Delayed gratification

Today’s guest picture comes from our friend Gavin. He noticed this strange stuff on a recent walk with Mike Tinker who identified it as white jelly fungus.

The delayed gratification of the title of today’s post is a misuse of the phrase. What was gratifying was that forecast rain was considerably delayed and this allowed us to enjoy much more of the day than we expected.

It had rained overnight and it was a grey day so everything was rather soggy, but we were able to enjoy our coffee with Margaret in the garden, and Mrs Tootlepedal was able to do a little gardening, including taking down most of the sunflowers in the front bed as well.

This is all that is left now.

How are the mighty fallen!

After coffee, I left Mrs Tootlepdal to continue some preparation work on the next slab move and went for a walk while it was still dry.

It was not a day for distant views but I snapped away as I crossed the suspension bridge and looked back at the church. It was looking very autumnal.

I saw a goosander in the river below the town bridge and as I saw a dipper later in the walk below the Jubilee bridge and I have killed two birds with one stone hit two targets with one arrow and put them together in a panel.

The truth is that in the grey light, the individual pictures weren’t good enough to stand alone.

Someone was feeding the ducks at the Meeting of the Waters…

…and there was an interested spectator standing near by.

I crossed the Sawmill Brig and caught a glimpse of the ruins of Langholm Castle….

…before walking up the hill and taking the top path to the North Lodge.

It was a treat to be out. The path was slippery with leaves so I had to watch my step, but there was little wind, the temperature was kinder than it has been recently, and the immediate surroundings were beautiful.

When I got to the North Lodge, the view up the valley was dull…

…so I was very happy to turn round and walk home beside the river round the pheasant hatchery and along the Castleholm, immersing myself in the autumn colour as I went along.

Some was delicate….

…and some was rather more full on.

There were contrasts between deciduous and conifer…

…which got quite pointed at times.

As I walked along the path down to the Lodge…

…I saw two grey squirrels which escaped my lens and several patches of fungus which couldn’t run away.

I enjoyed a wide variety of tones and tints….

…before I got to the Jubilee bridge where I saw that dipper on a rock under this tree.

In spite of the grey conditions, the walk was well worth the effort of watching my steps and I got home in perfect time for lunch. This made the walk even more satisfactory.

I noticed when I got back that we obviously haven’t closed the front gate for some time.

We had additional interest during the day, as new electricity poles were being put up at the end of our street, and men in yellow jackets were to be seen above the rooftops.

Having a traffic light at Eskdaill Street and seeing the scaffie cart back up the road to empty our bin was undoubtedly the biggest excitement in Wauchope Street of the whole year. We have been living very quietly lately.

After lunch we had a cheery Zoom meeting with our granddaughter Matilda and her parents Al and Clare. Matilda is on holiday and intends to spend part of her week off saving the world from evil with the help of her mother. This turns out to involve a console and not real life, but I hope that they are successful anyway.

I still hadn’t started to rain after the Zoom meeting, so I looked at flowers while Mrs T did some more preparatory work on the next slab. It was tricky becuase the ground was still pretty wet.

Mrs Tootlepedal has planted some pansies in the chimney in the hope of some off season colour and I thought that the back of a calendula was probably more interesting than the front..

The Special Grandma is trying its very hardest to come out and is almost there, while the Weigela just keeps on blooming.

While the preparation work continued, I went in and made a date, raisin and walnut teacake and came out just in time to lend a hand in raising the next slab. It is now in place…

…and the great work progresses steadily. You can get the ground under the slabs flat and level by using large thumping machines or by careful work with a teaspoon. Mrs Tootlepedal relies on careful work.

I had a look for birds at the feeder but the combination of poor light, works in the drive and an unsuccessful fly through by a sparrow hawk left me with slim pickings. Even when it did arrive, a chaffinch turned its back on the camera.

The tea cake was a learning experience for me and didn’t look quite as good as I had hoped, so no photograph, but it tasted delicious. As it has a good splodge of Demerara sugar in it as well as the dates and raisins, it is not surprising that it turned out to be quite more-ish. It will have to be locked away to avoid total diet catastrophe.

We had our second Zoom meeting of the day with my siblings in the early evening, and this was a lively affair with reports of ordering and paying for a meal out with a mobile phone, a great triumph for my two older sisters, and a lively political disagreement with my younger brother. My sister Caroline pointed out that everyone in East Africa pays for everything on the phone so it is no big deal really.

We had trout again for tea.

I only got half a flying bird today, but half a bird is better than none they say, so here it is.