Weekly Chat, Sunday August 29, 2010

Hi everyone.

A Happy New Month to all :-)

Another nice and sunny day in this part of the world.  Honestly sunshine in the west of Scotland!  It'll never catch on. LOL.

Not much to report from here apart from the fact that the garden birds tend to provide the majority and the best of the entertainment these days.  I've just spent the last few minutes engrossed in the antics of some House Sparrows.  Fantastic wee birds!

Diane:  Thanks for more webcams.  Always welcome.  :-)

Linda:  Sorry to hear you lost a reply.  I've experienced that once and it's not a nice feeling.  From then on I write my posts in Notepad and then copy them.

Joan:  Glad you had birds providing entertainment while you ate.  Perhaps next time they'll post for pictures ;-)  Thanks for the info on what a sea fret is.

Annette:  Glad you enjoyed the yoga class.

Here's a pic of a red squirrel I took from the Abernethy feeder cam, a wee while ago.

 

 

 

Paul.

Hi everyone.

My sincere thanks to all who have sent kind messages about elder daughter (ED)’s trip.  We were all late to bed last night as the suitcase was overweight and it took ages to identify the items which would have to be sacrificed.  Not easy packing for a month which is why I was anxious when I posted.  (The calm didn’t last HeatherB) Ultimately, the books and heavy items went in the hand luggage without losing too much and eventually we hit the sack at 12.30am, getting up again at 5.30am to prepare for heading to the airport (about an hour and 10 minutes from where I am). Horror of horrors - £2 for 15 minutes parking at the short stay car park in Edinburgh! Has the world gone mad?  There is an economic crisis out there – has nobody imparted this wisdom to the Scottish aiport parking authorities?  Anyway, Steed dropped myself and ED at the check-in and we proceeded to go through the sheep-herding baggage drop nonsense – as usual there had been a computer upgrade (downgrade) overnight which was slowing everyone down so it took ages to complete this, much to the frustration of important business travellers.  Finally it was the time to wave her off and of course we both had a little tear, but it was a relief to get to this point after organising this in a very short space of time.  I am now very tired but satisfied that she made her connecting flight and is almost there although I won’t have confirmation of her safe arrival until later this evening.  It’s a long, long way and makes you realise the might of the ospreys and all migrating birds when they head off on their migration.  I am enjoying all of your posts and look forward to chatting with you individually soon.

A few things I want to mention are: Lindybird – I absolutely loved the picture of the knitted cupcakes on previous weekly.  It reminded me of knitting egg cosies when I was 5 years old – I come from a family of knitters and this picture made me chuckle.  OG – thank you for your kind comments and you were right that there was a bit of confusion about my plans for going on holiday to Turkey.  In the end only younger daughter came with us for the first week – her friend pulled out and ED with boyfriend joined us only for the second week so six became three for week 1 and five for week 2.  Sorry I couldn’t impart this at the time but I was up to the eyeballs in organising so many things (including Thunder) which I know you will understand.  Hope your son enjoyed seeing all the bikes.  It was my first time and I was amazed and thrilled to be part of the spectacle.  Steed took part in the Tug o’ War and still has the bruises to show for it!  Great fun and the sun shone warmly while we were there during a mostly cloudy day.  Must get dinner ready now.  Catch up with more of you soon.

PS – hope Gary makes it over to this thread and whatever happened to BigRab74’s compilations?  Is he mostly on Facebook now does anyone know?

Hello everyone  - have enjoyed all your posts!

Emma Peel - I'm not exactly glad that your calm didn't last ! - but it has made me feel better about my tendency to totally lose the plot when packing and getting ready for any kind of journey, mine or anyone else's! You will hear soon from your daughter and have a good nights rest. Know what you mean about parking charges at airports--- When OH's son met us at Inverness airport after our last visit to foreign climes, he moved his car every wee while so that he would not incur more than the minimum charge. Now, does that tell any Scots watching this, that his father is from Aberdeen??!! 

Paul - please send sunshine to Inverness.

Everyone - thankyou for posts, once again have nothing to tell you about , all that happened today was housework and getting my nails done this afternoon. That in itself is always good, enjoy the 'crack', but found myself getting questions about 'X Factor' and 'Big Brother' - as an almost non TV watcher I was floundering a bit!  I prefer to read ,but started a book of OH's last night, called 'Inside the Gas Chambers'. I have had to put it away. Enough said.

Unknown said:

Terry - It was only 1:30 here! 

Rats! I needn't have felt so guilty about being on the computer for so long...

Hello everyone:)

I'm hoping to slink on here and completely ignore the fact I haven't been on the thread for months.....:( Sorry I can't keep up with multiple threads/social applications, I am only a simple man.. lolol Now the birds have gone I hope to take part much more fully in the general chat. I am off to try and see what everyone's up to.

I missed the last few days of the GEM"S at LG as we had a few days vacation on Cape Cod, which is on the East Coast here, just below Boston. Had a wonderful time and saw quite a few Ospreys, which was a real bonus. So, a few days back, catching up and here I am.

Mornings and evenings are cooler, but still brilliant weather –and set to continue through weekend!  OH mowed today, but I mostly had to be domestic indoors.  Funny cloud this evening – very white and thin but looks like giant fish-scales – is that nature’s way of attracting late Ospreys into the air?  Enjoyed today’s posts – keep them coming!

Alan – picnic at Barnwell sounds a better option than Tesco any day!  Sorry SiL is still in hospital, but pleased she is improving.

Annette – pleased you enjoyed the yoga.  A sea fret in Eastern England is commonly called a haar in Eastern Scotland – presumably from Norse – but I have heard both used in both areas.

Emma – so pleased you got an interim report from ED when she made her connection.  I think Son enjoyed watching on Saturday, but he did find it rather loud!  He says there is some other sort of rally this week – cars of some sort - and a stunt driver in The Square!

Heather – um, no, that book of your OH’s doesn’t exactly sound like comfortable evening reading!

Terry – glad to know we are both still in the same time zone!  Don’t forget we can meet up if you come to Caerlaverock or Mersehead for the Geese this winter!

Gary – at last you’re here!  Welcome back.  Pleased you saw the ospreys at Cape Cod.  Don’t know whether you’ll catch up with ironing piles, liberty bodices, cup cakes and the like – but leaf blowers have already made an appearance, so you should feel at home!

Linda, hope you had a wonderful birthday:) Sorry I'm a few days late.

Emma, thanks:) Re BigRab74, his wife had a baby about a month ago I think so he's got his hands full. He hasn't been on Facebook either. I'm hoping when he has some spare time.....he may be able to go through some of the wonderful clips everyone's posted to put something together. I have no idea if he will though. Your holiday sounds great and complicated at the same time!

Well, I've gone back 5 pages but it takes an age to load:(

Sorry I can't respond individually but I'll try and pick up from here going forward. Sorry for everyone who has been poorly/had accidents:(

George, sorry about your loss.

OG, thanks:) Glad leaf blowers have had a mention! Lol don't tell anyone but I've used mine once already as , like Diane, a few of our leaves are starting to fall. Glad you had nice weather today.

Well, it's downright HOT here. We have a temp of 36 and a “feels like” temp of about 38. It's meant to be cooling off at this time of year as well.

We on the east coast are watching hurricane Earl. In fact, I've been and “panic brought” some water and more torches! Lol The info at the moment is that we are on the outer fringes of the thing so we may just have strong winds and rain, probably on Friday sometime. However, the friend's house that we stayed at recently couldn't be closer to the sea or more exposed. So, hope they fare OK.  

Hi All:   I'm still trying to find the time to catch up on here! - one of the reasons I was so upset about this morning was I had a 'window' of about 15 mins to write on here, and then had to go out, so it was extra annoying to have to give up on writing. We are extremely busy at the moment - even the ironing and HW have had to wait recently ... so its got harder to find time for keeping up with the threads.

Many thanks to All who were so kind in wishing me a Happy Birthday, and especially for the lovely cards (poppies!) - I did indeed have a lovely day - I went shopping in the sunshine in the morning, and after doing some boring shopping, managed to pick up two pairs of bargain trousers (at Ed. Woollen Mill!).  Great for my holidays.

We went out in the evening for an Italian meal:   the restaurant was quite busy and lively for a midweek evening, with lots of happy young people, and had attractive Italian decor.  My OH and I chose a starter to share, to leave room for pudding later! - we had a very very thin crispy pizza with lots of Mozzarella on top.  Then he had Lasagne, and I had Herby Italian Meatballs on a bed of spaghetti, with a really rich tomato sauce, which was yummy. Our friends had steaks, which they pronounced delicious.  Then Husband had a very deep and creamy raspberry Cheesecake, and I had Sticky Toffee Pudding, which was just wonderful - with a dollop of Italian icecream on the side, of course.  We had good service & didn't rush the meal so we could talk and gossip, and enjoyed our wine.  Afterwards our friends came back to our house for coffees and more chat, so it was all in all,  a wonderful evening all round.

My friend gave me a surprise birthday present of a book:  "The Poetry of Birds"  which is a compendium by Penguin (very appropriate!).  I was thrilled with it.  Here is a quote from on the back cover:  " 'Hope' is the thing with feathers- / That perches in the soul-/ And sings the tune without the words -/ And never stops - at all-"   by Emily Dickinson.

Going to post this now before it too disappears!

Hi, its me again.   I have been trying to trawl through the hundreds of pics I took of LG this season, looking for the sunrise ones.  Can someone please remind me which update they were on so I can check my records as I want to get a mug or two with the photos on.

Lindybird said:

 -"My friend gave me a surprise birthday present of a book:  "The Poetry of Birds"  which is a compendium by Penguin (very appropriate!).  I was thrilled with it.  Here is a quote from on the back cover:  " 'Hope' is the thing with feathers- / That perches in the soul-/ And sings the tune without the words -/ And never stops - at all-"   by Emily Dickinson.

Just beautiful Lindybird. Sounds a marvellous book.Glad you enjoyed your meal.