Category: Rain

Dancin’ workout – 11 February 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Today was a dancin’ day and no mistake. No respite either!

The warmup today was a the Cameron Quickstep. That’s almost half a circuit of the floor, even before the teachers begin to make additions. Apparently it’s really a sequence dance! I can’t see many Tea Dancers doing this one without a defibrillator nearby. We tried it slow – a walk through and it was achievable. Then the teachers turned the music on and it was chaos. What comes next?? Is it the Zig Zag or is it the Chair? Nobody seemed to know or care. It was that old joke, all the moves were there, just not in the right order. Eventually, and I mean eventually we worked out where we were, what comes next and where we were meant to be. After half an hour we were exhausted, well, at least I was. I had to have a wee sit down to get my breathing back to normal.

We left the quickstep behind and did a wee relaxing Bossa Nova to cool us down before we entered the next 30min class on Foxtrot. I thought we had this in the bag, but it was in the wrong bag, not the one I’d brought. After some corrections from Jane and then Stewart, we began to find the dance we’d practised for a couple of turns round the living room. The living room Foxtrot bore some resemblance to the Brookfield (big hall) version, but only an expert could see it. Again, eventually, we managed to put all the pieces together and it began to sort of flow.

Another break and it was time for the third half hour which would be Tango. We can do a fairly representative tango, but then the teachers decided to add in another part that was new to us. It wasn’t difficult, in fact it was similar to another part of the routine and that’s what made it difficult. It was similar, but not the same, possibly too similar. In time we’ll either work it in properly or erase it from our memory – probably the latter.

Just to keep our heart rate up it was a couple of Midnight Jives to finish. I’m not sure whether that was a dance class or a workout. It was good and we learned a lot, but I was exhausted by the time we were walking out into the drizzly rain.

Drove home again via the M8/M74 route and stopped for rolls and a Danish pastry at the shops on the way home. I was so knackered, I went for a 45min snooze in the afternoon. By then it was dinner time and we’d agreed on a fish supper each for dinner. I walked to Condorrat and was back in about 15 mins. Record time. On the way there in the gathering gloom I got today’s PoD which was taken in the Adventure Playground in the park on the path to Condorrat. Lurking around in a kids playpark after dark! That sounds dodgy, but I love these rough cut balancing toys they look so graphic.

Today’s prompt was The Big Blue. Not only had I not seen this film, I’d never even heard of it. The only Big Blue I was aware of was IBM! However, I went with the flow (no pun intended) and watched the previews on YouTube. Still it meant very little to me.
The deepest I’ve dived, personally, was 2m in the swimming pool at Butlins, or was it Pontins? I can’t remember. But I do remember it didn’t give me the urge to go any deeper. However, I do remember you needed flippers, and a mask better than the ones you got in Woolworths, so that’s what I’ve sketched and painted today. I like the mask. It’s quite manic looking. Like a Japanese Daruma with both eyes painted in!

Tomorrow we may be resting our weary limbs. We might walk to the shops if we can summon the energy!

It was a dull day again – 24 January 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Worse than that, it was a dull day with rain. Never a good combination.

Scamp’s cough wasn’t abating and by the time I’d showered and shaved, she was just ending a call to the doc’s and had been given an appointment with the nurse for mid afternoon.

It hadn’t looked as if we would be going anywhere anyway, and as the cough had been there since Friday, it was time to let a professional have a look at it. I was planning on making a pot of soup in the new magic pot. This was to be Minestrone, but a different recipe from our usual one. Some unusual ingredients like courgette in the recipe would be interesting.

We drove up to the surgery. I dropped Scamp there and then went to Tesco to get the extra ingredients for the soup. I also managed to get a bottle of Benylin, Red Benylin no less. This is the most sought after medicine of the moment and here was a bottle sitting on a shelf, the last one again. Yesterday’s bottle of Benylin had been the wrong one, but it too had been the last one on the shelf. Drove back to the surgery and was just parking when Scamp appeared from the chemist and we drove home. She was told to take 8 steroid pills a day for five days and was also give a five day course of antibiotics. Shake her and she’ll rattle! but they seem to work because she’s not coughing quite as much.

I chopped the veg and made the soup and it tasted really too thick and quite bitter. A generous pinch of sugar helped with the bitter taste and after decanting a bowl full of concentrated tomato soup and replacing it with a bowl full of hot water, then giving it another 3min pressure cook, we had a decent minestrone. Still not as good as the original, but the courgette worked well in the mixture of veg. My only mistake was channeling my Simon & Garfunkel when I bought my herbs. I bought Sage and it should have been Thyme. Parsley would have been good too, but Rosemary would have been overpowering. You can have too much of a good thing!!

We watched an episode of Silent Witness, but the shock factor is being overplayed now and it’s becoming difficult to see where the past ends and the present begins. We both agreed after the first episode that it’s time to put it to bed, so the entire series was deleted. Thankfully you can do that with just one button now on Virgin.

I’d decided when we came back from the doc’s that I wasn’t going out in the drizzly rain to take photos I wasn’t really interested in. That’s why today’s PoD is cut flowers. Usually a photo of flowers is a last resort for me, but today’s were planned and I knew Scamp was just waiting for an opportunity to throw some of the wilting flowers out and the wilting ones are my favourites. I could have used more interesting lighting, but I was happy with my Yellow Lilies. They became PoD.

Tomorrow is to be a better day than today. We might just manage a short walk if Scamp is up to it. We’ll wait and see.

 

Dancin’ … badly – 12 January 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Today was the first Tea Dance of the year.

It was raining when we woke, which wasn’t surprising because it had been raining all night after a beautifully clear day yesterday. When I was opening the curtains this morning I was drawn to the distortion caused by raindrops running down the window. I thought the two geranium plants made a good foreground and trusting my new phone, I took some shots as ‘bankers’, just in case I didn’t get a chance to get some with my ‘real’ camera. That was a good move, as it turned out, because the rain just kept coming all day.

By midday we were almost ready to drive to Glenburn, south of Paisley for the tea dance. A much smaller group than normal today which was a double edged sword. More room to practise the moves we had sort of forgotten, but on the other hand, nowhere to hide when we made mistakes, and we did make mistakes, both of us. I was the worst though, I’ll admit it. Even dancing the two simple waltzes we know I still managed to make a load of mistakes. Sequence dances I could handle, but it’s the repetition that cements the steps and of course the ‘sequence’ of those steps. The other plus for sequence dances is that they are danced in a circle, so most of the time there’s someone in front of you to watch and learn from. Waltz, Foxtrot and Quickstep are a different kettle of fish. You’re out on a limb with them. If you do find yourself making mistakes or if you lose the sequence of the steps, your partner is going to give you THAT STARE! I know, I’ve been there. Having said all that, we had a great time. Almost two hours of dancing that passed in a flash. We sat with Barry and Cath and the conversation was good.

Drove home through more lashing rain and went the ‘long way’ down the M74 and the M73 and continued on to Tesco to post a birthday card to one of Scamp’s pals and get some Thursday stuff. You know what I mean. Thursday is still ‘Prize day’.

Dinner was a fall back, Fish Fingers, Egg and Spaghetti (it has to be tinned spaghetti). The fish fingers went between two pieces of butter bread and became a Fish Finger Sandwich. Delicious.

Remember those photos I took in the morning? One of them became PoD. I’d shot them in RAW format. Very few phone cameras will record in RAW which is an uncompressed, unprocessed, literally raw image file. Usually it takes up a lot more space in the phone’s memory, but the excellent quality makes up for that. I dumped them into Lightroom and after half an hour of tweaking it looked presentable, so that’s what you see here.

Tomorrow is a busy day. Scamp’s intending to go out to FitSteps class in the morning and I’m hoping to start by making the dough for the night’s bread. John & Marion are coming to dinner. First time they’ve been here for ages. Looking forward to it.

Wet! – 10 January 2023

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It was raining when I went to make breakfast and it’s still raining tonight. It hasn’t stopped!

Scamp was feeling better this morning. Sometimes a bit dizzy, but not nearly as bad as yesterday. As the day progressed and it looked like we wouldn’t have been going anywhere anyway because of the weather we settled down to regroup and relax.

Lunch was scrambled eggs for Scamp which I messed up the first time. “How can you mess up scrambled eggs?” I hear you ask? I mean, the word ‘Scrambled’ in the name describes it perfectly. My excuse is that I added water to the eggs before I beat them, it should have been milk. Scamp corrected me and watched over me as I made this culinary delight, especially delightful if you’ve a dodgy stomach. I had the much more rustic piece ’n’ square sausage cooked medium rare, just the way I like it.

After lunch and after being assured that she was fighting fit, Scamp started the ironing and I parcelled up Hazy’s calendar then drove up to Tesco to post it. Drove back home in torrential rain again and not long after that, Hazy herself phoned. She’d read the blog and wanted to know how the patient was. I think she was relieved to hear the Scamp was feeling a lot better. We talked for a while about holidays to come and problems with planes, Neil’s surgery, which seems to be healing well and also cats with heart problems. All in all we covered a fair bit of ground.

Dinner was just a plate of the tomato soup we’d put in the freezer last week. It was ideal for today. Easy to thaw out and reheat, and gentle on the stomach. I do think that soup brightened the invalid up, because she was back to her old self after that.

I still hadn’t a photo of the day and it was a tube of Rowntrees Pastilles that gave me the idea, that and a torch I’d been playing with all afternoon. It’s a set of traffic lights made with the new Rowantrees Illuminated Pastilles which missed the Christmas shelves due to the train strike or the postal strike or any other strike you care to mention. It doesn’t matter, they’re fictitious anyway!

Tomorrow, Scamp is going for coffee with Isobel and June. I’m sure I could come too, but not when there are three women all talking at the same time. I don’t think I’d fit in, nor would I be able to get a word in. Anyway I have work to do at home that will keep me occupied for an hour or so. If possible I’d like a dry half hour some time before the sun sets.

What a delightful day – 5 January 2023

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Yes, that was sarcasm!

Dry early in the morning, but after that the rain came and forgot to leave. Also the rain slid in quite quietly, but got stronger and heavier as the day progressed.

I suggested that we go to The Bothy near Stirling for lunch and Scamp readily agreed. It’s a nice wee cafe/restaurant at the foot of the Ochil Hills. We’d been there before and I had great memories of the Sri Lankan Lamb Curry. Maybe I’d have something different this time.

The place was busy when we arrived and they were handing out buzzers which isn’t really a good sign. We were told a wait time of about fifteen minutes. Half an hour later our buzzer buzzed and we were shown to our table for two. A quick glance at the menu while Scamp was looking for her glasses confirmed my choice. There it was on the menu Sri Lankan Lamb Curry. My day was going to be fine and hang the bad weather. Scamp chose Mac ’n’ Cheese, her second favourite on the menu. We weren’t disappointed.

After our I grabbed a few photos of the Ochils with the rain clouds misting them and a massive flock of geese in the field at the bottom. A panorama made in Lightroom from three of the frames got PoD. I had another try at photo of the Wallace Monument without the irritating electricity lines catching the eye, but it didn’t work, so I went with the geese on the grass at the foot of the hills. Then it was time to drive through Stirling because Scamp wanted to visit Dobbies. However, the shop was doing its Twelfth Night changeover from Christmas to Valentine’s Day, so it was, in a word, shambolic. We drove home.

For a three cylinder car the Micra fought its way through torrential rain and standing water to get us home safely and in good time. We stopped off at Tesco for a bunch of flowers for Scamp (it was Thursday, remember) and to see if the rum tanker had made it through. Flowers were bought, but no sign of the rum yet.

We watched the first episode of The Apprentice tonight, but it was more of an advert for Antigua than the usual contest, but the usual n-hopers were there and one of them got fired.

It’s a windy night tonight, but it might be a dry afternoon tomorrow.

Standing water – 30 December 2022

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Scamp was going to have coffee with Shona today.

I drove Scamp up to Costa in the town centre. What should have been a quick journey turned out to be a bit fraught. I thought I’d be smart and take the shortcut through Condorrat. Alas the sign saying No Road On Right had fallen down. I hadn’t noticed it at the time, but once on to the closed road there was nowhere to go but back again. Still stuck on the idea that this was a shortcut, I carried on round the Condorrat ring road. Then I was stuck in a queue because the road was flooded almost right across the road and cars were taking turns to drive through it. We did eventually get through the flooded stretch, but it was deeper than I’d first thought.

I came home the normal way and went to get my meds, then went next door to Tesco and got some fish because I was making a fish risotto for dinner. I also got a vanilla pod to use for Sunday’s dessert. Almost six quid for one vanilla pod? Somebody’s having a joke here. The reason the road was flooded this morning was because it had rained incessantly through the night, but when I came out of Tesco the sky was clear and the sun was shining. Where did all the rain go? Not a cloud to be seen!

I drove home, dumped the stuff and grabbed my camera bag and went over to St Mo’s. Of course, as soon as I left the house the sun disappeared and the first spots of rain appeared. Undeterred I carried on and got some photos of the flooded pond. Not the most interesting photos and by this time the white cloud had covered the sky, so there was no texture from that either. Still, I had a photo or five and an hour ago I didn’t think I was going to get any.

I walked home and just as I got in, my phone rang. Scamp’s bus from the town centre hadn’t appeared. I drove up to the town centre and picked her up. I made sure I came home the long, but unfolded way.

After lunch which was yesterday’s soup with croutons, or fried bread if you prefer, I settled down to write to Peter Hayward who I used to work beside. I’d only just got started when two cards dropped through the letter box. One for Scamp and one for me from Peter. After reading it I felt even worse for not writing sooner. But the letter was finished and in with the belated Christmas card then I walked over and found I’d just missed today’s collection. Never mind, it wouldn’t have been going anywhere until Monday or Tuesday anyway. After dropping it in the post box I felt a lot happier.

Back home again I started the dinner. It was Leek and Haddock with Cabbage. The cabbage wasn’t really meant to go in the risotto, but it was languishing in the chiller drawer of the fridge and it seemed a shame no to use it. Apparently that was a really good risotto. I don’t know what I did differently, but I too liked it.

The photo you see here as PoD has a more interesting sky than when the shot was taken. I don’t consider that cheating because I took the photo of the sky months ago and just got an app to insert it, and its reflection into the picture. By the way, its title was Porcupine, because that’s what I thought of when I first saw this big clump of reeds!

Tomorrow there’s talk that it may, just may, be dry. If that’s the case we might go for a walk. Drumpellier has been mentioned.

Glasgow in the rain … and sun – 29 December 2022

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Four seasons in one day? Why stop at four? Scotland can deliver four seasons in as many seconds, but it doesn’t always choose to do so.

We drove up to Tesco today, then headed in to Glasgow and the sun was shining … for a while. Then the rain came. After that the sun came out and dried up all the rain just like in Incy Wincy Spider. We got parked on level 4 of Buchanan Galleries and walked down Buchanan Street. It was raining again and the rain continued all the way down Bucky Street. I spotted a potential PoD outside the Apple shop with its resident sandwich board hopeful. Almost did a “Bad Thing” when I accidentally unscrewed the lens on the A7. Luckily none of the wet stuff got into the lens or the camera. Locked it securely on and continued taking photos as if nothing had happened. Dropped in at Tiso to get some waterproofer for our Bergy jackets which are absorbing more water than they are shrugging off. Thankfully the Goretex is doing its job properly and that water shall not pass!

First stop was Argento to get the Nominations charm she should have got from Santa. Thanks to a helpful sales assistant we got it, and another one she’d bought before Christmas, installed into the bracelet in the shop.

We walked further down the road, but there was a fire alarm in Frazer’s department store and the place had been evacuated which meant that there were people everywhere, almost blocking the pedestrian precinct. We were ready to go home, so we walked along Argyle Street and up Queen Street. Had a browse in Cass Art, but I don’t need any materials, I just need to take time to produce some paintings or drawings.

The carnival was still in almost full flow in George Square and I got a photo I had missed when Alex and I had visited a few weeks ago. It was a trio of carousel horses, but have a look on Flickr and check the names. Can you still get away with that? Apparently you can. Show folk are obviously not as PC as some!

Scamp had a voucher to use up in JL, so she treated us both to tea and a cake. I ordered coffee instead of tea. I’m not sure what I got, but it wasn’t my kind of coffee. The cakes were just lovely. Scamp’s was and Orange Grove and mine was a Red Velvet. That was our high calorie lunch.

I’d been looking at a ‘returned’ pair of binoculars before Christmas. JL doesn’t do ‘used’, or heaven forbid, ‘second hand’ items. Luckily they were still there. I tried them out in the shop and they were just what as good as they looked. I took them. Scamp demanded that she pay for them as they were a late Christmas present for me. I started to argue, but a wagged finger told me to just say “thank you”, which I did.

We drove home via Curry’s in Coatbridge because I wanted photo paper. I found the paper I wanted and bought two boxes because they would come in handy. I got a surprise at the till because there was money off if you bought two! Bingo!

Back home I had one more thing to buy, a bottle of Dark Matter rum. A spicy hot rum. Unfortunately Tesco weren’t stocking it, but what I noticed was a bottle of Langs Banana Rum. It had been discontinued many years ago and I thought it was dead and gone forever. I sampled some tonight and although it’s more a banana flavour than a rum distilled with actual bananas, there is a hint of the old rum there.

Last night I roasted some tomatoes and red peppers with a couple of small onions. Today I made soup from the veg, all by myself … well, almost. With helpful suggestions from Scamp and also following the soup recipe from the Instant Pot, I made a pot of Tomato and Red Pepper soup. It’s a bit thinner than my last batch, but a lot easier.

PoD turned out to be the bloke with the advertising sigh outside the Apple Store in Buchanan Street. He looked totally ‘drookit’.

Tomorrow Scamp is intending going for coffee with Shona, but I might pass on that. I’ve a letter I need to write. One I should have written a year ago.

Snow, Sleet and Rain – 27 December 2022

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That’s the short list of our weather today in chronological order.

It was obvious when the snow started that we weren’t going to get that walk today. What we did do instead was rearrange the kitchen and some of the cupboards. We were trying to make space for New Stuff and also use it as an excuse to get rid of old stuff. However, it was unlikely that the council skips would be open today, because today was a Substitute Bank Holiday for Christmas Day. Does that mean that Christmas Day gets a holiday to itself today? I don’t know, but as it came up only on my Samsung calendar, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it. Anyway, I collected some unused or broken small electrical items and they are now sitting in an IKEA bag in the back bedroom. I’m hoping to take them away later in the week.

I did make a loaf in the morning, but it didn’t turn out very well. Oven too low? Yeast too old? I’m not sure, but we’ll try toasting it tomorrow and if that doesn’t improve it, the remainder goes in the bin. I also braved the rain and took some photos in the garden. Abstract images for a change. Today’s PoD is a macro shot of the pea netting after it’s been messed about with in various apps!

It really was a dull day today. It started getting dark just after midday, but to keep our minds off it, Scamp launched into her ‘tidy the kitchen’ project. I’m sure it’s something to do with New Year. My mum, and her mum too were fanatical about having the house tidy for New Year. It was considered bad luck to allow the new year in to a dirty or untidy house. I’m sure it’s in the Scottish genes to continue this tradition. My part in the process was cleaning the extractor fan filter above the cooker. It’s a filthy job and it took me quite a while to get it looking decent and a new filter fitted. It’s done now, but I reckon it may need checked in about six months.

In the evening, we watched the first two episodes of The Crow Road, a Scottish mystery drama by Iain Banks from 1996. It was strange seeing these younger versions of folk who have aged a bit since it was filmed and also remember some who are no longer with us. Hoping to watch the final two episodes on iPlayer tomorrow.

That was a dull day but we got stuff done. We also had a practise at the Quickstep and Foxtrot, just to keep them fresh in our heads.

Tomorrow we may go for a walk, but it all depends on the weather.

 

Shopping – 19 December 2022

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Today we were going out in the wide world, maybe even as far as Stirling.

The rain that started last night had continued all night and into this morning. It had done a good job of removing most of the ice that had held us in its grip for the last week. Today we were driving to Stirling to get some messages, but as Waitrose is posh, we’ll have to call it “Shopping”.

Waitrose was utter madness. There were cars circling the parking area just hoping to get lucky and find a space. I dropped Scamp off near the door and told her I’d pay to park at the council car park just along the road and bring the car round when we were ready to go home. That was the plan, but instead of leaving, I found a space just being exited right in front of me. I took it and said “thank you” to the crazy driver who had reversed out of it at speed and nearly “tee boned” the bloke in front of me. I let Crazy Driver go and slipped into his space.

After almost an hour of wandering round the shop and with a full trolley we loaded everything into the boot of the blue car and drove home. Lunch was the remainder of yesterday’s quiches and they tasted better today, well, mine did anyway. Scamp made no disparaging comments about her’s, so I guess she agreed. By about 2pm it felt like the sun was setting, so it was boots on and out to St Mo’s for a photo before the little photons disappeared entirely. PoD became two Dogwood branches with their very wet berries. The bright red stems do a lot to brighten the landscape.

Back home I got a phone call from what looked like Margaret Kent, but it was her husband, Bill who spoke. Margaret had passed away at the end of June and he was apologising for not telling me about it at the time. The poor man sounded devastated and I felt so sorry for him. Margaret was my second cousin. Her mother and my mum were cousins, but I always knew her as my cousin. Then Billy told me that Maureen, another second cousin had died in September. Both of them had been seriously ill for a couple of years, but we occasionally bumped into each other. That put a bit of a damper on the day.

The snow has now all gone and most of the ice too. We might go in to Glasgow on the bus tomorrow, all being well.

A distinct quiet – 16 December 2022

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There was a distinct quiet about when I woke, almost as if everything was muffled. That probably meant it was snowing or it had snowed during the night.

I took a look outside and indeed, everything was white. Cars, road, trees and paths, everything. It wasn’t actually snowing at the time, but it definitely had been. One poor bloke was clearing his dark red car and getting ready for the morning commute. However, as it was about 6.50 in the am, I went back to bed and slept for another couple of hours before getting up to make breakfast. You can’t rush these things.

When I looked out a two hours later there were only two sets of footprints showing on our path. It must have been Wullie who lives at the corner and works odd hours. Nobody else had moved their cars and the space left by the dark red car was now covered in snow, so there had been another fall of the white stuff when I wasn’t watching. The temperature was a remarkable 0.3ºc when I was making the breakfast, a POSITIVE 0.3ºc. It felt like it had been weeks since the temperature had been above zero, but it was only a few days.

After breakfast I wrote my remaining cards and, dressed for the weather, I walked over to Condorrat to post them. I was hoping against hope that they would arrive on someone’s mat before new year, but I wasn’t confident about their chances.

On my way to Condorrat I took a photo of some leaves that would turn out to be the PoD. Just some warm brown leaves in a bunch without any frost or snow on them, but surrounded by lots of raindrops on the branches, in fact there was a very fine drizzle in the air. On my way back home I took a detour round St Mo’s pond, bit couldn’t see anything that would compete with the leaves. No directional light, you see. You really need directional light to give you shadows and form, to take away the two dimensional look of a photo.

Lunch was a bowl of Slimmers Soup. I don’t know if it is actually slimming, but the recipe came from Slimmers World via June and it’s quick to make and is just what you need when you’ve been out chilled in the snowy wastes. Scamp made it and it always tastes good.

We had already cancelled a dinner date with John and Marion for today because of the weather. Today we got a message to say that dance class tomorrow is also cancelled. One of the teachers is suffering from a cold or flu and doesn’t want to pass on her ‘Lurgy’. That’s a pity, but better safe than sorry in this weather.

Dinner tonight is Salmon fillet and potatoes for Scamp and a tub of stew Scamp discovered in the freezer. Both went down well. A wee glass of wine helped them on their way.

It’s been raining on and off all day and the temperature has been rising. We’re now up to 3.4ºc and the snow is finally receding. No real plans for tomorrow, but we’re hoping to get out somewhere if the roads are still clear.