Category: Dancing

Angels, Markets and Parties – 3 October 2015

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comboWe went to Angel to meet JIC and Sim. All organised and planned by Hazy and ND’A (thanks again folks). After a bum steer with a dodgy looking Indian/Mexican dive and finding a tank in the process(!), finally settled on Jamie’s Italian restaurant and had an enjoyable lunch (Italian sausage and pappardelle for me). Then went for a walk around a small market we’d visited before with Hazy. Some strange things for sale there. Numerous stalls selling spoons and fish-knives(‘?’ again) and other things that will not be mentioned for fear of nightmares – just don’t ask! Some beautiful opportunities for photos in the low afternoon light, especially with the 9mm and 20mm lenses. After that JIC and Sim went for their train and we did the same. Scamp was in a bit of a rush to get back to Hazy’s, to make sure we’d be ready for the party. I’d rather have had a wander around Kings Cross, or even better Vauxhall. I really want to have a go at photographing those riverside buildings. They are quite a favourite of mine, but obviously not as good as the one on Ingram Street in Glasgow. We agreed to disagree on timings and I left Vauxhall for another day. I need more practise anyway, to do them justice. Got some more photos of grapes in Hazy and ND’A’s garden. Then it was time for the party.

In the usual D’A style, this was a party not to be missed. Food, drink, dancing, speeches, laughs. These people really know how to enjoy themselves. It took my breath away the first time I met them and seemed too good to be true. It’s not. It’s just the way they are, and they are an object lesson for the rest of us. I admire them in so many ways. Anyway, we all had a great time and although Hazy didn’t stay long, I’m sure she too had a good time. When it was time for the last dance I was so disappointed, I hadn’t noticed the time passing. After we helped clearing up the hall, ND’A drove us home and we had to get ourselves organised for the journey back up the road.

A short trip, but a lot crammed in.

As I said, “… I need more practise anyway, to do them justice.”

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Perth – 16 September 2015

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comboOff to Perth today. Poor weather predicted, but aside from some misty, foggy stuff before we left, it looked good. Arrived in Perth in sunshine too. I’d broken my favourite watch’s strap on Monday and I wasn’t totally happy with the substitute watch I’d found. Last night I searched for and found my old Pulsar which has a metal bracelet, so that’s not going to break very easily. Unfortunately it needed a battery, so on my list of to-dos today was a battery for said watch. Scamp recommended Timpsons for the replacement. I eventually found Timpsons shop in Perth more by dead reckoning than by using my iPhone which couldn’t get a 3G signal in the centre of the town. All the phone companies are busy offering 4G-ready phones. Not much use when there’s not even a 3G mast nearby. Maybe it would be ok in Engaland (sic), but in Scotland it’s a no-no. Anyway, the nice man in Timpsons changed two batteries, yes TWO, one for the digital side and one for the analog apparently. I could say that he did it in double quick time, but that would be a pun too far 🙂 It’s a heavy watch, but at least I can read it without peering at it and the strap won’t come apart very easily. Sorted!

Lunch at Café Tabou was good, but the service, for once, was very poor. If this had been our first time at this restaurant, I don’t think we would have been back. The waitress made the excuse that one of the cooks was off and she hadn’t been able to get a replacement. What she really meant was the check had got missed in the kitchen. It happens. She did give us a discount on the bill which more than made up for the wait. Which reminds me, I had emailed Zizzi head office about the pulled pork pizza with the invisible pulled pork and yesterday I got a £30 voucher and an apology. Squeaky wheel … grease. Next on the list is an email to Vodafone about the service at their Glasgow shop. Maybe I’ll get a free iPhone 6s for my trouble!

Took some photos in Perth round about the bridge over the river and then stopped on the way home I took some more of the corn fields just outside Blackford. The 9mm lens makes beautiful skies.

Salsa at night, but our usual teacher still wasn’t back from his sojourn to Engerland (sic again – and I was). Teacher was dire. Luckily there were too many men and I managed to exempt myself from the proceedings and sat out the first class. Scamp called it a day after that class and we went home. Let’s hope JG is back on Monday.

Painting, Squirrels and Salsa – 14 September 2015

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comboI did get up quite early(ish). Well, before 9.00 anyway. Started an oil painting on a square canvas. I tend to shy away from square photos and paintings. I always think a square shape is quite boring. Not as dynamic as a vertical rectangle (portrait format), nor as relaxed as a horizontal one (landscape). However, I’d seen an interesting oil at the weekend and was impressed with the way it used the square format, so I set to work. I was using water-based oils which might seem a contradiction, but they work well. I like the smell of oil paint and also natural turps, but I know that not all people find it so favourable, so I experimented with the water-based oils and quite liked them. They seem to dry quicker than normal oils, and that’s a pity, because I like the fact that you can work into previous layers and change them. That’s the difference between oils of any variety and acrylic. Acrylic dries quickly, too quickly for me. What I do like acrylic for is the ability to layer washes when using the paint very dilute – as watercolour in fact. Once a wash has dried, you can layer another on top without the fear of one mixing with the other and diluting it. I digress. This one was to be in oils and it’s sort of half finished at present. I’ll take a fresh look tomorrow.

Watched a squirrel trying to steal some peanuts from the bird feeder. Managed to get a few shots of its acrobatics.

Went to the gym in the afternoon and found the pool was full of people. So it was exercise and no relaxation after. Then I went to the solicitors to pay our bill for signing off the house. Ha, the mortgage is only part of the expense in house buying. Hopefully that will be it bought now and properly signed over to us.

Salsa at night and our usual teacher was off galavanting somewhere down south, so we had a mystery teacher. One we’d never had before, although we had seen him dancin’ I mean reeeeely dancin’ at the Christmas ball and were both impressed. We were both impressed with him tonight too. Complicated move that looked oh so simple to start with. Unfortunately, he only stayed for one class. Colin took the other and oh dear, it was “Look how clever I am” and “Let’s just add another bit to this on to make it a bit better.” Then it was “Oh, you’ve almost got it, but you just need to turn a tiny wee bit more …” I don’t mind people making corrections when they are necessary, but when it’s just to allow them to preen, it doesn’t impress me. That’s an hour of my life I won’t get back.

An Asymmetric Day – 6 September 2015

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IMG_2708-Edit- blog--249One of those asymmetric days. The morning was all laid back and lazy after a late night yesterday. The afternoon followed suit with me doing very little except try to get a .bash script to execute so I can pull in WordPress entries into Day One entries. It all seemed easy, but it’s still not solved. May have to contact the writer to see what I’m doing wrong.

That was the easy part of the day. Late afternoon, we went dancing in the now upgraded and almost total darkness of the Garage. Do they think this looks chic? It looks shite to me. However, I expect it saves a packet on lighting. After that it was home to make the dinner – Chicken Curry if you must know. After that we watched a really boring F1 GP from Monza. For once I was glad it was only the highlights. If that was the highlights, I’d hate to see the boring bits! Then dishes needed washing and by that time the little hand on the clock was pointing to the 10 and the big one was pointing to the twelve and I still hadn’t done POD or Flickr or anything that I should have, so here I am at 11.12 finishing the blog.

Good Night

Forty years ago today – 16 August 2015

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Forty years ago today our son was born.  It hardly seems possible that that amount of time has passed.  I remember the day quite well, but remember the previous day, the Friday even better.  Where have all the years gone?  Is it only us old folk who say things like that?

Today, after the obligatory phone calls and singing of “Happy Birthday”, we settled down to enjoy yet another day in the sun.  I was cooking dinner tonight and it was to be chicken curry.  It involved a fair degree of preparation as there was a curry paste to make from onions, garlic, tomato puree and half the herbs and spices in the house.  Tried blitzing the paste in the little hand chopper thingy.  That was too small.  Tried the Magimix (other food processors are available).  It was too big.  Thought I’d found Goldilocks with the liquidiser, but it was too big too and I gave myself a scare watching myself put my hand in to push the mix down while it was plugged in.  Swiftly withdrew my hand and counted all my fingers twice just to be sure.  The liquidiser wasn’t actually running, I hasten to add, but it was still a scary moment.  Finally went back to the little hand chopper thingy, which doesn’t actually chop hands, thankfully. Eventually was satisfied with the texture of the paste and it smelled like it should which was a big bonus.  Tried to bakeDSC_3386- blog--228 some bread and dropped the loaf just as it was going in to the oven.  Baked it anyway into a shrivelled loaf.  DSC_3385- blog--228Said “OK, I’ve had enough” and went outside to take some flowers pictures.  Liked the Gladiolus stem which looked like the Gladius, the Roman sword it’s named after.  Gave in to the pleas of the Violas and took their picture too.

Dancing at the Garage in the late afternoon and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Worked out with Steven and Jess (!) how to do the move ‘Lunes‘ from last week.  That’s not its real name of course, it will change this week I’m sure.

Came home and cooked the curry.  The agreement is that there is too much coconut milk in it, it’s too watery with too little chicken, but otherwise it’s fine.  Oh yes, and the curry paste is a keeper!

Burds – 19 July 2015

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Despite it being colder than normal last night, I was too hot and couldn’t sleep.  So about 4.00am, I got up and had myself some cereal for a very early breakfast then went back to bed.  Even at that early hour, the birds were singing.

Finally woke around 8.30am and made real breakfast (more cereal) for us both.  While I was waiting for my tea to brew, I threw out a couple of stale slices of my lovely homemadeDSC_2969- blog--200 bread, for the birds.  This immediately attracted the corvidae population.  These scavengers are really taking over this year with crows, ravens, jackdaws and the ubiquitous magpies which I detest.  This is the first year I’ve seen so many of them.  They seem to arrive in masses to roost on rooftops all around us and, of course, grab any food that’s going.  I’m thinking of making a cage DSC_2966- blog--200that will cover the bread scraps with a mesh big enough to allow the smaller birds through, but prevent these black rogues from stealing any.  One of them sidled along the fence until it was within snatching distance, or so it thought.  Thankfully, I only have to grab the door handle and they are off on a sortie around the houses before returning for another look.  Actually, I don’t mind them as much as the pigeons.  The crow family are at least wild.  The pigeons live in a pigeon loft a couple of streets away and if left to it, can hoover up a whole loaf in no time.  Big fat rats with wings.  Not the brightest lights on the tree either.  My brother used to shoot them with an air rifle and said it took two or three slugs before they noticed that they were dead!

After the pigeon and crow watch, I restarted my painting, this time with oils.  I just painted on top of the acrylic (which was on top of a watercolour!)  As far as I can remember, you can paint oil on top of acrylic, but not the other way round.  If I get up tomorrow and find that the whole thing has slid down off the easel onto a pile on the floor, I’ll know I’ve got it wrong.  Anyway, I think it looks better and it’s has a much more tactile painting with oils rather than painting with acrylic – it’s like painting with soft butter – a strange analogy, but that’s the way I see it.

Salsa in the Garage tonight and it was really good and very hot.  We surely lost a kg or two at least.  Lots of people from our class there as it is Fair Monday tomorrow and the STUC is closed.  So no salsa classes this week unless we go to help with the beginners on Wednesday.  We’ll see.

Hoping to try out the bike carrier tomorrow if the rain stays away.

The Squeaky Wheel 18 June 2015

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After  a bumpy night heading south from Venice, we had a bit of a swell on the sea this morning, but the sun was out and the sky was quite clear.  We were all at sea and heading for Kotor tomorrow.  In other words, a sea day.  Sea days can be as boring as you want to make them, or they can be interesting.  We sunbathed after breakfast for an hour until it was time to go dancing.  It was Rumba this morning.  We’ve both done rumba before and Scamp keeps reminding me that you have to start on beat two.  I nod my head and make concurring noises, but I’m sure she knows I don’t have a clue what it means.  I just follow her like I do with almost all dances except salsa.  Even there she tries to lead, but if she does, I mess her up by inventing new moves or more likely, new combinations.  Anyway, rumba passed with very few raised voices or harrumphs. Hmm, my spell checker seems to think that harrumph is a word!

The rest of the day was passed, as usual on a sea day with eating, drinking and more rumba.  Scamp went to a piano recital and I went sketching for an hour.  I really enjoyed the freedom of plein air sketching.  Messing around mainly with pen and ink sketches of people on the deck.  I did take some photos around the ship.  Mainly patterns of ropes and rails against the sea.  Scamp wasn’t impressed with the pianist, she said it wasn’t his best hour. 

By the time she got back, and we had a coffee, it was time to get ready for the Captain’s Ball.  That’s just a chance for the sycophants to arse lick with the captain and a chance for him to make a wee speech.  Scamp decided we would start at level 5, have a free G&T there.  Then  move up to level 6 where our restaurant is and have another free G&T there too.  Sounds like a plan to me.  We were just starting our first drink when a voice behind me, a Scottish voice, said “Nice kilt”.  I turned round and here was one of the officers in his dress uniform.  We got talking and he told us he was in charge of reception and he came from Maybole in South Ayrshire.  It’s a place we know well as we used to pass through it when we stayed in Newton Stewart.  He asked if we were having a good time on the ship and Scamp said “yes” and I said “no”.  Then we told him about the noises coming from the restaurant above us in our room.  He immediately said “Do you want another room?  I think we’ve got a couple free.”  We both looked at one another and said “Yes please.  Thank you very much.”  So to cut a long story short, we’re now in a room on deck 5 which is seven decks below where we were and there have been no sightings of elephants so far.  Great guy, and all because of a kilt.  His is Mc Gregor by the way. 

It’s true what they say, the squeaky wheel gets the grease!