I need a new pic of Irbis who has two more weeks to go as a house dog but is driving me nuts as he is in full active mode. Here, to scale, is the plate that saved his leg, now one of my myriad desk chotchkes. Hard to believe it was inside his leg, …
Author: Steve Bodio
RIP Les Line
Les Line, the writer and editor who made the (old) Audubon into what might have been the best nature magazine in the world, has died. Audubon has been very and appropriately kind in its obit. It doesn’t mention that they fired him in ’91 to change the magazine’s direction. My friend Matt Miller of The …
Revolvers 2
I had some interesting responses to my post on a two- revolver “set” of mine last month but it took me some time to get back blogging– obviously. Jonathan Hanson, editor of Overland journal and possibly the last Edwardian, proposed a perfect pair of antique English Webleys. The big one is “a MKV (“star” or …
Urfa Guverchin
Which means “Urfa Pigeon”. The ancient city of Urfa in Turkey may be the oldest- looking town I saw in that country, and the most pigeon- obsessed town in the most pigeon obsessed nation in the world– see the “links” post below. What other country has town councils soliciting funds to preserve rare breeds? And …
A Car
Mary Anne Rose, who is responsible for my dictation software (and who is a doc and who has and loves deerhounds) also likes old cars. She sent me a photo of herself in a Morris Minor station wagon she is trying to get California legal– bet that is no fun at all! I was amazed …
Bek Nazar Dor
Ataika’s father Dor, a great dog belonging to our friend Andrey Kovalenko, died in his native Almaty, Kazakhstan, last week. He was sixteen. He had a good long life, and his genes live on in New Mexico, Kazakhstan, and even Scotland. But condolences to Andrey for his loss of such an old friend.
Rifles and Recipes
My old Montana friends John Barsness and Eileen Clarke, who run the site Rifles and Recipes, have two new projects worth your attention. John, who may be one of the best gun writers in the world– what other former poet is also a world- class gunsmith?– has started an online mag called “Rifle Loony.” It …
MANY Links
Two evocative essays, here and here, about the “pigeon warriors” of the ancient town of Urfa in southern Turkey near Syria. I have seen this, but too little, and would love to go back– will post some of my photos taken there separately later. The writer gets the atmosphere perfectly, and is a Turkish American …
Catching Up
I have been more than busy– PT, weight lifting, starting to walk again, keeping the little bird handled after some neglect, breeding and crossing pouter pigeons for our new “North American pouter” project (pix soon), trying to arrange getting “my” (not yet) Aplomado in. At least we are not having puppies! Health is generally improving. …
5000 Year-Old Scammer?
David Z (see below) sent us the latest on Hari Scam and and, amazingly, it is even more ridiculous than what has gone before. “Among the mixed-bag films at Tribeca this year, Thorkell Hardarson and Örn Marino Arnason’s Feathered Cocaine was arguably the most mixed. Alan Howell Parrott, an American Sikh convert, introduced falconry to …