Optical obsession

I was at a twitch at the weekend. Well, technically it was a big DIP, but let’s not go there. Anyhow, as I stood around seeing a late Sand Martin and practically nothing else, I noted two things. The first was that the average age of the crowd could best be described as “greying”, and secondly that almost to a man (and the three women!) they all had extremely nice, extremely shiny and extremely expensive binoculars. Does anyone use binoculars that cost less than £1500 these days?

I had a look through a friend’s pair the other day, and they were nothing short of wonderful. Whilst mine are no slouches I felt there was an immediate and noticeable difference. Although from the same manufacturer, I put this down to mine being 8x32 whereas these were 8.5x42 and much larger and heavier. Although I have a marked preference for smaller and lighter bins, picking his up and having a quick look has unfortunately resulted in feelings of envy and lust.

I thought I was past all this.

At the peak of my stupidity I had four pairs of binoculars. You will note I have only got two eyes (ish, the actual number is more like 1.2) and therefore cannot possibly use more than one pair at any one time. This key fact did not escape Mrs L, who whilst not quite able to sniff out the introduction of new optics at a hundred paces as they all look the same, nonetheless has a keen understanding of how they work and that they do not stack. She said I was ridiculous and I agreed with her. I had what I like to call my main pair that I use all the time, the aforementioned 8x32s that rarely leave my side. I then had a pair of rather nice 7x42s that were my original “post-mugging” pair that I had justified keeping for – get this – ‘low light situations’. God I am an idiot. Then I had a cheap pair for the car that never got used because my main pair were always around my neck, and finally I had a pair of 10x binoculars for situations where I might need that extra magnification. Don’t say it as I already have….

What was I thinking?! I do not know, but following a dramatic cull I am pleased to be able to say that I now have just one pair of binoculars again. A weight off my mind I can tell you. That’s not to say that I’m not slightly nervous having just one pair, this is almost uncharted territory after all, but so far I have not been found wanting. I just should not have touched that other pair on Shetland is all, that was a big mistake. That said I went and looked at the price online that evening and nearly choked. £1800! Good grief! I know that mine were not cheap, but neither were they anywhere near that. I mused on who might buy binoculars that expensive. The answer, as I discovered on Sunday, is almost everybody. I barely saw anything other than top-drawer brands, the very latest offerings from Leica, Swarovski and Zeiss. Most of them looked brand new, there must have been thousands and thousands of pounds of glass on display. Mind-boggling.

However despite their obscene cost it was interesting to note that these top-of-the-line optics were still unable to prevent the misidentification of Sand Martins as Cliff Swallows. That's poor. If you are going to spend £2080 on the latest Leica noctovid binoculars you need them to perform better than that. To get it right every time. Although my cheaper ones have had their fair share of ID hiccups, they did at least manage to avoid that particular pitfall. So I may save my pennies as it is perhaps not worth getting anything newer until the manufacturers sort this embarrassing defect out once and for all.

On hobbies

All my whining about the death of blogging has had a positive impact; NQS (v4) is back. In response Gav explored why it is that his hobbies (which include writing, go figure) rise and fall, and put it down to himself. In contrast I’ve always tried to blame something else - primarily my lack of time - for why I drop some hobbies either for long periods or altogether. In fact it is probably my own lack of focus, and the answer has been staring me in the face all along. He is called Henry and he is twelve.

For Henry, focussing on anything for longer than about eight seconds is frequently physically impossible. One exception to this was when he spent an entire day throwing a ping pong ball into a glass - admirable focus in more ways that one - but that’s also part of being twelve I suppose. This does not detract from him being a lovely kid, as you would expect given he is basically a miniature version of me - we are so similar that my parents frequently get us confused and call me him and vice versa. I thought that this inability to concentrate for much of the time was one area where we differed, but now I am not so sure. Given I see a lot of myself in him it should not really have been a surprise to me, as it was last week when I read Gav’s post, that instead of blaming a lack of time there should be a teensy bit more introspection. A bit more of blaming me. Although it is a very long time since I was twelve, am I actually able to maintain an interest in anything at a steady state? 

No. Or at least very infrequently.

As a child my mother despaired of my constant complaint of boredom. I moped. I kicked stones. I did not knuckle down to anything, including school work. My mother is a teacher, my father an academic; you can guess how this went down. Instead I had passing interests; in lego, computers, role-playing games, fishing, drawing, coins, snooker, naval history, birds, sailing, drawing, chess, bridge, tennis – the list goes on and on. Despite my inability to choose any one of these as a long-term prospect, I was nonetheless supported and encouraged. And in response I dumped nearly everything.

As an adult I have whittled down the list somewhat, but I am not sure that I am really any different now to how I was then. When we moved to our current house, sorry Chateau, my interest of the moment was growing plants. So in a huge fit of enthusiasm I constructed a large greenhouse and then killed 80% of what was in it due to complete neglect. Had we moved 12 months later I suspect it would never have got built and we would have a lot more garden. At least that hobby is currently undergoing a renaissance of sorts, but how long will it last? Worryingly this is hobby which requires an even and constant level of interest. The sort of interest that my pea brain seemingly cannot cope with for any length of time. However for now I am finding that my desire to poke and weed and dust and water is very strong indeed, and contrasts nicely with other more frenetic aspects of my life. I went down there this evening for a bit of a potter after work in a blaze of halogen. By the way, a whole 60 people read the last post about my observations on temperature variations in said greenhouse; I knew I was onto a winner.

In a somewhat similar vein, I became hugely keep on fishing again about ten years ago. On my first foray with my brother-in-law over in west London somewhere I caught a massive carp. Or rather he did, as my mind had predictably wandered off somewhere and only his quick thinking prevented the rod from disappearing into the lake. I then steadfastly reeled it in, all 31lbs of it, but I am under no illusions as to what would have happened had he not been there. Anyhow, this early success subsequently manifested itself as mostly collecting fishing gear as opposed to actually going fishing again, and so last week I sold that same fishing rod to a bloke in Poland and good riddance. Its departure on a van eastwards marks the end of my fishing career such that it was, and I now have a lot of my wardrobe back, which is where I had been storing the vast amount of paraphernalia that I had accumulated. What do you mean you don't keep your fishing gear next to your shirts and suits?

Then of course I got into birding in a big way, which in turn was a revival of a childhood fad. Birding locally and discovering Wanstead eventually turned into twitching and going everywhere for everything. To my credit (and surprise) birding continues to this day in various guises. Sometimes the patch dominates, at other times I abandon it completely. There is no telling when this will happen, albeit that June is frequently an indicator. I also blow hot and cold on the chasing of rarities; if I'm not in the mood I simply don't go no matter how close it is. If I am, then I get up in the middle of the night and am prepared to travel large distances. I thought I had finally laid this to rest but last week off I went again. What possessed me? I have no idea other than to say that this just what happens, be it in birding or anything else. Two or three years ago I went out on the patch every day and possibly further afield at weekend. I also ended up with no fewer than four pairs of binoculars; one for the car, one for a windowsill, one for the summer and one for the winter (I am cringing even writing this...). Mrs L pointed out that I have only two eyes and that one of those doesn't really work. I ignored her. Some things never change, my one steady state success.

This story repeats itself almost endlessly in any activity that gets my attention, up and down, peaks and troughs. The singular and obsessive pursuit of collection of whatever it is followed by an unceremonious dumping and shedding of all of it. In other words, I am hopeless.

The birding continues, but today I have just one pair of binoculars and use them about twice a week tops. What I really need to do is to talk myself out of being interested in anything new, boring though that would be, and concentrate on what I know that deep down I do truly enjoy and keep coming back to despite any temporary evidence to the contrary. Whether I am capable of such a feat is unfortunately highly questionable.