Category: St Mo’s

Off the leash – 28 June 2021

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was off the leash today, off to a witches meeting. That left me with a day to fill and what a day it was shaping up to be.  It was going to be a scorcher.

I didn’t even have to drive her to Denny, she had a lift already arranged with Jeanette. After she left, I got the Dewdrop down from its winter pasture in the front room and after a bit of a struggle, got the tyres pumped up. A quick spray of WD40 on the chain and we were good to go, and we would have gone, but first I wanted a photo or two, so it was off to St Mo’s with the macro lens on the Sony.

The warmth in the last few days has brought on a hatch of lots of insects, but so far, no dragonflies. We still seem to be running a few weeks behind last year’s numbers. There’s nothing we can do about it, it’s just a case of making the best of the opportunities that are available. Available today were Damselflies, Soldier Beetles, Lacewings and a Grasshopper. As well as the insects there was an interesting branch of dried leaves to photograph. Yes, I can see the rolling of the eyes. Let’s just say it’s a photogs thing. The Grasshopper, because it’s such an unusual insect to find in St Mo’s, won PoD. The rest of the menagerie, and the branch are available to peruse on Flickr.

I even managed to include a quick visit to the shops halfway through my photo safari and got the ingredients for a stir-fry which would make a change from pasta on a Monday. When I got home, there was the Dewdrop looking a bit sad because I’d been off playing in St Mo’s and it hadn’t had its run. The first run of the year! Possibly tomorrow. Because I didn’t know if Scamp was needing a run home from Denny, I settled myself with my audio book and a glass of apple juice in the garden and enjoyed the peace and quiet for an hour.

When Scamp arrived home we shared a bottle of Bitter & Twisted, one of my best favourite beers. She took over my garden seat and I started dinner. This stir-fry thing is great. No real skill needed. Chop up the protein (chicken) and fry it. Chuck in some veg and fry it. Chuck in some noodles and some of the sauce and heat it through. Bingo, almost instant dinner.

Beautiful sky tonight. It started off gold and gradually segued through hot orange into pink. It was much more complex than that with at least three different layers of cloud, all changing shapes and colours at different rates.

Tomorrow looks even hotter than today. More Shorts and Tee Shirts and maybe a drive somewhere.

A walk, as predicted – 27 June 2021

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I bowed to the inevitable.

Just a short version of our Broadwood Boarkwalk walk she said, well that’s how it started out. Scamp’s fly that way. She suckers you in with the offer of a short walk, but then she adds an extension and when she thinks you’re not paying attention another half a mile is added. That’s more or less how it happened today.

We started off walking beside the road, then over the boardwalk and back towards the dam. That’s when she posed the question, “Will we just go over the dam and down the other side?” It was a lovely warm morning with barely a breath of wind so I agreed. After the dam, we could have headed back up the hill to the sports centre and home, but ’when she thinks you’re not paying attention …’ She neatly took us up past the exercise machines instead and on to the part where the path turns and twists so you hardly notice that it’s getting steeper, at least until your legs start aching. Finally we walked past the shops where she got her daily fix of pineapple. There were no fresh pineapple chunks to be had, so she had to make do with Mango, Melon and Pineapple strips which is a poor substitute for the real thing!

Lunch was a pizza we’d bought yesterday in Lidl. I think it was a sourdough base. It certainly felt like it. Sourdough is fairly tasty, but I find it quite tough. Maybe too tough for a pizza base. Anyway it was scoffed while we watched Andrew Marr who seemed appalled that the Covid 19 virus had the temerity to infect him, just as if he was an ordinary mortal. I think he was a bit lost now that Matt Hancock has had his Half Hour of fame and has resigned as Health minister after being caught in flagrante with one of his aides. Poor man.

I took the Sony out with an old Zenit Helios 58mm lens in the afternoon. It was an experiment to see how I’d manage with a fairly modern camera and a thirty year old lens. Totally manual. No auto exposure, no auto focus. Just me a camera and a lens. Actually it worked out quite well. I was impressed with the photos and one of them got PoD!  It was a battered and bruised Peacock butterfly.  I was amazed that those damaged wings could hold it in  the air, but they did as the butterfly demonstrated by flying away as soon as I took this shot.

Our dancing in tonight’s class was the best for a long time. I was impressed, but even better, Scamp was impressed. Hopefully we’l be able to build on this during the week and be able to take over teaching the class next week. That’s the long game we’ve been working towards.

Spoke to JIC and hear a bit more about Sim’s first half marathon. Scamp was really impressed with her time. Good to hear about someone doing well.

Tomorrow Scamp is off to a tea party with the witches I might be needed as a driver, but for now I’m on an empty. I might get the bike out or maybe I’ll paint.

Surveyed – 21 June 2021

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A phone call with Hazy and the lady with the cotton buds.

Spoke to Hazy in the morning, glad that she’s feeling a bit better. Heard all her news and we filled in the details of our visit to St Andrews the details that hadn’t been recorded in the blog, that is. Also found out the back story of the Merlin Sheldrake book.

Then it was time to finish playing catch-up with the blog. Photos processed and uploaded. Blog written, but the posting left to later because lunch was on the horizon.

After that the lady with the cotton buds appeared. A new lady who hadn’t been before. Unfortunately the sampling technique hadn’t changed and was just as uncomfortable as ever. I think we are both glad we made the decision not to go with Phase 2: The Blood Letting! Just too invasive. However, we were able to answer “Yes” to a couple of questions about having people in the house, and seemed to surprise her by saying the we’d been to a restaurant more than once in the last seven days. Come on, we may be careful, but we do like to get out too!

Now that the survey was finished for this month I celebrated by going for a walk in St Mo’s. Scamp didn’t want to go today, but agreed that she’d join me tomorrow if I was going out. There were a few flying subjects today. A damselfly and a couple of strange looking little flies. The damselfly won PoD. Still haven’t seen very many dragonflies.

It had been a warm day again with very little breeze, but the weather fairies are warning us that the temperature is set to drop a bit in the next few days. That won’t be as good for daytime activities, but for sleeping at night it will be much more comfortable. The last few nights have been just too warm. Also there is the chance of rain by the end of the week. I don’t mind that, as long as it remembers to turn off after a while.

Tomorrow we may go for that walk. Somewhere nice, perhaps.

Dad’s Day – 20 June 2021

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A lovely day for Father’s Day.

A fairly relaxed start to the day, waiting for the Zoom call at 1pm. Unfortunately I got a message from Hazy, who had organised the Zoom call, to say she wasn’t feeling well and would speak to me later in the week. That was a pity, but some things cannot be avoided.

I was having lamb neck fillet for dinner and it needed a bit of preparation. Crushed Rosemary, Pepper Corns, a Garlic Clove, some Thyme, a pinch of Salt and a drop or two of Olive Oil in a mortar and pestle. Then rubbed the mixture into the meat which was left to marinade in the fridge. With the messy stuff done I could concentrate on typing up more of the blogs from the last few days. Then I needed a walk, so I took the Sony and the macro lens for a walk in St Mo’s.

There wasn’t much sun in the afternoon and as a result not a lot of insect activity. I focused (no pun intended) on some tiny wee flies sitting on grass flowers and also on some umbellifers like wild carrot. The one that became PoD was the wee fly on the grass stem, mainly because it was Scamp’s favourite.

Back home Scamp was tidying up after her flowers! The massive flower heads of the peony roses in her latest bunch of cut flowers were casting all over the floor. Such beautiful flowers leaving such a beautiful carpet of white everywhere. They really should be more careful!

Soon it was time to start the dinner. Scamp was having Trout as her main and we were both sharing potatoes and cabbage. I used my fancy grill pan because the lamb had to be browned first on the hob and then cooked in the oven. Both meals turned out fine.

Dancing tonight started with a Rumba One then a jive version of the same thing. Next was the Foxtrot with its complicated (for me) step routines. We just don’t have enough space to complete the dance. Not enough length and not enough width in the living room. However, I think if we practise the new part of the routine we might be able to fit it in to the space we have available. A quick reprise of the Cha-Cha finished off the torture lesson for tonight.

Spoke to JIC later and complimented him on his strawberries. We might get two berries form our hanging baskets this year. Not a lot else happening down south, it seems.

Watched a F1 GP from Paul Ricard circuit in France that started with a mistake by Verstappen and ended with a tactical error by Mercedes. Between those events it was a pretty dull race, but an exciting finish by Verstappen was worth waiting for.

Tomorrow we’re getting our next four-weekly visit from the lady who offers us the chance to stick a cotton bud down our throat and up our nose. Oh what fun!

Back to life, back to reality – 18 June 2021

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The car was packed and we were driving back south.

We’d started the packing last night, so it was really just a case of tidying up the caravan. Loading all the bags, rucksacks and more bags, plus the pink fluffy plant into various places in the car and pointing it south after we’d done some more shopping at Morrisons which happened to be on our way home. I must admit it was Scamp who did most of the work. I took a phone call from Fred. Not the easiest of calls to take. I’ll leave it at that.

We chose a slightly more picturesque route home, compared to the one the sat nav had chosen for the run up to St Andrews. Basically, after the initial avoidance of Crail and Anstruther, we just hugged the coast and followed it down to Rosyth where we crossed the Queensferry Crossing which is the Third Forth Bridge and from there we followed the M8 until the M73 and then we were on home ground.

After lunch we drove to reluctantly give Annette her caravan keys back, thank her for the opportunity and convince her that we hadn’t left too much of a mess in the ‘van.

Scamp and I went for a walk later in the afternoon and got a picture of some beasties which turned out to be immature Shield Bugs. They just looked like an unruly crowd of teenagers having fun. I couldn’t get that impression out of my head. They made PoD.  We continued our walk to Condorrat and got two fish suppers to celebrate the end of the short holiday.

Thank you Annette for the chance to share your holiday home. We really enjoyed it. I’m not entirely sure we could make a case for owning one ourselves, but it was still great fun.

Tomorrow I intend to relax and try to work out the knots that have appeared in my right calf. Something to do with yesterday’s up hill and down dale walk along the Fife Coastal path. Scamp is intent on starting a week’s worth of washing!

A dull Saturday – 12 June 2021

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Not a day for doing much or going anywhere, although it did brighten up later.

Scamp did a bit of tidying up in the garden and moved some plants around to give them more sun and also to put them in places where they could be seen better. I deadheaded some of the aquilegia plants to, hopefully force them to produce more flowers. Scamp also cut the grass at the front and edged it I am now reminded!

We had the other half of yesterday’s quiche for lunch. I think I prefer it cold, while Scamp definitely prefers it hot. After lunch I took the camera for a walk in St Mo’s. Snapped a few damselflies, but because I hadn’t lifted the macro lens, none of them were acceptably in focus. I walked out behind St Mo’s school and disturbed a big dragonfly. It flew around for a while before almost crashing into me. It seemed to perch in a tree, but when I looked I couldn’t find it. PoD turned out to be a little fragile looking damselfly that seemed to be playing hide and seek with me hiding behind a stem. Every time I moved, it moved too. I took some photos of it and left it to its game.

When I cropped the damselfly photo in Lightroom later, it was really a small image. However, this new Lightroom has the ability to enlarge a photo to four times it original size without losing definition. That’s what I did. The process is called ‘Enhance’ and that’s what it does. It takes a fair bit of processing power to do it and the PoD took almost 30 seconds. The wait was worth it, because the quality is quite amazing.

We walked over to Condorrat tonight to pick up a Golden Bowl dinner we’d ordered. Two Chicken Chop Suey and two Fried Rice. Just as good as it always is. It’s great that some things don’t change in this world.

After dinner, Scamp and I watered the garden, just the front garden and just with watering cans. If the warm dry weather continues we may hose back and front gardens tomorrow night. We had a quick practise later for tomorrow’s class. The routines are a bit rough, but we have most of the steps in the right place.

No plans for tomorrow. We’ll see what the weather brings us.

 

It almost rained today – 9 June 2021

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Not quite rain, but a definite dampness in the air.

Scamp was feeling a bit fragile this morning, having been a bit sick during the night, but after a big dollop of the white medicine that has been sitting on the top of the cupboard for ages she gradually felt better as the day progressed. I think the medicine is peppermint flavoured white emulsion paint, but it seemed to do the trick.

Just before lunchtime there was a sprinkling of rain. Not enough to satisfy Scamp, but better than nothing. It didn’t last long either, but it did at least wet the plants. After it had turned off again, I went out to photograph School Girl, the rose at the front door. The first flower bud opened today and it was right at the top. Standing on tiptoes I could just get a clear shot of it. It looked good with the raindrops beading on the leaves and gave me another chance to get lots of salacious views on Flickr with the usual title of “Wet Schoolgirl” or something similar. You’d be surprised by just how many views, not likes, just views, that title brings in. I really don’t know draws so many people people to a picture of a peachy pink rose ☺️!

Because of the delicate state of the patient, and the disappointing weather today we didn’t really go very far. We just kept waiting for more of the promised rain. It never came back for a long time and I got fed up waiting, so I grabbed a camera and took it for a walk in St Mo’s. I was sure I’d already got a decent PoD, but if you don’t go and look, you can’t complain about not having a photo. I went, I looked but I didn’t get anything that beat the rose picture, partly because the battery died after about ten shots.

By dinner time Scamp was feeling like her old self again and she even made tonight’s dinner which was Kedgeree and although it was a bit dry, I liked it and told her so. She thought it needed salt and more liquid. Maybe she’s right, but it was fine for me.

After dinner the rain returned. It seemed to be just about enough to wet the ground again, so we may have to consider doing a rain dance tomorrow if the dry spell continues.

Hoping for a better day tomorrow and also hoping that Scamp gets a restful night’s sleep tonight.

Coffee and Visitors’ Biscuits – 8 June 2021

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It was the biscuits that swung it for me.

Isobel phoned this morning asking if we wanted to come down and visit today. She said we could have a cup of coffee and she’d bought Visitors’ biscuits. I didn’t know what visitors’ biscuits were, but I was fairly sure they weren’t Rich Teas or Digestives, so I was up for it, so was Scamp. She was on the phone to Annette about a certain caravan in St Andrews that would become vacant some time soon, so I agreed for her and said Scamp would phone her when the deal was done with Annette.

I had a couple of Aquilegia plants to pot up for Isobel, so I got started to that and we were almost ready to go. Just a quick cup of coffee first then we were off to the Village.

We had an entertaining hour or so with Isobel then she gave us a guided tour of her garden. She has a wealth of plants in her fairly small garden and takes no prisoners. If she thinks a plant if failing, it gets chucked out. I’m sure Scamp gets some of her gardening nous from Isobel. Oh yes, and the biscuits were Tunnocks Teacakes and very nice they were too!

On the way home we stopped at Tesco and came out with a shopping bag fairly clinking with our ‘groceries’. A bottle of gin, one of Pimms and one of Limoncello. All the bottles were reduced, so some money spent, but a fair amount saved too! We drove home.

Hazy phoned almost as we crossed the threshold of the house and we had a long chat. Lots of books discussed and yes, Hazy, The Hidden Palace is now on my wish list. I may even re-read the Gollem and the Djinni too, if I can remember how to read after all the Audible books!

Went for a walk in St Mo’s in the afternoon to give the ‘new’ Samyang 18mm lens a good test and it passed with flying colours. Every shot from macro, through middle distance to far distance was in focus. It’s such a pity that I had to shell out an extra £50 to buy the lens station that would allow me to upgrade the firmware. It’s just another case of a company expecting users to do their work for them and also having to pay for the privilege. The rush to get technology on the market ahead of rivals means that the tech itself goes on the shelf only part finished. It’s things like this that make me give up on some companies like Samyang. Yes, they are cheap, but yes, they are nasty too! Rant number 2 this week is over.

Dinner tonight was Butter Chicken, but for some reason this time the sauce was a bit acidic. It can only be down to the passata as that’s really the only thing that was changed since the last time. Next time I’ll just used blitzed tomatoes. Still makes a decent curry sauce, though.

PoD went to a bunch of clover flowers photographed with the updated Samyang 18mm.

No plans for tomorrow. It looks like being a wet morning.

 

 

Hooray for rain – 5 June 2021

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Out looking for compost and a pot.

Such exciting lives we lead sometimes. What could be a more satisfying thing to do on a Saturday afternoon that taking a trip to the garden centre for a bag of ericaceous compost and a chance to compare the size, shape and price of different plant pots. In the end we did buy the compost, but passed on the pots, judging them no better than the one we’d bought earlier in the week. For once we were totally focused on the task in hand and didn’t really look at the plants on sale, we just bought the compost and went home.

It was a was a warm day and I just knew Scamp would want to get the new rhododendron planted in its slightly acidic compost. I, on the other hand wanted to have a look for some damsels or even some dragons. It was warm enough to wear a pair of shorts instead of jeans and that’s what I did. I walked over to St Mo’s, but there were no damsels or dragons to be seen. I took some photos of hawthorn blossom before I found what would be PoD. It was a little black fly crawling about on a tree trunk. I’m guessing it’s a Wasp Fly of some description, but I was struck by its strange eyes. The compound eye seems to have a simple eye in the middle of it. Since it’s on Flickr, someone will probably be able to ID it for me. Anyway, it got PoD.

Came back and Scamp was putting the final touches to the planting and was trying to water the rhododendron in, but something was blocking the watering can. She cleaned the rose from the watering can but that didn’t help, then she found that something was stuck in the spout. After prodding it with a garden cane, out popped a snail, complete with shell. How it managed to climb into the watering can and get stuck in the spout we’ll never know. I thought it was only Incy Wincy Spider who did things like that!

After dinner we watched a Baku F1 GP qualifying session with more than its fair share of crashes. Everyone seemed to want to throw their million pound race cars into the barriers today … and that was just the qualifying! What will the actual race be like, tomorrow?

Since we had missed last week’s dance practise, we though we should do a walk through of what we’ve learned so far, and we have learned quite a lot. Tonight we walked through two different waltz routines, a rumba, a tango and a cha-cha. We sort of walked through the first part of the foxtrot too, but couldn’t remember or agree on the first five or six steps. Hopefully it will all become clear tomorrow.

My weather app on my phone has been promising rain today for most of the week. It was apparently going to start at 4pm. They got it wrong by almost an hour. Just after 4.45 the first raindrops hit the window. It turned to hail for a time and then went back to rain again. It didn’t last all that long, but it did mean we didn’t have to water the garden, so the snail will be relieved.

Tomorrow seems like a better day and if the weather app is as accurate as it was today we may get out for a walk.

Coffee for three – 4 June 2021

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For the first time in ages we had a quorum when the call went out for coffee.

Scamp was away first to meet Veronica for a walk around Broadwood Loch. I was next, away to meet Val for coffee. We had barely sat down when Colin joined us. I’d missed his reply to my email invitation. For the first time in ages most of us were available. Fred had to call off as he was taking his wife to a hospital appointment. As you can imagine, discussions were wide ranging and interesting but without politics rearing its ugly head. Time just flew by and it was Val who had to leave first to meet his wife to go shopping. That seemed to break the spell and we all left to go our separate ways.

Back home and after lunch, Scamp drove us up to Tesco and we did a bit of shopping. Just essentials today, although I did get a few bottles of beer and Scamp selected a suitable bottle of wine, oh yes, and some ice cream. Like I said, just the essentials.

Back home, I grabbed the Sony with its big, heavy, slow macro lens, put it in a small rucksack and went over to St Mo’s on a damsel-hunt. I couldn’t find anything worth taking the camera out of its bag for, but wandered round the pond and then tried again. Immediately I found a couple of Large Red damselflies sitting on the upstand of the boardwalk. Took a few shots, then went looking for a dragonfly or two, but none were there to be found today. Walked back and found the two damselflies were now joined in the mating position with the male grasping the female at the back of her head. They sat quite patiently and gave me the opportunity to get some detailed photos. The Sigma 105mm may be big, heavy and slow to focus, but it really does resolve a lot of detail when it gets the chance. The mating pair became PoD. The rucksack makes it much easier to carry heavy kit like the Sony/Sigma pair although it is a bit more awkward to get quick access to the camera compared to the black Lowepro sling bag.

Scamp went out to sit and read in the garden later while I made Paella for dinner. It turned out really well although I hadn’t done anything different to what I’d done many times before. It’s probably just an extra gram or two of spice or herbs that tilts the flavour enough to make things taste different.

Tomorrow we may go out to get some more compost for the rhododendron and I may shovel some more earth on the potatoes which are showing their green leaves above the soil again.