Category: A Walk

A bit wet and a bit windy too – 5 February 2022

Posted on by Zogman

There wasn’t much to say about today. We could have gone out, but we didn’t. It tried to snow, then it got fed up with that and it just turned to sleet, then rain, heavy rain. We didn’t even have a dance class to go to.

I went out in the afternoon for a walk round St Mo’s and came back with a few shots of rivers of rain running down the paths, Not very interesting. Oh, yes and it rained some more. Torrential soaking rain. My boots kept my feet dry, and my jacket took a beating, but kept my top dry. The walking trousers are great for keeping me warm, but no use for keeping the rain out. They just soak it up. Admittedly that’s not what they’re meant to do, they’re just to keep my legs warm, so I shouldn’t really complain. But I do!

When I looked at the photos I had, they weren’t really worth looking at. Instead today’s PoD was a photo of a couple of carnation flowers with the kitchen window and some raindrops providing the backdrop.

In the evening we drove to Hamilton for dinner with John and Marion. A cold starter of Salmon and Lemon Juice. Two of my least favourite flavours, but it was delicious. Main was Chicken & Chorizo with Pan Fried Cubed Potatoes and Green Beans. Also delicious. Of course Scamp didn’t eat the green beans, because they squeak, but she apologised to Marion. Pudding was Deconstructed Black Forest Gateau for Scamp and Pear & Apple Crumble with a Praline Topping for me. That had to be the best crumble I’ve ever eaten. Nuts, grains of some kind and home made crunchy caramel. Amazing.

Scamp and Marion discussed Laura and Ross’s upcoming wedding almost all night, plus we got our official invitation to the event in May. It was a really good night that we both enjoyed. Nice to meet up with folk again, face to face.

It was late when we got home, so a G ’n’ T for both of us as a nightcap ensured that this would be a catch-up blog, as you’ve probably guessed and we hoped that tomorrow (ie today) would be better weather wise.

Inconsiderate Shopping – 3 February 2022

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Some days are filled with fun and some days are filled with shopping.

We were out fairly early and drove to Morrison’s at Falkirk. I thought we were going to our usual Morrison’s at The Fort, but Scamp had remembered the roadworks on the road for months. I’d no intention of sitting in a queue for ages just to get some messages, so I accepted her suggestion.

Morrison’s, like so many supermarkets these days was totally reorganising its shelving. Apparently it’s to encourage shoppers to find things by accident while still searching for what the entered the store to find. I really wish they wouldn’t do it. I didn’t find any wonderful surprises on the shelves and neither Scamp nor I could find things we came for. Just saying! Even worse, we got through the checkout about five past two and the cafe closed at two. No tub of chips for Scamp and no roll ’n’ sausage for me. According to their website the cafe closes at 6pm. I feel a letter of complaint is appropriate. I haven’t written one in ages. They might send me a roll ’n’ sausage and a tub of chips for Scamp (without prejudice.)

We drove home and lunch for both of us was a tub of yogurt. After that I went for a walk in St Mo’s, but first thing this morning I’d sneaked out into the garden and grabbed a shot of two little snowdrops and also a newly sprouted crocus. The crocus, still wearing what looked like its wrapping paper, won PoD. I didn’t get much in St Mo’s and nothing that beat the crocus.

The prompt for today was Born To Be Wild. How many of us in the heady days of the late 60s watched Easy Rider or listened to the Steppenwolf track and decided a motorbike on the open highway was for us.
How many of us were so disappointed when the Honda C 90, or in my case the CZ125, didn’t quite cut the mustard that those two Harleys did. Riding the plains in America is a lifetime away from slipping and sliding through the diesel slicked roundabouts of Motherwell in the rain.
Still, there was fun to be had on those bikes too, as long as you could Get Your Motor Runnin’.

We may go out tomorrow (if we can borrow a coat to wear). Maybe a walk round Glasgow for a spot of lunch, but only if it’s not snowing or icy, because that is the forecast.

 

 

The first day of a new month – 1 February 2022

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Always an exciting time!

It’s also a day when a lot of catalog management is required. I won’t go into the details, because that’s not what you’re here for, is it? No, I guessed not. What you want to hear is what we did today. Ok, here goes.

Scamp was first out. She was meeting Isobel for coffee in Costa and I wasn’t going to meet her. I was second out and I was driving to Glasgow to meet my brother. The wind had plagued us all last night again and it was still with us in the morning. I don’t know where all this wind is coming from. Somebody somewhere who controls the weather, I’m guessing it’s Putin, needs to seriously look at their food intake, because that’s what gives me wind. Anyway, parked in Buchanan Galleries carpark and walked round to meet Alex.

First things first, we had coffee in Nero to give us time to set the plan for the day. This was Alex’s choice of photo walk, so he got to choose where we’d go. His choice was to walk up Sauchiehall Street which has always been called Sausage Roll Street by Scamp and me. So off we went on our travels up Sausage Roll Street. We saw closed shopfronts, pigeons that crapped on us, Chinese dragons celebrating Chinese New Year. Kung hei fat choy to all the poor participants in the dancing dragons who got blown about mercilessly by the gales driving down the street.
We climbed the footbridge over the M8 and got some spectacular shots of Charing Cross. Photo is on Flickr.

Alex also wanted to get a shot of the sun shining through the glass of Buchanan Street subway entrance. He’d worked out on his app the best time would be between 1pm and 1.15pm, cloud base permitting. With that in mind we hurried down Sausage Roll Street again stopping for some shots of The Beresford, Glasgow’s Art Deco 1930s building. It’s very impressive now with a fresh coat of paint. Photo on Flickr.

We just managed to get to the subway as the light was fading but I think we did capture it quite well. Only time will tell when we get a chance to compare and contrast the photos each of us took.

Lunch was in The Cup which is a lovely wee restaurant Scamp and I have passed many times in the past and never went in. Today Alex and I had an interesting lunch. He had Pea & Ham (from a chicken?) soup with an Applewood Smoked Cheddar & Chive Scone. I had Toasted Sourdough with Scrambled Eggs, Smoked Salmon and Roasted Cherry Tomatoes. Quite posh but it was worth it because the flavour of it just made it worthwhile.

Time was wearing on and we had other things to see:

  • A new Mural where the Badminton Players had been. I think I preferred the originals.
  • The gargoyles on the Old Fruit Market.
  • A couple of churches

Then it really was time to go home. Alex got the bus although I offered him a lift. I drove home.

Back home we compared notes on the day.  Both different and both similar talking to people from our separate families. Lunch was chicken with rice and ‘rats’ (ratatouille)

The 1st of Feb marks the start of 28 Drawings Later or Every Day in February. Both are sketching challenges in Facebook. My first day is done and here it is.  The prompt was “Green Door”.  I chose to base my sketch mainly on the lyrics.  PoD was the shot of Buchanan Street subway.

It was a good day in town.  For the most part the weather was kind to us, much kinder than it has been recently.  Tomorrow we’re off to visit Margie, hopefully.

A quieter day – 31 January 2022

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Last night was a blustery one. Didn’t know if it was wind or thunder, but it was loud.

Woke to a calm clear sort of day. Sun was shining when we got up and it stayed with us all day. Scamp was out with her sister for coffee in the morning and I was scouring the InterWeb for somewhere, anywhere that had interlinked fire alarms. Many were advertising them, but few had them in stock. I almost had two places on my shortlist One place at least gave a delivery date of 21st March, but wanted your money now. I think not. Sounds like their financial status is questionable. The other one had a good Trustpilot score, but seemed too good to be true. Even Amazon seemed to be hard put to supply any time soon. What government imposes a law on folk that they must abide by, then turns round and says it won’t be enforced. Really? Do they really think we believe them.

Scamp’s return put an end to my investigations for today. However, I’d also made some practical use of my time and made a Sage and Olive loaf from one of my Baked In kits. It was a heavy looking dough, but it started rising quite well. After lunch I grabbed my camera and went to make the most of the fading sunshine in St Mo’s. That’s where the PoD came from. It’s proof that we had sunshine today, producing some shadows on the ground and with the boardwalk shining nicely too.

I got a few more, and almost got a nice little family group of Mallards to be the foreground interest, except I tramped on too many fallen branches getting to the water’s edge and they flew off in fright. I still took the photo, but the one in my head will maybe make it to Flickr another day. It was a really calm looking pond today. Hardly a ripple after yesterday’s hurricane force winds.

The bread turned out fine and is still to be cut. Dinner was tortellini. Not the best I’ve ever tasted, but it filled a space as we often say. I think the trouble with us both is that we are filling too much and not leaving enough spaces!

Boris apologised today for being bad after the long awaited Sue Gray report was published. He thinks that’s him off the hook. I don’t think he realises just how deep that hook is in, nor does he realise that most hooks have barbs to stop them coming out again.

Tomorrow I’m hoping to meet Alex in Glasgow in the morning. Later, Scamp is off to have coffee with Isobel and I’ll get pelters for missing her again. The last time I was supposed to meet Isobel, I stayed in instead to play with a new camera. This time my excuse is photography again! Weather looks cold again tomorrow.

 

Happy Anniversary to us – 30 January 2022

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Not the legal one, but the one we celebrate.

The other anniversary, next month is just the day we made it legal. This one is more important. If it hadn’t happened, the second one wouldn’t have happened either.

Because this was a special day we lay in bed and read for longer than was absolutely necessary. Then because the weather fairies were warning of heavy rain and strong winds later, we chose to go for a walk in the morning. The destination was Broadwood Loch and we walked round then over to the exercise machines and home via M&S for a steak for me and some oranges for Scamp. Back home for lunch and to check out today’s only picture. Actually it was three pictures of the same fencepost with its little garden on top. Never only take one picture of something interesting, just in case something happens, it’s out of focus, it’s a little bit shaken or and elephant charges past and blocks the view of the subject. Two or even better, three shots will usually suffice.

Lunch was calling and although my two slice of bacon and an egg was minimal for me, it needed to be after yesterday’s over eating and drinking. Watched the new replacement politics show for Andrew Marr. Not a patch on the great man. Sophie Raworth is trying hard, but she’s just not as incisive as the great man. Today she was interviewing Liz Truss. My heavens, that woman just sounds like a Tory. That same hectoring voice and a stare that would put a basilisk to shame.

Satisfied that the photo had worked, we settled down to do today’s Wordle. It appears that my spellchecker hasn’t heard of it yet. It’s an addictive word game where you only get six tries to find a five letter word. It’s a bit like the old Mastermind peg game, but alphabetical. I’m sure you’ve tried it, Hazy. Jamie, maybe not so much. Scamp likens it to the crossword puzzles my dad used to do many year ago. If you haven’t hear of it, Google it. It’s not Angry Birds or Candy Crush, it’s not going to steal away hours of your life and leave you wondering what happened to today.

I had thought about going over to St Mo’s to augment my three shots, but there was no need. I was satisfied with the quality and composition of my finished article. Besides it was time to get the dinner ready. My steak was just excellent. Maybe slightly overcooked, but it hadn’t lost any flavour by that. Scamp’s fish looked lovely too, but it was trout or salmon and I’m not a great fan. Our accompaniment was baked potato and cabbage.

As we were cooking dinner that wind started rising and the rain was driving through. I for one was glad we weren’t going out later. Jamie too was commenting that he was lucky for once and had timed his return from the US to perfection, just missing their snow-bomb. He seemed to enjoy the visit and the pizzas, although a pizza topped with mashed potato and bacon didn’t appeal to me.

Tomorrow looks like a repeat of today.  More rain, more wind.  That’s Scotland!  Scamp may be going for coffee with June.  I’ve two letters to write.  Hopefully I’ll get at least one done.

Driving through the wild wind – 29 January 2022

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To go dancing!

It had been a wild night. Gale force winds and even stronger gusts. Unabashed, we got ready and drove to Bridge of Weir. Actually, apart from some buffeting on the M80, the drive was fairly incident free.

First dance today was Tina Tango which we both kinda knew. Kinda being the important word, but we blundered our way through, as did most of the class. Next was the new Rumba which now has the name Rumba Romantica. Some bits we’d been practising, some not. To be honest, we’d been practising the complicated stuff like the Alternative Sliding Doors (don’t ask) and the Circular Hip Twist which is as complicated as it sounds for the lady, but for the man is simply walking backwards. As always, these parts were adequately covered by the teachers, it was the links between them that caused most of the problems and also the fact that Jane had re-choreographed the Circular Hip Twist to make it ‘easier’, but it was almost impossible to practise on a carpet at home. We got through it all and learned more techniques than we’ll ever need to use.

We though that was us finished with the new stuff, but there was more in store. ‘Baby Waltz’ came next. It was a completely new waltz that I’ve filmed, watched and still have no clue about. Why, I ask myself, do I put myself through this every Saturday morning when I could be lying in bed reading a book? The answer is: Because it forces your brain to do something other that photography. Also because you learn stuff like how to maintain a ‘frame’ without twisting your neck or having your shoulders ache for the rest of the day. Thankfully a Midnight Jive or two brought today’s session to a close.
I can’t say I enjoy these dance classes, but I do learn things and some of it actually ‘sticks’.

We drove home along the M74 rather than crawl along the M8, although both these routes seemed to be eased by the majority of the Glasgow bound motorists choosing to go through the Clyde Tunnel, rather than go the normal route. Something to do with Batgirl which is turning Glasgow into a 1960’s Gotham City. We’ll never know. We took the road less travelled and went home via the M74/M73.

I took a walk over to the shops by way of St Mo’s looking for some decent light and finding it for once. PoD was a picture of a couple of yellow flowers on a Whin bush, or Gorse bush if you prefer, against a background of out of focus trees. Very arty and really quite good, I thought.

Watched a weird documentary about Andy Worhol who was actually born Worhola. Who knew? Hard do follow, but filled in a few explanations for bits I never knew. Watched through the lens of a glass of wine (or two), a bottle of beer and a glass of whisky, it made perfect sense. But then, most things do.

More wind and probably rain predicted for tomorrow. An anniversary of sorts, the important one, but not the official one. Celebrations necessary, none the less.

 

Dancin’ – 27 January 2022

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Out photographing in the morning sun, dancing in the afternoon and fish ’n’ chips for dinner. Does life get any better than this?

I knew that most of the afternoon would be taken up with driving and dancing, neither of which I mind, but it was a lovely clear day and probably the only good day we’ve had for at least a week. The only way out of this and out in the fresh air was to go early, and that’s what I did.

I only had an hour or so out in the wilds of St Mo’s, but the light was good and bits and pieces of colour are appearing now. Green shoots are appearing, maybe a bit early, but the trees are preparing next years greenery already. However, it wasn’t the greenery or the trees that made PoD it was an alien looking landscape that was moss fruiting bodies in the morning light.

Back home, a quick lunch and we were off to Paisley, Sunny Paisley today. Still the same convoluted traffic system with a multitude of traffic lights. But we got there, a little later than anticipated, but we got seats too, although we didn’t sit on them much. I think the longest I was sitting was when the tea was served and when they played two line dances (if you can call ‘Waltz across Texas’ a dance. It’s more a walk around the floor with a grumpy face) back to back. The rest of the time we were on the floor for a waltz, every sequence dance, tango, salsa. Basically, you name it, we danced it. Some better than others, some for less than a minute before we admitted we didn’t know what we were meant to be doing.

We’d agreed that we would leave half an hour early today to try to avoid the worst of the traffic going through Paisley town centre. It worked. That half hour early must have cut at least an hour off the drive home.

I went for a walk to the shops when we got back, well, it is Thursday and traditions must be upheld. I didn’t take a camera with me because I was sure I’d enough in the bag from the morning walk, and so it turned out. It was a pity in a way, because there was a glorious sunset, all reds and golds.  Came home to the smell of home made Fish ‘n’ Chips.  Definitely the best fish and chips I’ve had for months.  Scamp’s expertise again.

Tomorrow doesn’t look anywhere like as good as today with wind, and rain forecast. If we manage to get out for a walk we’ll be lucky. Have a good flight home, Jamie.

 

 

Dull and cold – 26 January 2022

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With a bit of a breeze starting up later.

Out shopping in the morning. Just a normal Tesco run with Scamp using one of our vouchers and splitting the proceeds between us and the charity box. I think that’s fair. It’s what we said we’d do back when we started the Covid survey and she sticks quite well to that promise. Me, I don’t always remember, in fact I don’t Often remember. Must just do it one of these days. Soon. This month even.

Scamp bought a plain loaf as part of our purchases and as I had a square sausage in the freezer, my lunch was sorted. I can’t remember what Scamp had, I was concentrating all my culinary skills trying to make sure the sausage was cooked through but not burnt to a crisp. I’d eaten most of it as I was walking in to the living room. Just the crusts left when I sat down. That’s a measure of how good it was. Not good for you, but lovely and flavoursome. I must stop using ‘Tasty’ as my go-to word for things that I like eating!

Dinner tonight was going to be Chicken Curry the easy way. One of the great things about having a daily blog is reading what we did a year ago. It’s open to everyone, it sits at the bottom of the right hand column, at least on a ‘puter it is anyway. Today’s recipe came from two years ago on the 21st January 2020 when the world was young! I’m not going to go through the whole recipe, it’s there on the 21/1/2020 page of the blog. It’s the simplest and best tasting (see, I’m not using that ’T’ word) chicken curry I’ve made. There’s almost nothing in it apart from chicken, spices and tomatoes. I made the best flatbread ever to go with it too. The secret is in the prep, believe me.

I gave myself an hour in St Mo’s and that’s when I found out just how cold it was. Even wrapped up in my Bergy it was cold. PoD was four cygnets swanning around in the pond. They didn’t seem to mind the cold, but then they’ve got all that down to keep them warm.

Short practise tonight just to make sure we can make a decent fist of the new Rumba routine in its entirety because we’re hopefully going to the first tea dance for ages, tomorrow in Paisley.

The weather fairies say tomorrow is going to be a good day, so I’m intending going for a walk round St Mo’s in the morning to get some photos in the sunshine. Hope you’re getting some sunshine in NYC Jamie. Looks cold though, we’ve got nowhere near negative numbers here. Looking forward to hearing all about it.

Walking in the woods – 25 January 2022

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We went to Drumpellier today just for to get out the house and go somewhere different.

Not Broadwood and not St Mo’s. Just for a change we drove to Drumpellier and walked halfway round before entering the woodland. Long wide path that cuts straight through the woods. On the right there’s scrub land and on the left long grass and wilderness … and deer today. I saw only one, quite far away and then another appeared and then more until there were about seven of them. One young buck with velvet still on his antlers and I think the rest were female, hinds. By luck I’d brought the A6000 (don’t groan Jamie, I’ll keep it fairly light today). The A6000 and the long tele lens. However I forgot the snooker player’s maxim “chalk the cue before you take the shot” and took all the photos with the lens wide open. That’s not good. It was after we walked away I noticed and stopped the aperture down a couple of clicks (that’s ‘togs talk for dial in a bigger number). Next time I’ll remember … maybe.

We walked on then took the sharp left turn to the winding path through the trees that finally brings you out at the far end of the loch that seemingly almost everyone walks round ignoring the woodland with the deer and the different plantations that divide it up. On a good day with bright sunshine it’s a great place for a walk. Today it was cloudy and dull, but a walk in the fresh air is always a good thing. Especially as the eagle eyed Scamp had noticed that the cafe near the car park was open again.

So after our walk we had a coffee each. Scamp had a toasted teacake and I had a scone that crumbled away in my hands. More went on the table and the floor than in my mouth. Perhaps that’s a sign. Eat Less Cakes read the invisible sign! The coffee was no better. Scamp had a latte and I had a flat white. The only difference I could see was when she made the latte, the lady poured the hot milk in first and then the coffee. With mine it was the opposite way round. Both seemed to have the same half gallon of milk. That’s 1.893 litres in new money. Probably a slight exaggeration.

We drove home and I walked over to Condorrat to post a letter then emptied today’s photos into Flickr and perused them for an hour or so. Best of the bunch by far, and PoD was a shot, taken at the correct aperture setting, of some old waterlogged tree branches which I hope led your eye to the tree in the mid ground with the little opening at its base. Probably a fairy’s tree. A Coatbridge fairy. Not a lot of them left, I’m told.

Tonight being Burns Night we had the traditional Haggis, Neeps and Tatties. The haggis this year was a veggie one and didn’t suffer too much for being that. Lentils, mushrooms, spice and beans replaced minced unmentionable bits of a sheep.

We watched the second last episode of Around The World in 80 Days. Honestly, this serial gets better and better each week. We both agree now that we’ll read the book to see how close it is to the serial.

No plans yet for tomorrow. It looks wet in the morning, but might dry up later. Who knows.

 

 

Off the leash – 24 January 2022

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Scamp was heading out for lunch with the rest of the Witches. I was given free run of the house.

After she was picked up by Jeanette I did think of driving out somewhere to get a few landscape photos, but the sky was that moody overall grey and without some directional light I’d be struggling to make a landscape look interesting, so I chose to wait for a while. I thought about starting a painting, but couldn’t decide what to paint. These dull days make it difficult to find an interest in anything. I did for one foolish moment toy with the idea of clearing up the back room, but one look at the enormity of the task was enough to disabuse me of that task. Instead, I had lunch. Beans on sourdough toast. Earlier I’d picked up Jamie’s transatlantic plane on Flightradar 24 and lunchtime gave me a chance to check his position. He was about halfway across the Atlantic as I was scraping the last of my beans from the plate.

I’d a letter to finish off and once I’d done that, it looked like the sky was brightening up with a bit of movement in the clouds, so I got my boots on and the camera sorted and went out for a walk in St Mo’s. The woods were looking bare. Bare trees, dried up grass and not a lot happening. I did try to grab a few shots of lichen and moss and also a few late season fungi, but nothing new. Nothing exciting or interesting. The most interesting was a leaf spread over a fallen log and worn almost transparent by the elements. That might look good reduced to monochrome. I walked further than I’ve gone for ages, across the boggy grassland almost beside the slip road from the motorway, but the landscapes were all the same. I’d taken them all in the past. However, when I came out of the woods the sky was definitely clearing and Jamie was heading south towards the eastern edge of Canada at about 38,000ft.

Heading back towards home I got a decent shot along the length of the boardwalk with the 18mm lens sporting its washed and clean lens hood. Also I took two shots looking towards the breaking sky over the pond. Both were taken in portrait format, one to make the most of the sky and the other to show the silted up edge of the pond. I intended to join them together in Photoshop. That was it for the photography and it looked like Jamie was now even higher at 40,000ft and crossing the border into the US. I hoped he was actually on that plane and had managed to get up for that 4am taxi!

Scamp was home by the time I got back and we compared our day. It would seem that the Railway Inn is worth a visit some time judging by the praise it was getting from Scamp. It would be good to start going out to eat again, now that the restrictions are being relaxed. We might even get to go back to salsa with a bit of luck!

Scamp’s lunch was Macaroni with Chips. My dinner was Tagliatelle with a meat Ragu. More in the pan for tomorrow or to go in the freezer to be discovered some hungry day.

I watched as the Airbus turned on its dogleg to final and landed in a place I’ve never been and am never likely to see with my own eyes. I hope you get to read this Jamie and aren’t too bored with all the photography talk. Enjoy your visit to the Big Apple.

The PoD is the two part picture, assembled and manicured in Photoshop then finished off in Lightroom. The others I took today are on Flickr.

We have no plans yet for tomorrow. Sometimes that’s the best way.