Category: Dancing

FitSteps to DanceSteps – 1 November 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Dance Steps on a Friday?

Scamp went to FitSteps in the morning and I started selecting my clothes and shoes for the dance weekend.

Today we drove to Perth for the three day extravaganza. The destination was The Salutation Hotel. It opened in 1699 and has the original floorboards judging by the squeaks and creaks every time you walk across one of the rooms. We were in a second floor room which had a shower. A couple of years ago we were in the top floor which had a shower, but no running water. Maybe that’s too critical, it did have running water in the shower if you didn’t mind waiting for half an hour for it to build up a sufficient head of steam to get the water up to the third floor. It’s a listed building and lots of the corridors had a list too. Some even listed in two directions along their length. I’ll leave it there. We weren’t really bothered about the rooms, we were there for dancing, Three days of dancing.

Arrived and parked after innumerable roadworks and diversions on the way. We picked a road that looked like it was going our way, and let the sat nav do the difficult stuff. With Scamp’s help, it took us right to the entrance to the car park. Parked the car and carried our dresses, shoes, suits, changes of clothes and a bottle of gin round to the hotel.

A condensed list of the day:
Got the key and found the room.
Dumped the bags and went out for lunch in Nero.
A dull, wet day, so we didn’t hang about.
Dinner served in the restaurant of the hotel
Dancing started around 7pm …
… and went on until just before midnight.

Absolutely exhausted.

By the way, the photo is the view from our room. Putting the “B” in Brutalist.

Tomorrow, more of the same.

Dancing, Dancing all the day – 31 October 2024

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Yesterday we were at dance class and today we were dancing at a Tea Dance.

I struggled in the morning to find something to photograph, because I knew we were going dancing in the afternoon. There is so little time in the morning and by the time the tea dance finishes, these dark days approaching winter, there is no light worth talking about, so it was going to be an inside photo, which is always a get-out, but!

I already had a subject, an inside subject. All I needed was a display. A cardboard box and an old CD container covered with a scrap of velvet to disguise their angular shapes into smooth curves gave me a pedestal for the bow tie I made yesterday. Anyone who has tried to tie a bow tie will know how devilishly difficult it is to do, even standing in front of a mirror. Especially when standing in front of a mirror! Try doing it with a cup as a ‘neck’ and tying it from behind the cup. It’s utterly impossible … almost. I did manage it at my third attempt, only because I found the hidden loophole you have to thread the part made tie through. That is what you have here. Today’s PoD is the Star Wars Stormtrooper Bow Tie.

The dance was quite well attended, but for some reason, Stewart had decided to concentrate on Sequence dances. They are a bit too repetative for my liking. They are useful, it’s true because they are repetitive. They generate muscle memory and you can almost dance them in autopilot, almost, but not quite. We did dance one freestyle waltz, Waltz Nioli which is fairly simple but with some more advanced steps. We also dance a decent Cha-Cha without getting it too wrong or missing out the occasional couple of steps. The second half of the tea dance was devoted almost entirely to Sequence, but we joined in anyway.

Today was the final of this year’s Inktober. The prompt was Landmark. It just had to be The Kelpies. Anyone who has seen them and walked round them, knows they are special and you feel as if the are moving with you. They are massive, dwarfing any visitors to Helix Park in Falkirk, but not in a bad way. Yes, The Kelpies are a great closing image for Inktober 2024.

This was probably the worst and least imaginative collection of prompts I’ve seen. Also the increase in AI ’sketches’ and ‘drawings’ done on iPads has been exponential this year.
</Rant>

Tomorrow Scamp may be going to FitSteps and I might try to get a photo or five in the morning.

Dancin’ – 26 October 2024

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Off to Brookfield on a sunny morning in October wondering what the torturers oops, teachers would have in store for us today.

We didn’t have to wait long. The menu started with a Queen of Hearts Rumba we thought we knew, but obviously didn’t. After the second one we more or less had it.

Next was the October Waltz which was new to about half the class and nearly caused a fist fight between me and Scamp. As it happened, for one I was right. It was all about one back step which Scamp said I didn’t have to do, but on review later, I did have to do or I’d end up starting on the wrong foot. It was a simple wee dance with figures we already knew, just not in the order we were to do them in.

To cool things down, we did a Midnight Jive. Not my favourite by a long way, but at least we didn’t argue about the steps, because they are burned indelibly in to our brains.

The next dance was a Cha-Cha which deteriorated into a free-style Cha-Cha and one we stumbled through, or to be more correct, I stumbled through.

One more sequence dance and we were free to go. Can’t remember its name, but that’s no loss.

Drove home over the Kingston Bridge which allowed us to travel at 40mph all the way over. The easiest drive home from Brookfield we’ve ever had, I think.

The sunshine we’d had in the morning stayed with us well into the afternoon, but later everything dulled down and it felt like the sky was preparing for evening. PoD was a photo of a strawberry flower growing in the garden. I don’t believe it will ever produce fruit that will ripen, but the deep red flower held my interest.

Today’s sketch was Camera. I didn’t try anything fancy, like the camera obscura I was going to draw and instead just drew a fair representation of my A7iii with the kit lens that lives on it these days.
Half of the time I had one eye on the sketch and one eye on the progress of the dancers on Strictly, but, it being Halloween week, the antics of Craig Revel-Horwood and Anton Du Beke as two evil twin sisters really stole the limelight from the other two.

Up and out fairly early tomorrow because I’m booked for my combined Flu and Covid Jags. Oh what fun. At least I get an extra hour in bed because the clocks go back at 2am tomorrow. Scamp had her jags last week.

 

Nearly New Shoes – 23 October 2024

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The weather is just dragging its heels this October. Grey skies seem to be the order of the day. However, it wasn’t really cold and we did what I suggested in yesterday’s blog and went out.

We drove to Rutherglen, to look for a pair of dance shoes for me, but there wasn’t a great selection to choose from and I eventually left the shop empty handed, so did Scamp, which surprised me!

After navigating by following my nose and the occasional glance at the moving map in the car, we did head for home, then decided we’d go local for lunch and drove to Craigend Nursery which also has a big cafe bolted on to it. It’s all glass on two sides and the noise of all the folk talking just rebounds round the room, but we did have a lunch that was a bit overpriced for what it was, just two paninis a tea and a coffee. Oh yes, and the ubiquitous side salad and crisps. Didn’t ask for them, but got them anyway.

It used to be a decent garden centre too, but some of the plant labels were so old, neither of us could read the prices. Maybe that was just as well when we did read some of them. Scamp was shocked at the price for tiny wee Christmas Roses.

Just for fun, we drove home from Craigend by a quite circuitous route to see if we could find where the dance teacher’s new house was. I was amazed at the number of houses that were in a tiny little space that used to be a travellers camp, maybe still is. It gave me a chance to drive round roads I used to cycle on.

Dancing tonight was the amalgamation of parts one and two of the foxtrot we seem to have been learning for months. It wasn’t a great improvement from the last time we learned it. We seemed to spend three quarters of the allotted time re-learning part one, which we now knew, more by muscle memory than anything else. The remaining fifteen minutes were spent on part two and then on joining them together. Only four couples on the floor tonight and they were getting in each other’s way. Just imagine what it would be like if all six couples turned up one night. Carnage, that’s what.

Next week we are going to be treated to Paso La Paz which is fast, fiery and Spanish! That should be fun!

Today’s PoD was taken this morning before we went out and is of the Schoolgirl rose, now fully out and spreading its petals everywhere. Still a beautiful flower.

Today’s prompt was “Rust”. To my mind Rust should be red, orange or brown. If I’d drawing with a black pen, that makes life difficult. What I ended up by doing was changing the prompt to “Rusty”, sketched a whisky glass with a rusty nail and what looks suspiciously like whisky in it. Maybe there is a little spot of Drambuie in there too to make it a Rusty Nail! It’s simple if you just apply some lateral thinking.
Tomorrow’s prompt is Expedition. I’ll need to get my thinking cap on.

Tomorrow I’m hoping to meet Alex at the bus station to get a bus to Edinburgh to see the sights of the exotic Far East!

 

Dancin’ again – 17 October 2024

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After the recent changes to the Tea Dance schedule, we were back on track (allegedly) until next year. I’ll believe it when I see it.

We were off to Glenburn today for the first Tea Dance in a while. It started with a waltz as usual and also, as usual, I couldn’t put a foot right. Eventually I had to admit that I’d lost the waltz completely. Cha-Cha was better and I managed to keep everything working in the proper sequence if not the proper time. Lots of sequence dances in between the ballroom and latin dances and although it was a mixed bag, I think we both enjoyed it. We were sitting with David and Carol again and the conversation was as lively as usual.

After the tea break we started the second half with a waltz … again. I feared the worst, but Scamp suggested we try Kirsty’s Waltz Nioli and it almost worked for the first track, so we stayed up for the second track too and lo and behold it did work. Once through the whole dance and then on to the second round. I’ve a feeling it was muscle memory that was dragging me around, although Scamp’s whispered prompts helped too. I was really pleased with Nioli!

Drove home through heavier traffic than I’d anticipated, but would have got home earlier if I hadn’t gone via Tesco. I got a microwaveable Chicken Biriani for dinner, not noticing that it was a meal for one. Instructions were a bit ropey. They said to pierce the film in a few places and cook for 3min 30sec. Stir halfway through. How can you stir the curry if the film hasn’t been removed? Tell us that Tesco!
We agreed that the curry biriani was actually very good and we’d get it again, but then we’d buy two, one each! We completed the dinner with a baked potato each.

I hadn’t had time to take a photo in the morning and by the time we got home, the light was fading, so it was an inside shot today of a cutting Scamp had taken from a Honeysuckle. It’s sitting in a rectangular glass vase. I’m not sure it will actually take root, but I’m hopeful it will. It got PoD.

The prompt for today was Journal. I think my sketch of a hand writing in a book is reasonably good, sketched with a Lamy Safari fountain pen and a Pentel Sakura brush pen. It fits the prompt without having to twist things around as I usually do.

Tomorrow we’re booked for lunch with June & Ian.

 

Cardigan, Doll and Sketching – 16 October 2024

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Scamp was off to meet Isobel in the morning. Just before she left, she got an “Ur ye in?” text from Hazy, to which she replied “Phone dad. Ahm gaun oot!” Those of you who are englanders might not understand this and I’m not explaining. We had a three way discussion of the week so far, then Scamp was off to drive up to Costa for her meeting with her cousin. Meanwhile, Hazy and I had a discussion of books, new cars and Bake Off. Nice to know we’re on the same footing with Bake Off. Thanks for the recommendations, H.

It was a fairly lengthy phone call, almost an hour by my reckoning and I really enjoyed it. My task for the day was to find my Lamy Safari fountain pens, refill them with black drawing ink and get a sketch done. I actually cleaned and filled the Safari and the ABC child’s pen, although I only used the Safari for today’s prompt which was Grungy, not Grunge as I thought it was. Grungy was much easier for me. Just pick a face from Google that looked lived in and sketch it with a lot of corrections. That did the trick. By the time Scamp had returned, I was done. Fifteen minutes later the sketch was scanned, resized and posted.

After lunch, Scamp parcelled up a cardigan and a woollen doll Isobel had knitted, then I did the addressing of them to Grian and Scamp went off to post them. She’d already posted a couple of cards. One to Allan & Jaki and another to the new Gran & Grandpa.

Later in the afternoon I went for a walk to St Mo’s. On the way I dropped in at Brodens and booked a tab for June, Ian, Scamp and I. St Mo’s was a bit dull by the time I was getting there, but I did manage to get a couple of decent shots from the batch I took. Just leaves showing off their autumn colours. Lazy photography.

Tonight was a simple dinner. We had the last of the Butternut Squash soup from a couple of days ago, then Scamp had home made Ratatouille, “Rats” to us, and I had a veggie chilli which had been maturing nicely in the freezer and was blinding hot once it was reheated!

No dance class tonight. It seemed to be a last minute decision by Kirsty. No reason given. Maybe it was because it was October Week and she thought there wouldn’t be enough folk. We don’t know.

Tomorrow we’re hoping to go to the Tea Dance in Paisley.

Welcome Grian Murdo Macdonald – 9 October 2024

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Allan & Jaki’s wee boy was born last night, 8-10-2024 at 11.21pm, weighing in at 8lb 9oz. Those of a non-imperial persuasion can do their own calculations.

I was meeting Alex for another day in town. Weather could have been kinder to us, but it was dry for most of the day, but it was cold.Scamp kindly gave me a run to the station and I just missed the train! Not to worry, I was early and so was he for once. After coffee in Nero we went for a walk down Buchanan Street and took in this week’s artworks on the Clyde Walkway. From there we walked downstream and continued taking photos on the walkway and The Squiggly Bridge. Official name ‘The Tradeston Bridge’ but real name The Squiggly Bridge.

From there we crossed the river and walked through the mountainous office buildings on the ‘South Side’ before recrossing the Clyde by the King George V bridge. From there we made a series of zig zags until we followed our noses to Paesano for lunch. One Number 5 for Alex with less cheese and one Number 3 as it comes for me. Only non alcoholic drinks for both of us because Alex doesn’t drink and I was driving tonight.

The cold was starting to bite when we came out of Paesano and crossed the road to George Square looking for subjects, but there were very few. Eventually we gave up and went to Costa for a coffee and a heat. Cost I hear you say? Surely Nero? No, it was Alex who was buying and he wanted to go to Costa. Actually the flat white was just like real coffee. I was impressed.

After a heat, we headed back to the bus station, agreed to meet again in two weeks, then went to our respective sides of the bus station where, for the second time today I was just in time to see the X3 disappear round the corner.

Got back home to a plate of ‘Just Soup’ which went down nicely. Then it was time to get ready for tonight’s dance class. This Foxtrot we’re learning is quite tedious. It’s got that ‘manufactured’ feel to it, as if they are trying to cram in a load of different figures into a dance that wasn’t made for them. I can’t really explain it any better, other than to say that when Kirsty is demonstrating each of the two halves that make up the full dance, she demonstrates on the diagonal of the square dance floor. However when we’re dancing it, it’s on the shorter orthogonal, so it’s a bit of a cheat. Also, when we dance round the edge of the floor, everyone can follow the leader, but if we tried to use the diagonal, we’d crash into each other. A bit of mathematical spacial awareness, there. Just believe me, she’s cheating!
Anyway, we did get to do the individual sections and occasionally managed to join them together into a complete dance. Who said dancing is easy?

PoD today was a couple sitting at the ‘Graffiti Gallery’ on the Clyde Walkway with the ‘Blue Man’ keeping his eye on them!

Today’s prompt was ‘Sun’. The old,ancient Derwent Linemaker 0.5 pen came good again and produced the ink linework for this sketch of a man walking into the sunset. It was later augmented with some watercolour, but I think I might have been better leaving it as pure ink. Too late now.

Tomorrow, for once this week, we have no plans!

Off to Spain – 5 October 2024

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Now don’t get excited, we were just outside Paisley, but we were dancing Paso La Paz like Spaniards!

Well, Scamp was dancing it like a Spaniard, I was plodding along in her wake, more like a Spaniel than a Spaniard. It’s the fast and furious Spanish bullfighter’s dance that we started last week. It’s really too fast for me and my old dance shoes. They are struggling to keep up with Rumba One (in joke), far less do the heel stomps and the toe taps and the arm across the chest. I struggled with this last week and this week I think I was worse. Heaven knows how I’ll get on with the full strength Paso Doble the teachers are talking about!

The Paso La Paz was actually the last routine we did. The first one was the Queen of Hearts rumba which was our warm up. It too was a mystery until the second track when muscle memory took over and pushed me in the right direction. It’s been years since we originally learned this sequence dance and that’s my excuse for getting it wrong through most of the first track.

The second dance was the Viennese Waltz. It looks fairly easy when you’re watching it on Strictly, but don’t be fooled there are fast passages in this too. Natural Turns (clockwise) and Reverse Turns (anti-clockwise) plus Half Natural and Half Reverse. By the time we got to the end of the second track I couldn’t remember if I was coming or going.

Next was the Paso La Paz, but you’ve heard all about that already, so I won’t go into it again. We finished off with two tracks of a Midnight Jive which is a simple sequence dance that is extremely exhausting. I think Stewart just chose it out of badness!

We drove home and had a restful afternoon lunch. Couldn’t decide what we were going to have for dinner and eventually settled on a microwaveable curry from M&S washed down with half a bottle of Barossa Ink.

Later we watched tonight’s Strictly and wondered what Toyah Willcox was doing on this show, apart from a bit of self promotion. I don’t know how much she paid to be on the show, but it’s definitely not enough.

Today’s PoD was a branch of Berberis we passed on the way to the shops. Beautiful bright red and orange leaves.

Today’s prompt was Binoculars which is what I drew. These are a pair of Nikon binoculars I got for a song in John Lewis a couple of years ago. Light, bright and with a good magnification they are almost always in my case when we go on holiday.

Tomorrow we may go looking for tree lights to brighten up the Rowan tree in the back garden.

New Tyres – 2 October 2024

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Scamp was out this morning for coffee with Shona. I was left at home.

Another beautiful looking day. Bright sun, but not all that much warmth was getting through. While the coffee drinkers were out, I posted today’s sketch, whose prompt asked for Discover and if you read yesterday’s blog you’ll know that with a ‘Y’ tacked on to the end, Discover became Discovery which was the name of one of the first Space Shuttle orbiters. I seem to remember seeing a plane with a retired Space Shuttle riding piggyback on it flying around Glasgow. It was while I was at Jordanhill and it caused a great stir. Anyway, The Space Shuttle was posted today and I started sketch 3 for Inktober, since I had some peace. The prompt asked for Boots and I gave it a sketch of my solid leather walking boots. Like most of the sketches, it’s not perfect, but looks like a pair of boots. It’s good being able to keep one step ahead of the required sketches. Here is the first sketch. I’m going to rummage through the computer to find today’s!

When Scamp returned, I missed lunch and drove down to Jim Dickson’s to get four new tyres on the blue car. It seemed a shame to wait in the ‘office’ of the garage, so I handed in my keys and went for a walk round The Village. Isobel had told us that a voluntary group was cleaning up the village cemetery and I went to have a look. Thankfully they hadn’t cut all the grass or scrubbed away the moss on the old headstones, but still put their stamp on it, so folk would know that work had been done. From there I walked round the rest of the village and found my way back at the garage to be told that they were almost finished and would I like to settle up? It was exactly what I’d been told yesterday and I was happy to pay for the work done. It’s good to support local business.

Back home with four shiny new tyres, I was ready for a filled roll with cold meat. Then I had time for a quick walk round St Mo’s and got today’s PoD on the way home. A low viewpoint shot of the path to St Mo’s with a bit of warm late afternoon sunshine coming through the trees.

Dinner was paella and it wasn’t my best. It ended up a bit claggy and soggy. My excuse is that it’s ages since the last time I made it.

Just finished dinner and it was time to get ready for Kirsty’s dance class. Again not our best. We are both agreed that the floor is simply too small for four couples to dance in. Also when she’s demonstrating, Kirsty is dancing almost round in a circle, so it’s difficult to visualise how that dance would look on a ballroom floor where it would be danced in a straight line. Both of us lost our tempers during tonight’s class. We must do some prep before next week’s class.

We have no plans for tomorrow, but shopping has been mentioned.

Strictly! – 28 September 2024

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We’re sitting watching a recording of tonight’s Strictly, but this morning we did our own Strictly!

We drove to Brookfield in the morning with me in my usual Saturday morning grumpy “I don’t want to go” mood. The nearer we got to the dance class, the lighter my mood got. Don’t know why. I don’t ask the questions, and I don’t try to answer them. I just go with what my inner ‘Black Monkey’ says.

So today’s dance lesson started with Blue Angel Rumba which was a quite simple and fairly easy sequence dance. Then everything changed and the first dance they wanted us to do was the Viennese Waltz. Lots of turning and lots of simple change of place, but all done in a very strict tempo. Most of it worked for us without thinking, because we were working to carefully choreographed moves. Thankfully we didn’t have to do too many spins, because Scamp didn’t have her sticky out multi-layered petticoat on and I’d forgotten my evening dress and tails. Other than that it was a success.

Next dance was Paso La Paz. Lots of stamping of feet and pretending to hold a beachball between us as we strutted round the floor. We did toe taps and matador stances waving our imaginary capes in front of us. Apparently the foot stamps and the toe taps are to clean the blood and sand from our shoes while we are in the bullring and after the bull has been despatched! Who knew? Neither of these were the Foxtrot or the Four Seasons Waltz we’d been expecting. Interesting though!

A couple of tracks of the Midnight Jive brought us back down to earth again and then it was time to head home again. Actually a really interesting and thought provoking couple of dances. I won’t criticise Strictly again. Well, actually I will, but I’ll be a bit more sympathetic with the poor folk having to learn these dances that look so easy, but are not.

I took the A7 our for a walk later with the Tamron lens for company. There wasn’t much to see but it rained while I was out and I got a chance to see the raindrops beading and dripping from my new rain jacket. PoD turned out to be a robin singing its little heart out from the top of a Hawthorn bush. Quite impressed with the quality.

I came home via the chip shop with a Special Fish Supper (two fish in breadcrumbs and chips). After that we watched the ‘other’ strictly. Not nearly as good or as difficult as our morning dances!

No plans for tomorrow. I wonder if Scamp would notice if I cut a rose, and gripping it securely in my teeth while I stamped my feet, stood with my head back and one arm across my chest and the other behind my back in classic Matador’s stance, as I made breakfast tomorrow morning?