Latest news with #Yard
New York Times
07-07-2025
- General
- New York Times
The Questions Started With the Wren
Of all the nest boxes in our yard, the Carolina chickadees always choose the hanging box in the rose arbor. Every year the female builds her beautiful nest of moss and lays her clutch of speckled eggs. How many eggs? I never know. With chickadees it can be as many as a dozen, as few as three. But if I hear the glorious, burbling river of song that means a northern house wren has arrived, I know the chickadees don't stand a chance. A house wren is a tiny, feathered terrorist. He pulls the nests out of occupied boxes and fills the unoccupied ones with sticks to prevent other birds from nesting there. He scoots unseen in the underbrush, emerging only to puncture the eggs and kill the young in any unguarded nest. If a house wren has any say in the matter, all the nests here are doomed. This year a house wren arrived on April 9. Less than a week later the chickadee nest was in tatters, tangled in the rose canes. I held my breath every time I checked the bluebird box, but the bluebirds held their own against the encroacher. All four of their babies grew up and safely flew into the trees. Bluebirds generally start nesting again very soon after their young fledge — while the male cares for the fledglings, the female builds a new nest — so I cleaned out the box, treated it with food-grade diatomaceous earth to keep the ants out, reinstalled the wire nest lift meant to thwart parasites and waited for round two. But when the bluebirds left the nest box this year, they also left the yard and did not return. Were they taking their babies as far from the house wren as they could get? The wren, meanwhile, continued his rounds, moving from nest box to nest box, laying claim to them all. A female wren, if one ever arrives, will have four empty boxes to choose from. Will one ever arrive? Or choose him if she does? I don't know. I've spent 30 years learning the ways of this wild yard, and still there are so many mysteries. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Glasgow Times
30-06-2025
- General
- Glasgow Times
Inclusive play centre for disabled children opens in Glasgow
Scottish charity The Yard, which has supported more than 3,000 children and families since 1986, has expanded its model to the city. The charity has taken over the lease of the Linn Park Adventure Playground site on Netherlee Road. The site opened on June 28. Catriona Lowe (Image: Supplied) The newly renovated centre will include a 5,000-square-metre outdoor play area for children and young people, from birth to 18 years old, with disabilities and additional needs. The Yard will welcome the whole family to allow children to thrive, while parents and carers can connect with others in similar situations. Read more: Dominic Calvert-Lewin mooted for Celtic transfer but one key concern raised 'Do not travel' warning issued for Glasgow-bound trains this morning The charity has revamped the building to meet the needs of its service users, with plans to further improve the outdoor garden and play areas. Improvements include full rewiring, a new heating system, upgraded kitchen and toilet facilities, and a new office space. Celine Sinclair, chief executive officer of The Yard, said: "At The Yard, we're inclusive by design. "We never ask for a formal diagnosis. "Too often that's just another barrier for families already facing challenges. "Our doors are open to any child or young person who would benefit from an inclusive, safe place to play, express themselves and grow in confidence. "We're equally here for their families, offering connection, friendship and a shared understanding." Catriona Lowe, a Glasgow-based mum, said: "We are so excited that The Yard is coming to Glasgow. " I travel through to Edinburgh when we can as it's one of my son's favourite places and a fab day out as a family." Families can access The Yard Glasgow through the £8 per month membership scheme, which includes unlimited access to all The Yard centres in Scotland. A membership assistance programme is also available for families who need financial support.
Buzz Feed
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Buzz Feed
Pedro Pascal Praised For Flying Economy To Cannes
Pedro Pascal went viral more than once at Cannes this year — most recently for describing himself as a 'lazy 50-year-old bougie bitch.' Iconic! Now, Pedro has garnered attention once more after it was revealed that the star had flown economy to the French film festival, where his upcoming western Eddington premiered. USA Today published a video of Pedro boarding an economy flight from London to France, which was purportedly recorded by filmmaker and influencer Lucas Pelizaro. And while acknowledging that yes, the bar is 'on the floor,' numerous fans have praised the star for choosing economy for a short-haul flight* as they pointed out that many celebrities splurge on private jets for ridiculously short trips. As we all know, many celebs have faced increasing backlash in recent years for their private jet usage. Perhaps most notably, Kylie Jenner was branded a 'full time climate criminal' in 2022 after it was revealed that she'd used her jet to take flights as short as 17 minutes. Meanwhile, stars like Travis Scott, Taylor Swift, and Kim Kardashian were exposed for their excessive private jet usage too, according to research conducted by sustainability-driven digital marketing agency Yard. With this in mind, several fans branded Pedro a 'climate conscious king' as they commended his decision to fly commercial to Cannes. 'This man is in the news every day for doing good things,' one person said. 'Protect him at all costs,' someone else wrote. 'Clearly he just wants to be a regular guy treated like regular folks,' one more user said, while others named-dropped Taylor Swift and Travis Scott as they suggested other celebrities should 'take notes' from Pedro. You can check out more of our Cannes-related coverage right here.
Irish Independent
28-04-2025
- Politics
- Irish Independent
UK Conservative leader Badenoch demands prosecution of rap group Kneecap over ‘dead Tory' claim
Footage from a concert allegedly showed a group member saying 'the only good Tory is a dead Tory'UK Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has now demanded the prosecution of rap trioScotland Yard is looking into the incident, along with another concert from November 2024 in which a member of the band appeared to shout 'up Hamas, up Hezbollah'Badenoch previously blocked a government grant to the bilingual Belfast group while she was business secretary
Time Out
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
‘It was high chaos': the death and rebirth of London's coolest theatre
Of all the new theatres to open in London this century, none feel so vital as the Yard. Built in just a few weeks in 2011, from reclaimed materials – including some dubiously acquired scaffold planks and unwanted lino scavenged from the Olympic development – the Hackney Wick venue was billed as a pop-up when it opened with an eccentric programme of theatre that bore little resemblance to anything being staged elsewhere in the city. Early shows include a jokey micro-budget adaptation of John Bunyan's epic Christian allegory The Pilgrim's Progress (A Progress), a show about the mathematical phenomenon of emergence (Game of Life), and a 40-minute opera about a samurai rampaging through an old people's home (Manga Sister). Emerging in a then-desolate corner of east London alongside various other cultural start-ups and club nights, founder artistic director Jay Miller set up the theatre on a shoestring because it seemed cheaper than the alternatives. 'I graduated during the last recession,' he says. 'There were hardly any opportunities, I couldn't afford to live in London and I naively thought it would be easier to start a theatre than to get a job in one. The Yard was my last-chance saloon'. Since then, the Yard has not only survived but thrived, gaining Arts Council funding and playing a pivotal part in the launch of the careers of the likes of Michaela Coel, Ncuti Gatwa and director Alexander Zeldin. Late at night, it also serves as a pretty great night club: the auditorium becomes a dancefloor for an eclectic series of late-night parties. It's a model of what a modern grassroots theatre can be, and now it's about to embark upon its next chapter – following its current production, a Miller-directed take on Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie, it will close its doors, be torn down and built anew in a more durable and high tech building. After all, it was never intended to last this long, and it isn't really fit for purpose for what the theatre has become – there isn't even a backstage area. The last show in the theatre as we know it is on May 10. On the eve of the old Yard's destruction, Miller reflects on the theatre's past, present and future. What was your vision for the Yard when you launched it? 'The truth is that in the first year there was no business plan, there was no sense of what precisely it was that I wanted to do with it. It was more just following an instinct and impulse and a bunch of energy. Fundamentally I was really frustrated [about lack of opportunities in London theatre at the time] and really bored, and so that energy – rather than intellectual rigor – defined it.' Well it worked! 'Yeah! But I didn't realise how difficult it would be.' Can you give a flavour of what the early days were like? 'It was high chaos. I slept in what is now the female toilets for a few months because the door shutter wouldn't close and because I really couldn't afford rent. We got some money for a little garden from a lovely charity and unbeknownst to us people started growing weed in it. Every Friday a man would phone up asking, really politely, if he could turn up naked. We thought about it for a while and in the end I was like: no, that's probably going to make other people feel uncomfortable.' Was it always the plan to have clubbing as part of the Yard's programming? 'I moved to London in 2010 and it felt like the height of [legendary avant-garde club night] Shunt. I only went once, but I thought it was absolutely brilliant, and I was really inspired by the idea that you could give people a different context by which to engage with experimental performance. If that involved booze, then cool, if that involved a dance, then cool. And being in Hackney Wick and wanting to attract a younger generation of artists and audiences, I knew that would be a fundamental part of the offering. We started doing parties pretty much immediately.' Do you feel you've 'made it' now? The Yard's future seems reasonably assured. 'I mean, the truth is that I never feel like that. I'll have at least one or two nights a week where I don't sleep because I'm worried about what's around the corner, it never feels secure. It's not a world in which it's possible to feel secure: we make ephemeral art and so the ephemerality of it translates to the business and the way in which the budgets are constructed.' What will the new Yard be like? 'My hope is it will be the same spirit, but the offer to audiences and artists will be better. We've been operating in a tin can: when it's cold outside, it's cold inside. When it's hot outside, it's hot inside. There's no backstage area. We're not adjusting the style, the taste, the spirit of what we do and who we are, but we are hopefully ensuring that we'll be able to deliver that in a more exciting way, in a more comfortable way and in a way that ensures that the shows and the experience of those shows is better.' We've been operating in a tin can Hackney Wick has changed enormously in the last 14 years: how do you feel about it? Do you see yourselves as gentrifiers? 'When we opened we were a group of artists making theatre in a cheap part of London. We moved in, and others moved in too. But it is impossible to escape the contemporary relationship between art and residential development. People want to live near artists. Was that our intention? Absolutely not. We just wanted to make excellent new theatre. Do I regret making excellent new theatre? No. Can I influence the cost of flats around us? No. We've worked hard to get to know our neighbours. We''ve worked with local young people for ten years on a weekly basis. We started a partnership with our local primary school – I rehearsed Glass Menagerie at Gainsborough School. What hasn't changed is that Hackney Wick remains a place people go to have a good time.'
