grey, 2 Common Quaker, 2 Clouded Drab, 2 Mottled Grey, 1 Pale Brindled Beauty, 1 Early Tooth-striped, 1 Small Quaker, 1 Twin-spotted Quaker. Very impressive haul: there's a feeling that insects do better after a proper winter. Made Hyons Wood from 13:30-15:20 for a good walk in mild weather, almost calm and overcast, 8C. Raptors comprised a pair of Red Kite soaring over Dukeshagg at 14:36, a pair of Common Buzzard up over Hyons Wood at 14:35 and a male Kestrel out hunting. Total of 29 bird types included migrants to Norway -- Fieldfare (10 E), Common Gull (9 adult E); summer visitor – Chiffchaff (3 singing); waders – Lapwing (12 in 6 territories); tits – Willow (1), Blue (4), Great (2), Coal (1). Two moth types were spotted: Orange Underwing (3 flying high and fast around tops of birches), Stigmella aurella (2 galleries on bramble). Relevant to Red Kite report is Dukeshagg occupied today by a pair displaying so may well have been successful last year. Have also (already!) found an addition to last year's report at Edgewell House Farm, W of Prudhoe, of an adult Red Kite on 3/9; will update directly (made update 9/4)! Have been sent both ANPA papers as proofs for final approval before printing. Planning one day in NCL this week, maybe Thursday, to do some work in music/monad area. Made G4c4s to chat with P about Azores, which he's just visited. 2moro it's R @ B4m4l, N4c4ll, walk, G4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 7th: here below are the details of the Red Kite season for 2017, a year of consolidation.

More details of the Red Kite breeding season for 2017 are available in Table 11 from Population of the Red Kite in SW Northumberland:

Table 11: Breeding Data for Red Kite in SW Northumberland by area in 2017

This was a year of consolidation for the Red Kite in Northumberland with some slight retreat from the excellent breeding season in 2016. The number of sites found to be occupied declined from 30 to 29, the number of broods found fell from 22 to 16 and the number of young fledged fell from 30 to 21. There were 5 broods of 2 young and 11 of 1 young, making this season the second most productive since the recolonisation started in 2006. The Derwent area on the northern flank of the Gateshead population, and extending across the N side of Derwent Reservoir onto the grouse moors up the Beldon Burn to the watershed at Riddlehamhope, was again a major contributor to the success, with 10 sites occupied (11 in 2016) and 8 of these being successful, with 11 young fledged. All these pairs fledged young on moorland to the W and NW of Derwent Reservoir. The Tyne Valley W held 6 pairs (8 in 2016) with 2 pairs raising 2 young each in the Bywell area; territories were occupied as far W as the hills to the N of Hexham. Some encouraging occupation of the Devil's Water was noted with 4 sites in spring but no birds were seen in autumn; Hexhamshire has long appeared to be a sink for the species. The major change to the totals from 2016 was in Tyne Valley E where only 3 sites were found occupied (8 in 2016) with no young apparently raised. This may be a coverage problem with the Honey-buzzard survey taking priority and fairly brief visits to Throckley and S of Prudhoe. The population on the edge of the moors in the Allen and upper South Tyne areas expanded from 3 to 6 pairs, raising 5 young; these birds may be from the Grizedale reintroduction scheme in the Lake District. There are no systematic counts from elsewhere in NE England in summer 2017 with which to update the totals from the 60 pairs estimated in 2016. There is a feeling that some birds will have moved to the N of the study area so the regional population may well be significantly higher now.

So making progress! Know all totals now as Honey-buzzard results are on home page; they're not going to change by very much though am reviewing everything as add to spreadsheets. Tomorrow will get back to the data sheets. Last season generated too much data, hence the drive to reduce the fieldwork for the coming season. Besides the raptors, I also want to spend more time on music, CT and fun!! Moths also deserve attention as beautiful creatures of the nite!! Large numbers of moths are emerging now: full of the joys of spring!! C4c4c was inspirational with trhwso and tbbd looking good!! Was joined by D of dommies fame from G. Also 2moro will be out for walk at Dukeshagg (immediate kite check!), making later W4shop and G4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 6th: duly updated home page and Hobby page with latest data. Next up is Red Kite data for 2017. Am planning very radical changes to fieldwork in the current season. Maybe reduce study area for raptors in general to just the 'Shire and Tyne Valley W (from 49 sites to 13 on 2016 data) but maintain Honey-buzzard nest site visits at current level of 2 trips to 10 sites; make more trips to other areas such as the Irish Midlands; also commence writing up my work on Honey-buzzard in a book! Am planning a trip to the Kruger for a leading raptor conference in November where would talk about Honey-buzzard migration in the UK; can fly standby on Virgin from London to Jo'burg through daughter's work; Kruger holds wintering Honey-buzzard. The idea is to focus the work more on areas where still gaining information. Today had sleep of the innocent (alright for some), good lie-in (sorry for late update!!) and made N4c4t and W4g4s where 4 of us out for good catch-up. Funds +1k on week and +22k on year. No momentum in either direction but my big movement to short-term bonds continued today with 17k invested in that direction in ISA and SIPP accounts with start of new (tax) year. Another mini-crash on Wall Street this evening (-2.5%) means volatility will continue at a high level. There are rumours that China will block imports of US oil and sanctions will be re-imposed by US on Iranian oil, all very explosive stuff. So looking forward to a relaxing weekend with some fieldwork, moth trapping, and tomorrow, C4c4l. lok2t beauties!!!!

April 5th: Hobby report is done for 2017 (see below): constancy within fairly broad parameters continues; will shortly add report to Population of the Hobby in SW Northumberland after final checks.

More details of the Hobby breeding season for 2017 are available in Table 12.

Table 12: Breeding Data for Hobby in SW Northumberland by area in 2017

This was a typical season on the number of sites with the 15 noted being within the long-term run from 2001 of 10-15 sites. The number of broods at 5 was towards the lower end of the typical range of 4-9 in the same period, but the number of sites at the probable level of 7 suggests that a number of broods were overlooked at the critical time when fledging takes place. The upper South Tyne had the highest number of broods at 2 and the fledged family party here of 5 (2 adult, 3 juvenile) at Towsbank again produced the best aerial spectacle of the year on 20th August. This year 9 of the 15 sites occupied were adjacent to heather moorland; the remaining 6 were in or near the main Tyne Valley. Overall another year of amazing constancy.

A few patches of snow were lying this morning at home but spring is definitely trying to break through. Made Hexhamshire Common in Kings Law/Westburnhope area from 17:20-18:45 where felt amazingly mild. Had 4 Common Buzzard at 2 sites: 3 near Westburnhope, including a very pale bird, and 1 E of Kings Law. Also had a female Kestrel near Kings Law. Total for all birds was 16 types, including 2 types of wader with 11 Lapwing (c6 sites), 9 Curlew (c5 sites); 1 Stock Dove, 25 Fieldfare going to roost, 1 Mistle Thrush. Surprisingly had 2 moths, including 1 Acleris hyemana female fluttering over the heather, with snow patches around, laying eggs. Made N4c4l where sat outside in the sunshine, felt tropical! Later made HoN4st4s where met A. Drifted E for late rendezvous: good we could stay up: did come up to expectations: she's fantastic: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's N4c4t, W4g4s and start on Red Kite report for 2017. xxxxxx

April 4th: having trouble shaking off this cold spell with sleet as left house this afternoon, still falling on return but not settling. Family got off fine for long journey home: all went well! They've left quite a lot of stuff up here and back in August: maybe I'm being kept an eye on!! DP/CP reported a Red Kite from road between 2 roundabouts (Bywell Peepy/Styford). Went to Starbucks in afternoon as have switched garage for petrol to the one near A69; other one near Haugh Lane is just too chaotic. B not out yet so skipped G4g4t and went in a little earlier to NCL making for a quickie VctCmt4g4t! Completed tally of Hobby records on Metro CAL-NCL and hope to publish report for 2017 tomorrow. After TC4m4t made the film Ready Player One. Not sure we'll be that advanced in VR by 2045 but gr8 to see some of the possibilities. The whole film was very exciting, graphics were tremendous and plot was simple enough for me to follow: not surprising for a Spielberg film! The domination of big business as portrayed in the film is a worrying extension of current trends with people enslaved through their VR headsets and cities in a neglected state; the ending is more positive with the servitude division closed down and the 2 leading avatars (the stars), Parzifal and Art3mis, becoming romantic in real life!! The Shining starred in the quest for the 2nd key: what a great film that was. Nite ended in grand style: very pleasurable: inspirational memories linger from 30/3: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's N4c4l and much later HoN4st4s with the computing gang; might drift off E a bit on the late side!! xxxxxx

April 3rd: weather much better today with temperatures rising to 5C late evening and fog dispersing. We decided on a day out to Centre for Life in NCL; I drove us in and we spent 5 hours there; it's an amazing place with a nice mixture of educational, such as planetarium and the dinosaurs, in a fun way, straight-forward play areas and 2 cafes! The kids loved it and parents and I also thought the atmosphere was great. Cost of entry for us all was £39, very good considering how long we were there. On arriving back in HEX we went to BBQ (Polska) for 2 courses plus some Polish beer. At a nearby table there was also a family group with 2 young boys: they were very docile. Compared to them our girls were a little wild and the boys looked on wide-eyed! Food and drink were very good, costing £71, with £10 tip for good service (and tolerance!). 2moro it's farewell time in the morning; have to wave a wand over house b4 S comes to clean but should make G4g4t and TC4m4s via CAL-NCL, latter for a film not unrelated to Kiss me First, which think is fascinating use of VR!! Only 2 days left to complete your ISA subscriptions for 2017-18; more relevant on Friday (6/4) anyone can put 20k more into ISA and 2.88k more into SIPP to increase funds with tax-free interest, dividends and capital gains. Funds +1k today after relapse on Wall St on Monday, leaving ftse -0.63%. Tuesday might become Thursday!! lok2t beauties!!!!

April 2nd: weather was so bad for family: no real accumulation of snow (maybe 2-3cm) but wet snow, sleet and rain started at 09:00 and was still going strong at 01:00 (3 /4). Fortunately it didn't freeze with temperatures from 1-2C all day. Back garden is flooded: glad I moved the shed and the coal bunkers. They didn't fancy driving in the slush so I drove everyone into Hexham to make N4c4c and do some shopping. It will be milder tomorrow but little chance of any brightness before 15:00. Still plenty of time to entertain the lovely granddaughters indoors! Rough tally of Hobby and Red Kite shows broadly similar number of territories occupied in 2016 and 2017; Hobby remains in its very long-standing range and Red Kite holds on to most of its impressive gains in 2016. I think climate change alarmists are struggling; in many respects climate change has been a disastrous distraction from real issues such as loss of biodiversity, reducing pollution, curbing plastic use and increasing its recycling, moving to more sustainable agriculture including organic, population control. Note tackling all 5 of these areas improves the planet for wildlife; installing renewable energy to 'tackle climate change' industrialises enormous areas which have been a refuge for wildlife. Scientifically how can you have a testable hypothesis for climate change: it's happened all the time! There's going to be a painful retreat for some. Anyway another day of action 2moro. lok2t beauties!!!!

April 1st: excited family arrived today at 16:25; trains were on time; it was the 1st time the girls had been on a train and they loved it. Had massive sort out of daughter's room, which was so very beneficial as reignited some ideas to reduce clutter upstairs; also spring-cleaned the house plants. I went out for take-away from Saathi in evening: easier than cooking! Also made Co-op in west Hexham for top-up; it was open late until 23:00 with attractive wine prices. Completed abstract for Baden-Baden meeting and sent it off; Devon M rewrote it in his style, which I accepted as gives a different angle from the Unilog abstract.

Anticipation in Communication: The Example of the Cartesian Monad with Music

Nick Rossiter & Michael Heather

Computing Science and Digital Technologies

Northumbria University

Newcastle NE1 8ST, UK

nick.rossiter1@btinternet.com; michael.heather@trinity.cantab.net

http://www.nickrossiter.org.uk/process/

Abstract

Music is a testing challenge for formal information systems even using the power of the Cartesian monad for universal design. The concept of the monad developed from the term originally introduced by Leibniz needs to have the capability to present a musical performance as a categorical composition over time signatures that proceed in successive adjoint steps: the monad looks back and then forwards; its comonad looks forward and then back. The physical complexity of each musical note operates in its respective time-frame as a co-limit. The monad as process handles dynamic aspects in the Cartesian closed category of the Topos as it follows the variation of data like of players, score and venue together with their inter-relationships.

There are two distinct viewpoints of anticipation in music: the performer’s and the listener’s. The player anticipates the sequence of notes to come by extrapolating intuitively from preceding notes while at the same time physically keeping an eye on the subsequent score and the listener builds up a mental image of the music as it evolves. Tension builds for listeners as their anticipation of the performance is realised or denied. This paper explores how the monad is able to combine both perspectives in one categorical framework that may be implemented in a functional programming language such as Paul Hudak’s Haskell or as a tool for distributed ledger blockchain technology.

Compiled visit to Blanchland on 20/9 (7182) so can now produce final reports for Hobby and Red Kite. 2moro looks like heavy snow/sleet but it's not expected at lower levels so ploughs can concentrate on us. Will we be stuck in for 7th night of the winter? Visitors cannot believe it: it's April. But this is NE England! Whatever rapid rise in temperature forecast for Tuesday. Son is evidently buying a house in Hatfield after his rise of 2 grades as information (data warehouse) supremo at Herts Uni. It appears he's funding it himself but have earmarked a bit for it if necessary; there's plenty of good causes: lok2t beauties!!!!

March 31st: weather similar to yesterday with snow settling briefly just after dawn. Realised that needed to get house straighter, ready for family's arrival so into T to collect daughter's order (mainly for kids) and to W for my order, mainly for adults but did remember to get some Easter eggs! Turned heaters up in their rooms. Main problem is paperwork dumped around the house so actively sorting through that now; got a nice pile of excerpts to go into this page. Looking forward to seeing them again!! The Scottish guy McInerny has published a short note in the latest BB on wing-clapping Honey-buzzard. Good to see that as totals are mentioned: BB is more widely read than Scottish Birds, but don't think it's better! For own records added piccies for Blanchland on 20/9 (7182) and will add totals tomorrow morning to spreadsheet so can present Red Kite and Hobby results. Have 15 further data sheets to process: study area will be reduced next season, maybe removing Derwent (almost ¼ of sites), to make it manageable. Think I need an assistant: it's fun in the woods!! So will be missing from usual haunts until Wednesday but hope to keep things on the level: lok2t beauties!!!! FT, reading between the lines, suggests markets are not going to have a good year, though with interest rates now slipping back, it's not too obvious what is going to happen (so they don't really know!). xxxxxx

March 30th: weather very cool at home with heavy rain/hail showers, merging at times, and snow on windscreen first thing! Last night was strange on reflection at T&S; an increase in people around at 23:15 and no call on time; a butch woman with a pint of lager came over and sat with us chatting away; not sure what her game was! Anyway I said I was going at 23:30 and stood up to go; mates were very reluctant to leave; it's a long way to S so they did fairly smartly after a few moments reflection; probably been seeing too many gangster films! Today met N at MP for usual good meal and service. Much later we went to Br4g4s where left early to make SainsB4shop. Bach's St John Passion was the gem, performed this evening by RNS; it was sublime with the conductor, Harry Bicket, the 4 soloists, the RNS Chorus and the orchestra coming together to provide a very moving experience; some of the players put in tremendous individual performances. Good to see a reasonable service on Good Friday, catching last train to RDM at normal time. She's looking real bonnie: must sleep well tonite: very scintillating: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's getting ready for family and completing Baden-Baden abstract and Red Kite/Hobby records. A gr8 long weekend continues!! xxxxxx

March 29th: completed Pithouse Fell 14/9 (7176) and Sinderhope 10/9 (7168), now on Derwent Gorge 13/9 (7175) with just 1 to go of the Red Kite/Hobby sheets. Made N4c4ll where surveyed 4St and T&S4ra4s as HoN too full; had good chat at latter though happier with clientele at G/HoN!! Giving up on JC and the Labour Party, realising the discussion on 24/3 is in line with how some of their officials and members actually think about the Holocaust: welcome to Nazi socialism! Still a LibDem member so they won't really care. Donated £75 to HASS for their spring production Swing Swing Swing at QH and £100 to RNS for their 60th anniversary. Going to the 2 rehearsals on 20/4 and 23/4, former as concluding part of series, latter to promote next season. Funds went down further from -3k by Thursday but recovered to -3k today, +21k on year. March has been a very bad month for the markets but maybe there will be some respite with the start of a new quarter and a new tax year on Friday; tax-loss selling may well have been a factor this week in the prices of junk! But remaining cautious even though commodity prices are in general doing well. 2moro it's RDM-NCL, MP4m4t at 17:00 with N followed by S4con. lok2t beauties!!!!

March 28th: completed data sheet for Newbiggin 15/9, now working on Pithouse Fell 14/9 (7176) with 3 more sheets to go to complete results for Red Kite and Hobby in 2017. Should have family up here more often: big shop done at T by daughter for me to collect on Saturday; stores are closed on Sunday so good thinking; imagine it's mostly food for the kids, not cans of g! Had good crack at T4c4c with M; later went to G4g4t for a quickie as B recuperating. Made TC4m4s, where treated as a regular now, followed by You Were Never Really Here; found this not the easiest film to follow with very little dialogue, flashbacks in the combat veteran's mind (without any swirling transitions) and an amazing pace which didn't give much scope for catch-up or reflection; there were some tender moments such as the veteran's care for his mother and glimpses of such perhaps between the veteran (Joaquin Phoenix) and the abducted daughter (Ekaterina Samsonov) who he rescues from a brothel, in a 'happy' ending. Overall the 90 minutes was action-packed and left some very graphic memories: not sure that my enjoyment is relevant to the plot! Re-union day: very enthusiastic: made up for lost time: she's fantastically beautiful: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's N4c4ll and HoN4st4s, with S4con next day!! xxxxxx

March 27th: made C4c4ll where could survey the world! Have made it clear to R that not pursuing idea of being President along long route to 2021; said preferred to develop philanthropy more directly in music circles and to advance my research interests in blockchain; haven't had a response yet! I will remain active member of Hexham R. Completed 2 more data sheets, for Beldon Burn (7177-7179, 15/9); just 5 more to do to complete Hobby/Red Kite accounts for 2017. Have to get abstract into Baden-Baden conference in next few days, on Anticipation in Communication: The Example of the Cartesian Monad in Music. Funds -3k on profit taking in oils; markets are still very unsettled but have picked up a few more 'bargains'! Did make BH4st4s where had bonus of 1 free meat pie to eat there and then and 1 to take home; good crack! Not back too early: fiery exchange with the beauty: very moving sequel: she's so gorgeous: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c, G4g4t, CAL-NCL, TC4m4s, my sentiment entirely!! xxxxxx

March 26th: made R @ B4m4l where great attendance and induction of 3 members; early leaver as wanted to be home to collect large parcel being delivered by Yodel: 2 child seats for the car for my granddaughters who are arriving with parents by train from KGX on Sunday for 4 days; looking forward to that, will need to be on best behaviour! YEDT plans are getting a little heated; not sure that R members are up with modern methods of communication. Met the Secretary to the Trustees of Sir James Knott Trust, Vivien Stapley, at the Opera North supporters reception at the Northern Counties Club (NCC), last Tuesday; have suggested we apply to them for £500 if we're short of funds. Much later made G4g4s where gr8 chat with C, who is Manager of S.....g singers; she's asked me to an event at NCC in May. 'plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose' xxxxxx!! 2moro it's N4c4l, catch up on records (completed Derwent Ruffside (21/9, 7183)) and BH4ra4s!! Perhaps it's the time of year for migration!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 25th: today was 2 hours of hedge-trimming on the road, all 70m of it besides my field. Weather was great for it: light NW breeze, very dry, mild. Here's piccie 1 of lane and house after work, even swept up. Keeping your roadside hedge trimmed is essential in the 'Shire, if you want people to nod at you! My bedroom overlooks the road, where do a lot of scheming!! Kept an eye on the birds and, in the Devils Water, had a pair of Goshawk together, very welcome after recent scarcity, plus a pair of Common Buzzard, and a Barn Owl on the way to the pub. Daytime total was 17 species, including Curlew (1), Goldfinch (1 N). Did make G4g4s where pleased to have J on!! There were just 4 of us out for good crack. Finished processing Whitfield Moor (23/9, 7185-7187) and started on Derwent Ruffside (21/9, 7183). Good exercise today: feeling fitter for exciting adventures!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 24th: weather continued spring-like with warm sunshine, light W breeze and no rain; up to 10C today, phew! Made Stocksfield Mount from 15:00-16:30 and had a superb haul of raptors: Common Buzzard 11 (3 display at Styford, 3 display at Mowden Hall, 2 display at Bywell Cottagebank, 2 display at Ovington NW, 1 adult call at Mount), Red Kite 4 (all together at Bywell Cottagebank after feeding at Tofts Hill), Kestrel 1 (at Stocksfield East). Highlight was a Chiffchaff calling and in warm-up mode for full song; that's the 1st summer visitor noted. Total for bird-types was 25, including Siskin (3), Stock Dove (1 display), Green Woodpecker (1 regularly yaffling), Great Spotted Woodpecker (1), Lapwing (1 W), Great Spotted Woodpecker (1), GBBG (3 adult). Local walker mentioned that Kingfisher are frequently seen flying just over the water of the Guessburn. Also had 2 bumblebee on the Mount. From start of this year using BTO's BirdTrack again for bird records after their work via the EuroBirdPortal in restoring visualisations (maps!) of bird movements; will give them records for last year from my spreadsheets; prefer to leave the records to posterity but was very unhappy with the loss of the maps giving a running status for a species over the year, particularly as the changes were dressed up as an improvement. Have had 2 owls recently at Ordley: a Tawny at 00:00 today and a Barn at 23:00 on 22/3. Keeping pressure up on last year's results: completed Bywell Cottagebank 24/9 (7188) and started processing Whitfield Moor (23/9, 7185-7187).

Latest tactic of the climate-change mafia is to compare deniers to Holocaust deniers. Did comment in a Times discussion to someone with such views https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/opencast-coalmine-rejected-on-climate-fears-sfpkdb0w6

You compare an act of evil genocide, the Holocaust, to the projections from a model of our very complex ecosystem. I think you are indeed insane.

Should add I don't think of myself as a climate-change denier but, as a physical scientist, I do have some questions about the modelling.

2moro it's hedge trimming on the long roadside hedge in the morning with field trip in the afternoon and much later out to G4g4s!! So sweet dreams and lok2t beauties!!!!! xxxx

March 23rd: start of spring for me with 1st survey work, a walk to Dotland from home in the 'Shire from 16:15-18:05. Weather was nice and spring-like with sunshine, normal temperatures, light W breeze and no rain. Total was 26 bird-types, including Common Buzzard (1), Marsh Tit (2, a pair), Tree Sparrow (6), Song Thrush (3 singing), Blackbird (5), Great Spotted Woodpecker (1), Lapwing (3), Curlew (2), Grey Heron (1). Back on the desktop finished processing Wylam E on 2/9 (7161-7163) and started on Bywell 24/9 (7188). There were 6 of us out at W4g4s, a full house! Horrific week on markets for those fully exposed. Strategy of moving into short-dated bonds vindicated (so far!) making +2k on week after 0.6k withdrawal, giving +25k on year after 7.1k withdrawal; not very exciting but with ftse -3.4% on week and -10.0% on year, my funds would have reduced by 37k on week and 110k on year if invested in a ftse tracker. PoO is highest for over 2 years at $70.45 per barrel; maybe sometime oil stocks will react to this but sentiment in equities is now 'terrified'! 2moro it's C4c4l and 2nd trip out to the Mount followed by catch-up. A bit of a gap in my life at moment: lok2t beauties!!!!

March 22nd: completed processing 2 field-trips in London on 5/9 (Horsenden Hill) and 7/9 (Osterley Park) and made good progress on trip to Wylam E on 2/9 (7161-7163). Hoping to be able to complete Red Kite and Hobby reports for 2017 by end of month; a fantastic amount of information was collected last year. Weather milder and very good moth catch tonite (22/3-23/3) with light rain coming on: March Moth (7), Oak Beauty (4), Yellow Horned (2), Agonopterix heracliana (1). Had a male Kestrel over the house at Ordley in full display. May kick-off season this Saturday with trip to the Mount. Made N4c4l and M&S4shop followed much later by HoN4st4s with M/A for good chat on IT. Trade wars causing chaos on markets with FTSE down 2.96% so far this week and -9.57% on year, back down to December 2016 level (is Brexit a good thing?); PoO is rising tonight; wonder if Chinese are buying to unsettle US economy; own funds are still slightly positive on week and buying small quantities of 'cheap' stock each day! Think the Republicans may decide soon they've had enough of the Trump nonsense. Much better is to think of the gorgeous ones: lok2t beauties!!!!

March 21st: 3 of us out at T4c4c for good crack. Made point of making G4g4t for a quickie to see B as he's having a new knee installed tomorrow. Later into TR for part 2 of Men Behaving Badly: Don Giovanni (Mozart). The production by Opera North was much racier than seem to remember with simulated sex and adventurous shakes of vital parts!! The Don, a landowning gentleman, is a serial seducer and his servant keeps a running count of his conquests. But he increasingly runs into trouble with his earlier liaisons returning to taunt him and his intended liaisons becoming more awkward; in the end he's done in by a statue but does return on-stage for the final song. He got loudly booed by the audience but I couldn't quite bring myself to do that!! It was an energetic and creative performance, very well sung!! Missing someone!! Quite a spring in PoO today, reaching almost $70 a barrel on unseasonal stock draw in US. Started looking in detail at Scottish Birds paper: will compile a table comparing our results in as many ways as possible. 2moro it's N4c4l and HoN4ra4s with the IT gang. lok2t beauties!!!!

March 20th: almost completed processing of Dipton Wood visit on 26/9 (7190); have 2 tricky wee moths to id to complete the task. Did make N4c4l in the sunshine with weather on the mend! Opera North looked after us really well: the pre-show reception at Northern Counties Club was very classy with canapés, that look good but keep you hungry, red wine and of course a pep talk and plenty of chat! It was packed for Madama Butterfly, which was sung in Italian with subtitles. Opera does have a fairly devastating effect on me and tonite's was no exception; the atmosphere is overall very romantic even in the enfolding tragedy with her American 'husband' and his American wife returning to Japan to claim their child. The ending is of course overwhelmingly tragic as Madama Butterfly stabs herself and dies. Hope they warned Lt Pinkerton that, as the baddie, he would be booed by the Tyneside audience in the curtain call; he blew some kisses back! Performance started at 19:30 and finished at 22:14, in time to catch the last train; Theatre Royal evidently are adjusting to the poor late night transport service in the NE by trying to finish c22:00. We had a 2nd reception in the Olivier Suite in the interval with more red wine: opera is unashamedly hedonistic!! Only got as far as BH4ra4s off last train where met WYL-N for a nitecap; pub was very lively, people coming out of hibernation. Funds +3k in spite of Monday being a heavy down day for international markets; ENQ's results were slightly better than expected and, most important of all, no shocks! Trading some of stocks which have fallen heavily this year and are IMHO cheap! But keeping intact big block of short-dated bonds. Day ended in hedonistic style: gr8 form maintained: dog behaved itself: she's so beautiful: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c. G4g4t and TR4op, this time Don Giovanni!! xxxxxx

March 19th: bit milder today with most snow/ice melting and no frost by 01:00 20/3. Had female Brambling on grain on shed roof. Completed processing trip for Honey-buzzard to Wylam E on 25/9 (7189) and Swallowship on 26/9 (7190a). Here's Scottish Birds citation:

McInerny, C J, Shaw, K D, Little, A, Little, K, Hoey, K, Gibb, K, & Kerr, B, Honey-buzzards in central Scotland: observations and comparisons from two study areas during 2017, Scottish Birds 38(1) 15-29 (2018).

Expect some serious analysis tomorrow. At R we at last managed some concerted action on YEDT 2018 so maybe it will happen; I'm about to contact last season's sponsors. Made G4g4s where pleased to see C on again: very interesting chat on opera; her group is putting something on at end of July at S; good chat with gang, 5 of us out tonite. Haircut at JG was stimulating with Jd; gave her £5 tip on £17.50 charge as penance for long time since last visit; she ordered me to return within 4 months!! 2moro it's N4c4l, Opera North's Madama Butterfly (by Puccini) with 2 receptions for Associates in Theatre Royal area, BH4ra4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 18th: weather continued overnight to be bitterly cold with further drifting snow: -3C, wind chill -12C, wind 25mph E with accumulation of 10cm and drifts double that. Delayed drive-in until gritter had been through, leaving at 12:55 and making NCL in car at 13:30, missing Recital 1 but in time for Recital 2. N was already there. Drive-out of 'Shire was hazardous with ridges of snow across the road at every gateway through drifting and surface water all over the place as the grit went into action. Philippe Cassard's Complete Debussy [piano-wise] was monumental lasting, with intervals, until 22:30, clearly designed for lovers of the Ring. I had never appreciated the variety, depth and experimentation in Debussy's music before. PC was on top of his brief throughout with nice touches of humour from time to time: he made out as if he was going to sleep at the end of Recital 3. The programme had obviously been assembled with care, to provide a theme (not revealed!) in each Recital. There were decent intervals between each Recital to give some rest for the soloist. I took in laptop to research hotels in Norfolk where N and I are going in May and to show the Scottish Birds article to N. This article is so positive for me: not only are the Scottish numbers approaching mine for the country but the areas in which they are found are those where I've reported the highest concentrations. N helped to identify the forest areas occupied from the piccies. Chatted to TD about imminent tour: bookings are very good at the venues; we agreed that B4 is a superb symphony: love the start of movement 2 and the lively strings in movement 4. N left after Recital 2 but between us we heard them all. I missed Clair de Lune, which is the first thing people will ask me about! Fascinated by H-RM; she looks so much like photographs of my mum when she was that age. Day finished on a high: one or 2 surprises: we'll have to go on an excursion: she's absolutely fantastic: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! The road in the 'Shire was a glacier on return: not for the faint-hearted! 2moro it's haircut @ JG with Jd, R @ B4m4l, WG meeting afterwards, G4g4s!! xxxxxx

March 17th: completed visit to Burnham Beeches, London, on 18/9. Very pleased to see another instalment of the Honey-buzzard in Scotland in Scottish Birds with numbers found increasing quickly in 2017. Expect to make some analysis of this soon. The credibility of my results is increasing steadily now people are actually looking seriously elsewhere, rather than being in a state of denial! Bitterly cold today: -3C, wind chill -12C, wind 20mph E; a little snow had settled by dawn but this melted in the sunshine; around teatime more persistent snow, hail, freezing rain arrived and kept going until 22:00 with wind up to 30kph. It will be touch and go whether make Debussy part 1, but should make parts 2-4 with satisfaction concentrated towards the dark side (nite)!! Bought some bird food: they're very hungry: £10 for 2 large bags. Someone was very alluring: gr8 2 c!!! So 2moro it's S4con for most of day, travelling from CAL-GHD. lok2t beauties!!!!

March 16th: into the big city again for CT4s4l, L&P4research, Br4g4t, MP4m4t, S4con followed by W4g4s!! Weather-wise the gloomy day was one of the worst of the winter with driving rain on moderate E wind, just above freezing point. But wore full battle dress and felt quite warm! Research went well, finding a useful report from Yale on writing music in functional-language Haskell, which while not main point does show the foundation categories with basic functions could be constructed. Re-writing the UNILOG abstract for Baden-Baden: different emphasis on communication and anticipation in the latter so need another slant, which is always a good research objective. Met N at MP where we had 3 courses, wine and coffee, all for £42 including £5 bonus. The adventures of Putin continue to be fascinating: the 'broadsheets' are amazed at how many comments agree with Corbyn; not so surprising perhaps when you realise that many of their readers have a basic knowledge of jurisprudence and also remember the Iraqi 'weapons of mass destruction' claims, which were totally false. I've commented on a few with my real name: we're all thought to be Russian trolls! More seriously my son-in-law who works for G.zpr.m in London has also read a story that I came across about them moving their trading operations from London to St Petersburg. It's not due to this week's spat but a longer term decision partly motivated by Brexit and partly for repatriation purposes. So he's thinking about a change! Concert was brilliant as expected from the Hallé with Mark Elder conducting. The first half was dedicated to 2 Bach pieces. Bach's Concerto Keyboard 1 was superbly played by Charles Owen in a very authentic Baroque style. His Fantasia and Fugue in C minor, orchestrated by Elgar, did not appeal: didn't sound Baroque and the Elgar orchestration appeared rather odd. In the second half we had Shostakovitch 8; what a marvellous piece this was, reflecting the tensions of WW2 with long brooding passages, broken by tremendous climaxes and intriguing short passages featuring a particular instrument such as a bassoon; this was a very deep experience! There were 6 of us out at W so good catch-up. Snow didn't materialise by 00:45 (17/3) but 2 gritters were out in Hexham as freeze-up expected at dawn. Highlite of day was very moving: love the attention: she's so gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Funds finished -3k on week; actual movements were in balance but the Canadian $ fell quite heavily; there is silver lining as Canadian companies will be able to boost their profit margins with the devaluation. 2moro it's C4c4l and catch-up followed next day by Debussy marathon with N hoping to attend first 2 parts. xxxxxx

March 15th: completed Nookton Burn visit on 13/7 (7116) and Sinderhope visit on 28/9 (7193) so making steady progress; doesn't look like much up here at top of page but plenty of details and piccies added below. Terrible weather today with continuous rain on a cold moderate SE breeze. Made HoN4ra4s with the computing gang, where we had gr8 crack! Planning to make it a day in NCL 2moro coming in on 11:52 RDM-NCL, visiting CT4s4l, L&P, MP4m4t with N, S4con!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 14th: started processing visit to Nookton Burn on 13/7 (7116). Decided to chill out today, except for T4c4c with M and G4g4t with B (and H!). In West Dipton Burn there were 2 Common Buzzard up is display yesterday and a Red Kite hanging over a field today. 2moro it's N4c4l and catch-up finishing with HoN4ra4s with M/A. lok2t beauties!!!!

March 13th: completed processing Sinderhope S visit on 18/7 (7104). Interesting paper from the authoritative team led by Michele Panuccio in Italy; interesting to see the tie-up with Israel, another raptor migration hotspot. My bold is relevant to the situation postulated by some that Honey-buzzard (a soaring migrant) will migrate across the North Sea from the continent: they won't!!

Soaring birds exploit tailwinds to move faster and presumably to reduce the energetic cost of flight during migration. Using radar, we tested how bird flight is affected by tailwind and further predicted that the due to the advantages of using tailwinds, as increased number of birds migrating over the study area. We found that radar-tracked migrating birds flew faster with tailwinds over the study area, but despite this advantage, surprisingly low number of birds migrated when tailwinds prevailed. Furthermore, birds seem to drift with winds blowing from the sea to the land, but not in the opposite direction, suggesting that birds try to avoid drifting over the sea where it is riskier to fly. Hence, our study highlights the complexity of migrant flight behavior in relation to the wind and suggests a flexible response to different wind conditions and coastline geography at multiple spatiotemporal scales.

Becciu, P., Panuccio, M., Catoni, C., Dell'Omo, G., and Sapir, N. Contrasting aspects of tailswinds [sic] and asymmetrical response to crosswinds in soaring migrants 2018. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 72(28). https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00265-018-2447-0. Published by Animal Flight Group, University of Haifa.

Decided to watch RT (Russia Today) before it's banned. Very puzzled that British people think the poisoning case is so clear-cut: haven't they watched any James Bond films where the baddie tactic is to attack a superpower's facilities so as to precipitate a major conflict. There are some very funny aspects: Boris J got the wholehearted support from US Foreign Secretary Rex Tillerson for the UK position last night only to find that he'd been replaced this morning by the more equivocal Mike Pompeo. Even Trump was saving his fire until more facts emerge. Europeans are suggesting we should be more careful about our dealings with exiled oligarchs: well you have to agree with that!! Here's an article I entirely agree with: https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/unlikely-that-vladimir-putin-behind-skripal-poisoning-1.3425736. Expect RT to be a blank screen tomorrow with the word Censored across it! Don't think the public will go along with our not taking up our World Cup place. Censoring RT would be most illiberal but the public may not care. We and the Americans have complete f.....g idiots for leaders. Invited next Tuesday to Opera North's 2 receptions for supporters attending Madame Butterfly at Theatre Royal, Newcastle. Also bought ticket in Gallery for Don Giovanni next day. Like the Gallery: it is cheaper you might say but like the way the music floats up (honest!). Friday sees Hallé with N and Sunday the Debussy marathon!! Today made C4c4ll and BH4ra4s for good crack. Funds -2k so far this week, entirely on fall in Canadian $; still making portfolio less risk-on in current climate. Day ended in gr8 style: definitely hot: she's so beautiful: love the end-game: lok2tmbo!!!!!!!

March 12th: completed processing Ruffside visit on 2/7 (7104). Added moth trap contents from last night, complete with piccies. Made R @ B4m4l where food of usual high quality and company good; talk by AK was a little indulgent. Next into N4c4ll before starting preparations for trip to Vichy, including booking conference hotel the Aletti Palace for 6 nights at special discounted rate of €100 a nite: very large beds on offer to fancied ones!! Ordered book by Mazzola The Topos of Music for £81 from a German second-hand bookseller via Abe Books. Made G4g4s for nitecap where 5 of us out and the dynamic C on!! Keeping up the tradition this week: for instance 2moro sees C4c4l and BH4ra4s!! Spring is in the air: it's a gr8 time of year. lok2t beauties!!!!!

March 11th: quite a lot of record processing done today: completed visits 22/8 to local site (7150) and to Carterway Heads/Derwent Gorge on 9/7 (7110). Quite a lot bought at W4shop; food stocks back to normal now. Met Gr there who's a Grecians fan; can't see the Gulls in the league tables: where are they now? Heading for NLS is my inner view but didn't say that. Much milder today and put moth trap on; caught 8 insects of 6 types: 2 Oak Beauty 1  2, 2 Agonopterix heracliana 1  2, 1 Pale Brindled Beauty 1, 1 March Moth 1, 1 Chestnut 1, 1 Satellite 1. A pair of Tawny Owl were being very lovey-dovey nearby! Made G4g4s where 7 of us out for good crack. 2moro it's R @ B4m4s, N4c4ll and G4g4s. Sweet dreams!! lok2t beauties!!!!

Following on from 7/3, we visited a number of relatives on my father's side in the year following my father's death, some of whom I have difficulty placing, even after the family history studies. My mother was keen, as were the families visited, that the whole family accompany her, which we did, although elder sister and I were both at university. We visited Christchurch in Dorset (Jack Backhurst), Clifton in Bristol and Golders Green in London. The period of being strapped for cash didn't last long. The holder (paternal grandfather's mistress and accountant: frolics in the ledgers) of the protected tenancy in our Shaldon property at £39.50 a year, giving a £395 valuation, died. She left us some money, which my mother rather uncharitably said was conscience money, given to her temporarily by my grandfather to shield from taxes! Our solicitors 'kindly' set-up a new tenancy at a higher rent but still below market value (b.stards!); we refused this, insisted on vacant possession and sold it for 4k. The proceeds were partly used to redevelop our Teignmouth town house, which was over 4 levels, into an office to be let on the ground floor, a flat to be let on the first floor and a maisonette for our own occupation on the top 2 floors. With the resulting rental income, a shake-up in the investments and my mother returning to work, we were in recovery mode! My mother used to forward me all financial post for attention: her prospective financial leeches hated me. By age 24 I had quite a decent portfolio myself, around 3k, generally going for cyclical stocks at the low-end of the cycle (as now!). In the next 2 years my investments more than doubled to 7k as anticipated (as a chemist) the compulsory use of pt in car exhausts; that was enough to buy a house! I did buy a brand new white VW Beetle for 0.72k cash. But my motivations were changing …

March 10th: up at 06:00 to go for 07:19 train HEX-NCL. Good start as checking on web, that was cancelled: never trust an early train starting in CAR as there are no mechanics based there. So drove in to NCL station car-park which is a bargain at £8 per 24 hours over the weekend. Caught 08:25 NCL-KGX and then tube to Russell Square. Did 2 laps of square looking for Birkbeck College, which finally made at 12:15, not long to lunch! Mike and his wife Liz were already there. Workshop was Artificial Intelligence: Issues, Insights, Integration, hosted by the C-A-N (Christian Academic Network). So AI with a more social conscience than say from Silicon Valley. Quite a bashing for capitalism: kept FT well under wraps! Interested to see AI defined basically as algorithms (which perform rule-based conversion of input to output); while not too far off the mark, many would argue it's more sophisticated now with the ability for dynamic adaption as circumstances change. Workshop finished at 16:00 and M&E took me out for a very wholesome meal at the brasserie Tuttons in Covent Garden piazza. We had good chat over that, plotting the current year and perhaps a book. It's amazing how much you can get done face-to-face. Made KGX from Leicester Square, which was teeming, and caught 20:00 back to NCL, arriving supposedly at 23:04 but actually at 23:20 with wild drinkers delaying matters!! Our day was crowned by receiving this afternoon warm acceptance of our UNILOG music/CT presentation and abstract, as below (see 28/2 for submission). That's 2 chances to further our work in this area: Vichy and Baden-Baden; maybe it's the year of the spa! ANPA could well see CT&AI this year.

Dear Nick,

Re: UNILOG2018 Logic and Music Workshop, submission “Musical Performance: a Composition of Monads”

Everything is fine. Your talk is accepted for my workshop and Jean-Yves Beziau had already sent his OK regarding your second presentation.

I also sent him your abstract. To be on the safe side it would be great if you will send your abstract (LaTex-file) also to unilog2018@yandex.com (Arthur Buchsbaum).

Up to now we will have 9 presentations. You'll get more information by the end of March.

I look forward meeting you in Vichy!

Ingolf Max

Did not return to HEX: relaxed in appropriate surroundings!! Absolutely fantastic: we did very well: pity not every nite: she's so gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!!

March 9th: spring-like again at midday but rain by midnight. Made C4c4l as missing tomorrow and S4con with lift from L/N. Concert was a classic with Mozart's violin concerto 5 and symphony 36, Beethoven's Coriolan Overture and Bruch's Romance for viola as the programme and Julian Rachlin as conductor/soloist. very much enjoyed, particularly the string solos and Julian's strong rapport with the orchestra. Concert was recorded for Radio 3. Pleased to have EG as one of soloists in Spotlight. Dropped off at W4g4s for short chat to mates so not to bed unto 00:45. Funds +9k on week with bonds doing well; sold a few more equities which have rallied well. Have to be up early tomorrow for day trip to Birkbeck for AI, back on 20:00. lok2t beauties!!!!

March 8th: another grand sunny day! Completed processing the visit to Bywell on 23/8 (7151) and started in earnest on visit 22/8 to local site (7150), having labelled piccies and uploaded them to server. These site visits produce a wealth of data. Sad at EG and family's trials with cystic fibrosis, in latest FoRNS newsletter; have started a monthly donation of £10 (gift-aided) to research into the disease and living with it. HoN was packed and good fun: we had gr8 crack and atmosphere is much better than at the bigots'. 2moro going to S4con in evening for Mozart: after last Saturday's difficulties, getting lift there/back from N&L to HEX (who insist, at least once!). Will make N4c4l earlier. Saturday's plans remain positive!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 7th: nice early spring day with plenty of bright sunshine and snow melting fast. Full day as expected. New specs, 2 pairs – varifocal clear and shaded, are brilliant; pleased put effort and money into new test, frames and lenses; SS have done very well!! At G4g4t met B who's facing a knee operation in 15 days; cannot drive for 6 weeks after that and doesn't think his partner will drive him to the pub to meet the lads; H was on! Made TC4m4s on train where film was Lady Bird; enjoyed this, had shades of my elder sister who was very rebellious at a Catholic convent and had a free transfer to Teignmouth Grammar School, cheered on by all, particularly as we couldn't afford the fees! My late partner went to the same convent, where she had many, many elocution lessons to banish her Wakefield accent (on her family's return from Yorkshire to Devon; I didn't know her then). Could relate to the family's struggle of just about clinging on to the middle class: the rebellious nature of Lady Bird (full film name, Christine McPherson) in the sedate Sacramento had a lot of humour as well as revealing the vast gulf between her aspirations, to go to a prestigious E coast college, and her parent's much more modest aims. Eventually she gets to a New York college and after much family aggro, her future looks more assured and family relationships more at ease. There's again some parallel here with my elder sister. She applied to Birmingham University to do biochemistry, all quite prestigious. We had a relation in the neighbourhood. She may well have got in anyway but this relation was Chairman of the University Governors -- Sir Evan Norton, a business man in office equipment -- knighted for charitable work for United Birmingham Hospitals. He was our 2nd cousin: paternal grandfather's twin-sister's (Rose (Rossiter) Norton) son. Lady Mildred Norton was around to smooth things over. The interview panel was Dr Norris, who was in the same year at Imperial College as my father, also doing Chemistry at the time. On my father's death the Nortons donated quite significant sums under covenant for a while to my mother and younger sister to help keep us afloat. The visit to Toon was very stimulating: she's so gorgeous: will come again: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's catch-up day, maybe N4c4l and certainly HoN4ra4s!! xxxxxx

March 6th: have uploaded and indexed the piccies for 23/8 (7151) so just need to add the records to the spreadsheet now. LAF meeting went well with 3 of us there: we developed a strategy for upgrading the RoWIP; I arrived by train as going that way later anyway. Earlier made N4c4l where gr8 2 c trhwso and tmeo!! Later made BH4ra4s where fond reunion with N, an old friend, who used to be bar manager at CH 4 weddings. The bar staff were a little incredulous: judge people by the company they keep!! Gr8 end to day: made up for lost time (and more!): she's amazing: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! Funds +4k in 1st 2 days of week on rally, particularly in bonds. Not convinced gain will hold as sentiment still nervous!! 2moro it's T4c4c with the computing gang, new specs fitting at SS, G4g4t, TC4m4s (beetle, train). xxxxxx

March 5th: business meeting at R was short, not enough activity! Sad to see L moving to another job, but will be good for her! Made C4c4ll with P for good chat. Wondered why road conditions improved so quickly yesterday. Saturday did evidently see lots of complaints going into the County Council from the 'Shire and other rural areas (from Tory voters in a Tory-run council). The result was an emergency plan to pay farmers £70 an hour/tractor to clear the rural roads. Hence dramatic change yesterday with many rural roads reopening. The Council, after a number of mild winters, had allowed their regular contracts with the farmers to lapse. I know someone who was in R&C in Slaley yesterday lunchtime, hearing that some of the farmers had made £840 per tractor overnight! Very pleased that the clearing was finally done. Should put a smile on the face of some farmers! Much later made G4g4s where very pleased to welcome N back for a day!! There were 6 of us out. So life back to normal!! 2moro it's postponed LAF WG1 meeting at Wylam in afternoon (by train), which chair, followed later by BH4ra4s!! Booked up for Debussy marathon on 16/3 at S: looks good!! lok2t beauties!!!!

March 4th: road opened with rise in temperature to 1C, some wet snow and a little light gritting. Went in at 21:30 to Co-op4shop and thought might as well pop into G4g4s 2 c the gang, where a new empowered bar lass on (J)!! Dense fog was main problem tonite but fortunately didn't meet anyone (or didn't think I did!). There was no milk or bread at store but didn't need those: stocked up on fresh fruit, cereals and soap powder. Earlier had grand supper of fish and chips from freezer (pollack, frozen chips and runner beans; pollack was best b4 Oct 17!). Spent ages today compiling dealing records from start of year, which were numerous with change in direction. Listened to some Sibelius, very appropriate in the conditions! There's been an influx of Fieldfare into the gardens of the 'Shire: quite desperate, stripping the berries of Cotoneaster simonsii and pecking the softer snow at the base of the house walls. 2moro it's R @ B4m4l, N4c4ll, G4g4s and Honey-buzzard/Red Kite records for 23/8 at Bywell. Suggestion for paper at Baden-Baden on Anticipation in Communication: The Example of the Cartesian Monad in Music has been accepted for presentation and as a 5-page publication. Baden-Baden is on the edge of the Black Forest – superb for raptors, including Honey-buzzard. This week hopefully back to normal: lok2t beauties!!!!

March 3rd: venturing out in car (tentatively!) at 12:30!! 12:45 got to Newbiggin, Houtley 'very difficult' according to experienced locals so didn't attempt it, will walk in (60 minutes) to HEX at 3.2 miles, go to C4c4l and get bus to NCL. Walk in was brisk, very little traffic until got to Slaley - Duke's House - Hexham road, which was perfect – all black, no snow/ice. Stayed quite a while at C4c4ll where both trhwso and tbld showed well!! Caught 85X bus HEX-NCL, which only took 45 minutes, similar to train (and free!). Train service was severely reduced by strikes. Made S4con early to have something to eat, including fruit and red wine for vitamin C! Read the racing pink (FT): more acceptance after looming tariff wars that we're in for a bumpy ride. Had offers from 2 couples of lift back to Hexham, but declined as had a prior engagement!! Concert started at 19:00 in concourse with world premier of Venetian Sky, conducted and composed by James Weeks, performed by RNS, chorus RNS and New Tyneside Orchestra. The conductor looked as if he was using semaphore to drive the piece; the sound made was grating but the overall effect with the performers scattered around the Concourse like a night sky was dramatic. The main piece of the evening was St Luke Passion by James Macmillan, which was first performed in Amsterdam in 2014. He was there! Bit worried by the section headings: Chapter 22, the 2nd, is what companies apply for in the US when bankruptcy looms to secure protection from their creditors. Hope it's not a premonition! This choral work was performed by RNS, Chorus of RNS, Quay Voices and Girl Choristers of Newcastle Cathedral. It was an exciting piece throughout, with some fantastic work by the timpanist Owain Williams. Maybe a little more variation in the tempo would have made it even more dramatic. Was though very pleased to have made the effort to hear this ultra modern piece. The composer was there and attendance good with much of Level 1 filled. There was also a good opportunity for the New Tyneside Orchestra to shine, performing Jennifer Higdon's Machine, premiered in 2000, and Arvo Pärt's Swansong, premiered in 2014. The Sage audiences are becoming much more receptive to modern music, which is to be very much welcomed! Made Br4rw4s and the 10 bus NCL-HEX taking 70 minutes, but at least it gives a reliable late exit so appreciated!! At HEX jumped into a taxi, saying Ordley, but after a while the driver lost his nerve in the rutted snow and deposited me at Newbiggin; gave him £12 for the £8 fare showing, as he had got me most of the way; the snow on the edge was over the top of the hedges in places. So walked the remaining mile, getting in at 01:00 (4/3); the light is amazingly clear with snow-covered ground; didn't need the torch at all. Quite an adventure: think the 'Shire is in the land of the Selfish Giant! It was a grand trip though: very pleased at the reunion: plenty to do: she's brill: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro will see how things go: cabin fever dealt with for a while so may take it easy; feeling a little stiff. xxxxxx

March 2nd: still marooned, but very little more snow and cleared car and area of drive around it. Started car engine and all neighbours appeared, saying “you're not going out!”. No, just getting things ready for tomorrow! Evidently there's a 1+ metre snow drift between Houtley and Loughbrow, which a snow crew tried to clear but the snow kept being blown in again. Some people trying to get into Hexham this morning evidently spent 5 hours wandering round the 'Shire, most of it stationary. As neighbour K, mother of 2 young children and Company Secretary to the Board of LON:VM, said: snow defines a lot: women try a journey and if it's impassable return home; men spend hours pointlessly trying to get around the obstruction! Hoping that drop in wind overnight and tomorrow morning will enable the crews to pay more attention to the country roads! Stores beginning to run low with last of dessert fruit – 2 plums and a Kiwi fruit – consumed today and lemon, for tea, down to ½ a fruit. Do have some items in the freezer of uncertain provenance! Played safe with 2 poached egg and beans on toast tonite. That cold was funny; have shaken it off; not sure whether it was the meal in MP or the workout!! Seriously it may have been residual pollution from London giving chest problems. So plan tomorrow is to try to reach HEX early afternoon and CAL-NCL late afternoon to go to S4con. But cannot promise anything!! Completed processing the trip to Dotland on 25/8 (7153). Next up is trip to Bywell on 23/8 (7151). Another downward leg on correction this week with FTSE -2.4% on week and -8.0% on year. Own funds remained in the green at +1k but losing most of gain from Tuesday. Gain on year is 18k after 6.5k of withdrawals. Had good results from PFG and PFC this week and cautious move of large amounts to short-dated bonds is holding funds up relatively well. Hope to be less of a hermit soon: lok2t beauties!!!!

March 1st: snow reached 35cm around 10:00 but seemed much the same by dusk although difficult to measure now as the strong breeze has caused drifting. This is below the 45cm on 3/12/2010. The road was still open in December 2010 but the snow built up over a longer period in that spell and it was less windy. The wind is keeping the snow crews stuck on the main roads with significant drifting. Hoping that road will re-open on Saturday morning as wind drops so can make C4c4l and W4shop followed by S4con. No quick thaw is in prospect: March looks as if it might rival 2013 when was in Cape Verde: one of the coldest March in the last 100 years. See from electricity generation on GridWatch that wind is doing well at 20-25%, much the same as coal, which is being flogged to save natural gas: no other country relies almost entirely on JIT for such an important commodity. JIT was of course responsible for KFC's problems and probably with there being too many heavy lorries out in the snow.

Got back to Honey-buzzard/Hobby records, completing the processing of the fantastic visit to Towsbank (7149, 23 raptors of 6 types) on 20/8 with a brood of 3 Hobby (2 female, 1 male) confirmed. Started on 25/8 visit to Dotland (7153). So that's a bonus. Favourite film at present is The Shining, one of Jack Nicholson's best, where his role was that of a writer trying to use a prolonged stay in an upland hotel in Colorado in the close season to get back to creative ways: well the snow came and he didn't!! Hoping to press on with last season's records, perhaps moving to complete any with Red Kite so can produce another annual total. Missing greatly the empowered ones : wish they were here: lok2t beauties!!!!!!

February 28th: up to 30cm of snow now with temperature outside -6C, wind chill -13C. A photo taken at dusk is here: difficult to believe I did have the car out yesterday! Forecast to continue snowing steadily until Saturday morning after which it becomes stable around freezing point with light snow. Thinking about missed opportunities. Will make up: lok2t beauties!!!!!! Have completed some tasks on CT. Ensured all final changes in ANPA papers were reflected across all of my directories. Submitted abstract to UNILOG 2018 in Logic and Music tutorial:

Musical Performance: a Composition of Monads

Nick Rossiter & Michael Heather, Department of Computer Science and Digital Technologies, Northumbria University, UK.

Much work has been done on computer representations of music at the physical level. Developments such as K-nets by Klumpenhouwer and Lewin provide a way for representing transformations from one pitch-class to another. Category theory should facilitate the development of a logical approach to music, which can be mapped into one of the physical approaches for implementation. Towards this aim Mazzola and Andreatta developed the idea of a category of directed graphs (objects = notes or chords, edges = music operations such as transposition), as a topos-based approach for a description of the music, ultimately delivering the generalised PK-net with the concepts of form and support. PK-nets enable heterogeneous collections of musical objects to be naturally compared and manipulated as described by Popoff, Andreatta and Ehresmann [1].

The work to be presented builds on that developed for information systems, taking up the challenge of a testing application for the Cartesian monad approach to universal design [2]. A principal aim is to capture the performance of music as a communication between the musicians and the audience using the categorial construction of a monad. In this respect the monad, a term originally used by Leibniz, presents a musical performance as a composition over time signatures, with adjointness between each step: the monad looking backwards and then forwards and its associated comonad looking forwards and then backwards. The physical characteristics of the notes in each time-frame are complex, so it is necessary to use a strong Cartesian monad, facilitating the representation of each time-frame as a product. The monad is process, handling dynamic aspects. The category upon which the monad operates is a topos holding relatively static information such as the players, the score and the venue, together with the relationships between them. The topos is far from totally static with its arrows facilitating flexibility in all information held, including relationships; the topos is also searchable through the subobject classifier. There is no assumption of any particular musical genre. Such a categorial framework could be implemented in a functional programming language such as Haskell, under the control of a scripting language such as Forth, as employed in the Blockchain method.

References:

1. A. Popoff, M. Andreatta, and A. Ehresmann, A Categorical Generalization of Klumpenhouwer Networks, Mathematics and Computation in Music: 5th International Conference, MCM 2015, 303-314 (2015).

2. N. Rossiter, M. Heather & M. Brockway, Monadic Design for Universal Systems, ANPA 37-38 (2018). In press http://nickrossiter.org.uk/process/anpa2016.pdf

February 27th: wind swung E today with massive fetch from Siberia (Beast of the East, surely not racist!). Level snow rose to 6cm overnight and is now at 14cm after heavy showers since dusk. Drove into Hexham at 15:30 in the sunshine and went to N4c4t. tmeo looked good!! Visited Specsavers at 16:30 as lost glasses on KLM flight and anyway thought short sight needed attention. No problem, you can be tested now! Physical eyes were evidently very good with clear optic nerve, no signs of disease and a reduction in the slight cataract in the right eye from last time. But a little more long-sighted as expected so given new prescription. Chose some new frames and 'free' sunglasses, both varifocal. SA was very smart: reducing £481 to £238 in a few clicks, which was what I paid. Got out and snow was falling heavily. Things were bad as early as Kings Mews with a layer of ice on the road. Managed to get past the stranded cars there and headed out on Slaley Road as Loughbrow would surely be blocked. Managed to make top with a lot of slip and twist, only car up there (no tracks) and crawled down to the Lamb Shield road and went along it. This road had not been treated at all and was a lot easier to drive on as it was just packed snow, not ice. Problem is steep bank at end down to Newbiggin on which at 2mph went from side to side praying. More trouble by Newbiggin Hall with another queue of cars. Squeezed by those and got home after 30 minutes sweat. Road appears to be totally blocked now. It is an advantage if you drove at Haltwhistle in the bad winters of the 1970s; you cannot go too slowly uphill: you've got to keep up the momentum; downhill take it very easy. Sadly not out later and looks uncertain until at least Thursday night; expecting 25cm level snow by dawn (28/2) and the start of drifting as the wind picks up. By Thursday afternoon (1/3) could have 40-50cm.

In response to invitation, submitted title for Baden-Baden conference Intersymp (30/7 – 3/8): “Anticipation in Communication: The Example of the Cartesian Monad in Music”. Will need a title for ANPA 39 in Hampshire from 13/8-17/8 as well. Also communicating with Devon M over the UNILOG submission; he's sent me a template for our workshop in the music section. We're going to an AI workshop at Birkbeck, London, on 10/3. Going to a concert with N the nite before; plan is to go home on last train, catch early train next morning NCL-KGX (08:25), late one back (20:00) and stay in NCL on return!! Not going to Faro this March: want to spend more money on other pursuits!! Funds +6k so far this week, mainly on rise in PFG bonds (Provident Finance) as the company announced a rights issue to raise equity to better cover its debt obligations; they were only bought 2 weeks ago. lok2t beauties!!!!

February 26th: cold NW wind today but fairly dry until came out of G when a spell of moderate snow for about an hour. Pleased 2 c opera logistics C on; she's off to Israel next to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem! Earlier made W4shop, getting 4 days of supplies, just in case, b4 making N4c4l where S was on! Another S came up to clean at 21:45 when going out to G: she thought might be difficult to get out on Wednesday afternoon. Postponed a meeting 2moro morning of WG1 of LAF in Wylam as weather outlook uncertain; would rather do some work on document at home than skid around the countryside. 2cm of snow by 01:30 (27/2) settling on everything: will be very pretty in the morning. House is lovely and warm. Feel like hibernating: will play everything by ear: lok2t beauties!!!!

February 25th: evidence for mtDNA results include 1) NR's personal report for his full mtDNA coding (HVR-1, HVR-2, Coding Region) giving clade T, immediate subclade T2 and terminal subclade T2b13a; 2) extracts from Appendices 2,3 in NR's report giving populations with T2>7% in Europe and Asia (hotspots), sorted in descending order on T2; 3) background information with references/extracts on T haplogroup and on non-Ashkenazi Jews, particularly the Persian Jews and the Mizrahi of Israel.

Met N at S4con; PD was superb, playing Scriabin Sonata 2, Ravel Miroirs, Schumann Abegg Variations, Mozart Sonata 1, Schubert Sonata in A major. He played for about 2 hours with no scores in sight! Liked the Schubert and the Ravel best. In terms of changing musical tastes over the past year, my growing enthusiasm for Schubert's small-scale works is remarkable; his darkness and vigour really appeal. We went to MP4m4t where normal good food and service! There were some gr8 highlights: very warm: she's beautifully intense: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Later made G4g4s where met P, after trip to Oz, and the rest of the gang for good crack!! 2moro it's N4c4l and G4g4s, maybe skipping R @ HA4m4s. xxxxxx

February 24th: mtDNA research took ages. The story's still unfolding but the backbone, ancient line, is clade T, immediate subclade T2 and terminal subclade T2b13a. Think the subclade T2 is a good one to use for research in distribution as there's a lot of work on populations over Europe and Asia at this level. Although T2 is widely distributed in Europe at low levels, that is thought to be from sporadic movements from the Near-East into Europe. The top 3 areas are non-Ashkenazi Jews in Iraq and Iran and Pas Valley, northern Spain, with 18.3-20.0% of these populations being in subclade T2. The Spanish hotspot probably relates to a single population move giving a significant minority population who inter-married. My tentative picture is arrival from Iran/Iraq in the 17th century to the eastern Baltic, where the family were merchants, with Sarah Jane Dashper aka Yelena Dashevsky moving to Plymouth in the mid-19th century. So that makes my maternal ancestors Mizrahi (from the east!). Still work in progress and a lot of reliance on statistics but very satisfying to get this far!! My daughter may be amazed!! My late wife appears to have been right though she thought this ancestry would be found on the male side!! 2moro it's HEX-NCL c13:30, concert with N, MP4m4t and back well b4 Cinderella time, which is ridiculously early c20:30. C4c4l was gr8 with trhwso and tbld on form!! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 23rd: sorting out UNILOG at the moment with abstract to be submitted tomorrow. Do expect to get back to visit to Honey-buzzard site at Towsbank 2moro (at last!) and draft my mtDNA findings, which are a surprise. Made N4c4l and gr8 2 c tmeo!!! Today made N4c4t and W4g4s, where 4 of us out for good crack! Funds rallying well this week at +7k, making +17k on year after 6.5k of withdrawals. Since the swift correction, have increased holdings of short-term bonds substantially and planning to keep these. But in last 2 days, have moved over 100k of cash back into oil and mining stocks as oil shortage becomes more obvious and PoO rises. It's a traders' market at present! Going to concert with N at S with PD as performer, followed by MP4m4t. Hope iT went well!! 2moro it's C4c4l and catch-up. Battling some catarrh bug, almost certainly a London export, and high wind chill doesn't help but think I'll see it off!! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 22nd: updated Yellow-legged Gull web page with IGM presentation. Might get back to Honey-buzzard 2017 season soon! Think music paper at UNILOG workshop and title of paper for a conference in Baden Baden in early August are new priorities. Took car into KF for new battery fitting: cost £57 including battery 45, fitting 10, disposal 2. No problems today: computing mates said it was the obvious thing to do as an old battery with reduced impedance (pressure) will cause the ECU (electronic control unit) to ditch a device, to protect the core system. We will see! HASS are putting on 2 shows at QH in HEX next year, instead of 1; planning to increase my sponsorship. It's gr8 to help such ventures!! 2moro it's N4c4l and W4g4s and catch-up on a variety of things. lok2t beauties!!!!!

Should comment on the University pensions conflict: entirely with my colleagues in the universities concerned; the pension is the most attractive part of the total remuneration package. My pension is with the new universities, as Northumbria was my last employer. They are not involved in the dispute. Against advice I transferred in 2002, on moving to unn as Reader, the whole of my pension fund at USS, then 360k, to the TPS (which includes the school-teachers); this scheme is funded out of current government income so can never have a deficit. It's all funny money: the £6.1bn deficit quoted for the USS scheme would vanish in a few years if interest rates rose to more normal levels so attack by the employers looks to be opportunistic; the quote of that figure is to cause alarm; there are plenty more projections which are less alarming. The 'suits' are going to have to retreat. Already Oxbridge lecturers are moving quickly to remove their many institutions' hitherto-secret support for the pension reductions. Each Oxbridge college had one vote on the employer's preparations, the same as entire major northern universities such as Manchester, Liverpool and NCL.

February 21st: making G4g4t and TC4m4s, latter off HEX-NCL, going to a minority film! Car's steering back to normal so fault intermittent it appears; might be problem with battery, which is 7.5 years old from new and showing signs of ageing in other respects so going to KF 2moro for a new one to be fitted. Have had a valuation on car (£1440 initial quote from wbac) and looked briefly at nearly new ones, such as Ford Focus on PCP (1.5 TDCi 120 ST-Line Navigation 5d diesel; monthly payment £229, deposit £700, term (months) 48); RRP is £22,265 so some decent discount; think there's a cliff-edge at the end but good for current cash flow; in cities diesel cars are very bad for pollution but I'm a country boy! VW are out as they no longer have a franchise in HEX. Will play it by ear!! Have submitted to IGM organiser the talk given last week as report (ppt) on Azores visit, presented at IGM 2018, held in Ruse, Bulgaria, on 11th February. It's been quickly posted on the IGM 2018 Presentations official record at http://www.talk.gull-research.org/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=1198, a page of the Gull Research Organization.

Had good chat with B at G4g4t and always gr8 to have H on!! Then into NCL on train, making TC4m4s and watching film Loveless (нелюбящий), a Russian film, set in Moscow, with English subtitles. More people in the audience than expected. The title refers to the very sad son of a couple who are in the middle of a tempestuous divorce. However, there's plenty of love between the 2 divorcees and their new partners with some pretty salacious s.x scenes!! And the scenes of the Moscow in-crowd are very cool! Not sure I'd want to live in an apartment there though; endless apartment blocks seem to be a feature of eastern Europe. It also snows throughout the whole film and we hardly see any sunshine (think that actually happened in December 2017). The divorcing couple are forced to interrupt their diversions after their son, aged 12, goes missing, presumed a runaway but theories such as kidnapped are also raised. A tremendous search takes place but at the end we still don't know his fate. Films without closure are in vogue at the moment. Almost too late for last train but never mind as there was the last bus. So all worked out brilliantly in the end with satisfaction all-round: harmony sustained: she's so lovely: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! xxxxxx

February 20th: pretty chaotic journey back with fatality at Hitchin at 11:20 testing East Coast's efficiency. Was booked on 12:30 to NCL but had decided to come back on 11:30 to EDB to get some things done at home. Well was sitting on 11:30 when it was cancelled, 12:00 was over-flowing and 12:30 to NCL was cancelled; 13:00 to EDB did run normally but EC tried to run the original reservation system for that train, which caused chaos. Like many NCL passengers I got a seat and refused to give it up, quoting 'duty of care' to some aggressive EC staff; did say I would accept an upgrade to first or compensation, after which they retreated! Anyway15 minutes later an announcement was made that the reservations could not be enforced, that customers should be flexible and Virgin staff would help anyone find a seat! Common sense ruled! Felt much better after return to NCL at 16:02: gr8 welcome from the lovely grf!!!! Managed to get house sorted and final corrections submitted for Monadic Design paper to editor; also started final changes on gull ppt. Made BH4ra4s where friendly atmosphere!! Final reunion was a long one: very intense: she's so gorgeous: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! Solid yellow warning light for steering came on on crate at pub; will investigate and locate Kwik-fit insurance documents (for major repairs, see 5/10) before taking it in; steering is very heavy; no definite plans for 2moro; could be as simple as new battery required or as complex as new car!! Funds rallying a bit at +5k, mainly on ENQ's report; lack of bounce in rally on markets generally and severe punishment for any report less than satisfactory are not good signs for the bulls. xxxxxx

February 19th: off on 65 bus from EAL to Ham Parade, where met daughter and the girls (S/I) for tea; later M arrived and we had supper, with a few g, watching Man City crash out of the FA Cup to Wigan. Great to see them all!! Good operations update today from ENQ at http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/ENQ/13537136.html. Boosted both equity, where holding halved to 73k at book price of 17.4p after trading it, and bonds where large holding increased last week and major running profit looking good!! Off from EAL 2moro morning, exiting KGX c11:30 on way back. Looking forward to seeing everyone again: lok2t beauties!!!!

February 18th: had walk at Black Park, where in mild, grey, calm weather, had 3 Common Buzzard (1 in full display) and 4 Red Kite (one pair), plus a calling Chiffchaff. A bumblebee was flying around at Perivale, presumably hibernating in a house and released when refuge warming up. We met at Cozzo Caffe in Whitecross Street, Barbican: very good value, had piazza napoletana! There were 3 of us out: me, elder sis, my son. Concert by LSO at Barbican was very impressive, including works by Prokofiev and Richard Strauss. The former's Violin Concerto 2 was played by Leonidas Kavakos from Athens; very precise and well controlled throughout particularly in the slow movement but he brought the performance to life with a sparkling last movement, which had a Spanish flavour! He played an encore with the Leader, surely not pre-planned! Strauss' Alpine Symphony was fantastic if you're a Wagnerian, composed for an orchestra of 123+ with plenty of brass; thought it owed quite a lot to Rheingold but that wasn't a bad thing; the opening was quite similar to the start of the Ring!! Strauss is less subtle than Wagner and does not explore issues to the same depth. Might write to the AD affirming support for the Festival. 2moro it's visit to inspect family on the 65 bus! But return imminent: lok2t beauties!!!!!

February 17th: party day! S, 3 today, had main present of bike from parents. We all went out to Bocketts Farm, a farm for kids near Leatherhead in Surrey from 11-5 so full day with lunch, plenty of activities for kids, tea, a pig race, pony rides! There were 10 of us altogether, all the close relatives of S. T was not well, having nasty flu-type bug and left early: she probably shouldn't have come but good to meet her again. Had a Red Kite fly over the farm as it was emptying fast and a Common Buzzard glide over the M25 shortly after joining it. Big sis, son and I went to Indian restaurant in Pitshanger in evening, where masses of Biryani in my meal, poppadoms, side dishes, Kingfisher! So this is not a long trip with business as usual next week; family want to see latest DNA results so sending them out and will post them here. 2moro sees walk in Chilterns plus Italian meal and concert at Barbican. lok2t beauties!!!!

February 16th: journey all worked out well with train/UG on time NCL-EAL. Managed complete read-though of Monadic Design paper, all 34pp; still to compile the few modifications into intelligible form for the editor. Then visited a local bookshop to get presents/card for S/I! Birthday celebrations are tomorrow. Staying with elder sister with son joining us later; he'd been to a concert at Wigmore Hall where Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin) and Polina Leschenko (piano) were playing. We're going to Barbican in a couple of days. Calmer week for funds at -4k; have sold 400k+ over last 2 weeks and re-invested in short-term bonds or left as cash. As they say: when everything is going perfectly, then the next stage will not be going so well! Still have potential for rises in some areas but looking for consolidation after the past 2 brilliant years. This week's change included a withdrawal of 0.5k after 0.5k to S's JISA and 0.375k to RNS for quarterly sponsorship of EG, both of which of course very happy to pay. Change on year is +10k after withdrawal of 6.5k. lok2t beauties!!!!

February 15th: pretty wild send-off from NCL!!! Assembled all materials for final check of Monadic Design on train. Went to see The Mercy at TC late show. Very poignant film, not just for the tragic scenario but also for the many shots and memories of Teignmouth. The film's worth seeing just for the great acting of Colin Firth as the doomed yachtsman Donald Crowhurst and of Rachael Weisz, as his wife Clare, who throughout has tears in her eyes as she senses the inevitable failure of the voyage. Her performance was really moving! Rather too many shots of Teignmouth Pier for my liking perhaps, off which my father fell into the rough cold sea in February 1963 taking weather readings during repairs to the structure. HSE is often mocked but isn't all bad. Stay at hotel was brilliant: must come some more: we have a gr8 understanding: she's absolutely gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!!! xxxxxx

February 14th: hope the day went well for the fancied ones!! Met M at T4c4c for good chat but no CT. Continued getting place straight after week away. Made G4g4t where met B/S; took S to R&C at Slaley where met J/S; a longer time out than expected; good catch-up with S on birds of prey and gossip on local birders! Both pubs were packed. Very raw strong E wind today with little bits of snow not settling at home but doing so readily above 250m in the 'Shire. Had 2 Common Buzzard: 1 in my field at home eating a rabbit (balance of nature!), surrounded by 4 Magpie, and 1 high-up over Loughbrow, on way to Hexham. 2moro it's HEX-NCL a little b4 16:00, TC4m4s and no return!! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 13th: read through our 38 pp paper, giving it a close proof-read and submitted c10 corrections back to editor so hopefully this one sorted: Michael Heather & Nick Rossiter, Formal Representation of Process & Reality in the Metaphysical Language of Category Theory: Whitehead's Relational Theory of Space, ANPA 37/38, St John's College, Rowlands Castle, Hampshire, UK (2018). Will proof-read the monad paper tomorrow. Cold again today, similar to Bulgaria, and birds very hungry on the replenished feeders; both my sets of neighbours have stopped feeding them, quite sad really. Uploaded piccies from Bulgaria and will publish some next week; ones of the tip have come out well! Did make BH4ra4s at the bell so ordered a couple to not miss out! Made proposals early-on on vd: sorry, no card but there was a message: she's captivating: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c with M and G4g4t with B. TC is on Thursday nite when going 2 c The Mercy, a film showing the dark events surrounding Donald Crowhurst in his ill-fated attempt to win a yacht race around the world. His boat was the Teignmouth Electron with much of the action shot in my home town Teignmouth in Devon. The story is set c1969 when I was very much up with events in the town. It's not a happy tale with far too many b.stards in the town! You'd never believe how many swindlers my family had to deal with after the death of my father through the 1960s. But by 1969 the family finances had been restored through property deals and successful share purchases and my mother had married again, to the other optician in town! I had started work in Oxford. Own funds are more stable, down a bit by 2k, a follow-on from last week in OEIC prices, which are usually 2 days in arrears. xxxxxx

February 12th: took a while getting back but all in proper order. Up at 05:30 local time (03:30 GMT), caught Pegasus minibus at 07:00 for OTP where had 3 hours to wait; spent that having breakfast and modifying a few of the middle slides in the IGM presentation; pleased to see money laundering monitoring at OTP as changed 40 Bulgarian Lev (£18) into 80 Romanian Leu (£16) to buy 2 coffee, 1 orange juice and a croissant; had to produce passport and the lady had to fill in a form of ½ page; still she was smiling! Longer look at Romania showed how Italian they are in some respects; not a bad thing! It was a little worrying that the status of our flight KL1374 remained a mystery with a blank on the screen but had spotted that it had arrived from their web page and then the crew turned up; it left a little late at 14:00 (GMT+1) but arrived a little early at AMS; the NCL flight was almost on time getting in at 16:55 GMT. All the KLM flights were well patronised which they deserved through their drive, efficiency and charm. Have a similar journey with KLM to Budapest in June for the Wagner Festival. Caught Metro into central NCL and then train to HEX. That was slow as had meal at VctCmt. Always gr8 to have a welcome: really appreciated: she's so moving: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Got home, lit fire, emptied suitcase into washing machine and backed up all changed computer files from the trip, including the presentation. 2moro it's N4c4l, bit of shopping, uploading all piccies from trip and BH4ra4s, plus responding to editor on final modifications to our 2 ANPA papers and final work on Azores presentation at IGM. Further thought on IGM: my hair was just average length, unlike with stuffy R!! xxxxxx

Final trip report for all birds seen (25 types) in the trip to Bulgaria is available here

February 11th: lazy day, up late from 11:00-15:00, had a look around the town and parks, recording some more good calls from the City Hall with its gull colony up to 70 adult, with michahellis (20) and cachinnans (50). Birds noted other than gulls comprised: 1 Hawfinch 1, 2 Fieldfare (with Hawfinch) 1  2  3, 1 Feral Pigeon, 1 House Sparrow, 1 Syrian Woodpecker 1  2  3  4  5, 1 Hooded Crow 1, 3 Dalmatian Pelican. So just 9 types noted in the cold, gloomy weather.

Here are the recordings from Ruse on 11/02/18 of the calls with the birds in view as well: Mediterranean YLG (michahellis) clip 1 long calls 30s, clip 2 long calls 0s, clip 3 mew calls 15s long calls 35s rally calls 100s at night; Mediterranean YLG (michahellis) and Caspian Gull (cachinnans) clip 4 michahellis mew calls 15s long call 220s cachinnans long calls 100s squawk 160s, clip 5 michahellis long call 10s cachinnans long calls 15s; Caspian Gull (cachinnans) clip 6 long calls 50s 70s, clip 7 long calls 50s, clip 8 perched on roof (no strong calls).

Analysis of calls: the long calls of Caspian Gull are very fast, rather like a speeded up Lesser Black-backed Gull. The Mediterranean Yellow-legged calls are slower, deeper and can be guttural at end.

There was a covering of snow today in very raw weather, overcast, 1C max, calm. Had tea and dinner at hotel with 2 other gullers (including PR) from UK. 2moro up early before breakfast followed by minibus, to catch KL1374/KL0963. Will be at NCL by ttime if all goes well!! Back in town for a few days!! Will then be sedentary for a while. Looking forward to seeing the beauties again!!!! xxxx

Many thanks to Strahil Peev and Karina Peeva (both Ruse) for their efficient and enthusiastic organisation of the meeting.

February 10th: talk went well, Azorean atlantis is a hot topic; had 30 minutes and used all of that; great strides have been made in establishing the identity of atlantis since the last IGM attended in 2012. It is now accepted that c20% of atlantis have less black in the wing-tip than claimed historically. Also we've reduced a chaotic situation to 2-3 main forms: lusitanius, southern atlantis, Azorean atlantis, with a fast-moving genetic situation restricted to the Atlantic-Mediterranean intersection area where my studies in the field show what is going on. On the Atlantic coasts southern atlantis and lusitanius breed up to 50 km from Tanger and Tarifa respectively on cliffs and buildings; michahellis is invading from the Mediterranean, breeding on marismas, dunes and industrial sites; there is a narrow area around Gibraltar and Estepona where intergrades appear. We had dinner to close event at Chiflika, a traditional Bulgarian restaurant; plenty of dancing and music including a wild fiddler! Food was very tasty and traditional. Great chat with much enthusiasm about IGM2018; I've been to a number of IGMs, in Portugal, Poland, Croatia plus Bulgaria, making 4. Next one is in Basque country at Bilbao in 3 years time, so Atlantic gulls should feature well. Agreed to swap information with Juan (see 9/2). Boosted my field reputation earlier: a number of us were looking for a male Peregrine of possible Siberian form Calidus from the balcony of the hotel. I picked it up some way off and identified it first as it screamed around the buildings 1 looking for an easy Feral Pigeon kill. Other birds today included 3 Black-headed Gull, all 1w 1, 6 Common Gull, 5 ad 1 + 1 1w, looking dark in the field, 1 Mediterranean Yellow-legged Gull adult on Danube 2, 1 Caspian Gull adult on Danube 3, 2 Great Tit 1  2, 12 Tree Sparrow, 10 House Sparrow 1  2, 1 Hooded Crow, 4 Feral Pigeon, about 40 Caspian Gull, mainly on City Hall roof establishing territories for nesting and making many calls, the long calls being very fast: clips 1  2  3  4. So total was 10 types, including 1 raptor and 4 gulls. Weather was dull, cool, 3C, calm. 2moro will be taking it easy before departure with another early start looming. много целувки на красавиците: те са прекрасни ... Николас Росзитър

Have submitted to IGM organiser the talk given today as report (ppt) on Azores visit, presented at IGM 2018, held in Ruse, Bulgaria, on 11th February. It's been quickly posted on the IGM 2018 Presentations official record at http://www.talk.gull-research.org/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=1198, a page of the Gull Research Organization.

February 9th: out to the Ruse rubbish dump from 08:00-11:00 1  2  3, with plastic waste very conspicuous 1  2. We didn't stay any longer as although it was sunny there was a biting moderate breeze and the gulls refused to settle for any time; the 6+ feral dogs were impressive 1  2  3  4, a few look like wolves; evidently Jackals are the main predator in the wild, acting cleverly in packs. Caspian Gull was the commonest gull by far: here's adults 1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8 (with1s Caspian)  9  10  11  12  13  14  15 and 1s: 16  17  18  19  20. Caspian Gull adults usually show a quite deeply indented black triangle on the wing-tip, rather like Herring Gull but the black on the tips extends to P5 and often to P4, more like in Mediterranean YLG; P10 and P9 often carry large mirrors/wing-tips so much white here but some only carry a spot on P10; long white tongues are prominent on P10; the silhouette is slender as to wing-tips, head, neck and tail; the bill is long and narrow with constant width; the bill gonydeal angle is slight and the red spot is small. The 1s Caspian birds show similar structure to adults; the underwing is relatively plain with a lack of contrast between the darker carpal and wing-tips and the remainder of the wing; the birds are advanced in late winter/spring compared to even Mediterranean YLG with significant pale area on the base of the bill, white heads and faded plumage. Here's a piccie showing Caspian Gull 1s (left) and Mediterranean YLG 1s (right) 21; latter is darker and stockier with shorter, darker bill and more prominent carpal mark. Here are Mediterranean YLG adult 22  23, showing more black on wing-tip, darker grey colour and heavier, shorter bill, pale eye. A lone LBBG adult was found in a gull flock 24, highlighted here 25; the northern Norway birds appear to fly over the Black Sea to wintering grounds in Africa bustnes fuscus pdf so it may be fuscus though looks more like intermedius on mantle shade. Another LBBG, a 2w, is also in piccie 24, as highlighted in 24a, a lightweight bird reminiscent of fuscus. Could also be heuglini or barabensis. Some general shots of the gulls were taken: in flight as large flocks 26  27  28  29  30  31 and on roofs 32  33  34  35  36. The majority of birds in the flocks are Caspian Gull 1s though a few Mediterranean YLG 1s can also be seen. Two further shots 37  38 illustrate this with highlighted sections respectively 39  40 showing the sturdier Mediterranean YLG with shorter stubbier bills. Some adult Caspian are also shown on the roofs with a leg colour that is not bright yellow, more a greenish-yellow or pale flesh; Caspian have long slender legs compared to say Herring Gull. 12 Black-headed Gull (11 adult, 1 1w) and 2 Common Gull adult bring the total at the tip for gull-types to 5. Corvids were abundant with Rook, Jackdaw and Hooded Crow all seen well 1  2 (plus intrepid gullers!)  3. An extract 2a from piccie 2 shows some of the Black-headed Gull at the tip. Two Steppe Buzzard were seen on opposite sides of the tip; here's the juvenile 1  2  3  4 seen near the end at 10:19 with slightly longer wings than Common Buzzard; piccie 3 also shows an Alpine Chough, making another Corvid-type for the day. Other birds seen were 2 Crested Lark, 2 Magpie, 20 Linnet, 50 Starling. Some of the larger counts from the photographs are just guidelines: Rook 100, Jackdaw 30, Hooded Crow 5, with the large gulls at Caspian 600 (400 1s, 50 2s, 150 ad), Mediterranean YLG 30 (20 1s, 10 ad). Total was 14 bird-types and 1 mammal-type.

From the ridiculous to the sublime – passed Държавна Oпера Русе 1  2 (State Opera Rousse) on way to bus to tip. Posters included 1) Ромео и Жулиета (Romeo and Juliet, ballet, Prokofiev) 3; 2) Борис Годунов (Boris Godunov, opera, Mussorgsky), фондацията оперета (Foundation operetta), Красавицата и звярът (The Beauty and the Beast, Disney film) 4; 3) Ромео и Жулиета again plus Луд ГидиЯ Премиера (Crazy Guide Premier, think this might be facetious communist nostalgia! This was popular in Budapest but not convinced Orban is too much better) 5.

We had a lot of talks today running from 14:00-22:00 so studied hard. Gull id is a very difficult problem but we're making progress and it's all very challenging. The timetable has been altered a bit but think I'm on tomorrow evening with a few talks left for Sunday morning. One speaker Juan Arizaga from Basque country in Spain reported on genetic studies on the entire range of Atlantic Yellow-legged Gull; it agrees almost entirely with the classification system coming out of my results: very encouraging!! An amazing week for markets ended with a correction of 10% being done on Wall Street in a record 6 days. Ftse was down 4.7% on week, 7.7% on year. Own funds finished down 19k on the week, under 2%, with fall since Tuesday restricted to 4k; most of the earlier loss occurred on Monday morning as sold a number of falling shares. Continuing to be cautious but will buy some short-term bonds if situation stabilises. Gain on year is 14k after 6k of withdrawals. Return not so long: lok2t beauties!!!! xxxxxx

February 8th: did make Danube 1  2 at lunchtime: amazingly wide, lots of barges doing nothing, plenty of cachinnans, Caspian Gull, flying around (64 total, 48 adult 1  2  3, 1 2w, 15 1w 4) + 10 Black-headed Gull (9 adult, 1 1w 1) and a Mediterranean Gull adult. Star was 3 Dalmatian Pelican 1  2  3, new species. Also had 40 Tree Sparrow 1  2 in 2 flocks of 20 each, 2 Hooded Crow, 4 Cormorant, 25 Jackdaw, 2 Magpie 170 Feral Pigeon; total was 10 bird-types from 13:00-14:40. Weather was dull, slightly misty, 5C max, calm. This flower bed 1 looked rather flattened by past snowfall. The EU is sponsoring a big road project here 1. Did lots more work on gull paper, here's v0.9 pdf. Finally made opening of meeting at 19:00: gr8 to meet up with so many mates from 2012: they all remembered me!! We were supposed to see some formal gull photo shots but never materialised and the great brains of the gull world tucked into the buffet, beer and wine before retiring wounded at 23:30. Seriously was a gr8 social event and floated some ideas from my Azores paper with some of the * with encouraging response. Must say the admin asst looked so much like the meo that was a little nonplussed: didn't know she had Bulgarian ancestry!! 2moro sees us up at 06:30, breakfast at 07:00 and * attraction of the week: visit to the Ruse rubbish dump, complete with feral dogs!! Wish you were here: lok2t beauties!!!!

February 7th: quite a journey: up at 04:30 in hotel; 06:00 KL0952 NCL-AMS; 09:20 KL1373 AMS-OTP (Bucharest); 15:30 OTP-RUSE by minibus; arrive 18:00; taxi to hotel Dunav Plaza, arrive 18:20. Time difference is GMT+1 to Amsterdam, GMT+2 to BUC so journey time from getting up was 11 hours 50 mins. And 4 countries visited: England, Holland, Romania, Bulgaria, last 2 for 1st time. Bucharest looked a bit ramshackle with lots of apartment blocks in poor condition; Ruse looks in better state and hotel Dunav (Danube) Plaza 1 is high standard with good facilities, including WiFi. Here's a map of Ruse 1. Near the hotel is the Monument to Freedom 1. We crossed the Danube at the border: it was massive. They use the Cyrillic script in Bulgaria, not so bad if you're into maths because some of it is similar to Greek. Soon found out that Бира is Bira (beer) with ρ being rho (r) in Greek! Also Π is pi (p) in Greek. Ruse is Pyce in Cyrillic. It's useful to know both forms as sometimes they only give the Cyrillic one. But some of it is not so obviously in Greek as for instance и, which evidently is close to the Greek i (iota). Had meal in the hotel; meeting starts tomorrow evening so chance to explore the Danube area beforehand. Had 6 Kestrel around Bucharest, 2 at Airport, 4 in S of city including a pair displaying. Max today was 8C with showers but sunshine and 11C are promised in next 2 days. Missing the fit ones already: lok2t beauties!!!!

February 6th: very busy on Azores gull presentation: made good progress: up to v0.5!! Submitted at last: Nick Rossiter & Michael Heather, The Monad in Process-Relational Systems, 11th IWC, Azores, July 2017, 30pp (2018). pdf . Really pleased with that; section organiser and editor seems happy with it and has passed it on to the editor-in-chief for inclusion in the proceedings. Next task is to get the Unilog abstracts for the workshops sorted. Amazing start of week on the markets with the ftse losing not only this year's gain but also last year's, down 4.1% on week (2 days) and 7.1% on year. I've cheated by selling a lot, building up cash of around 250k, but am still down 15k on first 2 days. On year though remain in +ve territory, up 19k, even after 7k of withdrawals. I think upside is limited from here so taking a cautious approach, pursuing for instance short-dated bonds, maturing 2021-2022. Have traded ENQ so book price now 21p. Completely sold PFC, RDSA, BP, partially sold PKGLON and ENQ but bought some back of latter today. Did have a fond farewell before leaving: plenty of pent-up energy and desire: she's gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!! Writing this at Britannia Hotel, near runway, for 06:00 KL0952. xxxxxx

February 5th: pretty frantic day, preparing package for Whitehead submission with all figures labelled and supplied separately; wrote ½ of gull talk including the more technical slides, really just need to add a lot of piccies now of the AYLG and their nesting sites; attended 1 hour long YEDT meeting at B4R and I've been asked to explore feelings of last year's partners on a re-run in early July 2018. No let up 2moro but some space emerging once I get away. Think I need a logistics manager: it's Tuesday nite on the runway: may have a meal in toon but not up late as it's a desperately early start. KLM have sent me a check-in invitation. My clock runs from 02:00-09:30 for sleep: a creature of the nite!! Next midweek will actually be back to normal and so will the next one! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 4th: closing part of BF today with Aviv Quartet playing Schubert SQ 14, Haas SQ 2, Bradley Special Commission. Schubert's piece is often called Death and the Maiden and is harsh and violent in places but with a beautiful andante. Pavel Haas is another of the Czech composers who carried on composing after being taken into a camp. His work struck me as rather melancholy but with upbeat passages including the last movement with its use of percussion, played today by Jan Bradley. The last piece was written for the BF by Jan Bradley: it had amazing variety with deft touches. The Aviv Quartet were amazing with such high quality and feeling; very pleased that they were recruited for the final night; the viola player was really in the limelight! Earlier went to the N American music: loved Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue and all of Bernstein's West Side Story; maybe not so keen on some of Gershwin's songs from musicals. Later it was party time at S and in darkest Jesmond: great company and atmosphere: warm glow by all was richly deserved: it was a great festival!! Ended up in taxi to CP where car was a block of ice: home by 02:15: neighbours are going to talk!! 2moro it's R @ B4m4l followed by meeting on YEDT and maybe G4g4s much later. To make upcoming travel more pleasurable, have booked a hotel on NCL runway for Tuesday nite and the more regular one on Thursday week!!! Someone's looked terrific the last 2 days!!!! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 3rd: into GHD for afternoon at Shipley Art Gallery for The Strange Passenger, part 3 of the BF, focusing on works of Viktor Ullmann (1898-1944). It's a good venue with a decent performing area, plenty of side rooms and obviously supportive staff. Viktor was an active composer and pianist at the Theresienstadt concentration camp but was eventually transferred to Auschwitz where he was killed in the gas chambers. The programme for me highlighted the sombre, defiant mood of the composer, both before and after he was moved to the camp. Thought PH was brilliant as the actor for the poems, which interleaved the music: he had great presence! Six Sonnets were sung very powerfully by JH; we had 2 piano sonatas well played by YK, all rounded off in style by 4 members of the RNS (BC, SR, JS, GW) playing SQ op. 46. It was good to see such great support by members of the AD's family and was delighted to meet them all!! 2moro evening sees the closing part 4 of the BF in H2 @ S, preceded in afternoon by New York New York in H1 @ S with music by Gershwin and Bernstein performed by RNS. From the sublime to the ridiculous: spent 3 hours from 00:00-03:00 (4/2) analysing the wing-tip patterns from photographs of c50 adult AYLG on the Azores from my March 2012 trip, which lasted 3 weeks. Results are as expected with the Azores birds showing more black and less white in the primary feathers than any other form of YLG but the differences are significant only at the population level, with overlap in features on an individual basis. Well at least that gives me something to talk about in Ruse and piccies are very clear! It's now 03:48: time for bed after a gr8 day!! lok2t beauties!!!!

February 2nd: completed Whitehead read-through: submitting it tomorrow evening; must also write AYLG talk, at least the text, for Ruse; can sort out piccies later if take them on a stick but need to do a little analysis on features such as 1y wing-tip pattern found in Azores. Tarmac people didn't come: think it's a dodgy offload from another contract. W4g4s was good with 5 of us out for good chat!! 2moro it's CP-GHD for BF in afternoon: looking forward to hearing the Ullmann and the poetry!! lok2t beauties!!!!

Worst week for markets in a long time and IMHO it's serious with 10-year bond yield in US up to 2.80%; 666 fall (people have rounded it that way, for some reason!) today on Dow is colossal with ugly precedents; ftse is down 2.90% on week and 3.18% on year; German market is lowest since September. While hanging on through latest frothy rise, made a note that would reduce holdings quickly if markets appeared to be topping. So own funds ended week -15k or c-1.3% (after being -10k by Tuesday) but still +34k on year to date. Cash is at 172k after taking knife to holdings, particularly the large multinational oil companies, US gold companies and remaining U holdings. Not planning significant re-investment for a while: so many things look expensive, and may sell more next week. Bursting of Bitcoin bubble is blamed by some for extent of fall with investors in cryptocurrencies facing margin calls or being wiped out (and eliminated).

February 1st: made progress on Towsbank 20/8, indexing piccies of the Honey-buzzard; see there are 2 juvenile, a very weak flying one (maiden flight probably) and a stronger one, so raises result here from 1+ to 2; have altered home page summary accordingly. Have identified and labelled the insects so almost there for this one day! Completed the Whitehead but decided to read it through tomorrow morning for final check, rather than send it in today. There were 6 of us out at HoN4m4s from the IT gang including A and family; I had steak and a couple of stout; would recommend. There was an interesting article in recent Sunday Times: 21/01/18 Business Section https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/business/tech-on-the-tyne-is-all-mine-hp9z8dfbr: Tech on the Tyne is all mine: Northeast England is blazing a trail in luring digital start-ups. Here's text version for those without a subscription. It's quite upbeat about an IT community emerging in Newcastle. Transferring 2nd tranche of 0.5k to BF Friday morning (2/2). I'd always intended to donate 1k but thought I'd see how events unfolded. Have been really impressed by the festival this year: very creative and superbly performed!! Next visit for BF is CP-GHD!! 2moro it's N4c4l if can get car out; neighbours are having drive re-surfaced with tar water-resistant material, not really on my section so not asked for a contribution! Much later will make W4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 31st: within 6 lines of finishing Whitehead paper to send in 1 day late: have contacted the editor! Almost finished the task on the train HEX-NCL but went to sleep NCL-HEX after just making it at 22:34!! On way in met BrC from RNS at barrier. NCL was full of Toon supporters. Concert by Zimro Trio (piano, violin, clarinet) was very accessible with Gershwin's Three Preludes for clarinet and piano, Copland's Suite from 'Appalachian Spring' and Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale. It started with the almost jolly Suite for clarinet, violin and piano by Milhaud. The weightiest piece was Mozart's Trio in E flat. All was very well played and enjoyable; my favourite was the Appalachian Spring with the lovely Shaker melody. Recognised the page-turner: it was V! The Gershwin is a warm-up for a busy Sunday!! Only just made the start in time: having to collect ticket was not the best of ideas. Earlier had good chat with M at T on CT and met B/J at G4g4t; pub was packed with workers and H was hard-pressed!! Day came right in gr8 style: hope playing away went well: another brill coda: she's gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's N4c4l and HoN4m4s with M/B and possibly A. xxxxxx

January 30th: have completed labelling Honey-buzzard piccies in flight at Towsbank on 20/8 and uploaded them to server; have some Hobby and insect piccies to process and then that's it! Busy at work on Whitehead paper; returning to more abstract notations for Dolittle diagrams and happy that I've got it right after doing the much more detailed diagrams as proof for the ANPA series. Will submit it tomorrow afternoon or Thursday morning; then can think about the music workshop at Unilog in Vichy again!! Made BH4ra4s where bar-lass from W on: you can't do much without being noticed!! Was on halves after funds -10k in 1st 2 days of week; was not unexpected as no shake-out for a while; maybe Donald will rouse everyone with his State of the Nation address! Cause was really increasing nervousness of some investors, almost a panic. End of day was beautiful: dog was well behaved: she's fantastic: loved the coda: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c with M, G4g4t, HEX-NCL, S4con!! xxxxxx

January 29th: into NCL again for BF part 2 at TC: incredibly moving story Zuzana: Music is Life. Zuzana Růžičková, a Czech Jew, survived 3 concentration camps, emerging as one of the leading players of Bach on the harpsichord. The film was on special delivery from USA; very good audience though might have been the only one having a wee Merlot! Czech Republic was such a difficult environment with the Nazis, various flavours of Communism including Stalinist, and some demotivating false dawns before independence in 1989. The persistence and talent of Zuzana was amazing. I went to Czech in 1982 and 1990, helping give a summer school on the former date near the Austrian border at Tábor on computing techniques in physics and present a paper at a Simula conference on the latter date at Pilsen -- amazing contrast between the 2 visits. In the 1982 visit for 2 weeks I got detached from the main group in an escorted walk and ended up near an airbase, where I was interrogated, put in a car and taken back to our hotel: very thoughtful! I soon found some of the Russian attendees knew nothing about computing or physics: they were minders! Had great chat with some of the BF team at TC bar afterwards over a ps!! An amazing amount of work has gone into the Festival and it's good to see the talented performances so well supported. Earlier made N4c4l; it was very quiet! Had update on the IGM attendance; now 45 attendees, including 7 from UK. Here's programme with attendees; forecast temperatures are -8C to +5C; still a chance to come!! They're arranging a cultural trip around Ruse as an alternative to 2nd tip visit; may go for that! 2moro it's N4c4l, stepping up pace on Whitehead paper and much later BH4ra4s. lok2t beauties!!!!

January 28th: spent another few hours on Whitehead paper in morning, partly getting citations into Harvard format; have to charm editors if you want them to publish your work! Took a full printout and did some more work on Metro from CP and at pub CN, HAY. Been invited to give a paper in Baden Baden in early August; may well go, have decided to spend some spare funds on promoting our CT studies. Made KH, NCL, in evening where excellent concert in BF, with pre-concert a talk by IB on the holocaust and an address by composer Joseph Phipps, whose work Letters from Warsaw was later performed; the power of music to convey powerful emotions was obvious. Opening work was Different Trains, composed by Steven Reich and performed by Czigány Quartet with recorded voices: incredible pace with subtle variations made this captivating; the shrieks in the second movement relate to the trains carrying the Jews to the death camps. The final piece was Shostakovich's Piano Trio 2, premiered in 1944, which have heard twice already this season; it's an incredibly dark piece and was brilliantly played with much passion, including the Jewish melody in final act. Enjoyed the intervals and a chance to meet people!! All in all, truly a celebration of the music of the holocaust, even though a desperate time for the people of Europe. Still Wuthering Heights up here in 'Shire with almost gale-force gusty W wind. Static period up here will come to an end in February with Ruse, Bulgaria, and London trips looming. First is for International Gull Meeting where attendance has reached 35; sometimes we get on the local news as a little unusual (crazy!); visiting the local tip for fieldwork is the highlight! Second is for granddaughter's 3rd birthday: looking forward to that! Must book some local hotels to get off to good start. Have already donated family 7k out of 10k planned this year; our birthdays are biased towards mid-winter; not sure what that means except that parents must have been full of the joys of spring! Have scheduled 1k for transfers in February, including 0.5k for S's JISA (stocks, not cash). 2moro it's N4c4l and TC4m4t with later a film as next part of BF; will be on train RDM-NCL. lok2t beauties!!!!

January 27th: like Wuthering Heights today up here (well at least weather-wise!) with strong gusty breeze, temperature rather irrelevant; tonite we have clear air turbulence. Felt creative today and wrote page 1 of Whitehead paper, giving the introduction as a focused lead-in to the modified paper. That took a few hours! Have indexed the Towsbank nest piccies (7149) so next task is to look at the piccies of the birds in flight. 2moro it's the opening concert in BF in evening at KH, NCL, so CP-HAY; man with large head who sits in front of me in H1 is going; last train on Sunday NCL-HEX is 20:34; can you believe it! Think this might be a week for keeping to routine in some respects!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 26th: on way in to NCL had another 5 Kestrel and a Common Buzzard; Kestrel seem to be very plentiful this winter. Very satisfying day at S with 2 upcoming soloists and a new-composer competition in a diverse programme by RNS. The soloists were Sindy Mohamed, on viola playing Sally Beamish's Under the Wing of the Rock, and Aaron Pilsan on piano playing Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No.1. Aaron, who works with Lars, was very convincing in the concerto: loved the andante. Indeed wondered why this concerto is not more often played. Found the competition very interesting; the panel of experts had selected 3 compositions for the final, which heard in the rehearsal, in the official 'play-off' and the winner alone in the actual concert. The 3 composers were present throughout; after their piece in the rehearsal they were able to make further minor modifications; they had their scores on their laptops but the players were using printed scores showing an interesting divergence in technologies! In the play-off at 18:30 the audience was allowed to vote; I voted 1 (best) for Sturdivant Adams' Polin, 2 for Jocelyn Campbell's Wave, 3 for Joel Jarventausta's Stonewalls; that was the result! Liked the winner because of its harmonies and its continuity with themes running through it; see this composer's speciality is film music, which may have been a little controversial. There were 3 juries: panel of experts, orchestra players, the audience. Merging the different results was obviously an art: they did admit it wasn't the same result for each jury! The programme also included Mozart's Overture to Marriage of Figaro and Haydn 47. So that was all very stimulating: thought the flutes did well!! Just caught last train (2 minutes to spare!) and made W4g4s where 6 of us out for good crack!! Got home at 01:00. Scintillating performance: very impressed: gr8 to do the double: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! With enormous gyrations on foreign exchange markets and sharp rise in £ against all currencies, not just US$ which was particularly weak, funds trended erratically downwards from Tuesday finishing level on week, +49k on year to date. ftse declined 0.8% on week and is now 0.3% down on year to date. Overseas funds are in equities, where exchange rate movements in one direction are often compensated by share price movements in the opposite direction. That was roughly the case; if had had money in overseas bonds would have lost a packet! Late (good) news: tanker #8 offload, Navion Oceania ETA ENQ's Kraken is 02.00 28/1. 2moro main aim is to get Whitehead paper nearer to final publication; may well make C4c4l though to kick the day off! xxxxxx

January 25th: got on this morning with Towsbank visit on 20/8 (7149) labelling all the nest + debris shots, a Twite, perched on a wall, and a pair of mating crane flies, and uploading to server. LAF meeting at National Park offices in Hexham was long, from 14:00-20:30, with updates on legislation and organisation in the afternoon; we do get tea and sandwiches at 17:00 followed by the main meeting; my paper from WG1 went well so we're committed to updating the RoWIP! Made T4shop and met M at T&S4ra4s, where we had good chat. No sign of A: oh dear! 2moro is also busy with S4s4l, rehearsal brought forward to 13:45, S4m4t, a composer competition at 18:30, concert New Year New Artists at 19:30. May well be train RDM-NCL. Looking forward to a great occasion!!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 24th: took some shots of garden at home yesterday: here's the new 'rabbit-proof' fence, laid by neighbours' contractors at their expense, alongside my orchard; don't think it's guaranteed to work, rabbits might walk around it! Some snowdrops were disturbed in the fencing but they've survived. In the main garden, the snowdrops have emerged as soon as it's got milder; not sure the fence will stop the moles either, as they might just tunnel under it! Whatever the new fence is not hedgehog-friendly (with gaps). Did make T4c4c where met M for good chat; A's agreed that we should leave the pub earlier – we'll see! B not out so skipped G4g4t, going to TC4m4s a little earlier; film was 3 Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, a very dark comedy situated in a small town in the Midwest. Not sure that anyone from Missouri would have found it funny because it was rather taking the p.ss out of that part of USA! Indeed the comedy was so dark that wondered at times whether that was really the intent but sure it was on reflection! The billboards were put up by Mildred Hayes – her daughter was raped and murdered in the town -- in an unsolved mystery; the billboards ask Chief Willoughby of the police: why so long? The police force in Ebbing is a complete shambles, with no energy to solve anything, relying solely on DNA matches to track down the rapist; the force is also racist and belligerent, typified by Officer Dixon, who after blatant misconduct finds himself fired within seconds of the new Chief Abercrombie taking over, who happens to be black! Abercrombie replaces Willoughby, who commits suicide, writing very long notes to a number of people; his suicide was apparently due to terminal cancer. The film is inconclusive with no 'happy ending' (closure) of the rapist being caught. Difficult to capture its appeal and certainly not to everyone's taste but the audience (and I) liked it! Did pursue my strong interest: very touching: great glow with the fit one: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Used Metro GC for free ride from CP: all worked! Had the Barn Owl again at Lamb Shield at 17:45. 2moro it's LAF in afternoon and evening b4 T&S4ra4s; on Friday back to train for S4s4l, rehearsal and concert!! xxxxxx

January 23rd: made N4c4l for relaxing break; sorted out JLAF WG report for Thursday; started on Towsbank piccies but a lot to do! Also contacted IWC chair of session to find out about formats for 31/1 submission. Had 2 Sparrowhawk female yesterday, at Ordley and Elvaston Road, both hunting actively through gardens; today, well really 00:55 24/1, had a Barn Owl hunting at Lamb Shield. Funds +4k as PoO flirts again with $70+ a barrel before retreating again; new feature was price of natural gas, which rose 10% today in New York on short covering; Au is also firm as interest in cryptocurrencies wanes a little and people worry about Trump's reflationary tax rises. Made BH4ra4s where good crack!! Sequel was brill: very passionate: she's gorgeous: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c, G4g4t, TC4m4s via CP!! xxxxxx

January 22nd: completed indexing of Kellas piccies; will finish processing data for this visit tomorrow morning. Next up is Towsbank nest visit 20/8 (7149). Much milder today, 6.4C at 14:00, phew! Early Moth quick off the mark with 1 at Letah Wood yesterday at 1C, 3 at Letah Wood and 4 at Loughbrow tonight at 5C. Here's 2 reports on wind-turbines in Germany from a bird point of view; Germany of course has an enormous number of wind-turbines as part of its 'clean' energy transition, far more of which are on land than in England. Incidentally, as in the German report, prefer to call them wind turbines, not wind farms, to indicate that they are industrial installations.

Working Group of German State Bird Conservancies (Länderarbeitsgemeinschaft der Vogelschutzwarten LAG VSW): Recommendations for distances of wind turbines to important areas for birds as well as breeding sites of selected bird species (as at April 2015) http://www.vogelschutzwarten.de/downloads/lagvsw2015.pdf

Overview in Report:

• Climate protection and energy policy do not necessarily contradict biodiversity protection. Nevertheless, conflicts regularly occur when wind turbines are being planned. In order to minimize these conflicts, LAG VSW has reviewed the current knowledge and describes how the planning and setting up of wind turbines can be optimized on the bird interest.

• Jurisdiction has increasingly contoured nature conservation legislation. This mainly applies to special species conservation (§ 44 of the Federal Nature Conservation Act) and to site protection in Europe (§ 34 of the Federal Nature Conservation Act).

• Furthermore, there is new scientific knowledge concerning the conflicts between wind energy use and bird protection, for example regarding cumulative impacts (see chapter 4).

• Also, there is an increasing use of wind energy in forests, which until recently only played a minor role. This means that there is now a stronger focus on bird species occurring in forests.

A number of species are covered in detail, including:

Honey Buzzard (Pernis apivorus)

Six collision victims have been found in Germany (all of them adult birds) and eight in Spain. This number seems to be small, but it is relevant when compared to the total population size. It must be assumed that the number of honey buzzards colliding with wind turbines is actually much higher, because the chance to find collided birds is very low. Furthermore, honey buzzards get often mistaken for the common buzzard. Due to the increasing use of wind energy in forests it must be assumed that impacts on this species are growing. Several studies found evidence for honey buzzards avoiding as well as passing through wind farms (with and without reaction), showing partially differing behaviour between breeding and migratory birds. One bird in Brandenburg was found to abandon its territory after a wind farm had been built. Also, honey buzzards might get attracted to wind turbines: The larvae of bumblebees and wasps, which often occur at the fallow land around the towers, belong to its main food source. This may attract honey buzzards to those dangerous areas and increase the risk of collision. Furthermore, a higher risk of collision can be expected in the vicinity of their nests: displaying and territorial fights, soaring, foraging flights, prey transfer – they all take place at critical heights.

A minimum distance of 1,000 meters offers protection for these main activities near nest sites.

Sources: BIJLSMA (1991, 1993), Diermen et al. (2009, 2013), GAMAUF (1995), ILLNER (2012), MEYBURG et al. (2011), MEYBURG & MEYBURG (2013), MÖCKEL & WIESNER (2007), TRAXLER et al. (2004), VAN MANEN et al. (2011), ZIESEMER (1997, 1999)

TRULY GREEN? How Germany’s ‘Energy Transition’ is destroying nature, by Michael Miersch (2017) https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2017/11/TrulyGreen.pdf

The Global Warming Policy Foundation: GWPF Briefing 27

A more lurid read, looking at the dubious benefits from a biodiversity viewpoint, of 'renewable' energy; has my empathy in many respects; for bird populations, largely follows the official report of the German State Bird Conservancies above; backed by GWPF, which has an agenda against renewable energies and is sceptical on climate change so treat with some caution.

Made R @ B4m4l; speaker unn graduate CSt was very good on her VSO stint in India; showed all the perils of the caste system; good to have l on!! Then onto N4c4ll where chilled out: thought tmeo looked terrific!!! Sorted out minutes from trip to NCC at Morpeth on 17/1; quite a challenge as everything scattered. Much later made G4g4s where 4 of us out for good crack; closer to the bar, revealing chat on last nite!!! 2moro it's N4c4l and BH4ra4s; going to be very mild, up to 10C!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 21st: completed processing Oakpool visit from 26/8 (7154); started on Kellas Honey-buzzard nest visit on 27/8 (7155) by labelling piccies. Weather was raw this afternoon at 0C with wind-chill -6C on SE breeze; thaw taking hold in evening as wind swung to W; wet snow fell in afternoon but it didn't settle. Got some major scientific support for my unease on packing the countryside with wind farms:

Wind farms and biodiversity: a collision course? https://www.bto.org/science/latest-research/wind-farms-and-biodiversity-collision-course?dm_i=2FPX,16IST,2ZWKVN,3P0C3,1 [summary of Royal Society paper below]

Bird and bat species' global vulnerability to collision mortality at wind farms revealed through a trait-based assessment http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/284/1862/20170829

Large-scale citizen science improves assessment of risk posed by wind farms to bats in southern Scotland https://www.bto.org/research-data-services/publications/peer-reviewed-papers/2017/large-scale-citizen-science-improves

Above are 3 current articles on the impact of wind farms on bats and birds. I think the Scots are doing much more damage to their natural environment with their passion for wind farms than they realise. The Royal Society publication is very revealing; it's good to have the whole publication available as Elsevier and the like make you pay. Also the Royal Society is very influential. The conclusions are:

"This study is the first global quantitative assessment from the published literature of the relative vulnerability of different species groups to wind farms. Wind farms have the potential to benefit biodiversity through their contribution to climate change mitigation, but our results emphasize the global nature of the potential risks to biodiversity involved, which needs to be accounted for through appropriate wind turbine design and planning, if those risks are to be minimized."

Figure 2 shows that Accipitriformes (broad winged birds of prey) are particularly vulnerable to strike by a turbine blade. Model predictions show: "For birds, 936 species had collision rates of more than 0.046 collisions/turbine/yr (90% quartile), of which 174 species were Accipitriformes (figure 2), 57% of species in that order. Accipitriformes had the highest predicted collision rates of any taxonomic order (0.073 ± 0.064 s.d. collisions/turbine/year, mean lower credible interval less than 0.001, mean upper credible interval, 0.288)." Another quote says: "Collision mortality with wind turbines may reduce populations, particularly of long-lived, slow-reproducing species." like raptors. The study only deals with land-based windfarms.

A lot of the writings fit in with my worries about the number of windfarms required to make a difference to energy supplies. The sea will be no better as a site but we'll have to wait for the North Sea to be covered before that's admitted. The energy density of wind turbines is just too low at 1/5000 that of nuclear, meaning vast areas have to be covered, putting in jeopardy biodiversity, particularly for raptor and bat populations. I have another article on the effect of wind turbines on nature in Germany, which will put up soon. My U₃O₈ holdings have been much reduced so not talking my book!

So fairly studious weekend but went up a gear in evening in the exciting atmosphere of Hexham's nite-life!! A lively party was on at G4g4s led by usual suspect of MW; evidently a fight had only just been narrowly avoided; anyway A on right side of bar gave me a lovely hug!!! Can only say Wow to later action!!!! 2moro it's R @ B4m4l followed by N4c4l and G4g4s. lok2t beauties!!!!!!

January 20th: main business today was final polishing of 3rd paper for next ANPA proceedings, covering 2 years 2016/2017, which sent off 40 minutes before deadline, at 23:20! Took ages, doing final formatting and tidying-up. Full citation is not decided yet but will presumably be dated 2018, the date of publication, not that of presentation:

Michael Heather & Nick Rossiter, Formal Representation of Process & Reality in the Metaphysical Language of Category Theory: Whitehead's Relational Theory of Space, ANPA 37, St John's College, Rowlands Castle, Hampshire, UK, 8-12 August (2016). pdf

Mike earlier this week submitted this one giving us 3 papers in the next volume:

Heather, Michael, & Rossiter, Nick, Tribute to Professor Pierre Noyes (1923-2016), ANPA 37, St John's College, Rowlands Castle, Hampshire, UK, 8-12 August (2016), pdf

Feeling good after yesterday!! Did find on YouTube Ning Feng playing Paganini God save the King, just to show his party piece! Also listened to Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time : Part III Abyss of the Birds on YouTube and there's definitely Nightingale at the start, maybe Thrush Nightingale if inspired by 'visit' to Silesia. Bird feeding area is crowded with birds, including Red-legged Partridge, Tree Sparrow, Marsh Tit, Goldfinch, Nuthatch, Great Spotted Woodpecker, and many Blue and Great Tit; last 2 are commonest birds. Weather late-on is -2C with -6C wind-chill and most snow still lying but messy thaw starts tomorrow midday. Made C4c4l where gr8 2 c trhwso; think she's got promotion or something; darker hair suits!! FT thinks inflation is an increasing risk, partly from Trump's aggressive tax cuts but bond market remains at levels which are not alarmist. Trying to sort out Thursday nite: M wanted to go ½ hour earlier at 21:00, as he works full-time, which we did but A (retired) wants to stay until end (23:40), drinking 6 large red wine (2 bottles) which makes him raving. So told him it's 23:00 depart if he wants a lift back to Slaley or it's the £15+ taxi! Not sure he'll take any notice, hoping to continue to receive chauffeur service; he's the one who had a stroke with partial recovery. Might well ditch the T&S for a while and go elsewhere: probably easier!! 2moro it's C4c4l and G4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 19th: completed compilation of Honey-buzzard data for the Oakpool visit (7154); just need to compile data for the other birds. Next up is Kellas nest visit on 27/8 (7155). Weather today was sunny with some thaw on snow on ground; all froze hard at -2C with wind chill -4C later in day with nearly all roads iced over when driving back from W at 00:30 (20/1); showers in the evening had washed the salt off. Met N at MP4m4t, where had their 3-course early evening menu; I had duck, which was very good; total cost was £52 including voluntary tip of £5. Concert by CBSO was colourful with very good music. Conductor was a lady Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, from Lithuania, who not only conducted dynamically but also showed good ballet skills in dancing around on the podium! Star was the soloist Ning Feng in Brahms' Violin Concerto; he was good technically but also very expressive in the lovely adagio and lively in the well-known allegro. He played 2 encore, the 2nd of which was a rather jazzy version of our national anthem; BC was there, picking up a few tricks no doubt! The concert started with the dreamy Swan of Tuonela by Sibelius and after the interval we had Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra, with its incredible variations in rhythm. Overall a very good concert, played with enthusiasm. Some gr8 rhythm elsewhere: she's full of inspiration: very gorgeous: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Off last train made W4g4s where there were 6 of us out altogether for good chat!! Funds were +9k on week, continuing good start to year where now +49k after withdrawals of 6k; peak was Thursday when 2k higher. However, advance was very narrow with ENQ1 +10k and GAL +5k so rest was down slightly in poor sentiment after CLLN collapse. Sold 30k ENQ and 9k HUR on Tuesday morning and bought back some of the ENQ and all of the HUR at lower prices later in the week. Holding in ENQ is now 132k. Am building a stake in another North Sea gas/oil producer PMG, which appears to have been overlooked. 2moro it's C4c4l, not sure about evening. xxxxxx

January 18th: working on Honey-buzzard nest visit on 26/8 to Oakpool (7154); have labelled and uploaded piccies; next stage is indexing on this page. Most snowy night for quite a while, reaching 15cm at altitude of home at 150m asl; it thawed a little early afternoon from the trees but nearly all left on the ground and freezing tonight; had an Early Moth on the window at 0C – hardy! Made N4c4l but skipped T&S4ra4s as much water around roads to wash salt off, giving rise to icy areas. Wind-chill tonight is -5C with continued strong NW wind. Good news for ENQ bondholders with 20% of Kraken being put up for sale; hold almost £171k nominal. it's also good news for the shareholders in that the business is coming good; see EnQuest seeks buyers for stake in North Sea Kraken field https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-enquest-m-a/enquest-seeks-buyers-for-stake-in-north-sea-kraken-field-idUKKBN1F71MD.

LONDON (Reuters) - North Sea-focused oil and gas producer EnQuest (ENQ.L) has hired investment bank Jefferies to advise on a sale of a 20 percent stake in its recently-started Kraken field, according to a document seen by Reuters.

The sale could fetch as much as $400 million (289.02 million pounds) for EnQuest, based on recent analyst valuations of the field. EnQuest holds a 70.5 percent stake in Kraken where production is expected to ramp up to 50,000 barrels per day (bpd) by mid-year following its start-up last June.

Also good news from Irish gold miner GAL in that some high Zn/Pb grades have been found in drill cores in a garage: honest! To broaden travel options 'bus pass' arrived today; besides free buses, can now buy a Metro Gold Card for £24 a year, giving free travel on Metro after 9:30: desperate times! Devon M and I are submitting 2 more papers to ANPA proceedings with closing date 20/1; will add details after closing time. I'm planning to top and tail the ANPA monad/topos paper with philosophy for submission to Whitehead Proceedings (IWC) by 31/1 after being invited to do so by section organiser at the Azores. 2moro it's RDM-NCL, meeting N at MP at 17:30, followed by H1 at S4con with CBSO; much later due at W4g4s with the gang. lok2t beauties!!!!

January 17th: up at 7, off at 8 to County Hall at Morpeth; roads were appalling with a layer of ice under a rutted surface on 5cm of snow; there was a lot of trouble going up to Loughbrow in 'Shire with cars on side of road and 'snake' and skid marks over a long section; just put the car into 3rd at the bottom, kept a steady 15 mph and got to the top without any trouble; it's sometimes worth putting a bit extra into your choice of car! Roads in Hexham were slushy, not much sign of gritting anywhere. Friction is the key: you generate more friction, and hence grip, in a slow grind than in a fast race (or something like that!). The opposite trick is where you remove a tablecloth from a table without breaking the cups on it; this has to be a very fast flick, generating no friction so cups stay where they are. Three of us made the meeting from 10-11, which was with DB to discuss the pending update to the County's RoWIP (Rights of Way Improvement Plan); they're so short of resources, we're going to provide some input. Rushed back to meet M at T4c4l for good chat on Blockchain. Late afternoon made NCL via CP where met N at BC4m4t; it was French-style, good food, service and wine and not too pricey coming to £50 between the 2 of us, including added gratuity. Made H2 in S4con, where there were 3 of us: N, M and me. The first piece Schnee by Danish composer, Hans Abrahemsen, was premiered as recently as 2009; it was appropriately named, being pretty glacial in places. KH, AY did well in their major roles but all 9 players starred. After the interval we had Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time, most of which was drafted while the composer was in a prison camp in Silesia; the camp was one for PoW, nothing like the horrors of some of the other camps but far from comfortable. The 4 players (and audience) were obviously moved by the intensity of the music. We had some bird calls in Part III, could pick out Song Thrush and Cuckoo! The concert finished at 22:40 so train not on yet again. Enthusiasm was high early and late: plenty of action: she's very desirable: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! From last Metro ran into sleet on A69, turning into a white-out as got into the 'Shire but not much had settled by time got home. 2moro it's N4c4l if can get out, with T&S in evening but all a little problematical. xxxxxx

January 16th: weather harsh in 'Shire today at 1C midday with bitter NW wind. Went down to -1C by evening with snow settling again, wind chill -8C, sad at not going out!! Completed processing Whitfield Monk data from 26/8; next up is Honey-buzzard nest-site visit to Oakpool for same day (7154). Reviewed music bookings for next few months, adding: Zuzana (29/1); Madame Butterfly with reception (20/3); visit to Leeds for Salome rehearsal (18/4); Grime, Prokofiev and Strauss at Barbican, Daniel Harding leads a whirlwind musical tour from Russia to the heights of an Alpine peak (18/2); change of RNS rehearsal from 10/2 to 20/4 (away in Bulgaria). 2moro going to Morpeth in morning for LAF meeting on RoWIP, then it's CB4m4t at 17:30 with N followed by S4con (which is sold out!), may travel via CP!! Funds +3k after being +9k yesterday; some boiling over today and sold 30k ENQ at 44.5 to take some profit; not planning on any more disposals. lok2t beauties!!!!

January 15th: labelled Hobby and Raven piccies from Whitfield on 26/8 and uploaded to server; will index tomorrow. Don't hold any CLLN; some asset stripping looks to have happened with the record dividend of 12.65p on 11/5/17 (declared on 430.3m shares), looking far too close to the profit warning on 10/07/17; the highest share price was 379.40 on 28/2/14 so massive losses by shareholders, even with last Friday's price of 14.20; the short sellers will ideally need dealings to start again at a few p to buy-back their stock; the pension deficit is the major scandal; suspect the taxpayer will end up paying over £1bn to sort the mess out. But this week's started well for commodities and their producers! R @ B4m4l was interesting with good talk by Lisa Taylor of MIND. Made C4c4ll with P and there were 5 of us out at G4g4s; a cm of snow was on the road as left home in evening but it had melted by time came back! 2moro it's N4c4l and BH4ra4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 14th: back to compiling Honey-buzzard results by completion of Swallowship visit on 29/8 (7156). Next up is Whitfield Keenleyside 26/8 (no Honey-buzzard seen). Busy today catching up on logistics: bought petrol, kindling and logs from garage plus print cartridges, refuse bags and FT from T; also had car washed at T. FT was well-worth reading closely with several articles on whether the long-running 35 year-old bull market in bonds is over i.e. are interest rates going to enter a long-term rising trend. Well as you'd expect no clear view but investors need to watch closely as rising bond yields make equities and property look more expensive! Met P/M at C4c4ll and, much later, P and 6 other at G4g4s; gr8 to have A on!! 2moro it's R @ B4m4s, N4c4ll and G4g4s!! 2 definite concerts this week at S on Wednesday/Friday and a probable at QH on Saturday. Going with N to CB4m4t in Grainger St on Wednesday and to MP4m4t on Friday.

January 13th: into NCL for bumper concert at S, featuring all of Bach's 6 Brandenburg Concertos (BC), plus more modern pieces with acknowledgement to the influence of BC, all from 18:00-23:00. We had 3.5 hours of music and 2 intervals but skipped the £60 a head special meal, eating at MP for £42 for the 2 of us, including wine. N thought it would finish at 10 but doubted it, looking at programme, and was pleased came in via CP as would otherwise have missed last bus (last train was never on!). Many highlights: really enjoyed it: thought BC4 was exquisite with the 2 flautists EG/AY and violinist KH in expressive form; this was followed by Melinda (no relation to Richard) Wagner's Little Moonhead, which again starred a violin and 2 flutes; found this a difficult work but encourage inclusion of more modern works. BC6 was unusual in that it starred 2 violas with no violins present at all, which gave MG/MC a welcome chance to shine, which they did! BC6 was followed by hot-off-the-press (published 2009) Aaron Jay Kernis' Concerto with Echoes which enjoyed with its unusual harmonies. BC5 has an amazing solo role for the harpsichord, played by JP, with a sound box added to enhance the volume. This was followed by Gorecki's Harpsichord Concerto, which was really lively. The concert started with the well-known BC3, which was followed by 2 pieces: Errollyn Wallen's Photography (female composer, born Belize, premiered 2006) and Mozart's Adagio and Fugue in C minor; the Mozart was a little strange, didn't seem really Baroque or classical Mozart, a bit indecisive but maybe missed something subtle! The concert concluded with BC2/BC1, with Bruckner's Adagio from String Quintet in between; the Bruckner was lovely for a few minutes but did go on a bit! The brass/woodwind took over in BC1 with 2 horns, 3 oboes,1 bassoon excelling; BC2 starred trumpet, flute, oboe and violin. The tributes at the end were a little chaotic with BCr making it up as he went along; personally thought all the players should have been treated equally at the end as it was very much a terrific team effort!!! Overall it was a challenging thought-provoking programme which does a lot of credit to the RNS (and N agrees!). N actually added it was a bit long but he's far from being a Wagnerian! Early signs of spring today with 6 Kestrel at 4 sites and a Common Buzzard on a post on drive from home to CP. Early and late again featured very well: dynamic action at end: she looks so fit: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! 2moro it's catch-up, maybe C4c4l and certainly G4g4s. xxxx

January 12th: made big city via CP; good to return to CT4s4l where read the transaction part of the book Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies at http://www.the-blockchain.com/docs/Princeton%20Bitcoin%20and%20Cryptocurrency%20Technologies%20Course.pdf, finding out they use Forth as a scripting language; Forth, a stack-based language, can be used as a front-end to Haskell; later found Simplicity: A New Language for Blockchains by Russell O’Connor at https://blockstream.com/simplicity.pdf, which uses monads; so good progress there. At L&P brought together a new introductory paragraph, forming a literature review of music and category theory, which gives something almost ready to send. Did have some serious play: makes visit much more worthwhile: she's marvellous: lok2tgrf!!!!!! On continued revival in PoO, funds made further progress finishing +13k gross and +12k net after withdrawal of 1.4k to help fund daughter's birthday present of 2k. So gain on year is +41k net, after the withdrawals of 6k. Re-invested most of the cash from U sales into N American Au; Au is rising nicely and may be next play at this stage of economic cycle as things start to overheat. Made W4ra4s where 4 of us out. 2moro it's all 6 Brandenburg Concertos at S, preceded by MP4m4t at 15:00 with N; should be gr8 day; travel will be via CP. xxxx

January 11th: gloomy weather continues but it is mild and had first moths emerging at Ordley today: 2 Early Moth 1  2, 1 Pale Brindled Beauty 1. In some of these winter-flying moths, such as Early Moth, the females are flightless and only the males have fully grown wings. Labelled the piccies from visit to Honey-buzzard nest site at Swallowship on 29/8 (7156) and uploaded them to server; still to index, update textual account and add records to spreadsheet. Made N4c4l for relaxing look at the papers on my mobile. Much later made T&S4ra4s where our regular 3 were out again for chat on IT; have read through the new book looking at hashing in cryptography; tomorrow it's the critical area of blockchain transactions for a conventional view. 2moro making CT4s4l b4 L&P; train services are a mess with strikes and track work just W of NCL so it's via CP. Main aim of study is the music abstract for UNILOG! Funds quickly reversed small loss at start of week and are now up in double figures; no profit taking on oils contemplated. So looking forward to big city: lok2t beauties!!!!

January 10th: made R strategy meeting from 10:00-11:30; support the main objectives (which are secret!). Then met M at T4c4l where he produced a free book in pdf on blockchain, giving some of the details anyway. Back home to get place ready for cleaner S b4 making G4g4t to meet B where H was on: she was very inquisitive about what I was going to do in NCL!! Made TC4m4s and saw Molly's Game, another fairly long film of 2.3 hours. Read comments by some reviewers after seeing the film; they were not very impressed, looking for more tense action. But think they miss the point of the film, which at least partly is to show the family tensions between an elder daughter, whose promising skiing career goes wrong through an accident, and a rather smug and very successful parents and 2 brothers. Molly Bloom (Jessica Chastain) shocks her family by going on to run poker clubs in New York for very wealthy gamblers and makes many $; her name sounds Irish (after James Joyce's Ulysses) but her father in the film is Jewish; her downfall occurs when she becomes involved with the Russian mob, who are being closely monitored by the FBI. She has a good lawyer who eventually gets her off with a nominal sentence but her $4m fortune is confiscated as part of the negotiation. The family come together again during the court action and the reconciliation with her father (Kevin Costner) is very touching! Gr8 end to day (and b4!): marvellous glow: empathy is perfect with the gorgeous one: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Yet another tanker Navion Britannia is on its way to ENQ's Kraken field near Shetland: final commissioning must be close. 2moro should make C4c4l and much later T&S4ra4s!! xxxx

January 9th: weather-wise one of the worst January days at a gloomy 1C. Waited in for deliveries and lovely spoon came but the shelf brackets didn't; paid an enforced £8.45 for 'express' delivery for latter. Finished Beaumont 30/8 (7157) and now onto Swallowship nest site visit on 29/8 (7156). Not out until evening when made BH4ra4s with Consett Stout high-up on the menu at £3.20 a shot, not bad! All very matey there! End of day was thrilling: didn't realise it was so late: every minute was gr8 with the beautiful one: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! Funds -1k after profit taking; sold many U stocks today as suspect another false dawn is imminent; changing policy now with proceeds remaining mainly as cash with markets so high in many areas; PoO over $69 tonite after enormous stock withdrawal in US; converted 1.9k BP into 46k HUR early this week. 2moro it's R strategy meeting from 10-12, possibly M on CT at T4c4l, G4g4t and TC4m4s via CP!! xxxx

January 8th: almost completed analysis of visit to Beaumont on 30/8 (7157); just need to update spreadsheets with data. Found there were 2 Honey-buzzard juveniles here, not 1+, so updated home page accordingly. R was interesting with continuation of SGM; as expected got position of JVP for 2019 (so Pres in 2021); am attending meeting of key Strategy Group on Wednesday morning. Surely not respectability at last!! Good to have L serving!! Made N4c4ll and much later G4g4s where C on (from Canada); she's involved with opera logistics, going over next 2 weeks to Prague and then to Deutsche Oper in Berlin for Carmen!! She's a great Wagner fan: you enter a different time dimension, 5 hours is no time at all! Tannhäuser is one of her favourite operas so here's the fantastic finale youtube!! Been to Deutsche Oper twice, to see Flying Dutchman and Tannhäuser; it's a very friendly, no frills venue, not snobbish at all. Puccini is their most favoured opera composer. This week has a familiar schedule but on Friday may well make L&P to finish this music abstract!! 2moro awaiting deliveries in morning, then N4c4t and BH4ra4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

January 7th: completed analysis of visit on 19/8 to March Burn (7148), masses of material! Next up is Beaufront 30/8. Raising energy to sort out the gallery, the large space upstairs in the middle of the house (Italian style). It needs re-carpeting. Some of the book shelves stand on the floor, raising logistical difficulties. There are adjustable metal shelf uprights behind some of them so decided to get new steel brackets to raise the storage off the floor. Finally found some on Ebay, 20 of size 20cm costing £20 in all plus £8.45 express postage! So gone ahead with that. Will be able to throw away quite a lot, particularly that which is digitised or can be made so. Will take a few months of very much part-time action but will end up with everything sorted, like with son's room! Made G4g4s where good number of mates out, including P; we had good chat; gr8 to have M on!! Been cold the last 2 days: -5C last nite and -3C tonight but lovely sunshine today. 2moro it's R @ B4m4l and much later G4g4s!! lok2t beauties!!!!

Men whose ring finger is significantly longer than their index finger are thought to have inherently higher levels of testosterone, resulting in being charming but pragmatic, nice to women, having larger stretched penis size, cave-man like faces, better at maths, but more prone to prostate cancer. So says https://www.livescience.com/49883-finger-length-in-men.html. Well here is my left hand!!

Here's piccies of my recent art purchase:

Pass if you dare, Dave Pickard, acrylic/oil, bought 22 October 2017, £495 of which 20% to Hexham Abbey, so £396 to the artist. 1  2  3  4

January 6th: sorted Hexham Westwood (31/8) and started on Honey-buzzard nest visit on 19/8 to March Burn (7148), labelling piccies and uploading them to server. After doing the last 10 sheets for August, will have a break by doing totals for Hobby. Made C4c4l where gr8 2 c trhwso; she's not my banker any more, gone!! Bought an Exeter trefid rattail silver spoon c1720 on Ebay for £298 (no extras, not even p&p). It was offered last year at 395, I offered 340 which was declined, but couldn't resist after latest reduction; it was not in competitive auction; the leopard's head erased is very special from the Exeter assay office; it's from that rare period when silver standard was raised to 95.8%, so has a good Britannia mark. Got out for f&c+mp at SC later but otherwise at home, catching up with various tasks. Liked P's letter in HC on closure of Hallstile Bank (get on with the trial!); also HC's coverage of Tar Barl was favourable! Need to get some comments to Devon M on his ANPA contribution tomorrow. lok2t beauties!!!!

January 5th: completed below visit to Honey-buzzard nest in Slaley Forest 16/8 (7144); next up is Hexham Westwood 31/8 (7158). East Coast have accepted my claim that my train down to London was 32 minutes late and are going to give me a cheque for 22.85! Made N4c4l where very busy, before schools go back, and G4g4s where pleased to say 5 of us out for good crack. Trying to persuade N to go to CB in NCL next week but he's still a bit fragile and thinking about it. Think I may have had a mild virus the past week with sore throat and maybe slight temperature; main symptom was very vivid dreams, involving cliff tops and women (separate scenes); latter are censored!! Funds had flying start to the New Year at +34k gross or +29k net after the 5k withdrawal. Oil shares are being re-rated and fund managers who wanted out of the sector are having to go back in to preserve their performance ratings. ENQ equity and debt rose 37% and 13% respectively on the week as the Malaysian Star reported on “Bumi Armada to bid for new projects, keeping risks in check”:

As for the Kraken, it is currently producing in excess of 40,000 bpd, or almost 90% of the theoretical well-flow capacity of 48,000 bpd, which means that Bumi Armada is earning almost 90% of Kraken's BBC rate. Our forecasts assume that Bumi Armada will only reach this level in 2Q18F, hence things have progressed better than expected, it said. https://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2018/01/05/bumi-armada-to-bid-for-new-projects-keeping-risks-in-check/#b0ArZig4xM6J21u5.99.

So re-rate in progress, will hold. Have continued to top-slice RDSA and BP, putting funds into PFC and a new one HUR, which has massive reserves to the west of Shetland but is awaiting an implementation, probably involving a partner and some considerable infrastructure; needs a consistently high PoO. 2moro sees C4c4l and catch-up in evening!! lok2t beauties, as dreamed about!!!!!!

January 4th: working now on visit to Honey-buzzard nest in Slaley Forest 16/8 (7144); should complete tomorrow morning. Updated Goshawk page with yet more dismal results for SW Northumberland in 2017 (Other Raptors/Population of the Goshawk in SW Northumberland). Hope to do Hobby next.

Details of the Goshawk breeding season for 2017 are available in Table 11.

Table 11: Breeding Data for Goshawk in SW Northumberland by area in 2017

This was the worst year on record for Goshawk in the study area. In the breeding season only one bird was seen, a male at Staward in the Allen in May. Other sightings were outside the breeding season: a juvenile male at Towsbank in the upper South Tyne in October and a male at Peth Foot on the Devil's Water in December, It's a dismal picture as stated above [see Goshawk web page].

Booked up hotel at Ruse, Bulgaria, and asked organiser for minibus connection from airport, in response to a query. Added a bit more to account of exciting film and evening yesterday. Had bizarre trip to T&S. M was tied up with family but arranged to meet A. He was late and maybe not too well as he gulped down a large red wine that I'd bought him and then called his daughter, who said she was not well also. So he left in a hurry, no more than 5 mins in the pub. Very strange! Not too bothered: had good chat with S, on the bar, for an hour plus a couple of Ruddles as only customer; she's from Estonia!! 2moro will make N4c4l and W4g4s, assuming someone's fit from latter group. Hope the beauties are keeping fit: lok2 them!!!! xxxx

January 3rd: did make T4c4c where met M; we decided a more practical application with Blockchain in the title is the best way forward. No time for processing records today. Made G4g4t where good to meet B again and to have H on! Made NCL via CP, making TC4m4s and film The Last Jedi. Certainly full of exciting action and John Williams' score is again full of leitmotifs to add atmosphere and help the viewer. It was quite long at 2.5 hours but didn't drag at all. Maybe not quite so innovative as The Empire Strikes Back but liked Rey (Daisy Ridley) as trainee against the dark side and some of the scenes were superbly done, such as the battle on Crait. Ending was good showing the last Jedi may not quite be right! Great feel to town: very switched on by the lovely one: hope dreams are sweet: lok2tgrf!!!!!!! Decent start to the year by funds at +17k gross or +12k after 5k withdrawals for Xmas pressies to family; another landmark passed of 10⁶+10⁵! Main mover today was ENQ with equity +13.2% and bonds +6.2%; looks like leak of news that Kraken is about to be commissioned after some teething troubles; definitely hold: this is a multibagger! Also like PFC at the moment; this company is involved in oil infrastructure and was caught red-handed on bribes in Iraq, causing the share price to halve. But the only way these companies can survive is by trickery so not sure the SFO will be allowed to hammer the company. Top-slicing some profits from RDSA into PFC, particularly in ISA account. xxxx

January 2nd: completed addition of details of rewarding visit to Wylam on 17/8. Have 47 lists still to process for 2017: July 10, August 13, September 24. Will continue with August ones directly but will now have a wee break to report on Goshawk in the Study Area in 2017. The remaining August lists involve many nest visits so take a bit of time to compile; same for July but September ones are post-nesting so will be much faster. There are just 3 Goshawk records that I can find; this will kick-start the home page to show that analysis is active for 2017. Here's a couple more CT papers in progress, with inspiration from Devon M; June is going to be busy, I'm going to Vichy (and Budapest), M to Krakow.

Michael Heather & Nick Rossiter, What is Law?: the perception of Category Theory, Unilog 2018, 6th World Congress on Universal Logic, University of Vichy, France, 21-26 June 2018. pdf

Michael Heather & Nick Rossiter, Postmodern Theology and the Metaphysics of Icons, International Conference on Eugene Trubetskoy - Icon and Philosophy, Krakow, 3-6 June 2018. pdf

Made N4c4l where felt very much at home upstairs meeting P/J from RM. Much later made BH4ra4s, which was very quiet but porter went down a treat!! Weather was becoming wild as was action on the ground: she's so inspiring close-up: absolutely marvellous: lok2tmbo!!!!!!! 2moro it's T4c4c, if up in time, G4g4t, TC4m4s & LJ part 8/8 of *W via CP. xxxx

January 1st 2018: not up to 11:45 and feeling a little delicate! No train service HEX-NCL at all today so as planned did not go to RNS concert; service is a misnomer; all other parts of England had some trains today; people want to get around. Figures out today from ORR http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/01/01/britains-trains-oldest-since-records-began-figures-show/ show that average age of Northern rail stock has risen from 19 to 28 years in last 10 years; what absolute crap – renationalise asap! I did contribute to the debate several times. Next concert is the Brandenburg one, which should be brilliant! Completed 2 visits for 17/8 and 18/8 to West Dipton and Prospect Hill respectively; then started on completion of Honey-buzzard nest visit on 17/8 to Wylam where some good piccies. Made G4g4s where good chat with P and gr8 to have M on again!! Positive news of ENQ: “[Tanker] Scott Spirit is on her way to Kraken - ETA 1AM on the Wednesday 3rd January - she is currently just leaving the Hamburg and the River Elbe and sailing into the North Sea”. PoO and Natural Gas are spiking on troubles in Iran and severe cold in North America. Let's hope the New Year is prosperous and stimulating: lok2t beauties!!!! 2moro it's N4c4l and BH4ra4s!!

December 31st 2017: had a good sighting yesterday at 12:45 of a male Goshawk flying aggressively down the Devil's Water from Ordley. Went round for supper at P/M with J there as well: well fed! We then went out to the Tar Barl Festival at Allendale; this was great fun, starting with a g at Allendale Inn after queuing to get through the front door, followed by the parade. Weather was dry but cool (3C) with a moderate W breeze. Event, with many pagan characteristics, was as wild as usual with fire all over the place; after the parade the barl are thrown onto a great pile of wood, putting enormous flames into the sky with sparks everywhere! The band played some accompanying NE folk songs – all very inspiring! Did take some clips; this one shows the march coming close by in its second half (from 1:15). Evidently you have to be born in Allendale Parish to be a geyser (bearer of a cauldron) but there are rumours that understanding the erogenous zones of sheep is also acceptable! We came back for Prosecco at P's to celebrate the New Year further: thought someone might appreciate that!! Home at 03:25!

Happy New Year to the beauties!!!! Let's hope for more satisfaction in 2018!! xxxxxxxxxx

Funds: final picture for the year 2017 is +236k after withdrawals of 9k so gross gain is 245k or 28.7% on the sum held at the start of the year. It was a good year for many investors though have beaten comfortably all major indices. Many signs are good for 2018 particularly for commodities as the whole world pulls ahead in unison. Have moved some funds in last 2 weeks into oil & gas production and processing industry, the 2nd worst performing sector in 2017, including PFC. It's worth remembering, however, that when things are perfect the only way forward is down so may start taking chips off table directly; inflation taking off globally causing central banks to raise interest rates would be a very significant danger sign. Will face some withdrawals at start of year from Xmas and daughter's birthday but not bust yet!! Highlighting the millennials' booming inheritance, if their parents have property, IMHO shows a lot of the problems in the UK today. Far too many people have no assets other than their own house so that becomes the main focus of their financial lives. The property is also an illiquid asset from which it's difficult to make a small withdrawal without incurring major long-term financial costs. Above all though if the whole country invests in property and not in industry then where's the funding for creative new businesses; some commentators think our preoccupation with property is a major reason for our low productivity growth. Still, very attached to my own house!