Special reblog of a photo by Algy’s friend @boschintegral-photo for St. Georges Day, when Algy always tries to be kind to dragons. This one looks as though it might resist, but Algy will persevere
Quel magnifique paysage! Tellement plus vif et beau que le vrai - Algy et le petit dragon vert l'adorent Merci beaucoup, mon ami
Algy and his little green dragon friend were utterly thrilled to see this gorgeous representation of their resting place by the burnpainted by their kind and talented French painter @peintre-stephane whose work is always so fabulously colourful and vibrant.
This glowing paysage is so much more lovely and colourful than the west Highland landscape actually is at this time of year (in reality almost entirely dull rusty browns and dirty yellows, where it isn’t just grey rock) - and the little green dragon is glowing even greener Just gorgeous - thank you so much❣️
Algy sends @peintre-stephane an extra special fluffy hug, with many more soft fluffy hugs for his lovely grandchildren xoxo
Keith “Legsy” Mulroon, olympic cloud watcher and top-tier chill warden
Algy (@adventuresofalgy) suspects that the talented chalk artist @sluggoonthestreet is probably not aware of his existence, but the wonderful creatures which @sluggoonthestreet depicts have brightened Algy’s tumblr life for quite some time now
As it was impossible to invite them all individually to his 10th tumblr birthday celebrations, Algy chose Keith “Legsy” Mulroon, “olympic cloud watcher and top-tier chill warden”, to represent them, as “Legsy” seems to be an “Algytoo” - a bird rather closely resembling Algy himself, although Legsy’s feathers are nof a different colour
Algy sends all the creatures in @sluggoonthestreet‘s world lots of very fluffy hugs
Fly as I might, fly as I may I am extremely late for your special day! Happy 10th Birthday, Algy!
Thank you so much, Bill @kaiserbladz Algy’s birthday parties always continue until the very last guest has arrived, and of course a 10th Tumblr Birthday party is a particularly special celebration, which goes on even longer than usual, and no one could possibly be late. So Algy is ready and waiting to welcome him the moment he arrives
Algy thanks you very kindly for sending this handsome duck to join the party and sends you lots of his fluffiest hugs
Another early spring visitor to Ash Canyon: an orange-crowned warbler / chipe oliváceo (Leiothlypis celata).
As Algy continues to celebrate his amazing 10 years of adventures on tumblr, he welcomes this beautiful spring visitor to his 10th tumblr birthday party, and sends his good friend @fatchance a special fluffy spring hug and his warmest thanks for all the wonderful photos he has shared of the beautiful birds and flora of faraway Arizona.
And to continue the cake theme - most appropriate for a birthday party - here is a lovely selection from teabag artist @silvirub, who Algy has been following for a long time
Algy sends @silvirub a special fluffy hug on the occasion of his 10th tumblr birthday celebrations, and many thanks for the delicious selection of cakes
Algy has a relatively new tumblr friend known as @mumblelard who posts images (all original) which are perhaps not all that unusual on the whole, considering that this is tumblr, but with texts and tags that are a wee bit, shall we say, different… not to mention inventive
So Algy had a wee search through this relatively new friend’s archive and “borrowed” a delicious strawberry cake for his 10th tumblr birthday party.
He hopes that the master of mumblelandia will forgive him, and sends him a big fluffy hug from the wild west coast of the Scottish Highlands, where @mumblelard’s refrain “this is water, this is water, this is water” is more fully realised than in most places on this earth, as the stark, rocky land is surrounded on three sides by the sea, is pitted throughout with lochans and rushing burns, and is drenched by the rain (or sleet according to season) almost every day of the year…indeed it has been raining heavily the entire day today, and this does not make a change
Thank you for the cake, imaginary construct @mumblelard
And here’s another beautiful dancer to grace Algy’s 10th tumblr birthday party, photographed by Algy’s lovely longtime friend Stephi @stephiramona who has sent so many guests to Algy’s parties in past years
Algy sends Stephi lots of his very fluffiest hugs xoxo
Haha..look. Someone else is surprised as well and wants to say “Salut”. May I introduce you to a very special friend of mine. He lives at a little lake in my hood. For some reasons, he loves to follow me on my walks sometimes. He´s grey and dusty like our rustbelt. He doesn´t speak French, but he is spirited and loves to dance.
Like all of us, he claims to hear the sea surf behind the trees of the lakeside, when he close his eyes, although it´s just the soughing and whooshing rush hour traffic from the Highway 43. But who would dare to contradict a heron. Not me! ;-)
Thanks again Lady M. Meet you someday, when we are all be able again to fly like birds, run like horses and swim like dolphins. Have a wonderful evening.
No birthday party would be complete without Algy’s friend - and the friend of many of his other friends - @photoshamanism
So Algy invited this magnificent bird - which apparently follows Katharina around and which she photographed for another good friend @themazette - to join his 10th tumblr birthday celebrations, and he sends them both lots of his very fluffiest hugs xoxo
Thank you so much, dear Marella @maramarella Algy is delighted to welcome this imposing fluffy friend to his 10th tumblr birthday party! Do you think he (or is it she?) likes to eat chocolate brownies?
Algy sends you lots of his fluffiest hugs
[p.s. Kindly submitted by @maramarella - but Algy had to reblog this as tumblr would not allow him to edit the original submission to add his thanks.]
Thank you so much @icardamome for this lovely birthday greeting, and for sending this handsome chaffinch to Algy’s 10th Tumblr birthday party Algy is sure that he will feel at home here, as there is quite a community of finches in this area.
Now you or I might feel just a wee bit nonplussed if a small dragon breathing fire were to disturb our repose in such a place, but Algy was not the least bit surprised, for he knew that it was St. George’s Day, and he had always made a point of seeking out dragons on this day in order to befriend them.
For a moment, however, it looked as though this particular dragon might not be aware of Algy’s altruistic record, and Algy hesitated, wondering whether discretion would not be the better part of valour in this case: preparing to fly, he rapidly assessed the merits of a prompt retreat to another spot, from which he could assure the dragon of his best intentions at a safe distance. But fluffy birds are generally endowed with rather more valour than discretion - and Algy was mindful of the fact that most dragons can fly faster than birds - so he decided to hold his ground and greet the dragon with a Shakespearean sonnet, reminding it that it was not only St. George’s Day but also the great Bard’s birthday. Fortunately, this seemed to meet with the dragon’s approval, and it turned tail and left Algy safely on his ledge, chuckling with relief…
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date; Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
[Algy hopes that it is not necessary to tell you what he is quoting today ]
It was St. George’s Day again - a day on which Algy has always made a point of seeking out dragons to befriend.
However, with his own special dragon friend visiting him at home in the wild west Highlands of Scotland, Algy was reluctant to go out in search of other dragons: he guessed that the little green dragon might very possibly take offence. So instead they reminisced about their very first encounter, exactly one year ago today in faraway Patadragonia, when Algy had endeavoured to placate the fire-breathing creature with Shakespeare’s famous sonnet.
Worried that, if he were to expand abruptly, he might damage the wheel and upset all the other wee riders, Algy decided that the best thing to do was hop off again and continue waiting at a safer distance. After all, if the wheel did start to turn while he was still a suitable size, he should be able to fly up onto his seat without too much difficulty.
The dusk deepened into increasing darkness, and Algy was just about to give up and dismount, feeling rather disappointed, when - without any warning - the magical cherry blossom suddenly lit up, the wheel started turning, and fairground music began to play…
Algy was absolutely thrilled, and as he rode joyfully round and round on the tiny wheel, he sang along with the music:
By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea! You and me, you and me, oh how happy we’ll be!
** Best viewed full screen
[This video features an original soundtrack by Algy’s assistants, based on the melody of the early 20th century popular song By the beautiful sea.]
Algy’s little green dragon friend demanded to know more about his adventures on Easter Island a year ago, and so Algy recounted the story of the ferris wheel which had sadly seemed much too tiny for a large fluffy bird to ride upon, until the magical cherry blossom had shrunk him down to a miniature size…
Algy could still hardly believe that he could have taken such a ride, but the incontrovertible video evidence (acquired by some mysterious and magical means) proves beyond any doubt that he did ❣️
On Easter Monday - as though they were in Scotland and not on the magical Easter Island - the Easter bunny invited Algy to indulge in a wee spot of pace egging, but as they didn’t have a sloping hillside handy, they had to roll their eggs on the flat grass…
When indulging in the activity of pace egging it is traditional to sing an old folk song, and indeed to beg for some money, eggs, or beer, but as neither Algy nor the Easter bunny have very good singing voices, and they don’t much care for beer, they decided to leave the singing to those better qualified…
Here’s one two three jolly lads all in one mind, We have come a pace egging and we hope you’ll prove kind; And we hope you’ll prove kind, with your eggs and strong beer, And we’ll come no more nigh you until the next year.
Happy Spring and Happy Easter to you all
[Note: the word pace in this context has nothing to do with speed, but is an old English version of the Latin word for Easter - Pascha]
While Algy was chatting with the little green dragon among the Easter cherry blossom, he told his odd wee friend many stories of his adventures on the mysterious Easter Island, where he had found himself this time last year, and it occurred to him that perhaps some of his new friends might like to see what he had got up to last Easter Monday in that magical faraway place.
It was Easter time at last, and spring was advancing with its magical, unstoppable force, even in the wild west Highlands of Scotland. The weather was uncomfortably cool, wet and windy, but the more it rained, the faster spring leaped forward, and Algy observed that his assistants’ garden was bursting into life at a remarkably rapid rate.
Algy’s strange wee friend, the little green dragon, had never seen a spectacle of this kind before and was glowing at a varying speed in perplexity, while Algy himself - who had witnessed the same miracle each year - found that he was astonished and thrilled anew by the incredible transformation. Of all the blossom and flowers in April he especially loved the beautiful white cherries, which despite the inhospitable climate rarely failed to bloom in all their glory.
So from his perch in a windswept cherry tree, Algy wishes you all a very Happy Easter, and hopes that whether you are twenty or seventy, or fifteen or fifty or ninety-five, you will pause and take time to “look at things in bloom” and delight in the wonderful blossoming of spring:
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now Is hung with bloom along the bough, And stands about the woodland ride Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten, Twenty will not come again, And take from seventy springs a score, It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom Fifty springs are little room, About the woodlands I will go To see the cherry hung with snow.
[Algy is quoting the poem Loveliest of trees from the collection A Shropshire Lad by the late 19th century/early 20th century English poet and classical scholar A E Housman.]
The little green dragon had a fearsome expression on its face, as it was feeling both perplexed and frustrated. It could not understand why the flowers in the box had changed colour and shape, for when it had first seen them they had looked entirely different. It had little understanding of Nature, despite being a most remarkable natural phenomenon itself, and as botany was rarely studied in the dragon’s arid homeland of faraway Patadragonia, the funny wee creature knew nothing at all about the cultivation and lifecycles of flowering plants.
And it was greatly frustrated as well… When Algy pointed with delight to some beautiful blue hyacinths in the centre of the box, the little green dragon simply frowned, for try as it might, it simply could not glow in that colour. It was happiest glowing in varying hues of green, orange or red, and it could manage yellow reasonably well, as least for a short period of time - or even a reddish kind of purple if absolutely necessary - but blue was the one colour which completely defied it.
It sighed a loud and heartfelt little-green-dragonish sigh, disturbing a large bumblebee which was happily inspecting the fragrant blue hyacinth, and as the bee buzzed away to find other attractive flowers, the dragon followed it with a resentful eye.
Algy laughed, and tried to comfort his friend. “Don’t be like that,” he said. “We can’t always glow in the all the colours we want to! Look at me… I can’t even glow at all! I’m just fluffy. Don’t try to combat Nature - just enjoy the flowers!”
“Nature” is what we see— The Hill—the Afternoon— Squirrel—Eclipse—the Bumble bee— Nay—Nature is Heaven— Nature is what we hear— The Bobolink—the Sea— Thunder—the Cricket— Nay—Nature is Harmony— Nature is what we know— Yet have no art to say— So impotent Our Wisdom is To her Simplicity.
[Algy is quoting the poem Nature is what we see by the 19th century American poet Emily Dickinson.]
It had been a braw week in the wild west Highlands of Scotland, albeit a wee bit on the chilly side, and Algy and his little green dragon friend had made the most of the unusually fine spring sunshine, for the weather ahead did not look so good… in fact the forecast suggested that it was about to start raining, and would then continue non-stop, in dense Scotch mist, until Wednesday of next week…
But for the moment all was bright and beautiful, and even tolerably warm at ground level, which caused the little green dragon to emit a happy orange glow as he chatted with Algy among the pretty spring flowers. As Algy looked at the primroses around them, he remembered an odd little poem by William Wordsworth, and - wondering whether his funny wee friend had ever eaten strawberries - he anticipated what he fervently hoped would be a bountiful strawberry harvest in months to come, even though he had observed that the strawberry plants in his assistants’ garden were not even thinking about flowering just yet…
Pull the primrose, sister Anne! Pull as many as you can. –Here are daisies, take your fill; Pansies, and the cuckoo-flower: Of the lofty daffodil Make your bed, or make your bower; Fill your lap, and fill your bosom; Only spare the strawberry-blossom!
Primroses, the Spring may love them– Summer knows but little of them: Violets, a barren kind, Withered on the ground must lie; Daisies leave no fruit behind When the pretty flowerets die; Pluck them, and another year As many will be blowing here.
God has given a kindlier power To the favoured strawberry-flower. Hither soon as spring is fled You and Charles and I will walk; Lurking berries, ripe and red, Then will hang on every stalk, Each within its leafy bower; And for that promise spare the flower!
[Algy is quoting most of the poem Foresight by the 19th century English poet William Wordsworth.]
It was the first weekend of spring in the wild west Highlands of Scotland, and although it could hardly be said to be warm, even in that much coveted but rarely discovered “sheltered spot out of the wind”, Algy found the sunshine quite dazzling after the endless months of darkness.
So he tucked himself down behind another patch of daffodils, together with his little dragon friend - who was glowing so brightly with the fresh colours of spring that he almost rivalled the flowers themselves - and they spent a happy day relaxing in Algy’s assistants’ garden, discussing such profound topics as the question of why not all daffodils are yellow, while Algy’s assistants indulged in the hard labour which is the duty of all gardeners at this season of the year.
As they chatted, Algy told the little green dragon that, owing to the magic that is tumblr, the image of their rainbow dance had reached many new friends, all around the world…
And so Algy sends very special fluffy hugs to all his new followers - and, of course, to all those friends who have been following his adventures for some time - and he hopes that you will all have a chance to relax in some pleasant sunshine this weekend…
Spring had arrived at last, and although the air and wind were still cold, there was a quality of warmth in the vernal sunshine which Algy had not felt for six months or more - not to mention an enormous increase in the quantity and intensity of light, which was almost too bright to contemplate after the endless months of dreary darkness under perpetual rain clouds.
Few creatures could resist the joys of such a spring day, and Algy and his little green dragon friend were no exception. When they saw a large clump of daffodils opening their petals in the sun they rushed towards them and revelled in the glory of the golden trumpets.
As Algy watched his friend inspect the unfamiliar flowers, he was delighted to observe that there were several bumblebees buzzing around them, and all the birds of the vicinity were helping to celebrate the coming of spring in their own individual voices. Some only managed a chirrup or a tweet, and some proclaimed their opinions with an incessant “widgy widgy widgy widgy widgy”, but for a moment Algy caught the beautiful sound of the first skylark of the season, singing in the heavens, and he smiled a very large fluffy bird smile.
Resting on the mossy ground under the daffodils, it was inevitable that Algy was reminded of Wordsworth’s famous verses, for, like the poet, he “could not but be gay in such a jocund company”… although, basking in the sunshine with the little green dragon beside him, Algy was neither wandering nor feeling the slightest bit lonely.
So he hopes you will forgive him if he repeats the often-quoted poem once more for the sake of his dragon friend, for he suspects that the funny wee creature may not have had the usual advantages of a literary education when young
I wander’d lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host of golden daffodils, Beside the lake, beneath the trees Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the milky way, They stretch’d in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced, but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: - A poet could not but be gay In such a jocund company! I gazed - and gazed - but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought.
For oft, when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills And dances with the daffodils.
[Algy is of course quoting the famous poem Daffodils by the 19th century English poet William Wordsworth.]
