Category: weather

Another bright clear day – 20 January 2026

Posted on by Zogman

Maybe not quite as good as yesterday, but by midday the clouds were clearing and the sun was getting through. Plus, of course, it wasn’t raining.

Scamp went out first. She was heading for Tesco and I was gathering all my bits and pieces together then headed off not far behind her. I was using the A7c and saw a lone berry on a tree on the way to St Mo’s. Turned the camera on and saw the message “Battery Exhausted”. I was glad I wasn’t far from home and could just walk back and grab my A7iii instead. If I’d been in the depth of the woods and seen that message, I’d have been saying ‘Sweary Words’. Lots of them.

With the cameras swapped over, and with about 80% charge in the A7iii I was good for an hour or so. I wandered round the pond and got a few shots, the first one being the lone berry on the tree! As usual I went half way round the pond then reversed my direction and went the other way. It’s strange that the view one way round the pond is totally different from the other direction. The proof is the PoD which I didn’t see when I was walking anticlockwise, but found it right in front of me when I was walking back, clockwise!

With some shots in the bag and a PoD taken, I walked home and bumped into Scamp unpacking the car. I was settling down to look at the photos when Scamp showed me her new box of ‘Rice Krispies’ which weren’t normal Rice Krispies, but some alien version with twice the amount of sugar. We’re both trying to reduce the amount of sugar we eat and I could see she wasn’t happy with these lumps of sugar. It was still light so I suggested I’d walk over to the shops and buy a proper box for her. Usually Scamp will disagree, as a measure of her annoyance, she gave in and allowed me to go search a Real box of Rice Krispies. She also handed me a winning ThunderBall ticket that’s been stuck on the fridge for far too long. So, off I trotted and redeemed the ThunderBall ticket for three new ones. Then I walked down to the shops and picked up the a box of the Real Rice Crisps. After that, calm returned to the house. We won’t find out if we’ve won a million pounds until tomorrow, but at least breakfast will a quieter affair.

The PoD was what looks like three leaves stuck together by the rain and backlit by the low sun. I liked it. If you prefer a photo of Oak Moss ( that isn’t only on oak trees and isn’t moss at all, look on Flickr).

We watched ‘The Night Manager’ (second series) and I’ll admit I became completely engrossed in it. Can’t wait until next week!

Tomorrow I’m hoping to meet Alex for a photo walk round Glasgow. I think Scamp has a meeting with the other witches.

 

Sunshine at last! – 19 January 2026

Posted on by Zogman

Hooray for a day of bright sunshine. A bit chilly, but we can live with that, we’re Scottish!

I was out in the morning to get my broken tooth replaced with another more solid one. I had already had the preparation done and this was just the fitting and gluing in place. Also I talked the dentist into repairing a tooth whose cap had come off a month or so ago. She very kindly did both jobs at the same time, well one after the other, obviously!

Drove home with a strange feeling in my mouth. My tongue was a bit upset with this new interloper, but by the time I got home, tongue and tooth were getting along fine. Let’s hope it’s a marriage that will last.

The sun was still shining brightly when I got back, so I took that as a sign that I should get out and get some photos while the big ball was still in the sky. I drove up to Fannyside.

When I was driving there I passed a load of new houses. One of them had a jet of water outside it shooting straight up into the sky. The water must have been more than three storeys high. One poor bloke was in charge of waving traffic through the water. Somebody was going to have the “Looong Monday” John Prine sang about.

I hadn’t been to Fannyside this year, and went for a walk. I found some old rotting fence posts simply covered with Cladonia lichen and took a few shots. I gave myself a limit of the farmhouse at the top of the hill. From there I walked back, past the car and on as far as a stand of trees that create interesting shadows if the sun is in the right place. Then I had to drive back home to have lunch. For once I stuck to my pledge and got back with a fair few photos, certainly enough to get one or two ‘keepers’. On the way home I noticed the gusher had stopped gushing and the road was almost dry again.

Scamp had an appointment for a video appointment with a neurologist who specialises in Essential Tremor treatment. We were only on-line for about fifteen minutes, but in that time he, the neurologist, had agreed with Scamp that she should go to Dundee to have more tests to find if the procedure would work for her. He also explained that more modern techniques were now available. Now we have to wait and see what the outcome of a Dundee visit will be.

Today’s PoD was a stand of trees on a long straight road at Fannyside.

Today’s dance class with Kirsty was a bit of a hit and miss. We danced three different routines, but none of them seemed to gel with either of us. Scamp was feeling dizzy with some of them and I just felt lost. As Scamp said tonight, Kirsty is good at demonstrating, but isn’t great at choreography. I know I left wondering what I’d learned tonight and couldn’t really say I’d learned anything useful. Maybe next week Kirsty.

Tomorrow we’re possibly going shopping.

A fairly lazy day … for me – 16 January 2026

Posted on by Zogman

The furthest I went today was a short trip up to the town centre to drop Scamp off at her FitSteps class. She was meeting Isobel after that for a blether. I was going home.

I’d half intended going for a run up to Fannyside to get some landscape shots, but it was drizzling and it was cold and I like my creature comforts, so I drove home instead, knowing that Scamp wouldn’t be back for a couple of hours and I’d a couple of things I wanted to fix in the house.

It was one of those silly things, a misaligned toilet seat that should have been easy to do. A five minute job. We’ve all made that mistake. I firmly believe there is no such thing as a ‘Five Minute Job’.

I got my socket set out and started finding which of the sockets would fit. They are in such an awkward position, the nuts that hold the seat, but I couldn’t find the socket I needed and was beginning to wish I’d never started the job. Then I realised none of the sockets would work because the nut holding the seat wasn’t the normal hexagonal one. Then I remembered that there was a special plastic one I’d used when I fitted the seat before. After that it was easy to loosen one nut, tighten the other one and then tighten the original one again. All in all, that five minute job took almost an hour.

The rest of my time was taken up with the beginnings of a tidying up of my room. I’d an old briefcase that I wasn’t ever going to use again. It took a while for me to empty it of old papers and note, odds and ends and basically rubbish. The next one to go will probably be my ancient Black & Decker boxed drill with its totally useless battery pack. Why I keep these things, I do not know.

By the time I was finished, Scamp had returned and we had lunch. I’d missed an hour or so of decent weather and now it was raining again. I decided that PoD was likely to be a photo I’d taken yesterday of a wee bear ornament. I used a neat little app I’d bought years ago to change the creation date from yesterday to today and it looked genuine. Isn’t it great when you realise you bought an app years ago that adapted perfectly to work on today’s PoD. Sometimes plans do come together.

Dinner was Fish Risotto baked in the oven. Later we watched the first episode of Landscape Artist of the Year with a new presenter. Then we watched The Great Pottery Throwdown which is just Bakeoff with a twist. They make things out of clay, rather than flour. Even the presentation of it is too much like Bakeoff.

I think we have a quorum for dance class tomorrow.

Off the leash – 15 January 2026

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There was a big cardboard box heading our way today.

The man handed over the big cardboard box which wasn’t quite as heavy as it looked. We put it on the table and gently sliced away its Sellotape binding and even more gently lifted the contents out with their wicker handle. Then we untied the bow and stripped away the cellophane covering to reveal a large basket which looked as if it was made completely of fruit. Strawberries, some dipped in chocolate, different kinds of sliced melons, grapes on sticks and pineapple flowers. All arranged beautifully and very fresh. WoW!!!

It wasn’t until later we realised everything was held on spikes that had been driven into a carved out cabbage to support them. Ingenious! Of course we had to sample all of them just to make sure they were real and they were they were also delicious. Thank you Jamie and Sim. A wonderful surprise and the fruit is just ripe too!

Scamp was expecting visitors, Annette and Shona who were both coming for a blether, so you can imagine they too were impressed with this basket of so many fruits. I drove off before the ladies arrived, leaving Scamp to present the goodies.

I was heading for Kincardine Bridge on the Fife side of the River Forth. I’d taken photos there before and was hoping for a decent day, but it wasn’t quite as good as I’d thought. A bit breezy and decidedly cool on the banks of the river there. I’d been there a few times and knew you sometimes just have to take what you get. I walked along the path beside the water and guessed the tide was still coming in. I went as far as the old pipeline and turned back. I had a bunnet on, but had left my Buff at home. Silly old fool. I had my photos for the day and thought I’d head home when my phone chirped. It was a message from yesterday’s optician to say my glasses were ready to uplift. It seemed a shame to drive home when I could add a few miles to the journey and pick up the glasses, so that’s what I did.

The glasses were fine, as I knew they would be, so I paid the assistant and did head home this time. I missed Shona who was off at yet another meeting. However, I did bump into Annette and as she was driving home, she left me a space to park in. Thank you Annette.

That was most of the excitement for the day. The photos were ok, but nothing special. The fruit however made an excellent dessert after our Potato, Bacon and Cabbage dinner. Would you believe it, Scamp chopped up the cabbage and cooked it to go with the potatoes and bacon. Waste not, Want not!

Thanks again, Jamie and Sim for a lovely Christmas surprise.

PoD was a view looking over to the Kincardine Bridge.

Tomorrow Scamp is off to the first FitSteps class of the year. I may go a photographing again if the weather is good.

Busy day – 12 January 2026

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The morning was the relaxing part of the day. The rest was kind of busy.

I had a couple of very belated Christmas cards to write, just a catch-up with people I used to work with and cards that I’d put on the back burner too many times for my conscience. They were a bit of a scribble, but both were different and to totally different people, so both where written as opposed to battered out on a computer keyboard. With that done, I felt a lot better.

We drove to the Town Centre Tesco for Scamp to collect some messages for tomorrow’s dinner with Crawford and Nancy at our house. Another tick in another box. The third thing for today was my annual retinopathy check which seemed to pass without too many questions. Then we were free to drive home on a cold afternoon. The occasional splashes of rain driven by a cold wind that seemed to continually change direction.

Walked over to St Mo’s more for the walk than for any photos, but the rain kindly stayed away for the half hour I was there. I got a couple of shots. PoD went to desiccated hawthorn berries on almost bare branches.

A spot of lunch and then we were getting ready to go to the first weekday dance class of the year. Today’s class was Tango. Slightly different from our Saturday class, but well worth going to. Little things to pick up on, like crossing my foot behind, not in front of the other.

Back home we watched our usual Monday trio of puzzles and games. Then as I was trimming and twiddling with today’s photos I discovered there was a problem with a couple of day’s photos. Two hours the dulling of the first of our automatic lights announced that it was 11pm. Bed time was coming up fast.

That’s when I started writing the blog. The tangled wires and stuff in Lightroom will have to wait until tomorrow to be fixed. It’s a busy life us retired folk lead!

Tomorrow I’m going to be baker of bread. I’ll also be a helper for Scamp when she needs it. Another busy day then Crawford and Nancy are coming for dinner. More high jinks!

 

And then the rain came – 11 January 2026

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Finally the rain came today and washed away all the frost and a whole lot of the ice. Hopefully a fresh start.

It was a dull day. I don’t think I saw the sun today. Lunch was French Toast for both of us on thick-cut bread. Long time since we’ve thick-cut, and it was good.

I went for a walk round St Mo’s in the rain, just to get out of the house. I got a few shots that didn’t really impress me, and when I came home I chose instead to build a little garden for myself. I think it was Hazel who gave me the idea of a table-top. Instead of a loaf of bread as a subject, mine was a table-top garden.

One thing I did manage to do today was to create a link each for the A7c and the A7iii to record the GPS positioning digitally on the SD cards. I’ve struggled with this for what seems like years, but now I may have found the answer.  Hoping to write it up tomorrow for later access.

Spoke to Jamie in the evening and we picked his brains about carpet cleaners, the good ones and the problems with some of them. I think we’re settled on the fact that we do need one, especially for the living room, it’s just the plethora of them that overwhelms us as Carpet Cleaner Newbies!

Good to hear that Simonne is going to Italy for a training week. Some folk are just born lucky. Just back from Trinidad and she jets off to Italy. Hope you enjoy the trip, S.

We have high winds today, for the first time this year. Hope it fades away for morning.

No real plans for tomorrow, but Scamp wants to go shopping and I have an appointment with the docs for Eye Screening. I’d rather be in Italy, thanks!

Not Dancin’ – 10 January 2026

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We woke about 9am today. We needed to be on our way to Brookfield by 9.45am at the latest. We were both in agreement that it just wasn’t going to happen.

The cars were frosted and the icy paths were uninviting, so Scamp wrote the ‘Sorry, not today’ message to Stewart. We both rolled over and snatched another half an hour’s sleep before I made the breakfast.
I know, I know we should have got up dressed and snatched a breakfast before running out (careful not to slip) and defrosting the car, before driving over to Paisley … but we didn’t. Instead we watched the sun warm the paths and gradually remove some of the ice from the safety of the living room with a cup of tea and coffee.

Later I did go out for a walk in St Mo’s. There was clear evidence that the thaw was beginning to take effect. Where yesterday the ice was dry and capable of supporting the weight of a couple of daft teenagers, today was a different story. The ice was wet and around the edges of the pond there were cracks beginning to show. Although the ice was beginning to melt, the cold breeze was plenty cool enough to make it a single circuit of the pond for me.

Back home, Scamp was baking Viennese Shortbread in two batches. I lent a hand for the easy stuff like fetching and carrying the trays and greaseproof paper, but she did all the difficult stuff and after three, or was it four checks on how the baking was going, eventually she was satisfied with the results. I must admit the shortbread was very, very good. It will probably be gone in a flash.

One bad thing today was my 16-35mm lens started screeching when it was being asked to focus on any faraway subject, and most of my subjects are faraway ones. I’m beginning to suspect a bit of grit or dust has found its way into the gubbins (technical term). That means it’s dead. Pity. I hadn’t really used it very much, but it did good work for a while. I doubt if I’ll miss it or replace it, but I was going to sell it just before Christmas. The moral of the story is: “He who hesitates is lost” and I lost.

Today’s photo was a Nettle looking a bit down in the mouth. The contre-jour lighting and the out of focus Bokeh lifted it enough to get PoD.

I’ve a backlog of letters to write to a few folk. Hopefully I’ll get them written and posted tomorrow.

 

Spending money – 9 January 2026

Posted on by Zogman

Out this morning looking for a new cordless vacuum.

Our Dyson wasn’t running at its best and even after we fitted a new battery, the charge didn’t last all that long. Certainly nothing like the life I would expect from a Dyson.

We drove to Currys at Coatbridge which was the nearest place with a reasonable array of vacuums … except, they didn’t have any Dyson’s on display. Probably the most common vacuum cleaner on the planet, but they didn’t have enough room to display them. Apparently, and this is the story that came from one of the sales assistants,  Dyson demand payment from Currys to have their vacuums on display. It sounds a bit unbelievable, but that is what we were told. Strangely the same assistant told us we could see the Dyson range in Uddingston a few miles away. We ended up bringing home a Shark instead. It seemed to work just as well as a Dyson did, but was a bit lighter and hauled a great amount of dust in the time we used it. So who was the Shark? Dyson or Shark? I expect we’ll find out in the coming months!

While we were out, we did cast our eye over the carpet cleaners in Currys. I don’t think either of us were intending to buy one today, but we did have a look around. Some were big, some were small, some looked like they’d need a whole room all to themselves to be stored in. Maybe some of the bigger ones would fit in a small garage. I just wonder what colour the carpet in the living room would turn out to be if we used one over a weekend!

Back home and after we’d had lunch I took a walk over St Mo’s to see how the land was lying. A group of four or five teenagers were standing on the frozen pond, bashing away at the ice with metal bars. Maybe they were intending to ice hole fishing, like Eskimos or Inuits. I took some photos of them standing in the middle of the pond. The stupidity of some folk beggars belief. I’d imaging your lifespan if you fell through the ice would be measured in minutes.

I walked down to the shops and came back with some grapes, some sticky buns and a nice piece of rump steak. Most of the foregoing was for Scamp, but the steak was for me.

Dinner was a ‘small fish supper’ each. Delicious.

PoD turned out to be a photo of a boardwalk with little bunches of ice crystals spreading out from the gaps. Not great, but good enough for a cold icy and at times misty day.

Tomorrow I believe we are booked in for a lesson in dance at Brookfield. The first dance class in over a month. I’m glad now that we had a practise session yesterday at Glenburn.

Dancin’- 8 January 2026

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Today was all about dancing.

We drove through the snowy, sleety rain to get to Glenburn, but all the work was worth it.

The pavements were slippy when we left the house just after midday. The actual roads themselves were ok to drive, but occasionally it was sensible to drop the speed and concentrate just on driving. We made fairly good time considering this was a Thursday in the middle of the day and we weren’t the last to arrive.

We danced at least one of every track Stewart played. The only one I remember missing was a slow Quickstep which sounds like an oxymoron, I know. It would have suited us down to the ground, but I was talking to David and Scamp was talking to his wife at the time, so we didn’t really get a chance to shine. Pity!

As usual, it was a cheerful happy bunch at Glenburn and a nice collection of music to dance to. Ok, some of it needed a nudge from Scamp to get me started, but after that, muscle memory kicked in and we were away.

We, ourselves, were away almost on the chime of 3:00pm from the clock that was running two hours behind. For once I chose the right road home. Over the Kingston bridge an on to Cumbersheugh. We got parked fairly easily, not in the exact place I’d have liked us to be in, but close enough. One look at the sky told me that I wasn’t going out again today. Actually the automatic headlights had come on just about 12:30pm. It was that kind of day.

I was chef for the day and I had already chopped the tomatoes and roasted them last night. Today was just a case of blitzing them in the blitzed ( technical description ) and heating them up to become tonight’s dinner, helped by that delicious bread again. I must get back to making our own bread.

We watched an episode of Grantchester tonight. It’s getting a bit long in the tooth now, but at least there is a story line to follow. Simple, though it is.

I couldn’t think what to do for a PoD. If I’d been on the ball, I’d have had a photo idea in my head. Instead, I found an amiable monkey with its baby and forced them to climb up a Poinsettia tree which is why mummy monkey has a bit of a baleful look on her face. It filled a spot in Day 8 of the 2026 365.

One more thing I found by accident today:
Today, Charlie McKillop retired. I think some of you have met him. He was my apprentice at Siporex and discovering that he had retired made me feel very old!

Tomorrow I believe we may be going shopping for new toys for Scamp!

Back in the land of the living – 7 January 2026

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After yesterday’s aches and pains, today was a much more pleasant day, thank goodness.

In the morning we drove to Tesco for some shopping, more shopping than we’d anticipated, but when we got home we discovered that the new freezer held a lot more than we’d expected.

After lunch, Scamp went for a walk in the garden and found the first Snowdrops had appeared. I think that January 4th is quite early for these delicate looking flowers, but it was good to see growth appearing in the garden. Scamp went for a walk around both front and back gardens and found more little green spikes appearing.

Even later in the afternoon I went for a walk in St Mo’s and although I didn’t find any snowdrops, I did get some interesting skies with planes creating jet trails through air that must have been almost as cold as the frozen St Mo’s pond! Neither the planes, nor the jet trails got PoD. That went to a photo taken in the house, as a test shot for a very old Olympus 40-150mm, f4-5.6 lens. Old Glass, although it felt like Old Plastic. Not much, if any metal in its construction, but beautiful quality results. That was today’s PoD and its title was Our Daily Bread.

Back home it was my turn to cook and today it was an old favourite for us, Chicken and Pea Traybake. Just set it up and let the oven do all the rest of the work. In addition, and since the oven was on anyway, I roasted some tomatoes, a leek and a couple of onions. That should make the basis for tomorrow’s dinner if all goes well.

That was about it for today. Not a lot done, but much more than yesterday. Hoping to go dancing tomorrow if the weather plays nice and doesn’t bring us some snow, which is possible. We’ll wait and see!