Category: Birds

Last Dance in The Weavers – 4 March 2020

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Thankfully the last dance in that pokey little room, but we beat the corners.

First we got a phone call from Isobel to say that she was indeed getting out today. Although she’d get transport from the ward to the car, she would need a wheelchair to get from the car to the house, because the hospital wouldn’t load us a chair. Absolute nonsense, but totally in keeping with expected NLC policy. Scamp was not to be fazed by this problem and phoned one of the Gems singers and an hour later we had a wheelchair in the back of the Juke. You don’t realise just how much room a folded up wheelchair takes up in a car. I see the problem now Hazy.

By the time we’d worked out how to transport Scamp, Isobel, me and the wheelchair from the hospital to Cumbersheugh, Isobel had phoned to say she’d been told she was going to get hospital transport. Because she had more than one step up to her door and also she only had one handrail, she needed an ambulance person to get her safely into the house. One problem solved, but now we had to return the wheelchair and also return our life to what sometimes amounts to “Normal”. We went to lunch.

Lunch was in Craigend Nursery which used to be a decent sized plant nursery with a small tearoom bolted on. Now it’s very large tearoom with a nursery bolted on almost as an afterthought. Lunch was a beef burger and chips and salad and a dollop of ‘coleslaw’ that looked like a dog had been sick on my slate (no plates, just slates. Retro chic). Scamp had a very greasy looking Mac ’n’ Cheese. I don’t think we’ll be rushing back there.

Drove back and Scamp went to offload the wheelchair while I went to visit the ducks in St Mo’s. I also walked to the shops to try to get lemongrass for tonight’s dinner. Met an old friend of ours from salsa. Haven’t seen her for years, five years at least, according to her. How time flies. Didn’t get the lemongrass, but I did get today’s PoD which looks as if it’s been taken with flash, but it was just low afternoon light. A lucky shot.

Tonight we were dancing for the final time in The Weavers. I won’t be sad to leave that horrible room with its strange angles. What we did do was produce a decent foxtrot and another ‘work in progress’ quickstep. After a long explanation of how to dance in any shape of room, we even managed to remove the corners of the room and turn them into gentle curves, just by altering stride length and not dancing in entirely straight lines. It worked!

G&Ts tonight to remove the rough edges of an awkward day. Much like The Dukes of Hazzard song “Staightenin’ the curves Flattenin’ the hills …”. Exactly like tonight’s dancing.

Tomorrow more dancing in the afternoon hopefully. In a proper room this time.

Getting your ducks in a line – 27 February 2020

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There was snow lying this morning when we woke. Snow in February, that’s normal isn’t it? Does that mean Global Warming’s been cancelled?

Only time will tell if the proposed Global Warming has indeed been cancelled. For my part I think the snow was an oversight. It was fairly quickly removed from all gardens and some active person was actually removing it from the Campsie Fells by the time we were going out. We drove to Drumpellier and found that the snow that had been removed from Cumbersheugh had been dumped there. I presume it was Coatbridge that had paid for the snow to increase its scenic value and it had been inadvertently delivered to Cumbernauld. We walked round the loch. It was very pretty with a clear blue sky, but a cold wind and I did get today’s PoD there. It’s a Tufted duck and it was only one of the hundreds pestering the swans that are the usual stormtroopers when there’s food to be had. It made a refreshing change. Cup of coffee in the visitor centre which had an area cordoned off with serious looking red tape and heavy duty polythene that obscured our view of what was behind it. I firmly believe this is the Coatbridge way of quarantining suspected Coronavirus victims. Scary thought!
By the time we got back home all the snow had gone and half of the snow on the hills had also disappeared. Probably the work of an NLC operative with a big barrow and a few black bags. Cumbersheugh doesn’t get to keep anything. NLC just takes it away to Coatbridge or Motherwell!

After lunch I made some dough for a second attempt at Salt & Pepper bread and set it to rise while I went for a walk. I got a few more photos, but not until I’d reset the time and date on the camera. None of the other settings had been reset, only the time and date! Strange. Despite getting more photos, it was a shot of Tufty that remained the PoD.

I made some soup when I got back and also cooked some mince under Scamp’s instructions. Then I fired the bread after I’d sprayed it with water and put some pepper and sea salt on top. It rose well and tastes quite good. I had mince ’n’ tatties with beetroot. Scamp had salmon with tatties. Soup was fine. It was bean soup, to which the response is always “I don’t want to know what it was, I want to know what it is now!” Proof that the old jokes aren’t always the best.

Today’s prompt was “Duck”. This is my take on that topic. It’s a mallard I photographed last year in Cumbersheugh. And, before someone asks, NO I wasn’t tempted to draw and paint a Donald Duck instead!

We have no plans for tomorrow.

Coffee and some adult conversation – 24 February 2020

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Coffee at midday with the rest of the Auld Guys.

Topics under discussion were how to fix NLC, health centres and Boris.

  • It was generally agreed that NLC are now BER (Beyond Economic Repair) which is a nice way of saying FUBAR.
  • Health centres seem to be screwing up a lot of people. Within about a 10 mile radius the three centres under discussion were all operating different systems and all of them totally inefficient. Possibly they too are BER.
  • The book I’m reading at present is Real Tigers by Mick Herron. One nasty piece of work in the book is Peter Judd who is Home Secretary — described as ‘a loose cannon with a floppy fringe and a bicycle’ has his eye on Number 10. Now Peter Judd’s initials are PJ. If you say them quickly they’d sound like BJ, then all sorts of similarities are revealed. A nice piece of satire or simply a coincidence? You choose.

With the world once again set to rights, we went our separate ways and vowed that we’d organise our next meeting in a pub in Glasgow. We’ve been saying it for years and it hasn’t transpired yet. Perhaps 2020 will be that year.

When I got home, Gems were in full voice, so I swiftly had a roll ’n’ bacon and went out into the grim sleet to see if there were any pictures out there worth taking. There were as it happened. I’d stopped on one of my favourite places for a view of the Campsie covered in snow when the clouds came down and obscured them. Then I heard the sound of geese and a large skein appeared from behind some trees. There seemed to be hundreds of birds in the group that split up and rejoined as I grabbed my camera and shot off a few frames through the smirr that had started to fog up the lens. A quick wipe with my shirt tail cured that and I go some more before they headed off north. What do they know that I don’t. The resulting image is at the top of the page.

Dancing tonight was a reprise of waltz which I will tentatively say we can now complete without arguing 75% of the time. After that we did some foxtrot and made a bit of hash of it, but nothing that can’t be improved with some more practise. New to us tonight was quickstep. Now we’ve done quickstep with Michael, but this was quickstep with names for all the steps and the figures and it seemed to flow much better than when we were dancing it in Blackfriars. I’m not saying we have it off pat yet, it’s still a work in progress, but we’re about half way there. Feeling much better about this dancing lark.

I’m not publishing my attempt at a Mandala which is today’s challenge. I wasted an hour of my life drawing it and I don’t intend to foist it on anyone else. If you want to see it go to FB or Flickr.

Tomorrow, no plans, but I think we’ll be practising the quickstep figures.

Another visit to the doc’s tomorrow – 18 February 2020

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Not another blood test this time.

Got a message to call the surgery and was given an appointment tomorrow with the nurse to discuss my results. They had a free spot at 8.40am! I bet they did, as far as I know they still have it, and they can keep it too. Do you really think I’m getting up at 7.30am to have breakfast then drive through the gathering school runs just to find out that the nurse is running late and doesn’t arrive until 9.30? I think not. There’s a reason that slot is free. It’s because nobody wants it. I’m going at a sensible 10am. When the nurses will all be in and the weans will be in school.

With that settled, I started my new book “The End of the World Survivors Club”. I started it, but it’s just not cutting it for me. Not as gripping as the first book, but that’s sometimes the way with the second book in a series, or even worse in a trilogy. Because, in the second book of a trilogy, you just know that nothing is going to happen. I may struggle on with this one, but I don’t think so. Sorry Hazy.

I think I spent most of the day getting the blog hammered out in Day One and then posting it online. There must be an easier way to do it than this, it’s just that I haven’t found it yet.

Scamp was feeling a little bit better today, but not well enough to go out for lunch. I don’t blame her. I foolishly went out to get some photos in St Mo’s and got caught in a sleet shower, arriving home soaked. Saw a Golden Eye, nothing to do with James Bond, everything to do with a black & white duck with, you’ve guessed it, golden eyes. Beautiful wee thing it was too. It was too far away to be a contender for PoD, that went to a couple of coots. I really do think they recognise my red jacket and associate that with the person who feeds them bread. As soon as they saw me they gently swam in for some food and I gave them the two slices of granary loaf I’d kept for them after I’d fed the greedy swans and mallards earlier.

Today’s prompt was ‘Tennis’. Like I wrote on Flickr, I don’t like football or golf. Probably a cardinal sin in Scotland. I don’t like tennis either. I just don’t do ball games. Table tennis is the only one I partly mastered.

Tomorrow after the nurse has shouted at me, Scamp and I may go out to lunch in Hamilton. Hopefully, lunch will be a curry.

Parrots, Pizza and Reverse – 12 February 2020

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A strange mixture, but all in the correct order.

Last full day down south and my how the time has flown. All the things we were going to do and all the places we were going to see. Well we did do some of them and we did see some of them too. Today we were going to take Hazy to the garden centre, the same one Canute and Delia had taken us to, so I knew the route. We had some time to waste first, so I left Scamp to guard the house while I went for a walk in Horton Park.

Like I’ve said earlier, is a well kept park. Lots of little pathways going everywhere. Cycle tracks with obstacles to jump or ride over. Confusing signage which seems to point out five different ways to get to the same place, all in different directions and with different distances, and parrots! Well, actually they are parakeets, green ones that screech their way across the treetops, never coming close to the ground. Found lots of interesting little nicknacks all over the place. Rusted fenceposts that must have been pre-WW1. Little clearings in the woods and more parrots. I’d only been given an hour at most to investigate the woods, less than that once I’d navigated my way round a roundabout. Soon my phone was warning me that I’d used up half my time and it was now time to return to the house.

Managed to drive out the driveway and on to the road without hitting anything. For some reason the traffic was kind to me and allowed me a space to exit on to what is usually a very busy road. Followed the road Canute had taken and quickly found the garden centre without having to cross the standing water that had dogged his journey. Pizza in the garden centre is usually a must, but today it must have been the apprentice chef who was in charge, because when my buzzer announced its arrival from the oven, what I took charge of was a bit thin and scorched. I ate most of it. Scamp’s baked potato looked no better. Bought a few things then wheeled Hazy to the car and found out how to fold the wheelchair neatly into the boot. That’s when the trouble started.

We had to reverse out of the parking space, but every time I though I’d selected reverse, the car moved forward. I checked the gearstick to see if I had to lift the stick to select reverse, or push down on it, but neither of those was available, it was simply a case of push left, then forward … except that didn’t seem to work. Hazy even phoned Neil in Goa to find out if there was a magic word you had to use first, but he just confused me even more by saying that you moved the stick left, but kind of left and back, and then forward. If it had just been Scamp and I in the car I’d have started swearing then. If I had I’d have missed the sight of a beautiful bird, a Red Kite flying up out of a field across the road. I was half watching it the the stick slipped neatly into reverse and we were off again on our way. I was careful not to do anything stupid that necessitated reverse gear again until we arrived home and the passengers were safely in the house. Then I did the unforgivable. I read the manual. It said to use a dynamic movement to select reverse. More a curve left and forward, rather than two discrete movements. It worked like a treat. Now I saw what Neil had been describing. However, after I’d managed to get the car into the position it was in before we left, I got out, locked the door and walked away. I don’t think we’ll bother looking for a Mini as our next car.

PoD is one of the old pre-WW1 fenceposts.
SoD is a rose, using what I remembered from the technique I learned from an old man on a cruise a couple of years ago.

Spent the evening packing everything into two roll along cases one bag and a rucksack. Tomorrow we’re off home.

London – 7 February 2020

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Today we were going to the Tower of London, except …

When we’d walked the mile or so to the train station I realised that neither of us had the details that Neil had so kindly typed up for us. Time for a change of plan.

We’d still go in to London, but instead of visiting the Tower we’d go for a wander and find somewhere new to visit. To start with we’d find a coffee shop. Not as easy as you’d think in London. Loads of coffee shops, but none where I’d deign to actually drink their coffee. Eventually we found Westminster Bridge and along from that we found St James’ Park which looked promising on another beautiful bright sunny day. Loads of other folk seemed to find it interesting too and most of them were Italian or French or Spanish it seemed. Hundreds of them, maybe even thousands, and all of them were watching the pelicans or having their photo taken with them. Pelicans in London? According to Wikipedia ”Pelicans have been a feature of St James’s Park since 1664 when the Russian Ambassador presented them to King Charles II.” Who knew? Well, apart from Wikipedia.  A picture of a pelican made PoD

Further on, we went to look at Mrs McQueen’s big hoose, but I don’t think she was in. Either that or she was hiding from the hordes who were gazing intently through her railings hoping to catch a glimpse of somebody royal. Either that or they were waiting to see the changing of the guards. I don’t know why they’re changing them anyway, they seemed alright the last time I saw them on the TV. We walked back along the Mall and found a coffee shop in Waterstones where they sold a decent latte fro Scamp and some burnt water for me. Lovely Danish pastries though! After that we went to Covent Garden where we heard some dodgy opera singer and I got a tee shirt.

After searching for somewhere to eat we settled for a pub lunch. Macaroni and (a ton of) Cheese for Scamp and an apparently prize winning pie for me. The pie casing was lovely, as was the veg, but the meat was tough. Walked along the banks of the Thames and caught the train back. Maybe we’ll visit the Tower another day … with the directions!

Today’s topic was “Fly” and my take on it was a fly of the Dragon persuasion.

Kingston – 6 February 2020

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Off on our travels again.

Today we’d earmarked Kingston upon Thames as the place to go. We’d been there before a few times, but that doesn’t mean we can’t go again and probably find new wonders to explore. Now that we know how to use Oyster cards and even simpler credit cards to pay on buses and trains, travel without a ticket is the way to go. Single price journeys are so much easier to work with too.

So it was a walk along to the bus stop, then the No 71 to Kingston as the lady’s voice from the speaker reminded us at every stop. Then a visit to M&S for a new bunnet followed by a coffee in Nero. After that, a walk round the market and then down by the Thames in the sunshine under a bright blue sky where we saw some cormorants drying their wings.

Lunch was Japanese street food in Itsu. Mine was a Chicken Noodle soup with lots of ginger and Scamp had a Chicken and Coconut soup. We both shared a portion of Chicken Gyoza. To finish off we had a beer in the Druid’s Head. Managed to find most of the stuff we needed for dinner in Waitrose and got the bus back to Chessington.

PoD was the Thames walkway at Kingston. SoD was a snail which was the answer to the “Crawl” topic.

 

 

Tiger – 4 February 2020

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A beautiful bright morning. Seemed a shame to waste it.

Drove over to Drumpellier Park and walked round the loch in the sunshine. On the far side of the loch the water had overflowed into the bank of trees and it looked just like a mangrove swamp. We were expecting to see crocodiles in the water and a snake or two hanging from the trees, but all we saw were a gang of Mallards quacking away as they paddle through the maze of tree trunks. We went for a coffee in the wee cafe, at least it was coffee we asked for, but I think we got Babychinos instead. There certainly wasn’t much coffee in evidence. The place seemed to be full of mums and babies, three of whom were having a laughing competition to see who could make the most noise. Even the scones were a disappointment today. Not a good day at the cafe.

Drove home and after lunch I thought I should start today’s sketch and the topic was Tiger. I’d thought of doing a Tiger Lily or a De Havilland Tiger Moth, but finally put pen to paper and copied a tiger from a Google Images shot. My first attempt wasn’t all that good, so I tried a practise piece on my doodle sheet, beginning with the nose rather than the eyes. Then the beast you see above appeared through the doodles! It became PoD.

Scamp and I were discussing PoDs this morning and I was admitting that the quality of my PoDs of late has not been really worthy of the name. On dull, wet, dark days it’s difficult to find suitable subjects for the PoD, or even a decent photo to put into the 365. I’m loathe to stop the 366, but I have to say that the time it takes to make a silk purse from a pig’s ear photo, even in the best of software is disproportionate to the quality of the finished product. Also, taking the photos, processing them, sketching something that fits the February day’s prompt and then posting both shots, plus the blog takes a lot of time. As some of you will have noticed, if anything else happens on any given day, the blog is the one that suffers and I find myself playing catch-up next day.

With that in mind, and it being February, I intend to still take a photo if the light and the weather suits, but hopefully I’ll manage to complete a drawing or painting from the month’s list and this will become PoD. Hopefully once February is over and we are into the lighter days of March there will be more opportunities for photos DV. If not, then I will probably suspend the 366 and just post the occasional good quality photo.

Plans have been made for tomorrow. Hoping for some decent light to get some photos too.

Quarterly blood letting – 27 January 2020

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Some days have a wall. Something that has to be surmounted. Today it was bloodletting at midday.

Today it was time for my quarterly blood test. I felt a bit like Hancock when he hears that he has to give “a whole pint”. As the nurse counted out the four sample tubes and gaily filled them with my vital fluid, I wondered if I had any left in my body. When I got back home I found out that I did have and some of it was leaking past the plaster she’d stuck on. Not a lot, just a dribble, but you can’t go losing blood like that. I need all mine. Now I’ve just to wait until the end of the week to see if I need to meet the nurse to discuss the results or if it’s just an OK over the phone. Expecting the former, hoping for the latter.

After getting past the wall I relaxed a bit. Went out to post my old driving licence back to the DVLA, get my old dance shoes re-soled and heeled and get some more black ink to use with the adapter, or converter to use the correct term, for my collection of Lamy pens. At present the Fisk black ink is winning. It’s permanent, but doesn’t seem to have any shellac in its composition, so doesn’t clog the nib of the fountain pen. Still one more to check and that’s the W&N one I was going to get today in Hobbycraft. Almost got the full set done. Forgot to post the licence, but got the shoes booked in and I got the ink too. Bought myself an LED daylight bulb for use in a lamp in the back bedroom while I was in Hobbycraft.

While I was out I took the chance of dropping in at Drumpellier to grab a photo of some of the waterbirds on the loch. That’s where today’s PoD came from. Entitled “A Tall Tail” it’s a sculpture in the middle of the loch that makes a great perch for the gulls. I think I entertained a couple sitting having coffee in their car. They couldn’t understand what the hell I was doing, apparently taking photos of, well, nothing much. Obviously didn’t understand that that’s what photogs do most of the time with the sole purpose of puzzling the Muggles.

Back home, Gems were gone, leaving only their dirty tea cups and a few uneaten biscuits. Not long after I got there, Scamp returned from dropping them off. Sat for a while tweaking the aforementioned PoD and then we had half the dinner – soup. The other half we’d have when we returned from dance class.

I must admit, although I miss salsa on a Monday night, I don’t miss the drive in to Glasgow or back out again, especially when Rangers are playing and half of Scotland squeezes on to the M8 in front of me. We had been practising the Waltz all week and do you know, the teacher didn’t even ask us to show off our prowess at that dance. However, we have now mastered the first half of the Foxtrot routine and have a fair understanding of how the second half works. We can also Saunter Together quite adequately. Next week we add both halves of that dance together to make our first real sequence dance! The new black and white dance shoes seem to work. We only stayed for an hour tonight, but may try another hour on a Wednesday when she starts another new class in Condorrat.

Just before I started this, the snow began. It was fairly heavy for a while, but it’s just light now and although the temperature is just above freezing, I don’t think it will last until morning. That’s a pity because I could take some snowy pictures.

Tomorrow Scamp is booked for lunch with Mags and I’m determined to post that DVLA letter. Whether I manage that or not is the question!

Mirror Mirror on the wall – 24 January 2020

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Well, not on the wall yet, but hopefully quite soon.

Today the red Juke took us to Falkirk to look for a shaving mirror for me. Scamp was determined to replace the one she’d bought me for Christmas from JL. I’ve tried to tell her it just needs a wee bit of glue to secure the base, but she won’t listen. It’s not the best designed, or manufactured bit of kit I’ve ever seen, but it didn’t cost the earth either and apart from the demountable base, it does work well. We couldn’t see any better mirrors in the two shops we were in, but we did see some large room mirrors which we’d been discussing. Incredible variety of styles and bling and incredible prices to match. I think we’ve narrowed down the range to a few front runners now.

After the retail park, we went to Morrisons for some essentials and something for tonight’s dinner. Oh yes, and lunch. Lunch turned out to be a bowl of chips for Scamp and a roll ’n’ sausage for me. Fairly standard fare, but cheap and cheerful. While we were there I got a text from the dance shop to say that my shoes were in and the replacement soles for the old ones were there too. We considered driving over after lunch, but I eventually decided that the traffic would be too heavy on a Friday about 3.30pm and also I didn’t have a PoD and I might just have enough time to grab one in St Mo’s when we got back. We’ll visit the dance shop tomorrow, all being well.

I did get a few potential shots, but the only one that worked well was another magpie shot. Not just one bird, four. This is a case where four in a bush is much better than one in the hand. You wouldn’t want a magpie on your hand. If you did have one, you’d need to count your fingers carefully afterwards! However, the birds in the tree was my PoD.

Made a veggie chilli from the Bosh book tonight. Very time consuming to make and not all that tasty when it was finished. We couldn’t quite put our fingers on the problem, but there was a sour taste somewhere in the sauce. I don’t think I’ll bother making it again.

So, we’re hoping to visit the dance shop tomorrow. Other than that, we have no plans.