One of those cold, bright December days when you just have to get out.
Admittedly, it took a nudge from Scamp to make me get up and put my boots on and even then, it was about half past one in the afternoon before I managed to set foot outside the door. By then it was far too late to drive to Drumpellier which had been our stated destination, but Scamp agreed that a walk round part of Broadwood Loch would be a fair substitute.
So with both of us suitably dressed for the winter weather, we walked round the boardwalk at Broadwood, which is where today’s PoD came from. Technical details later. From the boardwalk we walked over the dam and I saw a bloke photographing the seagulls on the outfall of the loch with what I think was a Canon with a serious looking lens. Probably at least 500mm. It certainly outgunned mine, but it was fitted on to a ‘plastiCanon’. Not a real camera at all IMO. I tried a shot of the gulls too, but as usual, the result failed to inspire me. I hope he was skilful enough to get a good result with inferior equipment.
We walked over to the exercise machines and then up past the ripped up ground that will soon be converted to a ‘Micky Ds’. Allegedly they’re hoping to have it up and running for Christmas. I can’t imagine that happening, but who knows. It just might. We were going to the hole in the wall machine at the BP garage for some read cash in case the man who is coming to service the boiler tomorrow hasn’t got a card machine. With ‘real’ money in our pockets we headed for home and found the heating had noticed our absence and warmed the house up for us, all by itself. Scamp, of course, complained that it was too warm!
Dinner tonight was going to be Arancini (deep fried rice balls) using the remainder of yesterday’s risotto. Scamp was in charge of the arancini production line. She shaped the rice into little balls just smaller than a tangerine, dipped them in seasoned flour, then coated them in egg. Finally dropping them gently into the bowl of breadcrumbs. I was making the tomato sauce to go with the rice balls and also at the end of the production line, rolling the arancini in the breadcrumbs then easing four at a time into the hot fat from a wire scoop and fishing them out again onto kitchen paper a few minutes later. It may sound complicated, but it worked really well and without argument on either side.
The proof of the Arancini was in the tasting and we both agreed that they tasted fine and were filling enough with the tomato sauce. Quite messy though and would be even more messy without a dishwasher.
As I said, the PoD was a shot of the boardwalk at Broadwood Loch. In fact it was a panorama built in Lightroom from five separate images. I liked the finished result. The light was really good this afternoon and that warm glow from the afternoon sun gave it a wintry feel.
According to the weather fairies, we may be experiencing another ‘wintry feel’ this week with the chance of the first snow of the winter. We’ll hope it’s not too serious an attempt from the white stuff.
I’m off to the doc’s tomorrow morning to see what he has to say about my leg. Also, the bloke is coming to service the boiler, also in the morning.