Category: Dancing

Dull, Dull, Dull – 27 September 2017

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There’s not a lot you can say about today. Certainly not a lot of good things anyway.

The highlight of today was driving to B&Q to buy a stepping stool and a new shower head. Now how’s that for excitement? We didn’t go for a walk. We didn’t go for a swim. We didn’t do anything.

Drove in to Glasgow to Salsa and found out that although Jamie G took the depleted beginners class, Shannon was taking the advanced class so I proposed a sharp exit. Shannon has had her fun with me as her whipping boy, but not any more. She runs a good business, but she isn’t a teacher. That’s an hour of my life I wanted to enjoy, not be told I wasn’t doing things right (i.e. her way.) We left. Just to put the tin lid on things, it rained all the way home.

Didn’t even take any decent photos because the light was so poor. Today’s PoD if you can call it that is three of Scamp’s bus-stop ladies made by Geof Cox.

Tomorrow will be better because, for one thing, tomorrow is is ‘J Day’. Hoping to paint in the morning.

Paperwork, paperwork – 25 September 2017

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Checked my mail this morning and the registration document for the car had arrived. That meant it was time to get the insurance arranged. Hard to believe, but in the two weeks since I last got a quote, it had gone up by £30 from both companies, Nissan and Tesco. After a bit of moaning and wheedling with Nissan I got it down by £20. Tesco, on the other hand, were as flexible as an iron bar. No way were they going to shift an inch on their extortionate quote. Such a shame as I’d been with them for three years and their quote for the Megane had been fairly good. After a bit more paperwork and emailing we were done. Looks like Thursday will be “J Day”.

After that I spent some time swearing at Windoze 10 Creature Edition. I don’t think it will be staying with us very long. Gone, now are the days when you could just access the BIOS with a couple of keys at startup. Oh no, that would be too easy. Now you have to delve into settings, restart the machine, do more configuration on the blue screen that load and then you can access the BIOS. And then you wonder why Macs are so popular? Added to all that, it runs like a slug with a hangover. I do so wish I could go back to the original Win 10 I upgraded Win 8 to. That was brilliant, well, not exactly brilliant, but sooooo much better than The Creature From The Black Lagoon I have now.

Went out for a walk later in the afternoon after I’d taken the Megane for a wash and brush up. By then the sun started poking its face through the clouds and I found it was a beautiful autumn afternoon out there, warm too. Got some photos, two of which are above. Also saw two potentials. Will keep them in mind for tomorrow, perhaps. Today’s PoD was the Brambles. Not Blackberries, that’s for the english. These are fierce, jaggy Scottish Brambles and proud of it. If you look at the Flickr version and click to magnify it there, you’ll see a wee spider waiting to catch unwary flies enticed in to sample some bramble juice. Didn’t see it when I was taking the photo, only when I got it into the computer. The other plant’s name evaded me for years, but now I know it’s a Butterbur of the genus Petasites. There, you’ve learned something today (I learned it yesterday, so I’m a day ahead of you).

Strange night tonight, not having Salsa on a Monday is quite unsettling. Hopefully Wednesday will arrive soon and we’ll get our Latin fix.

Weather seems favourable tomorrow. We may go out for a run. In the car of course!

Rain and Salsa, nothing else – 24 September 2017

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Rain reigned today.  It started off just dull, then the rain came and really outstayed its welcome.

Had  a Neil D lunch of last night’s Chicken Rogan Josh and it went quite nicely on toast!  Then made the mad decision to give in and allow Windows 10 to perform its upgrade to Win 10 Creators Update.  That was about 2:30pm.  It’s now about 11.45pm and it’s still doing it.  Ok, I admit I closed it down to go to the Sunday Social, but it’s been going hard at it for the last four hours and is still not finished.  I hope the Creators (or is that Creatures) are worth it.  There was a message to say that I could postpone it to allow me to back up the hard drive, but then it seemed to say “Fuck it” and started installing it anyway borking the backup.  That’s what I love about Microsoft, NOTHING.  Macs, even with the despicable El Capitan are so much more user friendly that anything Mickysoft produces.  Windows 7 was the last stable OS on a PC and then Windows 8 came along to be the ‘inbetween OS’  The one that never worked.  No Windows 9 for some reason, maybe the same reason there’s an iPhone 8 and an iPhone X, but no iPhone 9.  Windows 10 started out well, then the inevitable upgraded borked it too.  Hopefully the Creators Upgrade will sort everything out, but I doubt it.  I think I’ll just return it to factory settings after its done its worst.

On a brighter note, Salsa was really fun tonight.  Maybe that’s because we had tapas in the restaurant before the dancing started.  Scamp got to dance with the legendary ‘Jamie’.  Not ‘our Jamie’, nor Jamie Gal, but the strange and twisty turny ‘other Jamie’.  I think Scamp was quite taken aback when he asked her to dance.  She did look terrified when I saw her!!  I should explain that ‘other Jamie’ is an excellent dancer who we see at most of the socials.  We think he is a professional dancer.  A very smooth mover who likes to show off on the floor.  He often dances with guys too!  We did think he might be gay, but he appeared with his wife and wee boy.  I know that’s no proof of anything, but still …  He didn’t ask me to dance, of course.  There were lots of girls there tonight, most of them beginners or pre-beginners if that’s possible.  I danced with a couple of them, but it was more like giving a lesson than dancing.  Not that I minded.  Then I danced with another girl who could dance.  Unfortunately, I overstretched her knowledge with one move, Aficionado and tripped over her feet, landing on my bum amidst peals of laughter.  Shannon, the boss, had been videoing the proceedings earlier, but luckily she didn’t notice my acrobatics, so it’s just between you and me.  First time ever I’ve fallen on the dance floor!  Bummer.  Literally!

Today’s PoD came from the salsa venue, which was La Rambla in Paisley.  I saw it on the cistern in the restaurant toilet today. I just had to go back in and capture this chrome smile.  Glad nobody came in while I was taking the shot. That might have been a difficult one to explain away!

Just checked and as of 12:13am Windows 10, which was predicting 90minutes for the installation at 3pm, is at 92% complete and the helpful message reads:

This may take some time

This week’s sketch is just a doodle trying to sketch people for paintings and the theme is rain and umbrellas, as if you hadn’t guessed.  The weather fairies promise a drier day tomorrow and some sun on Tuesday.  Let’s wait and see.

Despite all the bad weather we’ve been having I still saw some swallows this week, so all is not lost.

Party Animals – 22 September 2017

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“So do you think I’ll need another shirt to change into?” Question before leaving for John Carrigan and Natacha’s 110th Birthday Bash. “No” came the answer. By 11.30pm my shirt was sodden and Scamps dress was sticking to her. Wish I’d brought that other shirt now!

As you will have guessed today was the combined birthday party. Not a lot of Salsa or Ceilidh dancing, but a lot of Jive and Rock ’n’ Roll. I think I could handle jive, but I’m sure Scamp thinks I’d start dancing ‘jalsa’ which is half salsa, half jive. Well, it isn’t yet, but it would be. I already drive her crazy by inventing moves on the spot. How much more complicated would it be if we added in Jive? Anyway, we may give it a try!

Earlier in the day I framed the big A2 painting based on a London skyline and it’s hanging at the top of the stairs. Looking good too. It’s in an old IKEA frame that was just the right size and the mat is not real matting board, but a piece of cardboard Fred gave me ages ago. I think it sits well in the frame.

I went out to get some photos but the Luggie wasn’t looking very photogenic until I noticed the time and had to hurry home to get ready to go out. Then the sun came out and I got a couple of shots. This one looks good, but it could have been so much better if the light had been better earlier. That said, it’s a place marker and the 365 needed a photo, this was it.

I started writing this at 10.35pm while Scamp was dancing the Slosh or some other mindless line dance, and it’s now twelve fifty ish and it’s time for me to go to sleepy bye byes.

Nighty night readers.

Dull, Dull, Dull – 20 September 2017

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Today was very dull. The light was almost nonexistent. As a guide, we left for Salsa at 5.45pm and the car lights came on automatically and it had rained almost all day. However, before we get to that, other things happened.

Scamp had loads of ironing to do and for the first time in ages, I volunteered to help. That shows just how fed up I was. I managed to do three of my salsa shirts and two runners for the top of the drawers in the bedroom. I know she carefully filtered the selection to give me the easy ones, but at least it was five things she didn’t have to do. I managed to get them all done without burning them … or myself. I know I’ve now created a precedent, but I’ll deal with that on another day. A sunny day.

I added some watercolour to the sketch I did yesterday and it looked a bit better for that. I took four shots of a fuchsia in the garden and used Photoshop to create a ’stack’ which is just what it says. Every photo in the stack was sharp in a different area and the idea is to create a composite of all the ’good bits’ while hiding all the ‘bad bits’. I think it worked. I leave the final decision to you.

Salsa tonight was the highlight of the day. Seeing the beginners class actually dancing I mean reelly dancing was great and the numbers in the 7.30pm advanced class were very healthy again. That’s not to say they will stay healthy, we can but hope.

Tomorrow looks rainy, so I think I’ll do some painting.

Creepy Building – 18 September 2017

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It’s Monday and that means two things. Gems and Salsa.

While Gems were going through their paces I used the time to get a painting idea out of my head. I had a couple of old canvases that I’d painted over and were unallocated at present, so I started into them using some acrylics and some heavy body gel to give a bit of impasto. I was quite pleased with the effect and may work into it a bit more to brighten some areas of the hills to give it a bit more form.

That done, I drove to the Fort to buy a book from Waterstones – “How to paint people quickly” by Hazel Soan. I’m aware that I haven’t posted an ink sketch this week, but the matter is in hand.

On the way back from Glasgow, I stopped at Gartloch, where the ruin of the old mental hospital stands in the middle of an exclusive housing development. I took a few photos, but didn’t linger long. It felt like I shouldn’t be there. I can’t imagine what it must have been like being incarcerated in this victorian monstrosity. I’d heard it described as being like the set of a horror film, but it’s not until you see it, you fully appreciate what that means. I can’t understand why anyone in their right mind (no pun intended) would pay to live next to this scary big group of buildings, because this isn’t just one pile of sandstone, this is a whole group of them. No glass in the windows. Most of them and all the doors boarded up. I didn’t linger long, but I’d always told myself I’d visit it one day. It’s done now.

On a brighter note, Salsa tonight was great fun. Advanced class did Guanabo, Disco, Sombrero Doble Balsero Dos and ’The New One’.

Tomorrow we go to ‘recce’ the venue for a birthday party on Friday for John Carrigan.

Nnnn Nineteen – 11 September 2017

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Phone call this morning from the nurse to say that the podiatrist was off ill, so my appointment today was cancelled and I’d be given a new one. Five minutes later the nurse phoned back to say that another podiatrist had been contacted and my appointment was back if I was still available. I was.

Spent the morning putting the finishing touches to my painting. When I got to the point where as Whistler allegedly said “I can do no more to it”, I stopped and tore the A2 sheet from its spiral binding and hung it on the wall. Ostensibly to dry, but also to see if I would still like it when I walked past it occasionally. I did and it’s still drying. If I hadn’t it’d be in pieces in the bin by now.

After lunch I got ready and went to meet the podiatrist who signed me off as having a fit pair of feet, which was nice. Just what I’d expected.

Dinner tonight was exactly what I’d intended. A ragu made with the pulled meat from the dinosaur bone, served with some ribbon past I found in the back of the cupboard. It was very nice. Great way to use up the meat.

Salsa tonight was a bit frantic. One move in particular had me tied up in knots. It was called Balsero Dos and I hope Jamie G forgets about it next week, but I doubt if he will. We also did Disco(very), El Paraguas and Guanabo.

Found one of the limitations of the dashcam tonight. The detail in night driving is very poor. During the day it’s fine, but the contrast is so high at night and the frame rate and the shutter speed doesn’t allow for any detail to be recorded. This was pointed up when we were passed by a boy racer along Westfield Road. When I reviewed the footage, you could see it was a red car, and that was it. No detail. Useless as evidence in an accident.  Luckily we didn’t need it.

Today’s PoD is of a bunch of dragonflies I found sunning themselves up at Fannyside. There were an incredible nineteen of them all snoozing (I think) on an old rusted gate. One even let me get to within 30mm of her (I checked, it was a female Black Darter). All the photos were taken with the Teazer. Just shows what you can do with a point ’n’ shoot camera these days.

Early rise tomorrow when we’re off to the hospital in Glasgow for Scamp’s checkup.

A more down to earth day – 6 September 2017

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It seems like the last few days, in fact the last week have been a whirl of buying. Holidays, oops, forgot to mention that we are going on holiday! So apart from holidays, there were suites, hoovers dash cams and cars to look at, admire, assess investigate and purchase. Anyone would think we’d won the lottery. Now that would be unlikely because you have to buy a ticket before you can win and there is the downfall!

Today was more down to earth. A day to pick a drawer in a chest of drawers and clear it out into one of three piles using the KFC method:

  • Keep – It goes back in the drawer
  • File  – Find somewhere else to put it (where you can find it again)
  • Crap –  It goes into the bin. The more you can fit into this pile the better.

As usual, it’s really amazing the things you find in the back of a drawer. Things you’d forgotten about, things you knew you had but couldn’t find (previously filed!) and the things you find and haven’t a clue what they are, or why you were keeping them. After an hour of this I’d halved the contents of the drawer, filled two bags of rubbish and filed away numerous things, never to be found again. I just know that next week I’ll suddenly remember why I was keeping a 20mm long piece of dried clay in a zip top poly bag.

After lunch I started another painting. This one was of a real place it’s based loosely on a photograph of the Forth estuary at Torryburn in Fife. I’m quite happy with it at present, but I’ve a few bits and pieces to add and maybe, just maybe I’ll post it tomorrow, all being well.

I went for a walk along the canal in the late afternoon, just to get some fresh air in between the rain showers. It was too windy for any decent insect photos and the spider was the best I got. It was only when I was post-processing it I realised it was in the act of spinning its web. That’s my PoD.

Drove into salsa tonight and used the dashcam again. The video quality is really amazing. It even made a couple of ’emergency’ photos which it stores in a special ‘private’ folder. Impressed as I wasn’t actually braking hard, honest officer. Went to pay for parking at STUC and a prick was trying to talk to someone important on the phone that he had pressed between his shoulder and his skull whilst trying to feed about fifty 20p coins into the machine from a poly bag he was holding. It kept rejecting them then telling him to take his money, he kept on doing exactly the same thing again. After two iterations, I said to him that there’s a limit to the number of coins you can use in these machines. He looked at me as if to say go away old man. So I just said “Just trying to help and that’s what you get. WANKER.” I’m sure the person on the other end of the phone already knew he was a wanker, but I was said it loud enough to let them know that I knew too. I went across the road put in my £2.50 (no 20p coins were used) in another machine and came back as he was retrieving his ticket. It’s simple really. People who’s brain chip is an Intel Celeron single core shouldn’t try to do difficult things like parallel process. That’s only going end up in tears. Also, that’s what he gets for raiding one of his kid’s piggy banks to get his parking money. Just to annoy him more, I waited until he was back in his car and crossed the street again and photographed him. He’s sitting somewhere just now thinking “What’s he going to do with that photo?” No, probably he’s forgotten. Like my new dashcam, his brain chip will delete old data to make way for new stuff. You have to do that when you’ve only got 128k of RAM.

That last thought came from the tidy up today. I found a 128k memory module for a Sinclair QL (c1984). 128k what could you store on that now? A really small photo? About 8 seconds of music? Just shows how time and technology has moved on.

Salsa was great fun with the beginners starting to get adventurous with Exhibela and Exhibela Ronde. We even taught Jamie G a move we called Setenta Abaho. We’ll be teaching our own class soon!

Back to School – 4 September 2017

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Today was a ‘Back to School’ day for Gems.

The day started with rain that gradually got heavier as the day wore on. Since Gems were coming back from their holidays, I had to find something to do or somewhere to go after lunch. Lunch was the second helping of Thai Green Chicken Curry. I’d made the paste on Saturday and we had the first helping for dinner yesterday. I’d intended this to be a smaller portion, to use up some chicken that was languishing in the fridge and also to use up the rest of the curry paste.

It was while I was deciding where to go and while I was listening to Scamp running through some songs with them that I began to wonder … Many years ago, before we were married Scamp was working in Glasgow libraries and she sang on a recording for an LP. Yes, and LP. This was long before CDs, far less digital downloads. I wondered if the album was lying somewhere in Spotify. As I typed in the title, the associated list became shorter and shorter until it disappeared. However, I pressed the search button and Lo and Behold, there it was. I promptly downloaded it and showed it to her. Not only is the album there, but Scamp gets a name check on her track! I’ll send you both the title so you can listen to it. Needless to say it is also available on iTunes and was promptly downloaded. Isn’t technology wonderful.
Some technology isn’t so good. Today I cancelled my Amazon Prime subscription. I wasn’t using Prime. Also Prime wasn’t available for more and more items, so it made sense to cancel it.

After my search through the musical archives, I had intended going to Stirling to make sure I was happy with the Juke, but one look at the weather and the queues on the M80 made me defer that until tomorrow. Instead, I went to get some glue to repair a painting. Imagine a techy teacher having to BUY glue! Unfortunately B&Q were reorganising their stock and today was the adhesive section’s chance to be revamped, so it was blocked off and I wasn’t going to get any glue today. I went in to Halfords and bought a dashcam instead. I think it will be a useful accessory after hearing about Sim’s accident. It’s busy charging as I write this. Hopefully it will go into the Megane tomorrow. After that I went to the boggin’ Antonine Centre and in The Works, I got a little bottle of PVA for £1. Bargain. I’d just spent around £100 on a dashcam, but felt really good at getting my glue for a quid!

After the heavy lunch, we didn’t feel like having dinner so it was just scrambled eggs on toast. Absolutely fine. Salsa tonight wasn’t as bad as last week. For one thing, I remembered how to do Caltec! Tonight’s moves were Caltec, Disco, Prado and Machucho.

Today’s PoD was a grab shot out the open back door during a little respite from the rain.  Watching blue tits and coal tits scrambling over the peanut feeder always makes me smile.

Oh yes, if you get a chance, search Spotify for The Streets of Glasgow.  The track you are looking for is ‘Bottling Songs‘.  Listen carefully and you should hear a familiar voice!

Tomorrow we may make that run to Stirling.

The search is over – 28 August 2017

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Finally the search is over and a couple of suitable cow skins on cheap plywood and pine frames have been purchased! Hooray!!

Drove in to Glasgow this morning hoping to clinch the deal for a new suite. Nothing is ever that easy. We went first to Sterling in London Road. We had intended to have one final look at the suite we had earmarked, but instead we were side tracked by another one. It seemed better finished and slightly more comfortable, but was considerably more expensive. It just had to be added to the list There were now four suites vying for our attention. We went next door to DFS and decided immediately to remove that contender. Back to three again. We drove to Birkenshaw to look at number two on the list. That was easy. It was scrubbed off the list too. Now we were down to two. The original front runner and the new arrival. At least we were getting somewhere. Scamp went to look for ‘something’ in Dunelm Mills and I went to look for a replacement printer in Currys. We both met up again without a printer or a ‘something’. I suggested we go back to London Road and have a cup of coffee while we thought about the pros and cons of the two suites that were now neck and neck. While we were drinking coffee and eating lunch, I suggested we get the measurements of the two contenders and then go home to see if either or both of them would fit in the space we had. Sounded like a plan, so armed with the dimensions of the two, three seater sofas we drove home (all of this in torrential rain too). Measured the two and found that both would fit into the space neatly. It was nearly down to the wire, I think Scamp was reaching for the coin to toss when I said I thought the original suite was the best. It had been in our heads for longest, it was the price we wanted to pay and the colour was right. We drove back in to Glasgow and sealed the deal. If only we hadn’t been side tracked by that rogue sofa, we’d have been done with hours to spare. As it was, we had barely enough time to come back home with the ink still drying on the contract and have dinner before we headed off to Salsa class.

I couldn’t put a foot right tonight. Even in the first class where we go as helpers, I couldn’t remember how to do a simple move, Caltec. My brain just wasn’t working. I think I was still driving in and out of Glasgow. Once I got the start, it was easy and I could repeat it all night. It was just that start position I couldn’t get. That’s what happens when you format your brain and re-install a previous backup. New move tonight was Disco.

Today’s PoD is sweet peas. I make no excuse for yet another flower picture or indeed for yet another sweet pea picture. They just look lovely.

The sky eventually cleared this evening and apparently we are to have a good day tomorrow. Don’t know where we’re going, but it won’t be London Road or Birkenshaw.