Edible crabs in Loch Ewe

Yesterday while the others in the hill-walking club were climbing many mountains around Kinlochewe including Beinn Eighe and Beinn Alligan, Christine, Miriam and I headed for Inverewe Gardens. We were counting on the forecast sunshine to see them at their best; however when we arrived it was raining so we went for coffee and cake in the pleasant tea room. A long time ago in the tea room at Inverewe Gardens when I was sitting having lunch with my three beautiful little boys, Davie in a highchair, an old lady once wished me luck to “see my boys up” so it has good memories for me. And I count myself very lucky that I have lived to see them grow up. By the time we had finished our coffee the rain had gone off and blue sky was peeping through the clouds.
Christine knew most about horticulture and was kind enough to give us a tour of the different kinds of flowers. Osgood Mackenzie‘s house is now open to the public so we had a look round it. Designed in 1929, it is beautifully light and airy. We also spontaneously booked ourselves onto an hour long boat trip from the jetty at the end of the gardens. This has only been running for the last couple of seasons and it turned out to be great fun. The skipper is called Jamie and he is very knowledgeable about the wildlife of the area so he pointed out birds such as grey herons and cormorants as we chugged along Loch Ewe. He also stopped a couple of times to lift fishing creels to show us what was in them. He produced green crabs, velvet crabs, big brown crabs and tiny starfish. The brown crab is also known as the "edible crab," which ill-omened name I doubted that the crab would have chosen for itself! We returned to the jetty along the Inverewe peninsula with great views of the gardens. Soon we were wandering through the walled garden enjoying the huge variety of flowers and vegetables which are grown in adjacent rows. I wonder if potatoes grow particularly well in the vicinity of dahlias because they were planted in alternating rows. Or perhaps the flowers are there simply to add colour to the rows of vegetables. Back in Kinlochewe we joined the rest of the group, who were in varying states of exhaustion after their strenuous hill-walks, for a hearty dinner. 

On the road to Kinlochewe

We are currently driving to Kinlochewe for the weekend. Well, James is driving, and I am blogging. We are also listening to Midland’s new album. I am enjoying it considerably more than James, who keeps singing his own cheeky words to the tunes. Admittedly his words are quite funny.
I had one of my recurring dreams about my Mum last night. She was still alive in my dream and we were on holiday, but I had gone out without remembering to check that she was ok and had eaten her breakfast. The rest of the dream involved trying to get back to her to take care of her, but I was delayed again and again by increasingly unlikely scenarios. I woke feeling anxious and flustered. I think that this is probably linked to James’ and my current worry about Grandma, who is still in hospital and not doing too well. Also I met a lovely lady in Grandma’s ward the other day who told me that she was born in September 1931 - just like my Mum. So it’s not hard to work out why I had the dream.
The weather is mixed so far and according to the forecast is will continue to be a mixture of sunshine and showers for the weekend. I’m glad that we have booked a room in the comfort of the Kinlochewe Hotel instead of joining Ally and Cat in the more spartan bunkhouse next door.

* Update on arrival at the Hotel - our room is very nice indeed! Alasdair (who has organised the weekend) has done us proud. 

Students again!

The political situation in the country just now is very volatile, with all sides fighting and shouting each other down. When James and I were enjoying a coffee on Tuesday in Café Gelato, it was clear that James is very sure of his views of the situation. It occurred to me that one of my ex-colleagues has diametrically opposite views to those of James, but that like him, he is absolutely certain that he is right. I quite envy them because I think that one of my problems, both politically and in fact in all aspects of my life, is that I can see both sides of most stories. This can be very uncomfortable because for me the world is never clear cut or easy. It occurred to me that despite their opposing views James and my ex-colleague have more in common than they do with me!
Today James and I became students! We have both signed up to do short courses at Glasgow University, from which we both graduated in the 1980s. We pass through the campus all the time but it feels strange to be sitting in a classroom there again. I really enjoyed my first French lesson. I had chosen a fairly easy level so I was very much in my comfort zone, however it was good to go over the basics again and I did learn some new vocabulary. Also I think that the course will progress quite fast. There are fourteen of us in the class and everyone seems friendly and supportive. Meanwhile James had his first Geology lecture, which was a much bigger class and quite lively and hands on from what he tells me.
We didn’t have time to hang about in the West End being students today, because we headed straight over to visit Grandma in hospital in East Kilbride. Then we picked up a curry on the way home, with the excuse that we will be in Kinlochewe tomorrow evening so will miss our usual curry night. I chose a film to watch while David and James and I were eating it: Wild Rose, which is about a Glaswegian country music singer, and it was enjoyed by Heather and Ewan when it was on cinema release. I thoroughly enjoyed the music, the Glaswegian scenery and two of the children were even wearing the uniforms of the boys’ old school Hutchie! I think that Jessie Buckley, who I have already admired in the film of the musical Les Miserables, and in a supporting part in the recent television series Chernobyl, is extremely talented at both singing and acting.
My only slight criticism is that the Glaswegian terminology and accents of some characters in the film, while admirably attempted, were just not quite right. And a few other things didn’t ring quite true, for example Rose’s surprise that her employer has made a fortune selling conservatories in rainy Glasgow, when in fact it’s well known that conservatories here are very popular. But that is me being quite nitpicking as a Scottish linguist; it’s still a great wee film. 

From Anstruther to the Isle of May

With James and I boarded our boat today we were advised to sit near the front if we didn’t want to get wet. The boat was a rib which was taking us across the Firth of Forth to the Isle of May. We ended up in the middle and didn’t get too wet; just a bit of salt spray. The weather was absolutely gorgeous and the sea was fairly calm, although the boat tended to crest each wave and then smack down into the troughs, which elicited some excited screaming from a few of the passengers. The skipper circumnavigated the island, pointing out sea life and geological features. Many of the seabirds have left for the winter, but we saw plenty of cormorants, shags, guillemots and gannets, and even a few young pufflings which were bobbing about on the water. The coastline is lined with sea stacks and cliffs, with caves and rocky beaches. There were quite a few seals lounging around on low rocks and thousands more will be arriving over the next few weeks; in fact our trip today was right at the end of the season because the island closes to the public from 1st October until April in order to protect the seal pups. From a cliff top during our walk we saw a white seal cub lying on the beach below us, waiting for its Mummy.
The island has an interesting history and there was a religious community based there for a long time. The skipper entertained us with some lively stories about its past. Apparently a clan chief’s daughter called Teneu became pregnant by a man from a rival clan, and her punishment was to be driven off a cliff in East Lothian in a horse-driven carriage, which seems a bit unfair in the horses in my opinion. She survived and was then declared to be a witch, so was set adrift in the sea in a coracle. She then washed up on the Isle of May and was taken in by the monks there before moving to Culross. When her baby was born she named him Kentigern but he was nicknamed Mungo by St Serf - yes the baby was good old St Mungo, the patron saint of Glasgow! And Teneu’s name was corrupted to Enoch and she became St Enoch, also of Glasgow!
We were deposited on the island slipway at about 1 p.m. and had three hours to explore the island. The Isle of May is only 1.8 km long and less that half a kilometre wide, so that was plenty of time to explore it. It is very attractive with grassy paths, lighthouses and the remains of an old priory. We cross-crossed it, walking up its small hills, chatting and enjoying the views. James had thoughtfully brought a flask of coffee which we quaffed while sitting in the sunshine.
Later we set off for the eight kilometre journey back to Anstruther in our rib. The water was an amazing colour, like molten pewter. Back on dry land we treated ourselves to fish suppers in the famous Anstruther Fish Bar. 

Family reunion in Ward 15

It is a quiet Sunday afternoon at Casa Anderson. I have been doing some admin and am now blogging before I make the dinner. James is reading the paper and in the background we are listening to Brad Paisley. We are going to his concert in London in October, which I booked on the spur of the moment a while ago on the basis of one or two songs that I really like, but I actually know little of his music so I thought that I had better do my homework! Brad is not disappointing me, his music is as lovely as his voice. Ally, Cat and Davie are out and about, shopping and playing mini-golf, and we will have  dinner together later.
Earlier we were up at the hospital to visit Grandma and she was telling us that James’ Aunt May (to be accurate she is a first cousin once removed but has always been known as his auntie) had been in the hospital but had now gone home. She said that she had spoken to one of May’s daughters. We weren’t too sure of this because yesterday Grandma asked me to contact her mother (who died in the 1970s) because she had been “out all night”and would be worried. However I sallied forth to the nurses’ station to check out the story, and in fact Aunt May was indeed in the same ward, in the very next room to Grandma! We quickly grabbed a wheelchair and a genuinely heart-warming reunion ensued, the two ladies were holding hands and Grandma was smiling and laughing with joy. May’s daughter Margo and grand-daughter Katie were also there, and we all had a good chat. It was the most successful visiting time ever! 

Unseasonably warm

It is an absolutely gorgeous autumn Saturday. There is not a cloud in the sky and it is unseasonably warm. The washing is drying on the line and the cats and I have been wandering around the house and garden companionably. James and Davie are hill-walking near Peebles so it has been very quiet and peaceful. Ally and Cat appeared at lunchtime on their way from Dunlop to a wedding in Linlithgow of one of their school friends. We ate bagels and cheese in the garden; when Cat left her plate unattended for a minute naughty Tom quickly climbed onto her seat and started slurping greedily at the butter on her bagel. We all shouted at him to stop but he merely withdrew under the seat and licked his paws in a rather self-satisfied manner.
I remarked on the warm weather as an Indian Summer *, a term which was coined by European settlers in America in the 19th century, and may have been called “Indian Summer” because it was noticed in areas inhabited by First Nation Americans. Or it could have been a good hunting season for First Nation Americans and they told the Europeans about it. However Cat told me that this isn't technically an Indian Summer, because that is how a warm spell after the first frost is described - and we haven’t had a frost yet. I found that very interesting.
When I went up to the hospital to visit Grandma she was in good spirits and we sat outside the day room in the sunshine along with lots of other patients and their families. There was a friendly atmosphere and we were all chatting. Sunshine seems to bring out the best in people.

• On researching the term, I noticed that a few people online have pointed out that the phrase has old colonial undertones which are not politically correct. I can understand this but note  that it is still in general use, also that various representatives of First Nation peoples have stated that they are not bothered by the phrase. 

Mack the Knife

Today at lunchtime James and I went to see A Play A Pie and A Pint at Oran Mor. This week’s offering is “Mack the Knife”. We invited Davie to go with us and I was extremely glad that we did so because it was one of the best plays that I have seen at Oran Mor. It was written by Morag Fullarton and was both funny and poignant. It concerns the staging in Berlin in the late 1920s of Bertolt Brecht’s Threepenny Opera. Mack the Knife was its most famous song, sung by Kurt Gerron. Most of the play is about the disastrous rehearsals for the play and how everything went wrong in the months leading up to its opening night, with Kurt Gerron, Kurt Weill, Berthold Brecht and Lotte Lenya as the main characters. The acting and singing was first rate and the story of why they had to add in the song “Mack the Knife” to introduce Macheath was hilarious. But then the ending of the play was very sad; a few years later not all of them made it out of Nazi Germany in time.
When I was looking up all the characters later on the internet to check out the story, I discovered that the actress and singer Lotte Lenya (who escaped to America in the 1930s with her husband Kurt Weill) later became the James Bond villainess Rosa Klebb, with her trademark poison-tipped shoes!

An evening with Margaret Atwood

Last night Ally W very kindly invited me to join her book club on an outing to Eastwood Theatre to watch a live streamed documentary about Canadian author Margaret Atwood. This documentary was being simultaneously screened across the globe to mark the release of her new book “The Testaments” which is a sequel to “The Handmaid’s Tale”, recently popularised again by a television series. I have long admired her work and I read “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “The Edible Woman” among others, many many years ago. So I was keen to go along and Ally’s friends all made me feel very welcome.
We all met at Ally’s house where she made us a delicious supper before the short (and delightfully secret, through a locked gate) stroll to the theatre. The documentary did not disappoint. An extended interview with Margaret Atwood was interspersed with readings from her new book by top luvvies Ann Dowd, Sally Hawkins, and Lily James. Margaret Atwood was a fascinating speaker and I would now really like to read the book. I have to admit that when I first heard that there was to be a sequel to “The Handmaid’s Tale”, I rather cynically surmised that after the success of the television series it had seemed like a good opportunity to add to Atwood’s pension pot. However, after hearing her speak about it I felt myself drawn back in to the dystopian world of Gilead.
A rather sad postscript is that I read today that Margaret Atwood’s long time partner (since 1973) Graeme Gibson, died yesterday in London while promoting the new book with her. He was eighty-five and had been suffering from early stages of dementia so the family mentioned that although very sad they were glad that he died during a happy time before his condition deteriorated further. 

A cycle on Millport

On Tuesday we went for a cycle around the island of Cumbrae. I have been making this well loved trip all of my life but it must be quite a few years since the last time. It was a perfect autumnal day; sunny but cool enough that I didn’t overheat. We invited Davie, as his last hurrah before starting at university next week. Since we only have two bike racks, it was a bit of a puzzle how to transport David’s bike as well as ours. However James and David successfully removed one of the wheels and managed to squeeze it into the back of the car. We parked the car at Largs and wheeled the bikes onto the ferry. After the short crossing, we set off anticlockwise around the island. The views of the Clyde estuary were absolutely gorgeous and the route was flat enough to please even me. On a Tuesday morning in September the island was very quiet. There were only a few other cyclists, a dozen or so walkers, and almost no cars. We saw cormorants standing on the red rocks at the shore and passed sandy beaches and war memorials. We stopped for coffee at the café at Fintry Bay and then continued round to the little town of Millport. After paying our respects to the renowned Crocodile Rock (yes the most famous thing in Millport is a rock painted like a crocodile which has been a feature of the town ever since I can remember) we continued onwards to the ferry slipway. My watch app told me that we had cycled for a bit over 16.5 km. This, however, was not enough for the intrepid James and David. They decided to circumnavigate the island once more. I was a little more cautious because my thighs were already feeling rather tired. So I accompanied the boys the 4 km round to Fintry Bay once more, where we had a light lunch sitting outside in the warm sunshine. Then I turned back towards the ferry slipway while they cycled onwards right round the island. So James and David ended up cycling for a total of 33 km while I was quite happy with my 25 km. It was a grand day. 

Autumn

Well, it’s more than half way through September and it is definitely Autumn, my Mum’s favourite season and until this year my least favourite. To me, it has always signified the end of summer and the long descent into cold and short days. However now that I have retired I have time to appreciate its beauty more, and Autumn certainly is beautiful.
I’m back in the day room at Hairmyres Ward 15 and the doors are open onto a grassy slope which is edged with trees whose leaves are just beginning to turn rust and yellow. There are a few rowan trees whose berries are a startlingly bright red, and rose-hips are growing on bushes. The reason that I’m in the day room is that I have brought Grandma’s lovely wee friend to visit her at the hospital and I’m giving them space to have a chat.
This morning Davie and I watched Flora trying her very best to catch squirrels in the pear trees at the top of the garden, but as usual they were just too fast for her. She got pretty close though. Tom was also in a rip-roaring good mood and cavorted around the house before settling down on our bed for his long daytime sleep. I went for a pram walk along to Burnside with Suzy and the weather was crisp and sunny and we had a pleasant coffee and chat at Café Gelato. I think that I am becoming converted to Autumn! 

Grandma’s 90th Birthday

Yesterday was Grandma’s 90th birthday. As far as we are aware she has outlived all of her ancestors, her own mother having died at eighty-nine. Obviously she would not have chosen to spend her birthday in hospital but we did our best to make it special for her. Quite a few cards had been delivered to our house or her house from her friends over the past few days, some written in old person’s shaky handwriting. They are mostly too infirm to visit her any more but it was sweet that they had remembered her birthday. We bundled these up with flowers and presents and set off for the hospital in the early afternoon with Ally, David and Chanel. We were pleased to find her in good spirits; I think the nurses had been making a fuss of her and the other old ladies in the ward all knew that it was her birthday. Her main family celebration took place in the evening. The nurses got her all dressed up and we decorated tables in the day room with flowers and balloons and plates of crisps ready to start at 7 p.m.
The party was great. Marjory had ordered a beautiful cake decorated with sunflowers and Grandma loved it. There was much singing of Happy Birthday and eating of cake and drinking of Champagne and reminiscing. By 8 o’clock Grandma started to look exhausted so we had to wind things up. She was very happy as she said good night to us and said that she had enjoyed her evening.
When we got home the Last Night of the Proms was on television so we all watched it. It felt suitably uplifting and celebratory for the day. I’m so glad that Grandma had a good day. 

Savour the moment

While having a coffee with James in John Lewis the other day, I noticed something written on the inside of the lid of a miniature jar of Wilkin and Sons raspberry jam. The message recommended that we should “Savour the moment” Although this undoubtedly referred to jam, I found it to be rather apt for my current state of mind. I have been feeling quite thoughtful this week about life. I’m sad that Grandma is still unwell in hospital and I hope that she will be allowed out soon because she is very keen to get home. We visit her every afternoon and combine the trip with useful errands - my “to do” list has never been so short! I like it that David will be based at home for the next year while he completes his Masters degree, he is most pleasant company. I’m enjoying the autumn as the colours of the trees slowly start to change, and I’m enjoying going for walks in the cooler sunshine. I was at Pollok Park on Tuesday with Kathryn and it looked beautiful. 

We have been doing some batch cooking and James is doing a great job in the garden, which looks very smart. I have been reading quite a lot, and tonight I’m going to book club in Burnside where we will discuss our summer reading. 

However, now that the season has turned, we have decided to add a little more structure to our week, so James and I have recently signed up to a couple of courses at Glasgow University. I am going to attempt to brush up my rusty French skills and James is going to study Geology. We find it amusing that we will be studying there at the same time as David and we have threatened him that we will go drinking with him in the student union. David however remained good-naturedly unperturbed and said that he would happily meet up with us! Chanel has just arrived for the weekend and James has just poured us pre dinner drinks so I will finish here in order to have some chat. 

In my Liverpool home

On Sunday Chanel and her Dad James gave us a lovely tour of the centre of Liverpool. We visited Mathew Street and saw the famous Cavern night club, and lots of Beatles souvenir shops. There were more statues of the Fab Four, one of Cilla Black, and on another street we saw a statue of Eleanor Rigby sitting on a bench. The centre is very attractive with lots of Victorian (and older) buildings and little parks. We had lunch at a gorgeous café which had a series of small cosy rooms in it, called Rococo. We saw painted models which are called Superlambananas.
James quoted to us the chorus of the 1960s song by the Spinners, “In my Liverpool home” which has become an anthem for the people of Liverpool:
“In my Liverpool Home, In my Liverpool Home 
We speak with an accent exceedingly rare, 
Meet under a statue exceedingly bare, 
And if you want a Cathedral, we've got one to spare 
In my Liverpool Home”
Well, we heard the accent, saw the statue (it’s on the corner of the Lewis’s building and it IS exceedingly bare!) and visited both cathedrals. However there is lots more to see and I would love to come back to Liverpool soon. 

From Southport to Liverpool

Saturday dawned bright and sunny in Southport but I wasn’t feeling very bright because a nightmare had disturbed my sleep. An unpleasant nightmare about something that I thought was long behind me, and what’s more I know exactly what triggered it. It annoys me how easily I can still be thrown off balance. A refreshing shower perked me up and soon James and I strolled into the centre of Southport to meet Ally, Cat, Davie and Chanel for breakfast. They had all decided to join us for the air show which I found very heartwarming, and their lively and happy company cheered me and reminded me of what is important in life.
After breakfast we walked back through the park and hopped onto the delightful miniature railway. We then set up camp with our deckchairs on the promenade, ready for the flying display. The air show was good fun and much warmer than Friday evening, although the sea breeze necessitated the occasional brisk walk to limber up after sitting for a while. James enjoyed using his new, massive camera lens. There were plenty of food vans for lunch, and as well as watching the planes, I amused myself by observing various naughty children misbehaving down on the beach. Sand was thrown in siblings’ eyes, carefully constructed sand structures were sabotaged, small children ran away and had to be retrieved by their frazzled parents. To be fair, the parents did a valiant job of keeping them under control and all in all the children had fun and it was a good family day out.
Later we made our way to the centre of Liverpool where we had a tasty dinner at a restaurant called Panam. It was at the Royal Albert Docks, which are really smart with lots of pubs, restaurants, statues, views over the water towards the Wirral and several museums. Chanel gave us a brief night time tour after dinner and I was very impressed. I have only been in Liverpool once before, in the 1980s when our dear friend Margaret was living there. I was only there for one evening because I was in Manchester for a business meeting so took the opportunity to drive across for a brief visit. So I have never been to the centre of the city, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of it tomorrow, with the expert guidance of Chanel. 

Evening fireworks in Southport

On Friday James and I visited Grandma in hospital in the morning rather than the afternoon, because we were going to be travelling south in the afternoon. Finding her reassuringly alert and chatty, we spoke to the nurse about the next stage of her treatment which will involve physiotherapy. After a quick lunch at home we bade our farewells to the cats, both of whom sleepily ignored us, and set off to Southport. “Why Southport?” I hear you cry. Well, a few years ago James and Ally went to Southport Air Show, which is held over the sea, a bit like the one at Ayr. They had enjoyed it mightily, and James expressed a desire to return. 

We had managed to get booked into a hotel right at the front at Southport, which is right beside the gate to the promenade, and unusually there was an evening display on Friday before the main show today. This was rather chilly but actually pretty amazing, because you could see the afterburners of the Typhoon really clearly in the twilight, and there was a helicopter which shot out fireworks as it flew around. And the display ended with a splendid and gratifyingly lengthy firework display over the darkening sea. 

Good mood

I’m in a tremendously good mood today, for a variety of reasons. First of all, some friends of ours got some excellent news yesterday, about which it is not my place to blog. When the message arrived James and I were both delighted for them. The weather today is fine and blowy; I am in the back room with the doors to the garden propped open, because it is very warm. We have enjoyed our morning walk along to Burnside where we ran into (another) old friend, and had a coffee at Café Gelato where we are becoming quite the regulars! Jamie has messaged so say that he will be phoning for a chat soon, so I’m looking forward to that. James has fixed my phone so that the battery doesn’t run down so fast. I have polished and waterproofed two pairs of shoes and they look very smart. My furry boy Tom is relaxing beside me on the couch and James is reading his paper. Despite the chaos at Westminster all is well in my wee world just now. 

Dancing and errands

For some reason I was not at my most coordinated today at my FitSteps class, but I do enjoy the music and the dancing. Another lady in the class tripped and fell over during a complicated step, which caused a flurry of concern and the class was temporarily halted as everyone rushed to check that she was ok. She was a trouper and carried on with the routine.
In the early afternoon we went to visit Grandma, who was no worse but not really any better either. We’re not quite sure when she will be getting home and what sort of support she will need, which is a worry. The rest of the day was taken up with a series of useful but rather tedious errands, such as choosing a frame for Alasdair’s graduation photograph to match those of his brothers, grocery shopping, picking up contact lenses and delivering cards to people. I felt as if we drove around for ages and I was very glad to get home for a nice tea with James and Ally and a cosy and relaxing evening with the kitties. 

No deal and gooseberries

James is at the Hill-walking club social evening and I’m at home with Ally. Wee Flora is curled up on my lap. The MPs who are against the possibility of a No Deal Brexit have just voted to take control of House of Commons business. In response PM Boris Johnson (who asserts that he can still get a new deal, but does not want to rule out a No Deal because he feels it will adversely affect negotiations) has threatened that he will call a general election. I have said before in this blog that I’m not a political animal but surely ruling out No Deal will disadvantage the UK in negotiations with the EU? All sides seem to be intent only on blocking each other without any thought to the good of the country or indeed to the result of the referendum. It all seems such a mess.
Closer to home, we are back in the hospital routine again, visiting Grandma in the afternoons. She seems to be improving slowly. Ally went to visit her earlier this evening and thought that she was doing ok. We have also been exercising at the gym and working on various projects in the house and garden. On Saturday we had a really lovely evening at Michael and Lil’s. Steven and Hilary were also there and we had a great laugh. The meal was delicious but special mention must be made of the gooseberry cheesecake, made with red gooseberries, which was absolutely gorgeous. I have persuaded James to purchase a couple of new gooseberry bushes.