Category: insects

An improving day – 27 June 2016

Posted on by Zogman

27 June

With Scamp’s cold improving, she went to Marji’s for June-D’s birthday lunch. That left me off the leash for an hour or so in the afternoon. I spent the morning looking for the serial key for a piece of software I wanted to swap over from the Toshiba to the new Linx. Never did find it and I wasted almost a whole morning trying. I wasn’t going to waste the afternoon.

Once I’d got my ‘easy’ sudoku solved (Easy? Do these people know the meaning of the word?) I got ready, and dressed to deter the ticks, I drove down toe Auchinstarry to see what was new along the railway. The answer was, quite a lot actually. The trees were in full leaf now and the smells from the flowers, especially the Meadowsweet were lovely. There was quite a strong westerly wind blowing and this helped make the lighting on the hill much more interesting. Unfortunately, the wind also blew in the rain clouds that joined me for the walk back to the car. I could have got soaked, but luckily I’d prepared well and brought my old almost-waterproof rain jacket with me. It saved the day again. Happy with the collection of photos I got today.

Salsa for me tonight, but as I was getting into the car, I felt that little roughness in my throat. Don’t tell me I’m getting Scamp’s Lurgi. Salsa was interesting with three new moves for me to remember. Hope my voice recorder has caught all the nuances of the moves.

Just about to start on the doggie bags Scamp brought back from the party.

Back To School – 1 June 2016

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1 june bBack, but just visiting. A bit like the jail in the Monopoly board, it’s ok to visit, but I don’t want to go there. It was good to speak to former colleagues with a lot of friends among them, but it was even better to leave. I was only going to sign up for a retiral dinner for a two teachers who are making the best move they’ll ever make. Well, it is for Scamp and I anyway.

Other than that, I got some photos while I was out on a walk, but nothing spectacular.

The strangest shot I got was the one of the moth. I spotted it last night as I was going to bed, but it flew off before I could get a photo. I did get one clear photo this morning but I still can’t identify it. The unusual thing about it is the way the tail hooks over almost like a sting. It could be like the scorpion wasp that looks like a scorpion, but has no sting.

Today was another scorcher with temperature of 13.4c when I got up to make the breakfast this morning. The temperature increased to over 19c later in the day.

Looking forward to tasting our Strawberry Vodka tomorrow.

A walk on the canal side – 31 May 2016

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31 may bScamp suggested a walk along the canal this morning.  As it was so bright and sunny, it seemed a shame not to, so we drove down to Auchinstarry and headed off along the railway to Twechar.  Maybe it’s because we were talking all the way and maybe it’s because we were marching along quite sharply at Scamp’s usual pace, but I didn’t take a single photo all the way there.  Even on the way back I only grabbed two desultory shots of some backlit grasses, neither of which made the final cut.  The word ‘desultory’ always makes me think of A Simple Desultory Philippic.  It was a track on Simon & Garfunkel’s Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme album, and I never really understood it.  Liked it, but never understood it.  But to quote Dylan, “I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now.”  It was just after the grass photos that Scamp said that this was what retirement was for.  It’s strange, but last Tuesday, a week ago, when I was out walking around St Mo’s about 5.30am I was thinking exactly the same thing.

Didn’t do much else when we got back other than cut front and back grass while Scamp went to a ‘Witches’ meeting.  Don’t ask, it’s just an opportunity to gossip!  No spells were cast.  Later, when the light was better, I went for a walk in St Mo’s, being careful not to go in to the wild wood for fear of little beasties namely ticks which I seem to be very prone to.  Got some decent shots of the baby coots and Mr Grey hiding in the reeds, pretending he wasn’t there.  Then, in one of the smaller ponds, I spotted a dragonfly.  It’s still May, ok the end of May, but still May and there are dragons out!  Unheard of.  I’d say that this might be summer starting, but I know from the weather forecasts that next week rain sweeps in.  Still, we’ll take all the sun we’re offered and say thank you very much.  This is what retirement is all about.

Keep taking the tablets – 30 May 2016

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30 MayWe went in to Glasgow with the stated intention of getting a tablet/laptop.  Apparently what I was looking for was a “2 in 1”, which I suppose describes it quite well.

Note to JIC.  
Please feel free to ignore this part as it’s almost all technospeak.
First stop was Staples where I saw the cheapo looking Linx 10.1″ tablet with a clamshell keyboard/lid.  Cheapo maybe, but it had 2 x USB3 ports and 1 x micro USB for power and doubling as a port if you have an OTG (On The Go) cable.  Even better, it was at a bargain price of £149.99.  Ok, one possible.
Ok, JIC, Technospeak over.

Next stop was John Lewis who on paper had a load of these 2 in 1s.  Unfortunately, if we ignore the very expensive Mickysoft offerings, there were only two.  One was an Acer with no price on it and no power in the battery, the other was an HP at £80 more than the cheapo Linx.  The spec appeared to be almost the same, in fact it only had 1 x USB port and 1 x micro USB.  So it looks like it’s back to Staples.

Before that, Scamp decided that lunch at Patisserie Valerie was in order.  Since she prefers to eat inside, we got a table no bother because everyone wanted to sit outside in the sun.  Had our order taken: Crayfish Salad for both of us and Apple Pie for after for Scamp, Pecan Pie for me.  Tea for both.
The tea arrived, and so did the manager to apologise, but there was no Pecan Pie.  No problem, I’d just have the Apple Pie.  A little later he arrived back to say that sorry, there was no Crayfish Salad.  He did offer alternatives.  Scamp went for Chicken Caesar and I chose Chicken Brochette.  We’d been sitting for 20 minutes by this time.  Half an hour later and still nothing had arrived although the manager had floated past about 15 minutes before to say that my chicken was just going on the grill.  I’d had enough.  We offered to pay for the two teas, but the girl on the till would have nothing of it and told us the manager “should have been dealing with it.”  If I’d had to speak to the manager himself, Begbie would have come out of the box again.

Back at Staples, I bought the Linx.  Unfortunately, when I got it home, I found that it looked nothing like what I’d seen in the shop.  Quick phone call and was told to bring it back and they’d exchange it for the correct one.  I did, they did and this time I checked it before I left the shop.  So far, it’s doing everything I expected it to do.  Pity the same can’t be said for Patisserie Valerie.

More sun promised for tomorrow.  Bring it on!

Sitting in the Sun and Begbie Returns – 29 May 2016

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29 MaySunshine again!  Today we went to Loch Lubnaig, just north of the ‘Geriatrics’ Sunday Favourite’ Callander.  We were late leaving and I just knew we were going to run into queues along the route.  First bottle neck would be Dobbies garden centre just outside Stirling – It wasn’t too bad for a change.  Next on the list would be Blair Drummond Safari Park.  It was just as bad as I expected.  All these families eager to see the wild animals.  The queue was quite long, but as I drove past I glanced right and that was where the queueing really started and went on as far as the eye could see.  Maybe it’s the passengers in the cars that would be wilder than the animals by the time they got parked.  I wished them luck.  Strangely, the rest of the journey was uneventful, even Chronic Callander and we got parked at the new lochside parking at Lubnaig without any trouble.  An hour later, things were a bit more frantic in the carpark with cars abandoned everywhere.  People just seemed to park wherever there was a space long enough and wide enough for their car, with no thought of how other drivers were going to negotiate their exit.  They were in their space and that’s all that mattered.  Dobbers!

Lunch was a roll ‘n’ sausage for me and a roll ‘n’ egg for Scamp.  That was the last of the rolls and the last of the eggs.  We got ours and that’s all that mattered!  Loads of people there.  Must have been well over 100.  That’s what happens when you build a carpark at a scenic spot, provide facilities and catering.  If you build it right, people will come.  Think on this NLC.  After a couple of hours sitting in the sun, we decided to head home.  Scamp to do some gardening, me to cycle.  However, a pair of numpties were parked right behind us and didn’t look like moving.  No problem.  I put on my Begbie voice and they shifted sharpish.  Maybe it’s because I’ve just finished ‘The Blade Artist’ which is the story of how Begbie, the psycho from Trainspotting’s life has panned out.  Anyway, homeward through the legions of Grey Hairs out for ice cream and chips in Callander.

Got a few photos of a little red damselfly while out on my bike and Scamp got her pansies planted.

Swallows are flying lower today which means the weather may not be as good tomorrow.

Walking in the Sunshine – 22 May 2016

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22may bIt’s a sunny Sunday and after breakfast we headed off over the fields and far away.  Luckily Sim is friendly with the farmer and we got permission to walk through the horses’ fields to the right-of-way.  I’m not that happy walking in fields with actual horses in them.  Sim calls them ‘ponies’, but these aren’t anything like the ‘My Little Pony’ my daughter had when she was wee.  These are big brown monsters, much bigger than me, but I treated them like I treat anyone bigger than me – don’t make eye contact, pretend they’re not there and everything will be fine.  I did, and it was.  we reached the relative safety of the road.  Relative safety because this is a narrow single track road, but the drivers seem to think it’s their own personal autobahn.  In other words, they think there is no speed limit.  That said, we survived the killer ponies and the madskull drivers and started on our walk proper.  Like yesterday it was mainly between fields of wheat and also yellow rapeseed.  I synched the camera with my iPhone to allow me to geotag the photos.  I knew it would only work with the ’10 and not the ‘5, but that wouldn’t matter because at least I’d have a record of the walk that I could plot on a map when I got back home.  Checked the first one and all seemed to be well.  We walked for an hour or so.  Probably more than an hour because although JIC and Scamp were charging on ahead, Sim and I were constantly stopping to get some photos.

When we got to the top of one of the hills, gentle hills. This is Engerland, not mountainous Scottishland remember.  They don’t do real hills here.  Anyway, when we got to the main road at the top of one of the hills, there was a debate as to whether we should return by the same route or do a round trip.  The round trip would mean walking on the grass verge at the side of the road and, since we’d already seen the stock car racing that was being done on the narrow road, we didn’t fancy our chances on the main road, so it was back the way we’d come.

On the way back we got a really good view of the ‘Chicken Prison’ or battery hen farm.  If you’ve seen one of these travesties you will know why Scamp won’t but the cheapest chicken, but rather the free range ones.  At least they had a slightly better life.  We also got to see how a lovely vista across the green fields is destroyed by a solar panel farm.  Just to complete the trilogy, there was a wind farm behind us.  I’m all for being ‘green’, but just how efficient are these blots on the landscape?  Wind farm windmills are white (white = pure) and generally now they are painted green at the bottom (green = natural).  It’s all colour psychology, or kidology might be a more accurate description.  During the first two weeks in April in Scotland almost no wind energy was generated as the wind wasn’t strong enough.  It is not a viable alternative to traditional methods of generating electricity.  Enough of the rant.

Back home after passing the demon ponies again, we had ice lollies and Pimms for lunch, then watched JIC starting the barbecue that would provide our supper.  What a supper.  Chicken kebabs for Scamp. Pork burger and sausages for the carnivores.

Dumped my photos and oh, oh, it looked like only one photo had been geotagged!  Bummer.  Then when I got them all in there were 40 tagged photos.  Only one session, but forty photos in the session.  All was good.  Just as a finale, a woodpecker arrived at the bird table.  I’ve never managed to get a photo of one.  This one was a bit twitchy.  Every time I went near the window, it went and hid in the big tree at the side of the garden.  However, I managed about four good shots from a sitting position on the couch!

Back home tomorrow.  I’d love to have stayed longer, but all good things must come to an end.  We had an excellent day and an excellent break.  Three days with Hazy and N D’Ag and three days with Sim and JIC.

Coffee and a walk in the Toon – 5 May 2016

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combo bCoffee at lunch time with Val and Fred P.  Quite enjoyed the cut and thrust of another “frank exchange of views”.  Never one to allow the grass to grow under his feet, Fred held court on a variety of political issues of the day while Val attempted in vain to pour oil on troubled waters.  Me?  I threw in the occasional match to see if the oil would burn.  Topics for discussion today were the cost of upgrading your central heating, In or Out of Europe and the poor selection of guests in Jools Holland’s programme.  Sketches and paintings were critiqued and the world was set to rights.  Thankfully the word ‘ANTISEMITISM’ was not used by any of the participants.

After the scintillating discussion, I headed in to Glasgow to get some masking fluid to try some different watercolour techniques.  While I was in Cass Art, I wandered round their botanical watercolours exhibition and was really, really impressed with the quality and detail in the pictures.  My favourite had to be the sweet peas.  Such delicacy I can only dream of.  Walking back to the car, I grabbed a shot of the elegant security grilles at the Buchanan Galleries carpark.

When I got home, after a great walk round Glasgow bathed in sunshine, Scamp reminded me that we hadn’t voted, so it was off again to do our constitutional duty.  On the way back, we walked over to Condorrat to get a fish suppers for our dinner to celebrate the end of this boring baby kissing round of canvassing.  On the way I spotted the little yellow ball shaped flower and took its photo, along with its resident fly.  I wonder how many flies there are in, say, a cubic meter of bushes.  Probably incalculable, but as we are talking about a finite volume, there must be a finite number.  Multiply that by the number of cubic metres of bushes in Cumbersheugh and you have a very large number.  Now, if all those flies voted for the Greens, would the SNP still get in?  Probably.  A little bit too much politics for this time of an evening.

Our plans for tomorrow were to go to Perth tomorrow (Friday), but they had to be changed at the last minute and we’ll probably go next week.

A couple of lucky ones – 1 May 2016

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Combo bToday was wet from first thing this morning.  Not heavy rain, but persistent.  We took advantage of this to a certain extent by planting our potatoes in their bags.  At least we didn’t need to water them once they had been planted.  Scamp potted up her sweet peas and they are outside for their first overnight.  She also planted out my rocket which I kept meaning to do, but just never got round to.  Anyway, they are planted now.  It doesn’t matter who did it.

Photographically, there wasn’t very much decent light with grey overcast skies, but I went for a walk along the railway to see what was worth taking.  I liked the little branch with the blossom on it and I did see the fly, but I was impressed with the sharpness and the clarity and the fact that it was a colourful little hoverfly.  The second shot was another lucky with another little fly hanging below the white flower (it’s a common mouse ear by the way – the flower, not the fly).  Not as sharp as the blossom or the hoverfly, but still a decent shot.  Check them out on my Flickr page.  To think I drove about 10 miles and walked about 3 miles in the rain to get these shots.  That’s what a 365 makes you do.

Today’s word was ANTISEMITISM.  It has been bandied about on radio and tv since Ken Livingstone made his ill timed or cleverly calculated remark.  It was while Scamp and I were watching the Andrew Marr program this morning that I thought is there such a thing as SEMITISM or is there only a negative version of the noun?  It seems that everybody seems to have an opinion on this topic and everyone is desperate to have their opinion heard.  It’s probably true that those who speak loudest have the least to say.  I will say no more.

Went Out, Did Something – 29 March 2016

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comboYesterday was a bit of a wasted day and we were determined not to do the same today. I’d like to say we got up early and went out for a walk or a run or even to the gym, but we had breakfast in bed, then read for an hour or so, this after waking up about 9.15. However, after that we DID go out.

We couldn’t decide where to go at first with both of us making half-hearted suggestions. We finally settled on Hamilton, intending to walk through the Palace grounds to the Mausoleum. Hamilton is such an awful place to drive through, always has been with a convoluted one way system and stringent parking regulations, so rather that face that, I decided to take the Motherwell turn off and park in Strathclyde Park. From there we could walk to the Mausoleum if we wanted or walk part of the way around Strathclyde Loch. We chose the latter.

We started walking anticlockwise round this soulless man made sailing venue. It’s never been my favourite place to walk. At weekends it’s usually crowded with dog walkers, joggers and cyclists, oh, and hundreds of weans. At night it has a totally different reputation. It used to be a boy racers’ paradise, but the council speed bumps every 20 feet or so has put paid to that. Now it’s the secluded carparks that are venues for other sporting pursuits – or so I’m told 😉

I remember it when it was simply Motherwell Pond, away back in the ’60s. Then it was just a big pond in the middle of a field. It had the reputation then for holding the biggest pike in Scotland and I remember seeing some big fish taken there. Not by me though. If I was lucky I’d get a small perch or two. Now it’s just a big sterile expanse of water used by small boat sailors, the occasional windsurfer and canoeist. It also has an Olympic rowing course. Enough of the adverts, it’s a rich person’s playground. Proles like us just get to walk round it.

We walked round the south end of the loch and on past the man made beach. Just before that, I spotted a buzzard through a fence. It was sitting on a post in a timber yard just outside the park. I managed a few shots of it and it seemed quite happy to let me get near. Then a couple of seagulls started mobbing it and it flew off. When we were walking near the water and under some trees we were joined by clouds of wee black flies. I don’t know what they were, but as they only appeared when we were near the water, I assume they were water borne and had just hatched. Maybe spring is near after all. We walked as far as the Roman bath house which, if you read the description on the plaque is not original, but a reconstruction using modern materials. That’s a bit of a con I think, but what do you expect in North Lanarkshire? The South Calder Water runs in to the park at this point and just around a bend in it is the old Roman bridge. This is part reconstructed too, but there are no signs to tell you what it is and it’s fenced off so you can’t get across. Well, you could get on to it quite easily, but I suppose by fencing it off NLC exonerate themselves from any injury caused from falling from it. YOU WERE WARNED etc.

Walked back the same way we’d come and almost managed to get back to the car before the clouds opened and although we got wet, we didn’t get the soaking that we might had got if we’d caught the full downpour that arrived a couple of minutes later.

Tomorrow? Who knows. Hopefully we’ll GO OUT AND DAE SOMETHING again.

Sitting in the Sun – 19 March 2016

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combo bSitting in the sun for a couple of hours at Loch Lubnaig. Taking foties, doing sketches and  being amazed at the difference a day makes. Yesterday, all was grey, but today there’s blue sky all around.

We couldn’t decide where to go today and last night had almost settled on a trip round the shops in Stirling.  This morning when we saw the bright blue sky, we re-evaluated our options.  Finally we settled on Callander with the option of travelling on to Lubnaig if the weather permitted.  The weather did permit and we did take the Lubnaig option.  We drew in at the first of the new parking places which are so much better maintained than the old ones where the dobbers would overnight camp from Friday to Sunday.  Buckfast bottles and who knows what else left behind.  The only good thing about it was that it was free, but you didn’t wander far from your car in case it was propped up on bricks when you came back.  Those days are gone now, so are the dobbers and the Buckfast.  Now you’ve got to pay to park, but £1 for two hours is worthwhile for peace of mind.

I had hoped to see the seaplane land on the loch, but I think that company has now moved to Loch Lomond.  What we did see were mountain climbers on a ridge, canoeists on the loch and a beastie on my painting.  First time for a long while I’ve painted in public.  It wasn’t the best effort, but it was a sketch and it was in the open air – I won’t use that arty-farty French expression, but it was fun.