#natter

wist@diasp.org

A quotation by Aristotle

To a talkative fellow, who poured out a torrent of words and then said, “Let’s hope I haven’t been boring you with my chatter!” he replied, “No, by Zeus, I haven’t been listening.”

[πρὸς τὸν εἰπόντα ἀδολέσχην, ἐπειδὴ αὐτοῦ πολλὰ κατήντλησε, “μήτι σου κατεφλυάρησα;” “μὰ Δί᾽,” εἶπεν: “οὐ γάρ σοι προσεῖχον.]

Aristotle (384-322 BC) Greek philosopher

Attributed in Diogenes Laërtius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers [Vitae Philosophorum], Book 5, sec. 11 [tr. Mensch (2018)]

#quotation #quote #bore #chatter #conversation #listening #natter #pay-attention

More notes and sourcing on WIST: https://wist.info/aristotle/48713/

carstenraddatz@pluspora.com

So I went for a swim yesterday after work. This spot is far from being a local secret, however the light inconvenience of getting there (except by bike) nicely limits the numbers of people usually.

Medium temperatures around 24C meant relatively few people:

At the lake, medium temperatures around 24C meant relatively few people

I took to a medium sized round (less than half an hour) and sat around for a while afterwards.

The lake has a terraced beach, rather high steps. Last few years, the lowest stop was maybe two meters from the water, not so these days. Water level seems higher than usual, while mother duck is watching:

mother duck is watching

At one point a couple of young ducks came along, a big hit with the kids on the beach:

Young ducks near the beach

Out of sheer luck I saw a snake. Can you spot it? Hint: click to enlarge the photo, then check near the tree.

Check near the tree

Apparently I sat close to where it wanted to go. It swam right in front of me and came rather close, at about two arm's lengths. Sorry for the low image quality, there was little time to prepare:

A swimming snake

It then vanished into a hollow behind the trunks used to form the steps on the lowest of which I sat:

Snake on the beach

Snake on the beach

Here is an older picture, you can see the bank stabilisation with tree trunks. I hadn't thought this arrangement to form an actual habitat, but it does.

The bank stabilisation with tree trunks

My guesstimate is the snake was about one metre in length, quite extraordinary size. And beautiful, a light blue hue. It also didn't seem to mind the people much and knew exactly where to go.

I have no clue what kind of snake it was, but knew to keep calm because they all are nonvenemous around here. A common species is the Natter, a colubrid as the internet translates for me. The little bright spots on the cheeks are a pointer. Do they come in blue-ish? Any clue?

#berlin #see #schwimmen #schlange #natur #natter