Bye!

Well, folks, this is it. For now, at least - and possibly for good - this is the last entry on this here blog. Less than 20 visitors in the last month tells its own story. However, in the unlikely event that you like reading my inane babblings, I do skulk around other dark corners of the net:

Email - daveb75 (at) yahoo (dot) co (dot) uk
Note spamtraps - though I suspect even the harvesters have given up on this place!

FictionPress.Net - http://www.fictionpress.net/profile.php?userid=315214
This one is for original writing...

FanFiction.Net - http://www.fanfiction.net/profile.php?userid=315214
...and this is for Watership Down fanfic.

The WD Yahoo Group - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/watershipdown/
Over 12,000 messages! (No, not all from me!) Essential for all WD obsessives.

alt.lifestyle.furry - news:alt.lifestyle.furry (with a newsreader) or via Google Groups (on the web)
Usenet for furs

I suppose it's appropriate here to look back at how this blog changed over time - which was quite a lot considering its short life. When I started it in October, it was intended to be my primary outlet for Watership Down-related stuff; I'd only just discovered the Yahoo Group, and didn't realise how much fun it would be there. And the Bits'n'Bob-stones website was only a little thing - Frithaes! (my Lapine course) had yet to grow into the monster it is today!

Inevitably, the increasing use of my website and the Yahoo Group rather marginalised this blog, and so it became rather more like a normal blog, with bits and pieces of whatever came to mind. I stopped putting this address in the "URL" section of Guestbooks, and put the website's address instead. By this time, this was really only a clearing-house for ideas too vague and aimless even for me to publish elsewhere. The blog's days were numbered, but it still had one more task to perform - and one which has changed my life for good. ("Good" in both senses of the word.) Four short words will suffice:

I am a fur.

Obviously I'd known how much Watership Down affected me for years... but it wasn't until I read a lot more furry literature that I realised that the fact that the heroes were rabbits was so important in itself. I'm not the sort of fur who believes that they were a rabbit in a former life, or has a rabbit "power animal" or suchlike. Rather, I'm an "empathic fur" - someone who feels a deep, intense kinship with rabbits, beyond anything I can rationalise, to the extent that even the sight of the word is exhilarating and elating.

It's extraordinary, now I look back on it, that just three months ago I was confidently writing "I am certainly not a furry lifestyler" in a post on the WD Yahoo Group. Actually, it was reading through that post after I'd published it that triggered the "hmmm, I wonder, though" synapses. And to cut a long story short, here I am. Furry, and very, very, very happy to be so. I'm more at peace with myself than I can remember. So for that, blog, I owe you more than I can say.

The Cup's Waterloo?

Well, it's Waterloo Cup time again, I regret to say. But with a bit of luck it'll be the last one, as hare-coursing will be banned if the Hunting With Dogs Bill manages to fight its way past the House of Lords and into law. I shall now inflict on you a little poem I wrote on the subject - don't worry; it's very short:

Hare today.
Gone tomorrow -
Gone to the dogs.
Dog days?
Hares hoping.

('Fraid I can't be bothered to keep the "current mood" thingies going!)

Yep, I'm still here

Apologies to anyone who fondly believed I'd been got rid of! I see from the paper this week that a couple of young men are up in court in Scotland accused of hunting with dogs (which is now illegal there). No prizes for guessing my views on the matter! Also, I've started reading Richard Adams' autobiography, The Day Gone By. All I can say is that it is written in pure Richard Adams style, with all that that implies. Watership Down fans will almost certainly enjoy it greatly: others might find the style a bit of an acquired taste. Oh, and do have a look at the small photo of John Gifford in there somewhere - he is Hazel!

Current Mood: =:)
[pleased]
Music: George Butterworth, Banks of Green Willow

Fanfare for the Commons Man

And woman, of course... wonder of wonders, Parliament has done something useful, by accepting an amendment to the Hunting Bill that would outlaw hare hunting with hounds as well as coursing (and stag hunting). The Times reports that there are 70 registered beagle and harrier packs in Britain. Not for much longer! I'm sure the House of Lords will try its darndest to block this, but with a bit of luck it should make it into the final Act.

Current Mood: =8D
[ecstatic]
Music: The Beatles, I Feel Fine

Spanish practices

What is it about Spain, for God's sake? Every time I look up, there's another story about some appalling bit of cruelty to animals. Today's jolly installment concerns greyhounds considered inadequate for hare coursing. It's bad enough that hare coursing should be considered a "sport" in the first place, but in Spain it appears that "inadequate" greyhounds are hanged alive, sometimes deliberately with their hind legs on the ground so that they have a slower and more painful death. The link below is from Planet Ark, and the words themselves are from Reuters, so it should be pretty accurate.

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/19778/story.htm

Current Mood: =>:(
[angry]
Music: Elton John, Jack Rabbit

Castle in the Hare?

Been having a look at the website of Britfur, which all being well is going to be the first full-scale furcon in Britain, in just about two years from now. Not a lot on the site yet, and I somehow suspect that their recommended resolution of 1034x768 is a typo, but one thing that is mentioned is a possible location: a place called Peckforton Castle, in the wilds of Cheshire. Here's a map of the area from multimap.co.uk - zoom in twice on the northern end of the Peckforton Hills to see the actual castle marked. Also might be worth having a look at the Mascot competition if you're more artistically inclined than me (which isn't hard!)

Current Mood: =:}
[quietly intrigued]
Music: Nikas, Bein' Furry