Six Things, Volume 73

UFOs | Maps | Chaos | Narwhals | Swearin’ | Singin’

Thing 1 – UFOs

I spent 10 minutes the other day trying to identify a bird. It was distant, apparently hovering most of the time, but moving here and there occasionally with few visible signs of effort. Bigger than a skylark, smaller than a kestrel. Eventually it moved close enough for a positive identification.

It was a drone.

I was, of course, far from the first person to see something in the sky and wonder ‘what the…?’ Unidentified flying objects have been a constant of human history (there’s an incomplete list here), but of course no matter how outlandish or strange they might seem to the viewer, you can be pretty sure there’s some sort of rational explanation. Good old Occam’s razor.

Here’s an interesting piece about the surge of celestial phenomena in 16th century Germany.

And, just in case you’re susceptible to wild speculation, this, from the league of lost causes, is a handy reference guide.

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Thing 2 – Maps

Being a peaceful kind of fellow, and this space generally devoted to the warm and fuzzy, I wouldn’t usually share anything war-related, but I did find this timelapse map of WWI quite fascinating. It covers four days per second.

And while we’re doing it, there’s lots to explore in this interactive D-Day map.

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Thing 3 – Chaos

Back to the warm and fuzzy. You really don’t need to know anything about cricket to revel in the exuberant and joyful chaos of this 30-second clip.

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Thing 4 – Narwhals

Narwhals are amazing. Here’s a lovely and fascinating interview with Martin Nweeia, a dentist who has devoted his spare time to understanding these majestic, mysterious creatures.

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Thing 5 – Swearing

Just before we get into this, I should make one thing clear: I love a good swear (you might have noticed).

Not everyone shares this view, as evidenced by an email I received a few years ago from a disappointed reader. Was it entirely necessary, they asked, for a book about nature to include profanities such as ****, ****, and even ******? (Their asterisks, not mine.)

I was (and remain) slightly bewildered by the idea that nature writing (or, if you prefer, Nature Writing) should be an exclusion zone for words of saltiness – as if it’s fine to write ‘fuck’ in a book about sport, politics, history, travel, music, art, business or any other subject, but nature somehow exists on some rarefied plane where such things are Not Right.

It does of course depend on how you use these words, and while I’m painfully aware that what I write can always be improved, I do try to deploy them in the same way I deploy any other word: with a sense of ‘right word, right place’. As an example, when writing about a white-tailed eagle here the other week, I decided that simply calling it massive, enormous, gigantic or humongous wouldn’t accurately represent either the bird itself or my reaction to it. No doubt someone else (someone more poetically inclined, perhaps) would have come up with a more effective and evocative description, but ‘fucking huge’ felt (and still feels) like the right choice of words.

Billy Connolly puts it well, I think.

Anyway. Onwards to the Thing. It is an enjoyable infographic dealing with swearing in different languages. It goes from the mildest (balderdash, gadzooks, blooming and such like) at the top, to the rudest (I’m sure there’s no need for me to tell you what’s at the bottom – fond as I am of a good swear, I am at least partially sensitive to the preferences of others).

The list is far from complete, and limited at the moment to a handful of languages. But it does accept submissions. So you know what to do.

This has come from the excellent WebCurios newsletter.

Incidentally, you might have noticed that ‘muppet’ (a stupid, useless or incompetent person) is included fairly near the top of the list. I’ve always objected to the use of ‘muppet’ as an insult, muppetdom being, in my eyes, a status to which sensible people aspire.

Which leads us to:

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Thing 6 – Singin’

What we all need right now is three and a half minutes of wholesome, heartwarming goodness. So obviously we go to The Muppets, and this, from their last season. Gene Kelly doesn’t want to sing Singin’ In The Rain. Guess how that goes for him.