GB's Next Ice Hockey Star Spotted in Canada

A national past time for what seems to many as an eternity, Canadians love to skate.  So much so that they took a perfectly decent game played on fields with sticks and balls and put it on ice.  Clearly a brazen attempt to alienate their colonial masters in Britain, ice hockey has become an obsession and has been monopolised by my eminent hosts.  Until today!  Behold, video evidence of a Brit mastering the ice.  It is surely only a matter of time before he takes the hockey world by storm and maybe, just maybe, scores the winning goal at the 2014 Winter Olympic finals against a shellshocked Canada.  Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1Y7hJDxZlY

Fat Man Allowed in House: People Celebrate

As is custom in the Western world during the night of the 24th December the people are wont to allow a rotund old gentlemen dressed in red bearing "presents" into their homes.  Modernity brings changes.  Gone are the times when a chimney would suffice; doors are left open and dairy and wheat products are left as bait.

The good news is that your correspondent gets to drink hot, spiced wine and eat copious amounts of sugary foodstuffs without being ashamed.  He even was permitted, nay expected, to drink wine at various workplace functions!

Needless to say this turn of events is welcome.  Behold, the images documenting this jollity!

Birds Descend On Garden

Fall (or autumn as the much-maligned House Sparrows would call it) has been a tumultuous time in the backyard of your correspondent.

Here we have the majestic Blue Jay (Cyanocitta cristata). Apparently pertinent to Toronto's baseball team.

Dark-eyed Junco (Junco hyemalis). One of our most common winter visitors

The flipping huge (compared to the Downy) Hairy Woodpecker (Picoides villosus).  They enjoy the suet!

The quite gorgeous male Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis). Normally has a peaked head but is muted in the autumn.

It's mate the female Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis). She likes long flights in the park followed by candle-lit hulled corn dinners.

The Downy Woodpecker (Picoides pubescens). Very similar to the Hairy but is quite smaller and its beak is half the length of its head (Hairy's is the same length)

 On the left we have the frequent visiting Black-capped Chickadee (Parus atricapillus) and the male House Finch (Carpodacus mexicanus) to the right.

And finally a female House Finch (Carpodacus mexicanus) to the left with two fellas for company.

Stay tuned for more ornithological odyssey!!