Category: weather

An early rise – 13 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

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

Posted on by Zogman

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.

 

Embra – 11 April 2024

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Today Scamp suggested we get the train to Embra which I thought was an excellent idea given that the sun was shining and it wasn’t raining.

We drove to the station and along with half of Cumbersheugh got on the train to Embra (the other half were getting the train to Glasgow!). We were lucky and managed to get a seat across the passage way from each other. A family outing filled the other seats. I was sitting with the three kids who were all on iPhones and Scamp was with the mums and a bloke who, like us, was not in the family group. Scamp seemed to be enjoying being in charge of passing sweets from the mums to the kids and back again. I was listening to an interesting podcast about Mozart, the boy genius. With serious discussion and David O’Doherty providing the light entertainment. It passed the half an hour the journey took.

We did our usual walk up the hill from Haymarket and through Ladyfield to Nero for a coffee and a pastry. Then, instead of heading up and over to the Grassmarket, we went downhill and along to Princes Street Gardens. Walked round a display of high resolution photos about Space and listened to a piper who could play! I didn’t know that pipers could actually hold a tune for a whole series of for more than one piece of music. Thankfully he didn’t play The Sound of Silence. If that means nothing to you, see Monday’s blog.

We walked up through St Andrew’s Square and into the strange new shopping mall. We had a look at the tech in JL and came out without seeing anything we’d put money down for. Walked along George Street and down Rose Street to the end where Scamp was sure she knew where Whighams restaurant was. She was right and I’m glad she found it. It must be about five years since we’ve walked down the stairs to this restaurant, but it’s changed little in that time. Lovely lunch. Scamp had Goan vegan curry of cauliflower, butternut squash and chickpeas. I had tomato and prawn linguini. She had a glass of wine and I stuck to water. Even the coffee was good!

We walked back to the station via Waterstones, but I didn’t see anything that tempted me. Just managed to get the train back to Croy with minutes to spare and again, we got a seat across the passage from an american woman, a Scottish man, presumably her husband and two obnoxious children.

Drove home via Calders for Scamp to get a pot to plant out her newest acquisitions. Little pink flowers she’ll tell me the name of, and a bunch of pansies.

PoD was an arty photo taken from Ladyfield looking out over Embra with the curve of a concrete balcony sweeping overhead. Like I say, arty!

Watched the penultimate Apprentice, the interviews and found it less than riveting.

Tomorrow Scamp is intending to go to FitSteps and I may just relax for an hour and read.

A Dull Day in Scotland – 10 April 2024

Posted on by Zogman

This is getting boring and repetitive, but … it rained all day today. There, it’s said. I didn’t even attempt a walk, it was so bad.

Instead of a walk, we cleared another corner of the bedroom which will allow us to slide the bed forward and get the back wall and the wall facing the window painted on the next wet day, which looks like it will be Friday if the weather fairies are correct and tomorrow if they are not.

Because of the weather, I did some catching up with correspondence and then had a look inside the laptop I’m typing on. When I say “inside”, I’m talking digitally, using a piece of software called Daisy Disk which scans my MacBook and finds how much space I have left and where the biggest pieces of clutter are. The SSD that is the storage for my Mac is nominally 512GB and Daisy Disk found that I’ve got just over 50GB free. That’s roughly a tenth of the total free space. That’s not good. A sensible size is around 25% of the total space. My SSD needs to go on a a diet and fast. Work starts next week.

I managed to get out and grab a few shots of the Pieris in the garden, in the rain. Its full name is Pieris Forest Flame and it is living up to that name this year. Last year we thought we’d lost it when it suffered badly during the two weeks we were on a cruise and no rain fell for all of that fortnight. We often complain about the amount of rain we get in Scotland, but it’s better than dying of thirst. Good to see it’s back to full strength. What looks like red petals are actually young leaves. The flowers are inconspicuous little waxy white flowers that look like Lily of the Valley. Just the leaves made PoD.

Dancing in Kirsty’s class was Tango. We had a new couple in the class, one English and one Scottish. Maybe a little younger than us. I couldn’t fathom the tango moves at all to start with, then muscle memory came in to play and things fitted together again. I think it’s doable. It’s just a lot faster than we are used to. Love all the flicks and kicks!

Drove home through torrential rain and our entertainment tonight was Glow Up, where the MUAs (Make Up Artists) compete to produce the most ridiculous make up. Just a bit of fluff.

Hoping to get out somewhere tomorrow in the dry. A little bit of sunshine wouldn’t go amiss too. Hope you’re listening, weather fairies.

Here and there – 9 April 2024

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Just a normal Tuesday. Shopping and photos, but not at the same time. Oh yes, and a little bit of gentle gardening.

Shopping was just a bit of wandering around Tesco with a shopping list while Scamp blethered with a woman she used to work with, but hadn’t seen for ages. I didn’t mind at all. It gave me a chance to wander round the isles playing “Where have they put the peanut butter this week”. I got most of the things on the list although I’m sure Scamp would have done it in half the time.

Lunch was beans on toast. A bit of a come-down from yesterday’s Japanese extravaganza. ‘Auld claes and purrich’ as my dad used to say, but it was fine.

Scamp wanted to do a deep clean of the fridge after lunch. I started planting some seeds. So now we have two pots of Sweet Basil (do you think they have Sour Basil?), two pots of Sunflowers (two different kinds) and three pots of chilli peppers. The chilli seeds came from a chilli we’d brought from Portree of all places, two years ago. It grew well for two years, then died away. I harvested the pods and dried them. Today I cut one open and out came about fifteen chilli seeds. They’ve now been planted and I’m hoping I’ll get at least one plant from each pot. We’ll have to wait and see. I’d like to say that all the planting was done outside, but it wasn’t because the rain was pelting down, so it was all done in the back bedroom on my dad’s old card table with an IKEA bag on top to easily remove any mess. All the pots are now on window sills in the bedrooms and all are labelled. I’m going to restart my planting spreadsheet tomorrow, hopefully.

By the time I was finished, Scamp was too and the rain was getting lighter until eventually it stopped. I took the opportunity to go for a walk over to St Mo’s and got today’s PoD which is a fern crozier just unrolling. It’s called a crozier because it looks like a bishop’s crook.

Dinner was an old favourite we got from Jamie. Bacon & Borlotti Beans. Oops, I just realised, beans for lunch and beans for dinner. Hope the methane levels aren’t too high tomorrow.

And as far as tomorrow goes, we have no plans, I’m led to believe.

Happy Birthday to Me! – 8 April 2024

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Another year older and deeper in debt.

Well, another year older at least. Not a bad day, though. Sunshine in the morning shading to clouds later and finally rain at night. Still, let’s start with the first word, Sunshine … for a while.

We took the X3 in to Glasgow and although I didn’t think it possible, it took even longer to travel the route. Due to some roadworks the bus was forced to perform an almost complete circuit of Moodiesburn, then manoeuvre itself around a country road between Moodiesburn and Muirhead before taking another detour through the delights of the Muirhead housing estates and finally returning to the normal route. For once I felt sorry for bus drivers.

In Glasgow we walked down West Nile Street and out on to Buchanan Street, then into the Apple shop where I wanted to look at the new iMacs, because this seven year old iMac I’m typing on is running on borrowed time now, I think. That doesn’t mean I’m expecting it to croak any time soon, but I’m just thinking ahead. It no longer runs on its internal hard drive, but does all its work on a couple of SSDs and I knew they won’t last forever. We had a look at the specifications of the shiny new plastic things and they look possible, but looking deeper told a different tale, like the additional price for greater storage and the exorbitant price for more memory. I put them on the back burner for now … and turned the burner off!

We went for lunch at Wagamama and had a feast!
Starters to share were: Pork + Panko apple Bau Buns, Bang Bang Cauliflower and Ebi Katsu Butterflied Prawns.
Mains were Shirodashi Pork Belly Ramen for me and Prawn Raisukaree for Scamp. All were scoffed in double quick time and were as delicious as usual.

We walked down Buchanan Street listened to a bloke playing Despacito on one of those strange violins with a metal cone that gave the music a strange old fashioned sound. We walked on to Argyll Street and heard a man and a boy playing The Sound of Silence on real violins. I don’t approve of kids busking in the street. Let them be kids for a while. They will grow up soon enough and won’t have happy memories of their earlier life when they grow older. We walked along to M&S, but couldn’t see anything interesting to buy so we wandered back to Nero entertained by The Sound of Silence. In Nero I grabbed a shot of a Chihuahua sitting on a seat in front of us. It became PoD.
When we left Nero, about 20 minutes later The Sound of Silence was just finishing again. We guessed at that point that it was the only tune the two could play. Further up Buchanan Street, the man with the trumpet violin was starting what must be his umpteenth Despacito. So that’s what they do. They only play one tune. People are not stopping to listen, they just walk on and throw a coin in the hat. By the time the audience has passed on, the fiddler can start the same tune again to a new stream of people, and so it goes on all day. One tune, one backing track and some money made.

First Bus tried to completely spoil our day when we got to the bus station. When we got there, the bus and a fair crowd of folk were waiting for us. But then a driver got in and drove the bus away and parked it. 20 minutes until the next one. No explanation. And the bus companies wonder why folk aren’t using public transport.

Instead we got a bus from the other side of the bus station that took us up to Cumbersheugh, almost non-stop. Got off and went through the underpass and got the grumpiest driver I’ve ever had who took us past our stop and dumped us at the shops. Walked back and moaned about the state of the bus companies until we realised nobody was listening.

A large glass of wine later and we were both a lot happier and planning our next outing together.

Spoke to Jamie later and we had a laugh about birthdays.

That’s enough for now. “I’m tired and I want to go to bed” as a very old song goes.

No plans for tomorrow when it will be some other lucky person’s birthday.

Recovery – 7 April 2024

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Long day yesterday and a late night, so today would be recovery.

Late night yesterday after a lot of dancing, so today we would need some time to recover. Also there was a blog to write and post before I could get round to writing this. That’s what happens when you miss a day. So, here goes.

It was wet again this morning, in fact it was the rain on the window that woke me about 7am, then I went back to sleep! Dithered about in the morning solving Wordle and not getting a Pangram. Lunch was an omelette for Scamp and a slice of liver with an egg for me.

Then we watched another F1 GP from Suzuka in Japan. Horrible looking crash right at the start. I’m always amazed and impressed to see the drivers walk away from what looks like a scrap yard that used to be a couple of million pound racing cars. From then on it was a bit of a war of attrition. With the weak falling by the wayside. Glad to see Leclerc being bested again by Sainz. It begs the question again, why are Ferrari ditching Sainz in favour of far less skilled loser Leclerc? Answers on a postcard please.

Scamp wanted to hoover the living room and I just wanted out. I offered her a walk in St Mo’s but she declined. I took the A6500 with the weird looking LensBaby to get some unusual photos of anything that came to mind. What came to mind was a bunch of dandelions at the side of the path. Then I found a moth, a Welsh Wave (Venusia cambrica), I think, camouflaged on a tree. Both are on Flickr. But when I got home I saw the PoD. Today’s occasional bright sunshine encouraged the split rock, know as Terry, to display his orange flower!

Spoke to Jamie in the evening and heard about his map reading course in the wilds of the Lakes, and also about the progress being made with the house. Hopefully it will be ready soon, after a long wait.

Hoping for a dry day for a trip into Glasgow for lunch.

Windy and Wet – 6 April 2024

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It was a strange day. No dance class in the morning, but a monthly dance at night.

We didn’t really settle down all day. It was a wild day. Very high winds and heavy rain lashing at the windows. In a fairly dry spell I took some photos of flowers in the garden to make a collage just in case I didn’t get out again!

One brightener was the bud on the Split Rock began to open and almost opened fully, but not quite. Maybe tomorrow when the weather is supposed to be a bit calmer it will open up and show its petals.

We did walk down to the shops in the afternoon to get some food to take to the dance and a pizza for an early dinner. Afterwards I went for a walk in St Mo’s with the A6500 and a couple of lenses. I also took my ziplock plastic bag that provides the camera and lens with a bit of protection from the rain. I got some photos of the clouds scudding across the skies, but nothing I was happy with.

After dinner we got ready and had an interesting drive through the wind and rain to Brookfield where we were surprised at how few tables were spaced round the room, much less than we expected. We shared a table with Barry, Cath, Niahmat and Audrey and a couple of others. That brightened the evening! It also kept us well fed with the amount of food Barry produced from what seemed a bottomless bag!

The dance finished just after 10.30pm which is much earlier than we’ve had in previous dances. However it gave us straight run home along the M8 and the Kingston Bridge. We eventually got home and parked just after 11pm.

PoD was the collage of garden flowers. Not my best work, but fitted the bill.

Tomorrow we’re hoping for a bit day that’s at least partially dry with less disruptive winds. Too much to ask for? We’ll wait and see.

 

It rained… – 5 April 2024

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It rained all day. There was maybe a ten minute break for the rain clouds to catch a breath, but almost definitely not any more than that.

Scamp was out for the morning. Out for 10am to go to her FitSteps class, which was in a new (to her) venue in The Link which has been in Cumbersheugh since we’ve been there. She thinks it’s a great improvement on The Legion.

From The Link she went down to the Village to pick up Isobel and take her to Calders for coffee and an hour or so’s blether. No plants for either of them today, but Scamp drove Isobel home. After that she came home after about three hours off the leash.

While she was out I’d some computer stuff to tidy up, then I made good on my promise to wash up the pots and pans after decanting the oil from yesterday’s Fish ’n’ Chips. With my jobs done, I took the A6500 over to St Mo’s in teeming rain and got today’s PoD which is a bunch of yesterday’s weeds dripping in the rain. Best of a bad lot. Scamp had returned when I got back and we had a coffee before we went out to lunch.

We walked up to Brodens (in the rain) for lunch. Mac ’n’ Cheese for Scamp with a shovel full of skinny chips and Fish ’n’ Chips for me with the fish sitting on a raft of hand cut chips. Glass of wine for Scamp, pint of Guinness for me. That signed the deal. I couldn’t drive anywhere for the rest of the day because of that pint of Guinness! We walked back home and, of course, it was raining.

I started a book Fred had given me and found it was a bit more interesting than I’d thought. A strange vampire book: Masters of Death by Olivie Blake, in case you’re interested, Hazy. Don’t think it will interest Neil or your brother, but who knows!

Tonight we watched Series 1 – Episode 3 of Death in Paradise. So much more interesting than the drivel of Series 10. Of course, it’s the same format, but I think the acting is one notch more interesting, just one, but it makes a difference. The music is better too, although I’m sure Simonne would say that’s not a real Caribbean accent!

Tomorrow we are hoping to have a decent long lie in the morning as we’ve decided to forego the dance class. We may go to the evening monthly dance.

 

Out on the town – 4 April 2024

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Not me, this time, but Scamp. Off into Glasgow by herself!

I drove Scamp to the train station and then came home. I was going to have a photography day out, but before that, there was work to do. I started to tidy up the back bedroom to give us more space to decant the contents of the cupboards and bookcases from our bedroom in preparation for the decorating.

It was still a beautiful morning when I was finished, so I packed the camera bags and my boots into the car and drove over to Bothwell to take some photos of Bothwell Castle. Well, that was the plan. Just as I was passing the slip road to the eastbound M8 all the traffic slowed to a crawl. Two lanes of it. I knew I could take the outside lane and drive to the castle on the A road rather than the clogged motorway. I’d just made my move as many others now had when the overhead gantry demanded I return to the original road. Then what was a five lane motorway became a two lane motorway and that’s when I knew something serious was going on. Long story short, an articulated lorry had ended up on its side on the ‘alternative’ road I was hoping to take and all five lanes of traffic was being funnelled into the two lanes heading for Hamilton. I joined the queue and an hour and a half later did find Bothwell Castle.

I took some photos, but they weren’t inspiring. Too many barriers at the front and an incredibly complicated scaffolding creation was shoring up the back of the building. I only stayed for about half an hour and then headed for home. It took another hour to get back, partly due to my sat nav packing in on me and partly due to the increased traffic load. Eventually got back, not long after Scamp.

A couple of slices of toast and a cup of tea and I had a look at the photos and wasn’t impressed. Instead I took a camera over to St Mo’s to bolster the photos of the castle. Found an old bike that had been lobbed into the nettles and brambles by the side of the path to Condorrat. Took two photos of it and knew the second one was PoD. I was right. I took some more photos, but they weren’t very good. Just a bad day with one and eventually two good photos. I thought myself lucky, because there was a lorry driver somewhere who had a worse day than me. I checked tonight and he survived the crash and was taken to hospital. It didn’t even make the Scottish News!

We’d had a clear out of the freezer earlier in the week. Some food went in the bin. Too old or didn’t look right. Of the remainder, some went back in and some went into the fridge to defrost slowly. We had those for our dinner tonight. Chicken and Chips! What’s not to like?

Tomorrow Scamp is hoping to get back to FitSteps, then visit Isobel, and for the second day in a row, I have a free morning. Maybe lunch at Brodens for us afterwards? We’ll see.