Category: Anniversary

Snow – 14 March 2023

Posted on by Zogman

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.

Officially Spring – 1 March 2023

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We drove up to Costa at the town centre this morning for coffee with Isobel on the first day of metrological spring.

Unfortunately, half the weans in the town were also there roaring and shouting, crying and screaming and generally being obnoxious. For the second day this week, all the schools in Scotland were closed while their teachers were out protesting. The noise made this the most uncomfortable couple of hours I’ve had although the coffee was good for a change. I just feel sorry for the folk who have to work in that place with that noise all day.

Isobel gave Scamp a bunch of roses, and gave me a bottle of wine as anniversary presents. Then she explained the tortuous details of her side of the family tree while Scamp made notes to send to her cousin in Australia. I’ve never really been interested in genealogy, and seeing the complexity of this family’s family tree ensured that I won’t be delving into ours any time soon. We dropped Isobel off at her house afterwards and did some shopping in Tesco on our way home.

My daily walk in St Mo’s brought a hibernating or perhaps a just hatched sixteen spot orange ladybird as PoD. I now know where at least around ten of these insects can be found. All orange and all with sixteen spots. I did take a couple of photos of some clumps of Cladonia lichen too, but the ladybird was the winner.

Scamp made leek & potato soup for a starter and she had cauliflower, broccoli and potatoes for her main course. I had soup and then steak and kidney stew with potatoes and the left over cauliflower and broccoli. The Instant Pot heated the stew using the slow cooker function. Useful tool.

Watched Landscape Artist of the Year and we both disagreed with the judges decision. Of the three finalists, the winner would have been in last place if they’d asked me to judge.

Tomorrow Scamp would like to go out somewhere different. I’ll sleep with my thinking cap on tonight.

Fifty years – 17 February 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Fifty years ago we got married in a wee church in Shettleston in the east end of Glasgow. After the service we went back to Scamp’s mum and dad’s with a few friends and relatives for a Co-op purvey.

I hope you’re sitting comfortably because this is a long blog post!

Today we were blessed with sunshine. After we opened the cards we’d brought with us and had breakfast, we went for a walk. We walked down the slope to the coastal path and turned right. This would take us away from the commercial areas and out to pastures new, an area we hadn’t walked to before.

Scamp was feeling the after effects of yesterday’s longer than required stroll in the other direction and her knee was beginning to give her gyp, so we took it easy on today’s walk. Thankfully I was better dressed today with my baseball cap to protect my head and I’d remembered to put sun cream on before we left the hotel.

We walked for a fair distance out past the viewpoint for the blowhole where, if the tide is right, the incoming waves fill a hole in the rocks and blow up out of a fissure above. Quite impressive if you’re there at the right time. The tide wasn’t far enough in today, unfortunately. Further on we crossed a dried up river bed that’s now home to a host of balancing stone monuments, thousands of them. Then we found a viewpoint near the beach where the paraglider come in to land. That’s where today’s PoD came from. It’s a five frame panorama built in Lightroom to give a really wide view of the mountains and the hotels around here.

We decided to walk back and found a cafe that had some shade and a young bloke took about half an hour to make us a jug of sangria. He was working alone and was having a hard time keeping everybody refilled. The sangria was really good. Freshly made and full of fruit.

Then we met The Man from Salzburg. Scamp wanted to have lunch at a wee restaurant we’d eaten at the last time we were here, and was partly the reason for our walk today. There was queue and we waited patiently (impatiently for me) for a table to become free. Eventually one of the waiters pointed to a table and told us to go there. But there weren’t any empty tables where he pointed. Then the bloke who was smiling at us from a table waved us over. It seems that he was happy to have someone else to talk to while he finished his Barraquito (like a Cortado, but with added condensed milk and Liquor 43). He seemed a happy bloke and when we told him we were from Scotland he explained that he’d travelled all over Scotland on holiday. The only thing he didn’t seem to like was haggis after someone had told him what was in it! He said that he was from Saltzburg in Austria and was on holiday in Tenerife for four weeks. He scoffed at our one week and said “That’s not enough!” After a while he said he had to go and left us to our lunch which was a Chicken Milanese for Scamp and Thai Chicken Curry for me. Service was slow at this restaurant too, but we weren’t in a hurry. When we left we passed the table over to another man, German this time. It’s a strange way to run a cafe.

We were walking back towards the hotel when we noticed the paraglider were all coming off the mountain and we turned round and found a place to watch them land. Some of the landings were a bit clumsy and some were downright scary. Then there were the tandems where the poor person in front had to bicycle his or her legs to keep from falling when they landed on the rough sand of the beach. £100 for a flight!

Back at the hotel, it was ’School Dinners Food’. Not one of their best days. But we did have our photos taken by the one of the hotel resident photographers who would have taken more photos today if we’d let her, than we had taken at our wedding, fifty years ago! We chose a small selection from the ones she took.

We listened to the worst singer ever in the Piano Bar. He was playing guitar and ‘singing’. However, it was when he attempted to ‘sing’ What A Wonderful World while mimicking Louis Armstrong. That was creepily awful and, that’s when we left. I think he went to the Billy Connolly school of music where he lampooned country and western singers. The difference was this bloke was serious. We played Rummikub in a different area of the piano bar.

We’re sitting on the balcony of the room now drinking G&Ts and reviewing the day.

My Fitbit says 17,900 steps, 8.05 miles, 153 floors.

 

Happy Anniversary to us – 30 January 2023

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Not the legal anniversary, that’s still to come, all being well. This is the one that matters to us.

We were getting the bus in to Glasgow today. I like to have my earbuds with me when we go on the bus. It helps to pass the time and Scamp says she doesn’t mind, but I couldn’t find the little white pill case that holds the earbuds anywhere. I only spent about ten minutes searching for the case, but eventually we had to leave to walk to Condorrat to catch the bus.

Walked through JL and out into Buchanan Street and from there to coffee in Nero in St Enoch’s. Then we got the subway to Kelvinbridge and walked to La Lanterna in the West End. The place wasn’t busy to start with, then about half a dozen girls rolled in and the silence was shattered. Scamp had arancini as a starter and veg lasagne. I had bruschetta as a starter and meat lasagne. I wouldn’t say it was the best lunch I’ve ever had. The bruschetta was a slice of French bread, no garlic and cold. Basically it was a roll ’n’ chopped tomatoes. Scamp was happy with her arancini but wasn’t so complimentary about the lasagne, while mine was fine. Maybe not their finest offering and a relatively uninspired menu overall.

We walked up Great Western Road and had a drink in Oran Mor, then got the subway back to Buchanan Street. Scamp got some Rituals shower foam then we caught the bus home.

I’d taken some photos in Glasgow with the A6000 and my favourite was a grab shot taken through a window in Cafe Nero. That became PoD.

Remember that white pill case with the earbuds. It turned up, sitting on the duvet in our bedroom. I was sure I’d looked there and it wasn’t to be seen. The fairies must have brought it!

Tomorrow we have a table booked for lunch with Crawford & Nancy and June & Ian. I’ve been warned not to have the coffee as it makes Costa coffee look great. I’ll heed the warning.

A day of mixed weather – 24 July 2022

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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.

A long day – 17 February 2022

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A long day with a good result.

Phone call from the hospital at around 9.15am to ask if we could manage to get there for 10.30am instead of 12 noon which was the time we were told to be there. No explanation, but it was possibly because of cancellations due to the the weather which was quite ‘interesting’. Hail showers and gale force winds then blinding sunshine would make some people want to reschedule. We just said “Yes”.

Drove in to Glasgow and got parked in the correct place for once and Scamp got booked in. When she was called through to the clinic itself, I left to go home. Drove through what really was a car park on a four lane road reduced down to two lanes. Found myself in the correct lane except it was blocked by a white lining lorry. Fought my way through and eventually got on to the motorway heading east after losing almost an hour clearing the stramash. From there it was easy going.

After a cup of strong coffee the world began to settle down. I’d been told two and a half hours for the prep, operation and recovery, so I reckoned I had enough time to go and get some essentials at Tesco and put some expensive fuel into the car too. I’d just got to the self service till when my phone played the ‘unknown number’ tune and an 0141 number showed on the screen. Would this be another automated american robot voice telling me it was from The Amazon Prime? No it was from the hospital to say that Scamp would be ready to pick up in 15minutes. I thanked the bloke and said I was on my way. Paid for the stuff and body swerved the petrol station and drove back in to Glasgow to the hospital.

By now the log jam at the roadworks had extended itself by about 200m further down the road. Where, in the morning, I’d been able to just cruise into the hospital carpark, now there were about ten vehicles in front of me and they weren’t moving. Long story short, I got there, picked up the patient with her clear plastic pirate’s eyepatch and we navigated through the traffic jam for the second time today. This time it was easier and I was lucky that most folk were avoiding the lane I needed to be in, so we were on the M8 east in double quick time.

It looks as if the surgery has done exactly what the surgeon predicted. It’s not perfect, but it’s definitely liveable with according to Scamp. It certainly looks like a clean job. She’s not removed the eyepatch yet, and only when she does will she be able to properly assess the full extent of the improvement. Now a week’s wait until the next one.

I went for a walk in St Mo’s later in the afternoon got PoD, which is a baby larch flower, and then extended the walk down to the shops to get some fish for tonight’s dinner which was Fennel, Leek and Cod. It’s like a thick creamy soup with fish and prawns in it. Eaten with a spoon! That was our Anniversary Dinner. Later we watched The Apprentice with a Rum ’n’ Coke each. Mine was Dark Matter and Scamp’s was Kraken.

Wow! That was a busy day. Frantic at times, but with a good conclusion. Tomorrow we are hoping to take it easier and watch the predicted snow fall!

Let him wait! – 16 February 2022

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Twenty years ago today we went to a wedding in London and stood in a bit of sunshine when it was needed for the photographs.

There was no sunshine today, at least, no sunshine without accompanying rain. A stormy day too with no chance of a walk, apart from prowling round the house like a caged bear. We were in the grip of Storm Dudley with Storm Eunice to look forward to on Friday. Where do they get these stupid names from? It was a blustery day and Dudley is still bouncing around out there as I write. If the weather had any redeeming factors, they were to force me to grab a photo when and where I could and also to get a sketch done in daylight. More on both of these later.

Just as Storm Dudley was starting, we had a visit from a man who wanted us to stick a sort of cotton bud down our throat and then up our nose before dunking it into a plastic bottle and handing it back to him. Poor bloke had to stand there in the rain and gathering wind while we waited in the dry answering his questions. I hope he gets paid well for what he does with a smile on his face.

Now the explanation of the title. Today was Hazy and Neil’s 20th wedding anniversary. Twenty years ago Hazy and I rode in a white London cab from her house to the church. As we neared the church she told the driver to go round the block just once. I told her Neil was waiting at the church and she just laughed and replied “Let him wait!” It had been a terrible week of weather that year too, but when we went to a little park for the photos, the sun came out, just long enough to get them taken. It really was a lovely day. I remember it well. I hope you both had just as good a day today.

Back in the present day, I finally got a chance to claim my cash-back from Sony after not only sending my invoice as evidence, typing in the serial number of the camera, but also sending a photo of the serial number plate on he camera with me holding it in my hand! I hope I don’t have to go to a photo booth now and get a photo of me (not smiling) in good lighting and not wearing glasses. There were more pages to fill in for Sony than for my passport!

Next was today’s PoD. I noticed the little purple crocus just sprouting in a long tray of green shoots and managed to isolate it with its raindrops. I think I managed five shots in the dry before the rain returned. I was quite impressed with the result.

Sketch was a bit of a trial. Today’s prompt was Vogue.
Sometimes you just have to face your demons, and faces have always been my demons. I’ve tried and failed to get any kind of resemblance in the past. That’s why I decided I’d ‘do’ Madonna today. I could have sidestepped the challenge and drawn the front cover for a magazine, but where’s the fun in that? This is my take on Madonna in her Vogue persona.

Tomorrow we’re planning to go for a run to Braehead, hopefully for someone to see something new.