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I never believe the weather forecast from the BBC, but today they got it right.  I woke up to a blizzard blowing across the street.  Then, the sun came out and it was a lovely spring day.  Then it was blowing a blizzard again.  Welcome to Scotland.

Coming home from Glasgow tonight, we both noticed a really bright light to the north, over the Campsies.  Not a direct light, but more a bright glow in the sky.  I wondered if it was the northern lights which we do occasionally see.  As we dipped down a cutting on the motorway, it was lost from sight, then a bright flash appeared in the sky.  I thought it travelled north to south, Scamp thought it travelled towards us, more east/west.  Half the sky was clear half was clouded.  Don’t know what it was.  By the time we got to Cumbernauld the glow in the north was gone.  UFOs, that’s what they were.  Stands to reason.

Broom / Gorse flower with a little bit of rain on it.

Over at St Mo’s the weather was almost springlike today.

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After a lovely morning and early afternoon, I decided on a short walk around St Mo’s hoping for some shots of the deer.  No such luck, both on the weather and the deer.  The clouds opened when I was at the furthest point from home and I got hammered by what Dylan called “the wild and ripping hail” and was forced to shelter under some trees.  However, on the way home I startled a couple of mallards and managed three shots of them, but I forgot to switch off the anti-shake so my shots came out less sharp than they could – at least that’s my story.

Two mallards lifting off.

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A dull day. A Saturday. Not very inspiring. I did a bit of painting in the morning and we went to a local Italian restaurant for lunch. That was the highlight of the day. I think I’m going to downgrade my Nexus 7 to KitKat I’m fed up with the sticky Lollipop.

When you look at this, what do you see? A whole bunch of colours all mixed up. That’s what a painting is. Unfortunately, to be a successful painting, the colours all have to be mixed up according to a set of rules which are, at the same time, arbitrary, creative and structured. That, I think is where I’m falling down with this painting business. I can do the mixing of the colours. I can do the arbitrary part and I can also understand the structured part. At times, I even manage creativity. The difficulty is in getting all three to work on the canvas at the same time. It’s like Eric Morecambe said “I am playing all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order.”

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Up early and switched off the slow cooker which had been cooking the venison all night.  Made the panacotta and then made two different doughs for the bread.  After that, I had had enough so I took myself off into ‘The Toon’ for a walk and to get some paint and some help on choosing a 10″ tablet.  Didn’t get the advice on the tablet, but did get the paint.  Back home to help with final preparations for tonight’s dinner.

Early morning shot of a bluetit taken while making pudding for tonight’s dinner.  Really sharp for the lens being wide open.

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Cars roll by a hundred miles an hour

I was thinking while I was standing by the dual carriageway waiting for the bus that the traffic was speeding past at too high a speed.  I then realised that I too travel at that speed on that stretch and I’m below the speed limit.  Maybe that’s why I took this shot of traffic on the motorway.  Title comes from “To B without a hitch” by Bridget St John.

Up and out early in the day to walk along beside the Kelvin Burn from Auchinstarry to Twechar.  Cold walk with little to recommend it.  Saw a buzzard on a pole in the distance and am amazed that the Tamron long zoom managed to capture it in some detail.  Lots of water around, probably from snow melt from the Campsies.  Wild day with wind, hail, snow and rain.  Sometimes all at the same time.  Also some sun too.

Leaf impaled on a thorn branch.  I liked the colours and the effects of the backlight.

H is for Hawk was a dreadful book, no matter what Costa thought.  B is for Buzzard is my choice, and wildlife of the day.  Just a crop from the centre of the image.

High water on Dumbreck marshes, but a wee touch of blue sky for a change.  Most of the water came from melting snow on the Campsie Fells I think.

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A lot of different lichen here.  Most proliferous being  Cladonia fimbriata, but many others too.

The day started out well, weather-wise, but by the time we were going out, the sun had gone and had been replaced with grey.  However …

We went to Stirling and booked our summer cruise holiday.  Yes!

Came out of the travel agent and back to reality.  Grey and raining, but we still had sunshine in out heads 🙂

Wallace monument through a slight mist looking very grey today. There being so little colour in the scene, it seemed to make sense to turn it completely into mono.

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As usual, all is not as it seem.  I made a Fog preset in Lightroom. Then, with a large brush and heavy feathering, I passed it carefully over the bottom area of the shot, once it had been reduced to mono.  It needs some tweaking, but it looks promising.

The day the car passed its MOT again without any problem.  I realise I should be touching wood when I say that, but there’s so little wood around, I’ve got to search for it.  Everything seems to be chipboard in this house.  Does that count.  Other than that little celebration there was little to recommend the day.  It snowed, but immediately melted.  I went to look for a tablet, but couldn’t decide on any.  I finally got a scraper to clean my painting palette.  Not a great thing you might think, but I’ve been looking for one for months as the old one is getting a bit blunt.  £3.50 in B&Q where I was age checked because the scraper had a blade in it.  The bloke made my day by asking his mate if he should ask for my ID!  Nice to see some folk still have a sense of humour.

Prisoner Cell Block H?  Actually it’s an old printer factory in Cumbernauld.  Looks quite intimidating under that gloomy sky.

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Another example of the beautiful architecture and accessories around Cumbernauld.  It really deserves that sky.

Today’s nature pic.  This little bluetit was quick to discover that the peanut feeder had been reloaded.  I liked the fact that (accidentally) I’d caught one of its rejected bits of food.

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Yesterday it was birds.  Today started with birds and ended with a close encounter with a deer.  It never ceases to amaze me the variety of wildlife that’s on our doorstep.

Thrush on the apple tree outside the kitchen window this morning. Thankfully it stayed there while I got the camera. Such a nice wee bird.

I managed to get within 4 metres of this young deer before she saw me. Missed the shot, when she ran, but as always she stopped when she thought she was a safe distance away and I managed a half dozen shots. This was the best one. Taken in a local park.

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It rained from early this morning until after sunset, not that we saw much sun today.  Unlike yesterday, I didn’t have to wish for clouds, they were there all the time!  Maybe tomorrow will be better.

Throw out some bread and they will appear out of thin air. Starlings the commensurate survivors.

Two juvenile starlings waiting their turn at the stale bread.

As soon as Darth the Crow arrives, everybody else vanishes.

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It was Scamp’s turn to slip the lead today.  I had a day on my own and the sky was a boring blue.  Not one cloud.  Had a lazy morning finishing Alan Cumming’s excellent “Not my father’s son”.  I recommend it to anyone.  Like my daughter said, it reads as if he’s talking to you.  An uncommon skill.  After my reading session in the library and also after lunch, I took myself out to get the makings of dinner and to take some foties as the sky was no longer a boring blue, but had some clouds and some character.  Drove around some of the country roads I’ve not been on for ages and managed a few shots.

The trouble with using Autopano and other similar progs is it makes you lazy.  So it was today.  I just couldn’t be bothered going back to the car to get my short lens, so I just kept the 70-300 on and shot 12 or so images with the short end and later processed them into a wide shot in Photoshop.  Having said that, it took PS 20 mins to build the pano and it would have taken 5mins for me to change lenses.  Pointless technology!

This was a straight part of the country roads I was on. Possibly the only straight part in the whole system of roads. Still, I liked the compo and the trees looked good against the clouds.

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