2025 The Smile for Today

[richardandtracy]

Oh dear. Just look at this 'Cat on Ice for First Time' video:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AbruptChaos/co ... irst_time/

Regards,

Richard

[Mabel Figworthy]

Oh that is brilliant

[Serinde]

Poor puss! (But very funny.) Presumably you have introduced your kittens to the concept of ... mirrors... and also smallish brown paper bags? No wonder they hold us in such contempt.

[Mabel Figworthy]

Not a funny smile perhaps, but an "isn't creation wonderful" smile at these award-winning nature photographs (BBC website so should be accessible to all)

[fccs]

Beautiful photos!! Nature is always inspiring.

[richardandtracy]

The badger and the fake Banksie was ridiculous, but the outstanding photo for me was the one of the red & yellow glowing lenticular clouds over the Villarrica volcano.

Regards,

Richard

[Serinde]

That really was a cracker.

[richardandtracy]

I have just found this Reddit of silly videos. Don't look unless you have half an hour to spare or so. Very silly, very funny:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AccidentalSlapStick/

Regards,

Richard

[Serinde]

Oh, dear oh, my. Some of those guys are lucky to be still alive.

[Mabel Figworthy]

Someone sent this to me with the caption, "One day, English will kill us..."

[richardandtracy]

Oh that's ridiculous.
What should be said about is that 'Poor Punctuation may kill us one day.'

In Australia we went to a lovely waterfall and swimming hole between Cairns and Cape Tribulation. There was a permanent sign put up saying 'Crocodiles were seen here 0 day(s) ago', where the number could have different digits slotted in depending on how recently crocs had been seen. And despite the fact the crocs had been seen that day, people were swimming in the pool.

Regards,

Richard

[Serinde]

Maybe the swimmers were counting on the fact that the crocs were still full from the day before?

[richardandtracy]

Don't think so..

I must admit I feel Australians have a healthier attitude to risk than we do in the UK. They feel it's their own responsibility to assess the levels of danger. And, if they make a safety check of their own, they're happy to take responsibility for the hazard they're taking. I also think they understand crocs are mobile, and if the place was clear in the morning when it was checked, it could be hazardous a few hours later when a croc moves up stream.

W stayed at a campsite in Cape Tribulation (almost exactly where the pushpin goes) (https://www.google.com/maps/place/16%C2 ... FQAw%3D%3D) and when we went to sleep in our hired motorhome it was raining, no tracks on the mud. When we awoke next morning a Croc track passed 2 feet from the awning support poles by the motorhome heading down a track through the mangrove to the sea. That felt as close as I wanted to get...

Regards,

Richard

[Serinde]

Having grown up in North America, where there are creatures that will happily eat you for dinner, or make your life miserable in other, mostly insect-y but also weather-related, ways, I have to agree, Richard. There, you learn early on about poison ivy, how to assess the thickness of ice on ponds, when to carry a big stick in the woods and how to deal with a bear -- even in Illinois, where the latter was unlikely to be a problem (although it would be if you moved out west). We even learned how to park a car facing up a hill, even though it was purely hypothetical. In the UK currently, there's nothing that's not in a zoo or other enclosure that is likely to bother you unless you are very, very unlucky. Midges are a plague, to be sure, but they don't (yet) carry disease. Even adders aren't looking for trouble, after all, and if you deliberately get between any mammal and her young, your genes perhaps need removing from the pool anyway? (Ok, a bit harsh.)

[Mabel Figworthy]

The Netherlands aren't known for their dangerous animal population (unless you get crushed by a cow), but we very early on in life learn how to assess the thickness of ice, or indeed anything to do with water!

When DH and I were engaged he was visiting and on a walk we came across a small pool of water with a long pole in it, with markings on it, and the letters NAP about 6 metres up. "What's that?" he asked. "Hmm? Oh, sea level" I said before turning to something more interesting. He looked a little pale all of a sudden...

[richardandtracy]

Sorry for wandering off topic a bit, but I'd like to relate a daft story from years ago reminded by Mabel's hazardous cow.

One of my mum's friends used to bomb around the lanes near my parent's farm. She knew the roads, so 50mph down a 1 vehicle wide lane was the minimum speed, you know the way 'locals' tend to get. Anyway, this lady was bombing down a very deep single track lane with grass growing down the middle, where the road was 10ft below the hedge top. On the field side there was a herd of Friesen cows, and one of them got a bit frisky and decided to jump the 2ft high hedge on the field side.

And fell 10ft down into the lane.
Just as my mum's friend bombed past.

The 3/4 tonne cow's front hooves went straight through the windscreen into the passenger seat and the cow's body hit the car roof crushing it down to seat back level. Naturally the car came to a grinding stop as the springs went solid, and the cow's neck was broken by the impact. My mum's friend was trapped, but had a mobile phone and called 999 for help.

The fire brigade was dispatched and came screaming down ever narrower lanes. They got to the lane where my mum's friend was, turned down it and belted along, until the vehicle came to a sudden stop. The Fire Engine was wider than the lane and it couldn't go forwards. Turned out it was too stuck to go backwards too. And when the firemen tried to dismount, they discovered the lane was so deep and narrow they couldn't open the doors to escape the vehicle either.

And had to call for another fire engine to help.

Once the second fire engine turned up to rescue and remove the first, it was pulled out, and then the firemen all walked down to my mum's friend's car. They winched off the cow, cut the roof off and rescued a shaken but otherwise unharmed lady. Made one heck of a story...

Regards,

Richard

[Mabel Figworthy]

I bet she dined out on that for years! Poor cow though...
(One day i will tell you of the time our car was jumped on by a sheep )

[richardandtracy]

Would love to hear your jumping sheep story Mabel.

My brother was in a K21 glass fibre two seater glider on the Long Mynd in Shropshire coming down to land when he floated down over a field of sheep, and at an altitude of 6ft he got hit by a ewe jumping into the air to defend itself from the flying creature. It made his landing a lot more complicated & damaged the glider's wing. The sheep, having only hit its head, was unharmed.

Regards,

Richard

[Mabel Figworthy]

I am told that they are fairly brainless creatures (see story below) so that a hit on the head could well go unnoticed!

Well, DH and I were castle-sitting (as you do) in Westmoreland/Cumbria and on our day off we drove over to Windermere to visit Beatrix Potter's cottage. On the way we got stuck in a traffic queue of people trying to get into a sheepdog trial venue. We were going very slowly past a high bank on our left with a barbed wire fence on top, when suddenly I noticed a sheep standing on the edge of the bank. "Oh, a sheep" I remarked to DH (brilliant conversationalist, aren't I?) and at that same moment it jumped, landing on our front left wing. We were stunned, as was the sheep but only temporarily, and off it ran it that sheepish bouncing way.

We were relieved it was all right, but then DH wondered - if there was no damage on the sheep, did that mean the brunt of the collision had been borne by the car? It had. We turned into the sheep trial venue as that was obviously where the sheep had strayed from; they tried to charge us for coming in but David pointed to the damage and asked to speak to one of the organisers. He was most apologetic and insurance information was exchanged. We did want to reassure him that the sheep seemed to have come out of it all right, albeit on the run, and he said not to worry about the sheep, they were silly creatures born with the urge to find ever more inventive ways of killing themselves.

In a nearby town we bought transparent duct tape which held the wing together for the rest of our stay - very successfully too! We never did hear whether they found the sheep...

[Serinde]

But did they pay for the repair?? Surrounded as we are in this part of the world by sheep, and as much as I love their fleeces (and their meat), the farmer had it exactly right: always looking for novel and awkward ways to die. At least the car body did what it was supposed to do, which is reassuring after a fashion.