Oh no, Eugene McCarthy was right

 

Ahem. Please don´t tell Eugene McCarthy and the creationists! 

Rare blue-and-green hybrid jay spotted in Texas

Azure-blue

 

Our favorite azure-blue goddess Nila or Shani Devi (supposedly a real Hindu deity according to ChatGPT), this time together with an azure-winged magpie. OK, so that was my idea. You know the story, anons. 

Winterland

 

Credit: John Dyson 

So I saw a sparrowhawk in a residential neighborhood earlier today. In a neighborhood, in fact, in which I *never* seen such a bird before. Wat means? No idea. It could be a co-incidence, but another possibility is that the winter is really cold this year, so the hawk has to scout unfamiliar territory. It did succesfully kill another bird (not sure what kind) and ate it. The local magpies gathered in a nearby bush and looked unhappy. I was surprised that they didn´t band together and attacked the hawk - are the raptors *that* badass?

Is this an omen? I mean, I half-jokingly declared the magpie to be my spirit-animal a while back. Of course, the magpies have been attacking the local Paridae for a while now, so if the hawk´s victim was a Pica, I suppose this was simply another natural cycle in the food chain... 

Goddess and the magpie

 

Wonderful, just wonderful. Shani Devi a.k.a. Lila together with a magpie! Try stopping me, fam. 

I´m still doing it, fam

 

This is supposed to be some kind of Himalayan/Tibetan crow, which I suppose is Tantrically appropriate...

Ahem

 

Hah hah, OK, I clearly don´t understand how the new ChatGPT picture generator is supposed to work, but sure, it´s kind of funny. 

Back to Godhead

 

Since totemism is "the world´s oldest religion", I semi-seriously wonder what´s my spirit-animal? And yes, I´m aware that totems and spirit-animals aren´t the same thing. But I can´t really contact my tribal ancestors 250,000 years ago, can I now?

I´ve always found magpies to be somewhat sympathetic (don´t tweet at me, bruh) so I suppose Pica pica pica might be it, I mean that Latin name is hilarious! And yes, it simply means "magpie magpie magpie". 

Another possibility is the black swan, since it´s a good symbol for sudden and unexpected spiritual enlightenment. You know, a black swan event. 

I´m somewhat partial to ants and termites, too...

Bird brains disprove materialism

 

Scientists have finally started to use "the brains God gave geese" and realized that (non-human) animals are - wait for it - conscious?! I mean, maaaan, who knew? Or was it *self*-conscious? Same thing.

No surprise there. But thanks for noticing, I suppose. What´s more intriguing is that different kinds of brains can give rise to the same kind of (self)-consciousness. Brainy creatures mentioned in the video above include humans, birds (and not just the inevitable corvids), crocs and even ants. 

So how can entirely distinct kinds of physical structures cause animals to be equally conscious? Please don´t tell the Idealists, LOL. 

Therefore God. 

Worship service

 

This time, with a Northern nutcracker. There! 

Kali yuga

 

- Nej, min käre korp, jag är inte förvånad,
brahminerna i Bharat gjorde ännu värre saker,
förfalskade t.o.m. soma, varför tror du
jag utvandrade till Bjarmaland?!

De förfalskar t.o.m. saffran...

Falsk saffran: så vet du om det röda guldet är oäkta

Nutcracker from Saturn

 

I love the idea of Nila having a diverse set of corvid mounts. An idea I came up with after a little, shall we say, misunderstanding with two of the more popular AI systems. Here is Nila (Shani´s Tantric shakti - or one of them?) with an adorable (and adorably over-sized) Clark´s Nutcracker. There are 139 species of corvids, so I can do this for three years!

Come and take it, boy.    

Come and take it

 

Another Saturday, another picture of Saturn´s (Shani´s) shakti Nila. This time, I made ChatGPT generate a picture of the goddess together with a Thick-billed Raven from the Horn of Africa, the largest corvid in the world. And no, they are not to scale...since the bird is supposed to be Nila´s mount!

I was a bit miffed when Gemini claimed that somehow, in some unspecified way, asking for a picture of Nila was "culturally insensitive" or whatever. So it struck me that it could be funny to pair her with non-Indian corvids. How´s that for cultural appropriation, huh huh? 

Childish, I know. But it´s a really great picture. And, dare I say it, a very scary bird. Perfect as a mount for a Tantric planetary deity...

Ornithology Ganapati?!

 

- Trump? Who is Trump?
- Oh boy, oh boy, this alien guy have a lot to learn!

Lord Ganesha discovers the New World, speaks to some of its inhabitants! Rare pic, share for luck.

Cultural appropriation

 

I hope this isn´t too much for our Interweb overlords (alias Bing AI and Gemini)! It´s a picture of the Hindu goddess Nila made more culturally appropriate for a Swedish context, since she´s sitting on a Hooded Crow. Or perhaps culturally appropriated...

Edwardosaurus

 

Edward Dutton´s crazy video on dinosaur intelligence. I shall assume that he does render the scientific facts fairly accurately, but yeah, I was waiting for the bizarre joke at the end. 

Still, I suppose it *is* fascinating that some dinosaurs might have evolved the intelligence of ravens. I mean, some of them actually did. You know, the ravens themselves...  

Just sacrifice them to Kali

 

A small town in the Bay State is besieged by a very special kind of pilgrims...

Wisdom

 

- Yes, my dear raven, the humans are denying direct realism again. They apparently think we don´t exist, or that we can´t see them.

- Nor do they know that we´re not really dinosaurs at all, but descendants from the Great Eufalconid in Asgard, which only *we* can directly perceive!

- Exactly, my dear raven, exactly. 

The crow

 

Credit: Frank Vassen

In case you have absolutely nothing else to do 1:20 AM Swedish time...

There are some really, really weird goddesses in Hinduism. Wikipedia links below!

Dhumavati 

Alakshmi

Jyestha

But do they worship the true god?

Previously posted on March 7. Reposted due to technical problems with the original post!

I hope this isn´t a hoax. Elephants in India are said to bury their dead calfs. Could create problems for the theologians, I suppose. Should I or you tell them that corvids also bury their dead? 

Elephant calf burial ritual revealed in India

Controversial clades

 

This one might be a bit confusing, tbh. But there you go!