Category: DOF

Another day, another walk – 26 May 2020

Posted on by Zogman

Today I thought it was Sunday all day long. No reason why, except for Cabin Fever.

Phoned the bike shop in the morning (once I’d established that it was Tuesday and not Sunday) and got a promise the bike wheel would be finished by the end of the week. I sincerely hope that Big Al was not suffering from the same day-dislodgement that had overcome me.

After lunch we went for a walk more or less the same one as yesterday but in a slightly different direction. By the time we got home the sun was warming the place up nicely and we took the chairs out to the garden Scamp with a Pimms and me with a beer. Read for a while then got a surprise.

The girl next door, Lucy gave us a couple of facemasks she had made for us. We both thought that was very kind of her. They were much simpler than my pattern and much more effective I’d think. Curved to fit the face. She said she’d been making them for her gran and grandpa and thought we might appreciate one each too. Like I said we thought that was good of her, but then I thought, does that make us the old people next door? Scamp said “Yes, probably”. Doesn’t matter I liked the thought and because she’s just finished a fashion design course in London, the stitching was so much better than mine!

Dinner was Sea Bass with Potatoes, Broccoli and Cauliflower. Delicious! Scamp was chef tonight.

PoD went to a photo I took earlier in the day of a winged aphid on a rosebud. Scamp appreciated the detail in the picture, but wants rid of the beasties before they damage her roses.

Today’s topic was ‘A Pasta Dish’. I think by this time the setters were becoming tired with the whole EDiM thing and just throwing words and phrases at the list. This is my response to the prompt. There is a dish and there are two pieces of pasta, but really it’s a vehicle to practise drawing cutlery.

Tomorrow we are booked for an ASDA delivery in the afternoon, so any walks will have to be in the morning.

And what of the day then? – 11 May 2020

Posted on by Zogman

It was to be a busy day. Not hardly a minute to spare.

Can’t say much about it though. It’s all under wraps until 13th May when all will become clear.

Spent part of the morning planning out what today’s sketch would be. The prompt was “Illustrate a Recipe”. I did really try out different ideas, but none of them worked and as the day wore on, the chance of it making it to paper were getting slimmer and slimmer. So slim in fact that it became lost and I’m leaving it until tomorrow to finish (i.e. Start).

Tesco delivery arrived early and it looked as if we were back to our old ways of buying the entire shop. I pitied the poor bloke having to transport all those boxes from van to door on his porters trolley.

I left Scamp to deal with the storing of the mountain of stuff. If I’d tried to put things away, she’d only have gone back later and rearranged everything, so instead I walked over to Condorrat and posted a parcel to West Ewell. Sorry Hazy, it’s not for you, but be warned a small package will be dropping through your letterbox soon, maybe even tomorrow. IT HASN’T GOT YOUR NAME ON IT!!

Walked around St Mo’s a couple of times and took today’s PoD which, probably nobody will like and I agree it’s a bit dull, but I like it. I’m not certain the sepia treatment worked, but I’m trying to get out of the straight macro mode and become a bit more creative. It was a cold day. Allegedly it was just into double figures of degrees C, but when you were in that wind it didn’t feel like that at all. That’s wind chill, though. In the sun and sheltered the wind it was pleasantly warm … if you were wearing a thick hoodie over a thick shirt and a tee shirt it was pleasantly warm.

Not a lot more to say about today. Spent most of the evening trying to remove DRM from one of Scamp’s books without success. I’ll try again tomorrow, maybe once I’ve caught up with the sketching.

And that’s the plan for tomorrow. To catch up, then to fix the DRM.

Sub zero – 10 May 2020

Posted on by Zogman

Temperatures predicted to be below zero tonight and it didn’t feel that much warmer today.

We both did a walk around the garden trying to work out what had gone wrong with the acer which is looking very sorry for itself. Scamp thinks its roots have been too wet and that could be part of the problem, but I think it’s been sitting in the sun too long too. It seems to like the shade. Perhaps it’s a combination of the two. It’s now back in the place it’s been for the last year and has had a change of compost, with more drainage so we’ll keep a watching brief on it for the next wee while. Otherwise, things are progressing well. The cold east wind today was making some of the alliums bob about a bit and we may need to give them a bit more support soon. It was one of allium heads that got PoD.

Under Scamp’s careful tutelage I made a steak pie in the afternoon. It turned out a lot better than I thought it would. Different butcher, slightly different method, but the result was the same, just as good as last time. Even better, there’s enough left over for tomorrow’s dinner.

We needed some potatoes for tonight’s dinner, so I volunteered to go out into the cold and get some. Of course I came back with a lot more than potatoes. That’s the trouble with having to queue for your shopping, you want to make sure you get everything you went for and tend to buy things you didn’t have on your list.

Spoke to JIC tonight and heard how his garden is progressing. It sounds great and I’m sure he’s not exaggerating. His garden is huge compared to ours and I know he spends a lot of time keeping it up to scratch. I don’t think I could expend that amount of energy on a garden, but I’m sure Scamp could.

Sketch for today was a pet or an animal. Damselflies are animals according to some learned people. I took them at their word and painted a blue damselfly. I’m not sure if they, or my artwork is to everyone’s taste, but that’s not the point. It’s the act of painting that it’s all about. Doing something.

I’ve closed down the wee greenhouse tonight, just incase the weather fairies have it right with their -1º in the middle of the night. I’ve got some things to do tomorrow, including cleaning up this computer. It’s running very slowly and needs a good clean out. I think the time for a new OS is getting closer too! Oh yes, and we’re hopefully getting a Tesco order delivered tomorrow as well. A busy day beckons.

Hot Stuff – 4 May 2020

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Up at 4.30am for a cooling glass of OJ.

It did the trick, but it took me ages to get back to sleep again. It was, in the words of the song “Too … Damn … Hot!” I finally broke surface just before 8.30, but still felt tired. We both agreed that we need to change the duvet cover to our cheapo IKEA low tog one. That was one job added to the to-do list.

Scamp was delighted to hear that while we were struggling with heat, the grass was getting a good soaking from the rain. That meant we didn’t have to water the combined weedkiller, mosskiller, lawn feed into the roots of the front grass again. We didn’t bother to spread any on the back grass, because if all the weeds and moss was killed off, there wouldn’t be much else there, except about a dozen blades of grass.

Last night I’d been on the point of removing myself from Every Day in May on Facebook.  Today I did it. EDiM is a private group for sketchers to share and discuss our interpretation of a daily prompt. It’s a great idea and one I’ve taken to in the past couple of years. Unfortunately, a change in Admins has meant a change in the rules. I’m in agreement with some, but felt the need to complain about some that have been slipped in quietly in the dead of night. Now a member can’t post a drawing/sketch in their own page and then link it to EDiM. The Admin gave a somewhat contorted reasoning for this new rule. I disagreed. Today I received a reply to my criticism which basically explained how to post the pic twice, once to my page and then once to EDiM page. Now I know the difference between condensation and condescension and I hate being talked down to. That is why my response was “Wrong Answer.” Left the message a couple of hours to be read by anyone passing by and then left the group. I know the words “Toys” and “Pram” may be in your mind, but I don’t like to be told how to do something the awkward way when there are already routes in the software to do it much more neatly. Too many leaders in that group now, I believe. Too many rules.

We went for a walk, our daily exercise to St Mo’s. When we were walking there, we both spotted a bunch of daisies sprouting from a crack in the mortar of a wall. They became the PoD. Scallywag Daisies.

Scamp was baking today while I was working in the painting room. She made a Banana Cake which we haven’t tasted yet and also a Fruit Loaf which was very nice, especially spread with butter and with a cup of tea to wash it down. Tomorrow, hopefully we will get to taste the Banana Cake.

That was about it for the day. The rain cleared up halfway through the morning and the sun shone which was probably what enticed us out to St Mo’s. Weather seems set to improve in the next few days, but tales from the weather fairies of “Wintry Showers!!!” at the weekend. I don’t like the sound of that!

May need to go out for milk tomorrow, but just down to the local shops.

Oh, yes, and May The Fourth Be With You.

Another beautiful day in the sun – 11 April 2020

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Woke to grey skies and the threat of rain, but then the sun came out.

Lunch today was a reheat of yesterday’s Saag Aloo toned down a bit with some extra cream and a little water to reduce the effect of the salt and also to cool the chilli! Like most curries, it improved with age.

We needed milk today and it was my turn to go for the messages. I thought I could link it in with a walk in the park, but then decided it would be better for my step count if I did two separate walks. First one was to M&S for the essentials: Milk, cheese and tomatoes. Dumped the messages in the kitchen and took my camera for a walk in St Mo’s.

Beautiful day, bright sunshine and warm if you were out of the wind, which I made sure I was for most of the walk. Definitely saw few hoverflies and another couple of peacock butterflies. Didn’t get many photos, the spotted a couple walking along the boardwalk and grabbed the shot. I liked the way it was framed. Back home, Scamp was going out to sit in the back garden, so I joined her with a glass each of red wine. It was comfortably warm with just a little cooling breeze blowing in from the west, but the temperature was certainly high teens. It’s going to be much cooler (colder!) tomorrow with the wind swinging to the north. We stayed in the garden discussing possible rearrangements of plants and planting. Took a few shots of one of Scamp’s Christmas Rose plants. I used the Nikon with the 105mm macro lens and it did a really good job of the close up. That became PoD. Did a bit of gentle pruning and retired to the house when the sun went down. Take the chance of a seat in the sun while you can.

Scamp had found a YouTube channel with a full length stage version of JC Superstar filmed in Manchester arena. That was tonight’s entertainment. Very good interpretation of one of our favourite films. We’d actually intended watching the DVD of the film tomorrow night. Maybe we still will, or we may leave it until Monday.

It looks like the weather’s changing overnight, so we may not be sunning ourselves tomorrow!

The day that never really began – 2 April 2020

Posted on by Zogman

Some days are full of things to do some are not. Today was in the latter group.

It was a cold day with strong winds in the morning and early afternoon. It didn’t lend itself to gardening or to photography, so Scamp resorted to dusting the bedroom furniture. I started tidying up the back bedroom, but soon tired of that. Spoke to Colin on the phone and found that he didn’t do “the what’s appy thing” so I didn’t go as far as trying to talk him through Zoom™. Did find out that his son-in-law is volunteering to deliver folk’s Click and Collect groceries in the surrounding villages. We agreed this was a very useful task, but only if you can actually get a C&C slot. The problem seems to be people block booking slots and the supermarkets are unable (or unwilling) to do anything about it. Still, an admirable use of time and labour.

After lunch, Scamp wanted a loaf, so I offered to make one, rather than wait in a long queue to get one loaf and feel foolish, having waited all that time with just a loaf to show for it. I knew I’d end up buying a basket of stuff we didn’t need. We have loads of flour, some of it getting close to its Use By date, so this was an ideal way to do something useful with it. Made the dough and left it to prove then went out for a walk just in case there was anything interesting out in the Coronavirus world, because although there were scattered clouds, the wind had died down. I did get a few pictures of some dogwood branches with the buds just opened and the leaves caught in the transmitted light of centre-jour (backlighting). Interesting, but not brilliant. It was only when I got home I saw a wee daisy just starting to shut down for the night because the sun was dipping down behind some houses. That became PoD.

Scamp made a lovely Chicken Stir Fry for dinner. No sticky chilli sauce, just veg, rice, chicken and a great deal of skill. A little soy sauce just as extra seasoning and it was perfect.

We had a dance practise tonight. Foxtrot, Quickstep and New Waltz with some jive routines we hadn’t practised in too long a time. Really enjoyed it. Sometimes it’s the practise at home that burns the routines into your memory. At least it’s that way for me. I won’t claim that I got it all right, but the majority of it worked … eventually. Before that we joined a straggling few at 8pm to clap for the NHS. Not nearly as many as last week.

Watched the national news tonight and oh my they are so depressing. Such a difference from the Scottish news who are quite upbeat by comparison. Scamp thinks it’s because the geography is so different in Scotland in that we have a lot of open space around us, unlike London where everyone lives in each other’s pockets. Whatever way it finally turns out, we can only look after ourselves and try our best to keep healthy.

Tomorrow, getting colder according to the weather folk. Maybe even snow.  Probably stay in and eat the bread I made.

The man who worked in the garden – 29 March 2020

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Today I became that man, the man who worked in the garden.

I didn’t do it for very long, you understand, just long enough that it was noted, and I wasn’t alone. Scamp was making sure I didn’t do anything stupid, like dig up any of her plants. I dug up two leeks for her to put into soup, gently forked over that area of the raised bed and planted some Ambassador peas in their place. After that I hoed over the remainder of the bed to break up the soil and displace the weeds that were beginning to show themselves. It looked a lot better with the soil broken up a bit, so I then turned my attention to the flower bed beneath the window and broke up the soil there too with the hoe. I’d forgotten how satisfying it was to use a dutch hoe to get rid of weeds and to aerate the soil. While I was there, I cleared out a few pots from the greenhouse leaving more space for the pots with actual plants in them, not just weeds. Scamp was busy planting pansies in a long trough that hangs on the fence. With that all done, I felt I’d actually done something in the garden for a change. It was a cold day, although the sun was warm. We don’t get much sun in the back garden and today was worse with a north wind blowing right into it. We adjourned for lunch.

After lunch I went for a walk over to St Mo’s. Scamp encouraged me to go, but stayed inside herself. I think she needs just as much ’me time’, as I do. St Mo’s wasn’t too busy today, I think that north wind again kept people inside, using the ‘self isolating’ excuse reason to stay warm. There wasn’t much to see, but I did get a chance to take a three frames focus stack of a fly basking in the sun with the hedge sheltering it from that wind. Other than that, there wasn’t much to recommend it today, so the fly grabbed the PoD. Still can’t find those bracket fungi with the oyster shell pattern.

After dinner I slapped more oil paint on the acrylic underpainting and have now just the tree to add. I say “just the tree”, but it’s not as simple as that. Trees are difficult for me and as this is the focal point of the painting, It has to be reasonable accurate. A bit of practise needed tomorrow before I take the plunge. The lack of a ‘CTRL Z’ button really is an oversight on the part of the people who design paint brushes.

Other than practising painting trees, we have no other plans for tomorrow. Maybe a walk if the weather is decent? Maybe dancing practise if it’s not? Who knows.

“The man who worked in the garden” was the unseen gardener in Bill & Ben the Flowerpot Men. Just incase you didn’t know.

Breaking the rules – 25 March 2020

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We walked to the shops today, but I broke the rules by going out for a second walk later! Rebel!

We didn’t need much at the shops, which was just as well really. Like Sim has been complaining, no flour to be had anywhere, and of course, no toilet rolls. Well, not at the new shops anyway. They did have milk and they did have pancakes. They also had salt which has been in short supply too, so we got all three. That was about it. Walked back through very fine rain. That terrible wetting rain that just soaks you without you noticing it. It wasn’t cold though, the weather machine said it was over 12ºc for a while, so I gave my big Bergy jacket a rest and took my rainy coat instead. Much more comfortable and a lot lighter than the Bergy with all my odds and ends in the pockets. While we were at the shops, I saw a VW Campervan with two surf boards on top! I kid you not. Where were they off to I wondered? Maybe Tiree to catch some wild waves, or maybe just driving around looking cool.

I made a sort of pizza for lunch. It was the remains of yesterday’s flat bread dough, with some fresh flour, yeast, salt and water added. I think Scamp was right, I should just have made a proper pizza and been done with it. As it turned out, it wasn’t all that great. A bit doughy in places, but excellent in others. Baked it in the microwave using convection oven setting for about 12minutes at 220ºc. I’ve written that so I will remember it the next time I want to make a pizza in the microwave. I might not remember it, but I’ll know where to look to find it. That’s one thing Google has taught me.

After lunch I got itchy feet again and went out looking for something interesting. Yes, I know you’re only supposed to be out ONCE a day for a walk, run, jog or cycle, but I’m a rebel and I was going to tear up the rule book and put it in the bin. I wasn’t going to throw it away, I’m not that much of a rebel. I found a use for all that rain, it gave me a chance to capture today’s PoD. Just a little grass stem holding all those raindrops on its hairy surface. It would only work with that fine rain we’d been having. Heavy rain would have wetted the surface and prevented the surface tension on the raindrop from forming a shield for the enclosed water.
Then when I was coming back, I spotted a little ladybird, the first I’ve seen this year nestling under the cover of a leaf and spotted with raindrops too. Two good subject in one day.

We did a bit of a dance practise later in the afternoon. Waltz Nº1, Waltz Nº2, Quickstep and Foxtrot. Not all perfect, but adequate, considering that this is the first practise of the Isolation. Possibly Jive tomorrow.

No real plans for tomorrow, so if you’re reading this Boris, I don’t expect to be breaking the rules tomorrow. I’ll be a good little prole and not go for more than one walk.

Happy Birthday, Birthday Girl – 24 March 2020

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Today is Scamp’s birthday, but because of Covid 19 we stayed at home.

Breakfast in bed for her, and for me. Actually that’s nothing unusual for us. One thing that retirement has taught me is that there’s no need to rush anymore. If it needs done, it will get done. If it didn’t get done, then it wasn’t needing done in the first place. After Scamp opened her parcels and almost choked at the antics of her ‘Dancing Cat’, we both finished the chapters of the books we were reading and got on with the day.

I sewed a torn seam on two of my shirt pockets, caused by stuffing my phone and my glasses in there. After finishing one shirt and starting another I promptly lost the needle and panicked because a lost needle can be a really dangerous thing in a house. You’ve heard the expression “Turned the house upside down” when looking for something? We turned the three seater sofa upside down … and then shook it, but no needle. We hoovered, we tentatively searched between the cushions. Finally, I went upstairs to carefully strip off all the clothes I was wearing to see if the needle had become lodged in them, and that’s when Scamp shouted that she’d found it. It was still tacked into the shirt I had finished repairing. We’d both looked and looked at that shirt without finding it, but there it was. Thank goodness.

By then it was coffee time and after calming down and some discussion we chose to stay at home today. Nobody, but nobody was moving their cars out. Maybe we stayed at home, but that didn’t mean we didn’t go out. Scamp planted out her two boxes of pansies in the front garden. She also did a bit of weeding and some feeding of her plants. She did a bit more pruning of bushes and plants in the back garden too.

<Technospeak>
I must admit I was tempted to go out for a walk, but I thought I’d better obey Boris’s Rules and stay home. So I took the Benbo out to the garden and set up the E-M1 and macro lens on it, turned on ‘focus stacking’ and took some 15 shots of a crocus flower. The focus stacking allows you to take a rapid number of shots, all at slightly incasing focus distances. My aim was to get a set of shots with focus settings from the very front of the nearest petal to the furthest back petal. Eventually I worked out it should be about 9 shots, not 15. Focus stacking works best with a totally still subject, and just as I pressed the shutter button each time, a tiny wee breeze would blow and start to make the crocus nod its head. I finally got the sequence I wanted without the breeze and could pack up and go inside. There I squirted the shots into the piece of software that does the magic and merges the 9 shots into one. The result you see here is what it looks like. It was done using Affinity Photo. Thanks again Hazy!
</Technospeak>

I became so engrossed in this process I forgot that I was making dinner tonight. Carrot & Lentil Curry. A long time favourite of ours. Got it made and left it to keep warm just in time to go and speak to Hazy, Neil-D, JIC, Sim and Vixen. We didn’t actually speak to Tilly and Penny, but we knew they were there too. All through the magic of Zoom™. We were very impressed with the software. Scamp was desperate to show off the Dancing Cat. I think Hazy & Neil-D thought it was funny. JIC & Sim not so much. I could just see JIC mouthing “What the hell is that” or something similar. It didn’t matter, the main thing is Scamp thought it was brilliant!

That was a good day. Curry was good. Flat bread was better and even better still was the orange and rhubarb jelly, which was superb! Best of all was the look on Scamp’s face when the Dancing Cat started his routine this morning!!

Tomorrow? Possibly more of the same, but without Zoom™.

One Week In – 23 March 2020

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That’s us one week in to Self Isolation and we’re not at each other’s throats yet!

Today Scamp went out in the morning to walk to the shops to get some essentials, real essentials this time, no gin was purchased. I stayed home and removed certain articles that had been secreted in the hidden compartment of the Juke’s boot. I had been beginning to sweat about how I’d get them into the house without prying eyes catching me. It was a strange Monday. No Gems and no dancing. However, that’s one down and only eleven to go.

We decided not to go out walking together today. Scamp did a bit of gardening. I messed around with Affinity Designer which is a vector graphics app from Serif. It’s a bit like Corel Draw for beginners. Fairly easy to use, but powerful enough to be useful. I’ve got it on 90 day trial. We used to use some of their software in school, but it was always crashing and the kids got exasperated with it. Eventually NLC bought us a fairly up to date version of Corel Draw and we forgot about Serif. They (Serif) were a bit of a pest, they used to phone you up every couple of months wanting you to but more stuff. They didn’t seem to realise just how tight a technical department budget was. Anyway, I quite enjoyed making raised, sunk, fielded panels. Don’t ask, believe me it’ll bore the pants off you.

I went out for a walk in the afternoon to see if there was anything worthwhile to photograph. The best I got, and therefore PoD was a shot of daffodils on the banking of the M80 slip road. I don’t suppose I should have been there, but I got the shot and only one car blasted me with its horn. I don’t think it was the polis! Also got a nice wee shot of some fungi that looked like oyster shells, they even appeared to have a pearl at the centre. It was actually a pebble!  While I was out I saw a bee!  We’d seen one in the garden at the weekend, but this is surely proof that spring is on  the way!

Scamp showed me how to make Portobello mushrooms stuffed with cheese and wrapped in Parma ham. Delicious. I made Lemonade Scones which I thought were going to be underbaked in the middle, but they were perfect, at least the one we shared was.

Tomorrow, Scamp’s big day, we’d intended going to The Kelpies, but I fear the car parks there will be closed and the horses will be off limits too. It’s such a shame that this plague has hit us at the time of both our birthdays. However, we’re both still here and plodding on. We’ll find somewhere to go with a flask and a box of ‘pieces’.