A Pigeon Who Dares
As we all know, as months go, January sucks arse, which is why scenes like this are always worrying, until you find out that the pigeon in question does this kind of thing all the time.
He’s called Dave, and he loves nothing better than an extreme dare. The more extreme the dare, the happier Dave is.
Last year he walked across the M4 just by Junction 7. Thankfully it was 6.30 in the evening and none of the cars were moving very fast. Another time he hung upside down under a Number 19 bus all the way from Holborn to Upper Street.
I don’t often get the nod when Dave’s up to something. He likes to keep his antics a bit underground. Think he fancies himself as the Banksy of the pigeon world.
Yesterday though, I just happened to be there.
Here is on the tracks at Hammersmith Station. Jesus:
Heart stopping stuff. He sat there until the train came, and then flew off at the last minute. Total nutter.
Got me thinking… I’m wondering whether Extreme Dares could be an event for the Pigeon Olympics, like walking across the Thames on lollypop sticks, for example?
Parrots At Large In Petersham
I heard a rumor that parrots were rife in Petersham and the surrounding areas. Turns out the rumor was true.
Spotted a load of them today in Richmond Park. I was told they had a member’s bar on the go, so I went down to investigate.
No question about it.
Check out the look in the eyes of the one on the door turning away the non-members:
Then I saw a couple more of them appear out of nowhere:
Which was also the moment I decided to observe them from elsewhere.
Ring Of Sharing
You may remember a few years ago I posted about an activity enjoyed by London pigeons called the Ring Of Sharing (normally referred to these days as ‘The Camden Doughnut’ – click here to find out why, although it’s pretty obvious when you think about it).
The idea is, instead of racing beak open and eyes glazed shoving every pigeon in sight out of the way to get the best bit of whatever piece of shit you’ve found, you call out to your fellow pigeons, and share it. Course this is harder to manage when there’s more than a couple in earshot as not everyone gets it and it often ends up with several rings of sharing all standing on top of each other which kinda misses the point and can result in minor injury.
Here’s a great example of how it should be done. I spotted it at the weekend – The Camden Doughnut at its best. The reason for posting it, aside from reminding all you pigeons out there that sharing is the new black, was Albert’s shout of ‘Anyone want to share my doughnut?’ was entirely accurate because it was, in fact, a doughnut. Weirdly, it was also in Camden.
I’m not sure the others got it initially, the sharing thing that is. Dude on the left looked somewhat confused.
“Share? What do you mean by share exactly?”:
Probably just more used to the Scrap and Awe method. Have to say though, Al could have washed beforehand.
One by one, they got it, understandably giving Al a bit of a wide berth:
Frankly, had I joined in, I think he’d have put me off too, and that’s no mean feat when it comes to a doughnut.
By the end, Al’s personal hygiene aside, it was a great example of a sharing ring:
Be good to see more if this in 2012.
Thinking about it, be quite good to see more doughnuts too…
Remnants of New Year’s Eve
Still trying to piece together the events of NYE, crazy seeing as today is the 4th. Thinking I might give up and put it down to experience.
I remember it all started out a bit weird. Some bloke in St James’s Park insisted me and Mart sit on his hand.
Wouldn’t take no for an answer:
All rather uncomfortable, but I decided to put up with it expecting a bit of seed at the very least. Nothing. Nada.
The three of us just stood there looking awkward:
Eventually Mart suggested we should probably be making a move, so we did. All very odd, and kinda set the tone for the rest of the night.
After St James’s, we headed to Piccadilly Circus where we hooked up with Hoxton Elliot and a couple of the boys:
I seem to remember one of them had spotted a red wine spillage somewhere in Clerkenwell, so off we went. From that point onwards, all I have is photos.
Here’s one of them. No idea where this is:
Possibly Soho Square?
Then there’s this one of Elliot passed out in the gutter:
Jesus.
Clearly a good night was had by all, but what is it with red wine and the old memory synapses? No matter how hard I try, there’s nothing in there. Oh well. I’m sure we all had a great time and made total tits of ourselves. No change there then.
Onwards and upwards and 2012 promises to be a top year what with the Pigeon Olympics happening in July. Turns out there’s a proper event being held now organized by pigeons who know what they’re doing, and they’ve asked me, being the only bona fide blogging pigeon in town, to cover it. Exciting stuff. Mart told me he’s keen to enter even though I pointed out he’s not very good at any of the sports on the list (Synchronised Landing, Chip Tossing, Judo, 1m and 2m Sprint to name but a few).
The other thing about 2012, and I only realised this the other day, but I’ve been telling it how it is for the pigeons for London for six years now. Mental. Six whole years, so I’m going to be looking back a bit at how life has changed in London since I started. Quite a lot I reckon. For a start, the seed ban proper hadn’t kicked in yet so we were all feeling a little happier generally. Bird flu hadn’t been invented either so far less of the accusing stares, although that seems to have died down now.
Anyway, Happy New Year everyone.
2012 – Bring it on.
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