Birding Bond

j_w_pepper

Well, maybe the next thread should be "Pigging Bond" or something.

RichardTheBruce

@Birdleson, working in Alaska and in the course of my job I'd share what birds I'd seen recently. And my counterpart would let me know what they tasted like.

@j_w_pepper, remember the pig in The Living Daylights...so, possibilities, sure.

RichardTheBruce

Of course with You Only Live Twice and Tomorrow Never Dies covered, it came to mind another possibility. They're three of a kind, really.

Added above, between the two: The Spy Who Loved Me, Lewis Gilbert, 1977.

RichardTheBruce

Okay, I need to take a lesson from ornithologist James Bond that the Frigatebird and Man-of-war bird are one and the same (though different from the Portuguese Man-of-War, warships, and the famous racehorse). So more Fleming mentions below.

Live and Let Die, Ian Fleming, 1954.
Chapter XXIII - Passionate Leave

LIKE dangling emerald pendants the two humming-birds were making their last rounds of the hibiscus and a mocking bird had started on its evening song, sweeter than a nightingale's, from the summit of a bush of night-scented jasmine.

The jagged shadow of a man-of-war bird floated across the green Bahama grass of the lawn as it sailed on the air currents up the coast to some distant colony, and a slate-blue kingfisher chattered angrily as it saw the man sitting in the chair in the garden. It changed its flight and swerved off across the sea to the island. A brimstone butterfly flirted among the purple shadows under the palms.

The graded blue waters of the bay were quite still. The cliffs of the island were a deep rose in the light of the setting sun behind the house.

There was a smell of evening and of coolness after a hot day and a slight scent of peat-smoke that came from cassava being roasted in one of the fishermen's huts in the village away to the right.

Solitaire came out of the house and walked on naked feet across the lawn. She was carrying a tray with a cocktail shaker and two glasses. She put it down on a bamboo table beside Bond's chair.

'I hope I've made it right,' she said. 'Six to one sounds terribly strong. I've never had Vodka Martinis before.'

RichardTheBruce

Live and Let Die, Ian Fleming, 1954.
Chapter XIX - Valley of Shadows

...
There were no big fish about, but many lobsters were out of their holes looking huge and prehistoric in the magnifying lens of the water. Their stalk-like eyes glared redly at him and their foot-long spined antennae asked him for the password. Occasionally they scuttled nervously backwards into their shelters, their powerful tails kicking up the sand, and crouched on the tips of their eight hairy feet, waiting for the danger to pass. Once the great streamers of a Portuguese man-of-war floated slowly by. They almost reached his head from the surface, fifteen feet away, and he remembered the whiplash of a sting from the contact of one of their tendrils that had burned for three of his days at Manatee Bay. If they caught a man across the heart they could kill him. He saw several green and speckled moray eels, the latter moving like big yellow and black snakes along patches of sand, the green ones baring their teeth from some hole in the rock, and several West Indian blowfish, like brown owls with huge soft green eyes. He poked at one with the end of his gun and it swelled out to the size of a football and became a mass of dangerous white spines. Wide sea fans swayed and beckoned in the eddies, and in the grey valleys they caught the light of the moon and waved spectrally, like fragments of the shrouds of men buried at sea. Often in the shadows there were unexplained, heavy movements and swirls in the water and the sudden glare of large eyes at once extinguished. Then Bond would whirl round, thumbing up the safety-catch on his harpoon gun, and stare back into the darkness. But he shot at nothing and nothing attacked him as he scrambled and slithered through the reef.

Dr. No, Ian Fleming, 1958.
Chapter XIV - Come Into My Parlour

...
Bond's eye caught a swirl of movement in the dark glass. He walked across the room. A silvery spray of small fish with a bigger fish in pursuit fled across the dark blue. They disappeared, so to speak, off the edge of the screen. What was this? An aquarium? Bond looked upwards. A yard below the ceiling, small waves were lapping at the glass. Above the waves was a strip of greyer blue-black, dotted with sparks of light. The outlines of Orion were the clue. This was not an aquarium. This was the sea itself and the night sky. The whole of one side of the room was made of armoured glass. They were under the sea, looking straight into its heart, twenty feet down.

Bond and the girl stood transfixed. As they watched, there was the glimpse of two great goggling orbs. A golden sheen of head and deep flank showed for an instant and was gone. A big grouper? A silver swarm of anchovies stopped and hovered and sped away. The twenty-foot tendrils of a Portuguese man-o'-war drifted slowly across the window, glinting violet as they caught the light. Up above there was the dark mass of its underbelly and the outline of its inflated bladder, steering with the breeze.

Bond walked along the wall, fascinated by the idea of living with this slow, endlessly changing moving picture. A frig tulip . shell was progressing slowly up the window from the floor level, a frisk of demoiselles and angel fish and a ruby-red moonlight snapper were nudging and rubbing themselves against a corner of the glass and a sea centipede quested along, nibbling at the minute algae that must grow every day on the outside of the window. A long dark shadow paused in the centre of the window and then moved slowly away. If only one could see more!

RichardTheBruce

Diamonds Are Forever, Ian Fleming, 1956.
Chapter 11 - Shy Smile

"Don't worry," said Bond. "I'll be on the doorstep with my boots and my saddle while the coyotes are still baying at the moon."

Bond woke on time and there was a wonderful freshness in the air as he followed the limping figure of Leiter through the half light that filtered through the elms among the waking stables. In the east, the sky was pearly grey and iridescent, like a toy balloon filled with cigarette smoke, and among the shrubs the mocking birds were beginning their first song. Blue smoke rose straight up in the air from the fires in the camps behind the stables and there was a smell of coffee and wood-smoke and dew. There was the clank of pails and the other small noises of men and horses in the early morning and as they moved out from under the trees to the white wooden rail that bordered the track, a file of blanketed horses came by with a boy at each head, holding the leading rein right up close to the bit and talking with soft roughness to their charges. "Hey, lazybones, pick yo feet up. Giddap. You sho ain't no Man-O-War dis mornin'."

"They'll be getting ready for the morning works," said Leiter. "The gallops. This is the time the trainers hate most. When the owners come."

Goldfinger, Ian Fleming, 1959.
Chapter 17 - Hoods' Congress

...
Bond said casually, 'How many staff have you got?'

'Twenty. Ten Koreans and ten Germans. They are all excellent men, hand picked. Much goes on in this building. It is like below-decks in a man-of-war.' Goldfinger laid his hands flat on the table in front of him. 'And now, your duties. Miss Masterton, you will take notes of any practical points that arise, anything that is likely to require action by me. Do not bother with the argument and chatter. Right?'

Bond was glad to see that Tilly Masterton now looked bright and businesslike. She nodded briskly, 'Certainly.'

'And, Mr Bond, I shall be interested in any reactions you may have to the speakers. I know a great deal about all these people. In their own territories they are paramount chiefs. They are only here because I have bribed them to come. They know nothing of me and I need to persuade them that I know what I am talking about and will lead them to success. Greed will do the rest. But there may be one or more who wish to back out. They will probably reveal themselves. In their cases I have made special arrangements. But there may be doubtful ones. During the talk, you will scribble with your pencil on this agenda. Casually you will note with a plus or a minus sign opposite the names whether you consider each one for or against the project. I shall be able to see what sign you have made. Your views may be useful. And do not forget, Mr Bond, that one traitor among them, one backslider, and we could quickly find ourselves either dead or in prison for life.'

"Who is this Pussy Galore from Harlem?'

CommanderRoss

I'm sorry @RichardTheBruce , I had no intend to insult (too much). The pigging threat might not last long, but 'Fishing Bond' sure will give some interesting things to dish up.


Anyone a Hildebrand Rarity?

And the only aviation link I found, in development the 'Frigate Freejet':

RichardTheBruce

CommanderRoss wrote: »

I'm sorry @RichardTheBruce , I had no intend to insult (too much). The pigging threat might not last long, but 'Fishing Bond' sure will give some interesting things to dish up.

Insulted? Not in the slightest, @CommanderRoss, it's good to mine as far as we can then add a touch of scrutiny.

For a Fishing Bond discussion, nice suggestion. If we get there you can be sure it'll kick off with one of my favorite pieces of fan art that celebrates the best spirit of adventure and fun and potential Bond has to offer.

j_w_pepper

You're gonna need a bigger boat.

Agent_99

This has nothing to do with anything but I thought @RichardTheBruce might like it:



(Also, you've turned me into a weirdo who stands in the wine aisle at Tesco inspecting the labels for Bond connections, so thanks for that.)

RichardTheBruce

Love it, @Agent_99, passerines are perching birds, includes all songbirds like the sparrows on the label. Italian, huh. I'd buy that.

Regarding the new outlook on the spirits aisle (building on the Silva theme). I changed. Your nature. Or at least your behavior. What can I say, I'm motivated by my duty. Or did I already say that. Anyway, anyone will think you're an expert.

Agent_99

I have a friend who worked in the wine industry for many years, and she told me that, according to in-depth investigations by her and her colleagues, wine with an animal/bird on the label is always a good buy.

I'll keep you posted on any wines with rats on the label.

j_w_pepper

Speaking of birds on labels, I myself wouldn't pass up a Famous Grouse or Wild Turkey now...

j_w_pepper

RichardTheBruce wrote: »

Love it, @Agent_99, passerines are perching birds, includes all songbirds like the sparrows on the label. Italian, huh. I'd buy that.

@RichardTheBruce, I found your reference to passerines because of the name Passerina is only half the story.

Apart from the obvious connection to passerines (any of about 5,100 species among the order of Passeriformes), "Passerina" also denotes both a group of birds in the cardinal family (buntings) AND most importantly also a grape variety from, you guessed it, Italy.

I therefore assume that the name on the bottle is really meant to denote the grape variety (after all, it seems to be Tesco's own brand). The birds look indeed like sparrows. Passerines, no doubt, but no "Passerinas" which are more colourful.

RichardTheBruce

Good work, @j_w_pepper, and you've got me on the watch for Passerina wines. And wines from those grapes.

RichardTheBruce

Falcons (Falco) appeared on pages 12-13. There is also the Hobby.


Hobby / ˈhä·bē / noun
1. an enjoyable pastime done at leisure
2. a pony or small horse, even a toy horse
3. a small bird of prey

Middle English (hobyn, hoby, nicknames for Robin).

Hobby (Hypotriorchis): a small falcon, long and narrow wings. Four named Hobbies. Like all falcons, specialists in aerial acquisition of prey, on the wing. Bird and insect alike, even the fastest birds are on the menu—literally swifter than swifts. Identified by dark slaty grey coloring, downward black-striped cheeks, black streaks on belly, black (or very dark-banded) tails. From the Falco lineage.

Eurasian hobby (F. subbuteo)
African hobby (F. cuvierii)
Oriental hobby (F. severus)
Australian hobby or little falcon (F. longipennis)

Eurasian hobby.



African hobby.

Oriental hobby.


Australian hobby or little falcon.

RichardTheBruce

Casino Royale, Ian Fleming, 1953.
Chapter 5 - The Girl From Headquarters

He shrugged away the momentary feeling of unease and walked round the back of his hotel and down the ramp to the garage. Before his rendezvous at the Hermitage he decided to take his car down the coast road and have a quick look at Le Chiffre's villa and then drive back by the inland road until it crossed the route nationale to Paris.

Bond's car was his only personal hobby. One of the last of the 4½ litre Bentleys with the supercharger by Amherst Villiers, he had bought it almost new in 1933 and had kept it in careful storage through the war. It was still serviced every year and, in London, a former Bentley mechanic, who worked in a garage near Bond's Chelsea flat, tended it with jealous care. Bond drove it hard and well and with an almost sensual pleasure. It was a battleship gray convertible coupe, which really did convert, and it was capable of touring at ninety with thirty miles an hour in reserve.

Bond eased the car out of the garage and up the ramp and soon the loitering drum beat of the two inch exhaust was echoing down the tree lined boulevard, through the crowded main street of the little town, and off through the sand dunes to the south.

An hour later, Bond walked into the Hermitage bar and chose a table near one of the broad windows.

RichardTheBruce

Diamonds Are Forever, Ian Fleming, 1956.
Chapter 10 – Studillac to Saratoga

…
Their employers were not gamblers in the tradition of old Col. E. R. Bradley who was a stately man of courteous deportment. But there are those who tell me that his gambling bazaar at Palm Beach would go along with a mark until his score piled up too high.

Then, according to those who have gone against Bradley's games, mechanics took over and used any device that would keep the house solvent. It delights those who recollect Bradley when they read his canonization as a philanthropist whose hobby was giving the rich a little divertisement denied them by the state of Florida. But, compared to the lice who controlled Saratoga, Col. Bradley is entitled to all the praise he gets in the remembrances of the sentimentalists.

The track at Saratoga is a ramshackle pile of kindling- wood, and the climate is hot and humid. There are some, such as Al Vanderbilt and Jock Whitney, who are sportsmen in the obsolete sense of the identification. Horse-racing is their game and they are too good for it. So are such trainers as Bill Winfrey, who sent Native Dancer to the races. There are jockeys who would bust you in the nose if you propositioned them to pull a horse.

They enjoy Saratoga and they must be glad that the likes of Lucky Luciano are gone from the rube town that flourished because it allowed tough guys to fleece the drop-ins. The bookmakers were yegged as they left the track in the era of the hand-books. There was one called Kid Tatters who was relieved of $50,000 in the parking lot. The heist guys told him they intended to kidnap him if he didn't come up with more.

RichardTheBruce

Goldfinger, Ian Fleming, 1959.
Chapter 19 – Secret Appendix

Tilly Masterton was equally reserved. She worked like a machine - quick, willing, accurate, but uncommunicative. She responded with cool politeness to Bond's early attempts to make friends, share his thoughts with her. By the evening, he had learnt nothing about her except that she had been a successful amateur ice-skater in between secretarial work for Unilevers. Then she had started getting star parts in ice-shows. Her hobby had been indoor pistol and rifle shooting and she had belonged to two marksman clubs. She had few friends. She had never been in love or engaged. She lived by herself in two rooms in Earls Court. She was twenty-four. Yes, she realized that they were in a bad fix. But something would turn up. This Fort Knox business was nonsense. It would certainly go wrong. She thought Miss Pussy Galore was 'divine'. She somehow seemed to count on her to get her out of this mess. Women, with a sniff, were rather good at things that needed finesse. Instinct told them what to do. Bond was not to worry about her. She would be all right.

RichardTheBruce

For Your Eyes Only, Ian Fleming, 1960.
“The Hildebrand Rarity”

…
Mr Krest came across the carpet and held out his hand. "You Bond? Glad to have you aboard, sir."

Bond was expecting the bone-crushing grip and parried it with stiffened muscles.

"Free-diving or aqualung?"

"Free, and I don't go deep. It's only a hobby."

"Whadya do the rest of the time?"

"Civil Servant."

Mr Krest gave a short barking laugh. "Civility and Servitude. You English make the best goddam butlers and valets in the world. Civil Servant, you say? I reckon we're likely to get along fine. Civil Servants are just what I like to have around me."

RichardTheBruce

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Ian Fleming, 1963.
Chapter 20 – M en Pontoufles

…
'I think it must be him, sir. I was really getting the authentic smell of him on the last day - yesterday, that is. It seems a long time ago already.'

'You were lucky to run into this girl. Who is she? Some old flame of yours?' M's mouth turned down at the corners.

'More or less, sir. She came into my report on the first news we got that Blofeld was in Switzerland. Daughter of this man Draco, head of the Union Corse. Her mother was an English governess.'

'Hm. Interesting breeding. Now then. Time for lunch. I told Hammond we weren't to be disturbed.' M got up and pressed the bell by the fire-place. "Fraid we've got to go through the turkey and plum pudding routine. Mrs Hammond's been brooding over her pots and pans for weeks. Damned sentimental rubbish.'

Hammond appeared at the door, and Bond followed M through and into the small dining-room beyond the hall whose walls glittered with M's other hobby, the evolution of the naval cutlass. They sat down. M said, with mock ferocity, to Hammond, 'All right, Chief Petty Officer Hammond. Do your worst.' And then, with real vehemence, 'What in hell are those things doing here?' He pointed at the centre of the table.

'Crackers, sir," said Hammond stolidly. 'Mrs Hammond thought that seeing as you have company...'

RichardTheBruce

You Only Live Twice, Ian Fleming, 1963.
Chapter 4 – Dikko on the Ginza

…
Bond said, 'But what sort of a chap is this Tanaka? Is he your enemy or your friend?'

'Both. More of a friend probably. At least I'd guess so. I amuse him. His CIA pals don't. He loosens up with me. We've got things in common. We share a pleasure in the delights of samsara - wine and women. He's a great cocks-man. I also have ambitions in that direction. I've managed to keep him out of two marriages. Trouble with Tiger is he always wants to marry 'em. He's paying cock-tax, that's alimony in the Australian vernacular, to three already. So he's acquired an ON with regard to me. That's an obligation - almost as important in the Japanese way of life as "face". When you have an ON, you're not very, happy until you've discharged it honourably, if you'll pardon the bad pun. And if a man makes you a present of a salmon, you mustn't repay him with a shrimp. It's got to be with an equally larg« salmon - larger if possible, so that then you've jumped the man, and now he has an ON with regard to you, and you're guides in morally, socially and spiritually - and the last one's the most important. Well now. Tiger's ON towards me is a very powerful one, very difficult to discharge. He's paid little slices of it off with various intelligence dope. He's paid off another big slice by accepting your presence here and giving you an interview so soon after your arrival. If you'd been an ordinary supplicant, -it might have taken you weeks. He'd have given you a fat dose of shikiri-naoshi - that's making you wait, giving you the great stone face. The sumo wrestlers use it in the ring to make an opponent look and feel small in front of the audience. Got it? So you start with that in your favour. He would be predisposed to do what you want because that would remove all his ON towards me and, by his accounting, stick a whole packet of ON on my back towards him. But it's not so simple as that. All Japanese have permanent ON towards their superiors, the Emperor, their ancestors and the Japanese gods. This they can only discharge by doing "the right thing". Not easy, you'll say. Because how can you know what the higher echelon thinks is the right thing? Well, you get out of that by doing what the bottom of the ladder thinks right - i.e. your immediate superiors. That passes the buck, psychologically, on to the , Emperor, and he's got to make his peace with ancestors and gods. But that's all right with him, because he embodies all the echelons above him, so he can get on with dissecting fish, which is his hobby, with a clear conscience. Got it? It's not really as mysterious as it sounds. Much the same routine as operates in big corporations, like ICI or Shell, or in the Services, except with them the ladder stops at the Board of Directors or the Chiefs of Staff. It's easier that way. You don't have to involve the Almighty and your great-grandfather in a decision to cut the price of aspirin by a penny a bottle.'

RichardTheBruce

Dr. No, Terence Young, 1962.

Pleydell Smith: The set was still switched on when we came round. We tried to get through, but it was dead the other end.

Bond: And it'll stay dead. All frequencies are changed immediately security's broken.

Pleydell Smith: Receipt from Dent Laboratories.

Bond: Is geology a hobby of Strangways'?

Pleydell Smith: Not that I know of, no.

Bond: Who's the man with Strangways?

Pleydell Smith: One of the local fishermen.

Bond: He drove the car that tailed me. That gives us something to work on.

Pleydell Smith: I'll have him checked.

RichardTheBruce

The Living Daylights, John Glen, 1987.

Whitaker: How do you like my pantheon of great commanders?

Pushkin: Butchers.

Whitaker: Surgeons. They cut away society's dead flesh. Let me show you something. At ease, Sergeant. This way, sir. My hobby - the strategy and tactics of the world's historic battles. Afghanistan, the North-West Frontier. The initial trial of the first automatic machine gun. The .303 calibre Maxim. The King's Royal Rifles wiped out a vastly superior force. Kept the British in Afghanistan for another 25 years. What you Russians need nowadays is the equivalent of a modern Maxim.

RichardTheBruce

Tomorrow Never Dies, Roger Spottiswoode, 1997.

Dr. Kaufman: Okay, I ask. This is very embarrassing. It seems there is a red box in your car. They can't get to it. They want me to make you unlock the car. I feel like an idiot. I don't know what to say. I am to torture you if you don't do it.

Bond: You have a doctorate in that too?

Dr. Kaufman: No, no, no. This is more like a hobby. But I'm very gifted.

Bond: Oh, I believe you. My cell phone opens the car.

Dr. Kaufman: No, Mr. Bond. I do it, ja?

RichardTheBruce

Skyfall, Sam Mendes, 2012.

England. The Empire! MI6! You're living in a ruin as well, you just don't know it yet. At least here there are no old ladies giving orders and no little...Bip! Gadgets from those fools in Q-Branch. If you wanted, you could pick your own secret missions. As I do. Name it. Name it. Destabilize a multinational by manipulating stocks...Bip. Easy. Interrupt transmissions from a spy satellite over Kabul... Done. Hmm. Rig an election in Uganda. All to the highest bidder.

Bond: Or a gas explosion in London.

Silva: Just point and click.

Bond: Well, everybody needs a hobby.

Silva: So what's yours?

Bond: Resurrection.

CommanderRoss

Which brings us to Hobby Airport: Houston international airport.



and the USS Hobby (DD 610)



USS William M. Hobby (APD-95), ex-DE-236



Wonder where the name 'hobby'comes from, as it's called 'baumfalke'in German and 'boomvalk' in Dutch, which both translate to 'tree falcon'.

Thunderfinger

Revelator

One could say this thread was Richard's hobby-horse.

j_w_pepper

It sure is...but that's what it takes to run it.