Murmuration

I've seen blips of far more impressive murmurations in the UK, but this is the biggest I've ever seen here. And it features a pylon! Bonus :) See extra 1 for a small subset of the starlings. They flew directly over me, and the rush of wings is impressive. I watched and listened to them for ages, till the light started going.

I had another of those accidental eBay experiences ... I put in a low bid for a 25 mm f1.8 lens being watched by 11 people, sure that I would be outbid and hence would see how much it went for. I wasn't; mine was the only bid and I got it for the starting price. Goodness knows why ... because the description was in Italian? Anyway, it was shipped from Italy on 2 December and delivered here by a man with a van at 9:15 pm last night ... rather surprising. So that's what I was using today. Perhaps not the best lens for snapping murmurations, but hey ... I find it impressively sharp (extra 2). On a micro 4/3 like the Olympus it's the equivalent of a nifty 50. The 45 mm prime I bought a few months ago is very good too, but I find it's too long for taking photos indoors. I have to keep standing on chairs or moving furniture and backing up against walls. I might sell it to finance this one.

This (early) evening we went to a concert at St Giles' church in Oxford with lapsed blipper Bundle. That is to say, we watched on Youtube live and Whatsapped each other. The band was the Brickwork Lizards and I have to say they were a bit curate's egg-ish. They started with some North African/jazz fusion which we liked, but progressed to cheesy ballads of Eurovision standard (the Oxford Times describes them as "eclectic"). Most odd. Beggars can't be choosers ... I miss live music. And we should have been at the circus in Lagrasse tonight but it was cancelled :(