h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Isn't that a wonderful entry?
I've read it on its journey through PR and it has gone from a good entry to a brilliant entry.

Can we carry on the conversation here?

Annie/GB

Sure . Hi Annie/GB. It is an excellent entry.

What I nearly said was a bit of frustration at some double standards I see in the developed world.

Things like expecting the Masai living on the edge of Tsavo, for instance, to live with marauding elephant while wanting badgers culled here because they might infect cattle with TB.

Hard choices need to be made if we truly want to keep as many fantastic creatures as we can. It's such a pity they couldn't protect the Kakapo in a place they'd settled in.

This is a bit of a soapbox of mine , you know.

Waz

Yes, I remember the Ruddy ducks entry.

Rant away, I don't mind
(best you controlled yourself in PR)

Ruddy Ducks was ages ago! But you brought them up the day I posted a thread to the entry about £3.3m being allocating to complete the eradication of them .

No easy answers are there? I hate the fact that we're getting rid of these ducks (we had a couple locally, they're neat little ducks to have around). I don't think the case for eradication is proved either. Hard decisions like that need to be made on occasion though. Like the hedgehogs on that Scottish Island .

I have a dilemma of my own - I sorted out getting some building work done recently, with the aim of having it finished before the house martins came back. Most of it was, but not the new windows. Now the martins aren't just back but they've re-built their nest. Half an inch from the window.

I can ask the builder to wait til September, but it's not fair not to pay for the windows until then, but if I do he might not come back to fit them ... I must ring him and see what his reaction is. He's going to think I'm daft.

Waz

I don't believe in coincidence.
I think people are brought together (as friends, as support for each other, whatever) when they need each other, when they have a similar interest and can help each other...call it coincidence but I read your posting at the kakapo thread and decided to come here to talk to you off the PR thread.

I love ducks, too. I remember your Ruddy Ducks from years ago. I live a few streets away from Cleethorpes Boating Lake, which is home to many species of duck, geese, swans..other visitors..my town is divided between people who want them culled because of all the noise and mess, and the others who love them all.

I don't think you're daft. I think you're in touch with the Earth's soul.

thanks GB, I don't know about that. But I am pretty sure the builder's actually a good way towards thinking I'm daft already. I delayed the work last summer til the martins left, (then he had problems and didn't start til April... been a long story, but the work done's been excellent and well worth waiting for). There was a distinct air of politeness about his sympathy for my issues with martins...

The long story to do with the builder is full of what seem more than coincidence, mostly not my story to tell so I can't explain, your theory would fit though. There's more to life than hard fact can explain, in my book too .

I'm guessing Canada Geese are involved at your lake? They seem to stir up a lot of mixed feelings.
Waz

Yep, loads of them.

They breed like...guppies and

I'm going to write an entry on Cleethorpes Boating Lake and will be going down soon as the weather's nice to take some photos for my research. I'll let you know when the entry's ready, I'm sure you'll be interested

I'll give it a read with interest. I've never been to Cleethorpes. In your part of the world, I've only been to Grimsby Station ( back in the '70s), Saltfleetby and Mablethorpe.

I thought I'd let you know the builder rang me, and was very patient . And agreed to do all the windows in the next 7-8 days, except the martins' one, which he'd come back to do at the end of summer.

That was actually more than 2 weeks ago, but that's par for the course and I'm not exactly in a rush . So all's well for the martins.
Waz

GB?

Curse of Superman story http://uk.news.yahoo.com/12072006/344/curse-superman-strikes.html. You might have seen it elsewhere, it's about the guys who put the DVD of Superman Returns together.
Waz