Category: Beasties

Going for the messages – 12 September 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Just the run of the mill shopping run.

Scamp accepts that Tesco deliveries are a lifesaver at times, but prefers to see what she’s buying, and I have to agree with her. We did a fairly big shop and while we were going round I bumped into Fred and had a wee blether with him. He gave his apologies for not being able to get to the “Beer in the Toon” tomorrow and I understand the pressures he’s facing with his and his wife’s health. Hopefully some day soon we’ll be able to have that beer.

After we’d got through the tills and paid for the messages we trundled them to the car and found that there was nowhere to put them in the back seat because the bag of bottles we took for a trip to Tesco last week were still there taking up space. After a few grumps from me followed by an icy silence, Scamp drove straight to the council skips and we dumped the bottles into the overflowing plastic skips. One job done.

Back home lunch was a roll filled with cheese for me and one filled with Dairylea for Scamp. Honestly I didn’t think they made those Dairylea triangles any more, but it looks like they do. A second roll filled with jam became the lunchtime dessert.

After that we just lounged about for a while doing nothing in particular. Then I took the camera out for a walk in St Mo’s and got today’s PoD which was a little furry hoverfly sitting on a Scabious flower. Nice bit of sunshine on the background created some lovely patterns from the leaves of the bushes. While I was out, Scamp was picking the remainder of the James Grieve apples and beginning to prune the tree into a better shape. I had one of those home grown apples after dinner and it was a bit sharp, but perfectly edible.

Dinner tonight was Carbonara made the proper Italian way without cream, but with an extra egg yolk instead. It worked well.

That was about it for a cool day that was beginning to look like autumn was just around the corner.

Tomorrow I’m intending to head in to Glasgow and Samp is out to lunch with Mags.

Dancin’ – 10 September 2022

Posted on by Zogman

We drove over to Brookfield in beautiful sunshine.

We arrived early, mainly because there were no football matches on today as a mark of respect for the death of the queen, so the road was fairly clear.

First today was a reprise and a cleaning up of the Charnwood Cha-Cha, which we managed fairly well. Next was a new Foxtrot routine. We only did about half of it, but it was looking quite good. A lot more technical than the older foxtrot we learned earlier in the year. After that, things started to go downhill rapidly for me. Stewart announced that we were going to learn a new sequence dance called there Balmoral Blues, and nodded to us, because we’d attempted it on Thursday by watching what others were doing and following them. Today was different. Today we were learning the proper version and it seemed to have many more steps than Thursday’s version. Jane said she hated this dance and by the end of the lesson I fully agreed with her. None of the figures seemed to gel with each other. It just looked like a hodge-podge of moves. Lastly was the waltz we’d been learning. I think my brain had shut down after the Bloody Balmoral Blues. I’d had enough. I just couldn’t figure out where we were and what came next. I apologised to Scamp and sat out the last five or ten minutes and watched other suffer.

We drove home by our alternative route through the Clyde Tunnel which cuts out the dastardly Kingston Bridge. It worked its magic again and we only had about five minutes of queueing on the other side.

Back home, Scamp went out to get chicken for tonight’s dinner and told me to get up and go out for a walk in the sunshine to brighten my mood. I took her at her word, but it wasn’t until she came back that I was kitted out to go for a walk in St Mo’s. Lots of butterflies, Peacocks, Red Admirals and maybe a Tortoiseshell. Lots of bees and hoverflies on the Scabious flowers too. PoD is a Common Carder Bee. Ended my walk by going down to M&S and sourcing a fish pie for tomorrow’s dinner.

I’m still searching for my next phone. I did think about an iPhone 13, but after some good advice from Hazy, I may review the Samsung again. Now it’s your turn Jamie and Simonne. I’m looking at either an iPhone 13 or a Samsung S22+ with 128GB. Hoping it will give me a decent camera and enough storage space for my needs. Do you pair have any suggestions?

Tomorrow is the Cumbernauld 10K.  We may go and cheer the runners on if it’s not raining and if we’re up in time.  We will not be running!

A late rise – 3 September 2022

Posted on by Zogman

We must both have had a hard day yesterday. My excuse was that I’d been out cycling and Scamp’s was that she and the witches had been talking almost constantly for all of yesterday afternoon.

Once we’d dragged ourselves out of bed, dressed and completed today’s Wordle successfully, we discussed where to go and what to do with a very dull day. We settled on a run to Torwood, looking for something to buy for someone who has a birthday coming up soon. Unfortunately Torwood Garden Centre was having a bit of an Autumn Clean, which is really just a Spring Clean six months later. Lots of the garden furniture that usually lives outside was now inside and none of the usual stuff that Scamp expected to see had been put into storage, it seemed. For what must be the first time in our Torwood history, we left empty handed.

I suggested we try Calder’s in Cumbersheugh as an alternative, but although they had lots of things that “might do”, they didn’t have the exact article she was looking for. We were just about to leave when the heavens opened and the threatened heavy rain made us think again about walking out just then. Once the rain had eased, we ran to the car and drove home.

Later in the afternoon the sky cleared and although the sun didn’t shine, it was bright enough to take a camera for a walk in St Mo’s. The PoD went to a photo of a hoverfly on a Scabious flower, a wild scabious. While I was out, Scamp was talking to Jackie in Skye. She and Murdo are just recovering from the dreaded Covid and they both seemed to have it bad, but feeling better now.

On our walk earlier in the week, Alex and I had been discussing processing old photos taken years ago and tonight I worked on a photo of Castle Stalker in Appin from 2005. Taken with my old D70 it scrubbed up well as you can see here.

Tomorrow we may go looking for that birthday present again or we may leave that for a weekday when there will hopefully be fewer crowds

Coffee with Isobel and a question answered – 30 August 2022

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We were out this morning for coffee with Isobel at Costa, so almost coffee.

As usual Isobel was an entertainment. Full of stories of a visit to see the wreck of the Sugar Boat on an afternoon cruise from Greenock. The ship, the MV Captayannis was loaded with raw east African sugar for the Tate & Lyle refinery in Greenock. It was deliberately run aground to prevent it sinking after a collision with another ship during a storm in the Clyde in 1974. Apparently the remains of the ship can still be seen from the esplanade at Helensburgh, but Isobel’s trip started across the Clyde estuary in Greenock. I must admit, this is the first I’ve heard of the Sugar Boat and its story. We must go and have a look for it the next time we’re in Helensburgh. It’s actually visible on Google Maps about halfway between Helensburgh and Greenock.

Scamp was showing Isobel some of our holiday photos and then chanced upon a picture on her phone of a mystery flower that’s growing well in our garden. She showed it to Isobel who immediately recognised it as a Japanese Anemone, and to be honest, it does look like a very large anemone. We’ve been puzzling over that flower for well over a month now, but now Isobel has solved the problem.

We came home via the village to drop Isobel off at her house and then via Tesco to get some messages. Dinner tonight was to be Paella and we needed chicken thighs for that. Of course we bough a lot more besides the chicken. Back home and after lunch I struggled with today’s Wordle and was getting nowhere with it, so I did what I usually do and put it aside and went for a walk in St Mo’s. Not a lot of activity today, but I did get an animated looking group of dandelion seeds. They look as if they’re dancing in the breeze, but actually they’re caught in a spider web. I took a few insect photos too, but nothing spectacular, so the dandelion seeds got PoD.

Paella was ok, but the chicken thighs were a bit cheugh (chewy). Maybe my cooking or maybe not Tesco’s finest. Whatever, it filled a wee space.

We watched a fairly interesting program on the history of University Challenge which is 60 years old this year. I didn’t realise it had been going for such a long time. It was only fairly interesting because there was really far too much padding in it. A 30 minute program made to fit a 60 minute time slot.

I’ve talked Alex into going to the Kelpies tomorrow, rather than Glasgow again. If time permits, we might even get a half hour in Culross.

An improving picture – 18 August 2022

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Scamp tested negative this morning. Me, I’m at the coo’s tail as usual, still positive.

Scamp was careful not to look at the pink column as it rose in the recording window of the test kit. Then after about twelve of the required fifteen minutes she gave a yelp. It was a negative result. Not even the slightest ghost of a ’T’ trace. At last, one of us had broken free. Mine was slower than usual to confirm a positive, but it was there for all to see by the fifteenth minute. I didn’t expect it to be any better, but it would have been a nice surprise …

I took a walk down to the shops to get some bread and a bunch of flowers to brighten the house. Also got some cherries and the stuff to make a stir fry for dinner. Later in the afternoon we both went for a walk in St Mo’s. Just once round the pond, but that was enough for me to snag a few shots of dragonflies resting on the boardwalk. I reckon it’s the daily rain showers,  another of which we had in the late afternoon, that are increasing the water level in the ponds and that’s encouraging the hatch of dragons. Mostly Common Darters, both male and female, but a few Black Darters occasionally added to the mix. One of the low down views of a dragonfly made PoD.

Stir fry was ok, but I inadvertently picked up a carton of Vegan broth mix instead of Chicken. I’ll be more careful in future. I much prefer the milder chicken flavour.

It was a bit dull today. Couldn’t really get myself interested in anything. I’m just finishing my first Stuart McBride book in years and am not all that impressed with it. Too predictable, I think. However, I bought the Audible version with the Kindle book and it helped the flight home pass much more quickly than reading.

We may go out somewhere tomorrow, just to get out of the house.

Another day, another test – 17 August 2022

Posted on by Zogman

This morning Scamp did another test, but it was just positive and no more.

The general rule seems to be that you have to stay at home for five days from the first positive test. I assume that after that time you aren’t definitely clear, but are unlikely to pass on the infection. Everything is so vague now that hospitalisations are so much fewer than they were last year.

Anyway, Scamp declared herself still positive although she was feeling better than yesterday. I declared myself happy that today I was up to date with blog posts and also with Flickr posts, but was intending going for a walk in the afternoon to get more photos to post and stories to tell.

While Scamp was busy in the garden I went for a walk in St Mo’s. There were lots of lovely dragonflies fluttering around the boardwalk at St Mo’s pond. Mostly common darter males but also a few black darters circling the ponds. Butterflies too were in plentiful supply almost all of them were Peacocks. Had a chat with Fred while I was out and before my signal broke up. I really do need to look into the possibility of changing my phone. One of the common darter males (head on) got PoD.

Hoping for another sunny day tomorrow.

Back to life – 12 August 2022

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Back to reality. Back to the here and now.

This was the day for unpacking and for bundling clothes into the washing machine and then hanging them out to dry. Admittedly, I wasn’t doing much of that. Scamp did most of it.

After lunch I went for a walk in St Mo’s to get some ‘ordinary’ photos. PoD was a close-up of a Yellow Rattle plant. It’s a parasite, feeding on the nutrients in the roots of any nearby grasses. And yes, it really does rattle when you brush past it! It’s the dried seeds in the desiccated pods that make the noise. I also got a shot of a grasshopper hiding deep in the grass, but no Hummingbird Hawk Moths I’m afraid. Too cold for them up here in the frozen north.

It wasn’t really that cold, in fact it was pleasantly warm sitting in the garden. Thunder and lightning predicted for the next few days. We really should make the most of this warm weather before it all comes to a crashing end.

We’re not going anywhere any time soon.

Koper – 8 August 2022

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Looked for a flea market but found a hummingbird. Read on!

We got off the ship early because there are lots of things to see in Koper.

We opted for the sit-down breakfast restaurant where you’re not tempted to go back again and again for more from the buffet, especially after last night’s Indian feast. After breakfast and after checking out of the ship, we walked out of the port and headed for the lift to take us up to the viewing gallery and the town. I was impressed by the artwork advertising what I think was a ballet company’s “In a Dark Rabbit Hole”. Weird black and white photos overlayed with splashes of black ink hinting at scary things. Very arty and very clever. I photographed each of the billboards.

We didn’t actually go up in the lift, instead I suggested we climb the stairs to the viewing gallery where we took the mandatory photos of the ship and also photographed our reflection in the mirror panels that enclose the lift that the lazy folk use to avoid all those stairs.

Once we’d taken our photos and got our breath back, we walked in to the town and admired the cathedral and its bell tower. Scamp likes churches and she wandered into this one after covering her head and shoulders as is required. I’m not really all that interested in churches, but this one really shone inside with sunlight coming in through the high windows. We walked round and I took some photos, listening to what I thought was piped organ music, but it wasn’t piped. Someone was playing this massive church organ with an assistant turning the pages for him. That made it even more impressive.

After we left we walked in through the narrow streets of the town. I found some graffiti that I thought Alex would like because he’s into that sort of thing. In one shop they had a handbag shaped like a full size acoustic guitar. A snip at just over €80 and another about 60cm diameter shaped like an old style alarm clock with a working movement, a bit more expensive at €250. We walked on!

It’s an old town with cobbled streets and narrow alleyways that are just asking to be photographed, so that’s what I did, while Scamp found a dress shop with a reasonably priced dress that she bought. We found a real old fashioned cobbler’s shop where you could get a pair of hand made shoes made to measure. Luckily we didn’t have the time to wait, but the shoes looked lovely. There was a beautiful Yamaha Midnight Star motorbike just on a prop stand I took its photo, also for Alex.

I was looking for a flea market we’d wandered round the last time we were here and eventually had to agree that it was no longer there. There were some stalls in a park, but it looked as if it wasn’t going to be open today. Such a shame. We had a beer in an outside cafe and then headed back towards the ship.

We passed busts of what I think would translate as “National Heroes” all with a red star on them somewhere, so probably dating back to Soviet times. Further on, there were planters with great pillars of red flowers and … a Hummingbird Hawk Moth feeding on the flowers. I can’t remember who saw it first, Scamp or me, but the cameras were out in seconds and we were hammering away trying to capture an image of this fast flying insect. I remember seeing one, easily twenty years ago in France and maybe one since then. You just don’t get them in Scotland, even with climate change. There may be some in England, but I doubt it. Eventually after I’d shot over 50 images, I gave up.

As we were walking away from the flowers and the insect Scamp noticed a man on a wee electric ‘Monkey Bike’ with his dog sitting quite happily on a rack underneath him. Maybe that’s normal in Koper. We bought some things to take home at the supermarket in town and got them through security without any problem.

Back at the ship, Scamp went to the pool again for a swim. I grabbed my sketch book and pens and went back through security to draw the cathedral and bell tower. I’d sketched it the last time we were here, but for some reason I’d painted the clock face black – it’s white. This time at the third attempt I got what I wanted.

Normal sit-down dinner tonight with the couple we’ve been sitting with. Alan is a Senior chef and his wife is a Tax Consultant. Both from Newcastle area. Good company. We went to an awful show after dinner. That’s the last show I’ll go to on this ship. I’ve seen school shows that demonstrated more acting and singing talent.

Tomorrow it’s our last port, Šibenik, and we get to go in the wee boat, the tender to shore, then a free bus to the town itself.

An afternoon with the beasties – 1 August 2022

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The beasties in question were dragonflies and damselflies.

It was a lovely morning and we’d nowhere in particular to go. Scamp went off to get some messages at Tesco and to see what mess the roadworks at the roundabout were creating. Apparently it was a bit of a mess, but that’s not a surprise. I imagine it was even worse by 5pm when the factory traffic heads that way. There has been warning notices out for a week or so and we’d worked out alternative routes to take the avoid the congestion. Scamp had taken one of them and bypassed most of the stramash.

After lunch I had a look round my indoor garden of basil plants and chilli plants. The basil was drying out and took a fair amount of water to pump up its leaves again. One of the good surprises of the day was the old chilli plant from last year had made the effort and produced a fruit. I wasn’t sure the seed had set properly, but there it was a little 25mm fruit. The new chilli plant I got in Skye, of all places, is just covered in flowers and is fruiting away quite happily. I tried one of the branches of basil and the taste was really delightful. It had that spicy basil taste, but with a bit of aniseed to it too. Must be a different strain from the one downstairs. Scamp’s tomato plant is covered with fruit too. We had the first tomato yesterday and there are more ripening in the sunshine.

Later in the afternoon I went for a walk in St Mo’s and captured my first dragonfly of the year. It seemed quite content sitting on the boardwalk sunning itself. Not very skittish, either, sitting perfectly still for a few photos. A couple of blue damselflies crowded in to get their photos taken too. Then I found a big fly clinging to the shadow area of the upstand at the side of the boardwalk. It was a really big monster of a thing, about 30mm long head to tail. It too allowed me to take quite a few shots before I got fed up. Lastly there was a grasshopper, but I couldn’t quite get into a position to capture it. Pity, because they look almost alien. The dragonfly got PoD.

We had an hour in the garden when I got back. Just sitting listening to music on our headphones. It was a relaxing end to the afternoon.

Just before dinner, Scamp decided she’d better take the washing in as the clouds were gathering. I brought in the chairs too. Ten minutes later it was raining and it continued for a couple of hours. Not teeming rain, just gentle soaking rain. The best kind for the garden.

I had meant to go in to Glasgow today, but the notion left me. We may go tomorrow.

 

 

The warm-up begins – 17 July 2022

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Today was the start of a heatwave. We were warned that temperatures would rise significantly in the next few days.

Nobody informed the weather. It was raining when we woke and it kept on raining for about half an hour. But they were right about the temperature rising. The temperature was around 23ºc in the afternoon which although not earth shattering, was more than we’d had for the last few weeks. Probably that was due in part to the lack of wind which always cools the place down. It has been an extremely windy year so far. Is that to do with global warming too? I don’t know. All I know is that it’s been the windiest year I can remember.

In the morning, we took the tomato plant and the two chilli plants out to get the benefit of the rain, then we just left them outside to talk to the rest of the plants. While I was inspecting the flowers in the front garden (and getting some steps recorded) I noticed a little wee Marmalade hoverfly on one of Scamp’s dahlia flowers. It was kind enough to sit there for me and get its photo taken with not one, but three different cameras from three different dynasties. Ranging from the half frame Oly E-PL5 up to the mighty Sony A7iii with the Sony A6000 wedged in between. All of them produced great images, but the best of the lot was a shot from the A7iii. That photo became PoD.

In the afternoon we emptied out another ‘tattie’ bag. Not as many tatties in this one, but they were bigger. Some were pretty scabby too. Must ask Colin about that the next time I see him. There wasn’t much more to the day. Scamp watered some of the plants in the back garden with a watering can, then set up her lounger and read. In the meantime, I put my boots on and sprayed myself with insect repellant and went photographing insects (?) in St Mo’s where I almost got bitten by a cleg. Not a very clever one, because I felt it land on my leg and smacked it off. Clegs 0 – Photogs 1. I took a fair few photos, but nothing to beat the Marmalade.

Came home made a Pimms for Scamp and opened a bottle of Estrella for me. Sat in the warm garden. Note, warm but not sunny. The milky white sky from the morning hadn’t opened up to reveal blue skies and sunshine. A bit disappointing.

Dinner was Trout fillets with our potatoes and a salad. The potatoes might have been scabby, but once that was removed they tasted fine.

Spoke to Jamie and heard all about Hedgehog Houses and surveillance cameras to photograph the poor things. Must be a bit like being in Colditz! I think they’re resigned to the high temperatures predicted for the next few days. Thankfully the thick walls of their house will keep the temperature from rising too much inside.

Tomorrow we may go for a walk somewhere. Hope the sun shines.