Walking among ghosts on Glasgow Green

When we were at the fireworks display at Glasgow Green on Monday evening, I enjoyed the sense of history that I always feel when I go there, so on Thursday I popped back over there to have a walk around and a coffee in the Winter Gardens of the People’s Palace. I love that the land has belonged to the people of Glasgow since the 15th century when it was gifted to them by the King, and attempts to use it for other purposes such as coal-mining have always been knocked back. So over the centuries it has been used for grazing animals, washing clothes, drying fishing nets and swimming. In the 18th century Bonnie Prince Charlie camped here with his army while demanding food and clothing from the reluctant Glaswegians, and twenty years later James Watt strolled around while thinking of ideas to improve the steam engine.

Many political meetings and marches have taken place on Glasgow Green in the 19th and 20th centuries, including those of the suffragettes, and anti-war protests from the 1st World War onwards. It is home to rowing clubs, there are playgrounds and a football centre. It hosts music festivals and of course the annual firework display.
When I go there, I like to imagine that I am treading in the footsteps all the Glaswegians who have been there before me, including some of my own ancestors. I love the People’s Palace and enjoyed my coffee there; the light in the Winter Gardens is always warm even when the weather outside is dull. Nearby I came across an attractive but rather mossy statue of James Watt; he looks much friendlier than his more formal statue in George Square. I wandered onwards to Nelson’s Monument and then along the banks of the Clyde to the very beautiful St Andrew’s Suspension Bridge. I stood in the middle and watched the river flowing beneath me, which was very soothing. I was amazed at how brightly coloured are the designs on the stonework of Templeton Carpet Factory, famous for being modelled on the Doge’s Palace in Venice; it really is gorgeous. Although it hasn’t been a carpet factory for a long time, it’s still a thriving business centre, including the WEST Brewery where we dined on Monday evening. Glasgow Green really is a great and historic park, and even on quite a dreich afternoon it was being well used by parents with pushchairs, runners, and random visitors like me. And thousands of ghosts. 

More Fireworks

James persuaded me to accompany him to Glasgow Green yesterday for the annual 5th November fireworks display. I don’t always go to this because I’m not very comfortable with big, council-organised firework displays. If it should go wrong it could go very wrong indeed with about 600 lb of explosives, and when the children were younger I always preferred to have our own firework displays in the garden, which I could supervise and make sure they were safe. There is also the chance of someone in the very large crowd at Glasgow Green smuggling in their own fireworks and wreaking havoc with them, although to be fair that rarely happens. Anyway, we took the train to Bridgeton, only two stops along the line from us. The fireworks were indeed spectacular, especially the finale, and we had a celebratory dinner at the nearby West Brewery, one of the many trendy micro-breweries that are springing up everywhere. The food was Germanic and tasty, with lots of sausages and goulash soup and apple strudel. When we were still at the firework display we got a message from Alasdair, who was playing football with his colleagues, to enquire about dinner and we invited him to join us. He then traversed the city from Townhead to Bridgeton on foot and arrived only fifteen minutes after us. The three of us had a hearty dinner and a good chat, before catching the train home, which was full of my ex pupils who had clearly had a bit to drink. Luckily (and possibly thanks to the alcohol) they seemed to remember me fondly! 

The Aftermath

James did a lot of tidying up after the party - he hates to leave things messy overnight - so by Sunday morning the house was fairly tidy with the glassware lined up to be washed and the dishwasher going like a merry-go-round. James and I went to meet Jenn and Russ for breakfast at the airport before their flight, and it was nice to have a post-party chat. Then we met up with Heather and Ewan in town for a coffee and to return Heather’s phone which she had left at our house after the festivities, and thence to meet Davie and Chanel at Buchanan Galleries where we bought Davie the jeans and jacket that he had requested for his birthday.
By mid-afternoon we were back home and ready to finish the cleaning up, and were met with a lovely surprise. Alasdair had done all of the rest of the cleaning and tidying including washing all the glasses! Oh joy! We were able to have an afternoon nap before Grandma came round for tea, it was fantastic! I really did enjoy our party but what a pleasure it was to snuggle down under the duvet for a couple of hours with no plans or preparation to do. Grandma was on good form and after tea we looked at Ally’s holiday photos (the ones I had been too ill to look at on Thursday!) and Jamie rather heart-warmingly phoned to find out how the party had gone. We all had a fairly early night. The party is most definitely over. 

Party!

Well we have had our party! We ended up with fifty-six people which worked out fine although it was a bit daunting when a lot of folk started to arrive at once. Did I enjoy it? Well yes actually I did, but I must admit that it is even better in hindsight, now that I know that it all went well and people seemed to enjoy themselves. While the party was going on James and I were so busy dashing around introducing people and sorting out the drinks and food that my one regret is not being able to have a proper chat with anybody. The guests behaved exactly as good guests should, by chatting and socialising. Many of our friends don’t know each other at all but I noticed that they were all mingling and finding connections. There was much laughter and even some dancing. Quite a lot of dancing actually!
Meanwhile Ally and Davie and friends (Andrew and Sandy who were just brilliant above and beyond the call of duty) were all extremely helpful, taking coats upstairs, helping everyone to drinks and food, and later on providing an excellent firework display which was very loud and spectacular. The weather forecast for the evening was wind and 97% chance of heavy rain! Well we came up trumps with a mostly dry half hour at about 10 pm and it was mild enough to open the patio doors so that people could watch the fireworks.
Meanwhile Jennifer and Chanel were the queens of the kitchen! I had made chilli and also ordered in a catered buffet, but it didn’t look substantial enough so Jennifer nipped down to Morrison’s to get baguettes and pesto to make bruschetta - which were delicious and very highly praised by the guests. She and Russell had flown up from Buckinghamshire to come to the party and then she went out to buy and make food for it! How lovely of her! Chanel helped with the bruschetta and also made all the mini oatcakes with cream cheese and salmon, and organised all the layout and much more besides. She and Jennifer were absolute stars. I overheard Russ telling someone that they had flown up for the party because "Susan and James don't have parties very often!" which I thought was both true and very funny.
I had phoned Jamie in New Zealand earlier in the day when I was feeling worried about the party and he was very reassuring. He said, “Mum, these are all people who want to come to your party, and they will join in and have a good time.” And how right he was. Of course the guests were great, because our friends (and family) happen to be very nice people. 

Party Prep

We are having a party this evening to celebrate our joint eleventy-first birthday (I am fifty-five and James is fifty-six!) As Tolkien fans will know, this is a tribute to Bilbo Baggins’ eleventy-first birthday party which takes place at the beginning of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Our birthdays were many months ago, so it’s really just an excuse to have a party, with a nod to Tolkien whose books have always been part of our lives in various ways. My Mum and Dad read the books when they were first published in the 1950s and my Dad gave them to my Mum as part of his courtship. I read both the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings at a young age, as did James. And by the time our own children were old enough to appreciate them, the hugely popular films were coming out, which they enjoyed watching with my Mum. Last year we visited Hobbiton in New Zealand which was great fun.
So the invitations went out in Tolkienesque font, complete with maps of the Shire and quotes from the books. Ally and Cat gave us a sign from the gift shop in Hobbiton which says “No Admittance except on Party Business” which is now affixed to our front door. We have spent today decorating the house with paper lanterns (seemed hobbity) and preparing a Hobbit style party feast. Davie and Chanel are going to help me with the food, James is in charge of drinks, and Ally and Andrew and Iain are sorting out the fireworks. This will be a challenge as the weather is wet and windy! All we need now are the guests! 

A bird in Ally’s hand

It isn’t unusual for me to come downstairs in the morning to find a large amount of feathers drifting around in the hall. These are sometimes, but not always, found near the sad little dead body of a bird; often a sparrow, and on occasion a robin (perhaps the cats’ idea of a festive gift for us.) Sometimes there is no bird to be seen, presumably because the cats have taken it back outside. So today when I found a goodly pile of feathers at the foot of the stairs, I hoovered them up and thought no more of it.
Later I saw Tom staring fixedly at the top of my pulley in the utility room which was festooned with washing. And there was a little sparrow hopping around up there and watching us warily. By the way, I love my pulley, it’s so handy and can carry a full load of washing.
I waved ineffectively at the bird but it showed no inclination to come down, so I waited until James came home and asked him to deal with it. He certainly noised the bird up by flicking a tea towel at it but it just flew around the room crashing into the glass of the door. So we texted our secret weapon - Alasdair. When he arrived home from work he brought through the step ladder and there was a lot of flapping (by the bird) but in the end it took both James and Ally to capture the unfortunate avian and wrap it securely in a tea towel (which has since been washed - we pride ourselves on our hygiene!) When Ally set the birdie free outside, it flew off energetically into the darkness, hopefully that means that it still has enough feathers to get by.
Later when I took the washing off the pulley I found that our fowl friend had left a little present on my trousers - bird poo! 

Gut ache

I have just had the most dreadful evening. I had one of my occasional terrible gut aches, probably brought on by eating six satsumas while making the dinner. I love the tasty, sharp satsumas that you get at this time of year, but six turned out to be too many especially since I then wolfed down a hearty dinner of home made beef stew. It didn’t take long for the consequences to arrive. After dinner Ally had started showing us his photos of his holiday in Jordan, and they were really good, but I started getting excruciating stomach pains that radiated right through to my back. I had to excuse myself and paced the house like a wounded lion, as the pain got worse and worse. I couldn’t sit down because that seemed to make it even sorer, although walking about didn’t do much good either. From time to time my stomach rumbled promisingly but nothing transpired.
No enquiries as to my well being were made by either James or Ally. To be fair, this has happened before and they both had work in the morning, but a solicitous word of comfort might have helped a bit. Instead they took themselves off to bed in due course, and at one point when I was asking my Mum for help aloud (why do I still do that?) I’m sure that I heard a voice saying “Shut up.” Not my Mum sending me a message from the afterworld, but the harsh, unsympathetic tones of an Anderson male.
Eventually I vomited copiously which brought almost complete relief, and I decided that since the satsumas were probably acidic I should drink a glass of (alkaline?) milk to neutralise the effects.*
Despite my almost complete lack of scientific knowledge this seems to have the desired result and I’m now tucked up in bed, pain free. What a relief.

* I have just done a google search to find out which foods are acidic / alkaline and it looks like I have got it completely the wrong way round, but it seems to have balanced out anyway!