NO FROGS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS BLOG

   A very good morning to you dear reader and may I wish you a very happy and peaceful Easter Day. Welcome to Chez Comb and I must apologise for the non-appearance of a blog last weekend. Technical difficulties, i.e., my computer went on strike and needed a bigger elastic band fitting and  two mysterious looking gizmos attaching. I don't suppose my computer engineer would like me to refer to his expertise as fitting an elastic band but all I know is that I have an all singing, all dancing machine again - but will it improve my writing????

   Dear reader, we have had a very interesting fortnight since we last met. The seagulls, frogs and crows are all paired up ready to rear the next generation and have been causing us a spot of bother, but on the plus side and miraculously for us - and I hope I'm not tempting Providence here - no cuts, bruises or shedding of blood has occured to Spouse or myself. Spring is here and the sap is rising and not just in the trees.

   A pair of seagulls recently took up residence on Spouse's shed roof and a short time afterwards began taking an interest in my bird feeding table, which led them to exploring the garden more than they usually would have done and their explorations led them to the pond - choc full of fish that would provide more than one tasty meal for a hungry seagull. Our fish have grown a great deal during the winter months, as a result of their feeding off the algae and detritus at the bottom of the pond. Thus it was that I became the village mad woman, rushing down the garden several times a day, yelling, 'shoo, shoo, go away,' etc. and waving my arms about in a threatening manner. Dear reader, I think you can imagine it all. But the seagulls were hungry and grew bolder. One morning they outsmarted me and made a very early sortie on the pond. When I looked out, the two gulls were very happily perched on Spouse's shed roof with a goldfish apiece dangling from their beaks. The gloves were off, SOMETHING HAD TO BE DONE. We were jolly well not going to lose all our fish to the seagulls.

   As luck would have it we were the proud owners of Sammy Swan, a lifesize plastic swan, a Christmas gift from my young friend, Olivia. We didn't put him on the pond in the winter, fearing the cold might damage his plastic body. But, dear reader, now that it is Spring, Sammy can safely go out of doors. And guess what? He's the most brilliant gull scarer ever. Result!! The seagulls perched on the shed roof for at least a week, chattering away in indignation at Sammy, but did not venture into the garden and now, best of all, they have pushed off elsewhere. We are blissfully seagull free. We had also put some netting around the edge of the pond to deter them, but then the frogs came for their annual three day love-fest and so the nets had to go. Spouse is now making very neat frames that can be placed over the pond at night time. No sneaky fishing expeditions for visiting gulls or herons now.

   So, the gulls departure was followed by the arrival of the frogs - dozens of 'em and doing what frogs do at this time of year, extremely enthusiastically and getting tangled up in the netting in the process. So, to assist them in the continuation of their amorous pursuits, Spouse went to one side of the pond and I to the other and we grasped the netting and pulled it tight - voila, we had invented frog trampolining! By bouncing them along the netting we assisted them back into the pond, but as the numbers increased and the love-fest grew more intense, the netting had to go. Pity really, we had a great team for any future frog Olympics, amazing somersaulting techniques.  But, rest assured, dear reader, that no frogs were harmed by their trampolining experience and our pond is now full spawn and the frogs have gone their separate ways until next year.

   Which presently leaves us with the crows. They are building nests and will soon be raising their young. Then the fun starts all over again at the bird feeders. Crows are very intelligent birds and once they cotton on to where the food is they develop quite a good hovering action, beating their wings like a giant humming bird whilst bashing seven bells out of the feeders to knock the seed out on to the ground and then it's a simple matter of stuffing their faces as fast as they can before another crow comes along to mug them for their efforts. I gave up long ago doing my wild banshee act to chase them off - I think the neighbours were getting concerned.

    And after this there will be the pigeons, but I think we've been there before, dear reader. Back in 2017 I wrote of 'Pigeons - again.'  - to quote from the first paragraph, 'Over-sexed, over-fed and definitely over here in our garden.'  I will say no more abut them, only I wish I had their stamina and it won't be the hills that will be alive with the sound of music soon.

   Last, but not least, this week we are beginning to move out of our lockdown situation and are able to meet people in our gardens. So, friend Jenny and daughter Olivia came for afternoon tea and cake, (Jenny's cake - the best Victoria sponge in the world). We sat in glorious sunshine talking, 'of shoes - and ships - and sealing wax - Of cabbages and kings.'  (Lewis Carroll). In the mysterious way that conversation meanders along many paths and byways, the conversation touched on the quaint French law of requiring dog owners to name their dogs starting with the letter of the alphabet used in the year they were born in. My French neighbour, Joelle had a huge Belgian beast named Ohio, born in the 'Year O'. Young Olivia, bless her, was much taken with this notion and immediately spotted difficulties with this system, but thought of Zeus with Apollo as a follow on for the next year. I was really impressed with her knowledge of the Greek gods, but no - it turns out the Greek gods were unknown to her;  these were the dogs featured in the American detective series, Magnum P.I. Dear reader, a rare event, I was speechless.

   So, on that happy note I will depart to my domestic goddess duties and prepare an Easter Day feast. Have a lovely Easter break dear reader and I wish you luck with inventing alphabetical doggie names - it's better than counting Easter lambs if you want to get to sleep.