Through The Eye Of The Seagull - E-Mail correspondence with Spooky St. Ives

yes..... well.. now what? will send notes by carrier pigeon when the dust settles. keep on a goin as ald old woman told me just keep on a going..... your pal over ere M and very thankful for you and wit...

I shall endeavour to keep up the bad work until the bitter end. Probably next bank holiday if I don't make it to the Beer Festival!

hay buddy... just keep on.... don't let the bastards get you down ( I think that may have been my Dad's regimental yell) Toronto Scottish.... you know... WAR and all that.. he met my Mom, a Yorkshire lass.. and me, why I still remember the thick squares of glass in the OR where I was born.. though I knew Toronto was all wrong for me,,, hence the dream time of the English Coasts...since l944 even...

WHAT ARE FOX PAWS? I'll make seagulls if they would fly around the necks of unsuspecting tourists.... gently but effecticely... bringing the cash into the purse....

Fox paws are 'mistakes of a social gaffe sort of nature' from the french 'faux pas, which translates as 'false step'. (As opposed to No Step which is what they print on the wings of aeroplanes for some unfathomable reason. I mean, anyone dumb enough to walk off the wing of an aeroplane is hardly likely to be intelligent enough to read!).

PS. Acshually, seagulls are quite popular ornamental items down here. I think the visitors buy them because they don't realise what the seagulls do to the emmets and the locals buy them because they do realise what the seagulls do to the emmets.

PPS. Saw a classic seagull strike yesterday. Female emmet sitting on the Wharf with big tray of chips in open view. The decoy seagull distracted her while its wingman nailed the tray sending chips flying. Woman promptly engulfed in a mini-tornado of seagulls. Poor dear seemed quite perturbed by the experience although given the number of 'Beware of the Seagulls' messages plastered all over the place she could hardly claim she wasn't warned. Her boyfriend/husband/escort just laughed evilly. I fear for their relationship!

for some reason a bunch of kittiwakes and a few black backs or herrings (don't know witch) show up here in Whitehorse about now... for the MacDonalds and THE COLONEL... dumpsters I guess..... anyhoo.. I had a lot of bbq chicken stuff to get rid of and tossed it up on my roof...and the next thing was a load of fab white birds came and flew around singing their songs... and keeping the ravens away too...well the next day and yesterday ... they sent a caller to sit on a nearby lightpost and scream for more so I naturally obeyed and threw up a couple of yogurt containers of dogs fud and they really like that... so now I have had to tell them to buggerfatty off and get back to the river and see if they can find some fishes or... maybe the dump and they call them birdbrains!! yes, enjoyed your picture of the gal with the fries...do they sell those T shirts with fake eagle crap on the shoulder in St. Ives.....?

No, I don't think you can get the t-shirts (mind you, I am not in the habit of frequenting the sort of tourist tat shops that sell things of that ilk). I have seen the odd person wearing a baseball cap covered in fake seagull poo, though.

Mind you, what's the point when you can have the real stuff. There is a reason why the locals mostly go round in scruffy stuff. The seagull poo round here will dissolve cars given time so you can imagine what it does to posh clothes. That's why we always snigger when some emmet poseur/poseuse rolls into the Sloop in their designer gear. For what they are about to receive we are truly grateful!