Category: weather

Fitba’ Crazy – 12 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

12 July bSo here am I, the man who says he’s only been to one football match in his life, sitting in the stand watching the Homeless World Cup in George Square in Glasgow. How strange.

I just thought I should write a wee bit on Day One while I was sitting in George Square waiting for the teams to come out again for the second half.  I don’t know why I was so determined to go to this football thing.  I think it was the fact that it wasn’t expensively paid prima donnas who were the stars, in fact it was exactly the opposite.  The people who were playing and those who were running the show were homeless and for a week they were stars.  Good luck to them.  If I could have managed the time I’d have gone back for more.

Other than that, I put my sewing machine experience to work on repairing three pairs of jeans.  I’d torn the pockets on a couple of pairs and worn through the pocket on another – not from my mass of coins, but from the wear and tear caused by my keys.  I managed to fix two pairs by my own fair hands and the third with a little help from Scamp.  Really quite proud of my achievement.  If I hadn’t gone to that Sew Macho class in Glasgow way back in January, I wouldn’t have had a clue.  Not quite Sewing Bee standard yet, but finished what I set out to do and that’s what counts.

It stayed dry all day.  While I was watching the football in Glasgow there was the slightest drizzle, but it didn’t last long and it didn’t get any heavier, in fact, the sun came out after that for a while.  For Scotland, for summer, it was actually quite pleasant. Let’s hope it’s the re-start of summer.

Getting things done – 11 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

11julyI had a few things to do today and after I got started, late as usual, I got started on my To Do list and tonight, everything is ticked off.

It was another day of mixed fortunes as far as the weather goes. We had sunshine, rain and wind today in almost equal doses. Most of these climate elements were acted out under cloud cover.

One of the good things today was the delivery of my Grass shower gel from Lush. I had wondered if it would be the solid gel that they seem to have adopted as their base shower soap, but it was true shower gel. Expensive, but so good to have again. I will use it sparingly, I’m not that dirty these days 😉

Among the items on my To Do list today was thinning out my basil seedlings that have been sitting on the kitchen window sill for the last month. Scamp thought they should be left as they were, but I decided they’d grow better after they had been thinned out. We’ll just have to see who was right.

Scamp came to salsa class tonight, but didn’t dance. I think that was a sensible decision as the tempo towards the end of class was becoming quite frantic. Hopefully it won’t be too long before she’s joining in again.

Today’s photos are details from Scamp’s favourite rose. Alec’s Red was a wedding present from my mum, dad and Alex. It’s a beautiful deep red rose with a heavy scent. It’s followed us all around Scotland as we travelled around following the work in the 70s and 80s. It’s been a central point of the front garden here since we moved in in the mid 1980s. I had a bit of concern when I was taking some shots of it in bright sunlight, using extension tubes on the ’10. I noticed considerable evidence of flare appearing on the finished images that I hadn’t seen in the viewfinder. I think it may be due to some light getting in from the extension tubes which have worked really well since I got them, but they are plastic and maybe there is too much wear in the mounts. Some more research is necessary.

May go to Glasgow tomorrow to get some photos of the Homeless Football World Cup if it’s not raining.

Dull, dull, dull – 9 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

9 july bFrom start to almost finish today we’ve been labouring under grey skies. Occasional showers of drizzle made things even more miserable although it did brighten up in the evening for an hour or so before sunset.  We got the bus in to town in the morning and found some Spanish sun in Cafe Andaluz, always a bright spot on a dull day. Tapas and a glass of red made the day that little bit better.

Loads of activity in ‘The Toon’ with groups of Street Soccer players wandering around. George Square has been transformed for the event. I might drop in some time this week to see if there are any ‘photo opportunities’.

Got some paint in Cass Art. It’s times like this that you realise how much you miss the Art Store. Millers used to be an alternative too, but the half pan of paint I was buying was over 50% more expensive in Millers than in Cass Art. That’s just greed.

Maybe I’m a traditionalist, but the move to paperless transactions does annoy me at times. It’s nice to get a paper receipt that you can check while you are still in the shop. You can’t do that with an electronic emailed receipt. My e-receipt today was for £9.90 and that was what I was charged in the shop. The itemised bill was for:

Liquitex Ink 30ml Carbon Black £4.95
Liquitex Ink 30Ml Tit White £4.95
Total £9.90

What I actually bought was:

Liquitex Ink 30ml Tit White £4.95
W&N Mauve Half Pan £4.00
Total £8.95

That’s nearly a pound difference and I’m a pensioner (shades of Grandpa Charlie). Where the Carbon Black came from I’ll never know. Where the Mauve Half Pan went, I’ll also never know. What a White Tit is, well, that’s anyone’s guess.
The moral of the story is, be a bastard sometimes, insist on a paper receipt and check it before you leave the shop. If there is a difference between what you bought and what you paid for, kick up a stink. Unless, of course, you profited from the error. Charlie Christie rules OK!

More Repairs – 9 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

8 july bThe Megane was due in at the garage for 8am, so it was another early rise, this time for both of us.  Got it down there on the dot at 8am.  Back for breakfast then just after that, decided to set the garden back the way it was before the fence went up.  Almost the way it was.  Scamp wanted the compost bin put in a new position, so clearing a space for it and levelling it was the first order of the day.  With that sorted, we could procede to refill it from the six black bin bags we’d filled with the compost.  Then plants in their pots had to be relocated round the periphery of the garden.  Some trimming next.  Two branches of the Rowan Tree were encroaching in the neighbour’s garden, so I lopped them off.  Dead headed the Schoolgirl rose at the front and that’s where I found the caterpillar.  It ended up in the front grass to fend for itself.

Just before lunch, the garage phoned to say that the Megane was ready and for once the bill was slightly smaller than we had estimated.  Every little helps.  Picked up the car and came home for a well earned lunch.  After that, I drove us in the Megane with its new CV joint boot to Bishopbriggs to get a lightweight Manfrotto tripod I fancied.  It will probably be a ‘car tripod’ as the big Manfrotto is a bit of a tight squeeze in the boot.  It really is a neat little thing and is much less cumbersome than the big 055CL.  However, I will keep the 055 to hold the D7000 because it feels much more secure on the big Tri.

Went for a walk over St Mo’s and got the shot of the damselfly.  The Pana lens wouldn’t focus on the damsel because it found the daisies in the background more attractive, so I used manual focus and focus peaking on the ’10 to get accurate focus on the insect and it worked perfectly.  The butterfly is a Ringlet and this is the first time I can recall seeing this name.

One wee sad thing today, but a happy thing too.  Val wanted a DSLR.  He’d been given one by one of his friends, but that person asked for it back.  He’s been looking for a cheap second hand one for a while with no success.  I had a D70 that’s been redundant since I got the D7000, so I stuck on the Nikkor 70-200mm and gave them to him.  I think he liked them.  I hope he enjoys using them as much as I did.  A wee bit sad for me parting with them, because they’ve both been great tools for me, but hopefully a happy day for Val, who’s going through a bad patch just now.

More problems uploading to Flickr tonight.  That’s the second time this week.  I finally got the images uploaded, but I think I may be looking for a new repository for my images soon, along with a few other people according to the forums on the net.

It’s not been a bad day at all weatherwise.  A little rain in the morning, but lots of blue skies and a lovely sunset tonight.  Let’s hope for more of the same tomorrow.

Life in the Wetlands – 6 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

6 July bWell, so much for the plan to go walkies early in the morning.  I’ve discovered that it only works if you get up early.  9.15 isn’t early, certainly not early enough to drive to Auchinstarry for a walk along the railway.  That’s the only thing that prevented the walk.  The weather was lovely.  Unfortunately it didn’t last.

Went to meet Fred P for coffee at midday and after half an hour the staff in Costa were putting out the buckets and the signs that said “Wet Floor”.  That’s what happens when you are sitting in the new town centre in Cumbersheugh.  It’s only been open a few years and already it’s as waterproof as a sieve.  It only took us the usual couple of hours and two cups of coffee to set the world to rights.  Brexit, Jeremy Corbyn and the bastards who skimped on the seals in the glass roof of the Antonine Centre in Cumbersheugh.  All topics of conversation today and all problems solved … our way.  Hang them all!

The rain only got worse as the afternoon dragged on.  Managed to get a few shots of flowers and plants in the garden.  Not grab shots, nicely calculated shots.  My only regret is that I couldn’t get a clean angle on the Gazania that didn’t include the hanging basket holder.  I think it was still my favourite shot of the day.

Not as much rain predicted for tomorrow.  Still wet, but not AS wet … allegedly.

Sleep Walking – 5 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

5 JulyWoke at 6am and couldn’t get back to sleep. I decided that as it was a lovely looking day, I shouldn’t waste it lying in bed, so I got up and dressed and drove down to Auchinstarry and walked out along the railway. Although the birds were singing in the trees, I couldn’t see a single one and there were no deer or other animals to be seen either. What there were, were hundreds of slugs and snails, probably encouraged out after the overnight rain. Although I quite like snails, slugs not as much, I didn’t want to spend my walk photographing them. Instead, I took some photos of the leaves and plants that were shaking off the rain. In the process, I got soaking wet, but that’s inevitable as soon as you leave the path. By the time I got back it was just after 9am and time for breakfast and the sun was still shining. That was so much better than lying in bed thinking I should be doing something more creative. Scamp was just getting up when I got in and breakfast was beckoning.

Skipping forward to lunchtime, I took myself off to the pool for a swim. No gym yet, I’m not ready for the full exercise regime just yet. On the way, I stopped in at Jim Dickson to get two new front tyres to be ready for the drive down south later in the month. £100 lighter, I went to the pool and had a relaxing sauna, swim and steam bath. Then I intended nipping in to B&Q to get a price for some gravel to edge the grass at the back garden, then going to see what was wrong with the air-con in the car. It was supposed to be a quick visit, but then I bumped into an old colleague Mae Campbell (no relation). We spent nearly an hour standing taking about folk we used to know and schools and stuff. That put paid to my visit to Bonnybridge to check the air-con. Oh well, maybe tomorrow.

Flickr seemed to be working better tonight and when I uploaded the photos, the first one that appeared was the mono shot of the grass flower. That made me think of a Lush shower gel I used to get called, oddly enough, ‘Grass’! They had stopped making it, but I was told in the shop to check the ‘Kitchen’ area on-line as Lush occasionally made up small batches of some discontinued lines. Lo and behold, this week there was a short production line of … Grass!  Ordered on the spot.

No great fakery today with the photos, not anything like yesterday’s forgery. Only cropping, a bit of tonal adjustment and then, for some, a reduction to black and white.

Don’t know if I’m doing an early shift tomorrow. It depends on my sleep pattern.

Another Wet One – 4 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

4 julyWet from start to finish today, but stuck to my guns and went out in the rain to capture something of the essence of the day. There were quite a lot of people about given the weather conditions. I felt sorry for the poor wee man sitting fishing under his umbrella. I hope he caught something – not the cold though! My cold has lifted thank goodness. Scamp is still coughing, but I think she is on the mend now.

It would be nice to say that these were all as they came out of the camera, but as usual, some ‘shopping’ was necessary.
The man with the dog for example:
When I got the base photo, the dog was off investigating an interesting scent in the woods, so I had to wait until it surfaced again, but then the man was facing me and had lost his hunched shoulders pose that really summed up the rainy day. No problem, I cut out the dog and added it to the original base photo, then blended it in with a vector mask. Although I knew it was raining heavily at the time, the photo didn’t show it, so I added some rain as a layer and changed the layer type to Lighten and it looked so much better. If you can’t see those carefully crafted raindrops, check out the version on Flickr 😉  EDIT!  Well, you will when Flickr remembers how to upload files.  What’s the point of having all these bells and whistles when the basic system doesn’t work.  For Flickr read Fuckr.

Had coffee with Val in the middle of the day and enjoyed the chat. It’s always good to see old friends you haven’t met with for a long time. Had a long discussion about computers and programs. Picked up a few tips on new apps to try, both on the PC and on the Mac.

Dinner was a bit rushed as I decided at the last minute to go to salsa after all and with Scamp’s blessing. I knew that Jamie Gal wouldn’t be hosting tonight’s session, and was hoping it wasn’t Colin but dreading it might be Shannon although there is one worse than that. Surely she wouldn’t inflict him on an advanced class. Keep him for the beginners. It turned out to be Will who taught a good class very clear instruction and a great deal of humour. Total enjoyment for the full hour, 9/10 Will.

Driving home, I thought I might attempt Charing Cross Mansions as a sketching objective some time. One of the prettier architectural frontages of Glasgow. I would need a dry day for that, and the weather forecast doesn’t seem to include one of those for the foreseeable future.

Cold Friday – 1 July 2016

Posted on by Zogman

1 July bTwo weeks ago we were in sunny Ajaccio. Today we’re in Cold Cumbersheugh with the cold. Scamp threw out some bread for the birds and the birds came in a variety of sizes and types. After I’d chased the seagulls (AKA Shitehawks) the rest of the birds descended. Only the jackdaws seemed to hang back, which is strange for a member of the crow family. Usually they are almost as bad as the shitehawks. I did get a few decent shots of the jackdaw.

I went for a walk later in the afternoon and while I was walking through St Mo’s wood, I almost tramped on a wee bird. It was sitting on a branch in the long grass and looked as if it was completely lost. I did think of lifting it up into one of the trees, but the golden rule with wildlife which looks lost is don’t touch. Mum and dad birdie will be watching from the safety of the trees and if you disturb the youngster, they might just abandon it. Best to leave it to its fate.

Tonight I feel worse than I did this morning. The only good news is that Wales are into the next round of the Euros. It’s not that I’m interested in football or even that I support Wales. I just cheer for any team that plays England. Even better if, like Wales, they beat England, whatever the game.

Tonight Michael Gove announced his intention of standing for PM. Who could voter for such a Spitting Image puppet. He says he was born in Scotland. He wasn’t, he was born in Embra. Embra isn’t in Scotland, it’s in Embra.

Off to bed now, doped up with paracetamol and Benylin.  Feeling shivery tonight.  I even put the heating on!  Hope July warms up a bit.

Perf – 30 June 2016

Posted on by Zogman

30 June bWe were off to Perf today, mainly to get some coffee and tea, but also to take our colds out for a run in the country and possibly to share them with the posh Perf people (intentional alliteration).  It turned out a pleasant day.  Not totally dry.  It rained for a while during our journey and also just for a short time while we were in the Fair City.

We used to go to Perf (ok, it’s real name is Perth, but I prefer Perf and it’s my blog, so live with it).  We used to go to Perf to eat in Cafe Tabou which was a really innovative and slightly expensive French restaurant.  Not its become a quite expensive and slightly innovative restaurant that still produces French food, but cooked by a very good Polish chef.  The big failure for us is that the menu, which used to change every month, now stays the same and the intention seems to be to change it only four times a year.  Admittedly they still have a Plat de Jour and a Poisson de Jour, but the choice isn’t there anymore, so that is why we didn’t dine there today.

I did get my coffee and tea in The Bean Shop.  I’ve been going to this shop for years and the quality and taste of their coffee and tea never changes.  I always buy beans now as JIC gave me a grinder last year and it produces the same grind time after time.

On the way home I took a side road to grab a shot of the corn field and the big daisies probably Marguerites, but always called Big Daisies by my mum.  After I took the shots, I wished I’d brought a tripod to get some movement in the flowers and corn stalks.  Maybe next time.

Tradition – 29 June 2016

Posted on by Zogman

29 june bA 7.30am start to take my car to Tadstar to get new rear brake disks and pads fitted.  As an added extra, Renault supply the disks with with wheel bearings.  They don’t do it for free of course.  £70 a pop plus VAT and you need to fit them in pairs.  All up, counting disks, pads and fitting, I got a quid’s change from £300.  I suppose I could have got it a bit cheaper, but it’s brakes, you don’t cut corners with brakes.

Waiting for the car to be ready meant we had the rest of the day to play with and it was threatening to rain.  Well, it was the end of the school year and we all know it rains in the afternoon of that day.  It’s traditional.  After we had breakfast, we went to the gym, or to be exact, the pool to pretend we were still on the ship in the warm waters of the Mediterranean.  The pool was almost full, penshies everywhere.  Luckily the steam room was empty.  Ideal for me to help shake off the cold that’s hanging on me and for Scamp to rid herself of the last vestiges of hers.  After a couple of sessions in the steam room, the pool got a bit emptier and I did manage a few lengths before more of the grey hairs waddled into the water.  Heavens, there was even one codger wandering around with a zimmer frame!  Aargh!  I thought I was back on a P&O ship again.  I’d had enough.  One more soak in the steam room and it was time to go.

By the time we got back, the schools were out, the holidays had started and it was raining.  From simple ‘raining’ someone turned it up a few notches to ‘hammering down’ and it stayed there for a few minutes before returning to ‘raining’, but you could tell it was on for the day.  Sorry boys and girls, but it is traditional.

Got the car back about 4pm and after signing away or keying away the £299, I took a walk through St Mo’s, a wet St Mo’s.  Didn’t get much, the light was so low, it’s a wonder I got anything at all.  Took the Nikon for a change and I’m glad I did.  One thing the Oly doesn’t excel at is low light.

Hopefully a bit brighter day tomorrow, because the weekend and most of next week don’t look too clever.  It’s traditional.