1. I’m looking in awe, because I think I just spotted Munguin, in person, or rather, in penguin.2. I’m off for a gambol about the field. No, not a gamble, silly!3. Srem in the morning mist.4. What is this?5. Mummy provides good transport.6. Chapel of the Thistle, St Giles, Edinburgh.7. More Srem residents.8. Who’s a pretty boy. Black Throated Bushtit.9. Mum and baby donkey.10. Glencoe.11. All dressed up and no where to go.12. Wake up and smell the flowers.13. Fairy Bridge, at Fas Na Cloiche, Glen Creran.14. Just when I was getting ready to do a marathon… to the bottom of the garden and back and then I went and broke my leg, but some kind person to me to the hospital and I got a plaster. You can sign it in very small letters if you want.15. Yum Yum, on John’s lap in the pub!16. Aren’t I a beauty?17. I was sent to the supermarket to get sultanas for Bertie the Blackbird. Unfortunately they only had organic ones which cost a fortune. Happy, he appears to like them.18. Sherman, Wyoming. (If you read the poem on the page, have a hanky a hand.)19. Ilulisat, in Northern Greenland. where they are having a midnight marathon, now that there is daylight 24/7.20. Comme chien et chat.21. I don’t suppose anyone would mind if a little bird had a peck or two at these apples, would they?22. Yeah, right. I can see everything now… but, um, how do I get down?23. Well, someone had to look after them and Munguin chose me.24. Chez Munguin.25. Munguin’s coming for an inspection….eeeeek.
Thanks to Kenn, Claire, John, Rob, Andi, Danny, Hetty, Daniel. I hope I didn’t miss anyone. My internet has been playing up all evening, so if this doesn’t work out, I apologise in advance.
4) Possibly moth cater pillars. Wont have too long to wait to identify them, they are quite well grown. The plant/shrub looks like a dogwood, cornus family.
Always enjoy seeing that craggy rock peak towering behind the gap as you pass through Glen Coe. Several Munguanites will know the name of it I’m sure.
Garden always looks a delight Tris, hope the little fella appreciates it.
#4…….In the states, I would identify this as webworms……more specifically, “Fall webworms.” (But there’s also “Eastern tent cantepillars,” which appear in the Spring.) Anyway, in this part of the country, they appear in the late summer or early Fall, and can sometimes more or less completely cover a tree, or a big branch. They’re aesthetically disgusting and they eat the leaves, but do no long-term harm since the leaves would soon drop anyway. Then they leave and move into the ground for the winter. We had a tree close to the house that was covered with them. Then one morning, I saw a hundreds of worms on the wall of the house moving downward. Soon they were gone. They like some threes better than others.
Mostly, people just leave them alone, since they do no harm and sprays don’t penetrate the webs very well. The alternative is physically removing the webs…..getting worms all over you and maybe falling out of the tree.
Right, Alan, they’re moth caterpillars but I wasn’t able to see their markings through the web – probably Tent caterpillars, maybe Eastern.
The peak is Bidean nam Bian (Fence of the Hides/Pinnacle of the Peaks) – truly magnificent. I love that classic view across Loch Achtriochtan to the wee crofthouse with Bidean towering behind.
Read it. Despicable, but then it’s what most of us have come to expect from this bunch of criminals, so I’m afraid it doesn’t come as much of a surprise.
I see what you mean by the poem in No.18. Brought tears to my eyes.
Read it. Surely they cannot manage to keep a lid on it now. Sue Gray will be wanting to clear her name, the Met police don’t look good (again) and junior staffers feeling that they are unfairly being blamed.
One of the cleaners died. They were made to come to work every day on crowded public transport. Why could they not have sent a bus for them. Given that they were clearing up bottles, glasses, vomit and doing it around dirty bodies lying on the floor.
Can’t imagine what that must have been like, but you can’t say no or you get sacked that that drunken old bitch from the DWP stops your benefits.
Well I have to say those orangs were particularly awe-some and indeed some more!
Chez Munguin est exceptionnellement magnifique ces jours-ci.
(If that is mince blame google translate!)
Many cats so me is happy, though I wonder what the ratio of humans to animals is in Srem. It seems the latter are taking over! The birdies were looking lovely to but keep them away from the cats…
All in all SS today definitely qualifies as a balm for the soul and rather life reaffirming.
Sorry to be picky but it is Fas na cloiche, not no.
It means shelter or hollow of stones, I think.
Same as in Achadh na Cloiche (Achnacloich) which means field of stones. Went camping there once with girl guides in my youth – and I can assure you the field we camped in was chock full of stones!
You will find a lot of place names here: https://learngaelic.scot/dictionary/index.jsp
Click on the wee speaker to hear how it sounds.
There are rules for pronouncing Gaelic but they are radically different from English.
Once you know them it is not so difficult – in fact Gaelic pronunciation is actually more consistent – not that that is difficult.
For example can you tell me the rule for “ough” as in these?
though thought through rough.
Spent many of my schooldays roaming the countryside round Fas na Cloiche (and Achnacloich, to give the Anglicised version of the neighbour) but today was my first introduction to the Fairy Bridge. We keep saying that MNR is always a schoolday, but how could I have missed that? Between Boy Scouts and personal exploration, I thought I knew every nook and cranny on that side of Loch Etive -and inland. Got to be a ‘must visit’ if I ever do get back to the Highlands.
As a native Gaelic speaker, I can understand how baffling the spelling and pronunciation must be for non-Gaels. But we somehow manage to learn the eccentricities of English – the various -ough renderings being a good example. I’ve now found the long-sought solution that evaded Noah Webster and George Bernard Shaw: switch to the Cyrillic alphabet!
After several years in Bulgaria and getting to grips with the language (sort of) I’ve come to appreciate the ease of Cyrillic. Every character has its own phonetic value and does not change, so no complications with silent letters (like the p in swimming pool) or illogical combinations. What you see is what you get – and what you sound and hear. The alphabet may look daunting, but half an hour’s study should be enough to get the hang of it. After that, reading and speaking become simple and straightforward. English spelling reform in one easy step. Anyone at your end ready to recommend this to the Mogg as a great Brexit opportunity? Gets rid of all these confusions arising from damned European influences (French, German, Roman, Greek, Scandinavian, Celtic etc) in a single swoop. No more need for spelling swot as you can hardly go wrong with Cyrillic. Just spell it like you hear it. ‘As any fule kno,’ to quote the great schoolboy linguist Nigel Molesworth.
You must be annoyed you missed the Fairy Bridge, John, because it is indeed a beautiful place.
It’s gone on my ‘must go to’ list.
My Bulgarian mate, Stanislav, came to Scotland to do his degree, speaking pretty poor English. We actually met in the gym when he was teaching someone how to use a piece of equipment, and I took his accent to be French… and started speaking to him in that language. “I’m not French; I’m Bulgarian!”
Oops, embarrassing.
Anyway, we became mates and he taught me a lot of good exercise tips… and I taught him the difference between the English he was speaking, and the English he had to write to get good marks.
Clever guy, he picked it up in no time, won prizes and graduated with a First, which is more than I did!!
He said exactly the same about Cyrillic script… He was always a bit mystified about the silent letters and stupid pronunciations in English/Scots.
I remember, early on he suggested that if we were having coffee we should have some bisquits….bis cuits.
Off to the Florida now, and got a girlfriend and son, Venci.
I miss him.
Now that everyone has to learn imperial measure, it might be a good time to revise the language so that we write what we pronounce.
But knowing Johnson, he’ll insist we go back to Anglo Saxon or Latin.
The first 9 Pin printer I owned had the Cyrillic alphabet as it’s alternate character set.
I had vaguely considered writing a routine to convert English text to the Cyrillic equivalent so that when read out it rendered in English, if you see what I mean.
I never learned the correct phonemes for the Cyrillic and suspected I might have required a complex look up table of exceptions, so nothing came of it.
Seems that I might have been over cautious way back then.
(Waves from over here in England’s first (and probably last) colony).
Our spelling system is probably the most consistent of all real languages (i.e., not Esperanto and the like) written in Latin script. Every letter stands for the same sound…well, except for ‘y’ which can be pronounced one of three ways…and ‘w’, which can be a vowel or a consonant…and ‘u’, which can be pronounced differently depending on whether you’re a northerner (gog) or southerner (hwntw)…but you get the idea, and it’s still more consistent than English.
MUNGUIN'S NEW REPUBLIC 
I like a bit of fan vaulting.
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Is that what’s on St Giles’ Roof?
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It is. It’s a bit more subdued than some other examples, but it’s still nice.
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4) Possibly moth cater pillars. Wont have too long to wait to identify them, they are quite well grown. The plant/shrub looks like a dogwood, cornus family.
Always enjoy seeing that craggy rock peak towering behind the gap as you pass through Glen Coe. Several Munguanites will know the name of it I’m sure.
Garden always looks a delight Tris, hope the little fella appreciates it.
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Well done, Alan. Andi will probably tell you more about it… His pic.
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#4…….In the states, I would identify this as webworms……more specifically, “Fall webworms.” (But there’s also “Eastern tent cantepillars,” which appear in the Spring.) Anyway, in this part of the country, they appear in the late summer or early Fall, and can sometimes more or less completely cover a tree, or a big branch. They’re aesthetically disgusting and they eat the leaves, but do no long-term harm since the leaves would soon drop anyway. Then they leave and move into the ground for the winter. We had a tree close to the house that was covered with them. Then one morning, I saw a hundreds of worms on the wall of the house moving downward. Soon they were gone. They like some threes better than others.
Mostly, people just leave them alone, since they do no harm and sprays don’t penetrate the webs very well. The alternative is physically removing the webs…..getting worms all over you and maybe falling out of the tree.
https://blog.davey.com/2020/05/why-is-my-tree-covered-in-webs/
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#6…….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thistle_Chape
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Thanks, Danny.
You have to add an “l” at the end. 🙂
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Tris…..I sometimes have trouble with Copy and Paste!
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Yeah,I understand that> Hard, ain’t it? 🙂
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🙂
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thistle_Chapel
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Ha ha ha ha… I’d definitely draw a line at falling out of a tree…or, indeed, being high up in one!
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Tris…..And you not only fall out of the tree, you’ve probably got some of the worms on you. 🙂
Errata……I meant to say that web worms like some TREES better than others…..not some THREES better than others.
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Yeah, we got that, Danny!!! 🙂
I don’t really mind the worms, but if they are more than 3 feet off the ground…. SCREEEEAAAAAM
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LOL!
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Right, Alan, they’re moth caterpillars but I wasn’t able to see their markings through the web – probably Tent caterpillars, maybe Eastern.
The peak is Bidean nam Bian (Fence of the Hides/Pinnacle of the Peaks) – truly magnificent. I love that classic view across Loch Achtriochtan to the wee crofthouse with Bidean towering behind.
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I’m trying to imagine what it would be like to live there… and to wake up every morning to that.
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https://archive.ph/g0YzS
This is way off topic, but you REALLY have to read this.
Can you imagine for a minute what would happened if this had been Bute House?
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I await the ‘There’s a war on’ dross getting doorstepped on all the big decisions are right.
Have a munchkin.
Lovely start to the day in the pictures.
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The BBC will be on to him right away over something as important as this.
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Read it. Despicable, but then it’s what most of us have come to expect from this bunch of criminals, so I’m afraid it doesn’t come as much of a surprise.
I see what you mean by the poem in No.18. Brought tears to my eyes.
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Yes, it’s what we expect from him.
But we didn’t expect to see it laid out so clearly by The Times.
We can believe NOTHING any of them say or do.
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Read it. Surely they cannot manage to keep a lid on it now. Sue Gray will be wanting to clear her name, the Met police don’t look good (again) and junior staffers feeling that they are unfairly being blamed.
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One of the cleaners died. They were made to come to work every day on crowded public transport. Why could they not have sent a bus for them. Given that they were clearing up bottles, glasses, vomit and doing it around dirty bodies lying on the floor.
Can’t imagine what that must have been like, but you can’t say no or you get sacked that that drunken old bitch from the DWP stops your benefits.
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Well I have to say those orangs were particularly awe-some and indeed some more!
Chez Munguin est exceptionnellement magnifique ces jours-ci.
(If that is mince blame google translate!)
Many cats so me is happy, though I wonder what the ratio of humans to animals is in Srem. It seems the latter are taking over! The birdies were looking lovely to but keep them away from the cats…
All in all SS today definitely qualifies as a balm for the soul and rather life reaffirming.
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Munguin congratulates you on your French, which is the language of the dinner table here at the towers.
I thought it was rather top heavy with cats, but I’m glad you approved.
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I think this just about qualifies for SS.
Be a shame to drink it!
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LOL. I don;t think I could.
Great artistry, somewhat wasted on something that’s going to be drunk!
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Wow!
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Lovely photos as usual.
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🙂
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Sorry to be picky but it is Fas na cloiche, not no.
It means shelter or hollow of stones, I think.
Same as in Achadh na Cloiche (Achnacloich) which means field of stones. Went camping there once with girl guides in my youth – and I can assure you the field we camped in was chock full of stones!
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LOL. Thank you. My Gaelic is poor to awful.
I remember learning that whatever it was spelled like, that was not how it sounded!!!
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You will find a lot of place names here:
https://learngaelic.scot/dictionary/index.jsp
Click on the wee speaker to hear how it sounds.
There are rules for pronouncing Gaelic but they are radically different from English.
Once you know them it is not so difficult – in fact Gaelic pronunciation is actually more consistent – not that that is difficult.
For example can you tell me the rule for “ough” as in these?
though thought through rough.
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Absolutely. English is a nightmare. I used to teach it in France. and people were utterly mystified by the pronunciation
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Spent many of my schooldays roaming the countryside round Fas na Cloiche (and Achnacloich, to give the Anglicised version of the neighbour) but today was my first introduction to the Fairy Bridge. We keep saying that MNR is always a schoolday, but how could I have missed that? Between Boy Scouts and personal exploration, I thought I knew every nook and cranny on that side of Loch Etive -and inland. Got to be a ‘must visit’ if I ever do get back to the Highlands.
As a native Gaelic speaker, I can understand how baffling the spelling and pronunciation must be for non-Gaels. But we somehow manage to learn the eccentricities of English – the various -ough renderings being a good example. I’ve now found the long-sought solution that evaded Noah Webster and George Bernard Shaw: switch to the Cyrillic alphabet!
After several years in Bulgaria and getting to grips with the language (sort of) I’ve come to appreciate the ease of Cyrillic. Every character has its own phonetic value and does not change, so no complications with silent letters (like the p in swimming pool) or illogical combinations. What you see is what you get – and what you sound and hear. The alphabet may look daunting, but half an hour’s study should be enough to get the hang of it. After that, reading and speaking become simple and straightforward. English spelling reform in one easy step. Anyone at your end ready to recommend this to the Mogg as a great Brexit opportunity? Gets rid of all these confusions arising from damned European influences (French, German, Roman, Greek, Scandinavian, Celtic etc) in a single swoop. No more need for spelling swot as you can hardly go wrong with Cyrillic. Just spell it like you hear it. ‘As any fule kno,’ to quote the great schoolboy linguist Nigel Molesworth.
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You must be annoyed you missed the Fairy Bridge, John, because it is indeed a beautiful place.
It’s gone on my ‘must go to’ list.
My Bulgarian mate, Stanislav, came to Scotland to do his degree, speaking pretty poor English. We actually met in the gym when he was teaching someone how to use a piece of equipment, and I took his accent to be French… and started speaking to him in that language. “I’m not French; I’m Bulgarian!”
Oops, embarrassing.
Anyway, we became mates and he taught me a lot of good exercise tips… and I taught him the difference between the English he was speaking, and the English he had to write to get good marks.
Clever guy, he picked it up in no time, won prizes and graduated with a First, which is more than I did!!
He said exactly the same about Cyrillic script… He was always a bit mystified about the silent letters and stupid pronunciations in English/Scots.
I remember, early on he suggested that if we were having coffee we should have some bisquits….bis cuits.
Off to the Florida now, and got a girlfriend and son, Venci.
I miss him.
Now that everyone has to learn imperial measure, it might be a good time to revise the language so that we write what we pronounce.
But knowing Johnson, he’ll insist we go back to Anglo Saxon or Latin.
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The first 9 Pin printer I owned had the Cyrillic alphabet as it’s alternate character set.
I had vaguely considered writing a routine to convert English text to the Cyrillic equivalent so that when read out it rendered in English, if you see what I mean.
I never learned the correct phonemes for the Cyrillic and suspected I might have required a complex look up table of exceptions, so nothing came of it.
Seems that I might have been over cautious way back then.
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It does look very complex, and a bit off putting.
But looks worse than it is.
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(Waves from over here in England’s first (and probably last) colony).
Our spelling system is probably the most consistent of all real languages (i.e., not Esperanto and the like) written in Latin script. Every letter stands for the same sound…well, except for ‘y’ which can be pronounced one of three ways…and ‘w’, which can be a vowel or a consonant…and ‘u’, which can be pronounced differently depending on whether you’re a northerner (gog) or southerner (hwntw)…but you get the idea, and it’s still more consistent than English.
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LOL…
I think most languages are like that though. There are a few inconsistencies.
Famously, in French, you don;t pronounce the last letter of a word if it is a consonant, except when you do…avec? donc?
And two lls sound Y, except when they don’t (ville village).
Etc.
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I’m taught p-l-o-u-g-h
Shall be pronouncé “plow.”
“Zat’s easy w’en you know,” I say,
“Mon Anglais, I’ll get through!”
My teacher say zat in zat case,
O-u-g-h is “oo.”
And zen I laugh and say to him,
“Zees Anglais make me cough.”
He say, “Not ‘coo,’ but in zat word,
O-u-g-h is ‘off.’”
Oh, Sacre bleu! Such varied sounds
Of words makes me hiccough!
He say, “Again mon frien’ ees wrong;
O-u-g-h is ‘up’
In hiccough.” Zen I cry, “No more,
You make my t’roat feel rough.”
“Non, non!” he cry, “you are not right;
O-u-g-h is ‘uff.’”
I say, “I try to spik your words,
I cannot spik zem though.”
“In time you’ll learn, but now you’re wrong!
O-u-g-h is ‘owe.’”
“I’ll try no more, I s’all go mad,
I’ll drown me in ze lough!”
“But ere you drown yourself,” said he,
“O-u-g-h is ‘ock.’”
He taught no more, I held him fast,
And killed him wiz a rough!
— Charles Battell Loomis
Obviously an Englishman according to his last verse.
I thought No4 was a bunch of caterpillars having a rave in a bespoke marquee.
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That’s brilliant.
It’s probably their idea of a jubilee celebration. Probably the only ones in Scotland doing it.
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If you want a wee peek at why English is written and spoken the way it is I recommend
Spell it out: the singular story of English spelling
by David Crystal
This PDF gives a taster.
Click to access 9781846685675.pdf
I found it fascinating.
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Yep, a very good read.
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