Category: weather

A lazy end to the week – 26 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Scamp was going to FitSteps and I was left to write a blog and get organised.

I have been keeping a log of my blood pressure, once a week for the last month and a bit, so I got that sorted out first and recorded it in a spreadsheet. I also needed to write yesterday’s blog and by the time Scamp had returned, I had finished and posted it. Then I drove up to the Health Centre to book an appointment with the nurse who asked me to keep the log of my BP. After that I was free of most of my commitments.

We went over to Brodens for lunch. Unfortunately they had a group in from a funeral, so we were put in the upstairs lounge and the poor bloke who works there had to keep going up and down the stairs all the time we were in. By the way he spoke, it sounds like we weren’t the only folk who had been in the upstairs lounge. Poor guy. Food was just as good as usual and so was the pint of Guinness!

Later in the afternoon, Scamp started her packing for her two day visit to Aviemore. I packed my camera bag and went for a walk in St Mo’s in the sun. It was a lovely day and I really enjoyed the walk. So much so, that I quite lost track of time and was shocked when I was walking home just after 6pm.

Watched another silly episode of Glow Up and wondered at the amount of time these youngsters take to put on their, often theatrical, makeup.

PoD was a low viewpoint shot of a fallen blossom flower on the path to St Mo’s. I really liked the isolation of the flower from the trees behind.

I think Scamp is sorted now and has everything packed. I’m intending dropping her off at the Town Centre just before 9am, then I’m coming back to have breakfast before I decide what to do with the rest of the day and where I’m going. I’ve a couple of options so, as usual, it will depend on the weather.

 

Off to Larky – 25 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Driving up to Larky this morning to get my annual eye check.

It was the usual rigmarole, reading from the charts and assessing brightness differences between the green and red panels. The “Is it better with … or without? … With or without?”. Then the hated spot the white light test.The outcome was that I’m slightly more shortsighted than I was last time. I’ve to go back in a week to have some checks on my eye pressure done. It was a new optician who looked as if he’d just finished secondary school, but that’s probably just a sign that I’m getting older!

I’d managed to break my old sunglasses earlier in the week when we were in Sunny Dundee and Scamp encouraged me to “get a DECENT pair”, ie not a pair of Poundshop ones. I bought a pair from Boots and they worked well, They would have been perfect to cut out the glare from the drops the optician had put in my eyes today if I’d brought it with me! The glasses were in my raincoat which was in the house.

I’d driven us up to Larky, but Scamp was driving us out into the countryside because I couldn’t see to drive. We went to Chatelherault for a walk and a bite to eat afterwards. It was a lovely afternoon and warm when we were in the sun and out of the wind. We walked over the Duke’s Bridge to the Cadzow Oaks and sat under one of the ancient trees. Then we walked back to the cafe for a coffee and a scone each.

Scamp had to drive home because I still wasn’t safe to drive. I know she doesn’t like motorway driving, but there wasn’t really any other option today and she managed perfectly well.

Later in the afternoon I walked down to the shops via St Mo’s to get some chicken for tonight’s Paella. It was on the way to St Mo’s that I got today’s PoD which is, I think, some apple blossom from a low branch of a tree.

Back home and after dinner, I managed to work out how to get Lightroom to automatically apply lens correction when importing photos. I realise this will mean nothing to anyone reading this, but it has been bugging me for a couple of weeks now and I was one click away from fixing it last week. However, finally I’ve found the answer until Adobe ‘improve’ the procedure. I’m going to put a link at the bottom of today’s post to remind me!

Watched another two episodes of Death in Paradise – Series 1. One of the best nonsense programmes on BBC. Ok, the accent isn’t quite proper Caribbean and the acting is a bit wooden, but it’s easy, relaxing watching. So much better than the last series.

Tomorrow we’re back to normal again, hopefully. Scamp’s intending to go to FitSteps and I’m maybe going to have a quiet hour reading.

Link: Automatically apply lens correction when importing photos.

 

A lazy Sunday – 21 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Weather wise, it was a dull day with just a hint of rain.

Spoke to Hazy in the morning and heard about their holiday. It seemed to be a lovely peaceful place, but the house and especially the bedroom weren’t really anything to write home about.

We watched a Chinese F1 GP that was fairly eventful at times, but in the end it was the usual suspects who stood on the podium.

I went out for a walk in the afternoon once the rain had petered out. There wasn’t much sunshine, but I did find some interesting moss fruiting bodies with bright red stems where they are usually green. One of them got PoD.

Spoke to Jamie later and he sent us some photos of the house revealed after its scaffolding and plastic sheeting had been removed. It looked very good, sitting proudly in the sunshine with a roof line that wasn’t wonky any more! Beautiful house.

That was about it for this lazy Sunday. Hoping for more good weather tomorrow.

On the bus – 20 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Just as I promised yesterday, today we went somewhere interesting on the bus.

Got the X3 up to the Town Centre, then got the bus to Dunfermline our destination and “somewhere interesting”. Quite a comfortable journey and it was good not having to drive. We started off as usual with a cup of coffee in Nero and then walked round to the Abbey which is in ruins, but still interesting ruins. Clambered down a very narrow spiral staircase, which if we’re being pedantic isn’t really a spiral, but a helix. Wandered round most of the abbey and then crossed over to the Abbey Church which is a functioning church, not a ruin. Scamp wandered off to speak to the organist who was rehearsing his music for tomorrow’s choir piece which was written by John Rutter, one of Scamp’s heroes. While they were talking I took some photos of the inside of the church and also found a beautiful modern lectern made from layers of oak and ebony laminated and curved into shape.

From the church we walked down into the park and found the hot house was open, and warm, trapping the sun but excluding the cool wind. I got a few photos of exotic plants growing in the glasshouse. It seemed that the formal gardens were still in limbo. Not quite warm enough to burst into full bloom, much the same as Scamp’s own garden.

By then it was lunch time and we headed back into town and got a table in Wetherspoons where we had our usual Fish ’n’ Chips with a G ’n’ T for Scamp and a pint of Birds & Bees for me. First time I’ve tasted it in draft.

From there we walked up the street. Scamp heading for M&S and me heading for Waterstones, but there was little in either shop to interest us. We walked down to the bus station which, while not the most interesting place, was at least 100% more attractive than Cumbersheugh’s Gulag. The bus arrived on time and we were soon in that Gulag waiting for an X3.

PoD was the Abutilon Pictum Thompsonii or Chinese Lanterns plant we saw in the hot house at Pittencrief Park.

No plans for tomorrow so far.

Quandry – 19 April 2024

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Quandary: “a state of not being able to decide what to do about a situation in which you are involved”

We were in a quandary today. Should we go out for lunch or go for a walk. Eventually we came up with the elegant solution to do both, but not at the same time. But first Scamp went out to her Fitsteps class and I set about excising some useless parts of my 512GB SSD. It wasn’t a surgical gloves and a scalpel type of excision, just a heart in the mouth, digital one.

One of the nice things about third party software is that it allows you to search the hidden parts of a Mac that Apple don’t like you poking your nose into. The software I was using was Daisy Disk. A clever little program that shows you where all your junk is stored in your computer. It was only recently I discovered that you can search deeper in to the all the Ones and Zeros that hold Apple’s secrets. To do that you have to make a request to Apple, through Daisy Disk. Then you are given a code that will open up restricted areas on the drive. This isn’t the Dark Web, just a little bit of poking around where we shouldn’t be. The problem was that my 512GB SSD was almost full, because it had 150GB of Apple backups stuffed away in a corner, but with a bit of careful digging around, I could get rid of it and free up an additional 30% of space. That space was being used to produce a backup of the operating system that I didn’t know about until recently and didn’t need, as I do my own backups ever week. Apple, like Mickysoft are devious.

When Scamp came home, I had performed the surgery and the drive was looking healthy again. I’d suggested we go to Hamilton for a curry, but neither of us could be bothered driving there, so instead, at Scamp’s suggestion we went to Mango in Haggs. It’s an Indian and Italian restaurant where you can mix and match your starters and main courses between the two culinary areas. As it was, we both stuck to Indian today:

Vegetable Pakora and Vegetable Boona with Rice for Scamp
Chicken Pakora and Chicken Rogan Josh with Rice for me.
We had a plain Naan to share.

Most of the food was fine, but Scamp reckoned that her pakora was made with plain flour, not Garam Flour. And we both agreed that the naan bread tasted more like a flatbread. Foodies!

Instead of driving home, we took a wee single track road that led us down to the Forth & Clyde canal. Where we walked west towards Auchinstarry, but turned when we were at the first lock on the canal and walked back to the car. Lots to see today. A big bunch of yellow Celandine growing in the crotch of a tree and more on the ground. Some white Wood Anemone close by. I also saw and photographed a Dark-Edged Bee-Fly which I’ve never seen before in Scotland. Another sign of Global Warming perhaps? None of these got PoD. That went to a bunch of dandelions growing from the cobbles at the canal lock.

We drove home on a beautiful spring day with sunshine and blue skies, but with a cold wind from the east. I just knew that Scamp would be desperate to get back to get her grass cut. The first cut of the year. My job was to lift the heavy plant pots out of the way so she could strim behind them and then to replace the strimmer cord when it broke, before replacing the pots again.

Not a bad day. I really enjoyed the walk, but I think I’d go back to Hamilton rather than Mango next time, if only for the naan bread!

Tomorrow we may take the bus somewhere interesting.

 

Dentist – 18 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Not for me, thankfully, but for Scamp.

We did very little in the morning, just attempted to solve Wordle ( I did eventually find it, but it took a while) and I’m still looking for today’s pangram. It’s probably under a cushion somewhere.

At midday Scamp got ready to have her temporary tooth remove then the old molar from the back of her mouth extracted. Next she had an x-ray taken, and a new temporary tooth rebuilt. That was a lot of work and a lot of anaesthetics to deal with, but she came back with a smile on her face, as always. Brave girl.

It does look as if most of my seeds have now sprouted although some took a lot longer than others. Still no sign of potatoes in the fancy double skinned bucket, but it has been unseasonable cold. There’s time yet for them.

After lunch, and after Scamp was safely ensconced on the couch, I took the A7 for a walk in St Mo’s in the drizzly rain. Not much to see today, but I did get one decent shot of a fern unfurling its leaves. Like my seedlings, it’s a bit late, but getting there. I extended my walk down to the Shops to get some flowers for Scamp and some sweeties for me. Well, it is Thursday for me as well as Scamp.

Dinner tonight was Haddock Risotto, the easy one, made in the oven. By that time Scamp was able to eat again and her tongue had done one or two circuits of the new mouth and tooth.

We watched the final of The Apprentice even although there was no doubting who was going to win. I’ve said this before, and I’ll probably say it again. The program needs a revamp. A replacement for Lord Sugar. He’s becoming repetitive. Oh yes, and a new scriptwriter to put the jokes back in the crackers.

The fern was the PoD. Not the best shot, but it’s in and posted. Got myself another ‘Explore’ for the view looking up the South Tower of Bothwell Castle. That was a brightener.

No plans for tomorrow, but I really must tidy up the back bedroom soon.

 

Off the leash – 16 April 2024

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Up fairly early to taxi Scamp up to the town centre.

I drove Scamp up to the town centre this morning to meet her sister and catch the bus that would take them to meet the third sister in Inverness. It would be a long journey for all of them. Four hours for the pair from Cumbersheugh. After that, I was on my own for the day. However, there were tasks waiting for me.

The first task was to have breakfast and that wasn’t even on the list. So, the first real task was to vacuum pack a venison burger and three slices of lamb’s liver and get them all into the freezer. That was easy. Next I had two bags of tee shirts that really needed to become one bag of tee shirts I’d actually wear! That took a lot longer than I’d anticipated, but after some shuffling the Keepers and the Chuckers, I came to an agreement with myself that I could live with and two became one. I know I’ll relent and put stuff back in the wardrobe, but only one or two.

I had decided last night that if the weather was decent (and it was) I’d go to Bothwell Castle and see what it looked like inside those ancient sandstone walls. It was a beautiful day. Blue sky with white fluffy clouds, cold, but the sun would warm the place up.

Last week I drove to Bothwell Castle on a dull day and didn’t have my entrance card for the castle, so came home with some poor shots and a bad mood. Today I was kitted out with cameras and lenses and a raincoat (just in case) and my Historic Scotland card. Followed the satnav which took me by a strange route to the castle. Different from the route I’d driven last week. I think this one was better, certainly quicker.

Inside the curtain wall of the castle the the ancient sandstone really glowed in today’s sunshine and gave the place a warm feeling. You have to use a great deal of imagination if you want to ‘see’ what this building was like when it was built centuries ago. The scaffolding and barriers that are all around it don’t help, but if you imagine the cost of keeping a crumbling edifice like this safe, you understand that some restrictions are necessary.

I spent an hour or so wandering round the castle and I think the strangest thing and the thing that impressed me was the amount of graffiti that abounded. Not your normal tags and gang names, but folk’s names carved into the sandstone. Some of it very carefully done with great skill and some just scribbles, and so much of it. I’m grateful that HS had the foresight to keep it untouched.

Driving home through Uddingston and stopped at traffic lights I saw Laura and Ross (big Ross) crossing the road with Ross pushing the pram with their new baby girl. If Scamp had been in the car she’d have been out and across the road to see the baby, but she missed that trick, because she was still in Inverness.

Dinner for me was then other venison steak and a couple of baked potatoes. Very nice too.

Later, much later, I got the call to say the long distance travellers we’re just leaving Stirling on the way home. Drove up to the bus station and picked up Scamp. Her sister refused a lift and phoned a taxi instead. Scamp was complaining that the bus was cold, but a basin of hot water to heat up her feet and a cup of Ovaltine warmed her up.

I’d say a good time was had by all. We all in our own way were “off the leash” today.

PoD was a view up the South Tower of the castle.

Tomorrow I’m hopefully taking Alex out to lunch.

Shoes and Greece – 15 April 2024

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How the other half live!

So, the story of the shoes:
Scamp bought a pair of dance shoes back in November last year. She wore them once to the gala ball in Perth, but found they hurt her foot. She changed the shoes midway through the evening and though no more about it. Recently she tried wearing them again and felt a sharp pain in her toe. When I had a look at the shoes and probed the sole with my finger I could feel something like the sharp end of a staple. Presumably that was the source of the pain she felt.

Long story short, she sent a message to the lady who owns the shop where she bought the shoes and today we took them in to the shop in Rutherglen for inspection. The owner recognised Scamp because we’ve both bought shoes from her in the past and agreed that a badly placed metal staple was the problem. She apologised and is intending to replace the shoes once her stock comes in.

We bought some fruit and bread, some solar powered lights and a new frying pan in a big Tesco not 100m from the dance shop then drove home in the rain. The fruit was for Scamp and June to have some refreshments on the four hour journey to Inverness, tomorrow. The frying pan was because we needed one and it was a bargain. £22 marked down to £8. Couldn’t resist a bargain. The lights were also cheap and Scamp has been talking about getting them for a long while. The only problem might be they need 48 hours of sunshine to charge them.  I don’t think we’ve had 48 hours os sunshine this year!

After lunch I went out for a drive, but couldn’t get parked in my usual spot at Fannyside because someone had dumped a big tractor there. Farmers! They think they own the place and can just park anywhere! Couldn’t find anything to interest me enough to take the camera out of the bag, so I just drove home. It was just one of those days!

When the rain went off about half an hour later, I went for a walk in St Mo’s and got a couple of decent shots. PoD was a bunch of daisies growing beside the path that leads to St Mo’s. The grass looks good and lush, but underneath it’s like a swamp. I fully expected a crocodile to be crawling through it. Everywhere seems like a swamp this year. Scotland seems to be getting the worst of the weather and to rub it in, the dance teachers keep sending photos of the wonderful places they are visiting. Today it was Rhodes in the Greek islands, and by the look of the photos, it wasn’t raining there.

Tomorrow we’ll have to be up early because I’m driving Scamp up to the bus station in the Town Centre. June has booked a taxi for herself. I have the rest of the day to myself, I hope, before picking Scamp up about 9pm.

An early rise – 13 April 2024

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Not an enforced wakening, just neither of us could fall back asleep, so we agreed to have and early breakfast instead.

We were up and dressed just after 8am on a day that seemed to throw everything at us. Rain, hail, sunshine and a strong wind were the main factors in our weather and they cycled throughout the day.

We chose to drive to Stirling to go to Waitrose for ‘The Messages’. Maybe an odd thing to do on a Saturday, but we needed some essentials and we were fed up with Tesco, so Waitrose was probably a better option, besides, they do a good, fairly cheap packet of tea. We had half intended going for a coffee in Stirling, but the opportunity didn’t arise, so after we’d packed all the bags into the car, we just drove home, unloaded them and had lunch.

After lunch, inevitably it was time to empty the wardrobe. I hadn’t realised I had so many pairs of jogging bottoms. ‘Athleisure’ I’m told is the modern description. I knew I could probably hire a stall in The Barras Market to sell all the surplus tee shirts I have and also sweat shirts with stains on the front, but Joggy bottoms? Some of them, possibly all of them, have to go. Once I’d helped Scamp clear out the clothes, I started looking through the old record of work books from a pre 2014 life, knowing they would not be looked at again until the next spring clear out. Instead, I pre-empted that next clear out by getting rid of most of them today.. Not everything that came out of the wardrobe would be finding its way back in. The same would be true of my chest of drawers and various other glory holes in our room. Phase 2 was complete.

By the end of the afternoon the remainder of the storage areas had been emptied, or checked to see if they could simply be moved without emptying. When we were satisfied that we were organised, Scamp went downstairs for a coffee and I put on my walking boots and went for a walk in St Mo’s. It was still a wild day with strong winds and the occasional sharp shower. I went for a walk in the woods, but after seeing how many big strong trees had recently blown down I thought it wasn’t the most sensible place to go for a walk. However, I got a few shots of some Horse Chestnut trees opening up their buds to expose their big leaves and some had the candelabras of flower buds ready to open. One of those shots got PoD.

Back home the oven was on, ready to take a Charlie Bigham Tikka Masala curry we’d bought in Waitrose in the morning. It was a surprisingly filling dinner.

There was nothing worth watching on TV, so Scamp and I sat and read for a while and I had another of the instant whiskey cocktails Jamie and Simonne had given me. Tonight’s offering was Whiskey Sour which is basically Bourbon and Lime Juice over ice. Very refreshing.

Tomorrow we are intending starting Phase 3 of the grand plan, painting the remaining walls.

Artists at work – 12 April 2024

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It’s a long while since we did any painting, so I thought we’d attempt one today.

Not a very artistic painting, but a strenuous one. One coat of Melon Sorbet on the back wall of the bedroom and one on the wall opposite the windows. It’s quite a congested room, the bedroom. A cupboard, a book case, a chest of drawers or three plus a big wardrobe and odds and ends of storage areas, plus, of course the bed itself. So the room had to be done in two phases and today was phase 1. On Tuesday Scamp cleared the bookcase and I emptied one of the chests of drawers Today we moved the other two chests of drawers to be clear of the painting area and moved the empty chest of drawers away from the wall with the the bookcase joining it. Then we moved the bed out of the way of the paint. All the prep done, the only thing left to do was slap some green paint on the walls.

I worked from one corner and did the high bits with the big roller while Scamp started from the diagonally opposite corner and did the lower bits with the small roller. An hour or so later, when Scamp had completed both her walls, I had one and a half walls finished. We stopped for lunch. After lunch Scamp went out to post a card and purchase dinner which was to be pizza, while I finished off and started snagging, then tidied away the rollers and brushes and closed the door on the room to allow it to dry.

Just before dinner we had a look and although there were a few bits that would benefit from a second coat, it looked quite decent. Later we put the furniture back in place, made the bed and it looked less like a shambles. Tomorrow or Sunday, hopefully we will do the other half.

The rain that had been on and off all afternoon disappeared before dinner time and I took the opportunity to take the A7 out for a walk in St Mo’s where I found some patches of Cowslips waving their green heads in the breeze. Some even had their yellow flowers showing. One of them made PoD. When I was on my way home, I sent Scamp a text as instructed to give her time to fire up the oven.

Dinner was a pizza and we both enjoyed it. I think Scamp had the harder day of the two of us. She’d been to FitSteps in the morning while I was searching out brushes and rollers and paint trays and having a coffee too, of course. But I think we both worked hard today and that’s one of the reasons we’re enjoying a G ’n’ T tonight.

Tomorrow there’s no dance class because the teachers are off on another cruise. There’s a rumour we may be going shopping.