My Posts are packaged by intellectual weight, and some settling of contents may have occurred in transit
Monday, February 22, 2010
Track your booze
Incidentally, go and read Barry's Blog, it's very good.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Lenten promises
I shall now give those who know me a moment to let that statement sink in.
It's notionally me giving it up for Lent (not that I've ever given anything up in the past), but in truth I'm using Lent as an excuse, well perhaps a prompt would be more accurate, to try to lose a bit of weight and get fitter. I'm not so stupid as to think I'll get all the way through the six weeks to Easter without having a drink, particularly since I have a few pre booked events/parties along the way, one of which is today when RSCM Scottish Voices will be singing Choral Evensong at St Mary's Cathedral in Glasgow, and then we're going to the Lansdowne Bar for a drink or three. If I get to Easter having had a 90-95% alcohol free Lent, then that's a good result in my book.
On another topic, we are getting new lockers at work soon and yesterday was the deadline to clear all the old crap from the current ones. Aside from my old SLR camera, in the bag for which were orders of service for weddings at which the camera was used, the most recent of which was 1994, the most interesting things I found lurking on the shelf were a magazine pull-out and a train ticket. Sounds boring, eh? Yes, probably.
The magazine pull-out was from Mens Health, which a while ago I sometimes read, called "The Complete Total Body Workboook - All the information you need to build an outstanding body" and it's basically a book of exercises, mostly using free weights or the machines you find in gyms.
The train ticket was from Partick in Glasgow to a station near my work. All very boring of course, but the point is that the ticket was lying on top of the magazine, and the ticket's dated 24th November 2000.
So here I am, almost 10 years on, and although I still haven't managed to build myself an outstanding body perhaps this is the year I'll properly get on the road towards it, starting with giving up alcohol for (most of) Lent. We can only wait and see.
Monday, February 01, 2010
Pubs of Lay Clerk #2
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Review of 2009
A bit mixed, to be honest, but then again such is life. Much of what occupied my mind throughout the whole year concerns another person and according to the unwritten rules of Blogging which are solely in my head, I choose to keep that topic to myself.
Another unwritten rule is that I won't Blog about work, so apart from saying that I'm still enjoying it and we continue to be as busy as ever, I'll leave it there.
On the subject of work, a close friend was unfortunately made redundant at the start of the year, a victim of the worldwide economic situation, and for a few months went through a difficult time during which I hope I was there to offer what little support or help I could, and thankfully a new, better job was secured after a while. Onwards and upwards.
I still sing with Glasgow Chamber Choir, mostly enjoying it but sometimes having to fight against my inner dislike of certain types of choral music. On the whole it continues to be good fun, good musically, and a good bunch of people.
In 2009 my presence in the choirstalls at the Cathedral occurred more frequently and more regularly, and more or less every week I sing Choral Evensong on the Sunday, which I am thoroughly enjoying.
In about May the administrator of RSCM Scottish Voices, which was started the previous summer, resigned, and I was subsequently asked to take over that role. It's been an interesting 6 months, most but not quite all of it interesting in a nice way. I've registered a Domain name for the choir, but haven't yet got round to uploading the website which is sitting on my laptop. In truth, this is mostly because I've forgotten how to go about having multiple websites hosted together but kept separate, since it's been such a long time since I did anything with any of my sites. At some point I'll get the finger out and do it. And if anyone familiar with creating and uploading websites to 1&1 using Microsoft Frontpage is reading this and wants to remind me how easy it is, I'd be obliged! In the meantime I've also started a Blog for the choir, which is linked from the sidebar on the left. If any RSCM Scottish Voices members are reading this for some reason, and they fancy having a go at sometimes adding choir-related content to our Blog, email me.
In May I sang with The Biggar Singers in an enjoyable performance of Morten Lauridsen's piece, Lux Aeterna, which involved about a hundred mile round trip every week to rehearse. The choir's conducted and accompanied respectively by two members of Glasgow Chamber Choir who live down that way, and my few weeks of excessive travel pale into insignificance when set against them doing it every week coming to Glasgow. And indeed two other GCC members travel from Dumfriesshire every week to rehearse!
A personal high point of the year was when I was asked to sing the tenor solo in a performance of Stainer's Crucifixion on Good Friday in Paisley. My initial reaction upon being asked was "no thanks, I'm a chorister, not a soloist" but when I thought about it, knowing that I can actually sing the notes if not necessarily perform them as a "proper" soloist would, I thought why the hell not. And so I did. And it went well. First time I've ever had my name on a poster! I have no ambitions to be a soloist, and while I'd possibly say yes if asked again, equally I am not at all bothered.
I paid another visit to Paisley later in April, but this time to the Paisley Beer Festival, which was most enjoyable and having been there two years ago is likely to become an annual pilgrimage, albeit I missed last year as I was in Calfornia. I only went on one evening, but a fellow Cathedral chorister, Neil, took holiday from work and went every day. Now that's dedication!
In July four of us from Glasgow Chamber Choir, having coincidentally and enjoyably sung solo parts together during a recent concert, decided to get together and sing together some more. We've met twice so far, it's as much a social event as a musical one, and despite some (hopefully tongue in cheek) remarks from another couple of friends about "the elite group" it's just a bunch of friends singing, drinking and eating together. We've performed together under the name The New Quartet in public once, a few days ago in a branch of a bank for charity, but who knows whether we'll do it again or whether it'll stay purely as a social event.
After a break of 29 years, I met up with former schoolfriends at a wee reunion in Motherwell in April. It was as though we'd only had a break of 6 months and we all got on great again. An unexpectedly tremendous evening. Another one, on a bigger scale, is planned for next year when it'll be 30 years since we left school. And I foolishly offered to co-ordinate it. It shouldn't involve much more than a few emails though, so should be OK.
On the subject of school, there is a sobering time in one's life when one's schoolfriends start dying. In August Kenny Stewart was the first of us to go. Admittedly the lovely, intelligent, caring person Catherine Fellowes died in a tragic diving accident soon after we left school, leaving her massive potential unfulfilled, but Kenny is the first to die without having an accident. He was one of my closest friends at school, and despite us having some differences in later years, you can't take away the fact that we grew up together.
In July RE and I made a weekend trip to the north east of Scotland to see friends, Stephanie and Martin, and to have a wee tour about. It's an area of the country I happen to really like, and it was good not only to show RE round it, but to catch up with old friends at their barbecue. I've known Stephanie since the mid 1980's when she was a student at Glasgow University and joined the Cathedral Choir, so she's probably one of my oldest friends and although we don't see each other terribly often, it's good to catch up when we can.
In August my brother, his wife and daughter moved back to Scotland. They've been living abroad for about a dozen years, first in Dubai and then in San Diego, California. For some reason they decided to come back to the Scottish climate, and it's great to have them here. My niece, Jess, has joined the Cathedral Choir trebles, and seems to enjoy it I'm glad to say. I was immensely proud to be asked to present her with her surplice at Evensong when she passed from being a probationer to being a chorister. They hosted a Halloween party in October (on the 30th, funnily enough!) and the fact that they live in a castle (yes, really) made it all the more spooky! Great fun.
August also saw a return visit to the World Pipe Band Championship at Glasgow Green, with RE, her cousin and his German girlfriend who were visiting Scotland. It rained. But it was a very enjoyable day despite the weather.
In September RE hosted one of her sisters, visiting from New Zealand, and I joined them for a trip to Linlithgow, their ancestral town. It was the first time I've been there, and I can now recommend the Four Mary's pub in the main street.
In a much previous life I was a roadie and mixed the sound for a local band. All very enjoyable, but in an amateur way. A friend, Ian, does it for a living though, well, the sound engineer bit anyway, and ages ago I mentioned to him that if he was ever needing some semi-skilled labour (i.e. really unskilled!) then I'd happily come and lift and carry stuff around for him. In September he called my bluff, and I found myself for two days being a roadie working on the sound crew at the Merchant City Festival in Glasgow. With three outdoor stages and an indoor venue to be covered, it was hard work, a bit physical sometimes, and a lot to take in, but it was great. I even ended up twiddling the knobs for one act, while Ian was called away to deal with a change of venue for another group. All very basic stuff of course, but I'm glad to say Ian trusted me enough to leave me on my own, and I'm even gladder to say I managed to avoid fucking it up! I'm looking forward to the next time, although I don't expect a change of career is due anytime soon!
The Institute of Advanced Motorists has taken more of a back seat this year, pardon the pun, although I did complete the necessary number of observed runs to continue as a Qualified Motorcycle Observer. It remains to be seen however whether I'll continue next year.
I've started to get the flat a bit more sorted. With the benefit of hindsight I realise that when I moved in I wasn't really in the right emotional frame of mind to do the decorating necessary, and as time went on I stopped seeing the faults. I have now got as far as getting a quote from a decorator, and getting the hallway replastered. Soon after Christmas I'll contact the decorator again and get him to come and do the business in the living room and hallway.
My general level of fitness continues to improve as I take advantage of the gym a few hundred yards from my house. I even made it onto a running track with RE a couple of times, but that was very hard going at that time! In the past few weeks I've slipped a bit, but my main New Year's resolution is to redouble my efforts. And I WILL do it.
On a fitness topic, in 2009 I did something I never thought I'd do. I climbed a hill. Not only a hill, but it was in fact a Munro. I've never ever ever been interested in hillwalking, and have been vocal about that opinion all through my life. But RE persuaded me to try it. Well I say persuaded me, but not proactively. I just mean that her influence, unbeknownst to her, made me want to do it. So she kindly agreed to "babysit me" up a hill. I'd be lying if I said there weren't bits I didn't enjoy. I slipped and fell up to my knees in a very cold stream; I slithered and slid my way down what was allegedly a "path"; I fell and staved my finger, but I bloody enjoyed it! And I know that thousands of people do it every weekend and think nothing of it. But this was me doing it. Me who about a year ago looked as though he was about to expire after a very short climb up a set of steps to a scenic viewpoint in the Scottish Borders. Me who a year ago hadn't taken any form of exercise for God knows how long, apart from when I tried badminton and spectacularly ruptured my achilles tendon. Me who is a city boy who has always said he didn't mind walking as long as it was on a pavement. This was me who walked up that Munro. And it is still me who is immensely proud of having done it, and proud of his friend RE for having the patience, skill and perseverance to help me all the way. Others may do it more often and with less effort, but we all have different abilities and different goals, and this particular achievement ranks highly for me.
So that's a potted history of Lay Clerk's 2009. A mixed year, but generally a good one and ending better than it started. Much of the above was Blogged about in depth at the time so if you've read this post in isolation it must seem pretty sparse of detail, and of course I've missed things out. Not just deliberately missed things to protect other people's privacy, but simply because things will have slipped my mind. Something which will hopefully never slip my mind though is to mention the love, friendship, and support of my closest friends, some of whom have been such for the thick end of 25 years, some for only a couple of years, but I value them all and thank them for their continuing friendship and support. I won't name them, but you know who you are. Thank you one and all.
Happy Christmas folks!
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Pubs of Lay Clerk #1
Don't forget that sometimes it's been a LONG time and a lot of water's been passed since I've been in some of these places so what I describe tends to relate to how I remember they were back in the day. All opinions expressed are my own so please feel free to try even the ones I warn against and see if you agree with me.
Monday, June 01, 2009
Tap & Spile - the pride of Morpeth
Morpeth is a lovely wee market town, and one of the best bits about it is the Tap & Spile pub in Manchester Street, where I went on Saturday.
So, if you're ever in the area of Morpeth, you could do much worse than to pay a visit to Margo in the Tap & Spile.
Friday, April 17, 2009
Mutatis mutandis
The advent of Friends Reunited, and more recently Facebook has meant that I have in fact kept in email contact with a small handful of people, but never face to face.
So anyway, in January I was contacted by someone I haven't seen since about 1979, and he's arranged a bit of a get together next Friday which has rather grown in scale as the net widens and more people are contacted and invited.
It's only a few beers in the Electric Bar in Motherwell, which always has been more or less an unofficial Dalziel High School Former Pupils Club, but I'm actually really looking forward to it. Particularly now that sense appears to have prevailed and the event has been opened up to persons of the feminine gender too!
I say sense has prevailed only because when it was first mooted to include ladies there were a few low level grumblings about it being a lads evening and if women were there we wouldn't be able to swear and fart. Well personally I rarely fart, not when there's anyone at all around anyway, but as regular readers will realise, I do swear a lot. I don't go out of my way to offend, and I will in fact take steps to try not to offend, but swearing is an intrinsic part of my vocabulary, and if I can swear when in conversation with clergy and family members, then I can do so in front of adult females with whom I went to school!
So anyway, the latest email has just arrived and to my surprise, frankly, it seems that there are a number of the girls intent on turning up. It'll be good to catch up with people, male and female alike, albeit I'm well aware that none of us will be the same people we were in 1980.
I know I'm certainly not.
Thankfully.
The photos, from around 1964 and 1977, and my current profile image respectively, are evidence of physical changes, but underneath the exterior, there are inevitably psychological ones too, which are much more important. Maybe in a future post I'll try to outline those changes.
Or maybe not.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Buffalo Theory
"Well you see, Norm, it's like this... A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it's the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members.
In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells. Now, as we know, excessive intake of alcohol kills brain cells. But naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first. In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine.
And that, Norm, is why you always feel smarter after a few beers...."
You know it makes sense!
Thursday, January 01, 2009
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Whiny things
Now, dear gentle reader, I am no snob. Not in a real way anyway. But I do have certain standards, and I recognise that there are different, ahem, cultures living cheek by jowl all around Glasgow (and other places too).
One sure fire way of spotting the sort of area you're in is to walk into an off licence. For example, the ones in the west end, the trendy studenty west end, of Glasgow are bright welcoming places, often with large stacks of wine and beer from all around the world invitingly lying in the middle of the floor, from which you can make your selection if there's nothing on the wall shelves which takes your fancy. This is of course after having lifted down a few bottles to read their labels in an effort to aid the decision making process.
Not so the one in Maryhill Rd. You walk into what is essentially a cage three feet wide by six feet long. Everything is behind either metal bars or what looks like bulletproof plexi-glass. There's a tiny hatch which can be opened by the staff when they swap your money for their products. The important thing is that you can not touch anything, so you can't steal anything.
So into this cage I went, with two young chaps standing in front of me in the queue, both dressed in the ubiquitous ned uniform of white trackies (tracksuits to you and me). The first one, who was already being served, handed over his ten pound note, which at first the staff member attempted to refuse. When asked why, she told him that "half of it's missing!" In a uniquely Glasgow nasal whine, which sadly I really can't do justice to in the written word, he pleaded his case, hampered only slightly by the fact that he was clearly ripped out his tits on something rather stronger than mere alcohol. If you know what I mean. After not very much bargaining, the staff member relented and accepted the torn cash, at which point junkie boy was most enthusiastic in his offering of thanks. By the way.
So that left one person in front of me. He wasn't an obvious junkie, but looked like your average young ned. In a clearly well practised routine, he handed over his passport to the staff member, without being asked to, who checked his age and handed it back, and in a similar, yet less ripped to the tits, whine, he requested a bottle of fortified wine, and a packet containing ten cigarettes. Well, he actually said "a boattle 'o Buckie an' ten Mayfair", but I knew what he meant, speaking fluent ned when required due to that requirement often being called upon in a previous occupation.
So far so normal. In some places anyway. But there was a follow up question from the staff member, clearly well versed in the partaking of said Buckfast Tonic Wine, which caused me some surprise. She asked him if he'd like one from the fridge. Neddy boy merely whined "Aye!" in a tone of whine that suggested "of course you silly lady, why ever would I want a warm one?".
So, my educational horizon has been expanded yet again, every day being a school day and all that guff. In my years growing up in deepest, darkest Lanarkshire I was obviously aware of the presence of Buckfast. I even tasted it once. And I served it, ironically of course, insisting that all present tasted it, at the housewarming party in my previous flat on the grounds that I'd moved back from Renfrewshire to Glasgow, which is technically in Lanarkshire, so I should serve the local wine! But until that moment of Epiphany last night, I never knew it was apparently best drunk chilled! I can't wait for next summer!
So, he departed and that left me. I asked for some bottles of Corona beer, which the staff member walked away to get. While she was away though, another three people came in behind me. Nedettes. In all their glory. "Oh shit!" I thought, knowing what else I had been tasked with obtaining. The Corona was brought to the counter (still behind the screen though, you don't get it passed out until the money, torn or otherwise, has been given over) and I was asked "anything else?". Clearing my throat I asked "have you any ..... fruit juice, like Schloer or something?". She looked at me, making eye contact for the first time, and just sadly shook her head while saying "naw son, we don't have anything like that here, try Tesco". I paid for my Corona and squeezed past the three nedettes to the outside world and my friends in the car.
The party was great!
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Jumping around and singing on the phone
On a related topic, I had a blood pressure check this morning at my GP, and I'm glad to report that it's now down to a much less deadly level! A few months ago it was something like 140/115 and it's now about 105/81. Put in an over simplified way, it's the bottom reading, the diastolic one, which is important because that's the pressure when the heart's at rest, rather than the higher, or systolic, figure, which relates to the heart pumping the blood.
The weekend just past was a busy one musically for Glasgow Chamber Choir, as we had concerts in both Glasgow and Edinburgh. They both went well, on the whole, although there was one bowel-loosening moment in the Edinburgh concert on Sunday when I came in on a completely exposed (i.e. the only part singing) top G tenor entry without the company normally offered by my two fellow first tenors! It all happened in a flash, as I sang the German word "Ein" very briefly, then stopped dead and my neighbour then sang the same word and note in the next beat after which the other first tenor and I joined in and we carried on as if nothing had happened. Except I was thinking something like "bollocks bollocks bollocks bollocks bollocks" for the next few minutes. How could I have ruined the piece, I was thinking. Oh well, that's life.
Only, in the pub afterwards, our music director told me that the other two first tenors clearly owed me a pint as I had been right and they were wrong, although in my own mind I now think I should have had the courage of my convictions to keep going instead of stopping, but it all happened so quickly that my subconscious took over and I didn't have time to rationalise what was happening, and that can't be helped. The knowledge that my original entry was correct helps my conscience though!
After the Glasgow concert we had some wine and nibbles in the church hall, which was OK as far as it went, but as a party venue it rather lacked atmosphere. Not helped of course by my one glass of wine, since I had decided to drive there.
After the Edinburgh one though, we adjourned to the pub next door. I can't remember the name off hand, although I should try as it's another one to add to the my pubs page of my Website, which is an ongoing effort to list every pub in which I've ever had a drink. It's a long page! After two or three pints of Deuchars IPA, a very fine pint and well worth trying if you get the chance, and an exceptionally ordinary cheese and onion toastie, the world seemed at peace. The train journey back the 50 miles to Glasgow, then the bus journey home, didn't seem so bad either. It was a good crowd of friends, so that helps.
My average monthly bill recently has been £38, so in fact I'm paying roughly the same as I have been, but with more free minutes, and Internet access thrown in. And in fact, having been given a couple of months of free insurance for my Palm Treo last July, I found out at the weekend that it seems like I forgot to cancel it after the free period was over, so I've been paying just under £7 extra every month over and above my tariff, making an average spend of about £45 per month recently! So that's cancelled now!
I'm still playing with it, sorry, finding my way round the functionality of it, but I'm very impressed so far. I like the solid feel of the slider, it's the first slide phone I've had, and the functions are good. Like GPS navigation, which I can use at no extra cost since I have Internet access, and the FM radio, which I haven't had on a phone for a few years now.
Monday, October 27, 2008
In vino veritas
Today, Sunday 26th October (ignore the "official" post date and time recorded here which is in GMT, or in fact probably BST, it's a little after 10.30pm on Sunday here in San Diego, Southern California, as I start to type this) we visited the Callaway Winery near Temecula. Took the (free) tour and heard the story of how the wine is produced, and how Ely Callaway founded the vineyard in 1969 before becoming even more famous as a maker of expensive golf bats (a good walk spoiled, some say). And sampled 6 different wines ranging from pretty good to very good!
Before hitting the winery though we stopped in the town of Temecula. Actually I think it's a city, but it didn't seem all that big so looked more like a town. Didn't stay for all that long, and didn't do much except have breakfast (crepes and coffee) and visit an antiques centre where plaster representations of Winnie the Pooh and the late Emperor Julius Caesar (or G. Cesare as the inscription says, which means Guilio Cesare we have worked out by means of research on t'InterWeb) were procured. The crepes and coffee were good, but served a bit randomly one plate at a time with a gap of a few minutes between each.
Next, and final, stop was a picnic area at Lake Wohlford, where chicken bits and tuna sandwiches were consumed, and a football (of the American version) was thrown around for a while.
This evening I had a long overdue, and very welcome Skype conversation with RE who is in New Zealand. She will be arriving in Los Angeles on Tuesday morning, and I'm very much looking forward to seeing her again and spending some touristy time together.
While in Temecula today, and on all the roads round about here, huge numbers of Harley Davidson motorcycles have been very much in evidence, and to be truthful the more of them I've seen, the more I've realised that I don't buy into the culture of that particular make of machine. I've no problem with anyone who does, and I still think they sound great (although apparently they handle like shit on anything except a straight road), but I've never had a desire to ride one in the UK and have felt pressure to hire one while here only because it's probably The Thing To Do, so over the course of today I've pretty much come to the decision that I'm not going to bother hiring one while I'm here. Sure, it's great biking weather, and if I had a BMW like my own at home (the link isn't to my actual bike, incidentally, just to the same model) then I'd happily head out there, but the San Diego BMW Motorrad dealer doesn't advertise rentals on their Website, and when I did some research before coming out here I saw some BMW's for hire at a price far above what I'd deem reasonable, so to Hell with that!
So tomorrow, we haven't quite decided what to do. Golf has been mentioned, but it remains to be seen whether my brother will put up with a non-player accompanying him and hacking his way round the course to everyone's amusement and probably irritation. Also, I don't look good wearing Pringle sweaters.
Did I mention that last night we ate at Joe's Crab Shack? Very nice too. Almost bought a tee shirt proclaiming My waitress gave me crabs, but didn't!
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Hi tech stuff
On Thursday my brother, D, took me for a whistlestop tour of the place he works, Solar Turbines, in the centre of San Diego right next to the airport. What struck me most in the assembly area was, considering this is engineering on a big scale, it was really really clean. I'm not an engineer myself, and my previous limited experience of it was a week of work experience in my last years at school, probably around 1978, which I spent at the Terex earth moving equipment manufacturer near my hometown, and various short visits to collect my dad from his work when that was at a steelworks. All very noisy, dirty environments. But not Solar, it was all very clean, very hi-tech, pretty quiet, and very impressive.
Thursday evening saw us eating at the Fish Market at Del Mar/Solano Beach. An interesting if unsurprisingly fishy menu full of things of which I'd never heard before, let alone tried! And some beer too. Wouldn't necessarily recommend you try it, but it was OK.
On Friday we set off slightly north of the city, and finding the beach near Carlsbad we followed the coast south again, largely on the historic Route 101, aka the Pacific Highway, seeing groups of surfers on the way. Through a mixture of towns like Encinitas, Solana Beach, Del Mar and La Jolla (pronounced Hoya apparently), which varied from what looked like not much more than beach huts perhaps occupied by people who moved to California in the 1960's and never left (the area or the 60's for that matter!) and huge multi million dollar properties, probably occupied for a small percentage of the year by film stars and other such celebs.
We'll go back to that area next week though, to explore a bit more when RE gets here. On Friday we were headed somewhere specific, not just Pacific. Our destination was the rather large and exceptionally impressive USS Midway, a decommissioned aircraft carrier berthed in San Diego Bay just along from the Maritime Museum we visited earlier in the week. When she was launched in 1945 and for the following ten years, Midway was the largest ship in the world, and she is big! Lots to see, and one refreshing thing was that many of the aircraft on the flight deck have bits sticking out of them at body or head height (edges of wings and suchlike) yet there are very few roped off or protected areas so it would be easy to walk into something slightly painful. The authorities who run the ship as a museum have obviously trusted the intelligence of their visitors enough not to have felt the need to over protect them. I genuinely thought that was a nice touch, and perhaps all the more surprising in the notoriously litigious USA.
After leaving the Midway, we visited Beverages and More, which if it were in Glasgow would be a very regular haunt for me. I got some Gordons Gin and some Pastis, and D got various Belgian and UK beers and some wine. Great store!
So that was us all set for Tapas type starters followed by Jambalaya, sitting outside in the still warm evening, with large glasses of Pastis for me, and red wine for everyone else (except my niece J, who had Sprite!). A good evening, yet again, of good food and drink and company.
This morning, Saturday, and my sister in law and niece, C and J, available to join us since it's the weekend, we all set off to San Diego Wild Animal Park, a few miles north of San Diego. Something like 1800 acres of wilderness tamed and filled with a variety of exotic animals and boutiques selling the usual touristy tat. It's part of San Diego Zoo, which is in Balboa Park in the city and which we'll visit next week, and by all accounts it isn't quite as good as the zoo itself.
Now it's chill out time, because it's too hot to wander about outside, so I've copied all the photos I've taken so far from my camera onto a flash drive pen, just in case. I'd post more of the images here, but I've got the camera settings such that my images are roughly 3Mb each, and while if I was at home I'd use the Microsoft PowerToys image resizer to easily and quickly make small copies with just a right click of the mouse, D's laptop runs Windows Vista and the resizer only works with XP, so I don't want to upload too many big images. I'll upload smaller ones to my Flickr account after I return home, and provide a link to them from this Blog, in the unlikely event anyone wants to see them.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
It's hot hot hot
In my last post I mentioned what we did on Sunday morning, and on Monday.
Yesterday, Tuesday, we headed a little further afield, to the Mount Palomar Observatory in fact. Operated by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), which coincidentally is who our friend MB, recently formerly of Glasgow Chamber Choir, is now employed by, but in LA (or somewhere nearby) not at Mount Palomar. He's a physicist, and at his leaving party in Glasgow a few months ago (he had been working at Glasgow University) I asked him, as someone who has passed Higher Physics and who has a keen albeit passing interest in "popular" science, what he actually did. Ten minutes or so later, MB had explained to me in really simple terms how he was involved in a world wide experiment relating to gravity waves, and I understood not one word! RE and I are visiting him at the end of next week on our way back home. Oh, did I mention that RE, who is currently in New Zealand, is making a stopover for a few days and joining me in San Diego?
Anyway, the observatory is at the top of a mountain. Mount Palomar in fact, funnily enough. It was a spectacular drive up an extremely twist road, and I took over at the wheel of D's Chevrolet Trailblazer with its 4.2 litre engine and automatic gearbox, part way up the mountain. An interesting experience, not being at all used to left hand drive vehicles (although I have driven them a few times in the past) and not being familiar with the US system of road markings and the rules of the road.
There's not a great deal to see at the observatory, apart from a single room museum nearby (fairly small but quite interesting), and of course the 200 inch Hale telescope, which is HUGE! Well worth the trip though.
Coming back down the mountain, we took a different route part way, and headed to the traditional western town of Julian, which is an historic gold rush town, now famous for its apples and the pies and cider therefrom! We sampled neither, but my brother told me of a previous visit with a couple of friends from Scotland, D & L, when D was horrified to discover that the cider he'd just bought and drank was in fact alcohol free!
Julian is a lovely wee town, and there are some good shops too. Next time I might try an apple pie! And the roads round it are really good, and would be excellent for biking on.
I forgot to mention, at breakfast yesterday we tried Einstein Brothers Bagels instead of Starbucks. The bagels were great (Egg sandwich with bacon and cheese, on an onion bagel) and the orange juice was exceptional, but don't believe their website when it claims darn good coffee. The coffee wasn't great. While sitting outside waiting for my brother to come out with the Bagels, I overheard half of a telephone conversation which made me glad to live in the United Kingdom, and very appreciative of the National Health Service, with all its faults.
The phrase I overheard, which requires no further comment from me, was:
".......I'm not having the heart procedure, because it costs way too much money......."
We rounded off yesterday by having a bit of a barbecue and then watching a DVD, Ben Stiller in Night at the Museum, which if you haven't seen it I would suggest not to go out your way to do so. Harmless and inoffensive, but not the best! I enjoyed the company though.
This morning, Wednesday 22nd October, we mixed and matched at breakfast, finding an Einstein Brothers Bagels next door to a Starbucks, so we had orange juice and bagels from one and coffee from the other, and sat outside in the shade.
Off then to Balboa Park and to the museums. Specifically to the Air and Space Museum and the Automotive one. The Air and Space one has loads of interesting stuff including the Apollo 9 command module, and the Automotive museum has a large collection of Ferrari cars. Again, both well worth a visit. It was $15 each to get into the Air and Space Museum, and $8 each for the Automotive one, although D received a $4 discount to that one for being a member of AAA.
One of the things I experienced in the Air & Space museum was a flight simulator of a fighter aircraft, an F-18 I think it might have been. Let's just say that after my first barrel roll and loop the loop, I was glad I hadn't been to the diner this morning for the size of breakfast I'd had on Sunday! Very exciting though, particularly the upside down bits! Made me glad of the time I've spent in the past using Microsoft Flight Simulator, because at least I knew which way to move the stick!
Leaving Balboa Park, we headed for the Old Town of San Diego, which was fantastic. Lots of history, and lots of shops with the staff dressed in traditional costume. Certainly worth another visit and we'll go when RE is here.
Lastly, for the out and about stuff anyway, we found a Harley Davidson motorcycle dealer, and went in for a look round. More chrome, leather and tassles than you can shake a stick at! Just like the H-D dealer in Glasgow, in fact, only much much bigger.
Before coming here on holiday, I had considered hiring a Harley Davidson for a few days and riding part of the Pacific Coast Highway, but when I started to look online at prices I realised that I wasn't all that bothered! However, when I was engaged in conversation with one of the dealer's staff this afternoon, he mentioned hiring a bike for 8 hours, and it turns out this only costs $59 (plus maybe $20 insurance and the cost of fuel too) and for that I can choose any bike. It also includes helmets, although no other protective gear is supplied. Watch this space!
So that was today. I'm currently relaxing in preparation for some nice steak tonight, and maybe some beer or some wine.
Monday, August 04, 2008
Technicolour yawning
The inaugural residential rehearsal weekend of the Royal School of Church Music Scottish Voices choir. At Strathallan private school in rural Perthshire. Very posh. Apart from the accommodation that is, which was surprisingly basic. But the teaching bits seemed more than adequate!
Anyway, suffice to say for the moment that a combination of Lager, Red Wine, Gin & Tonic, and Port does not make for a happy tummy. Spectacularly so, but in a controlled way, if you get my drift. That said I have heard a suggestion that there was no Gin in the Gin & Tonic, and if truth be told I was so pissed I couldn't tell you if that's right or not. Whatever. I had enough wine to drink that I feel justified in my not-wellness anyway!
The choir seemed to gel fairly quickly under the expert arm waving of FW. He really is very good at it you know!
Off to bed fairly soon now, I need my beauty sleep. Not for the first time, work has sprung a last minute surprise on me this afternoon, and tomorrow I have a "chat" with some very important visiting inspectors because others, perhaps better or at least equally suited to it and certainly better paid for it, don't want to do it. Ah well, shit flows downwards. We've only known the dates for this visit for several months, so why would anyone plan ahead!
Friday, July 11, 2008
If we pull the shutter half down no one will see the cigarettes!
I couldn't resist taking this last night on the way to the pub to celebrate RE's birthday with friends.
It just looked so strange, three people standing in a doorway, with the door behind them closed, and the shutter pulled down, in an apparent attempt at hiding the smoking! Well OK that probably wasn't what they were actually trying to do, but that was what it looked like to me!
It's also a rather interesting selection of footwear.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Heroes
Evensong was good, with the choir singing Durufle's Ubi Caritas. Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est. Where charity and love are, God is there.
In the morning, having woken stupidly early for a Sunday, I quit the house and headed towards town carrying my new camera, determined to start playing with it properly and get used to the buttons and dials so that I don't have to think about what to press and when. I got as far as the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and the Transport Museum, which are across the road from each other, but since neither opened until about 11am I confined myself to a wander round outside.
I've seen the war memorial outside the Art Gallery a few times, but only from a distance, and I discovered to my surprise that it is actually dedicated to the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles) which was a Lanarkshire based regiment, now long disbanded, which my grandfather (see photo below) joined the TA version of on 29th March 1929 as a Rifleman, leaving again on 19th January 1930 before enlisting with the Scots Guards on 11th August 1930 and serving with them for exactly 3 years before being transferred to the Army Reserve on 10th August 1933. His certificate of service book from this time says he was a clean, sober and hard working man who was honest, willing and reliable. It also says he was a good footballer!
In another subsequent certificate of service book for him, he kept the same army number (3242219) and rejoined the Scots Guards upon mobilisation on 1st December 1939, leaving again on 19th September 1944 after 4 years and 293 days. By this time he was a sergeant, his conduct was again listed as very good, and he was described as a clean, honest, sober and hardworking non-commissioned officer who carried out his duties in a satisfactory manner during his service with the colours.
Clearly he was mobilised due to the outbreak of World War II but left before it was finished. The reason given for his discharge was that he ceased to fulfil army physical requirements. I understand that he caught Tuberculosis, and in my lifetime I know he spent some time in Erskine Hospital, which actually isn't too far from where I now live, which is for injured, disabled and ill service personnel. I have a photo of me taken by him when I was a small child lying at the foot of his hospital bed in Erskine.
In total he spent 7 years and 293 days with the colours, and 6 years and 112 days in the reserve, making a total of 14 years and 40 days service. He enlisted with the Cameronians when he was around 22 years old, joined the regular army in the Scots Guards at about 23, was mobilised at the start of the war when he was about 32 and was invalided out when he was about 37. In fact he, and his contemporaries, obviously packed a lot of experiences into a small number of years around that time.
So anyway, what was I saying? Oh yes, the Cameronians memorial. The photo at the top of the page is a part of the memorial.
I've just this minute been contacted via Friends Reunited by a former school mate who I haven't seen since about 1979. He's thinking about arranging a bit of a reunion, which I'd guess will be no more than meeting in a pub rather than hiring a hall etc, and he's looking for email addresses for our contemporaries. Makes me realise that I've lost contact with all of them, although recently through Facebook I've made contact with a couple. So I think I'm now going to go onto Friends Reunited and start messaging people to try to re-establish some contact. It was all such a long time ago!
Monday, March 17, 2008
A year later
A couple of months of being in a non-weight-bearing plaster cast, 3 months off work, lots of months of physiotherapy, and a year down the line my left calf is still noticeably smaller than my right one due to muscle wastage when the cast was on, and I still have to concentrate on not limping.
Relatively recently I realised that the reason I keep getting cramp and aches in my left calf is because without having noticed it I now tend to walk with the muscles of my left leg tensed. When I manage to relax it I can walk a lot better and without limping, but I have to think about it as it doesn't come naturally yet. It'll come though, I hope.
So, since my previous post what has happened? I made a fairly rare purchase from Amazon. Rare these days anyway, although I used to buy a lot more from the site. A couple of posts ago I mentioned a few books which had been recommended to me, so that's me bought all three. Additionally I chucked both the Long Way Round and Long Way Down DVDs onto the order because although I've seen various individual episodes I haven't seen either series in its entirety. I really shouldn't place orders online after returning home from the pub, because I also added something off my Amazon Wish List, namely a digital photo frame.
In the flat I rented for a while before buying this house I had my PC in the living room, and quite enjoyed the experience of watching the screen saver of my photos randomly displayed (or rather, displayed in a random order). Since moving however, the PC is in a separate room and I've been missing seeing the photos. No one really ever looks through their photos and I found the screen saver to be a good way of looking at them with no effort involved. So anyway, I have been looking for a digital photo frame for a while, but haven't seen any, apart from pretty expensive ones, that I fancied.
So, I bought an expensive one. On the bright side I saved over £100 on the list price, but it was still well over £100! And it's a 10" one rather than the more usual 7"-8", so although size isn't everything (!) it means I can see it from the other side of the room quite easily.
And it's Wi-Fi enabled so I can just connect to my home network and display all the photos on my PC without having to transfer them to the frame. In theory anyway. I'm having a few teething problems and although I have connected it to the network, it keeps rebooting randomly every so often, so this week I'll have a proper look at it to see if there's something in the settings I need to change. Otherwise it'll go back to Amazon to be replaced.
On Saturday evening a friend, RE, and I were invited to a whisky tasting evening at G&G's house. Could have been messy, but it was actually damned civilised! When we were told about it, in the pub last week, there was some discussion about what the dress code would be, and "dress posh" seemed to be the order of the day, but in the event it didn't end up like that. However in the meanwhile I had decided that this was probably just the right time to splash out on some new accessories for my kilt.
As an aside, my kilt is the Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) tartan which is rather nice I think (see image).
So I went to Slaters Menswear and bought an Argyll jacket in a lovely charcoal grey colour and with bone buttons rather than silver so it's kind of semi formal, ghillie brogues, black socks, black sock flashes, and a new kiltpin. All for the bargain price of about £200.
As I say, the whisky tasting turned out not to be a posh dress event, but I wore the kilt anyway, and I'm very pleased to have at last got round to buying the stuff I have spent a fortune hiring over the past years! And a good time was had by all while tasting the whisky.
Next weekend will see this year's Motorcycle Action Group Easter Egg Run from the SECC to Yorkhill Children's Hospital in Glasgow, with 3000+ bikers bearing donations and Easter Eggs, and RE has agreed to accompany me by riding pillion on the bike. This morning then was a small scale trial run when we made sure she was OK riding pillion and I was OK with her on the back. Went well, exceptionally well, and we both enjoyed the experience, made better by having a decent intercom so we could speak to each other as we went along. So next Sunday, Easter Day, should be fun. I will, of course, report on it in due course.
Sunday, March 02, 2008
The great whore of the east
One of the nice people I met, Mike, has recommended a couple of books related to a topic close to my heart, motorcycling. They are Way to Go: Two of the world's best motorcycling journeys, and The Road to Gobbler's Knob: From Chile to Alaska on a motorbike, both by a friend of his, Geoff Hill. I've located them on Amazon, and I'll order them in due course, but suffice to say they seem to be similar to the higher profile Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman Long Way Down and Long Way Round trips, only this guy apparently did it all first and without the backup and infrastructure surrounding McGregor and Boorman. And I'm not having a go at them for that, what they did was still pretty impressive.
Mike has also written a book, The Blue Cabin: Living by the Tides on Islandmore, and I'm going to order it as well, not just because I've met him, but because the Amazon reviews rate it highly, and I've also had a personal recommendation from a friend who has read it.
Life is good at the moment and I am generally very happy, and getting happier.
Oh, and the title for this post relates to the city of Edinburgh, not a person!
Thursday, January 10, 2008
The wonders of modern science
I was in the new Silverburn shopping centre in Glasgow yesterday (don't bother, it's not that great), and when I returned to the multi storey carpark after wandering around the shops for 5 minutes before getting bored, I noticed that above each parking space there is a light. Said light is green if the space is empty, and red if it is occupied. Presumably there is a sensor in each light fitting to detect the presence of a vehicle.
It made no difference yesterday because the place was virtually empty, but when it's busy it must be a fantastically simple way to spot empty parking spaces as you drive around. Why has every multi storey not got them?
Choir starts back again tonight (Glasgow Chamber Choir, that is) after our Christmas break. OR is our guest conductor for the next concert (23rd February) and that'll be good because it's always a pleasure to sing for him.
After what for some reason seems like an extended holiday from it, I'm really looking forward to seeing the folks of GCC again, old friends and ones that are new since I returned to the choir last year after a break of a couple of years. I first sang with GCC when it was founded back in 1994, left in 1997, joined again in 2001, left again in 2005 and rejoined in September 2007. I might stick it out this time!
Speaking of old friends, and mindful of the image on the right, I had a good evening of mild debauchery the other night in the Three Judges pub at Partick Cross in Glasgow with RN, GS, JM, AD, RE and GS, and a very pleasant time was had setting the world to rights with a wide ranging list of topics covered. Very wide ranging! Nice to catch up with them all, and really there's no reason we couldn't do it more often. Debauchery is a good thing, in moderation and between consenting adults!
And as far as the image is concerned, no, the Three Judges does not serve tiny umbrellas in their drinks. It does sometimes sell lovely pork pies though, which are worth going in for on their own, never mind all the lovely Real Ale on offer!