Category: Food

Dancin’ – 24 October 2026

Posted on by Zogman

A wild day with a lot of enjoyable dancing for a change!

We were a bit late for dance class today, mainly because of the heavy rain, but thankfully we did just manage to get Brookfield just as the class was starting. Also, just by luck, I managed to avoid the ‘Rhumbumbumba’ a dance I hate!

The first ‘Real’ dance was the October Waltz that I’m getting used to. Hopefully I’ll have a chance to perfect it next week, all being well. As for today, well, it was a bit of a mixture. Most of it worked, but there are some awkward bits that need looking at. It’s a work in progress.

Next was the ‘X Line’ Tango. A dance we learned during Covid, watching it over Zoom. That was back in 2020 when the world was young and we were ready for anything to do with dance. In other words, what I’m saying is that I’d forgotten most of it, and it’s only recently I’ve gone back to it. It’s almost there in my memory, but not quite all in the right places. I’m assured that it will come back … soon.

The Feta Foxtrot was the next on the agenda. One of Scamp’s favourites and I must say one of mine too. A nice gentle foxtrot with nothing too difficult to remember, but a lot of clever tweaks that make it much more interesting.

We finished the class with the Midnight Jive. This one is definitely embedded in my little brain and I sometimes think I’ve danced it in autopilot. Whether that is the case or not I’m not willing to say, but it’s all to do with Muscle Memory, I’m sure of that.

We weren’t driving straight home. Instead we were booked for lunch at Coast, a restaurant that sits with wonderful views across the Clyde Estuary. Of course it was pelting rain today, sot those views were mere blurs on the horizon. Still we had a decent lunch there, even if the first piece of steak from my steak and sausage pie was all gristle and completely inedible. Scamp was much happier with her Sea Bream with Risotto. I think this is only the second I’ve had bad luck with meat from Coast. Next time I’ll remind myself to have something else instead, all being well.

Instead of driving home by the M8 as we would usually do, Scamp remembered there were long delays near Glasgow Airport, so we went via the Erskine Bridge instead. I don’t think we gained any time by going that way. It would probably be just as quick risking the M8. No matter, we arrived home safely and got parked.

Not long after we got home, we could feel the wind rising. Storm Austen was handing over to the much stronger Storm Boelo. It’s blowing a hoolie just now with gusts around 50mph. Hopefully tomorrow it should calm down.

Today’s PoD was the view from the front window with the rain sheeting down. Brrr!

No plans for tomorrow.

A really dull day – 23 October 2026

Posted on by Zogman

Thankfully we went to Tesco in the morning and missed most of the heavy rain.

Rain had been predicted for us, but after that early deluge, everything calmed down and we saw very little of named storm Austen. However we did have a continuous drizzle and that’s almost as annoying as rain.

I restarted cutting the fabric for the reversible bow tie. I thought I had it sorted, but now I’m thinking I might try a different version. I don’t want to waste any more fabric and end up with nothing. Maybe tomorrow I’ll do a dummy run with some cheap fabric and photograph each step so I can always come back to it after I’ve got it the way I want it. Assuming that I get it right this time around!

Hazy: I bought a packet of clips (Clover Wonder Clips) that seem to be easy to use for holding fabric layers while you stitch them. Much easier than using pins and less likely to draw blood!

I did manage to get just three photos taken today. The best of a bad lot went to a shot of some red flowers that were hanging from a pot that itself was hanging on the fence in the back garden. It was drizzling and I wasn’t hanging around. That was PoD covered.

Scamp was clearing out the fridge yesterday and found a plastic tub of home made tomato soup. That, and a Fish Finger Sandwich was dinner. The soup was excellent, but I would say that, because I made it! So was the FFS!

It looks like we’re going to have a windy couple of days tomorrow and Sunday with the next named storm, Boelo. High winds and heavy rain. Oh what fun.

Looking for shoes – 22 October 2026

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Not just any old shoes, Scamp was looking for dance shoes. Sparkly dance shoes.

We drove over to Rutherglen to Scamp’s favourite dance shoe shop. She can usually manage to pick up a couple of pairs of dance shoes there but today she was out of luck. The lady who owns the shop knew what Scamp was looking for, but didn’t have the exact ones she was looking for. However, she did get a new pair and the rhinestone sparkles on them kind of made up for her initial disappointment.

After leaving Rutherglen we got a bit lost trying to find Glasgow Green. It must be years since we were last in ‘The Green’. Thankfully the Sat Nav found a way through the twists and turns that brought us neatly to our destination and we managed to find the last slot in the car park.

Beautiful light on the Park as we walked over to M&S where Scamp was hoping to get a Rab lookalike jacket. I was heading to Jessops to get my hands on a Sony A7c ii, one step up from the one I bought a year or so ago. Both of us met up again just outside M&S in Argyle Street and neither of us found what we came for. Scamp’s raincoat was a bit tight and my camera wasn’t much better than what I’ve been using. Money back in our pockets!

The light on Glasgow Green when we were walking back was better than what we saw going into town, but after I’d looked at the photos when we got home, I wasn’t really impressed with them. The PoD went to a distorted view of a new housing development halfway to The Green.

Chicken and peas for dinner. A long time favourite.

Tomorrow it looks like it’s going to rain all day. Let’s hope they got it wrong.

We were out visiting today – 21 October 2026

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We went over to The Village today to see how Isabel was progressing. She’d had a fall last week and has been recuperating. Good to see she is almost back to her usual chatty self. Keep up the good work Isabel.

After Scamp and Isabel were finished talking plants and gardens, Scamp and I drove home for a spot of lunch. Afterwards, Scamp was tidying up some of the plants that were needing a good trim and I’d half intended to go for a walk. Then the rain arrived and I gave up on that idea. Scamp had only a few more plants to work on and then she too gave up gardening for the day. Instead, she started working her way through some old clothes that could go somewhere useful while I started making Lemonade Scones, sometimes called Australian Scones. I’d made the scones years ago and luckily I still had the recipe which was really simple:

  • 4 cups Self-Raising Flour, sifted.
  • A pinch of Salt.
  • 300 ml Cream.
  • 300 ml Fizzy Lemonade.
  1. Preheat oven to Gas Mark 7 (220ºc) and line a baking tray with baking paper.
  2. Sift flour and salt into a bowl. Make a well. Pour the cream and lemonade or soda water into the dry ingredients and mix together to form a soft dough.
  3. Turn the dough out onto a well-floured bench, dust lightly with flour and gently roll out into a rectangle. Cut into approximately 12 pieces and lift each onto the baking tray. (Size 2 cutter)
  4. Bake in a preheated oven for around 15 – 20 minutes or until golden brown. Remove and cool inside a clean tea towel to help keep their freshness.

Serve with butter or your favourite jam and whipped cream.

After testing the scones and agreeing that they were good, it was time for dinner. Today it was Pasta Carbonara. I thought it was a bit strong tasting, and Scamp thought it was a bit dry. We agreed to disagree and settled down to watch Bergerac on U which neither of us had heard of, but Scamp managed to get it working. A good start to series 2.

Since rain stopped play today, I was stuck with an inside shot for PoD. Then the Lemonade Scones saved the day and they became today’s PoD!

Scamp says she may have plans for tomorrow, but she’s not telling anyone what it is!

Schoolgirl – 20 October 2026

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Today Scamp was going to visit Shona for coffee and I was starting to make a bow tie.

I dropped Scamp off at her niece’s house and drove home to start on the bow tie construction.

I had brought back some interesting fabric from our visit to Jersey and thought it would look good for the bow tie. Scamp reckoned she would be out at Shona’s for a couple of hours and I was sure I could get a good start to the bow tie construction. Half an hour later I was still looking for the paper bag that held the fabric. Then I remembered that it should be in one of my cupboards. Once I’d found it, it was fairly plain sailing to pin down the paper pattern and cut round it. I remembered to arrange the fabric Wrong Sides Together and it all looked fine.

The bow tie was to be a reversible one with different patterns on each side. A year or so ago I worked out how that could be achieved. It’s too complicated to explain, but basically there is a lot of twisting and turning involved, but once you’ve worked that out, the rest is easy. It should have been, but it wasn’t until Scamp phoned to say “could she have a lift home” that I noticed one of the patterns was round the wrong way. Thankfully I think I might have just enough fabric left to make a new one. Either that or it’s a flying visit to Jersey to get more of the fabric!

I’d had enough of twisting and turning patterns for the day and left everything as it was and picked up Scamp and we drove home.

Dinner tonight was Potato Wedges and Veggie Sausages for Scamp and also Potato Wedges but with a Wagyu burger for men. Both served with a tin of beans. Yes, I was cooking!

Today’s PoD went to a photo of a Schoolgirl flower, cut from the climber rose in the afternoon. It was too wet and dull to get any decent outside photos, but the indoors version worked perfectly.

I think we might be visiting Isabel tomorrow.

Autumn – 18 October 2026

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Today was one of those wonderful autumn days with leaves falling from the trees and a crisp feel to the weather. A good day to be out and about. At least, it was good to be out if you were well wrapped up. When I got up this morning, the temperature was telling me it was 0ºc outside. Thankfully the heating had clicked on an hour before me, and for that I was very glad.

By the time we’d finished our breakfast, the sun was shining through the trees and those trees were thawing with steam rising from them. It was quite delightful, especially if you were inside looking out!

I spent most of the day looking for a connector for my old MiniDisk. I knew I’d seen somewhere recently. A connector that would allow me to play some of my ancient collection of MiniDisks. After about half an hour I found the little black tube that would take an AA battery and power the MiniDisk. It actually worked at the first try. I really should have two MiniDisk drives, but neither Scamp nor I could lay our hands on the other one. I’m pretty sure I can find it if I really need it.

Because we had been searching in cupboards and drawers, Scamp decided this would be a great time to gather up some hardware that I no longer needed. Between the two of us we separated most of that hardware into those that would be useful to keep and those that would be going in the skip. The Useful articles were soon outweighed by the ones heading to the Council skip. That means that tomorrow will probably involve one or two runs to the “Small Household” area of the tip.

Scamp made a lovely Fish Pie or Smoked Haddock Dauphinoise if you want the posh name!
While she was hard at work with the Fish Pie, I went for a walk over to St Mo’s and got a pretty shot of the late afternoon sun shining through the trees. That was the PoD sorted.

Spoke to Jamie later and heard about his plans for Christmas. It’s only October, but he likes to be organised.

Tomorrow if we get the black bags organised and off into the tip, we may go shopping.

Keeping the wheels turning – 16 October 2026

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Some weeks the wee Blue car hardly turns a wheel, and then there’s this week when we found ourselves driving every day of the week!

Today we drove to over for lunch at John & Marion’s.

It was truly a wonderful day. Blue skies and good friends. Marion produced a lovely lunch that was worth the drive through quite heavy traffic. We also had a few rain showers too, but nothing too heavy. It’s nice to meet up for lunch, knowing that we’ll be driving in the light. Driving in the dark never used to faze me at all, but lately I’ve found it more and more a chore. Just getting older I suppose.

We spent most of the day discussing weddings and how much has changed from when we got married, a few years ago now! The up and coming wedding sounds like a good day and I think we’re both looking forward to it.

I couldn’t help but compare yesterday’s drag of a drive home from Glenburn with today’s easy run home from J&M’s. All the heavy traffic was heading the other way today and our lanes were quite calm by comparison.

I couldn’t decide what to use for today’s PoD, then Scamp suggested the knitted flower she’d laid claim to last week. It was an inspired choice. Just a drape from an old off cut from a piece of purple velvet and a bit of careful disguise of bits and pieces and we had a PoD.

Sometimes things create more difficulties than are really necessary and sometimes, like today, it just works!

Good Friends and Good Food. What’s not to like?

Hoping to go dancing tomorrow.

What a dull day – 12 October 2026

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I don’t believe the sun got out of bed today.

For once I was up fairly early today, waiting for The Gates of Midnight to land on the carpet. It actually did arrive quite soon afterwards. I was a bit disappointed at the state of this ‘new book’, but then, after some research, I found that the soft, seemingly hand cut look was what the author had intended. I’m glad I got the hardback version or I would have missed the hand-made effect! No, I haven’t started it yet, Hazy. I might start it later tonight.

Scamp had realised she’d forgotten to replant one of her Heuchera plant (Lime Marmalade) yesterday, so she managed to get it split into four parts and divided them up round the garden. I’m sure she felt better for that, especially because it didn’t rain while she was out. After that it was the usual start to the day with a cup of coffee and the puzzles, we had lunch which was toast and beans, mainly because the beans were just passed their sell-by date and it seemed a shame not to use them. Scamp had wanted to go for a walk in the morning, probably a walk round Colzium Estate, but on checking I realised the rain had started and neither of us wanted to go for a walk in the rain. The rain seemed to be on a start/stop routine, because it couldn’t decide whether to go for the full rain option or for the drizzle. It settled for the drizzle.

We eventually walked down to the Shops for bread and stuff. Just essentials, because we were walking, not driving. On the way back, Scamp took the shopping bag and told me to go and have a walk round St Mo’s and that’s what we did. I went for a walk round the pond and she carried the ‘Messages’ home.

PoD went to  spider looking for food to fill its larder.

There wasn’t much to see in St Mo’s today. The swans came over to see if I’d anything worth eating, and then left when they realised there was no food to be had. There were lots of spiders on all the trees and desiccated branches and one of them got PoD. After that I just made my way back home. By about 4pm, the little light there was had disappeared and we amused ourselves by searching for a new kitchen carpet to replace the old charred one that’s way past its useful date.

We may go looking for a replacement kitchen carpet tomorrow. That has to be a better plan than today’s.

Triffids – 9 October 2026

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A day of mixed weather, but mainly rain.

It seemed that every day I put my boots on to go for a walk, the clouds would be waiting, massing on the horizon go drop some water on me. Eventually I gave up and walked out anyway. But first I had a Pizza to make.

I’d promised to make the pizza halfway through the week, but I managed to avoid the work every day … until today. I had most of the ingredients already just waiting for a chance to make a mess. I used an old recipe I’d had for years. I carefully measured the Olive Oil, Flour, Salt and Water. According to the recipe it would take ten minutes to knead the dough, but for some reason mine took about twice that. It did look nicely smooth without lumps by the time I was finished. I left it to rise for the required hour and guessed that would give me just enough time to do a walk round St Mo’s. I was just finishing the walk and on the way home when the rain started. Nicely timed.

The dough was rising nicely when I got back and I flattened it down to clear the air bubbles and left it to do its second prove and got the topping sorted out. Just some tomatoes a handful of chopped chicken and some tuna, with a blob of Burrata cheese. Gas was on and heating to gas 7/8 and we were ready for assembly. I reckoned 10 minutes would be a good starting point for baking, with the possibility of another 10 mins if needed. In the end it took nearer 30 mins total to bake it enough.

Thankfully, although the base was a bit wet, it all held together and most important of all, it was edible!

Scamp says I should make a smaller one next week to see if that improves it! My response is “How can you improve on Perfection?”!

PoD went to an indoor shot as the weather wasn’t going to play nice, and it was a pair of Sarracenia plants, Pitcher Plants sitting in the kitchen before I started baking the pizza. Otherwise they would have swallowed the pizza whole. Very hungry plants. They are not called ’Triffids’ for nothing. Always count your fingers after touching them.

Tomorrow we may go out for lunch.

A walk in the park – 8 October 2026

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Today we caught the bus rather than the car.

It was a lovely morning, very cold in the morning with a temperature in single figures and just the hint of ice on the hardy plants in the back garden. Brrr, winter’s just around the corner.

We were just in time to catch a bus that would take us to the town centre. About fifteen minutes later we caught the bus to Dunfermline. Walked round the gardens of Pittencrieff Park and then found the big greenhouses that we enjoyed so much were closed, likely for good, by the look of things. We had hoped that they might have been repaired since the last time we’d walked through the park, but it looked as if nothing had been done in the last couple of months. This looks like the People’s Palace in Glasgow all over again. No money and no desire to do anything about it. Don’t get me started on it again!

When we walked round the park we passed a couple, possibly just a wee bit older than us walking hand in hand. I couldn’t resist a quick photo of the pair. It wasn’t until we got home I noticed their feet were synchronised in the photo! PoD sorted out.

We walked back up the hill and out of the park after Scamp had a good look at the flower garden. We usually go for lunch at Wetherspoons, but today, just for a change I suggested we go to a local place. It wasn’t busy, in fact it was us and a couple of guys who were reminiscing about past glories. Scamp had a Mushroom Risotto and I had a Pizza Marinara. Both washed down with a glass of house red. It didn’t cost a fortune, but it was good to go somewhere quiet for a change.

The down side of today was waiting for the bus that would take us home. I think we just missed a bus, and it was a bit of a wait for the next one. We were ‘entertained’ by a trio of noisy weans who were definitely on something. Quite what, I wasn’t interested in, just as long as they didn’t get on our bus. They didn’t.

Next we got caught in a loooong tailback from repairs that seem to be taking far too long to complete. They should have been finished about a year ago, but were still dragging on.

The final problem was a bus that arrived late at the Town Centre and promptly broke down. We gave up and managed to catch another one that took us a round about journey round Condorrat, but eventually dropped us off near the door.

Other than that, it was a good day. Scamp got a cardigan or two and I got a new pair of corduroys. So we both came home with “A Toy Off The Rack” if you remember that!

No plans for tomorrow so far!