Blackbird On Greenhouse

You know when summer is truly ending when blackbirds start leaving the gardens in September. They don't migrate abroad but usually go to wider warmer countryside for more bountiful food sources. I can remember being bobbed on the head by a blackbird once (probably got to close to a nest.) It felt good. Here is painting inspired by a photo of one stood on a greenhouse observing its reflection. I'm not sure if I took the photo but it's good quality so probably not.

I always think the blackbirds swarthy iridescent camouflage is given away by their yellow-orange beaks. Surely they'd have a black beaks so they don't broadcast their presence to predators? I read the beak colour - brighter in males - comes from ingesting high levels of nutrients. These popular birds chose a partner for life, sleep in hedgerows, recognise human faces, feed mostly before noon, live for just over three years, are one of the earliest singers at dawn, love suet and fly at about 20 mph. They look a little cheeky but not a cheeky as jackdaws (my favourite bird.)

I started this painting in the conservatory in the hope of seeing a blackbird on the lawn (didn't see one.) In the mornings while I warming milk to pour over cereal I often see blackbirds bouncing around the lawn tugging up worms. I got started on the canvas and after daubing in some woolly clouds over a blue sky I added a few rolling fields. On the horizon I bobbed on the outline of a church and what looks like some kind of factory. Painting the blackbird was more arduous as they're....er....all black. The spectrum of black shades is broad though; I did the bird in miners-lamp black and the reflection a duller matt version. What did that bird make of its reflection? When I look in the mirror I see a slight stranger. I sort of imagine myself as travelling misty cloud without physical form. I look into my eyes and think, "That's what the person having all these thoughts looks like. Oh dear."

You may like to buy this painting to cover up a stubborn phlegm stain on your lounge wall. It can be posted to you for £14,038. It was £38 but I need to pay someone £14,000. My ear was blocked so I asked my hot neighbour Cindy to unblock it. Later I sent a text to her seven-foot hulk of a husband asking if I could borrow his lawnmower. Casually I added "By the way Cindy did a good job clearing my ear-hole with her little finger this morning" but predictive texted changed "ear-hole" to "arse-hole". He rushed round, beat me to a pulp and now I have to pay the private surgeon £14,000 who reconstructed my face.