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Dancin’ again – 18 March 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Back to the “bump and grind”. More of which later, but not what you think!

Drove through busy traffic to Brookfield and we started with the Catherine waltz. It looked more difficult than it was and by the end of the half hour we had it, more or less. “More or less” covers a multitude of sins. Next we went straight into a Jive routine. Technically it was a different jive from what we normally do. We learned “Glasgow Jive” which is based on six beats but they were teaching “Ballroom Jive” which is based on four beats. That doesn’t seem like much, but it made a big difference to us. Eventually we did work out what was going on and on the way home we realised that most of what we were being taught, we’d already done, and that includes the “Hip Bumps.” No grinds though, at least not yet!

We’d both forgotten just how exhausting jive can be, so we were relieved to find that the next item on the ‘menu’ was a much more sedate Slow Foxtrot. Still complicated, especially in what they call the ‘back end’ which we think of as the second half, but much slower than the jive.

A couple of tracks of sequence dance and we were done for the day. That was exhausting, but once we’d looked over the videos of the jive, it wasn’t really more difficult than the ones we’d done years ago in Blackfriars with Michael, just different.

Drove home through more traffic than a normal Saturday, but managed to take the M74 turn off and ended up arriving home in about 45mins which is good for the return journey on a Saturday.

After a quick lunch I chopped up some half price tomatoes, two onions and a red pepper, loaded them into a baking tray, sprinkle them with basil and roasted them in the oven (gas 6) for an hour. Decanted the lot into a pot, added a tin of tomatoes, a litre of hot water and a chicken stock pot and cooked it for 30mins. Blitzed the lot in two stages in the blitzy thing (liquidiser) and let it settle for a while.

I went for a walk in St Mo’s with the little A6000 and a 55-200mm lens. It’s not a brilliant lens, but it’s the longest one I’ve got that actually works on the Sonys. I got a few photos of the host of frogs that have now invaded the ponds. One of them made PoD. I liked the reflection of it in the murky pond.

Dinner tonight was tomato soup with a baked potato. Not elegant, but warm and filling. Watched the qualifying for the Saudi Arabian GP. I think Scamp was a bit disappointed when Verstappen’s car died on him and he was demoted to the back of the pack. It will be interesting to see how long it will take him to get back to the podium tomorrow.

The dancing, but especially the Jive took a lot out of us today. We had an early night, and that’s why this is the second catch-up in a row. Thank you Hazy for getting back to me. I hadn’t found that page before, although most of the links lead back to pages I’d already found. I think my plan is to let the SSL expire and then start a new one from Namecheap this time. At least that should be an easier way to go.

No plans for tomorrow which is Mother’s Day, of course.

A long day – 17 March 2023

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A day that would last until tomorrow.

In the morning, Scamp went to FitSteps class and I had promised myself a day painting, but that didn’t happen. Instead I spent most of the morning trying unsuccessfully to understand how to reissue my SSL certificate. Namecheap must have the most user unfriendly ‘help’ files I’ve ever come across. It feels as if it was designed as instructions for a professional programmer, which I am not. If any “Webmonkeys” out there hear this plea and can help, I’d appreciate it. I gave up not long before Scamp returned.

By then it was lunch time and after that I took the A7 with the 105mm macro lens out for a walk in St Mo’s to see if the four frogs from yesterday had managed to find any like minded amphibians to join their orgy. Where the had been four frogs yesterday, there must have been a hundred today. The water was literally boiling with ripples and the rafts of frogspawn now stretched right round the pond. I took a few photos and then the rain that had been threatening all day called a halt to photography for the day. One long shot of a pensive looking frog made PoD.

Back home, Scamp read while I did the post-processing of the frog photos, mainly to waste time until we got ready to drive over to Larky for dinner with Crawford & Nancy.

We had a great night, as we usually do. Good food, good company and lots of jokes. Crawford and I had a jam session with Crawford on ukulele and me on guitar. I won’t say the singing or my playing was world class, but we had a good time. We left just before midnight and drove through some torrential rain. I got to bed just before 1am although Scamp was there before me. PoD to post and lots of other folks photos to look through in Flickr. Of course, this is a catch-up. You knew that.

Tomorrow we’re off to Brookfield and I’m sure the morning will come too quickly.

Frogs are back – 16 March 2023

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A fairly early rise for breakfast and see Jackie safely on her way back to Skye.

We got a bit edgy waiting for the taxi and the blue car was ready to drive her to Glasgow if it was needed, but just at 9.15am the car arrived and with her cases in the boot, off she went. It was really good to see you, Jackie even if it was only for a few days.

Once we’d had breakfast, Scamp phoned June to give her a share of our beautiful cake and to just have a good blether. While she was off drinking coffee and talking, I’d intended to do some painting, watercolour painting that is, not “two coats of Crown gloss”. No, I’m not into that at all! As it turned out I didn’t manage to get brush to paper, because instead I rebuilt my old Mac Book Pro. I had planned to cannibalise the SSD drive that was in it, but now I think it would be better keeping it as it is. That took me ages more than I thought it would, because the screws that are used to fix the SSD into the MBP are not normal cross-heads, but three slot screws and that meant I had to search for the three bladed screwdriver. With the drive back in place I needed a tiny cross-head screwdriver to fit those. The poor MBP has been disassembled and reassembled so many times since 2009 that more than half of the screws are now lost.

When Scamp came home, we had a late lunch. After that I drove to Tesco to buy some extra ‘messages’. I came home via St Mo’s and parked there for what is maybe the second time since we landed in Cumbersheugh. As I was walking across the boardwalk in the rain, I spotted a ripple in the water, and then another and yes, it was frogs. I only counted four of them, but they had been busy. Great rafts of frogspawn stretched across the pond. After the council dug up and cleared part of the smaller pond, I though the frogs might not return to lay their egg, but they have, or at least four of them have. It’s a start.

Unfortunately I didn’t have the best lens on for photographing frogs, but it was ideal for wide angle views of the burn and waterways that had been created by the rain that’s been heavy and continuous for most of the week. One of those burns had made a tiny little waterfall by the side of the path and that became PoD.

We watched The Apprentice tonight when five became two. I didn’t totally agree with the two who were chosen, but I am beginning to lose faith with this show. How can anyone who has gone through what must be a rigorous pre-show selection process produce a business plan riddled with the number of holes that those five had. It makes me wonder how many of the participants are actually business people and how many are actors.

So, Jackie sent a text to say that she had got home safely and had enjoyed spending all that money all that time with us. I hope you remembered the address to let you read the blog JG! Tomorrow Scamp is intending going to FitSteps and I might just start that painting.

Perth – 15 March 2023

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We’d decided on two possible destination for today if the weather was decent and one if it was raining.

The weather seemed set fine, so we drove up to Perth for the day. It suited Scamp and Jackie because there were lots of shops to investigate and it suited me because I could buy some decent tea and coffee.

Lovely run up with the sun shining on and off on the snowy hills. Midweek is definitely the time to go because apart from the lines of artics, the traffic is light. We parked in a new to us parking place just behind the Salutation Hotel. At least you can still use cash to park and not have to rely on a dodgy app that everyone seems to despise, but which the councils seem to love. Money is changing hands there I presume. After we parked we went our different ways. The ladies went clothes shopping and I went to get some much needed tea and coffee. Unfortunately The Bean Shop didn’t have any Cuban coffee, so I had to make do with Dominican which is almost as good.

We’d agreed to meet at Nero at 12.30pm and we did, for once. Real Nero coffee, not like the brown water I was subjected to last week. The roll ’n’ sausage was a different matter. It may have been veggie sausages pretending they were real ones, or they may have actually been stuffed with sawdust. It made no difference. They were almost inedible. But the coffee WAS good.

Once lunch was over we split up again because I told Scamp how to find Bon Marché and that needed some serious investigation. This time we agreed to meet back at the car. I went to take some photos and my prime target was the modern sculpture of two bloke leaning on a massive ring. It stand in the middle of the High Street. I’d already taken a couple of shots of padlocks hanging on a railing, but I reckoned the sculpture was better. A quick look in the Oxfam book shop and a visit to the health shop for a 200g bag of Coltsfoot rock and I met up with the happy shoppers.

Drove home through fairly light traffic. Thankful that we’d been limited to three hours parking because we didn’t have any more loose change. That meant we were hitting all the traffic hot spots well before they got too busy.

Dinner tonight was paella and it tasted good. I wasn’t too happy with the last paella I’d made, but this one was almost perfect. A glass of wine with it and a G&T for the ladies and a whisky for me afterwards sealed a good day out.

The statues did in fact get PoD but one of the padlock shots got a good second place.

Jackie goes home tomorrow. We don’t have any plans as yet.

Snow – 14 March 2023

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We woke to an unusual brightness. The snow that arrived during the night was reflecting the sunshine.

After breakfast, Scamp and Jackie were going to investigate the ‘new’ shops. While they were out I took the A7 and a couple of lenses over to St Mo’s to get some snowy pictures. But there was almost no snow. Whether that was to do with an over energetic sun or maybe the tall trees over there were sheltering it from the worst of the snow, I couldn’t tell. As usual, I worked with what I had and today’s PoD became a strange flower that I haven’t managed to ID. It flowers late into the autumn with fluffy looking pink flower. The stem and leaves look a bit like brambles, but the flowers are very different. Google images thinks it’s a carnation and I can see why. I had to cut my photo wanderings early because the snow came on again while I was out and I headed home.

I was home before the two ladies and made myself some coffee. We all had a light lunch after that and it was almost time for Scamp and I to get dressed for Bobby Flavell’s funeral. It seemed to have been agreed that the cars would leave from the house, so we all waited until the hearse and the family car moved off before we followed on behind. Quite a long service at Daldowie led by a Humanist speaker. He covered a long life well lived. Who knew that that wee quiet man was once a drummer for Linda Ronstadt on an American tour? But it was the wee quiet man who cut folk’s grass for them and who brought the empty bins back that we will miss, not the drummer.

After we returned, we changed into different clothes to go for a belated anniversary dinner arranged by Jackie and June at the Red Deer. Taxi to the restaurant whose boiler wasn’t working, so we had to make do with the wood burning fire and blower heaters. June and Ian were already there and there was a surprise for us. A brilliant anniversary cake with Scamp and I as ballroom dancers. Oh, if only I was as elegant as the man who was dancing on that cake! Having said that, he did look very like me! Both the sisters and Shona had a hand in the creation of this cake. Thank you all for such a clever idea.

For a starter, June had Duo of Pâté and the rest of us shared Stone-Baked Flatbread with garlic butter. For a main, Scamp had Fish & Chips, Jackie and I had Gammon Steak, June and Ian had Beef & Chianti Casserole. We all had a glass or two from a bottle of Prosecco and Ian and I had a beer each while the ladies scoffed a bottle of white wine.

The only fly in the ointment was that the taxi taking us home was almost half an hour late. June and Ian went home with it after we had been dropped off at the house. More drink was taken and we set the world to rights after a long, busy day.

A few plans for tomorrow, but they are all weather-dependent.

A less hectic day – 13 March 2023

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With a carton of milk waiting on the step for us when we woke.

Our first milk delivery in who knows how many years. A 2 litre carton of semi skimmed.

Hazy phoned in the morning and we had a good half hour blether about what was happening in Epsom and here. She also told me about a TV adaptation of Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman. I must look for that.

We went for the messages in the morning. Off to Tesco in the rain that followed us everywhere we went today. Came home with three big bags of essentials and by the time we’d put it all away, it was time for lunch. Sandwiches today, filled with Dairylea and Tomatoes for Scamp and Corned Beef for me. My what an exciting life we lead. While Jamie and Sim go to the beach, we get a shopping trip to Tesco.

I had decided not to take a camera for a walk in the rain, at least, not a long walk. Instead I cut a hole in a plastic bag, just big enough to poke a lens through and did some photography in the garden in the rain. The PoD turned out to be a Lupin leaf with a few water drops sitting on it. You can see how the shape of the leaf tends to hold some of the rainwater and channel it down to the roots, rather than allowing it to drip off the ends of the leaves, although some generally does that too.

Scamp was monitoring her sister’s progress down from Skye to Glasgow and we picked her up at the Concert Hall and drove home.

Lots to talk about and lots of question from both sisters as they caught up with what was happening in both families. I tried to keep out of it most of the time and made dinner which was Pasta Amatriciana, pasta with tomatoes, basil and bacon, with a pinch or two of chilli flakes.

Later in the evening I changed my role to Barman and we all had a Gin ’n’ Tonic. Still more blethering from both sisters.

Hoping for a good day tomorrow for a send off for Bobby Flavell.

 

 

… and the lights came on – 12 March 2023

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Actually the lights weren’t affected by the outage, but the central heating, the WiFi, the freezer and the fridge were in part or completely useless. It’s nice to have heat again!

The friend of a friend, Owen the Electrician arrived dead on 10am. He started by checking all the plug sockets beginning at roughly the middle of the ring main, which, coincidentally was where I thought the problem might be. We had to haul out the washing machine to get to the socket. There was a fault in it, but he also found a socket he though was dodgy and when he took off the cover to check, all the wires were loose inside. With that fixed, he started to systematically check round all the sockets on that ring main. Thankfully he didn’t find any other problem sockets, but was very careful to double, and even triple check all of them again. Finally after reassembling the one with the loose wires and checking it, he worked out how to deal with the socket behind the washing machine. To do that he neutralised the socket with a fancy little disconnector thing, then put a new cover plate over the now disconnected wires. Two hours he was at it and then he was off to pick up keys from somebody to start work tomorrow on an industrial unit.

For two days we’d been without heating and access to some of the electrical goods we take for granted. I’d managed to rig up an extension cable from the upstairs hall that wasn’t affected by the outage and used that to keep the freezer working. We also had a somewhat smelly De Longhi oil filled radiator that kept us from freezing. Blogs were posted using a hit and miss hot spot from my phone. We got by, but it wasn’t much fun.

We’ve agreed that we need a new distribution board, but the good news is that Owen says we don’t need the house rewired.

After the electrician left we had tea and toast for our lunch and watched the thermometer rising steadily. Later while Scamp put all the things back in place, I walked round St Mo’s and took today’s PoD which is a bunch of catkins. Then I walked down to the shops in the rain for a pizza and a trifle. That became dinner.

We watched the last ever Endeavour, and then discussed what had happened and how far back that story went.

Tomorrow I may go out with Val for coffee, because the rest of the week will tight.

Life in a cold country – 11 March 2023

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Today was a catalog of errors, from everyone.

Last night we were told that someone would call us this morning to arrange a time to come and fix the downstairs electrics. The phone call came at 9.20 and it was to say that nobody was available to visit us until Monday. Not exactly the emergency cover we’d hoped for. I phoned the insurance company and told them what had happened. They agreed to check with the repairs company and get back to us. They did get back to us to say that there were no emergency electricians in our area able to visit us today. However if we could find someone ourselves they were willing to reimburse us for the expense of the repair up to £1000. After searching the Internet for local emergency electricians and phoning friends to see if they had any suggestions we came up blank. Of course it’s Saturday and folk are entitled to their weekend away from work, but if they advertise a 24/7 service, they should provide one.

I had phoned Crawford in our attempt to find an electrician, but the call went to voicemail. Later in the afternoon we went for a walk, to get warm and to get some fresh air, that’s when Crawford phoned back, apologising for not noticing his voicemail. He’d phoned a friend of his who’s an electrician and sent me his number. I phoned him and he’s coming out tomorrow morning. Let’s hope he has the magical solution to the problem.

We’re a bit cosier tonight than last night. We’ve an old De Longhi Dragon heater in front of us, all the doors shut and the curtains closed. I wouldn’t say it was warm, but I’m not as cold as I was last night – Scamp never feels the cold! Dinner tonight was a hot fish supper each and Scamp had bought a tub of fruit salad from M&S earlier, so we had dessert as well. Since we don’t have access to the coffee maker, I’ve resorted to drinking instant coffee. It’s just not the same.

That is our tale of woe for today. Didn’t get to dance class. Didn’t get an electrician. Still no central heating.  Life in a cold country is hard. PoD was a photo of the swans and ducks in St Mo’s pond.

Hopefully it will be resolved tomorrow.

 

… and then the lights went out – 10 March 2023

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Another bright and cold morning. The thermometer read -0.3ºc when we woke.

While Scamp went out to FitSteps I struggled with renewing the SSL on my website. I got the first part ok, I think and have the encrypted code for the SSL on the computer, but the next stage getting the CNAME registered is beyond me. I can’t understand the language and the video explanation of how to go about it is just so vague, it could be written in invisible ink. Eventually, after an hour of struggling I gave up and solved Wordle and Spelling Bee instead.

We’d talked about going in to Glasgow for a pizza lunch, so that’s what we did. We drove in to Glasgow. I couldn’t be bothered getting the bus and after all, that’s what we bought a car for, the convenience. Walked through JL and then along Buchanan Galleries then down to Miller Street to Paesano. Scamp had a variation on her usual and chose tomato and spinach – no cheese. I had a number 3: tomato, mozzarella, anchovies and olives. Both were great, just great, not excellent. PoD was the view of the Tron Church in Buchanan Street with some lovely reflections from the building opposite.

Wandered round the town afterwards and had coffee in Nero on Argyle Street. They claimed they had to use take-away cups because they were short of staff and refused to use the normal cups on the shelf behind them. Then they filled a large take-away cup almost to the brim with hot water and dropped my single shot into it. It was like drinking brown water. I thought I was in a Costa. They might have been short of staff, but they were definitely short of toilets too. The entrance to the downstairs toilets was blocked off and that left one toilet for the whole shop. I sensed an irate email coming on. We walked back up through the homeward bound office workers and drove home.

We sat and watched a recording of The Apprentice at night and were almost at the end of You’re Fired … and then the lights went out!

We thought at first it was a power cut, but housed across from us and next door had lights on, so just us then. Checked the fuse board and sure enough it was the something in the downstairs sockets that had tripped the switch. Went round with the torch on Scamp’s phone switching off all the sockets but still it tripped. Next we unplugged all the devices connected to the sockets. Still no go. That’s as much as I can do, so we phoned the electrician we usually use and he said he couldn’t come until Monday. This was Friday night. No heating, no power downstairs for two days wasn’t good. Then Scamp remembered Jamie using their emergency cover from their insurance. We phoned the number and the person I spoke to confirmed that ours was a valid claim, gave us a claim number and said that someone would phone in the morning to arrange a time to come and visit.

That’s where we are at present. We still have power upstairs and I’ve run an extension cable down from the landing to keep the freezer powered until we can get this fixed. I’ve brought a heater down from the back bedroom so we will get some heating although the central heating won’t work because there’s no way to power the boiler. Scamp says we can still use the cooker, so we won’t starve, but it’s unlikely we’ll be dancing tomorrow! I think we need to get the distribution board replaced and maybe we need the house rewired. That’s for the near future. For now we want to see what happened at the end of You’re Fired!

This blog comes courtesy of a mobile hotspot! No plans for tomorrow :-\

 

Dancing and Weather – 9 March 2023

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Today revolved around two topics: Dancing and Weather. Last night we had a couple of snow showers and by morning the cars in the car park had a decent covering. However, by the time we left for the Tea Dance, the sun had melted almost all of it away, thankfully.

Drove to Glenburn Community Centre in the southern outskirts of Paisley for the tea dance and didn’t see any hint of snow after we left Cumbersheugh. Even the Campsie Fells as we drove along had no snow. Just our luck then! I think the cold weather and the constant scare stories from the media about snow drifts and danger to life kept some folk at home. Not us, we’re made of sterner stuff, although it might have been the temptation of the tea loaf that drove us to travel today.

We struggled through the Quickstep, the Tango the Foxtrot and countless sequence dances but our biggest struggle was with the simple Waltz. We couldn’t put a foot right, at least I couldn’t. How could this simple dance cause so many problems? We used to be able to dance at least two variations of it, now we can do none. More practise required I think. Despite all that, we had a good laugh. We were sitting with Leslie and Gordon who are at about the same level as us, although I did not that they managed the waltz without a problem.

The drive home was just as easy as the drive there because we slide neatly from the M77 to the M74 to the M73 and finally to the M80. That means that we can avoid completely the notorious Kingston Bridge and its moving car park of vehicles.

I didn’t go out for a walk this morning and by the time we were getting home the light had all but disappeared, so today’s PoD had to be a tabletop. It’s just a pink flower from a bunch that is sitting on the book case beside me. I took it with the A7iii equipped with a LensBaby Sweet 35. I realise this means nothing to anyone but me, but it’s a good reminder. The Sweet 35 is a 35mm lens designed to produce a soft image and if you’re lucky enough to have some bright lights in the frame, you get some spectacular light blobs called Bokeh. I wasn’t looking for that today, just a soft focus effect and I was pleased with the result.

It’s snowing again as I write this blog, but I’m not sure it will lie until morning. I certainly hope it won’t. We might go in to Glasgow tomorrow for a walk and a pizza in Paesano. It depends on the weather.