tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post4561824756569378450..comments2024-01-28T03:56:39.351-08:00Comments on TOM CLARK: The BirdsUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-60864665455968871532014-01-29T06:35:23.684-08:002014-01-29T06:35:23.684-08:00Couldn't agree more, and I'm sure Tippi He...Couldn't agree more, and I'm sure Tippi Hedren would be of our party, as well.<br /><br />Still, however long we may sit here in our comfortable private gondolas parked outside the Doges' Palace and condemn the casual insensitivity of resorting to animal cruelty for a good-purpose (peace) photo-op, this sort of piddling misdemeanour is never going to elevate the present primate (a bit tired here -- that IS what they call him, no?) into the rarefied <a href="http://tomclarkblog.blogspot.com/2010/11/certain-notable-moments-in-papal.html" rel="nofollow">Elite Eight of Bad Popes</a>.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-39124421637589588152014-01-29T05:56:46.069-08:002014-01-29T05:56:46.069-08:00Dove releases, butterfly releases, all uses of ani...Dove releases, butterfly releases, all uses of animals as props, is grossly offensive. Magic should be left to professionals. The paintings were and are magnificent to behold. CurtisACravanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00315707533118640284noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-9045625628845231392014-01-29T04:45:47.359-08:002014-01-29T04:45:47.359-08:00Still, it's hard to tell why anybody would be ...Still, it's hard to tell why anybody would be frightened of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hplpQt424Ls" rel="nofollow">a few crows...</a>TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-37152517893371850312014-01-29T04:32:06.059-08:002014-01-29T04:32:06.059-08:00Not that it relates, but we used to have a crow ca...Not that it relates, but we used to have a crow call--a whistle that would call them. And I mean, hoards of them. They would circle around, looking for something to dive-bomb, the sky full of them. <br /><br />Nin Andrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12643167108589844026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-84876013324587424322014-01-29T01:17:05.936-08:002014-01-29T01:17:05.936-08:00I've said they bicker nosily. Meant noisily; b...I've said they bicker nosily. Meant noisily; but nosily fits too.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-68679761496574798352014-01-28T23:55:31.468-08:002014-01-28T23:55:31.468-08:00And my other thought, probably obvious, but still ...And my other thought, probably obvious, but still maybe not, this is blogging -- if the Pope's handlers had the lightest clue about the hard truth of Nature Red in Tooth and Claw in the Avian Sector, they'd have never allowed those kids to toss those doves into that extremely dicey air traffic situation. Or to put it another way, doves are not nature's idiots, and given the choice, it's extremely doubtful they would celebrate their release by voluntarily plunging directly into the path of larger, leaner, meaner avian predators. No dove is that dumb. But a Pope...<br /><br />Another way of putting it. Here, we have a gang of lovely gigantic black crows who live atop the tall trees and bicker nosily and congenially with one another across the treetops all the livelong day; but god help the intruder who enters what they regard as their proper domain; any human reckless enough to venture into range is immediately gang-shouted into terrified flight.<br /><br />There are also now and then mating pairs of mourning doves that happen into the aerial precinct thus defined; and they are intelligent enough to give the crows a VERY wide berth, without having to be warned.<br /><br />From this I conclude that doves of any species are likely smarter than papal-advisorial amateur behavioural biologists of any known era.<br /><br />But then for not dissimilar reasons, those who must experience reality are often much more acutely aware of it than those who conceive themselves, from a safe distance, to be experts on it.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-39956009457779656782014-01-28T23:37:10.726-08:002014-01-28T23:37:10.726-08:00By the by, to pull the fleabit curtain back a bit ...By the by, to pull the fleabit curtain back a bit so as to reveal the wicked heart of the plan here (in case anybody cares!!), the post was originally titled "Never Going To Have a Chance". The theme was to be the unfair treatment of doves in Christian iconography. That grand Teutonic bore Heidegger, who it seems sided with what the historical analyst T. Perkins calls the "Progressivism" of his particular epoch, opined that whatever it is we are -- walking lumps of Dasein, to be a bit more precise -- we are, like it or not, thrown into this world, and will keep on falling forever, no safety nets or refunds; and I thought, imagine how much more horrible for the symbolic Christian dove, whose existence resembles that of a laser beam painfully cross-bred with the world's greatest fastball, constantly being hurled by that big Power Arm in the Sky into someone's womb, ear brain, or you name the body part. You may name it, but only the Captain gets to decide the location. Ouch. Predestination was never meant to be like this.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-8248186174995972972014-01-28T21:56:37.780-08:002014-01-28T21:56:37.780-08:00Curtis, thanks very much, hadn't seen that til...Curtis, thanks very much, hadn't seen that till just now.<br /><br /> You've caused a benign readjustment in my prediction for the Stupor Bowl, that annual national climacteric the effects of which even those who don't care about it cannot avoid.<br /><br /> I'm now putting my play money on the Doves, representatives of all that is innocent and therefore bound to lose in the long if not also the short run.<br /><br /> Not that being pecked at by a bird isn't something to be grateful for, but as one can never know for sure whether it's heaven-sent... or the wicked prop deployment of a demented Hollywood director... well, let's just say if I were Gregory, I'd definitely be thinking about the sad example of what happened to Tippi Hedren and wishing I'd remembered to put Doveproof Earmuffs right up near the top of my Christmas Want List.<br /><br /> But oh, the full sublimity of the ecstatic genius of the Cinquecento burst upon me once again somewhere in the process of examining the surviving work of Fra Lippo Lippi. The examples I've given here, simply breathtaking. In the Munich version of the Annunciation I've given the detail, which demonstrates that the art of painting in that time and place was advanced well beyond what we reverently regard as scientific knowledge in our devolutionary epoch. The broadband radiation tracers emanating from the throwing arm of the Divine Hurler indicate the directional inspiration-beam splits as it passes through the wee cloud pillow atop the pedestal tree mount of the Holy Ghost, who just happens (pure blesséd coincidence) to be perched there awaiting upon Providential Dispensation. The roentgen count may actually go up when the beam splits and is intensified like that. One can hardly blame the poor girl for looking just a bit apprehensive.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-77510720669211607822014-01-28T18:02:55.658-08:002014-01-28T18:02:55.658-08:00Uh-oh. Based on these haruspicious prognostication...Uh-oh. Based on these haruspicious prognostications, looks like it should be Seahawks by 6, around the time the last exravaganzertisement fades into the frozen fog, and the couch armies get the all-clear, signalling it's (maybe, almost) safe for the rest of us to crawl out of the deep bunker.<br /><br />So glad once again not to have cable.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-2804354032552567602014-01-28T17:58:32.549-08:002014-01-28T17:58:32.549-08:00Possibly I'm feeling insufficiently cynical he...Possibly I'm feeling insufficiently cynical here (hard to imagine), but my long day takeaway here are assorted views of the marvelous in the everyday (although admittedly those real life doves might disagree). Thank you for sharing all these photos, paintings, captions and details. CurtisACravanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00315707533118640284noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-35473002362072784572014-01-28T10:28:12.682-08:002014-01-28T10:28:12.682-08:00First, we send out the pigeons, then we . . . no, ...First, we send out the pigeons, then we . . . no, not those pigeons. Then we issue BB guns to the Swiss Guards. No, wait; depending on the condition of the birds’ entrails following their unintended sacrifice, we call in the haruspex-in-chief to divine the future, find out who’s going to win the Super bowl. Important stuff like that. The gods do have their faves, so it’s said.Hazenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13417573435195561519noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-87584533291776749352014-01-28T07:34:25.711-08:002014-01-28T07:34:25.711-08:00Wow, that's kind of creepy. Reminds me of the...Wow, that's kind of creepy. Reminds me of the hawks around here that like to keep an eye on the bird feeder. Nin Andrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12643167108589844026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-29888392323989333062014-01-28T06:23:25.443-08:002014-01-28T06:23:25.443-08:00Red,
Yes, just the sort of thing that could trigg...Red,<br /><br />Yes, just the sort of thing that could trigger a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=215C-tadRmk" rel="nofollow">Holy Ghost Explosion</a>.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-19874825796573149082014-01-28T06:07:49.907-08:002014-01-28T06:07:49.907-08:00Just struck me that the release and attack of the ...Just struck me that the release and attack of the doves was a Cormac McCarthy moment... a "Blood Meridian" tone.Poet Red Shuttleworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06053848100740944133noreply@blogger.com