Month: July 2022

Every light a red light – 31 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

We drove to Bishopbriggs retail park, more to get out of the house than any great desire to participate in any retail therapy.

Scamp was looking for a chance to refill the medicine cabinet. I was looking for a replacement Giotto Rocket air blower. I use it to blow dust off the camera sensor and I fear my 2007 model is blowing more dust on than its taking off. I didn’t find one in Currys. I didn’t really think I’d get one there, it’s a bit of niche tool. Scamp did, however, stock up on over the counter antiseptics, plasters, mouthwash and all sorts of fun stuff. While I was off the leash I bumped into a former colleague who was shocked to learn that it was 8 years since I’d retired. Her gaze went a bit distant when she said that she had maybe another 8 years to go before she would be able to retire. I smiled and told her she’d enjoy it when the time came. She was kind enough to smile back.

When we were heading back to the car I suggested that we drive in to Cowcaddens and walk to WEX to get the aforementioned Giotto Rocket. Scamp was in agreement as we had nothing else to do. I’d forgotten about the swathe of roadworks and closures that are going on in Glasgow at present. We managed with the help of the sat nav to avoid most of them and got parked, but only after we’d stopped at just about every red light on the road in. We walked over to Bath Street and climbed up the big hill then went down the other side, then found the shop shuttered and with a notice to the effect that due to unforeseen circumstances it would be closed today the 31st of July. Bummer!

We walked back to the car and drove home, but not until I’d taken a few photos in the uninspiring chasm of Cowcaddens car park. You can see what I did with the photos in Flickr. The other photo I took that I liked was a shot looking up Hill Street in town, with St Aloysius Church at the top.

Back home we both worked in different rooms taking things out of cupboards and putting them together, rearranging them and putting some back and more rearranging. Oh what fun it was. Well, not really, but it has to be done.

Dinner was trout fillets with potatoes and cauliflower. Dessert was an M&S apple pie. Then we sat down to hopefully enjoy a Hungarian GP with George Russell ending in the gravel trap in the first lap. That didn’t happen, but at least Verstappen showed him a clean pair of heels to finish first after starting in 10th place. Hamilton too beat Russell leaving him in 3rd place. If you didn’t want to know the final score you should have looked away just after “… M&S apple pie.”

Spoke to Jamie and heard about his win at a Shortbread Baking competition at work and his preparations for his last week with his present company then a week long summer holiday before starting his new job. Good luck with all of that, Jamie.

Tomorrow I may phone WEX to make sure they are open for business before I commit myself to driving in to Glasgow again. Hoping to avoid most of the red lights!

A lazy day – 30 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

A lazy morning, more like.

We just seemed to lounge about and complain about the rain, although it had been forecast for about a week with progressively more accurate details of when and where. The ‘where’ wasn’t really all that important. We knew it was going to be in the central belt of Scotland. The ‘when’ however, was important. Scamp was sure it was going to be in the morning and that it would clear up by midday. I, as usual was more down in the dumps and though it wouldn’t rain until late afternoon. Scamp’s weather forecasters got it right.

We’d half intended going to the Merchant City Festival in Glasgow if the weather had stayed fine, but as it was, that seemed unlikely and maybe would be postponed until tomorrow. Maybe we should go out to lunch, just to get out of the house. That sounded like a good choice. Scamp suggested Cotton House, or ‘The’ Cotton House, to give it its full name. I didn’t think we’d get a table, but as usual, Scamp had done her due diligence and could tell me that it was open all day at the weekends, so we could go after the usual lunchtime rush. That’s what we did.

We got a table without any problem. Scamp had her usual Thai Spring Rolls to start, followed by Chicken Chow Mein. I had Crispy Pancake Rolls and Ginger & Spring Onion Chicken with Noodles. Both excellent, both finished in double quick time.

What to do now? I’d offered a drive up to Fannyside and a walk along the path there, but then thought a walk along the Forth & Clyde towpath might be even better. We drove down to the towpath from Haggs and walked as far as the ruin of Underwood Lockhouse. An historic part of the Forth & Clyde canal that’s been ‘accidentally’ burned down twice now and remains an empty shell, hidden behind hoardings, but easily accessible if you’re of the Urban Ex frame of mind. I wasn’t, but got a shot of a half bottle of Buckfast on a line of steps that now go nowhere.

Lots of cyclists on this section of the F&C, but not many walkers. Such a beautiful day with cloudscapes that just made you want to keep taking photos. One of those views along the canal made PoD.  We walked back to the car and drove home where Scamp decided it would be a perfect afternoon for a seat in the garden, to enjoy the fruits (and flowers) of her labours.  I agreed and sat for a while reading my latest Kindle book.  After a while it began to cool down and we had to adjourn to the house.  Watched a ‘thrilling'(?) Hungarian F1 Qualifying.  I do believe that one day that commentator will simply burst with excitement at George Russell achieving something.  Anything.  Today he was getting pole position.

Tomorrow we may make that postponed trip to Glasgow.

 

 

Unsupervised – 29 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was out all morning and I was left to my own devices.

More likely, I was left with my own devices. It meant I could read my Kindle, do Wordle and Spelling Bee when and if I wanted to. As it happened, I chose to tidy up the back bedroom after yesterday’s setup for Flickr Friday. I was quite pleased with the final result, but it did involve a lot of setting up and now today was tearing down day. Always a delight to tear down something that had been built, but was now just gathering dust.

It was round about there the desire for more clearing and organising came to a halt. Also, Scamp returned from her FitSteps class. We discussed options for what was left of the day and what was up for grabs for dinner. The former was already sorted as far as I was concerned. It was either banana on bread or cold meat on bread. The second option won, not because Scamp had chosen the banana piece, but because I wanted to test out the thermal strength of some Nduja paste we’d bought. ‘Nduja’, just in case you don’t know is a spreadable spicy pork sausage from Calabria in Italy. It varies in strength and this one wasn’t too hot. It went well with cooked ham and some pickled peppers (not necessarily the Pickled Peppers that Peter Piper Picked, though). With lunch done and dusted. What was for dinner?

We settled on pizza. Stuffed crust bake at home pizza. I was intending going out anyway to get some more critical tests done on the new lens, so continuing my walk down to the shops wasn’t a real hardship. On my return I Scamp was reading in the sunshine in the garden. I joined her with a bottle of beer and a rum ’n’ coke for Scamp. Read for a while and got the nudge from my watch to go and complete the final 250 steps in the hour. This I did and that gave me my first ‘8 active hours’ of the week.

Pizza turned out ok, but not really the meat ‘feast’ it promised. Sliced Pepperoni, little squares of Ham and reconstituted chicken is no my idea of a feast. I much prefer the Chicken and Bacon that we usually have. Iceland didn’t have any this time.

PoD was four little sparrows lined up on a fence while the fifth was having dinner from the bird feeder. They were very patient and arguments only erupted when one of them tried to jump the queue.

I’d been fascinated yesterday with the amount of gunge that had accumulated in the radiators, so this morning I thought I’d give the stairs a go with the new flexible brush.  While I was destroying ancient spider webs in places where we didn’t even know we had places, I thought I heard a rustle from one of the unhitherto unaccessible void areas underneath the upstairs floor.  I eventually teased it out and it turned out to be, not a fat bundle of tenners wrapped up with string, but an empty packet of Monster Munch.  I immediately thought that one of my two regular readers might shine some light on the subject, but then I noticed the advert on the back for an offer that closed on the 31st March 1984.  So you pair are in the clear, because we didn’t move to this house until 1986!  Pity, I’d have liked it to have been a bundle of tenners tied up with string!

Tomorrow looks wet … all day wet. We’ll hope the weather fairies have got it wrong.

Wee men – 28 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

They don’t come out as often as they used to, but they enjoy being in the limelight.

Before we got to that, there was a new lens to test. And before that there was messages to go for. We needed some messages and we drove up to Tesco. Just some veg really, but it got us out the house on a dull day. On the way home we stopped for a stir fry kit from M&S. Chicken strips, veg mix, noodles and a carton of chicken stock to make a Ramen just as good as Wagamama and a whole lot cheaper.

Back home there was more pruning to do and also I potted up a Ammi Majus I’ve been growing from seed. Scamp bought me the seeds when we were down at Jamie and Simonne’s in the spring and the plants have been very slow growing. I sowed a row of them in the raised bed and another row in the ground. The ones in the ground have never developed. Most of the ones in the raised bed had disappeared too, but three plants remain and I was potting up the largest one. They look a bit like bushy carrots, but should grow into a plant resembling the Cow Parsley that I love to photograph. I’m hoping the slow growth is because the plant is biennial and will survive the winter to flower next year.

<Technospeak>
After lunch I took two cameras out with two different lenses for the big test. It wasn’t a great day for a test because it was dull and uninspiring. I did get a few photos taken with the new ultra wide zoom lens. It’s actually designed to be used with a smaller camera like the A6000, but it copes quite well with the much bigger sensor of the A7iii. At its shortest setting, 10mm there is a lot of empty space on the photo. It’s a bit like looking down the wrong end of a telescope. At 13mm the empty space is gone and the distorted image is very sharp indeed. It can go as far as 18mm and is then almost in the realm of wide angle. Ultra wide is much more interesting to me. It passed today’s test with flying colours. It’s a keeper.
</Technospeak>

An even bigger surprise was that the A6000 coped with the 105mm macro lens and produced some good images. Worth trying again, if for no other reason than it weighs a lot less than the A7iii.

After dinner I started building the set for “Kiss”, Flicker Friday’s competition. No prizes, just an exercise in covering the prompt. My solution to the prompt made PoD. A “Troopies” wedding! Just a bit of fun.

The dinner, by the way, turned out fine, except … the veg mix had green beans in it and I’m sure two of my readers know that Scamp will not eat them. I was going to pick them out of the dry veg, but Scamp said I should just keep them in and she’d spit them out! That’s what she did, but delicately leaving them at the side of her plate, rather than inelegantly spitting them out. Other than that and the fact that the chicken stock was a bit spicy, it was a good meal.

I have a morning to myself tomorrow as Scamp is out all morning! What will I get up to, unsupervised?

 

A toy off the rack – 27 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

It was coming today, but not until evening. Who would want to be a DPD driver.

It was an early rise for us lazy folk. The lady with the long cotton bud and the questions was coming between 9.30 and10.30am.

She arrived right between those times, and this was to be her last visit to us because from now on we’ll get a sampling kit sent to us and once it’s been used we’ll post it away for checking. The questioning will be done online. All those folk who’ve stood in the rain with masks on, dispensing the sampling kits and asking the questions finish work at the end of the month. I felt quite sorry for her because she seemed to enjoy the work and the meeting people. However, the cotton bud down the throat and up the nose still had to be done today and the questions had to be answered and logged for one last time. I think we’ll keep it on for a while anyway, if just for the free test.

Scamp went off after that to get some essentials from Tesco and I started working out how I’m going to get tomorrow’s picture for Flickr Friday. The topic is ‘Kiss’. My plan involves two ‘Troopies’, male and female kissing. Not as easy as you might think. While I was working on it I got a text from DPD to say that the lens would be delivered between 7.09 and 8.09pm tonight. I had hoped it would be here earlier, but it was not to be.

When she returned, Scamp had bought bread and some bananas. That was lunch sorted for both of us. After lunch, Scamp wanted to cut the front grass because it was a lovely warm day and there’s just the chance t might rain tomorrow and you can’t cut wet grass. While she was doing that, I thought I’d better be gainfully employed, and used the new radiator brush to clean out the inside of the back radiator. It’s amazing how much gunge gets stuck in the vanes of those heaters.

With that done, I offered to cut the remaining grass. I hadn’t realised how technical, cutting a couple of square metres of grass is, but with plenty of instruction from Scamp I got it finished. Or almost finished because she was pointing to a bit I’d missed. Then I was unloading the clippings the wrong way too. I gave up and went for a walk in St Mo’s.

I didn’t get much today, because there wasn’t a lot of insect life about. A couple of Ringlet butterflies was all I found. I was just heading for home when I got a message from Scamp asking me to get a lettuce from the shops. I phoned her to say I’d no money, but if she wanted I’d meet her and we could walk to the shops together. On the way to meet her I found today’s PoD. It’s the seed heads of a Sweet Cicely plant. I’ve photographed them before, but didn’t know their name. Mr Google did. When we got back there was just enough time for a relaxing G ’n’ T in the garden.

Dinner was a salad with lettuce, potato salad (last of our ‘earlys’) beetroot and prawns for me. I’m not really keen on big prawns served cold. I’d wished we’d got some small fresh prawns at the shops. Never mind, it was food. Plus there was strawberry jelly and ice cream for dessert.

Just after 7.30pm the driver delivered the box from MPB. Inside was a red box. This is important. It appears that there is a group on YouTube who have proved that lenses that come in red/orange boxes are better than those that come in white boxes. It’s probably utter tosh, but this was a red box, so I knew we were good!

It’s a neat little lens. Solid feeling and it does indeed produce a distorted wide angle view. Unfortunately it was starting to get dark before I could get any decent images, so tomorrow is testing day.

Tomorrow we have no plans. I thought we were going to a tea dance, but Scamp decided to err on the side of safety. Probably quite right.

 

Hair raising – 26 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was out this morning to get her hair cut.

I did offer her my services with the number 4 cutter on top and the number 3 cutter on the sides and back, but she refused. It would have been cheaper and quicker than having it done at a salon with the added benefit of not needing it done again until it had grown in. Ok, I’m not a trained stylist, but the difference between a bad haircut and a good one is just two weeks.

While she was out I used the plastic to get me a new lens. This one looks as if it will be quite versatile. I know you’re all waiting to hear all about it, but all I’m going to say is it’s a Sony 10-18mm ultra wide angle that has the benefits of being constant aperture and also having OIS built in. I knew it would impress you and it was a steal at £1100.

When Scamp returned looking more beautiful than I thought she could, we had lunch which was a pot of yoghurt each because there wasn’t really any useable bread, especially after I’d paid all that money for a lens.

We both wanted to go for a walk and I suggested Colzium. It’s been a long time since we’ve been there and there’s always something new to see. We parked beside the old cafe at the Curling Pond. The cafe closed down about fifteen years ago, never to open again. I didn’t want to park where the tourists go on the other side of the pond because it’s so easy to lose your car in the potholes over there. I often wonder how many folk have broken a spring in them.

We walked up the steps to the big house, went left and followed the road round and down to the new cafe in the museum. Unfortunately their card machine was out of order, but luckily Scamp had a nice new tenner in the little purse she takes with her on walks. That paid for two coffees and a packet of shortbread. How’s your shortbread coming along, Jamie? We’d intended to walk round the walled garden before heading back to the car, but forgot, at least, I forgot anyway.

When we were walking over the bridge that crosses the wee burn, I spotted a twig with two Sycamore keys on it, the little seed pods that twirl round like miniature helicopters from the trees. I took a few photos of them and one of those shots made PoD. We walked down the drive and round to the car and home.

Back at the house, we’d decided to lift one of our remaining two ‘tattie bags’ for tonight’s dinner. It wouldn’t have made good eating as we unearthed just three potatoes. Thankfully the final bag gave us far more than we needed. Scamp had salmon with her potatoes and cauliflower and I had a very salty venison burger which I’d got cheap at Morrisons. Now I know why it was so cheap. We might plant some late potatoes for lifting in the winter, I think. Next garden job was to prune back the roses at the back door. It’s half finished, hopefully I’ll get the rest done tomorrow.

We’ve been watching a flower growing in the bed at the back of the house beneath the window. Neither of us had a clue what it was, at least until I put its photo into Google Image Search and out popped the name Astrantia major. The picture it showed was exactly like our mystery plant. Now we need to know where we got it from!

The lady with the cotton buds to shove down our throat and up or nose is coming to see us tomorrow, but we’ve no other plans. If it’s pleasant we may go for a walk, at least if the DPD man arrives with my new lens in time.

And just in case you’re wondering, I’ll say that the lens probably was a steal at £1100 when it was new, but I paid a fraction of that for it second-hand. If you’re not impressed, I’ll go and tell Alex. He will be!

Wet again – 25 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Then after a long heavy shower, the sun shone and the clouds drifted away.

During that heavy shower I was trying unsuccessfully to repair the boot switch of Scamp’s wee red car. I took cover in the car and hoped the rain would go off because I hadn’t realised just how cramped it is in the back seat of an old Micra with the parcel shelf and the boot cover for company. Also, I was feeling the call of nature!!

Eventually the rain eased off enough to make the short trip to the house doable without getting thoroughly soaked. The boot is now locked and won’t be able to be opened until I get the switch mounted properly. The last time I fixed it, it was held together with that amateur mechanic’s standby viz: Duct Tape and Hot Melt Glue. I’m thinking I might try something more substantial this time as the tape was holding, but the hot melt glue was just sitting there, getting in the way. Allegedly you can buy replacement switches from a bloke in Wishaw of all places. Not sure I’m that desperate yet.

Back in the house and feeling a lot more comfortable, I had, what I can only describe as, a slab of bread and roasted cheese for lunch. The loaf it came from was far too soft to cut with the bread knife, really so I had cut a thicker than normal slice to make sure it didn’t crumble away (it made sense at the time). Actually it tasted better toasted than it had yesterday, just spread with butter.

Now that we were pretty sure the rain had gone, we went for a walk over to St Mo’s. There was nothing to see there and Scamp wanted to get a card in Condorrat, so we extended our walk to the paper shop in Condorrat. The next thing she wanted was a voucher from M&S to go with the card and we walked back the way we’d come and onward to the shops. We got the voucher and something for tomorrow’s lunch and walked home.

On the way Scamp got an email with a cabin number we’d requested, so then two computers were utilised to find where that cabin was located. We found it, but it was nowhere like where our initial email a couple of weeks ago had said. Never mind, another box ticked!

I still didn’t have a photo for today, so I went for a walk around St Mo’s again and this time took more heavy duty armoury with me in the form of the A7iii and the 105mm macro lens. Got some photos that looked worthwhile and came home, because in a change from tradition, Scamp had offered to make dinner tonight. Monday is always pasta and I am usually the pasta chef. Tonight it was pasta, Scamp style. It was Macaroni ’n’ Cheese and it was quite the best she’d made for a long time. Not one morsel was left on the plate.

When I looked at the photos, I knew something was wrong. Almost all of them were absolutely filthy. Not dodgy filthy, you understand. No, dust all over the sensor left black marks on the images. It must have been from the old Sigma 10-20mm lens I’d used, or more likely from the adaptor. It took about an hour with a magnifier a blower brush and a fine white paintbrush (that’s never been near paint) to carefully remove most of the dust. After that, cleaning up the actual photos was fairly easily done, but time consuming. PoD went to a wide angle shot of some wild flowers in St Mo’s.

We got some photos from Jamie showing off his tomatoes. They look great. I’m afraid none of ours are turning very red yet. I suppose that’s one of the advantages of having a ‘real’ greenhouse. Well done Jamie.

Tomorrow Scamp has an appointment with the hairdresser and I’ve just realised she might need her car, so I’ll have to tidy it up a bit so it doesn’t look such a sight!

A day of mixed weather – 24 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Sometimes sunny, sometimes cloudy, but always with rain of some description.

Heavy rain, light rain, sometimes just drizzle or a Scottish smirr, but there was always water of some description falling from the sky today.

We voted with our feet in the morning and our feet were up on the coffee table, although I did clear the junk off my IKEA Poang chair and had a relaxing half hour or so on it. It’s a great chair for reading in, but not so good for using with a laptop. I suppose it was designed before laptops were a thing. Allegedly it was designed around 1978.

Eventually had to get up to help prepare lunch and then the laptop came out of hiding and I was lost in Flickr for an hour at least. It did seem to stop raining for a while after that, but it was only a ruse by the rainclouds. As soon as we went outside the rain started again.

<Technospeak>
It was about 4 o’ clock before I decided to put on my new Columbia trainers and take an unusual combination of Sony A7iii + adapter + Sigma 10-20mm lens out for a walk in St Mo’s. I restricted myself to one circuit of the pond and had to get all my photos in that time and only with my Heath Robinson contraption. It’s really a very capable lens. It originally fitted my old Nikon D70, but when I upgraded to a D7000 the lens wouldn’t work with the more demanding electronic connections, so it was relegated to a cupboard. When I was selling all my Nikon gear to fund my move to full frame Sony hardware, I couldn’t bear to part with the old 10-20mm and found an adapter that would allow its use on the A7 series. It still takes great pictures, but is now manual focus only. The other problem is that it’s an APS-C lens which doesn’t quite cover the sensor of a full frame camera, so some cropping is inevitable. I could allow the camera to do it for itself, but where’s the fun in that when you can spend an hour doing it yourself!
</Technospeak>

The old lens took today’s PoD which is a view of St Mo’s pond with its duckweed carpet, viewed from the pond outfall. I just liked all the different green hues in the picture.

Dinner tonight was yesterday’s pakora and curries reheated and with some flatbreads for good measure. It’s now making itself known to me again, so some Gaviscon may be necessary tonight!

Watched the French GP with more than its fair share of thrills and spills. Good to see Hamilton making it to the podium. Not so happy to see George Russell sneaking 3rd place from Perez.

Spoke to Jamie in the evening and heard how they survived the heatwave on Monday and Tuesday. Heard too about the tomatoes in the garden ripening while Scamp’s are still green.

I think it may still be raining outside and we’re forecast for more tomorrow. Maybe the garden still needs a little more.

Messages – 23 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Today was one of those dull days where the sun can’t be bothered getting up, so it doesn’t.

In an attempt at finding something to get us out of the house today, we discussed what we’d have for lunch, but that discussion didn’t get us far. More constructive was the next discussion about what we’d have for dinner. Scamp said we needed a few messages and the answer to today’s dinner would be found in what messages we bought. Fine, we were on a roll. Where to go for the messages? I suggested two birds with one stone. We go to Morrisons and get the messages then have lunch in their cafe. That was the plan there and then. We’d drive to Falkirk to Morrisons for messages and lunch.

Drove to the shop, got the messages and put them in the car. Then things started to a bit awry. The cafe at Morrisons is now staffed by a large computer screen where you select and pay for your food. I don’t know how this works if it’s busy, as they can only afford one screen. No humans were to be seen. There was a till, but nobody in charge of it. Ok, I could do this. One scrambled eggs on toast. One filled roll with sausage. One peppermint tea. One Americano coffee. It’s a pain in the backside because you have to confirm everything after you’ve selected it. Paid it and got my receipt. When I turned to go away, the screen flashed up a message “Cafe Closed”. The time was 2.10pm. According to the website the cafe is open until 6pm, and it advertises an “All Day Breakfast”. All day seems to end just after 2pm.

Went for the coffee and the tea. Coffee was easy. Press the button and the coffee is brewed into the cup. Tea is a bigger problem. Hot water is dispensed, but where’s the peppermint tea bags? Eventually found someone at a till and asked where the tea was. The answer was a backhanded “It’s in the pots.” Where’s the Specialist Tea then? After a bit of huffing and puffing she brought out a small wicker basket and pushed it towards me. I think she’d used up her vocabulary on our previous conversation. I picked one and thanked her. A grunt and the basket was gone as was its guardian.

Then we waited. And waited. And further waited. Not just us, either. Half of the cafe seemed to be waiting. Eventually, 40 minutes later a roll with two barely warm sliced sausages along with the toast and scrambled eggs arrived. No apology. No sorry for your wait. We were the lucky ones. The others started forming a queue for their money back. I know Morrisons is in trouble. Now I know why. The most disorganised, unsupervised and plainly rude staff I’ve ever met. They deserve to go down with the sinking ship.

We drove home and it rained. Not a lot, and not for long but it did rain. We’d decided to buy in a curry for dinner.

Scamp phoned Jackie who claimed she was just about to phone her. Everyone always says that, don’t they? I know I do it all the time. While they were on the phone, I went out to St Mo’s for some photos. Decided to take a waterproof from the car and was glad I’d taken it because the rain came tipping down. Walked twice round the pond and got some photos of black currant bushes that would put ours to shame, growing without any care or weeding, planted by volunteers years ago. I nearly pinched some, but didn’t. On the way home I found my PoD. The light was just right for a view down the path through the trees, then this bloke appeared and the shutter clicked!

I eventually ordered a curry for both of us after a disgruntled half hour or so. Something was annoying me and I couldn’t decide what it was, so I went in the huff. So childish, I know. So me. Curry only took just over 45 minutes to arrive and it was really, really nice. Best one I’ve had from Bombay Dreams in a long while.

We watched an old episode of Death in Paradise while we ate. Neither of us could remember seeing it before. Strange, as I thought we’d seen them all.

It’s raining tonight, just as it was forecast to. It will do the garden good to get fresh rain water into the plants roots.

Tomorrow we have no plans.

Keeping Fit – 22 July 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Not me! This was Scamp’s adventure into dancing fitness.

Scamp was out just after 11am to go to a Fitsteps Tone. I have a Fitbit, so I don’t need Fitsteps too. My Fitbit keeps me toned to perfection. However, while she was away I spent a worthwhile hour or so running up and down the stairs, lifting stuff and searching through other stuff, looking for my Kindle. I thought I’d done almost as much exercise as Scamp had. That was until she came home still sweating from her class. About half an hour after that, I found my Kindle buried under a load of cartridge paper in my room. I really must tidy it up THIS WEEK! Apparently the class was a great success and she really enjoyed it. It certainly looked strenuous.

After lunch, I drove over to Fannyside and got some photos of what I though were sheep, but which turned out to be goats. Very nosy goats that came right up to the fence and one in particular more or less demanded that I take its picture, which I did, of course. I’d intended getting some landscape photos, but there was a van parked in my usual parking space so I went for a drive along the single track road to Arns which is a couple of houses about 50m apart. I eventually gave up looking for somewhere scenic to photograph and drove back to see if Van Man had moved on. Thankfully he had and I got my landscape photos. The lighting had been better earlier, but since there is only room in the parking place for one vehicle, I couldn’t stop.

I drove back after getting some moody cloudscapes. I stopped just after the boatyard at Fannyside Loch and got some better shots with the loch sparkling in the sunshine that had appeared. Behind the sun I could see the rain clouds looming and sure enough, as I was driving down towards Cumbersheugh the first splashes of rain hit the windscreen.

The rain stopped. I, too, stopped, at Tesco and tried to get a pizza and two litres of milk, but with a queue of twelve folk, some with the weekly shop in their trolleys, waiting for a slot in the self-service checkouts, and only two of the ten main checkouts in operation, I put the milk and pizza back in the racks and left empty handed. You’d think that a company like Tesco would be able to organise its staff better. It’s not as if they wouldn’t know that Fridays were going to be busy. The shop is usually jumping on a Friday. Or, do we blame it all on Covid again?

I went to Iceland, got the pizza and the milk and got served in a quarter the time it would have taken in Tesco. Maybe I’m just in a ranting mood today because Van Man stole my parking space in Fannyside!

Pizza was ok, but the glass of cheap Malbec wine was better. All was well with the world again. The PoD went to the photogenic goat, and second prize went to the landscape shot I took of Fannyside Loch.

We spoke to John and Marion in the evening and got an invitation to dinner next month. That will be good. That put another smile on my face. Wrote to Alex and sent him some photos.

Just before Marion phoned the rain started again. Not a shower this time but good heavy soaking rain. Good for the garden.

Tomorrow we may go out somewhere, but I also want to clear a space on the sofa in my room.