A big bull seal joined hubby on a fishing trip today.  It happily took the fishy tit bits offered.

Then, there was a tug on the line and through the clear water, a fairly large fish could be seen at the end of it.  As the fish was pulled in, a large black form was also seen moving  underwater in towards the catch.  The race was on!  The fish was landed in the nick of time.

They are scudding, expressive, full;
Cumulus crossing storm streams of white,
It's like a world within a sky busy, busy and even busier,
Rushing to an important rendezvous in a crowd and to a crowded place.

Our sun is strong, all encompassing,
An equally as strong breeze keeps the temperatures controlled;
The vista is wide and varied, the landscape sparkles;
The wondrous clarity of the panorama almost defies description,
Poetry cannot encapsulate what there is here because it is so vast.

Menhir Aug 30th 2006 15.20

Meet The Bloggers...

With baited breath (at the time I was leaning forward to smooth the bed sheets) I waited for BBC Radio 4's introduction to fellow bloggers. I enjoyed my contact with the first one and switched off half way through the second candidate.

Guess what - they were both London based, one north west London, the other west London. They both used various means of London transport. Is this a one off or a series. If a series, I sincerely hope Aunty Beeb gets off her cheap fundament and starts using a bit of energy and a few more pence to meet others who are dotted around the whole of the UK and from a variety of blog sites.

At the weekend we decided to wander down one of the straths some distance from home.  The heavens opened up and pelted us with weighty bursts of rain as we drove towards the east coast. 

Our neighbour the sheep farmer got his apprentice to give us an enormous cabbage by way of a thank you for an offering of cod which was freshly caught in the North Atlantic, and filleted by hubby. It's a smashing cabbage, really juicy and sweet and it has so far yielded two generous meal portions. There's lots more cabbage to go.D

Meantime, I have received another cabbage from someone else, a much darker and tighter variety. As it is so fresh, I am hoping it will survive a week or so till I have finished the other one. I do like a variety of vegetables, so I already have such veggies as green beans, sweetcorn, broccolli and lettuces to munch through.

Neither of these cabbages are salad types which reduces my options a bit for their use. The dark one might work for dolmades/dolma but then, I do need to use up the first one before I pinch bits off the second one. It is preferable that it remains in its entirety; it should preserve better that way I think.

Just when you think that all is clearly explained up comes another interpretation of the same statement.  Without actually writing out word for word what an explanation should be I am not sure how you get around our talent for variations on a theme.

Returning through Gatwick, using the same airline and carrying my shoulder bag and tote, I was stopped.  "Madam, you have two bags, only one is allowed on board."  I remonstrated, mentioning that I had travelled to this airport carrying the same bags.  The guy was insistent I had two bags and only one could travel on board.  I resorted to the broken record technique; he gave way.

While queueing in the crowded corrals to check-in my suitcase I decided that it might be wise to put my handbag into my tote bag  in case the check-in-clerk had yet another interpretation of the regulations.  To all intents and purposes, I was, by then, visually carrying one bag.  The arrangement satisfactorily passed through personal security, one bag packed inside the other and both bags accompanied me all the way home. 

How on earth are people with families managing?  There's only one of me preparing to wander off on my travels again (not as long this time as the last trip) and it took me an age of eternity to sort out what might be allowable in my cabin allowance plastic carrier bag, which is a watery opaque, the nearest thing I have to clear.  Yes, we have a good outline of instructions of what to put in such a bag,  but there are still grey areas which will be cases of try and see. 

I wonder if the plane will be flying, Scotland was cut off air travel by a number of airlines for two days last week.  If there is no flight, then my current conundrums will change into new ones. 
Che sera, sera

The little Highland Scottish town that is my home and that of my immediate and extended family has a very proud memorial in the central square. Every year on Remembrance Sunday it is the focus for remembering our war dead including now, servicemen and women who have served and died in more recent times. There are the names of those who fell in two major world wars carved on the memorial, many local families have a story to tell.

The striking feature of the memorial is that it tells you just from looking at it, how decimated our small population of menfolk was during the 1914-18 war, because, by the time 1939 came and the second world war was in flow, the memorial indicates that there had been little regeneration. There were not many young men, in particular young men of a suitable age, to conscript from this place. The numbers of names carved on the memorial for the 1939-1945 conflict are very few, when compared with the relatively large numbers remembered from the first world war.

It is such a sad revelation.

"It looks a lot but you'll find there's not so much to concern yourself with, it's mostly advertising and you will get through it very quickly." This comforting description of a month's mail, piled up awaiting my return, could not have been less true. Mail unopened, assumed to be adverts/sales were all overdue bills. One bill, a phone bill in an identifiable envelope, virtually screeching pay me, just needed to be filed. The anonymous envelopes were in need of urgent attention. Obvious adverts were left to one side. Several large packages have taken hours to sort through and deal with. Over a period of four solid days effort and getting boggle-eyed, I cracked through the work and reduced the 'must do' list to manageable proportions, leaving the worst till last.

I now have to summon up some stamina and enthusiasm for another trip away from home, bearing in mind what might await my return. The up side is that I won't be away so long.

Maybe, in the meantime, I shall find some time to call my own and spoil myself. I think I will call it 'rengenerating me time'! D

What's all this logging on stuff yet again? Perhaps blog is having a brain wave in a heat wave. I feel a bit rejected with all this re-identification stuff.

It's me feeling miffed; tonight I my debit card was eaten by one of the money machines and I hope it gets indigestion! Puzzled and cogitative I returned home and decided to distract myself and write a blog, only to find a barrier to access, not insurmountable I grant you, nevertheless, a barrier. So, I feel a bit rejected.

Tomorrow, I shall have to go through all the fun, games and hassle of communicating the details of the digested debit card. I know I won't end up in the exotic realms of the subcontinent discussing the rainy season, that one was quite an interesting chat, I shall however, have to deal with all the inconveniences that this little hiccup has caused.