Today is Food Day (yeah, we were counting down on our calendars too) and this means there’s a plethora of goodness waiting for you! Stop by John Jay Lounge for an an assortment of foods: kale cheese chips, some cheese platter with a little bird (they’re everywhere) crafted from apple slices, and various other healthy foods.
A tipster also reported that the Hillel Souper Troopers are on College Walk with soup on-hand. Food Day! Who’da known.
Yesterday afternoon, a small green bird infiltrated the 11th floor of Wien and try to update his/her Twitter status on an unsuspecting upperclassmen’s Macbook Pro. This is only the latest in a series of animal incursions into our purportedly urban habitat. You may recall last year’s bats in Hartley and squirrels in Claremont. Maybe they are trying to tell us something?
Unexpected acts: On Thursday night, NYU held a “mystery concert” (featuring Flying Lotus, Gang Gang Dance, and Light Asylum) which got rave reviews. At Columbia, we still have to plan our concerts months in advance. (NYULocal)
Unexpected calendars: Forget firemen. Now you can check out hot New York City bus drivers and semi-famous Republican women. (NYDN, Clare Booth)
Unexpected places with animals: A pet cat waiting to be put on a flight with its owner escaped into JFK airport. Meanwhile, this bird in a crowded mall tried to go down an “up” escalator. (CityRoom, Jezebel)
Unexpected radio hosts: Former governor David Paterson now has his own radio talk-show on AM 710. Unsurprisingly, he likes his new job more than his old one.
Unexpected food: Weeds that grow downtown and taste like gasoline apparently make good guacamole. (CityRoom)
Unexpected Columbia roommates: Azar served in Iraq with his “battle buddy,” Alex, until Alex was badly wounded and taken out of the country for medical treatment. After a tour in Afghanistan, Azar enrolled in GS and encouraged Alex to do so as well. Now they’re roommates. (NYT)
Lucy from Google Images
B's on Bwoglines
Congress avoids a full government shutdown and passes a last-minute budget deal that plans to cut $38 million from federal spending. While Planned Parenthood and other groups that provide abortions should go relatively unharmed, President Obama admits that “some of the cuts accepted by Democrats ‘will be painful.’” (NYT)
Columbia superstar professor of mathematics and physics Brian Greene appears in the opening of an episode of The Big Bang Theory in a reading for his newest book, The Hidden Reality. Sheldon is not impressed by Greene’s dumbing down of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. (CBS)
A 17-year-old British high school student literally gets bored stiff in class, yawning so widely that she can’t close her mouth! Let this be a lesson to you all: if you’re too tired to go to class, just sleep in. Classroom fatigue could be hazardous to your health! (Daily Mail)
New Yorkers are catching up with Bwog’s love for Hawkmadinejad and taking hawk bird watching to the next level. First, it was a live nest cam of two hawks (Violet and Bobby) nesting outside of NYU President JSex’s office. Now, the new hawk to watch is Pale Male, whose womanizing ways are receiving major attention. (City Room)
Surprise of the century: New Yorkers love brunch. We guess it’s not just a HIMYM thing! This article even gives our beloved Community Food and Juice a shout out. (WSJ)
B Typography via Wikimedia Commons
Horrified by the Swan Wars of Prospect Park Lake, Brooklynites man the front lines. (City Room)
Apple receives patent for some pretty horrific-looking TV glasses. (Gawker)
No online reports means no repairs to your housing. Yeah, shocker, we all rely on the internet. (Spec)
A horribly low turnout marked yesterday’s run-off elections. DeBlasio and Liu won by large margins. (Gothamist)
Be afraid. The next time you fly, the War on Geese may strike close to home. (NY Post)
(For the record, Bwog is horrified by the previous error. The scary-faced Chinese indie rock show was indeed last Friday night)
Image via Flickr
Before her official classes begin, Hawkmadinebwog editor Courtney Douds spends the morning with an informal assembly of birders in Central Park.
Every Tuesday morning in September and October this year Richard Lieberman will lead birders through the Ramble of Central Park for the Linnaean Society of New York in search of warblers, raptors, waders, thrushes, and the many other birds that can be found in Central Park during the fall migration. Putting in my newly acquired contacts was not quite the best part of waking up, and the extra time needed to put in my eyes made me late for the 7:30 meetup at 72nd Street and Central Park West. However, it was easy to find the group of mostly 60 and up folks bunched together, necks craned back, staring at the trees with binoculars. They had moved about 20 feet in the ten minutes I had missed, and had found the first bird of the day, a female ruby-throated hummingbird.
I caught a glimpse of a broad-winged bird flapping across the nearby water and in my wishful thinking announced that I had seen a raptor, probably a red-tail. Another member of the group thought it was a night heron, and as we rounded the corner to Willow Rock, my amateur status was confirmed as we saw a lovely immature black-crowned night heron perched in the eponymous willow.
More story and photos after the jump.
Bwog tipster Tipper Austin, CC ’11, alerted us of the presence of a Bird Relocation Expert on campus. Worried that Our Hero may be in danger, we scurried out to College Walk and saw this van.
Hawkmadinejad, Winged Hero of Morningside, appears to have returned to campus. O, glorious return! Your bird has been spotted outside of Hamilton (correction: where he promptly devoured a pigeon), Butler (where he promptly devoured a pigeon) and Riverside and 109th. More photos of his fearfulness and sublimity below! Saakashtweety, prepare thyself.
Bwog just received the following Shocking Report from Lecture Hop editor Pierce Stanley, who’s currently staked out in Butler:
“There is a pigeon in the reference room right now, flying around trying to get out and walking alongside the books on the walls. Everyone is sort of watching and laughing.”
Quickly! What should we name him? Stanley suggests Webster, “in honor of one of the most seminal reference books ever.”
And if you’re in Butler and you have a camera, snap a picture of this delightful avian distraction and send it to bwog@columbia.edu.
UPDATE 9:14 PM: Saakashtweety it is!
Right this minute, on the lawn in front of John Jay, the hawk that’s been spotted near Lewisohn and the LLC is lunching on a pigeon. It swooped down and snatched it in dramatic fashion. Onlookers, please send in your photos and stories. Bored studiers, please suggest names for our hawk. Apparently, they’re territorial, so he/she may be around for a while.
- ACM
Tonight marks the first night of Chanukah. We have the Maccabees and their defeat of Seleucid Empire to thank for 8 nights of presents, gelt and latkes beginning in 25 minutes. (And our friends in states with agriculture-based economies to thank for sunset at 4:28pm tonight.)
Chabad house is celebrating by lighting an outlandishly-sized menorah (the press release claims “8ft!!”) on the steps of Low every night of Chanukah. Chabad’s combating the bitter, freezing cold with promises of free hot cider and donuts.
A happy Chanukah to all!
Meanwhile, the cycle of life and death continues to play out in front of Furnald. Reports are circulating of large bird (“hawk/falcon,” says a source) perched in front of the dorm and causing a disturbance within Furnald lawn’s regular crow population. Perhaps the “8ft!!” menorah will frighten the hawk/falcon back to the wilds and rectify the unbalance in Morningside Height’s ecosystem. It would be a Chanukah miracle.
UPDATE 5:14PM: Bird expert and Bwog tipster Courtney identifies the hawk/falcon as a juvenile red-tail hawk. And in the grand tradition of Maccabees vs. Antiochus IV and other battles of Chanukahs past, thus commences 8ft!! Menorah vs. Red-Tail Hawk.
Whether you’ve noticed or not (and whether you like them or not), there have been several pigeon nests on campus recently, baby pigeons included. Julia Kite gives the scoop on this campus bird trend — and includes cute pictures!
It’s understandable if you’ve never seen a baby pigeon. Formally known as “rock doves,” parents build their nests on small ledges, just as their wild ancestors constructed them in crevices on the cliffs of Europe. In the urban environment, this usually means a window ledge, underneath an air conditioner, or anywhere else they can find a stable platform and shelter from the elements.
When it comes to nest-building, pigeons don’t pay much attention to aesthetics. They typically throw a few dead pine needles and small twigs into a pile and let that suffice. Their own droppings, and later those of the chicks, bind this material together — not a pretty sight, and certainly not something you’d want to touch, so if you see a nest, leave it alone. An interesting fact is that pigeons almost always lay two eggs per clutch — never more. The male and female, who are closely bonded, will take turns sitting on the nest for about eighteen days.
Bwog recieved this picture and a panicked message from a camera phone a few minutes ago:
“I WAS WALKING DOWN BROADWAY AND THIS LITTLE AGE [sic] WAS SITTING INJURED ON THE SIDEWALK SOMEONE FIND A BIRD EXPERT. There as to be someone here for enviro day.We put him near this Tree at bArnard”
Save the bird! Make a friend!
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