Cranes over our head

[nicolas claris]

Cranes passing over our heads today in Bordeaux.
Gathered by hundreds in several groups, after a few turns over the city, they left towards the North-East.
It is soon spring!

​

 

[Jarmo Juntunen]

What a lovely sight! Keep then coming, I`m sure some of these guys are headed in our direction.

 

[nicolas claris]

What a lovely sight! Keep then coming, I`m sure some of these guys are headed in our direction.

Send me some geographical info so I can tell to the next ones coming over!

 

[Peter Dexter]

In the first they are confused but in the latter images they have formed a flight plan. Not a crane in sight here abouts.

 

[nicolas claris]

Not a crane in sight here abouts.

Hi @Peter Dexter
What do you mean?

 

[nicolas claris]

Hi @Peter Dexter
What do you mean?

@Peter Dexter
In French we call them grue which is the same name for the one used to build buildings, I guess it is the same in English (crane).

As I am not a specialist of birds, I googled "oiseau grue" (bird crane) and found the very same bird :

So is this right in your opinion? Or were you playing with word?

 

[Maggie Terlecki]

Oh, I think the cranes mean that spring is here, or just around the corner. I'm so jealous. They look fabulous and would certainly up a smile on my face.

We don't get cranes here but just as anxious about getting spring. Unfortunately, our weather has been very wonky. Sunday, +3C, Monday, -29C. This is the second time in 2 weeks, that weather has been 30 degrees Celcius difference from one day to the next. We are still covered in snow. Lucky you! Maggie

 

[nicolas claris]

Thank you Maggie,
Yes Spring should not be far but here also we have back and forth with temps (but not -29°C!) and sun/rain…
I would love to see some photos of your surroundings covered by snow

 

[Maggie Terlecki]

Bonjour Nicolas,

Well, I took a couple photos out my window, and then included one from a mining village we have here, after a snow storm where the trees are all dressed up in white. The ones from my window are very bad, but just snapped to show you what we have now. We have not had a lot of snow this year yet, but march is a month that we normally have lots of snow storms, (who knows this year, as the weather is all over the place) but that we call, les tempêtes des poteaux, because the snow sticks to the electrical posts because it is sticky and wet as the weather starts warming up.

 

[Jarmo Juntunen]

Nicolas and Maggie, we had a short cold spell with temperatures around -25 C in Finland, just during our spring holiday. Here`s a husky who couldn`t choose between being a dog and squirrel.

 

[nicolas claris]

Thank you @Jarmo Juntunen !
That is stunning… To get such amount of snow here we have to go up to 1500 meters altitude in the mountains, and still not every year…
We really live in different worlds, but what is interesting is that that provided we are a bit open minded we can share so many common feelings and cultural. Of course, and that's very much fine, our differences make humankind richer!

 

[Asher Kelman]

Bonjour Nicolas,

Well, I took a couple photos out my window, and then included one from a mining village we have here, after a snow storm where the trees are all dressed up in white. The ones from my window are very bad, but just snapped to show you what we have now. We have not had a lot of snow this year yet, but march is a month that we normally have lots of snow storms, (who knows this year, as the weather is all over the place) but that we call, les tempêtes des poteaux, because the snow sticks to the electrical posts because it is sticky and wet as the weather starts warming up.View attachment 7087

“les tempêtes des poteaux”, I thought must be a tempest of something like gateaux! But no such thing!

Still, the snow scenes are marvelous for me, bringing back scenes of snow-drift blocked streets 2 meters high in Boston, Massachusetts that totally cut off our wooden houses from the fuel tankers to supply our heating systems!

I plowed a 1/4 mile, 1/2 meter wide strip at a time, driving my snow blower under the snow.

It was like the street celebrations at the end of World War II in London!

People who never previously knew each other, joined at the sides from the apartments to help. Some women with hot drinks or cookies. Men and children grabbed shovels and cleared the snow. I had cut away alone, throwing snow above and to the side, to giant ridges the jetted snow created by the roadside.

The safety cotter-pins kept breaking with the stress on the axle of the motor. I used up my 3 spares and now only 1/3 the street was clear, enough for walking but to narrow for the fuel tanker!

Sp one fellow turned his garage to a metal shop, making new cotter pins to keep repairing the snow blower.

one home owner scoffed and mocked me and refused to help. He thought I was crazy to take on such an impossible task!

I just persisted! I focused on the snow and just holding it in the path of solid white going above my head!

Eventually I cut a wide enough path for an oil truck to dare to enter our street.

The first apartment to get fuel was owned by the one man who laughed and mocked me for my preposterous idea of polishing the entire street with a tiny snow blower meant for just a driveway to park a car!


Asher

 

[nicolas claris]

“les tempêtes des poteaux”, I thought must be a tempest of something like gateaux! But no such thing!

View attachment 7090​

Still, the snow scenes are marvelous for me, bringing back scenes of snow-drift blocked streets 2 meters high in Boston, Massachusetts that cut off our wooden houses from the fuel tankers to supply our heating systems!

I plugged a 1/4 mile, 1/2 meters at a time, driving my snow blower under the snow.

people joined at the sides from the apartments to help. One women provided hot drinks or cookies. Men and children grabbed shovels and cleared the snow I had cut away to giant ridges by the roadside.

The safety cattle pins kep breaking with the stress on the axle of the motor.

Sp one fellow turned his garage to a metal shop, making new cattle pins to keep repairing the snow blower.

one home owner scoffed and mocked me and refused to help. He thought I was crazy to take on such an impossible task!

I just persisted! I focused on the snow and just holding it in the path of solid white going above my head!

Eventually I cut a wide enough path for an oil truck to dare to enter our street.

The first apartment to get fuel was owned by the one man who laughed and mocked me for my preposterous idea of polishing the entire street with a tiny snow blower meant for just a driveway to park a car!


Asher

Cool (if I may say) story!
If needed, another proof of @Asher Kelman being stubborn!

 

[Asher Kelman]

Cool (if I may say) story!
If needed, another proof of @Asher Kelman being stubborn!

Nicolas,

It’s necessary, at times, for even very flawed fellows to be stubborn, independant and proud enough to serve a higher purpose.

De Gaulle did it for France, Churchill for England and I, a nobody, am delusional enough to do things at the edge of what’s practical!

But then, in my practice treating cancer, a young man with lung cancer, arrived with a small boy. The cancer was clearly spread to a hard swollen supraclavicular lymph node. That dignified a hopeless future for him and his boy.

By training and standard of practice, such a patient should have only be offered a short “palliative” radiation course as his cancer was already spread . There are only two choice recognized for “treatment intent”: either “curative“ or when it’s too late, “palliative”.

I looked at the little boy and then impulsively planned to treat the man as if I could cure him. But how do I justify that in my documentation?

I couldn’t chose between the accepted choices. So I invented for myself a new category for which I printed a new version of the treatment form. It was “Local Definitive”. They

That meant “the intent“ now was to wipe out any cancer locally where we know it was.

So, armed with my invented self-permission, I gave a high radiation dose to the lung tumor and also to that enlarged node. I prayed to the entire universe that his own body would swallow up and defeat the remaining millions of cells hiding around the body. What if a competent colleague read my chart?

Well he survived!

So one has to know when its time to go against all odds, “act like God“, with both humility and arrogance, when one really wants to do something good and one is in a position to take the law into one’s hands!

But that is nothing about me, Nicolas. It’s about the human genome, perfected by selective pressure, so we tackle the impossible and each find challenges to overcome!

Par chance, de temps en temps, ce que je fais me semble intéressant!

Asher

 

[nicolas claris]

Nicolas,

It’s necessary, at times, for even very flawed fellows to be stubborn, independant and proud enough to serve a higher purpose.

De Gaulle did it for France, Churchill for England and I, a nobody, am delusional enough to do things at the edge of what’s practical!

But then, in my practice treating cancer, a young man with lung cancer, arrived with a small boy. The cancer was clearly spread to a hard swollen supraclavicular lymph node. That dignified a hopeless future for him and his boy.

By training and standard of practice, such a patient should have only be offered a short “palliative” radiation course as his cancer was already spread . There are only two choice recognized for “treatment intent”: either “curative“ or when it’s too late, “palliative”.

I looked at the little boy and then impulsively planned to treat the man as if I could cure him. But how do I justify that in my documentation?

I couldn’t chose between the accepted choices. So I invented for myself a new category for which I printed a new version of the treatment form. It was “Local Definitive”. That meant “the intent“ now was to wipe out any cancer locally where we know it was.

So, armed with my invented self-permission, I gave a high radiation dose to the lung tumor and also to that enlarged node. I prayed to the entire universe that his own body would swallow up and defeat the remaining millions of cells hiding around the body. What if a competent colleague read my chart?

Well he survived!

So one has to know when its time to go against all odds, “act like God“, with both humility and arrogance, when one really wants to do something good and one is in a position to take the law into one’s hands!

But that is nothing about me, Nicolas. It’s about the human genome, perfected by selective pressure, so we tackle the impossible and each find challenges to overcome!

Par chance, de temps en temps, ce que je fais me semble intéressant!

Asher

My dear American friend, what you just wrote, beside being an emotional read, is exactly what I meant!
For me being stubborn is a quality, certainly not a failure!

 

[Maggie Terlecki]

Nicolas,

It’s necessary, at times, for even very flawed fellows to be stubborn, independant and proud enough to serve a higher purpose.

De Gaulle did it for France, Churchill for England and I, a nobody, am delusional enough to do things at the edge of what’s practical!

But then, in my practice treating cancer, a young man with lung cancer, arrived with a small boy. The cancer was clearly spread to a hard swollen supraclavicular lymph node. That dignified a hopeless future for him and his boy.

By training and standard of practice, such a patient should have only be offered a short “palliative” radiation course as his cancer was already spread . There are only two choice recognized for “treatment intent”: either “curative“ or when it’s too late, “palliative”.

I looked at the little boy and then impulsively planned to treat the man as if I could cure him. But how do I justify that in my documentation?

I couldn’t chose between the accepted choices. So I invented for myself a new category for which I printed a new version of the treatment form. It was “Local Definitive”. They

That meant “the intent“ now was to wipe out any cancer locally where we know it was.

So, armed with my invented self-permission, I gave a high radiation dose to the lung tumor and also to that enlarged node. I prayed to the entire universe that his own body would swallow up and defeat the remaining millions of cells hiding around the body. What if a competent colleague read my chart?

Well he survived!

So one has to know when its time to go against all odds, “act like God“, with both humility and arrogance, when one really wants to do something good and one is in a position to take the law into one’s hands!

But that is nothing about me, Nicolas. It’s about the human genome, perfected by selective pressure, so we tackle the impossible and each find challenges to overcome!

Par chance, de temps en temps, ce que je fais me semble intéressant!

Asher

Wow, Asher, as Nicolas says, very emotional read. Doing what your heart of hearts told you was the way to go. Touched by the story and how you saved his life. Amazing!

 

[Asher Kelman]

It’s important for all of us to not be cowed by naysayers who feel we are not up to a task. Of course we each know our limitations. But knowing that is only the first step. We have to stack up whatever “boxes”, rugs and furniture and reach what would otherwise be an unachievable goal!

 

[Peter Dexter]

I simply meant there are no avian cranes in Colombia...as far as I know. And Asher, beautiful story and congratulations.