Coastalblog

The results are in, and the Nation has voted. And our favourite bird (and now our national one) is, apparently, the Robin. Now, I’ve nothing against Robins. Enterprising, entertaining bird, and I suspect its fearlessness and tolerance of humans close proximity is the clincher in its victory. It’s a bird most people will see, and in this Springwatch era of anthropomorphization it does have personality. It’s an easy bird to construct a narrative around. It’s also a chippy, aggressive and highly territorial bastard, so in that sense it chimes perfectly with the national psyche. Of the shortlist provided I went for Blackbird, in honour of the pair who are resident in my garden. Plus gratitude for their song. The temptation of course is to go for something majestic and rare, golden eagle or osprey (neither of which made the shortlist). Somewhat surprisingly Hen Harrier and Red Kite did quite well. But the robin is probably a more apt choice. There’s something too cool about apex predators...

Enough with the moping. I’ve not blogged post election, which is just as well, really. It was all getting a bit much, and once the Great British Public (TM) turned in their frankly mystifying result I felt, after the shock had subsided, and the futile rage had washed from my system, an odd sense of relief. The other shoe had dropped. The worst had happened, and now I might as well just get on with it. Which is what I’ve been doing. I’ve just not been telling the internet about it, but the last month has seen a variety of grips being got on various aspects of my existence which are all far too mundane to go into here. Suffice it to say that when the fundamentals are going well everything else clicks into place (hence finding the time for this post, which, now I read it back, seems infuriatingly cryptic, but frankly, you’re just going to have to get over it). So chin up, so there’s five more years of the rapacious money-grubbing bastards to cope with, that’s no reason to go and hide ...