Category: Flowers

Looking for mythical creatures – 16 February 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was out in the morning to get her hair cut. I was left in charge of the house.

When she returned looking glamorous we discussed what to do with the remainder of the day. We discussed various options and came up empty handed. Finally, after a long wait I suggested we go shopping in Lidl in Kilsyth. My ulterior motive (there is always one) was that I’d heard tell of a kingfisher frequenting the Garrel Burn.

So after we’d bought our shopping we took a walk through Kilsyth and followed the burn all the way to the main road without seeing any life in the burn whether fish or feathered. We walked back to the car by a different route and found a tributary to the Garrel, but it didn’t look as if there was any activity in it either. I’m not sure if the story of the kingfisher is a myth or not, but I’ll give it another chance some time, maybe going downstream as well as upstream this time.

I did get one decent photo on our walk. Looking through a circular hole in the cast iron bridge over the burn to look upstream through the trees. I just liked the frame the circle made for the burn. That became PoD.

On the way back to the car we discovered the fresh fish shop we used to visit in Kilsyth. Scamp was impressed with quality of the fish and bought a piece of salmon for tomorrow’s dinner. I’d already selected a thick slice of rump steak for mine from Lidl.

We drove home and found a nearly empty car park and had our choice of parking places for once.

Today’s prompt was “Violet”.
I chose to paint some African Violets, at one time my favourite flower. They used to be seen in garden centres all around the country, but now they seem to have fallen out of favour. One of the easiest plants to propagate from cuttings, I may go looking for some once the cold weather has gone.

That was about it for the day. Dinner was the remains of yesterday’s chicken which for some reason disagreed with Scamps teeth and a very old filling came out. It had to happen late on a Friday when the dentist isn’t open at weekends. I think it might be something soft and easily chewed for breakfast tomorrow, maybe porridge!

It appears that the dancing teachers have returned and so have the classes, starting tomorrow.

Out to lunch – 14 February 2024

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But a case of the Curate’s Egg

Today Scamp mentioned that she would like to visit a new garden centre called Homegrown. We’d nothing better to do, so we drove over to Gartcosh to see what it was like.

We found it easily enough, just a few minutes off the M73. It was a new-build rectangular block. We went straight upstairs to the restaurant and were one of the last to get a table. All the other tables were already reserved, but didn’t have any notice on them to say they were not free. We both settled on the soup, Leek & Potato, and chose to have coffee afterwards. The soup was fine, lots of flavour, but apart from the obvious L&P I couldn’t quite put my finger on the other ingredients. When we finished and the waitress was taking away the plate I asked what was in the soup and that’s when things started to go wrong. The waitress just couldn’t answer my question and mumbled “Well, leeks and potatoes … “ Scamp leapt to her aid by suggesting “Celery?” She agreed that “there was celery in it and onions…”

In the end I gave up and we both ordered coffee and a scone. When mine arrived it was absolutely roasting. Just one notch down from glowing red hot. Worse, it was brick hard (probably a fire brick.) The final flaw was that it was baked onto the black serviette it was sitting on, I had to tear the thing off. Scamp said her’s was fine, but a bit hard. When a second waitress came to take away our plates, Scamp mentioned the problem with the scones. The waitress made a few noises, but seemed unable to string the noises into a coherent sentence. We paid and left to see what treats the shop and plants had in store for us.

The answer was “Not Much”. It seemed a bit of a shambles. Shopping trolleys filled with cushions were being wheeled about in quite a tight space and shelves were being re-stacked in the shop area. Some lovely pieces were on display for ‘lovely’ prices. The outside plants area was the same. Lots of workers with wheelbarrows bring in raw materials and the sound of a Stihl saw cutting through sheet steel. Almost everything was overpriced compared to the garden centres we’re used to visiting.  The overall impression was of a work in progress.

Would I visit again? Well, today could just have been a bad day, but there was definitely a feeling of style over substance here. Also, people were being turned away from the restaurant because tables had been pre-booked. That is fine if there is a card on the table to say ‘Reserved’, but there wasn’t. They company might also think of investing in buzzers to hand to potential customers if they want to keep them onside. I’m usually happy to give a company a second chance, but I’m not sure I would for this one.

We drove home. I’d managed to get a couple of grey photos of a grey landscape on a grey day. I turned one of them into a sepia toned monochrome image that would become PoD.

Next task was to get sketches and paintings done for today and yesterday in EDiF.
Yesterday’s prompt was Lime, so being cantankerous, I made it Limes. After a couple of aborted attempts at using salt to give me the texture I was looking for in the lime’s skin, I eventually searched on YouTube and found the answer. I learned that the best way is not to remove the paint using salt, but to add the texture with a fine brush and a stippling action. Lo and behold, the additive method works. I’m done now with limes. I’ll keep them and the salt for Margaritas!

Today’s prompt was for “Rose”. This might have had something to do with today’s date, 14th February is traditionally Valentine’s Day. To me it was just a chance to sketch and paint a rose, more or less freehand with very little pencil sketching. I did it in what an art teacher once called my ‘splashy style’ totally the opposite of yesterday’s ‘Lime’ which was quite tight and calculated. Strangely I enjoyed both techniques.

Tomorrow looks a bit like today as far as the weather is concerned. I’m not sure where we will be going yet, if anywhere.

We did lunch – 9 February 2024

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Just an ordinary lunch in Brodens. It was that sort of day. A day for good filling food and a glass of something to wash it down.

I admit that I suggested it because it was Friday and for no other good reason. Also, Scamp had raved about the Fish ’n’ Chips in what used to be The Masonic Arms in Condorrat and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Well, the fuss was all about the slab of Peterhead Haddock in Breadcrumbs served with hand cut skin-on chips and the Breadcrumbs have a capital ‘B’ because they just made the fish great in both our opinions. It didn’t quite knock their Steak Pie off the number one pedestal, but it came very close. The lunch of champions.

The weather was awful. A bitter east wind driving rain that was horizontal at times with no letup all day long. Now at about 11.30pm the rain is tapering off a bit and the wind isn’t howling as much, but it’s still pretty cold.

I did some renovation work on yesterday’s project, but I think I may have to do a ‘Ribbit’ to quote Hazy and rip it all out and start again. Pity, it looked quite good, but it just didn’t work.

Today’s prompt was Charcoal. I hate charcoal. The only time I’ve used charcoal sticks is on an evening class on portraiture in college at the town centre. I found these fragile bits of burnt twig too messy to work with and spent more time cleaning up the paper than putting charcoal on paper. I still have the box you see here with about five of the original twelve sticks and a lot of charcoal chips. Charcoal isn’t for me (and neither was portraiture), so I’ll draw a rather grainy smudged line under it and say no more.

We watched an uninspiring episode of Death in Paradise that had an over complicated plot line and the usual almost ready to retire actors, making a few bob. That is one of the things that keep us watching. “Who is that?” and “What was she in?” Today’s guest appearance was Sean Maguire who was ‘Teggs’ Ratcliffe in Grange Hill from 1978 to 2008. A couple of my readers may remember him. Allegedly he was also in Eastenders, but we never watch is so we can’t verify that.

Basically that was it. PoD was a photo of a bunch of pink carnations with a very old joke tagged on to them. When we were walking back from Brodens I made the conscious decision not to go out for a walk in St Mo’s. I may be daft, but I’m not stupid. Neither did I want to catch a cold from the rain and that vicious east wind. I think I’m with Vixen in the avoidance of bad weather brigade.

Tomorrow looks better say the weather fairies. Not sure I believe them yet. We’ll wait and see.

Dull and wet but dancin’ inside

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Today was a day for driving to Glenburn and dancing for a couple of hours.

For the second time in a row, we drove to Glenburn, just outside Paisley and danced almost everything the threw at us. We both made a mess of some of it, but there was a quiet confidence to us that wasn’t there before. I don’t know exactly what was happening, but I’ve a curious feeling that I was leading for a while! Usually I rely on Scamp to tell me what comes next, but for some of the dances, I knew what came after what. It’s hard to explain, but there was definitely a difference to our dancing.

The afternoon started with a waltz and that led on to cha-cha and then an interspersing of ballroom or latin with a sequence dance. I’ve complained here in the past about Stewart’s plan to have, let’s call it formal dancing, in the first half and sequence in the second half. I don’t think that works well for everyone, but the mixing he and Jane were doing today seemed to encourage everyone to get on the floor more often. We covered usual trilogy of waltz, cha-cha and quickstep with lots of sequence dances. We even attempted a Gay Gordons as well, but stayed well clear of the Canadian Barn Dance, the music for which seemed never ending. It was good to see that folk were taking to heart Stewart’s recommendation to wear something tartan for Burns Night. He even ‘accidentally’ played Donald Where’s Yer Troosers because he said I liked it! Cheeky get!

The two hours went quickly and then it was time to go home, have a cup of tea and a biscuit before getting ready to drive Scamp up to The Link to get her Shingles jag. That didn’t take long. Probably about 15 minutes maximum, then we were heading home again for Haggis Neeps and Tatties. Standard fare for a Burns Night. I don’t know why we call turnips ‘Neeps’. Burns was born and bred in Ayrshire, but Neeps is a north east coast word. How did it get inveigled into Ayrshire dialect? I blame the Aberdonians. Or better still, I blame Boris who was a bit of a turnip heid!

With the traditional Burns Supper meal and a wee dram to toast it, the excitement for the day was all but over. Today’s PoD was a photo of a bouquet of cut flowers, well, it was a Thursday. The flowers weren’t “arranged tastefully, in a vase” as D.P. Gumby used to demonstrate on Monty Python, but laid down on the kitchen worktop, but the little light that filtered in through the clouds lit them perfectly.

Tomorrow we may drive somewhere for lunch or we may walk somewhere local for it instead. As usual, it depends on the weather.

Another cold one – 17 January 2024

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Temperature this morning was -7ºc when breakfast was being served – in bed.

I downloaded a To Do app last week and am beginning to use it. I had three tasks for today and took great delight in ticking them off one by one. I even added another couple to the list and ticked them off. How long it will last, I don’t know. Probably until they start asking me for a subscription and start removing parts of it or adding adverts. That’s when it will get the heave.

The first task was to post my calendars to some folk. I actually really like the photo on the front page, but it’s more than halfway through the first month and the poor folk will only get this one for half the time it deserves. Unless, of course, they get crafty with a pair of scissors! I’m not saying what the picture is, but it’s not alcoholic, that’s all I’m telling you. I only did five this year. One for me one for Alex and one each for three lucky people. I strengthened the calendars with some corrugated cardboard, so they should arrive intact. I also spent ages working out how to mail merge my database of “Where Was It Took in 2023” into a Word document, eventually giving up and using first Scamp’s computer and then my old Tosh to do the job. Mickeysoft make some clever office apps, but they don’t give a toss about whether they work on a Mac or not. Anyway, I digress – as usual. At least one of you recipients didn’t get a copy of WWIT2023, so if it’s you and you really want to find out what was taken where, email me and I’ll send you a PDF of the script.

I walked over to Condorrat and posted all three off to their recipients. Then walked down to St Mo’s with the shiny new lens on the A7iii and let it take some photos for me. I think it was 35 photos in total today and about 5 of them ended on the cutting room floor. Not bad odds. Everywhere was white. Not snow, just frost. Best of a bad lot was one of a St John’s Wort flower well covered in frost. Despite being well wrapped up, I was beginning to feel the cold on my face and any other bits of exposed flesh, like my hands. I did have a pair of cycling gloves with me, but they are a bit cumbersome to wear when you’re operating a camera. I was glad to get in to the warm house and heat up some soup for lunch. Scamp was away to a birthday bash at Castlecary Hotel, so she wouldn’t be needing any, I thought.

Next task was to order some coffee. I still get it from The Bean Shop in Perth and get it delivered to me. It’s the sensible way to get it. £3 for DPD to deliver it and about twice that in petrol costs to drive there and buy it. DPD are pretty good at delivering it within the one hour time slot they state. I also ordered a new UV filter for the new lens. The old one I had was ages old and showing its age with a handful of scratches. However it was protecting the lens for now at least.

As it turned out, Scamp’s lunch date hadn’t been all that good. Two of the group, Scamp included weren’t impressed with the quality of the food which is a a pity as it was always a good restaurant. But, as we know, things change.
So it was Mince ’n’ Tatties for my dinner, cooked by my good self and Fish Fingers ’n’ Tatties for Scamp.

We watched the weather report on BBC and tomorrow looks just as cold as today, if not colder. I’m booked to meet Alex in Glasgow. We were going to go to Paisley, but if the weather is so bad, we may, at Scamp’s suggestion, take the subway up to Kelvinbridge and have lunch in the Paesano there, then spend the afternoon in the warmth of the Botanic Gardens greenhouses!

 

 

 

 

Freezin’ – 7 January 2024

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It really was freezing. Freezing fog. Temp just below zero.

Just to check it out I took out the rubbish, slipped on the icy step and landed with a bump, knocking over the bin in the process. I don’t do it every day, but occasionally I do try to get a bit of gymnastic practise in and this seemed like a good time to do it. Thankfully it was foggy, so nobody was about to see my wee slide. Then I went round the garden in baby steps picking up all the fallen cardboard and yoghurt tubs. I think Scamp got a bigger fright than me!

Back inside I grabbed a camera and gingerly walked out into the back garden to grab a photo of what were our sunflowers with trails of frosted ice crystals hanging on them. It wasn’t a day for hanging around, so I equally gingerly made my way back inside again to the nice, warm, safe kitchen.

If you read yesterday’s blog (published today), you will have read that last night I gave up on trying to fix the botched attempt at clearing up the mess of the Lightroom catalog. Well, I did sleep on it, and somewhere in the restless night, I came up with a plan. Why build a new catalog when you can just adapt the one you’ve used for a year. There must be a way of changing the name from 2023 to 2024. There was and it was a Scottish lady who explained the intricacies of the renaming in a YouTube video. It was really simple, but also convoluted, with some parts being done while Lightroom was active and others when it was shut down. Long story short, it worked. So now it looks like I have an operating catalog for 2024. However, I’ll know better tomorrow.

Dinner tonight was the opposite of last Sunday’s three course meal and was lentil soup with apple pie and custard for dessert.

Spoke to Jamie later and heard about aquaplaning cars and flooded fields and roads. However he says it’s not too cold in the house and the builders start again this week. So work is progressing.

The frosted sunflower stalks with their necklace of ice crystals were PoD.

I think we will have to go out tomorrow to get some much needed supplies. Just simple stuff like bread and milk. No alcohol was mentioned!

Dentist – 20 December 2023

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Today I had an appointment with the dentist and Scamp had a lunch appointment with the other Witches.

My appointment with the dentist was in the morning. The easy part of it was the replacement of a filling that was coming loose, but I wanted her opinion on the big tusk at the back of my mouth that was giving me toothache. She checked it by tapping it with her scraper tool and also by scooting cold water on it and it passed the tests. Just to be sure she did an X-Ray and it came up clean, no sign of an abscess. Scamp thought it was the Edinburgh rock I’m addicted to and that a bit of sugar from it had got into the tooth. The dentist said Scamp is probably right, because teeth are porous (didn’t know that) and the sugar could pass through and cause the pain if it reached the nerve. She put some varnish on it and set it with an ultra-violet light thing. I’ll keep a watchful eye on it for a few days until I forget and go looking for that bag of Edinburgh rock again!

The filling was easily removed and replaced with a shiny new one that I’m hoping to keep for a while and not go poking at. It seem that the NHS are now recommending annual dental checks, not biannual as they were last time I had one. It’s just a cost saving exercise, I know, but at least Scamp and I are on the NHS list, rather than paying the full price as a lot of folk are.

By the time I got home, Scamp was ready to get a lift from Jeanette to Calders where they had a table booked. I had a couple of hours to myself, so I added another wash to the painting I’d been doing. What I SHOULD have done was check what that wash was supposed to do. That way I might have avoided the mess that resulted from adding paint where it shouldn’t go. Not to worry, it was a first attempt and I learned something. I think I now know what I’m meant to do with this second stage, so I might try again tomorrow on a clean sheet.

I decided lunch was on the menu and today it was going to he a Larky favourite of an egg poached in mince. Sounds disgusting? Try it before you condemn it. It’s delicious, especially served on buttered bread.

I thought I’d just enough time for a walk round St Mo’s pond before I lost the light entirely and that was how it turned out. Today’s PoD was a fairly close-up shot of a St John’s Wort plant that’s been growing quite happily through the summer, the rain of autumn and the frost and snow of early winter. I’m surprised that those big flat green leaves didn’t collapse under the weight of the snow last month, but there it is with them and the flowers still intact.

Walked back and hadn’t even taken my boots off when Scamp arrived in Annette’s car. Spoke to Annette about her fairly new hybrid Toyota and she told me she wasn’t impressed with it. Mpg is good, but not brilliant and it’s a bit sluggish on hills. However, we agreed on one thing. It’s much better than the Juke she had before. I think we’ll keep to the Micra for the foreseeable future.

I was just heading out to post the last two Christmas cards and I suggested I might bring back a fish supper for dinner. Scamp agree and that’s what we had. A lazy dinner for a change.

Tomorrow we’re intending to go to the last tea dance of the year. Let’s hope Storm Pia isn’t as bad as predicted.

 

 

I think the sun is on strike – 17 December 2023

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As you’ve probably guessed, today was another sunless day, and it rained all day too.

We both read for a while in the morning and the early afternoon too.

After lunch I started planning dinner, which was Carrot and Lentil Curry. It’s ages since I made it and I had to look up the recipe to make sure I was doing it right. I was, but grating two big carrots doesn’t half make your arm ache. I was contemplating transferring my Fitbit watch to my right arm so I would get the benefit of some extra steps, because it didn’t seem like I was going to get many outside steps today.

Once the curry was on the go and simmering gently, I started looking around for a photo. I tried some photos of the Christmas Roses at the back door, but they were battered by the wind and rain and not looking at their best. The plants in the hanging basket were a possibility, but they needed some focal point. Then I found a Lego Minifig of a weeman in a gorilla suit and that’s where today’s PoD came from. It’s entitled “In the jungle …”

The curry wasn’t really all that spicy, but we didn’t have much garam masala, probably not enough to add the authentic taste. However, it was warm and there was rice and flat bread to fill it out. More for tomorrow and maybe even the next day.

Spoke to Jamie later in the evening and heard about a surprise visit from the previous house owner’s son who was just passing. Probably been asked by his dad to go and have a wee look at what they were doing in the plastic wrapped house. Also, it seems that they might not need to have their wall taken down after all. That will make less of a dent in their expenses.

Not a lot else happened today, but what can you do when it’s windy, wet and sunless. Well, you could moan about it, but nobody would listen.

Finally got round to writing most of my Christmas cards and with a bit of luck I’ll get them finished tomorrow.

Scamp and I are booked for coffee with Isobel tomorrow. More gossip for the ladies and coffee for me!

 

Back to dull again – 12 December 2023

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One good day and then back to dull grey skies and rain. Scotland the Grim.

Scamp was going out to meet June and Shona. I reckoned I would be surplus to requirements, so I left them to it and stayed home in case a parcel arrived. I felt that was a reasonable excuse / reason, even if Jamie had sent me a message to tell me it wouldn’t arrive until afternoon. What I did attempt was a watercolour wash over a rough sketch of a house. It was a tutorial I saw on the December issue of Urban Sketchers. It looked good when the tutor did it. Not so good on mine. I left it to dry and went to look for something to photograph, preferably inside, because it was raining.

Scamp arrived home later looking drookit and we had toast & beans for lunch. Not long after lunch the parcel arrived. It’s sitting in the living room now, looking at me and silently inviting me to slit the sellotape and look in, but I know better than that. Scamp would not be a happy bunny if I did that. I may do as she suggested and cover it with a table cloth and pretend it’s a low table until the big day. Thank you Jamie and Simonne!

Dinner tonight was Spaghetti Carbonara the way Val told me to make it. No cream! Just two eggs with one additional egg yolk, beaten up with grated parmesan. A slice of smoked bacon cut into thin strips and fried in a pan (I added mushrooms, but it’s probably better without) while your spaghetti is boiling. Once everything is ready, pour the eggy mixture into the pan with the bacon, drain the spaghetti well and add to the eggy, cheesy mixture. Grind on some pepper and mix the spaghetti with the egg mixture. You can do the cheffy thing where you flick the egg mix over the spaghetti if you want to look as if you know what you’re doing. Serve immediately. Spaghetti Carbonara the Val way.

Today’s PoD is an old favourite of mine, Christmas Cactus. A two frame focus stack to get back and front in focus.

Thank you again Jamie and Simonne for the parcel. I wonder what’s in it!

That was about it for today. Tomorrow, Scamp is out for coffee again, this time with Isobel. I may go with her or I might return to my painting.

In the Toon – 10 December 2023

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Just a flying visit today. It was dull, it was wet and it was miserable. It was Scotland!

I was taking a lens in to WEX to sell it on to some lucky girls or boys who really needed an 18mm f2.8 Samyang FE lens. I imagine they will be clamouring to be the first to get their hands on it, even with the mark-up WEX will put on it.

I took a crowded train in to Queen Street and walked up Bath Street and down the other side in the rain, handed in my boxed lens and got the paperwork, then I was back over the hill again to the city centre in the rain. I walked down Buchanan Street heading for George Square and on the way I took a few shots. Then I thought to myself, “Why bother. You’ve delivered the lens. Just go home.” Sometimes it’s sensible to listen to yourself. I turned in to Queen Street station and had 3 minutes to get through the crowds and on to the Edinburgh express. First stop Croy. I thought the train going in to Glasgow was busy, but this one was rammed!

Phoned home to see if Scamp wanted anything in Tesco, got a negative to that and then drove home to a lunch of bacon and egg washed down with a cup of coffee. I expect my jacket is still dripping!

Two days ago I photographed a poor wee rose bud clinging to its broken branch. It got PoD. Yesterday I cut it down, smashed the end of its stem to let the poor thing take in some water and carefully placed it in a rose vase on the kitchen window sill. It took about fifteen shots to get what I was looking for, but eventually I was happy with the result and today it got PoD for the second time.

Dinner tonight was an experimental Chicken Poached in Chicken Stock with Roast Potatoes, Baby Mushrooms and Multicoloured Veg. Served with a Chicken and Pea Jus. I think Scamp has been watching too much Masterchef the Professionals! It was delightful. I could almost hear that presenter’s breathy delivery with Gregg shouting in the background OH MATE!!!

We watched the sad end of one person’s journey in Strictly. The show is becoming a parody of itself. Not funny anymore, results predetermined. I give it one more season before it’s completely kaput.

Spoke to Jamie and thought he sounded more upbeat than of late, even if their wall might need repaired, but glad to hear that work can now begin again for a week or so.

No plans for tomorrow. I think it might rain!