auchmeddan

On Sunday we took Jules Dad diving, and it went very well. Diving is a really strange experience the first few times, but he did great! (especially considering his weight belt slipped off when he jumped in).

A Father and Daughter shot is below, early into the dive at the Montana and Constellation.

At this time of year, the Constellation’s old jars turn into a perfect spot for Damsel Fish (Sargent Majors) to nest in. At that time, the nesting parent changes from Yellow/Black to dark Purple and gets super aggressive. They will chase and nip at anything that gets too close, regardless of size.

I got a shot of this guy under my body just as he was about to tag me (the original shot was upside-down, I’ve rotated it).

Well, the weather finally got better for Jules Mum & Dad arriving - Summer appears to be finally here!

We got out Snorkelling at Achilles Bay at the weekend, and I managed to get 2 pretty good photos of a Queen AngelFish that I’m quite happy with.

The unfortunate thing about working in IT is everyone you meet seems to have a problem with their home PC.

I usually try to avoid home PCs like the plague, but made an exception recently for a friend of a friend ’cause I like the guy and all his photos were on his unbootable PC. Being a bit of an amateur photographer, I know how distressing it would be to lose all my photos (I have mine backed up, of course).

Anyway, the happy ending is I fixed the PC and as a thank you he gave me 8lbs of HAGGIS! SCORE!
It makes me wonder what a full network upgrade or Firewall install is worth in terms of lbs of Haggis…

On other fronts, Jules Mum and Dad get here tonight, and are staying for 2 weeks. I’ve said my sad farewell to my PC and playing Battlefield:Vietnam online for the next couple of weeks.

Thank goodness I finally finished “HALO 2″ !!

“It’s an ugly planet. A bug planet!” -Starship Troopers

It’s been an odd year so far in BDA. Summer hasn’t really started yet - it’s warm and humid, but the sun isn’t making any sort of sustained appearance. We also seem to have a TON of bugs this year. I feel like I’ve seen more cornflies, worm/centipede things, and ants in the last couple of months than in the previous (almost) 5 years here. They’re starting to get a bit annoying. We need more lizards! (or Rico’s Roughnecks).

On the bright side, we got out snorkelling at the weekend at Church Bay. The vis(ibility) wasn’t great, but there was one very large parrotfish that made it worthwhile. Unfortunately, it was happy to let me hang around for quite a while, and I ended up staying in the water far too long. It really wasn’t warm enough for that.

The photos below are a Puddingwife, and Parrotfish (respectively).

Same reason as the ducks, apparently
On my drive to work this morning I hadn’t even managed to get out of the estate before I had to stop to let a Chicken (they’re feral here) and it’s little bright yellow baby chicks cross the road. I sat there for a moment as they scurried and “cheep cheep cheep”-ed their way into some bushes.

Within 2 minutes I was stopped again, this time in a queue of traffic on the main road as a parade of ducks crossed from the golf course to (I think)”Mrs Tea’s Tea Room”. I assume that “Mrs Tea” began feeding them one day a long time ago, and now they turn up every morning for breakfast. These sort of things are wonderful little quirks of living in Bermuda. I can’t imagine the morning rush-hour traffic in Edinburgh stopping on a daily basis so Ducks can get breakfast.

Unfortunately, my trip took a downturn when I popped into one of the local supermarkets to drop something off for a friend. The radio was playing Wham’s “Freedom”, which has been burned into my brain ever since…I can actually picture Andrew and George jumping about in their white shorts and throwing shuttlecocks out to adoring female fans…

…and I can’t get it out of my head!