Drive by..

  ..which I do here every now and again, not sure why. I consider writing something then get distracted by something shiny or realise it's not 2007 any more. Anyhow I noticed something amiss months ago and it's been festering in my neural network until a fortnight ago when I finally decided to do something about it.

 
You know that entry I wrote a while back about 'sites' from google being the way to host blog photos after photobucket decided to self destruct, well I hadn't factored in how google also has a habit of dropping products and services seemingly on a whim. Now I'm probably what you'd call a google fan, I have a pixel phone, google assistants dotted around the house, a google doorbell and subscription to nest which I pay for, google one which i pay for...this blog obviously.. But them dropping google sites earlier this year once again left these pages without images. I felt a bit betrayed, even though technically I wasn't using sites as intended.

 
Loopholes readers are there to be found, so in search of one I went and just as sites hosted my photoblog images for me I realised,  admittedly after a fair bit of url skullduggery, that your common or garden google drive can do pretty much the same. (Actually I suspect uploading images to and then ahem repurposing them on blogger itself might work too but it'd be much more of a faf and tbh I can't be arsed to find out 

Note Ok so I finally got arsed,faffed and found out it does. In fact some are hidden in this very post now..and I found a better way of doing notes as this isn't 2007 yahoo

) I'm not going into detail but if you share something publicly from your googledrive you can use its id to craft a url that displays whatever it is directly without google sticking an oar in and galleryfying it or plugging it into a google doc or form or whatever else google property alphabet thinks is an appropriate vessel for its web consumption.

So yeah. TL;DR Blog pics fixed again..you're welcome... woah.. look a shiny.

The Naked Birdwatcher

Friends and followers of my Instagram account may have seen footage from our cctv enabled nestbox the last two seasons showing a family of bluetits nesting and eventually fledging said box.

  

Further to this they have also been treated to my 3d printing shenanigans including the birdfeeders you can see here.

  

 For those who may be interested you can get design files for all manner of stuff 3d print wise from thingiverse and hack/remake or design your own using tinkercad. This may sound terribly expensive and complicated but when you consider a 3d printer in kit form can be had new for under £100 and print model files themselves are for the most part open source and free..well it could almost be considered rude not to have a little dabble. My entire set up including the desk, chair, the 3d printer itself, the consumables (filament cleaner fluids wipes etc) and a couple of upgrades so it's less likely to burn my house down has so far amounted to less than £200..and that includes buying a half decent second hand desktop computer to dedicate to running it.

Now, my apologies for the somewhat clickbaity title however in my defence it is a technically true statement and if I hadn't thought of it just now this rather neglected blog probably wouldn't contain this entry. You see these feeders have seen very little action in the few months since I printed them. Aside from the odd pigeon attempting a landing and usually failing or myself banging my head on them more often than occasionally when I walk down the garden both resulting in birdseed spillage all over the patio I havent needed to refill them.   For some reason though, perhaps it's the weather or the time of year when we have lots of youngsters fledging the nests or maybe the bloke next door isn't filling his plethora of feeding stations up as much, the last week or so we have begun to notice birds taking more of an interest. This morning when I got up and was making my way downstairs to the shower (hence the naked part) I noticed loads of activity around the feeders. Not wanting to miss the opportunity I quickly grabbed my camera from the cupboard and started snapping the shots you see here through the backroom window.

	TITS!! lots of them.. ..and other birds Click thumbnails to enlarge...

Fortunately I was close enough not to get any unwanted reflections..or maybe that should be read unfortunately if you arrived here purely because of the title. 

Take a seat.

Forgive me reader if this post presents itself as rather euphoric but I believe humanity has finally truly evolved to its next level.
'How so?' I suspect you are thinking, current events, earthquakes and other natural disasters, not to mention nuclear threats in Asia and terror in the Middle East surely point towards Armageddon especially if you have happened to stray over onto the more errr eccentric side of Youtube recently.

Well going about my usual business in Aldi this morning I found on sale a toilet seat..it gets better reader.. down from £15.99 to an almost affordable £8.50 in the up to 50% reduced special buys bins. Woohoo thought I knowing that for several months the upstairs khazi has been adorned with a lime green plastic affair prone to slippage and recently missing its outer lid.

   
Normally I check carefully prospective  purchases before adding them to the shopping trolley, however I spotted the words soft close and after picking up the box and finding it reassuringly heavy nestled it straight in amongst the baby maris pipers, own brand cola and everyday essentials real butter...salted if you were wondering.

Now on its own this might have put me in a good mood, after all there is something mildly satisfying about a quality bathroom fitting. Having one's posterior met  by upmarket warm thermoset plastic on a cold morning has a lot to be said for it especially if like me you can remember the days of the outside bog and its freezing hard black seat. Coupled with a luxurious soft close hydraulically dampened hinge you can see how my general disposition may have been elevated..

This particular throne topper though with its smooth action and top quality material is a thing designed for palaces and landed gentry. In fact I would suspect even the ablution facilities adjoining Valhalla may lack this feature.. On reading the fitting instructions I found It's quick release. The whole thing comes off at the push of a button for...errr... hang on.. oh yes cleaning
.
The owners manual however doesn't mention the other obvious benefits of such a mechanism. Quick release means portable. everyone in the house could have one, even public conveniences could be fitted with the attachment points so you would never again need to perform a dreaded hover dump over municipal porcelain. Worrying about looters stealing it after a hurricane? Never fear simply click and take it to the nearest shelter with you.

It could spawn a whole industry of accessories, monogrammed carry bags, custom release buttons,  branded wet wipes and maintenance kits.  I have seen the future reader and it's in the middle Isle of Dudley Aldi. I kid you not.