Category: Food

A bit calmer today – 2 February 2022

Posted on by Zogman

Thankfully the wind had gone to bother someone else today.

I spent the morning getting my photographs organised into the correct folders in the correct place for my new regime. It took a lot more time than I’d anticipated, but it’s done now. In fact it took me until lunchtime to get it completed.

Immediately after lunch we drove up to Seafar to visit Margie who is one Scamp’s oldest friends in Cumbersheugh. Old in the sense that they’ve known each other for a long time. Old also in years, but not in outlook. The stories she tells have us in stitches. A great painter too. I took last night’s work to let her critique it and it won some praise from her. Then we discussed the prompts for the week and she gave me a few suggestions for the more obscure ones. Things I’d never have thought of. We stayed for a couple of hours and I think Scamp was careful not to tire her out too much. All in all an entertaining and at times hilarious afternoon on a really dull day.

Dinner tonight was house favourite: Cod with Bacon, Lentils and Braised Peas. Simple and satisfying. Two cheap steamed puddings from Iceland provided the pudding.

Today’s prompt was Brown Eyed Girl. Van Morrison is not my favourite artist, so I stuck with my lyrics theme and added the chorus from the song, but gave a nod to Van the Man with his archetypal hat and dark glasses. The cow is called Daisy. Named by Margie.

PoD is further adventures of The Professor. This time he has discovered the fabled Dragon’s Green Tooth. It’s a sprouting garlic clove and I guess that slight double image is because it moved slightly during the long exposure. Just for fun and because I didn’t have anything else.

The Christmas decorations finally made it up into the loft to rest there until next year.  A bit late this year, but it’s been a busy week for both of us and that’s my excuse.  Not a reason, just an excuse.

No plans for tomorrow. Neither of us has any commitments, but we’re open to offers!

The first day of a new month – 1 February 2022

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Always an exciting time!

It’s also a day when a lot of catalog management is required. I won’t go into the details, because that’s not what you’re here for, is it? No, I guessed not. What you want to hear is what we did today. Ok, here goes.

Scamp was first out. She was meeting Isobel for coffee in Costa and I wasn’t going to meet her. I was second out and I was driving to Glasgow to meet my brother. The wind had plagued us all last night again and it was still with us in the morning. I don’t know where all this wind is coming from. Somebody somewhere who controls the weather, I’m guessing it’s Putin, needs to seriously look at their food intake, because that’s what gives me wind. Anyway, parked in Buchanan Galleries carpark and walked round to meet Alex.

First things first, we had coffee in Nero to give us time to set the plan for the day. This was Alex’s choice of photo walk, so he got to choose where we’d go. His choice was to walk up Sauchiehall Street which has always been called Sausage Roll Street by Scamp and me. So off we went on our travels up Sausage Roll Street. We saw closed shopfronts, pigeons that crapped on us, Chinese dragons celebrating Chinese New Year. Kung hei fat choy to all the poor participants in the dancing dragons who got blown about mercilessly by the gales driving down the street.
We climbed the footbridge over the M8 and got some spectacular shots of Charing Cross. Photo is on Flickr.

Alex also wanted to get a shot of the sun shining through the glass of Buchanan Street subway entrance. He’d worked out on his app the best time would be between 1pm and 1.15pm, cloud base permitting. With that in mind we hurried down Sausage Roll Street again stopping for some shots of The Beresford, Glasgow’s Art Deco 1930s building. It’s very impressive now with a fresh coat of paint. Photo on Flickr.

We just managed to get to the subway as the light was fading but I think we did capture it quite well. Only time will tell when we get a chance to compare and contrast the photos each of us took.

Lunch was in The Cup which is a lovely wee restaurant Scamp and I have passed many times in the past and never went in. Today Alex and I had an interesting lunch. He had Pea & Ham (from a chicken?) soup with an Applewood Smoked Cheddar & Chive Scone. I had Toasted Sourdough with Scrambled Eggs, Smoked Salmon and Roasted Cherry Tomatoes. Quite posh but it was worth it because the flavour of it just made it worthwhile.

Time was wearing on and we had other things to see:

  • A new Mural where the Badminton Players had been. I think I preferred the originals.
  • The gargoyles on the Old Fruit Market.
  • A couple of churches

Then it really was time to go home. Alex got the bus although I offered him a lift. I drove home.

Back home we compared notes on the day.  Both different and both similar talking to people from our separate families. Lunch was chicken with rice and ‘rats’ (ratatouille)

The 1st of Feb marks the start of 28 Drawings Later or Every Day in February. Both are sketching challenges in Facebook. My first day is done and here it is.  The prompt was “Green Door”.  I chose to base my sketch mainly on the lyrics.  PoD was the shot of Buchanan Street subway.

It was a good day in town.  For the most part the weather was kind to us, much kinder than it has been recently.  Tomorrow we’re off to visit Margie, hopefully.

A quieter day – 31 January 2022

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Last night was a blustery one. Didn’t know if it was wind or thunder, but it was loud.

Woke to a calm clear sort of day. Sun was shining when we got up and it stayed with us all day. Scamp was out with her sister for coffee in the morning and I was scouring the InterWeb for somewhere, anywhere that had interlinked fire alarms. Many were advertising them, but few had them in stock. I almost had two places on my shortlist One place at least gave a delivery date of 21st March, but wanted your money now. I think not. Sounds like their financial status is questionable. The other one had a good Trustpilot score, but seemed too good to be true. Even Amazon seemed to be hard put to supply any time soon. What government imposes a law on folk that they must abide by, then turns round and says it won’t be enforced. Really? Do they really think we believe them.

Scamp’s return put an end to my investigations for today. However, I’d also made some practical use of my time and made a Sage and Olive loaf from one of my Baked In kits. It was a heavy looking dough, but it started rising quite well. After lunch I grabbed my camera and went to make the most of the fading sunshine in St Mo’s. That’s where the PoD came from. It’s proof that we had sunshine today, producing some shadows on the ground and with the boardwalk shining nicely too.

I got a few more, and almost got a nice little family group of Mallards to be the foreground interest, except I tramped on too many fallen branches getting to the water’s edge and they flew off in fright. I still took the photo, but the one in my head will maybe make it to Flickr another day. It was a really calm looking pond today. Hardly a ripple after yesterday’s hurricane force winds.

The bread turned out fine and is still to be cut. Dinner was tortellini. Not the best I’ve ever tasted, but it filled a space as we often say. I think the trouble with us both is that we are filling too much and not leaving enough spaces!

Boris apologised today for being bad after the long awaited Sue Gray report was published. He thinks that’s him off the hook. I don’t think he realises just how deep that hook is in, nor does he realise that most hooks have barbs to stop them coming out again.

Tomorrow I’m hoping to meet Alex in Glasgow in the morning. Later, Scamp is off to have coffee with Isobel and I’ll get pelters for missing her again. The last time I was supposed to meet Isobel, I stayed in instead to play with a new camera. This time my excuse is photography again! Weather looks cold again tomorrow.

 

Happy Anniversary to us – 30 January 2022

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Not the legal one, but the one we celebrate.

The other anniversary, next month is just the day we made it legal. This one is more important. If it hadn’t happened, the second one wouldn’t have happened either.

Because this was a special day we lay in bed and read for longer than was absolutely necessary. Then because the weather fairies were warning of heavy rain and strong winds later, we chose to go for a walk in the morning. The destination was Broadwood Loch and we walked round then over to the exercise machines and home via M&S for a steak for me and some oranges for Scamp. Back home for lunch and to check out today’s only picture. Actually it was three pictures of the same fencepost with its little garden on top. Never only take one picture of something interesting, just in case something happens, it’s out of focus, it’s a little bit shaken or and elephant charges past and blocks the view of the subject. Two or even better, three shots will usually suffice.

Lunch was calling and although my two slice of bacon and an egg was minimal for me, it needed to be after yesterday’s over eating and drinking. Watched the new replacement politics show for Andrew Marr. Not a patch on the great man. Sophie Raworth is trying hard, but she’s just not as incisive as the great man. Today she was interviewing Liz Truss. My heavens, that woman just sounds like a Tory. That same hectoring voice and a stare that would put a basilisk to shame.

Satisfied that the photo had worked, we settled down to do today’s Wordle. It appears that my spellchecker hasn’t heard of it yet. It’s an addictive word game where you only get six tries to find a five letter word. It’s a bit like the old Mastermind peg game, but alphabetical. I’m sure you’ve tried it, Hazy. Jamie, maybe not so much. Scamp likens it to the crossword puzzles my dad used to do many year ago. If you haven’t hear of it, Google it. It’s not Angry Birds or Candy Crush, it’s not going to steal away hours of your life and leave you wondering what happened to today.

I had thought about going over to St Mo’s to augment my three shots, but there was no need. I was satisfied with the quality and composition of my finished article. Besides it was time to get the dinner ready. My steak was just excellent. Maybe slightly overcooked, but it hadn’t lost any flavour by that. Scamp’s fish looked lovely too, but it was trout or salmon and I’m not a great fan. Our accompaniment was baked potato and cabbage.

As we were cooking dinner that wind started rising and the rain was driving through. I for one was glad we weren’t going out later. Jamie too was commenting that he was lucky for once and had timed his return from the US to perfection, just missing their snow-bomb. He seemed to enjoy the visit and the pizzas, although a pizza topped with mashed potato and bacon didn’t appeal to me.

Tomorrow looks like a repeat of today.  More rain, more wind.  That’s Scotland!  Scamp may be going for coffee with June.  I’ve two letters to write.  Hopefully I’ll get at least one done.

Dancin’ – 27 January 2022

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Out photographing in the morning sun, dancing in the afternoon and fish ’n’ chips for dinner. Does life get any better than this?

I knew that most of the afternoon would be taken up with driving and dancing, neither of which I mind, but it was a lovely clear day and probably the only good day we’ve had for at least a week. The only way out of this and out in the fresh air was to go early, and that’s what I did.

I only had an hour or so out in the wilds of St Mo’s, but the light was good and bits and pieces of colour are appearing now. Green shoots are appearing, maybe a bit early, but the trees are preparing next years greenery already. However, it wasn’t the greenery or the trees that made PoD it was an alien looking landscape that was moss fruiting bodies in the morning light.

Back home, a quick lunch and we were off to Paisley, Sunny Paisley today. Still the same convoluted traffic system with a multitude of traffic lights. But we got there, a little later than anticipated, but we got seats too, although we didn’t sit on them much. I think the longest I was sitting was when the tea was served and when they played two line dances (if you can call ‘Waltz across Texas’ a dance. It’s more a walk around the floor with a grumpy face) back to back. The rest of the time we were on the floor for a waltz, every sequence dance, tango, salsa. Basically, you name it, we danced it. Some better than others, some for less than a minute before we admitted we didn’t know what we were meant to be doing.

We’d agreed that we would leave half an hour early today to try to avoid the worst of the traffic going through Paisley town centre. It worked. That half hour early must have cut at least an hour off the drive home.

I went for a walk to the shops when we got back, well, it is Thursday and traditions must be upheld. I didn’t take a camera with me because I was sure I’d enough in the bag from the morning walk, and so it turned out. It was a pity in a way, because there was a glorious sunset, all reds and golds.  Came home to the smell of home made Fish ‘n’ Chips.  Definitely the best fish and chips I’ve had for months.  Scamp’s expertise again.

Tomorrow doesn’t look anywhere like as good as today with wind, and rain forecast. If we manage to get out for a walk we’ll be lucky. Have a good flight home, Jamie.

 

 

Dull and cold – 26 January 2022

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With a bit of a breeze starting up later.

Out shopping in the morning. Just a normal Tesco run with Scamp using one of our vouchers and splitting the proceeds between us and the charity box. I think that’s fair. It’s what we said we’d do back when we started the Covid survey and she sticks quite well to that promise. Me, I don’t always remember, in fact I don’t Often remember. Must just do it one of these days. Soon. This month even.

Scamp bought a plain loaf as part of our purchases and as I had a square sausage in the freezer, my lunch was sorted. I can’t remember what Scamp had, I was concentrating all my culinary skills trying to make sure the sausage was cooked through but not burnt to a crisp. I’d eaten most of it as I was walking in to the living room. Just the crusts left when I sat down. That’s a measure of how good it was. Not good for you, but lovely and flavoursome. I must stop using ‘Tasty’ as my go-to word for things that I like eating!

Dinner tonight was going to be Chicken Curry the easy way. One of the great things about having a daily blog is reading what we did a year ago. It’s open to everyone, it sits at the bottom of the right hand column, at least on a ‘puter it is anyway. Today’s recipe came from two years ago on the 21st January 2020 when the world was young! I’m not going to go through the whole recipe, it’s there on the 21/1/2020 page of the blog. It’s the simplest and best tasting (see, I’m not using that ’T’ word) chicken curry I’ve made. There’s almost nothing in it apart from chicken, spices and tomatoes. I made the best flatbread ever to go with it too. The secret is in the prep, believe me.

I gave myself an hour in St Mo’s and that’s when I found out just how cold it was. Even wrapped up in my Bergy it was cold. PoD was four cygnets swanning around in the pond. They didn’t seem to mind the cold, but then they’ve got all that down to keep them warm.

Short practise tonight just to make sure we can make a decent fist of the new Rumba routine in its entirety because we’re hopefully going to the first tea dance for ages, tomorrow in Paisley.

The weather fairies say tomorrow is going to be a good day, so I’m intending going for a walk round St Mo’s in the morning to get some photos in the sunshine. Hope you’re getting some sunshine in NYC Jamie. Looks cold though, we’ve got nowhere near negative numbers here. Looking forward to hearing all about it.

Walking in the woods – 25 January 2022

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We went to Drumpellier today just for to get out the house and go somewhere different.

Not Broadwood and not St Mo’s. Just for a change we drove to Drumpellier and walked halfway round before entering the woodland. Long wide path that cuts straight through the woods. On the right there’s scrub land and on the left long grass and wilderness … and deer today. I saw only one, quite far away and then another appeared and then more until there were about seven of them. One young buck with velvet still on his antlers and I think the rest were female, hinds. By luck I’d brought the A6000 (don’t groan Jamie, I’ll keep it fairly light today). The A6000 and the long tele lens. However I forgot the snooker player’s maxim “chalk the cue before you take the shot” and took all the photos with the lens wide open. That’s not good. It was after we walked away I noticed and stopped the aperture down a couple of clicks (that’s ‘togs talk for dial in a bigger number). Next time I’ll remember … maybe.

We walked on then took the sharp left turn to the winding path through the trees that finally brings you out at the far end of the loch that seemingly almost everyone walks round ignoring the woodland with the deer and the different plantations that divide it up. On a good day with bright sunshine it’s a great place for a walk. Today it was cloudy and dull, but a walk in the fresh air is always a good thing. Especially as the eagle eyed Scamp had noticed that the cafe near the car park was open again.

So after our walk we had a coffee each. Scamp had a toasted teacake and I had a scone that crumbled away in my hands. More went on the table and the floor than in my mouth. Perhaps that’s a sign. Eat Less Cakes read the invisible sign! The coffee was no better. Scamp had a latte and I had a flat white. The only difference I could see was when she made the latte, the lady poured the hot milk in first and then the coffee. With mine it was the opposite way round. Both seemed to have the same half gallon of milk. That’s 1.893 litres in new money. Probably a slight exaggeration.

We drove home and I walked over to Condorrat to post a letter then emptied today’s photos into Flickr and perused them for an hour or so. Best of the bunch by far, and PoD was a shot, taken at the correct aperture setting, of some old waterlogged tree branches which I hope led your eye to the tree in the mid ground with the little opening at its base. Probably a fairy’s tree. A Coatbridge fairy. Not a lot of them left, I’m told.

Tonight being Burns Night we had the traditional Haggis, Neeps and Tatties. The haggis this year was a veggie one and didn’t suffer too much for being that. Lentils, mushrooms, spice and beans replaced minced unmentionable bits of a sheep.

We watched the second last episode of Around The World in 80 Days. Honestly, this serial gets better and better each week. We both agree now that we’ll read the book to see how close it is to the serial.

No plans yet for tomorrow. It looks wet in the morning, but might dry up later. Who knows.

 

 

Off the leash – 24 January 2022

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Scamp was heading out for lunch with the rest of the Witches. I was given free run of the house.

After she was picked up by Jeanette I did think of driving out somewhere to get a few landscape photos, but the sky was that moody overall grey and without some directional light I’d be struggling to make a landscape look interesting, so I chose to wait for a while. I thought about starting a painting, but couldn’t decide what to paint. These dull days make it difficult to find an interest in anything. I did for one foolish moment toy with the idea of clearing up the back room, but one look at the enormity of the task was enough to disabuse me of that task. Instead, I had lunch. Beans on sourdough toast. Earlier I’d picked up Jamie’s transatlantic plane on Flightradar 24 and lunchtime gave me a chance to check his position. He was about halfway across the Atlantic as I was scraping the last of my beans from the plate.

I’d a letter to finish off and once I’d done that, it looked like the sky was brightening up with a bit of movement in the clouds, so I got my boots on and the camera sorted and went out for a walk in St Mo’s. The woods were looking bare. Bare trees, dried up grass and not a lot happening. I did try to grab a few shots of lichen and moss and also a few late season fungi, but nothing new. Nothing exciting or interesting. The most interesting was a leaf spread over a fallen log and worn almost transparent by the elements. That might look good reduced to monochrome. I walked further than I’ve gone for ages, across the boggy grassland almost beside the slip road from the motorway, but the landscapes were all the same. I’d taken them all in the past. However, when I came out of the woods the sky was definitely clearing and Jamie was heading south towards the eastern edge of Canada at about 38,000ft.

Heading back towards home I got a decent shot along the length of the boardwalk with the 18mm lens sporting its washed and clean lens hood. Also I took two shots looking towards the breaking sky over the pond. Both were taken in portrait format, one to make the most of the sky and the other to show the silted up edge of the pond. I intended to join them together in Photoshop. That was it for the photography and it looked like Jamie was now even higher at 40,000ft and crossing the border into the US. I hoped he was actually on that plane and had managed to get up for that 4am taxi!

Scamp was home by the time I got back and we compared our day. It would seem that the Railway Inn is worth a visit some time judging by the praise it was getting from Scamp. It would be good to start going out to eat again, now that the restrictions are being relaxed. We might even get to go back to salsa with a bit of luck!

Scamp’s lunch was Macaroni with Chips. My dinner was Tagliatelle with a meat Ragu. More in the pan for tomorrow or to go in the freezer to be discovered some hungry day.

I watched as the Airbus turned on its dogleg to final and landed in a place I’ve never been and am never likely to see with my own eyes. I hope you get to read this Jamie and aren’t too bored with all the photography talk. Enjoy your visit to the Big Apple.

The PoD is the two part picture, assembled and manicured in Photoshop then finished off in Lightroom. The others I took today are on Flickr.

We have no plans yet for tomorrow. Sometimes that’s the best way.

 

The Smiddy – 20 January 2022

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Out to lunch today.

Drove over to The Smiddy at Blair Drummond because it was a lovely spring-like January day and because the food is generally good and not too expensive. Great scenery too looking across the carse to the hills in the distance. I’m sure I’ve said all this before, but it bears repeating. The management of diners is improving because, while you still can’t book a table, you do get given a buzzer now when you arrive. This is a good ploy on their part, because it allows you to wander round the shop that is joined on to the cafe. While the cafe food is reasonably priced, the articles on sale in the shop range from expensive to exorbitant. Bottles of beer in the shop are more than twice the price of the same in Tesco. Lady’s masks, very prettily embroidered, are about £13 each. I though £15 was expensive for three reusable ones in Boots. Now I’m recalibrating.

We did have to wait a bit more than the ten minutes we were told when we entered, but we did get a table today! Service was slow. I had a home made beef burger that came with warm (ie, not hot) chips and the usual salad. Scamp had a Mac ’n’ Cheese also with those, just warm, chips. I don’t think they were deep fried chips, more oven baked, but they looked hand cut rather than reconstituted. But service was slow. I was glad that Scamp suggested we have coffee after we’d had our lunch. Coffee arrived without a spoon. It’s little things like that, that make you question whether you will rush back again. Yes, I realise it’s mid week and yes, I realise it was lunchtime, so it was busy, but if you want people to keep coming back you have to be on the ball these days.

I did take a couple of rushed shots while we were there, but the light was gone by then and it was my own fault for not taking them before we went in. Maybe next time, if there is a next time.

Back home after stopping at Lakeland/Sainsburys on the way for the makings of tomorrow’s pudding, I decided there was just enough light to get an hour in St Mo’s to bolster my collection from The Smiddy. It had been freezing during the night and the ponds were still frozen even late into the afternoon. I tested the ice on the wee pond and deemed it strong enough to hold the weight of the Sony with kit lens. It held, just, although there was a skin of water on top of the ice, so I was ready to whip it up and out of harm’s way at the first sound of cracking. As it turned out, the shot didn’t make the cut and PoD is a photo taken standing, with both hands on the camera, of the wee frozen pond.

WiFi disappeared tonight again at almost the same time it did yesterday. This time I phoned to complain and hopefully get an explanation. I got a sort of explanation that it’s an on-going repair. ‘They’ thought they had fixed it yesterday, but then found that the repair had failed today, so ‘they’ were working on it again tonight. I don’t know who the mysterious ‘they’ are and why they are only allowed to work at night. Maybe ‘they’ are nocturnal. Maybe Virgin are employing vampires who can’t work in daylight. That might be the case, because they are bleeding us dry for a service that’s not up to standard. The WiFi came back after a couple of hours, but the member of the Help Team I spoke to said it might happen again tomorrow until they find a solution.

So, I’d better get this posted in case it all goes a bit tricky again! Working tomorrow making dinner for Crawford & Nancy. Soup’s made tonight. Pudding is almost finished, but still lots to do tomorrow.

A bit of woodwork – 18 January 2022

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But first a return to the abysmal B&Q.

I decided I’d have another look for the correct screws for the pedestal I was making to hold the new TiVo box. I found them in the place I’d been looking. I remembered that the staff don’t to bother where they put some of the boxes and bags of screws and applied that logic to finding the right size of screws. They were in a box labeled 4mm x 25mm, but the actual screws were 3.5mm diameter x 30mm. It doesn’t help when the bag containing the corner blocks states that you need number 6 gauge screws and that nomenclature was changed around the late 1990s to the much more sensible metric measurement. B&Q living in the past. I got the screws and drove home.

Before lunch I managed to get all the wood cut to size and had a freshly charge battery in the drill. The hardest bit, apart from decoding B&Q’s filing system, was sawing the wood I’d drawn the elevation and end elevation of the pedestal and added all the required dimensions, so it would be as simple as I could make it before I put saw to wood. After lunch it was just a case of assembling the structure and, for once, it was done with the minimum of swearing!

The completed support passed muster with Scamp and looked reasonable in its place under the TV. It also fulfilled its secondary purpose of disguising the rats maze of cables that run between the modem, the TiVo, the Hive controller and the TV itself. Job done.

After hoovering the back room and putting all the tools away, I put my boots on and took the new Sony to meet the wildlife in St Mo’s. I got a picture of the little orange ladybird, still hibernating. However it was after I lost my Samyang’s lens hood and was retracing my steps to find it (it’s still lost), I noticed the Dragon Tree. It’s a rotten old fallen tree, but doesn’t that look like a dragon’s head? Or do I have to decrease my gin intake? Anyway, it got PoD.

Tonight’s dinner was potatoes and cabbage for Scamp. I usually have mine with the addition of bacon, but tonight I had the remains of my roast lamb shoulder. I think it tasted even better tonight than on Sunday. It’s all gone now!

We watched the first episode of The Tourist, but neither of us was convinced by it. If you can’t relate to the actors, (I think empathise is the word) then it’s a hard ask to keep watching it. I may give it one more chance, or maybe not. Much more entertaining and just downright watchable is Around the World in 80 Days. Just good fun.

Bloke came to encourage us to push probes down our throats and up our noses. He had a good sense of humour, despite having to stand in the bucketing rain. I suppose you need a GSOH for that job.

Well, it looks like the dance classes will be free to start again after the weekend. That is good news. Most of the restrictions have been released, and not before time, say we.

Tomorrow I’m booked for coffee with Val. Scamp is intending to do some more tidying up.