Author: Zogman

Getting back to normal – 3 October 2021

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After yesterday’s Dance Class, Cookery Class and late night, today was a chance to get back to normal.

A normal Sunday with sunshine to start with but we weren’t fooled. We knew it wouldn’t last and that rain would be on its way, sooner or later. It turned out to be later, much later and by that time Scamp had hung out some washing. She should have known that was the signal for the rain to start. Thankfully it didn’t last and the clothes just got an extra rinse … to two.

After lunch and with the weekend Sudoku done I doodled the Inktober sketch for today whose prompt was “Vessel”. With a few possible sketches done and now that the rain was tapering off to very occasional showers, I got booted up and went for a walk in St Mo’s. As I suspected, there were not many insects looking for a portrait session, but in the woods I did find quite a few bunches of fungi in a variety of forms, sizes and colours. They would have made PoD, but my eye and camera were drawn to a sprinkling of light across the pond and without the wherewithal to take a wide angle shot which would include some lovely clouds, I did what I usually do and hammered off six shots which I later got Lightroom to build into a decent vertical panorama, technically a Vertorama. That did win PoD.  With a little time to spare I drew the submission piece for Inktober ’21

Dinner tonight was Shepherd’s Pie. It’s ok, the shepherd doesn’t know we have it. They weren’t traditional shepherd’s pies either. Scamp’s was a purely vegetarian one with brown lentils taking the place of meat and mine was made with last week’s mince which had been chilling in the freezer and since it was beef mince, it wasn’t the traditional lamb for the pie. All that aside, we had two decent main courses preceded by Haggis Bonbons. Very cheffy and fairly easy to construct according to Scamp. Pudding was Ice Cream with Meringue Nests and Blackcurrant Syrup. A decent Sunday dinner almost all made from leftovers. Just shows what you can do when you have an imagination, especially an imagination like Scamp’s.

Spoke to Jamie later and found that the fuel embargo is beginning to lift down their way. Supplies are getting through and the tanks of cars are being filled again. No more news for there.

Tomorrow we may be going to Rutherglen to find at least one pair of lady’s dance shoes. No men’s shoes are required at this stage.

Tango and Rain – 2 October 2021

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Dancing the Living Room Tango in a hall.

Dance class in Bridge of Weir this morning. Drive to the hall was easy peasy. No real traffic to speak of apart from one numpty who tried to overtake me on the inside and got quite upset when he found I wasn’t going to let him, and he had to pull in behind. I don’t think he was a happy driver.

We started with easy stuff, just to get our feet tuned in again after a week’s lay off. Then we began the Tango we’d learned from the Zoom classes. We did really well and we both agreed about that, even the teachers made very few changes to the way we were dancing it. The strange thing about it was in Lockdown we danced half of it up the living room, then half back down again. Today the teachers sort of unfolded it so we danced it as it should be danced, in a straight line. Then we had a break for a sequence dance that Scamp and I can do, but which evaded us, and a few others, before it all came flooding back. Next was Waltz and we did make a few mistakes in it. Most of the mistakes were mine. Forgetting to do heel leads when going forward and losing “The Frame”. If you watch Strictly, you’ll hear that referred to all the time. Another sequence dance to finish and we were allowed to go home … in the rain. A rain that didn’t stop until about 5pm.

I spent most of the afternoon doing Sudoku and playing catchup with Flickr and the blog. Finally the sun came out and I prepared to go for a walk. I was spraying some beastie repellant on my boots and trousers when I must have turned the wrong way and got a sharp pain in my back. I thought the walk would help work it out, but for once it didn’t seem to help. A hot shower and a couple of paracetamol did and I felt better after that. But it returned later in the evening. I’m hoping a hot shower and another couple of paracetamol will help me get a decent night’s sleep. PoD was an Osteospermum from the front garden covered in little water drops.

Tomorrow looks like being much the same as today. I’m hoping for a little bit more sunshine.

It’s all about the timing – 1 October 2021

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Today we were cooking for our guests.

It seemed to take up almost all of the day. I was making mushroom soup and also tear and share bread. Scamp was in charge of the main which was spicy chicken, Swiss Roll and also ice cream. A bit of imbalance there, I know, but I didn’t mind doing all the difficult stuff. I was trying to get two things at the same time and that means two timers going at the same time. While they were ticking away, I was showering and shaving and almost managed to get that done before the timers ran out. Almost, but not quite. However both the bread and the soup worked fine and I didn’t cut myself shaving!

Scamp on the other hand seemed to float through the entire day. No panics, no problems with the timing, just cooking. That’s the difference between us as far as this is concerned. I’m firmly stuck in the “Time and Temperature” method, Scamp cooks by intuition and that’s a much more flexible way to do it.

The guests arrived just after seven and the food went down well, especially the Tear and Share and Swiss Roll. Then we had a few drinks and sat and talked all night.

In between the different cooking sessions I managed to get some photos in St Mo’s, but the light levels were low again. PoD was macro of a dandelion with the new lens. Nice detail, but very little shaping. Maybe we’ll get some sun tomorrow.

As you can imagine we didn’t get the dish washer loaded until so late it was early, so this is a catch up. Tomorrow is Saturday so that’s Dance Class.

 

 

 

Coffee at last – 30 September 2021

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We were taking Isobel with us to Costa

Picked up Isobel in the village and drove to Costa where I met Val. Surprise, Surprise, Costa had coffee. Real coffee, not instant and not filter, but barista made coffee. Conversation between Val and I ranged over the usual wide range of subjects, tech subjects and photography subjects admittedly, but what else would you expect from us?

During the discussions I must have missed the email that had arrived to tell me when DPD were delivering my parcel. We drove Isobel home, Val was meeting his wife at Tesco, and then Scamp and I went to Calders to get some snowdrop bulbs. Unluckily for us the HGV drivers hadn’t been to Calders and there were no snowdrop bulbs to be had. I think half of Cumbersheugh must have been panic buying them during the week. It was while we were at Calders that I found the email and the second one to say that they hadn’t been able to deliver it because there was nobody in! I wasn’t in the best mood after that, but we drove to Tesco to get food for tonight and tomorrow’s dinner.

Drove home and went in the huff for most of the afternoon. The only thing that brightened my afternoon and brought me out from under my black cloud was a phone call from Hazy. Found out about the goings on down Epsom way. Good to hear that Grannie is in much better spirits, and yes, I will try to get the recipe for the bread to you soon. By the way, I don’t know if I said Hazy, but I used a credit from Audible to download Entangled Life and am quite addicted to Mr Sheldrake’s soporific voice reading his book to me. Also it means I don’t have to try to work out how to pronounce those big sciency words! I like that it’s a Jamie and Hazy collaboration.

After we’d finished talking to Hazy I discovered that my phone had received a message to say that I could now collect my DPD parcel from Matalan at The Shops. Jacket on, because it had been raining on and off all day, made sure I had the QR code on my phone screen and that I had photo ID. I’m going to a shop. I have to wear a face mask in a shop. What good is photo ID? They can only really see my bloodshot eyes! Anyway, I picked up then parcel containing a Sony 50mm f2.8 macro lens that weighs about a third of the weight of the Sigma 105mm f2.8 macro lens I’ve already got. There was almost no useful light to test it with tonight, but the few photos I took look like it was worth the money … and the wait.

Scamp was busy all afternoon making ice cream and yet another Swiss Roll. The ice cream is now in the freezer and the Swiss Roll has its chocolate ganache coat on and is in the fridge.

Today’s PoD is one of Scamp’s Lisianthus cut flowers, not to be confused with Lissajous which is a figure I met on an oscilloscope many years ago and nothing like the flower.

Tomorrow we are having Crawford and Nancy for dinner, so lots of prep to be done, which probably explains the ice cream and Swiss Roll.

Somewhere we hadn’t been for a while – 29 September 2021

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That was what I said yesterday and that’s where we went today.

We left early and drove by M80, M8, M77 then off the motorway on to Nitshill Road to Rouken Glen.

We parked and went for a walk, but half the park seemed to be cordoned off with great barriers either being put up or taken down, it wasn’t clear until we read a notice that Boy George, Nile Rodgers and some other has-been pop stars had been performing at the park at the weekend. It even gave a timescale for the removal of the stages and the barriers. Now we understood why there was a covid rapid testing bus just outside the car park. Oh well, at least we didn’t come on Saturday and have to endure that noise!

We found or way around to the Meadows which is really just a big park with rough cut grass and some craggy boulders. Wild but in a ‘contained’ way. It’s always good to find a path you haven’t been on before and that’s what we found. The path took us around the perimeter of the park on the border between park and golf course. I found a few chessies that I’ll plant in a pot full of dry compost and leave them to overwinter in the greenhouse. By the spring they should hopefully be ready to plant out properly and hopefully some of Glasgow will grow in Cumbersheugh.

The path didn’t look as if it was taking us anywhere interesting, so we took a side path, there are lots of side paths to explore. Our path took us beside a burn and eventually brought us out at the waterfall. The water from the falls drops about five or six meters and flows out through a bridge under the path. The bridge had been plagued by padlocks for years, but was now clear with signs warning that padlocks would be removed and destroyed. However, the thoughtful council had built a “Padlock Wall” for people to put the locks on and still display their everlasting love for all to see. There must have been hundreds, if not thousands of padlocks of all shapes, sizes and colours. That photo made PoD.

Further on we found the boating pond with the Boathouse Cafe on the far side. That was our lunch venue. Two Fish Finger Sandwiches, one each. And there was that strange warning that they had no machine coffee, only filter! Why are coffee machines breaking down everywhere? I think the real reason is that you put a fair few spoonfuls of coffee into a filter machine fill it up with water and set it going. You can get a three or four times more cups of dodgy filter coffee from the the same amount of coffee beans that would produce one cup of barista produced espresso. It’s a fiddle and I blame Brexit.

After lunch with tea to wash the sandwiches down, we headed back to the car via the “Garden Centre” which was already “Beginning to look a lot like Christmas”. Heavens, we’ve not even had Halloween yet. In fact it’s only September!

Back home I took the bull by the horns and phoned EE. Was offered 2GB data for £9. Told them I could do better with Tesco. I got the usual spiel about Tesco being a supermarket and so on. He asked me what the Tesco deal was and when I told him he said he could better that. Long story short, I got a 12month contract for 11GB for £10, plus unlimited text and calls. Thought about it for a while then phoned back and sealed the deal. I could probably have held out for more, but why? I’ve not really had much bother with EE and I don’t need the faff of moving my number. Happy Bunny.

Scamp had closed one of our dormant bank accounts yesterday and in doing so lost her breakdown cover. Tonight she booked and 18 month cover with RAC. Cheaper than AA and not the same strings attached as with some of the cheaper companies. Happy Bunny.

Tomorrow we’re both intending to go out for coffee at Costa. Scamp with Isobel and me with Val. Parcel due for me from DPD tomorrow too. Hope it doesn’t clash, with the coffee and hope they actually have coffee!

A change of scenery – 28 September 2021

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This was a lazy day and a wet one too.

Scamp was out meeting Annette for a coffee and I put some washing in the machine and set it to work while I worked upstairs. I removed the part finished pastel painting I’d been working on, because I wasn’t going to take it any further. It’s now pinned on the wall for appraisal.

Next task was to get my pens washed and primed ready for Inktober which is fast approaching. It’s a footery job. First you have to soak the nibs in a cleaning solution that has cleaned so many pens that it’s become 75% ink itself. Next that solution has to be washed out and the nibs dried. Finally I filled the pens with Higgins black fountain pen ink. My favourite drawing ink. Three pens are now ready to produce some excellent artworks, or failing that, my usual clumsy attempt at ink sketches.

The last task on my list was to produce a photo for the title page of this year’s Inktober group. The photography took about fifteen minutes, but trying to import the shot into Flickr is a nightmare. It tells you to drag the picture to your chosen position, but you can’t drag it. Actually it was fine where I’d put it, then when you save it, it changes the whole format of the title. It’s no use complaining to the staff on their badly named “Help” page. All they say is try to find a workaround. Excuse me, I’m paying for the privilege of finding my own workaround. That doesn’t seem like a good deal from my point of view. I get that the staff are actually unpaid volunteers, but who, then is collecting my subs every year? And what are they doing for that payment?
Answers, as always, on a postcard.

Maybe I was just in a bad mood because I found a tick on my arm this morning. A tiny little one that’s now a lot flatter than it was earlier on. I hate ticks.

With the pens washed, the title page finished and my anger abating, I hung out the washing and that was when Scamp returned. When we were having lunch some workies, who had erected scaffolding yesterday at a house across the road started stripping the roughcast off its gable end. The noise really got on my nerves, so I suggested we go out for a walk, and then noticed it was raining. Should I take the washing in, or let it have an extra rinse. “Leave it”, was Scamp’s suggestion as she started moving the furniture around. That’s the signal for a dance practise and that’s what we did for about half an hour, maybe not as long as that. It took my mind off the rain and the incessant hammering. Then the sun came out, so I got the Big Dog and a couple of lenses and went to take some photos down at Broadwood Loch. That’s where today’s PoD came from.

When I came home I made Carrot and Orange soup which was nowhere near as delightful as it sounds. Neither of us could agree on what was wrong with it, but we did agree that it wasn’t nice. Back to the drawing board. I’m thinking Carrot and Ginger or Carrot and Apple for tomorrow, perhaps.

Tomorrow we may go for a run somewhere we haven’t been for a long time. That’s all I’m saying just now.

I think it’s raining – 27 September 2021

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Every time we looked out the window we said that.

I’d kind of thought of stripping out the old sealant from the shower cabinet and redoing it, but it might take a few days to get that done, so maybe next week.

Instead we say and watched the showers blowing in from the west, then the sun would come out for a short spell before the next wave descended. It seemed to go on like that all morning and into the afternoon. We needed milk, so necessity meant we needed to face the elements and walk down to the shops. That’s what we did and on the way back I took the diversion through St Mo’s while Scamp continued on to the house.

There wasn’t much going on in the park. Two folk were spinning for pike in the pond and catching nothing by the looks of things. I was taking some moody shots of cow parsley and tangles of weeds when the sun shone enough to illuminate them. I eventually settled on a plant of the pea family with one of its tendrils firmly attached to an old russet colour dried up weed. It was fascinating the complicated knot it had made to grip the weed. That became PoD. Actually it’s two shots blended in Photoshop to get sharp seed pods on the right and keep the weed on the left in focus. You don’t shot photos, you make them.

I’d been out for about an hour all in, Scamp a little bit less and it hadn’t rained in all that time. However I’d hardly sat down with a cup of coffee when the raindrops were hitting the window. Maybe we were just lucky today

I bought myself a new, well second hand, short macro lens. It won’t be the same quality as the big heavy Sigma lens, but it will be so much lighter that it will entice me to carry it about with me. It should work well with the light little Sony A6000.

Scamp’s hoping to go out for coffee (if there is any) tomorrow with Annette. I may stay in and watch the rain.

Out for a test drive – 26 September 2021

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Testing the red car and no coffee in a coffee shop. Strange times.

We decided we’d take the red car out for a longer run than it’s had for while. Enough to allow the alternator to generate some electrical power and store it in the battery. I suggested we drive to Robroyston and have a cup of coffee then come home. The drive was fine and the wee red car performed perfectly. The coffee shop, Costa, not so good.

There was a reasonable queue in the shop, but when I got to the front one of the baristas told me there was filter coffee and soft drinks, but no coffee, no lattes and no cappuccinos. If there was no coffee, what were they making the filter coffee with? Maybe instant coffee? Or perhaps gravy browning? To be honest, in Costa it’s difficult to tell the difference. I said “No thanks” and we left. Most of the queue left too. I’m guessing there were no HGV drivers available for the coffee delivery.

Instead we went to Lidl and bought enough to make tonight’s dinner and some other things too and drove home to get our caffeine fix. Again the wee red car behaved perfectly with a few squeaks from the brakes and maybe a noisy wheel bearing, but essentially it was working just as it should do. Now we just have to find a petrol station that’s open, without a mile long queue, and one with petrol in the pumps. That might be a bigger challenge!

After lunch and after watching Andrew Marr savaging Grant Shapps the transport minister and listening to Keir Starmer mumbling about what he’d have done if he’d been prime minister (fat chance of that), after all that, I booted up and went for a walk in St Mo’s. Sitting on an old log I found four dragonflies. I joined their group and took their photographs, individually and in pairs and trios. Never quite managed the full group photo. Well, you know how it is with group shots. There’s always somebody who blinks or looks the other way and there’s always the joker who pulls a funny face. It’s just the same with dragonflies, except with wings. One of the dragonfly photos got PoD.

Dinner tonight was Haggis Neeps and Tatties. No, it wasn’t Burns Night, it was just a great idea from Scamp that really hit the spot. It was buying the turnip from Lidl that settled the case for H,N&T. Very enjoyable and even better, there may be enough haggis left for tomorrow’s lunch.

After dinner and after watching another fascinating GP which Hamilton won <Insert boo here> and Verstappen drove a spectacular second place after starting last <Insert Hooray here> we did a bit of online investigating. Scamp found that the owner of the garage we used to take our car to for MOT and servicing has now gone into partnership in a new place. We may go and do a drive by tomorrow, just in case the wee red car need some TLC.

Spoke to Jamie in the evening and found that life was just ticking over as normal down there. Told him I was testing Dashline and Lastpass, his and Hazy’s password managers at present. I’ve Dashline working on the MBP and Lastpass on the iMac. Not much to pick and choose between them, but I’m just a week in to the test.

Tomorrow we might do that drive by, or we might go for a walk or maybe we’ll do both. Who knows? You might, tomorrow.

 

Recharging – 25 September 2021

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Getting the wee red car back on the road.

Up with the bonnet and then … I found my socket set was all imperial sizes and the bolts holding the terminals to the battery were metric. My 7/16” socket was too tight and the 1/2” socket was too slack. I needed something like a 15/32” socket, or more realistically, an 11mm one. I did have a set of cheap metric sockets at one time, about a year ago, I think, but I reckon I must have thrown them out in a clear out last year. Oh well, I was going to Halfords anyway to get a battery charger. I’d add a socket set to the list.

Drove up to the retail park in my car, in heavy traffic all heading north or east. This was September weekend in Scotland a school holiday and what used to be a bank holiday too, so maybe that explained the rush into the wilds of the countryside. I wouldn’t have rushed, because it was another of those drizzly Scottish days. I got the battery charger and the cheap socket set that I won’t throw out this time and returned to remove a battery that’s only about a year old. Tried to remember which terminal you remove first and found that Mr Google had the answer. Dragged the battery up to the back bedroom and meanwhile Scamp had unboxed the charger which we plugged in and set it to work for a couple of hours, after which it merrily told us the battery was charged and being ‘maintained’ whatever that means. The instructions weren’t that explicit about that part of the charging procedure. Two hours seemed a very short time to charge a totally flat battery, but I took it out and after checking with Mr Google again connected the positive, then the negative terminal. Immediately the warning lights came on in the car which I remembered from last year when I replaced a totally dead battery. Locked the battery in place and tentatively locked the car with the fob then unlocked it again. Key in the socket turned and so did the starter motor and the engine burst into life again! Hooray! The Wee Red Car will live to fight another day. I left it to rest after the open heart surgery, but we’ll go for a run tomorrow just to give it a bit more energy.

A Piece ’n’ Egg, actually two eggs was a late lunch and then, while Scamp did a bit of baking, I took the Big Dog and the macro lens out for a walk in St Mo’s. Found a Black Darter dragonfly on the boardwalk which was very skittish to start with, but after a bit of patient crawling around the boardwalk, I managed to get a couple of shots of it. I saw one last year and was reading about it in last year’s blog post. It would have made PoD, but it was pipped to the post by a couple of mating Shield Bugs. The larger of the two (the female) was calling the shots and decided it wanted to head off while the poor male was dragged along behind. It’s a tough life and probably quite painful being a male shield bug!

Scamp had cabbage and potatoes for dinner while I had mince ’n’ tatties with some of the cabbage. Not beetroot, Jamie! We had a baked corn on the cob each from the Campbell Garden down south. Both were still perfectly fresh. Scamp’s baking had included a rhubarb and apple tart from the Campbell Garden in Scotland. Beautifully crisp pastry. One of the best she’s made.

We struggled through the first Strictly of the year, but I’ll admit I wasn’t all that interested in most of it. Did enjoy the gay couple’s tango. Brilliantly done. We used to do a routine with Jamie Gal’ where the leader became the follower and vice versa. It’s very, very confusing for both parties, but the two men were faultless tonight.

Maybe we’ll take the Wee Red Car out for a run tomorrow to give its battery another charge.

Family Photography – 24 September 2021

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Today I was going to Glasgow on the train, to meet my brother. Unfortunately the Wee Red car wouldn’t take us to the station.

A rattle from the starter made me think it was a flat battery, except the battery was only a year old. Starter motor? I had a look under the bonnet, but there was nothing to see. Nothing loose, battery connections tight. Not sure if the RAC would come to the house, because we don’t have Home Start. The simple answer would be for Scamp to drive me there in the Blue Micra, but she’s only driven it once or twice a year ago. However, she stepped up to the plate, locked the red car and got into the driver’s seat of the Blue Micra. She drove me to the train station and I had plenty of time to get a ticket and get on the train. Meanwhile she texted me to say she had parked at Tesco.

I wandered round Bucky Street, because I was a bit early and it was a lovely clear morning, which was a change from the soaking Scottish drizzle at Croy station. I sat on the steps of the Concert Hall and took a few 18mm photos down Bucky Street to St Enoch at the bottom and on to the M74 in the distance with just the hint of Queens Park on the South Side. I was wearing a red carnation so he’d recognise me, but I spotted him first. Even from the back he was recognisably Alex. We met halfway up the stairs and after a quick hug we walked up Sausageroll Street.

Alex wanted to photograph some architecture and I suggested St Aloysius church on Rose Street. I really like this building and did a pen sketch of it some years ago. I can’t remember ever photographing it though. Maybe I did, but it’s so tall and there is no room to get distance to it, I don’t think any of my lenses could have coped with it. The 18mm managed it today. From there we walked down towards the motorway and more importantly the beautiful wedge shaped ex-bank on Shamrock Street. Glasgow’s version of the ‘Flat Iron’ building. While we were photographing it an older lady stopped to ask if we were interested in the building. She told us she lived in it and gave us a bit of its history. Built in 1909 and designed by architect Neil C. Duff. She said it was good that some people were interested enough in the building to photograph it. We thanked her and said our goodbyes.  Today’s PoD was a view of the front door of the ex-bank.

From there Alex wanted to photograph some modern day graffiti on the Chinese Supermarket across the street. Then we went for a coffee in Costa and compared notes. Next stop was Union Street for a bit of tech shopping, but the actual purchase didn’t happen because the queue was far too long. More graffiti on Mitchell Street (the lady picking people off the street), then a delightful tea and cake in the Willow Tea Rooms on Bucky Street. Never been in there before, but would go back again for the carrot cake!

All too soon it was time to go. We’d had a fairly comprehensive walk and photo shoot around central Glasgow. I got the bus home and Alex headed for the train. We’ve vowed to meet up again soon in two or three weeks, depending on the weather. I thoroughly enjoyed today. We will do it again.

Back home I brought tonight’s dinner. A small fish supper for Scamp and a single large fish for me. I needed that after a day of sugar overload. Found the battery in the car was completely flat. It’s been lying dormant for a long time, so maybe it needs to keep its wheels turning, or maybe there’s something more wrong. I’m suspecting a flat battery caused by a dodgy alternator, but we’ll get a charger tomorrow and try that first. One step at a time. That might be the theme for today.

No plans for tomorrow except charging a battery.