Leap Year

I returned to Inverness yesterday after a couple of social activities, leaving a rather dreich morning in Glasgow which brightened up as the train travelled through Perthshire, and by the time we approached Inverness the sun was breaking through the clouds. I alternately read my book and enjoyed the beautiful views of mountains and fields. I do enjoy a train journey. I met up with James at Inverness Station and we had lunch before heading back to Ullapool. 

Today is 29th February because this is a Leap Year, and it felt like a kind of bonus day. After a walk round the village with James in the sunshine, I spent the rest of the day updating the Ullapool Notes book, a record that I keep of our activities here. It’s not like my blog, it’s more a series of dates and bullet points with topical lists at the back, such as places that we have eaten and walked and swum and visited. I managed to finish it right up to date and I was very pleased with myself. This evening we watched a film I have been wanting to see, called “It Happened One Night” starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, a romantic comedy which won many Oscars in 1935. It had its witty and quite funny moments, but was inevitably very dated. When we were discussing it we agreed that it was probably very daring at the time, for example an unmarried couple sharing a room, even though it was divided by a blanket on a rope. At nearly ninety years old there are probably jokes in the film which James and I simply don’t “get.” It was mildly amusing and somehow a bit reminiscent of the dialogue in “It’s a Wonderful Life” which is not surprising because they were both directed by Frank Capra. 

Mountain views from the train

James and I had a walk around the village and the harbour this morning in beautiful weather and then drove to The Storehouse, a very good wee restaurant on the Cromarty Firth north-east of Dingwall, to meet Alison and Hugh. Hugh’s sister Lyndsey had recommended it and it was very good place for lunch, relaxed and spacious with lovely views of the water, and the food was excellent. It was so great to catch up with Alison and Hugh, we had a lovely chat and a laugh. Then James dropped me off at Inverness train station where I caught the train to Perth and then the replacement bus service from Perth to Glasgow. The train was almost empty and I had the most amazing views of the snow-capped Cairngorms as I travelled south. The replacement bus was waiting right outside the station and the staff were very helpful at pointing people to the correct bus but oh dear, oh dear, what a long time the bus took to get from Perth to Glasgow Queen Street. More than an hour and a half; it did stop at Stirling on the way which must have added to the time. I was home by 9 p.m. The house was very quiet without James and the kitties. 

Ullapool after the storms

We returned to Ullapool on Thursday and could immediately see the effects of the wild weather they have had since the beginning of the year. Glasgow had storms too (most of which we missed when we were in Austria and London!) but not on this scale. The fences have all been blown down in Morefield Lane and there are trees uprooted all over the place. Our garage door was blown open and buckled in the wind; our neighbours Anne, Natasha and Heather all rallied round and managed to wedge it shut. We are lucky to have such good neighbours. We warmed up the cottage and lit the fire; Tom immediately went out to explore his northern territory but Flora preferred to stay indoors, apart from a jaunt outside just before bedtime. The weather is fine although a bit too chilly to sit outside, after all it’s still February. We have been strolling around the village, plenty of places to have a coffee even this early in the year. Natasha and Marcus came round for coffee, they are such an interesting and pleasant young couple. Marcus is a proper native of the area, their croft has been in his family for many generations. Natasha comes from Lincolnshire, they met at college and they both have full time jobs as well as working on the croft, they are very hard-working. Tom was very affectionate to Natasha and graciously allowed her to rub his tummy. 

We are watching a new spy series called Slow Horses. It is very good. Gary Oldman plays a cynical old manager of a unit of misfits and failures, and he has all of the best lines e.g. “I know that you didn’t mean to kill him. If you had meant to kill him he’d still be alive!” 

Meanwhile Jamie spent his 34th birthday yesterday going to a Taylor Swift concert in Sydney, Australia with Kerry and some friends. They did well to obtain tickets which were much in demand, and decided to make a celebratory weekend of it. I hear that they had a marvellous time. 

French for cats

I am still enjoying my French course by Zoom very much. It has reignited my ambition to improve my French, and I like the teacher and my classmates. However there is someone else who is unexpectedly enjoying the class with me - Flora! She likes to climb up onto James’ desk and sit watching the screen. I think she likes seeing the faces of my classmates as we talk, and she seems to pay close attention to the worksheets; perhaps she will become a bilingual cat! Occasionally she stands up, has a stretch and walks around the desk a bit, at which point her tail can be seen on the screen as she passes. This causes a bit of excitement and I have been asked her name and to introduce her to the group, who are all cat lovers as it turns out. In fact there is only one of the six of us who doesn’t have a cat! 
I was at book club at Jenn’s this week (she is another cat lover although her cats were not in evidence during the evening) and we had good chat as well as discussing the book, a detective novel called Death in the Dordogne by Martin Walker. I gave it to Jennifer (sister) as part of her Christmas present and also read it myself. It was a wee jokey present because she and Russ have just bought a house in the Dordogne! We had a good discussion about it; Susan T pointed out that it is more than just a light read; it’s well written and addresses political and historic issues as well as the inevitable murder or two. We chatted about all sorts of things as usual. It’s always interesting to hear from my former colleagues about what is going on in schools currently, and there were excellent recommendations about good box sets to watch as well as chat about family and life in general. 

Bill’s funeral

This poem was read at the end of Bill’s funeral today. I thought that it was very apt. Alison and the family gave him a good and very loving send off, with music from the Beatles and a reading from Douglas Adams. 

Epitaph on my own friend by Robert Burns

An honest man here lies at rest,
As e’er God with His image blest:
The friend of man, the friend of truth;
The friend of age, and guide of youth:
Few hearts like his, with virtue warm’d,
Few heads with knowledge so inform’d:
If there’s another world, he lives in bliss;
If there is none, he made the best of this. 

Home from London

We went back to the Two Magpies for brunch in our last morning in London. We bought a box of baklava from the recently opened and rather delightful The Baklava Company across the road from the café, and also a wee bunch of early daffodils, and left both in the flat as a thanks to Ally and Cat for their hospitality. Back in Scotland we have been catching up on useful stuff around the house and also enjoying a bit of socialising. We had a lovely dinner and evening at Heather and Ewan’s on Saturday and I had a very nice coffee and catch up with Hilary today. I also visited Alison on Monday, it was good to see her but I also felt so sad for her. 
Months ago I impulsively purchased tickets for “I Should Be So Lucky” a new musical based on the 1980s and 1990s hits by Stock Aitken and Waterman. This evening we went along to the King’s Theatre to see it and as I expected it had a really rubbish plot to cobble together the songs, and a hologram of Kylie Minogue which appeared in a mirror. In fact I even considered leaving. But as it went on, I was won over by the talented singing and dancing of the enthusiastic young cast, and by the end I was singing along with the rest of the audience to “Never Gonna Give You Up.” 

The Imperial War Museum

Today we walked from Limehouse to the Imperial War Museum which was about 6 km, a mixture of riverside and urban walking. We had lunch in the museum café before spending the afternoon looking at the displays on the 2nd World War (James) and the Holocaust (both of us.) The displays have been updated since our last visit (at least a decade ago) and were very good, we were there for several hours without realising it. We met Cat for dinner at Koha before going just round the corner to Wyndham’s Theatre where we met Ally (who had had a late work meeting) to see a comedy called The Unfriend. As we went in I had the tickets all ready to display on my phone screen, but for some reason when I showed it to the ticket checker, a photo of Ally swimming at the Fairy Pools in Skye came up instead! The show was amusing; it starred Lee Mack and really had the vibe of an extended episode of his tv show Not Going Out! Lee Mack’s physical comedy was excellent, he is very funny, and supporting actors Frances Barber and Sarah Alexander were very good too. We all enjoyed it. Back at the flat we had hot chocolate and said our goodbyes before bedtime because we will be leaving tomorrow while Ally and Cat are at work. 

Courtauld Gallery

There is always so much to see in London. Ally and Cat were back at work today, and after a leisurely breakfast in their beautiful flat (although it’s not quite the weather yet for sitting out on their balcony!) we wandered the streets of the big city happily. We went to the Courtauld Gallery, to see its Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings, including of course the very well known A Bar at the Folies-Bergère by Édouard Manet and Vincent van Gogh's Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear. We have never been there before (Andrew recommended it) and we were very impressed. Although small there is plenty to see, and it has some good medieval and renaissance paintings too. It also has a small but pleasant café where we had a relaxing lunch. Then we went to Leicester Square to watch a film (a spy thriller called Argylle - it was ok but not great.) When we arrived back at Ally and Cat’s flat in the evening Cat made us a delicious vegetarian lasagne and we had a very pleasant evening chatting and watching film clips about the history of Limehouse. 

Bill Thomson

While we were on our way into London on Friday we got unexpected and very sad news from Alison, that Bill died peacefully the night before, a few hours after suffering a massive stroke. We were shocked and so sad. Bill was a very fit and active 76 year old, who had spent the previous week skiing in the Dolomites. Alison and Bill came round for coffee just a couple of weeks ago and I can hardly believe that we won’t see him again. 
We have such good memories of Bill. We met him and Alison on a ski holiday to Villars, where we were in the same hotel and found out that coincidentally we all lived in Cambuslang. We all hit it off including the children; Rachel and Cameron were on holiday with them, and we kept in touch afterwards. I remember when Jamie was in Hairmyres waiting on surgery for a badly broken finger, Bill passed the window of the room we were waiting in and did a huge double take, then came in for a chat. And a few years later Bill very kindly took Jamie to do a week of work experience at Hairmyres and Jamie had a fantastic time with him; Bill even took him into the operating theatre with him which I suspect may not have been officially approved by the hospital admin! They also had some heart to hearts in the car on the journeys (Bill even gave him a lift there and back every day) which Jamie appreciated.
The world is a poorer place without this remarkable, kind and generous man. My heart goes out to Alison, his children, grandchildren and his wee great-granddaughter. 

Day out with Ally and Cat

Today was Ally and Cat’s Christmas present from us, in the form of a day out with several hopefully pleasant activities. We started with brunch at our favourite café, The Two Magpies, and then headed for Stratford to ABBA Voyage! This was our second visit and Ally and Cat’s first. Although I knew what to expect this time I was amazed again by the Avatars and their realism, and Ally leaned over at the end and said “How do they do that?” which was just what we had said the first time! I think that Ally and Cat really enjoyed it, although very clever and commercial the event has such a joyful feel. We then strolled the short distance along to Stratford shopping centre and had coffee and cake, before it was time for our next activity; the Horizon of Khufu. This was a Virtual Reality experience set in Ancient Egypt which I had booked on a whim. I wasn’t sure what it would be like and it turned out to be absolutely fantastic. With our VR headsets firmly in place we set forth to see the Egyptian Pyramids. We even had a VR guide to tell us all about it, and we were joined by Bastet the Cat God. We went inside the Great Pyramid, which Ally and Cat assured us was very true to their real life visit last year. And thanks to VR we were guided to a “platform” which floated us up through the higher part of the pyramid to see how it was constructed, and then we walked out on to the very top of the pyramid where we could see all around us. We sailed on a boat along the Nile, and learned about mummification techniques. It was amazing. It did occur to me that we would have presented an amusing sight to anyone watching us, as we picked our way carefully around an empty warehouse as if balancing on the top of a pyramid! 
After this we headed to Marylebone, calling in for a brief visit to Selfridges, which I didn’t realise is Ally’s favourite department store. He likes the way that it’s organised. We saw a man who had a cat on a lead, and were gratified to see that it refused to walk on the lead and he had to pick it up to carry it!
Our last experience of the day was dinner at the Chiltern Firehouse, a popular restaurant which as its name suggests is housed in an old fire station. In fact our table was right beside the old fire engine doors. It was very busy. The staff were effusive but not the most organised, and the food was really good but a bit overpriced for what it was. If I was to return I think that I would go for breakfast or brunch and I would sit in the attractive outdoor courtyard. The most important thing about our day was of course the company and the four of us had a fine time. 

Macbeth (2. David Tennant)

This evening we met Gordon, Sheena and Peter at the Monmouth Kitchen for pre-theatre dinner before going to the Donmar Warehouse to see David Tennant in Macbeth. This was our second Macbeth in three weeks, not the way we would have planned it but how could we choose between Ralph Fiennes and David Tennant? We were instructed to wear the headphones plugged in behind each seat. This clever device meant that we could hear two levels of dialogue; that which was publicly spoken and that which was whispered. This totally made sense; after all, why would the Macbeths hatch their evil plans out loud, even in their own castle, rather than murmur them quietly into each other’s ears? It worked very well. David Tennant was, quite simply, brilliant. As James pointed out, he didn’t seem to speak in a stagey way at all, he just spoke the lines so naturally that I would defy anyone even to notice that the language was Shakespearean. The rest of the cast were excellent too, and Cush Jumbo was a subtle, gradually disintegrating Lady Macbeth. The death scene at the end was really poignant, Macbeth showing his old bravery at the last, and again Tennant’s acting was peerless. 
So to summarise my two recent Macbeths; Ralph Fiennes was excellent, but David Tennant was in a class of his own. 

National Gallery with Andrew

We are down in London for a few days, visiting Ally and Cat. A while ago we asked Andrew to give us a tour of the National Gallery, to show us some of his favourite paintings. Today was the day, and we met him in the basement coffee shop of the Gallery before sallying forth on our tour. I had asked him not to prepare, we just wanted an informal tour from his perspective, and it was great fun. He took us to a couple of Medieval rooms that we had never even been in before, where we very much enjoyed all the gold leaf and the beautiful colours. Then it was on to the Northern Renaissance, quite a few of which we hadn’t seen before in our October trip - Andrew knows his way around the National Gallery extremely well. He then showed us a few more favourites before we all headed for lunch and a chat. My favourite new (to me) paintings of the day were both modernist; firstly “The Kien Valley with the Bluemlisalp massif”, painted by Swiss modernist Ferdinand Hodler in the summer of 1902. The bright, steep-sided valley, the dark green trees, the blue mountains and sky beyond, convey a beautiful scene captured in time. The other was painted in 1905 by Finnish artist Akseli Gallen-Kallela of Lake Keitele, which lies about 350 km north of Helsinki. The water is painted naturalistically, with different patterns where the breeze is touching it, and it’s stunning. 

Feeling hateful

Today I have felt hateful all day. The reason that I use this expression is that years ago I was reading an online article about embarrassing things that people have said or done during their early years in the workplace. One woman had contributed that when she was in her first year of work after graduating she asked her manager if she could go home early one day “because I’m feeling hateful.” I seem to recall that she said that her bemused boss acquiesced! Anyway, I thought that this phrase was very funny and it stuck in my mind. 
And today I have indeed felt hateful. Usually when I feel like this there’s a reason for it, whether personal or professional. However today I have just been in an off mood, for no particular reason that I can think of other than a fairly large admin task that I really needed to do. As I had anticipated it took up the majority of my day, and when I finished it I didn’t really feel much of a sense of achievement. In fact I even felt a sense of foreboding. Even my much loved French evening class (by Zoom) didn’t lift my spirits much. 
It may be because I’m feeling a bit under the weather, it may be that I’m a bit wistful after our lovely ski holiday; I should be grateful that there’s no specific reason. Tomorrow is a new day!