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I had intended to visit the Escher exhibition in Edinburgh today, but after driving to the train station, I couldn’t get a parking space. There were cars abandoned everywhere. Some on the grass at the side, some with two wheels in the flower beds, some just sitting with their engine running their occupants waiting for a space to become available. At just gone 9.15 in the morning, that was going to be a long wait. There were also around five or six cars slowly cruising round the car park looking for a space, at least I hope they were looking for a space. They might have been practising their kerb crawling skills for all I know.  After having had my time on this boring roundabout, I made my apologies and left to grab my Nikon and exchange culture for some sun on my back.

I drove to Auchinstarry and walked the walk along the railway, delighted at my decision to walk in the sun rather than stand in admiration in a gallery. There was bit of dew on the grass and spider webs along the path which is a reminder that we are more than half way through September. Also, the Himalayan Balsam plants are setting their explosive seed pods but a lot of them are still flowering. Further indications that although the sun is out, summer is now gone and autumn is certainly on its way. If further proof was needed, the leaves on the trees are turning on their autumn colours. It’s all to do with the sugars, you know.

In the afternoon, I took the bull by the horns and reset my Nexus 7 from languishing in Lollypop (Android 5.2) to kicking it in Kit-Kat (Android 4.4.3). I used the instructions from here.
It worked perfectly, I’m glad to say. It just feels so much faster and smoother. Also, when I registered my Gmail address, the device immediately started downloading all my apps, so nothing was lost except data and as my worthwhile data was all stored on Dropbox, it will be easy to get that back if I wish.
Wouldn’t it be great if you could downgrade your Windows 8 PC back to Windows 7?
Wouldn’t it be great to remove Yosemite and replace it with Mountain Lion?
On the subject of Yosemite, It’s amazing that the App Store shows that 67 people voted the OS 5 stars and 57 voted it 1 star, and if you read the reviews, most of those 57 would have given it 0 stars or a negative rating if it was possible. Hard to believe that Apple see this disaster of an OS  as the way forward. Maybe they should listen to their customers. Now, that would be innovative, wouldn’t it.

If it’s a bit difficult seeing the detail in the pics today, either click on the mosaic or go here.  All rights reserved and all photos copyright of D. Campbell (that’s me).

Such a busy day today. I think this is the first time I’ve manage to sit down for a few minutes.
Painting in the morning. I’d intended this to be an oil painting, laid on top of an acrylic ground on a canvas, but it turned out to be an acrylic on acrylic on canvas. Confused yet? I’ve taken the advice of one of the books I’ve been reading recently and assessed the basic colour scheme of my intended artwork. Then I paint the canvas with a ground which is the contrasting colour to the dominant one in the painting. Ha! You’re confused now aren’t you? It’s an interesting idea and I think it works. It’s so different from painting in watercolour where you have to plan the painting before you put brush to paper. You leave bare paper to produce the whites. In acrylic (and oils), you can add the whites later, in fact, some experts say the whites should be added last. Also, this is a small 200mm x 200mm square canvas and I don’t like squares – too static, you see. However, it’s working so far. Time will tell.

After the arty farty stuff, I made the chicken curry for tonight’s dinner and then some bread. Usually I just bung all the ingredients into the mixer and set it to go for 10 minutes. Today, for some reason, I kneaded the dough myself. It’s a good feeling kneading sticky dough until it turns out smooth. Very therapeutic.

After that it was off to the gym and swim while Scamp’s ladies were practising their singing. Came back too early and they were still at it, so I grabbed my bike and cycled off to one of my favourite bramble patches and got just about half a kilo of fruit. Most of the fruit isn’t ready yet, maybe another week or so.

Dancing at night, and thank goodness our usual teacher was back. Good teaching with a relaxed and pleasant manner. Not what we had last week. The guest teacher was good. A bit severe, but still good. JG though is head and shoulders above him – he is quite tall!

So, I’ve done the gym thing, a swim thing, cycling and dancing today. Surely that will take a few grams off when I next step on the scales. Of course the Old Speckled Hen I’m quenching my thirst with is low calorie and so was the chicken curry which was quite superb even if I say it myself.

I realise it’s a bit difficult to see the detail in the pics today, but either click on the mosaic or go here.  All rights reserved and all photos copyright of D. Campbell (that’s me).

Such a relaxing day a Sunday. I did a bit of gardening. Me? Gardening? In the same sentence? Well, it was just a little bit of trimming. First the roses round the back door and then chopping down the remains of an apple blossom bush that Scamp wanted rid of. The next thing was to get rid of the garden rubbish and that’s when the problem arose. I couldn’t get out of the estate because there was a 10K road race in progress, so it was back home and have lunch. Later, when the coast was clear I went out in the rain and dumped the rubbish then went for a drive to get some photos. Walked along a bit of the canal and took what I could get, which wasn’t much today under a milk white sky. No direct sunlight and no shadows, just grey. Still, I got some shots along the canal.

After dinner we watched a disappointing Singapore GP. Not disappointing because Lewis didn’t win, that was a little bonus. No, just disappointing because it was a boring race. It was a bit like today. No direct sunlight and no shadows, just grey.

It might sound dull, but dull’s sometimes all we have.

I realise it’s a bit difficult to see the detail in the pics today, but either click on the mosaic or go here.  All rights reserved and all photos copyright of D. Campbell (that’s me).

testing 1 – 2

I had been meaning to visit two exhibitions in Edinburgh (notice I gave it the Sunday name for a change!) and today I’d chosen to go see the David Bailey *Stardust *exhibition. We’ve become used to getting off the train at Haymarket rather than travelling in to Waverley and that’s what I did today. I also wanted to go and get tea at my favourite tea shop in Edinburgh. The guy in the shop doesn’t deal in these new fangled metric measurements, he still uses pounds and ounces. He’s also got an opinion on everything and a story to go with that opinion. It’s an experience visiting his shop and always a pleasant one. I can’t remember what today’s story was about, but it started with me commenting on his choice of shirt which was much like my own favourite. It ended with him telling me that although the shop sign said OPEN, he didn’t start serving until 11.00. I apologised but he told me that it didn’t matter as I had money in my pocket! After getting my tea and a bit of convivial conversation, I walked up and on to the Grassmarket and there was still no sign of grass being sold, but there were beautiful golden colours in the trees. From there, I walked to Greyfriars Church and had a walk round the churchyard. I was tempted to take some photos there as the light and colours from the trees were good but I’m always a bit uneasy taking photos in a graveyard, so I kept the camera in the bag. Then on to the Playfair Steps to take me down to the exhibition, remember the exhibition? The first room in Stardust was wonderful. All monochrome shots. Some small, some big, some gigantic. My favourites were Henri Cartier-Bresson and Man Ray. The HC-B was especially cleverly shot with the secretive man shielding half of his face with his camera. The luminosity of Man Ray’s eye was fascinating. I wasn’t so taken with the large colour shots, but the technical quality of the large fashion images was fantastic. About his paintings, the least said the better. Stick to the camera David. Speaking about cameras, in one of the display tables was DB’s Asahi Pentax SLR. Lovely piece of equipment but well used. Quick jaunt to John Lewis to see if there was anything going cheap – there wasn’t (no surprise there). Cup of coffee and a panini in Nero and it was time to get the train home. An enjoyable day getting a bit of culture – what else in Edinburgh? Next time I’m hoping to take in an M C Escher exhibition all being well. See me? See culture?

It’s a long time since we’d been to Glasgow Green on a Sunday morning, so today we up and went for a walk. Yesterday was Proms in the Park and the fencing was still there from the event, but to be honest, there’s always some sort of event with the staging or fencing for it in the park. It was a beautiful morning. Blue skies and a warm breeze, 18ºc on the thermometer in the car. Lots of people rowing on the Clyde. We spent a while standing on the suspension bridge watching them going up and down stream. While we were there, who should I see but Mike McGivern, the ghost teacher from school. It was a great privilege to see the man in the flesh, so to speak. He has become a mythical person to me. I wonder who’s life he’s making a misery of now. I’m sure he hasn’t retired, he makes too much money as a ghost teacher. I think he clocked me, but I didn’t speak to him. What could I say? You can’t swear on a Sunday, so that would have severely limited my conversation!

After the usual lunch of Roll ‘n’ Sausage in the Wintergarden of the People’s Palace with toast and jam for Scamp, we headed home. We had just closed the front door when the rain started. It continued to rain for the rest of the day, on and off. I think we had the best of the day.

I’m really beginning to enjoy these early morning walks.  Today was a bit later because I didn’t waken up until about 7.20, so I wasn’t out until about 7.30.  It’s nice to think that just over a year ago, I’d be driving to work at this time in the day, and not in a happy frame of mind either.  Two and a bit years ago, I’d still have been driving to work, but I’d have been a lot happier.  That’s what happens when your school is taken over and you just know that everything is going to the dogs.  I couldn’t have worked for the despot who took over the running of the school and I consider myself very lucky to have made my exit before his dictatorship began for real.

I don’t think anyone believes me when I say that I’m superbly happy now that I’ve retired.  It’s great being able to do what you want, when you want, and if you don’t fancy doing anything, there’s nothing and nobody forcing you to do it.  So, with a smile on my face, I headed off to St Mo’s to see what I’d find.  Again, there was no sign of the mist that was there on Monday, but the light was so much better than Tuesday.

I wasn’t sure which of the cow parsley shots looked best, the mono or colour version, so I put in both.  The backlit trees were taken with the 9mm wonder lens.  Snails seemed to be the topic of the day.  There were snails everywhere today.  Big ones, small ones and tiny wee ones too.  Not slugs, but real, honest to goodness, shell carrying snails. The walk took about an hour, but I got a lot of shots and was happy with the results from both cameras.

Larger versions of today’s pics are available for viewing on my Flickr account.  All photos copyright of Donald Campbell and are digitally watermarked and therefore are not available for use by anyone except me.  If you wish to use them, please contact me in the first instance by using the comment section on this page.

I gave in and did the decent thing. We went to IKEA to look for Billy. We had a bit of a problem getting Billy into the car, but between Scamp and I we managed it.  Then I spent the afternoon with Billy, fitting his plugs, screwing in his cams (Ooh!) and finally managing to get him vertical and ensconced in his new room. After that it was down to Scamp to decide where the shelf supports would go, because as you probably knew, Billy is a bookcase. Picked up a wee LED desk lamp, a shopping bag and a picture frame too. Scamp got Billy and some storage boxes. It doesn’t take much to keep us happy.