Lockdown For The Laid-Back

It is a shocking commentary on modern society that even as our jobs get more and more deskbound, and even as the internet and general over-connectivity lead to lesser locomotion, our hobbies are getting distressingly more physical.

Keeping up with the Joneses now entails Weekend Trekking, Weekend Motorcycling, Weekend Trips to Ladakh, Weekend Parkour and Weakened Knee-Joints. It’s been described as the Back To Apehood movement and is causing considerable consternation in civilized circles.

And that’s why this whole lockdown thing has come as a bit of a reprieve and a lifting of performance pressure for the sapienthomo sapiens.You can hardly be expected to go rambling up random rockfaces when just poking your head out of the front door will likely earn you a punch in the snoot. It’s the prefect time, indeed, to talk a bit about gentler pursuits.

I, of course, am an ardent Treewatcher, and have elsewhere committed purple prose extolling the joys of this noble pastime. But of late I’ve been dabbling in a bit of Backyard Birding as well. Of course I didn’t intend to multi-task; but I’m not a discriminatory person, and if I was observing a tree on a lazy afternoon and a bird happened to alight on one of its branches – well, I gave it a gaze as well.

In this way I ended up studying several of the less strenuous species that seek the sunlit spaces. And without ever setting out to do so, I’ve become a bit of a Backyard Birder myself. I’ve bought birdseed. I’ve even bought a couple of purposeful-looking bird books, and may actually get around to reading them someday soon. And on particularly pleasant mornings when even the sun is carrying a light windcheater, I snuggle deeper into bed, sip a hot cuppa and hang out at birding websites.

And that’s how I came across this example of just how much we serious birders sometimes have to put up with:

Selected replies from the official website of the Belapur Association of Birding Enthusiasts (www.BABE.co or was it slash-dot-org?)

Dear Disappointed,

I know our November post begins by saying “With the advent of the cold weather, we can now expect to see exotic winter visitors frolicking in our gardens…” but if you had continued reading, you’d have realized the birds under discussion are the egg-laying, feather-covered kind…

Dear Disappointed,

I assure you we are not ‘having you on’. The Red-Headed Tit is very much a bird. And before you ask, so is the Greater Western Tit.

Dear Gourmet59,

Scattering birdseed in your backyard to attract pheasants is a perfectly acceptable birding practice. However we recommend you use a camera to do the shooting, not ‘your trusty old twelve-bore’.

Dear Worried,

Tap water is fine for filling the birdbath. Unlike foreign tourists, migratory birds are not susceptible to Delhi Belly. Do you think European lakes are filled with Perrier?

Dear Curious,

To the best of our knowledge, there have been no reliable sightings of kiwis anywhere in India. This is undoubtedly because the kiwi is a flightless bird and lives in a remote island country thousands of miles away. The thing you saw in your hedgerow is probably a small brown feline. Or a very big rat.

Dear Gourmet59,

No, we have no plans of adding a recipes section to the website. And please stop shooting the birds.

Dear Completely Cuckoo,

Always a pleasure reading from a genuine enthusiast. The diagnostic difference between the Lesser Mountain Chiffchaff and the Sandy-Bottomed Thrush is the absence of ventricular markings on the supercilium in the former. The bird you describe could also be a vagrant Fulvous Scrubchat in eclipse phase, though it would be unusual for this time of year...

I tired somewhat of these fascinating exchanges at this point, and became a Duck Shooting enthusiast for twenty minutes, before moving on to Bird Wringing (which boringly turned out to be Bird Ringing, without the all-important ‘W’). But by then, I had realized what I’d been doing. In a flash of subconscious insight, I had seen the Next New Thing.

I’ve named it Hobbysurfing^© (and copyrighted it too, in case it turns out to be monetizable). What it does is completely brilliant – while hobbies like Treewatching and Eyelid Mapping minimised the element of crude physicality, Hobbysurfing has removed the need for commitment as well. You can flit from hither to yon, dabbling in this, then flirting with that, without feeling any compulsion to get into the depths of anything. 

And in just 3 days of moderate Hobbysurfing, I’ve discovered gems that will make your heart salivate. I will soon be introducing you to fascinating hobbies – Advanced Owling, Synchronised Snoring and Sheep Countathons.

Watch this space (but don’t hold your breath).