Category: Food

Walking in the rain – 11 February 2026

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was entertaining Shona today and I was meeting Alex.

Scamp gave me a lift to the station and I had only a few minutes to wait before our train came which was handy because the rain was tipping down. In Glasgow the weather was just the same and I walked up Buchanan Street then parked myself in the bus station. For once I’d forgotten my headphones, but I didn’t have to wait too long for Alex to appear. I explained to him that I was on a timer. I had to be back in Cumbersheugh by 3.15pm at the latest to get my bloods taken.

As usual we walked down to the nearest Nero and had a coffee. I told Alex about yesterday’s disaster and he suggested some remedies I hadn’t thought of, but none of them were really practical and I think he knew that, he was just trying to help. I showed him the A7iii and explained what was wrong, but when he pressed the shutter button the lens worked. No screech from the internals, it just took the photo. Now, remember we were in a fairly noisy cafe and it could just have been that noise that was covering up the sound of the screech, but the more I tried to make it screech, the quieter it became. Neither of us could understand it. Maybe my brother is a magician, but don’t tell him I know that!

We wandered into Princes Square, partly to be out of the rain and partly to see what was new on their displays. There wasn’t much, so we decided to have an early lunch. Round to Paesano and I volunteered to pay. More discussions about cameras and the reason for the recent failure, but still without a sensible answer. Paesano was really quiet. Usually around midday it’s just a wall of noise with everybody shouting to be heard and making the noise even louder. Today it was half empty. Maybe it was a holiday week for the school kids. Holidays in teeming rain. Yes, that sounds like Scotland.

Outside we walked into the GoMA (Gallery of Modern Art). Only one or two new displays, nothing interesting again. It was nearly time up when we came out and we both walked up to the station. I had about fifteen minutes to spare before my train was due and Alex was going for another walk in the incessant rain. We said our goodbyes, he went for a walk and I got on the express train then phoned Scamp to tell her I was on my way home.

I dropped Scamp at the house and drove to the medical centre. After cruising round and round the lines of cars, I finally got parked, got my blood taken and went home.

Dinner tonight was tomato soup, home made, of course. Watched a bit of the Winter Olympics from somewhere in Italy where the UK went from being second to being seventh in a matter of minutes. I don’t think they like us much, these Olympians!

That was my stunning day. I got home and the camera had started making its scratchy noise again. I have a Sony 16-35mm f4 lens which I was going to sell just before Christmas, but it started the squeaky noises and I put it on the back burner. Today it’s been working brilliantly. Not a cheep out of it. I just can’t make head nor tail of these big lenses these days.

PoD was a cheeky we grab photo of a lady admiring some photos in the GoMA.

Tomorrow we’re intending going to John & Marion’s for lunch tomorrow. Haven’t been to Hamilton for ages.

 

 

Green Shoots – 8 February 2026

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Green shoots need water and they got plenty today.

We spent most of the morning working through the Wordle puzzles. Nothing difficult, but some of them made me smile. By the time we got through them, it was almost lunch time and that meant Laura Kuenssberg. Usually she can be relied upon to destroy any politician, but today she was up against an old hand at this politics lark, Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden, His calm style belies a very clever brain behind those eyes. Like him or loathe him, he’s a cool customer, rarely flustered.

After lunch I decided I could manage to get a few shots in the garden. My target for the day was a pot of deep chocolate brown Hellebores. However, almost every time I tried for a photo a rain shower would force me inside. Eventually I gave up and went upstairs where I knew there was a tray of recently emerged Antherinum seedlings. They became the PoD. Hopefully I’ll get the shot of the hellebores another day, a dry day perhaps.

Dinner tonight was an old favourite, Chicken and Pea Traybake. It takes a good hour to cook, but the oven does all the work

We spoke to Jamie later. Simonne is in Italy this week on a training course for her new job and Jamie is working from home, and looking after Vixen too.

Two guys knocked on the door in the evening, asking if we owned a taxi. I told them no and asked why. They said there was a taxi sitting across the road, up against a wall. As soon as I saw the taxi, I knew it belonged to one of our neighbours. He wasn’t too pleased when I told him, but he quickly got it back into place. Neither the two guys, nor our neighbour could come up with an explanation. Still, nobody was hurt and there was no damage done, but it’s a puzzle that will stay with everyone until it is solved.

The seedlings in an egg box was the PoD and collected a few comments.

Tomorrow I may go and book an appointment with the doc for a blood test and a check up. It’s almost due, so it has to be done.

Dancin’ – 7 February 2026

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Out early as usual on a Saturday.

We drove over to Brookfield, a fairly easy drive to light traffic but clouds and occasional rain. What we’ve come to expect these wintry days.

The class started with a quickstep, but not one we already knew. Almost everyone else seemed to be happy with it and although we did bring this fact to the attention of the teachers, we didn’t get much instruction. Luckily I had Scamp to tell me what the teachers were doing and after I’d added in a few steps from Thursday’s Tea Dance, it began to come together, but teachers are there to teach, not to get partners to make up for their shortcomings. I don’t think Stewart believed we’d not done this dance before. For the first time in ages I wasn’t impressed with his teaching.

What I will say in his defence is that he did intersperse some units with a couple of sequence dances, mostly ones we knew. Given that we’d had a tough start to the day, I did actually enjoy most of the class I think Scamp did too.

We drove home with about a million others, all heading in the same direction as us at about 15 mph and in the rain again. It was a stop/start drive, but after half an hour or so the traffic picked up speed and thinned out. No rhyme nor reason to it. I’m sure you’ve all seen this feature of driving in the past. Nobody seems to be able to explain why the roads get snarled up and then just return to normal with nothing to explain it. I wish I could be in a helicopter to watch the changing traffic patterns from above. It would be an interesting thing to investigate.

I chose the M74/M73 again and everything went smoothly back to the house. Lunch was toast and beans. A simple menu that just hit the spot.

Later in the afternoon I went for a walk through St Mo’s and got a few photos, a very few. My favourite and PoD was two magpies discussing world problems in a tree. Magpies, the Darth Vaders of the Avian world.

We’d hoped to have a Chinese dinner, but Golden Bowl in Condorrat was closed until the 13th of the month, so it was Fish ’n’ Chips instead. Lovely fish, but too much chips. We watched the Olympic Snowboarding and Luge while we consumed our dinner, wondering why people put themselves through these dangerous looking games. Good fun to watch, but I can’t see it catching on in Cumbersheugh.

As far as tomorrow goes, we have no plans. Not ever Snowboarding.

Another grey day – 6 February 2026

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It’s becoming monotonous.

I’m really getting fed up with all this rain. Can’t somebody do something about it.

Scamp went out to FitSteps in the morning. While she was out I worked out the last few February I’d missed in the past week. That’s the problem with deciding to do a photo a day. You forget just how much time it takes.

I’d like to say we did lots of things today, but we didn’t. I went out in the early afternoon into the cold east wind that’s been blowing for the last week and a bit. I’d offered to do some shopping while I was out, and picked a photo of a weed of some description sneaking out from a metal cable support. I thought it looked interesting. Then I walked round the back of St Mo’s school and from there down to the shops and back home. It was just as I was reaching the house I realised those two photos would have to be the PoD for today.

Scamp made a curry from the Mowgli book, but wasn’t. Impressed with the finished article, saying there was a funny taste from it. We tracked that ‘funny taste’ down to a tablespoon of English Mustard I’d put in as stated in the instructions. I don’t know how the English can eat this stuff. I can’t even abide the smell of it. I think we’ll use a different recipe in future.

That’s about it for me for today. Hoping for a dry(ish) day tomorrow, just for a change.

Dundee – 2 February 2026

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We got a taxi from the house to the bus station at the town centre, then the Ember bus to Dundee. It’s a very civilised way to travel and for oldies like us, an economical one too. Once there we went for a coffee and something to eat before we got the bus that would take us to Ninewells Hospital. It was a round trip on the bus. The journey to the hospital was a long trip all round the houses and the one back was a much shorter one.

The meeting went well. The doctor was really nice and went over what was going to happen in detail. Then he got Scamp to sit facing him with her hands, palms down, on her knees. Then he got her to lift her hands to about shoulder height, palms down again. Then she was to turn her hands, palm up and then hands at shoulder height, palms facing and finally with middle fingers touching.

Next he had her touch index finger to thumb with both hands, slowly at first, then faster and faster. Next test was touch her index finger to her nose with her left hand, then with her right hand. She had to do it a few times. Then he asked her to touch her outstretched index finger to his, once or twice with one hand then the other. Finally he asked her to open her mouth and close it two or three times.

He took her to another room, I wasn’t invited, and got her to walk a straight line in a corridor, then back again. Finally he got her to do the same thing, but this time doing ‘toe, heel’ like you see the cops do on the old films, and that was about it.

He seemed really surprised to discover that she only had the tremor on one hand, he was expecting to see evidence of it in her ‘good’ hand, but there was none.

He told us that he thinks Scamp would be a good subject for the ‘MRI Guided Focused Ultrasound Thalamotomy for Essential Tremor’, but she is unlikely to be put forward for Deep Brain Stimulation. He did say he may give her a course of Parkinson’s medication to see if that would reduce the effects of the tremor, but admitted it’s unlikely to work. It doesn’t look like she will get another appointment until the middle of next month at the earliest, but that would be a consultation with himself and the surgeon. She told him that we were hoping to go away for a couple of weeks in the summer and he said that wouldn’t be a problem.

All in all, we were happy with the meeting, although afterwards we remembered all the other questions we wanted answered, although he had covered most of them.

The day was horrible outside. By the time we were coming out of the bus from the hospital, it was cold, horizontal rain. We went into the V&A to be warm, and then walked back to get the bus home. We were both shattered by then. Maybe it would have been better to do an overnight in Dundee and come home refreshed next day, but I think Scamp just wanted to get back home.

Despite the weather, I did get a few photos taken. The best of them was a view through the archway under the V&A.

Tomorrow will probably be a day of working out what happened on Monday!

Chickens – 1 February 2026

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Two Chickens had arrived in the garden.

There had been a ceramic chicken in the back garden for about six months. It was just a bit of fun we found in Torwood Garden Centre in one of those heady days of sunshine and warm sun. This was the ‘other chicken’ you heard about before my computer had a meltdown and messed up the tail end of January. It’s not quite fixed yet, but it’s getting there. Hopefully it will soon be back to full strength.

Anyway, on Sunday the chickens were united in the garden and Scamp was happy with the positioning of them.

In the afternoon I went for a walk in St Mo’s and managed to get a shot of a tiny little fungus, ball shaped and living a solo life on an old tree. I really must put a macro lens on the new Sony A7c and take some close-up shots of it, that is, if I can find it again. I’d forgotten to use the GPS setting on the camera to record its position. All I can remember is that it was in the woods near the road. That covers a good few acres, so it might be some time before I find it again.

My dinner was two lamb rump steaks from Waitrose. If you get the chance, they are really worth buying. Two fairly small steaks, about the size of your hand, but they taste delicious. There, that’s my advert for Waitrose done!

As you will realise, this blog post was written a few days after the beginning of February. Stick with it, I’ll hopefully get it sorted out soon.

The Continuation – 30 January 2026

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Now that I’ve whetted you appetite, here is the continuation and the explanation …

After I’d visited the skips and disposed of the unwanted goods, I drove up to Torwood Garden centre and spoke to one of the ladies who work there and asked her a strange question:

“Do you still have those ceramic chickens?”

She didn’t think they did still have them, but passed me over to a manager who said “Yes, we do still have them”.
The garden centre has been having a make-over since Christmas and everything seems to be a bit shambolic, but she took me to where about a dozen ceramic chickens were standing on a couple of wooden shelves. I chose one and paid for it right away. I don’t know what the sales ladies thought I was going to do with it! What I did do was wrap it up in some bubble wrap and tuck it into a box in the boot of the car, ready to be revealed on the 30th, today.

The Explanation:

Today, the 30th of January, is our unofficial anniversary. I won’t give away the date, but it’s quite a while ago! I wanted to surprise Scamp with a ceramic chicken. She had fallen for a comical black chicken during the summer and seemed so pleased with it in its place in the garden. The new one was a white chicken and looked just as cute as the first one. Today I presented her with a green compost bag and inside was the white chicken. I do believe she was quite delighted with the prezzy. She handed me a poly bag and inside it was two pairs of socks. Not just any old socks, but Merino wool socks of different colours, so I can wear different socks on each foot! Thank you Scamp.

To celebrate our special day, we got the bus to Glasgow, walked down to Central Station and caught a train to Mount Florida. We walked along Battlefield Road and reached the Battlefield Rest where we’d booked lunch.

For a starter, Scamp had Mussels in a Rich Tomato Sauce. I had Tomato and Black Olive Focaccia with a traditional Caprese salad.

For a main Scamp had Smokie Crepe stuffed with smoked haddock, salmon, and creamed cabbage, topped with tomato sauce and cheese. I had tomato risotto with Nduja, chicken and chorizo.

A generous glass of Malbec each to help wash it all down and to finish, coffee and a small glass of Jura for me and for Scamp it was Kahlua and a latte!

Phew! That was a lunch to remember!

We got the train back to Glasgow and had a quick wander round John Lewis looking for a new table cover. Too awkward to get it home on the bus, so we may go back soon to get one.

PoD was a view down one of the alleys that lead off Buchanan Street. That was about it for the day. Wasn’t it enough? We thought so. A very good day.

The diet probably starts tomorrow!!

Going for the messages – 28 January 2026

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It was a lovely bright morning and it seemed a shame to waste it sitting in the house.

So, after some discussion, we decided to drive to Stirling to get some messages in Waitrose and have a walk through the town. In the end, and with a very full car boot we decided to have a coffee in Waitrose rather than walk down to Nero. The coffee wasn’t the best, but Scamp was happy with her latte and an iced bun staved off the hunger pangs for a while.

Instead of driving straight home, we turned off the motorway and parked near Haggs. From there we had a walk along the Forth and Clyde canal. The weather held up and with a few fluffy clouds in the sky and an almost perfectly flat calm on the canal we walked along the canal, heading east. Beautiful reflections on the still water gave me plenty of opportunity for photos. Even when we passed one of the locks, the water stayed still and allowed more photo opportunities.

Not far past the canal lock we turned and walked back to the car. We saw a couple of swans following the twists and turns of the canal, presumably looking for a good place to land. Unfortunately I just missed them! Maybe next time.

Back home and after we’d emptied the car, Scamp went out to plant two new pot plants, pink at the front and purple in the back. Both Primulas. Not happy with that, she did a bit of pruning and also stayed out in the sunshine just tidying up the back garden.

Dinner was a shared pizza from Waitrose. Then after I’d downloaded today’s photos and posted a couple, we watched another Landscape Artist of the Year. I don’t know where they find these ‘artists’, but today’s lot were some of the worst we’ve seen. Hopefully they will improve soon.

A week or so, Scamp asked Hazel to ask Neil if his mum knew where she, Scamp, could get Panch Phoron, a Bengali five spice mix. Today a parcel dropped through our letterbox and inside was a packet of Punch Pooran which is the same mix with a slightly different name. Attached was a message from Neil’s mum saying “Happy Cooking”. Isn’t it great when a plan comes together!

PoD went to a view looking east along the Forth and Clyde canal.

No great plans for tomorrow. Scamp says she might do some ironing. I may take a load of odds and ends to the council skips.

Scrubbing the floor – 26 January 2026

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We weren’t down on our knees doing the scrubbing. We’ve got a machine to do that for us now!

In the morning we built up the Vax carpet cleaner. It’s a bit of a beast! With a lot of reading of the instructions we managed to get it built up. Then we added some water and a glug or two of the magic carpet cleaning stuff, plugged it in and started it going. It’ quite noisy and it was soaking the carpet, until we realised we could push it forward quite quickly, but had to withdraw it fairly slowly so the muck in the carpet was sucked into the chamber. In the end we were both impressed with the efficiency of this new technology. So far we only have a small bottle, but I imagine we’ll get a larger bottle before the end of the week. We were impressed by the amount of muck that was sucked into the dirty water container!!

After that we walked down to the shops to get something for lunch and also something for dinner. It was cold and a bit windy, but the weather fairies are warning us that it’s going to get even windier before the end of the week.

I took myself out for a walk in St Mo’s later and got a few photos, but even fairly early in the afternoon, the light was fading quickly. For a change I took the small A6500 with me. I usually use a nylon cord to suspend my cameras when I’m walking. I almost made the mistake of letting the A6500 dangle, but realised just in time that there was no cord on the camera today and caught it before it fell. Eejit!

Once round the pond was enough for me today. If there had been more light and it it hadn’t been quite so cold I’d have gone for a second round, but once was enough today.

We drove over to Kirsty’s class at The Link and completed the third part of the three part Tango routine. It was a bit repetitive in places and the constant turns were causing some of the ladies, Scamp included to become dizzy, so I don’t think the full routine will be danced very often.

PoD was a three holly leaves making a break for freedom from a nearby wooden fence.

I think we may be going shopping tomorrow, but as usual at this time of year, it all depends on the weather

Out shopping – 25 January 2026

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Not Tesco shopping, shopping for new tech!

We’d been talking about getting a carpet cleaner. Scamp had searched the usual online places and it seemed on paper that everyone of them was happy to sell us one in two days time. We knew that Currys in Coatbridge had them on display, and we found the one we were looking for, but when we said we’d like that particular model, the assistant said they had none in stock … but they did have that model in the Hamilton and Uddingston stores. If we were interested, we could pay for it in Coatbridge and she would sign off the paperwork, then we could pick it up from either of the two stores.

It seemed too good to be true, but, for once it worked almost seamlessly. Unfortunately when we drove to Uddingston, the slip road that would take us to the store was closed, so we had to drive a long circuitous route round a roundabout and down under a flyover that eventually took us to the Curry’s store in Uddingston. There we picked up the big box and drove back home via the M73, a route I’m quite familiar with, except we were approaching it from the opposite direction!

Meanwhile, Scamp had been in text conversation with Shona who was out for a walk and asked if we were busy. Scamp explained that we were on our way home and would meet her at our house in about 20mins, and we did just that. She stayed for a couple of hours and we heard about all her worries about Ben and Paul. Neither of them really involved us, but gave us more of an insight into how the councils work, and how convoluted everything is. We’re both glad we don’t have to go through all those hoops. It must be tough to be young in these times.

Shona didn’t want to stay for dinner, but got a taxi home. We don’t think she likes Haggis, Neeps and Tatties! That was dinner for tonight, it being Burns Night. After dinner we watched a supposed Burns Night celebration. It was truly awful. One Scottish bloke told a couple of jokes that were really, REALLY funny. Something you could laugh at without feeling talked down. Nor did you feel awkward because they were crude or rude. No, they were just good humour.

With one exception, the remainder of the ‘celebration’ was cringeworthy. Scottish singers singing Burns ballads in English, not with a Scottish voice. Burns spoke and wrote in Scots, not the anglicised version that was foisted on us tonight. Even worse, it was a recorded version that was played, not a live show. Bah!

Spoke to Jamie later had heard that Simonne is happy in her new job and hopefully Jaime’s house may have a new part-time owner. That’s a weight off both their minds.

Today’s PoD was taken on the kitchen worktop before all these shenanigans were taking place.

Tomorrow we may build the big carpet cleaner. It’s a hefty piece of kit, judging by its weight.