Category: photography

Stitchery and Boozy Pudding – 8 November 2020

Posted on by Zogman

A day for putting things right. A day for mending. A wet, dull day. A day for getting things done.

The main reason I was mending and putting things right and also for getting (some) things done was that it was indeed a wet, dull day.

Before lunch I’d made some bread, well made the dough at least, well made the dough in the mixer and then adjusted it by hand. That was the delicate, skilled work. The rest was just grunt work. After lunch I adjourned to the sewing room where three pairs of jeans awaited my attentions. Scamp stayed downstairs and talked to herself while she made a … well, let’s contract it to Boozy Christmas Pudding, it’s got a much longer name than that, but cutting to the chase, that’s it. Once assembled it was to be cooked for three and a half hours in a slow cooker. It looked messy, so I let her get on with it.

First thing for me to do was fix a worn pocket in one pair of jeans. As the next pair would need exactly the same repair done, so ideally I should make all my mistakes on the first pair and then sail through the second. For once, that’s exactly what happened. The first pair was a pain in the backside. Cut the wrong shape of patch. Got in a fankle (another good Scots word) sewing the patch onto the pocket. Eventually got it fixed and it looked and felt ok, so I went down to see how the chef was getting on. She was almost ready to put the assembled pudding in the slow cooker. Got it in without too much trouble which meant she had three and a half hours to sit and wait. I started jeans two’s pocket.

This one was easier and soon I had two useable pairs of jeans that had been malingering in the back bedroom for months. The next pair needed a hem turned up. It was a bit of a struggle to get the sewing machine to accept that it could actually pierce the double, double thickness of denim that would form at the doubled up side seams, but with a bit of a run at it, together we achieved a reasonable result. Like the pockets, once I’d done one leg, the other one was a dawdle. Make that three pairs completed!

We were having Duck Legs with Orange Sauce for dinner. Actually M&S had done the hard work. All I had to do was take the duck legs out of the bag and bake them in the oven I’d just taken the loaf out of, for 30 mins. Covered them in Orange Sauce after that and another ten minutes in the oven saw them cooked. They actually tasted really good. I wondered as I was eating mine if they had both come from the same duck. Were they ‘handed’, you know, left and right legs? I hadn’t thought to look. They both looked about the same size, but how would you know these things? We rarely think that what we’re eating walked this earth with us. Maybe I should go vegan. Nope, chicken curry would put an end to that idea!

The time to open the slow cooker had arrived and Scamp carefully undid the string that held the tinfoil lid in place and the smell that wafted out was simply divine! Boozy? Yes. Fruity? Yes. We got a big slice each and slathered it in cream and discovered that it tasted as good as the smell. The rest is now in the fridge for tomorrow, but I fear it won’t taste as good as today’s offering. Pity, Hazy. It’s got eggs in it.

Spoke to JIC tonight just as I was beginning a swearing session at the Sony for not working with the remote app on my phone. The poor boy wasn’t feeling well with clogged sinuses, and on his weekend off too. That’s just not fair. However we talked for a while about Mr Trump, boilers and stuff.

I went back up to the Photography room (because the sewing machine had been put away again) and proceeded to take today’s PoD manually. Came down stairs and tried again, because I’m like a dug wi’ a burst ba’, and lo and behold the bloody thing worked. I’ve a feeling it’s only doing it to annoy me!

Tomorrow evening we are doing a WhatsApp with a man from British Gas to see how much they want to supply and fit a new boiler. The one we have at present is about 20 years old. We’ll be talking big numbers, I’m sure.

A long walk – 7 November 2020

Posted on by Zogman

It was a foggy start that faded to a misty morning.

We had thought of going in to Glasgow today but we waited too long for the mist to clear. Eventually we decided on a walk and if you’re having a Saturday walk it should be a proper one, so this one was a walk around Broadwood Loch.

We set out with our usual walk down to the stadium and I managed to get a ‘one in the bag’ with a few shots of some mushroom/toadstools. Crawling around on the grass with your bum in the air is what gives photos a bad name. We chose to extend our walk to include the loch too.

Although I had one in the bag, the PoD was some cormorants on Cormorant Island on Broadwood Loch stretching and drying their wings in the feeble sunshine. I needed a long lens for that and the Sony can’t quite manage that … yet. I had to resort to the tiny sensor of the Teazer 90, but it didn’t let me down. It’s the best camera in the world. The one in your pocket. The rest of the walk was just ok. Mainly because the sun was on our backs and walking into the sun is always more interesting, photographically.

Dinner was meant to be roast duck legs, but someone forgot to check that they were fully defrosted and we had pizza instead. Hopefully duck legs tomorrow. I couldn’t possibly say who was responsible for the oversight with the frozen duck legs, but you know it was me. Numpty.

We had a wee dance tonight to practise our three jive routines with a couple of successful attempts at quickstep. It was partly to revise our jive and ballroom skills(?) and partly to celebrate Joe Biden’s win over the other Donald.

Not a bad day at all. Hopefully another one tomorrow.

A dull day in the morning – 5 November 2020

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Blue sky looking out the front window but really black at the back.

We decided to wait it out and see if the blue sky or the black clouds would win. Eventually the blues did win the day, but it was lunchtime by then and we stopped our cloudgazing to have a Bruschetta each for lunch. Sounds very posh, but the bread was going stale but would make good toast and the wee tomatoes were just past their sell-by date. A good way to use them up. Full marks to Scamp.

After lunch Scamp decided to make a chicken curry for dinner in the slow cooker and headed off to the shops to get a couple of chicken legs. I gathered my camera gear together and took a walk over to St Mo’s. Today I was mixing my cameras. I had my Oly with a macro lens and the Sony with the kit lens. I was fairly sure the Sony would produce the best landscape shot, and I wasn’t wrong. But I was equally sure the Oly would produce the best macro and again I backed the right horse. In fact, the Oly won the day with PoD going to a conifer trunk with a pattern looking like the flatworms from MC Escher’s lithographs. Google “Escher Flatworms” to see what I mean. I think the tree was a Larch because it was starting to shed its needles.

Back home the chicken curry was beginning to scent the air in the living room, because the great thing about slow cookers is they’re portable. You can plug them in anywhere there’s a power socket and they’ll do their job as well as sitting on the kitchen counter.

For a while we watched the antics of a couple of 70-somethings arguing about who won and I thought: Would I really want either of them to run my country? Boris is a bumbler, but these two are zoomers.

Tonight was Guy Fawkes Night, but since he was a bit of a terrorist and it’s not the done thing to glorify terrorists, the celebration has been renamed Bonfire Night.  That’s what we used to call it anyway, so it’s obviously the right name.  Although we didn’t have an official fireworks display this year, or maybe because we didn’t, there were loads of rockets flying through the air and explosions all around us.  Certainly one of the noisiest Bonfire Nights for many years.

Tomorrow we go out for lunch, but still stay within the boundaries of North Lanarkshire.

The Chicken Curry? Of course it was beautiful. Tasted as good as it smelled!

On the yellow brick road – 4 November 2020

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… with masks on.

Today, you’ve probably guessed, we went to Ikea. That’s what Scamp suggested, and as I had nothing better to do, I agreed. Fairly long queue to get in, but it was moving quite quickly. One absolute numpty literally ran in front of us to get in the queue before us. I don’t know if she’d maybe never been in the Big Yellow House before, but I hope she found what she was looking for or I imagine she’d scream and scream!

We were looking for three things one of which I thought was on the upper floor. I was correct, but we had to walk all the way round the maze and found it at the very end of the upper floor. With Covid restrictions you MUST follow the yellow brick road where before you could double back sometimes. That is totally forbidden now. So two trays for my storage cabinet meant I accumulated about 1,000 steps. We came out with the three items we had gone for … and a few more.

Drove back into Glasgow, heading for Glasgow Green. I followed the map in my head and then missed a lane change and we had to drive right through the city rather than round the edge. It didn’t matter, Scamp knows the city well and told me the lane changes well in advance. As we were walking past the People’s Palace I saw what looked like two sword fencers practicing under some trees. Now, as I said to Scamp, there’s used to be a fair amount of swordplay down on Glasgow Green, but only on Saturday nights. This was in broad daylight. If it was London there would be van loads of polis armed to the teeth surrounding the Green within minutes. In Glasgow it’s just par for the course, apparently!

We went along to Parnie Street because I was looking for a fitment for my Benbo tripod. Unfortunately the didn’t have it. The nearest they had was more than double the price. I could get it from Amazon, but I’d have preferred to have bought it from a small independent shop. Never mind, they said they might have it in two or three weeks. I might wait that long. We walked back through The Green, the fencers were still there and there were still no police marksmen hidden in the bushes with laser sights drawing red dots on the fencers’ heads. Nobody shouting “Throw down your weapons and lie on the ground!”

After lunch I gathered together a collection of ‘small electrical and electronic’ gadgetry that was destined for the council skip. For once there was no queue to get in and I was waved through after showing my proof of ID to show that I was a bona fide Cumbersheugh resident. Junk dumped, I headed for Fannyside Moor where I was aiming to get some photos with the Sony camera and a fifteen year old Sigma lens. The test went well and you can see the result on Flickr. It nearly made PoD, but was just pipped by the fencers. Love that stance!

Scamp and I hung up more of her ball lights on the rowan tree in the back garden. They really do brighten up the garden with such a cheery light.

That was about it for today. No plans for tomorrow, but the weather looks good again so we might go out for another walk, this time in NL.

More junk goes – 2 November 2020

Posted on by Zogman

Even more junk will arrive to fill its place, that’s inevitable, of course.

The junk in question was my Linx 12×64 laptop(ish) computer. The (ish) refers to the fact that it won’t sit comfortably on your lap, because it takes up a fairly large footprint with its kick down stand extended. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but like all ‘good ideas’ there were drawbacks. It was fairly light with a decent sized screen. It wasn’t fast, but I knew that at the time. It could run from an emergency phone charger battery quite happily. The killer was that it was Windows 10 and constantly wanted to ”Get you going again” only it didn’t. The downloads nearly always failed for some unexplained reason and with every successful download it got slower and slower. I finally decided it had to go and today was the day. Scamp was out having coffee with her sister in the morning, so I’d plenty of time to get it organised. I did my final check to make sure the battery was 100% and that it would charge if needed, polished the screen, swept the crumbs out of the keyboard (terrible keyboard) then packed it in its box, ready to go.

It was still looking good outside when I was finished, so I grabbed the camera and headed off to see how much water was in St Mo’s pond. The answer was really quite a lot of water. In fact, all the weeds and assorted rubbish in the pond had blocked the outlet and the pond was overflowing onto the path and cascading down the other side into the gulley that takes it out to somewhere else. I have no idea where. Didn’t get many photos because the trees were looking a bit bare after the buffeting they’ve had from our recent gales. I did try a few landscapes, but I wasn’t impressed with the look through the viewfinder.

Back home, Scamp had arrived just before me and we had lunch. My first look at the photos on the computer confirmed my suspicions that quite a lot of work would be needed to find anything worthwhile there. Took the Linx up to CEX which are the easiest company to deal with for small electrical and electronic gadgets. The next best, I’ve found, are the workers at the council skips, but CEX give you a few quid more for your unwanted electronic junk, and there’s not such a big queue. Left the Linx to be checked and GS23’d and came home to close down Inktober 2020 on Flickr. It hasn’t been such an easy job being admin for the group this year. Too many punters seem to think that slapping some coloured ink on a page is drawing/sketching. It’s not, it’s just being a poser and if you keep doing it, I will remove your ‘artwork’. That’s what happened to an irate Italian bloke last night who seemed to think that he could unload his entire back catalog into my Inktober site. He got barred.

With Inktober sorted, Scamp and I turned our attention to additional storage space needed in the front bedroom. I suggested we get another bookcase and create an organised shelf system. That seemed to meet with her approval.

Back up at CEX the nice lady handed over the readies and I took some of them round to B&M where I exchanged them for a cheap chipboard bookcase. Strangely I met Emma, an FP (Former Pupil). I’d been reading last year’s blog the other night and had written about meeting her in the Beech Tree restaurant a year ago last week. She was one of my nicer FPs. I stopped on the way home when I saw what might just be a decent sunset forming. It got a few shots, and that’s what you see here. Sunset over the Pylons! Scamp approved the purchase of the bookcase. We’ll build it tomorrow.

Watched and interesting video on YouTube tonight that showed how to adjust lens adapters. The first one I bought was very loose. I fixed it tonight after watching the video. Very happy with it now. I’ll be able to use my Nikon lenses on the new camera until I save up enough pennies to buy Sony ones.

Tomorrow the Gas Man is booked to do the maintenance on the boiler. We know he’ll probably try to encourage us to get a new one. We may just let him make an appointment for us. Don’t know how that will work with Covid restrictions. We are now in Tier 3 of the Scottish system. England go into full lockdown later in the week for a month. Wales are just coming out of a ‘Circuit Breaker’. It’s complicated!

Old Tech meets New Tech – 29 October 2020

Posted on by Zogman

It was obvious from early morning that today was going to be wet.

Another of those days when the rain was heavy and continuous. There was no point in going out, far less travelling a distance. We just contented ourselves with staying at home, but were buoyed by the news that Nick the Chick wasn’t going to put us in Level 4 which is almost a total lockdown. It appeared at first that we’d be allowed the right to roam across all the Level 3 regions, i.e. all of Central Scotland. Now it looks like we will be restricted to travel in North Lanarkshire. That wasn’t in the original bill, but that’s what it is now. She, the witch, is also warning that all of Scotland may go back into lockdown. Isn’t she just a bundle of fun?

The furthest I got today was down to the shops for stuff to make tonight’s Thai Fishcakes. I’d intended walking down, but swiftly changed my mind when I met the wall of water falling from the sky. That’s what we buy a car for, to drive to the shops in, instead of getting soaked. So it was down to the shops, get the essentials (and a bottle of wine) and get home.

The Amazon man had been when I was out for that 15 minute jaunt and he’d brought me another adapter. This one takes old M42 (i.e. ancient) lenses and allows them to work on the Sony A7. The lens in question is a Helios 58mm f2 that used to be on the front of a Zenit EM that may or may not have belonged to JIC. If it was yours JIC, I hope you don’t mind me borrowing it. This adapter cost half the price of the Nikon adapter and feels a lot more solid. I used it to take today’s PoD which is the last of Scamp’s Lady Emma Hamilton’s from the back garden. I was amazed at the quality of this camera / lens combination. Old Tech meets New Tech, indeed.

Thanks for the email JIC. The video on the website was just at my level. No big words, lots of easy to understand graphics and nice colours. I approve. Just a pity you didn’t get a mention.

Message for Hazy. The Big Scottish Book Club, has guests including Neil Gaiman who will be discussing The Graveyard Book. (Sunday 1st November 10pm BBC Scotland. Also available on iPlayer) If you can’t get it, let me know and I’ll try to ‘obtain’ a copy.

Today’s prompt for Inktober was Shoes. I decided to rebel and sketch boots instead, my Merrell Moab boots. Like I said on Flickr:

Ok, they’re boots, not shoes, but arguing about that is just splitting hairs. Merrell Moab boots. Really comfortable and as waterproof as blotting paper. Goretex? Don’t make me laugh Merrell.

Tonight it’s getting a bit windy, as was predicted by the weather fairies. However, the wind is supposed to blow away most of the rain over the night, leaving us a clear, dry day tomorrow. Then more wet stuff arrives on Saturday. Hoping to get out somewhere (in North Lanarkshire only ;o) for a wee run.

MOT – 26 October 2020

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The red car lives to fight another day!

Out at 8am to take the Red Micro to the garage for MOT. Since we’d driven down to the garage, and had nothing else planned for the rest of the day, we went for a walk, since it was such a clear, dry morning. We walked down and round the stadium, then back home for breakfast. Like Scamp said while we were out, we should do this more often. Lie in bed reading on the cold, wet mornings, but on decent days we should be out and enjoying what little sunshine we get now that the days are shorter. It’s a plan. Whether it turns into action is still to be seen.

After breakfast we did sit around for a while and basically ‘footered’ for what was left of the morning. Just after lunch we got a call from the garage to say that the car had failed MOT because of a broken coil spring on the driver’s side. I’d guessed that might be the case, because I’d noticed during the week that it seemed to be listing a bit to that side, and said as much to JIC yesterday. Not too expensive to fix and they had one in stock, so it would be done today. With that dealt with we went for a walk around St Mo’s with a bit of a spring in our steps. Because the light was good and also because the car would be fixed today, we went round the pond twice! On the way back I grabbed today’s PoD of leaves beside the path to the Adventure Playground. Later in the afternoon we paid our dues and picked up the car. MOT’d, repaired and serviced. Scamp had a smile on her face. We drove home in the dark. First time driving in the dark since about February!!

Sketch topic today was “Hide”. I was tempted to put in a signed blank page to the effect that everyone was hiding, so I couldn’t draw them. Instead I drew a bit of a face peering round an open door. The ‘Hide’ part of Hide ’n’ Seek.

Scamp cut the last of her roses today and they were sitting in a vase on the coffee table. With such good light streaming in the window I couldn’t resist the opportunity. Look on Flickr and you’ll see them.

Tomorrow Scamp is meeting Annette who is coming to Cumbersheugh to get her Juke MOT’d. How is that for synchronicity? I may go for a walk.

Wet Ones – 21 October 2020

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That used to be the name of hand wipes. Now it seems an apt description of the days this week.

The sun was splitting the trees this morning and we took a chance on it staying with us when we drove over to Mugdock Park. It was a bad choice. At least, for the choice of weather it was a bad one. It rained on and off all the way there, but we’d come prepared with raincoats and boots. We needed them. It was just liquid air we were walking through for a while. Down past the old ruined ‘Big House’, then down the hill to the tree lined walk. Crossed the boardwalk over the bog to Mugdock Castle on the banks of Mugdock Loch. We were in and out of the trees all the way, but I did get a few shots through the trees and of the trees themselves. It was a bit dreich, but the colours were beautiful and the company was good. We continued round the loch in the hopes of getting a cup of coffee in one of the wee cafés, but one only had outdoor seating with no available umbrellas. One only had uncomfortable bar stools available and by that time the notion had left us. We changed our footwear and went home. Annoyingly, the closer we got to Cumbersheugh, the better the weather became and when we arrived home, blue sky was showing through the clouds.

After lunch Scamp drove to Halfords to get a rear wiper fitted. I told her I could do it. The biggest problem was taking the old one off and I’d done that at the weekend. Not without a fair bit of wrestling. With the wiper in place we tackled the scrubbing down of Scamp’s car. It needed it. One of our neighbours who was watching the action said “Oh, so it’s a Red car then!” That is its first wash this week. It’s going to need at least one more, probably in a carwash before it goes for MOT next week.

Dinner tonight was Chicken Tikka Masala and I was chef. It was a slightly less than successful curry. I don’t think I’ll be using that recipe again.

Today’s prompt was “Sleep”. Another vague request. Thinking along the lines of “Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?”, I asked the question:
“Do insomniac sheep dream of counting humans?”
Answers on a postcard please.

PoD was a grab shot walking through the avenue of trees at Mugdock. I don’t know who the bloke was wearing the red jacket, but thank you sir for providing my focal point. ARPS = A Red Point Somewhere!

Tomorrow we’re booked for breakfast at Calders with Isobel. Let’s hope the rest of the day is not another Wet One!

Off to see David – 18 October 2020

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He’s a hard man David. He stands there every day, wind, rain or shine.

We couldn’t agree what to do today. Scamp thought maybe we could walk round Glasgow Green. I wasn’t all that keen. Various other venues were discussed at length before we settled on a visit to Lakeland to get a flan dish for Scamp to make a flan in, strangely enough. That was it settled. We drove to Stirling and found the aforementioned flan dish and also found that Lakeland had fallen out with Dobbies which they used to be joined to. They had lowered the portcullis and were not receiving visitors from that shop. Dobbies had removed their outrageously expensive food shop and replaced it with a Sainsbury’s, which is probably why the portcullis was down. Otherwise the crafty Stirling folk would load their shopping basket at Sainsbury’s and waltz out through Lakeland without paying. I do hope Lakeland and Dobbies patch up their differences and exchange Christmas cards when the time is right. I hate seeing neighbours falling out.

With slightly more than the single flan dish in our bag (and paid for) we headed on to the motorway and up to see David Stirling. He was the man who invented the SAS and his statue is one of the most lifelike I’ve seen. It stands on a plinth with his greatcoat blowing in the wind and a pair of binoculars in his hand looking over to the hills he used for training his commandos in WW2. I had gone there because the view on a good day is tremendous. Today wasn’t a good day, but it gave me a chance to test and compare two camera lenses. None of the photos were going to win any prizes, but the difference in the shots was startling. Don’t worry, I’m not going to say any more on that score. Just let’s say the new camera is a STOATER!

Back home we needed potatoes for tonight’s dinner, so I volunteered to walk down to the shops and get them. On the way back I got today’s PoD which is simply two leaves stuck on a bush. You could almost say they were trapped on the bush and that would lead you neatly on to …

Today’s prompt was Trap and the sketch you see here is my answer to that request. There has been a bit of discussion going on at Inktober 2020 about the relevance of this year’s prompts, and some folk are saying they think it’s a good thing to have vague prompts. They make you move out of your comfort zone. I see where they are coming form with that argument but too many vague prompts make you think of simply giving up.

It was a sad day for me today. I packed up my old trusty D7000 ready to be uplifted by the man from DPD tomorrow to go to MPB to be sold to someone who would hopefully get the same amount of joy from it that I did. Look after the 7000 whoever you are and it will produce great pictures, just the same as it has done for me almost 23,000 times.

Tomorrow, it will be a day of comings and goings photography wise. Scamp is out in the morning with Veronica for coffee at Calders where I’m told not to go because they don’t serve what I would call coffee.

Oh yes, the Flan!! Wonderful. Worth the trip to Stirling to get the dish. Not any good for you Hazy, too many eggy weggies I think!

Writing – 8 October 2020

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So much writing today.

This morning I sat down to write to my brother. We communicate by email and send each other what we consider our best photos. It’s roughly an email every two months, but I’ve been especially tardy of late and realised with a bit of a shock that my last epistle was sent on the 25th of July. It being the 8th of October today, that makes it nearly three months. I’d a fair bit to tell him, because a lot has happened at this end in the intervening 75 days. It started with Good Morning Alex, and was finally posted with Good Afternoon Alex. He deserved the time. His photos this time were excellent. Another photog who has moved back to Canon from M43. I must admit that I like the Olympus cameras and the Lumix lenses and the light weight of the cameras. I also like the detailed complexity of the menu system that allows you to change almost every bit of the hardware, but I’ve never liked the 4:3 format. I much prefer the 35mm 3:2 format whether it’s full sensor or APS-C. I just think it looks better. Anyway, I finally posted the email with my contribution of images in the afternoon. I felt better after that.

Having been sitting around all day, I needed to get out and walked down to the shops to get some stuff for tonight’s dinner, but mainly for the walk and maybe a chance to grab some photos. I didn’t get the stuff for the dinner and I didn’t get any photos either until I came home. I saw the light shining through the yellow leaves of the chestnut tree outside our house and took some shots of that, but none of them really worked for me. Instead, while I was making dinner I was putting some fish wrappings in the outside bin where they wouldn’t smell the house and saw one of Scamp’s roses just opening and there was still enough light to grab a shot. That was PoD. The rose is Remember Me and it goes through some amazing colour changes from bud to fully opened.

Dinner was Mediterranean Fish Stew. Another one stolen obtained from JIC and Sim’s recipe book, and another winner. I’d definitely make that again.

Sketch prompt today was “Teeth”. I couldn’t decide what to draw that would reference the subject. Scamp suggested the teeth of a comb. I thought of a saw’s teeth. Eventually I just sat and doodled a face with broken teeth and there was today’s picture right there.

Tomorrow all the pubs and restaurants in Central Scotland will close at 6pm and remain closed until the 25th of October. We may go out somewhere, anywhere tomorrow to have a pre-lockout drink or a lunch.