A drop of the soft stuff

Today’s guest picture comes from my sister Mary.  It shows the Houses of Parliament which is nominally the seat of our government.  Sadly, we are currently not being governed at all.

In a shocking challenge to the established order, it rained today…

…but as it only rained for about five minutes and not very hard at that, it didn’t make any difference and I still had to potter about watering anything I thought might benefit from it.

I also managed some weeding and a little strimming of the paths in the vegeatble garden and I edged the middle lawn.

It was cloudy and definitely a bit cooler than it has been so that was very welcome.  Encouraged by this, I got my bike out after coffee and the crossword and set out to see how my legs were feeling.

They were feeling fine so I did a 32 mile circle of familiar roads at a gentle pace (I was trying hard but the pace was gentle), keeping an eye out for anything interesting.  Once again, I found that if I stopped and looked around, there was usually something to look at.

My first stop was not far from the town.

There are orchids and red soldier beetles all over the place.

I stopped about 2o miles further on to check out a verge.

There was a good variety of flowers to be seen.

On my next stop, about 4 miles from home, there was an even greater variety.

There were all these…

…and many more.

Looking at the hedges and verges certainly keeps me occupied while I am pedalling along….and give me a good excuse for stops for a breather.

The light wind and cooler temperature made for very agreeable cycling conditions and I had worked up an appetite for a sardine, lettuce and potato salad for a late lunch when I got home.

I watched the bird feeder while I was in the kitchen.

Two sparrows posed artistically for me.

An interesting time trial in the Tour de France gave me a good excuse for a rest after lunch and then a visit from Mike Tinker caused me to stir my stumps and get back out into the garden.

The sun had come out by this time and it was a lovely afternoon.

I mixed a little more watering with some flower watching.

The new iris is adding to its charm…

…and the tall sunflowers are reaching ever higher into the sky.

The calendulas don’t seem to mind the dry conditions…

…and have a nice assortment of styles.

Then I had to go in and have a shower and get ready for my flute pupil Luke to arrive.  As I hadn’t done any practice for a fortnight, I couldn’t complain too much about his lack of practice.  He has just started his first job so I suppose he has other things to think about at the moment.

I picked some peas and beans for my tea and enjoyed them with some fish cakes and then I had a selection from the cheese board to round off the meal.

One last expedition to the garden for watering followed, where I noticed that a leycesteria has flowered underneath the apple tree….

…checked out another of Mrs Tootlepedal’s new nicotianas…

…and discussed the political situation with a couple of blackbirds.

The flying bird of the day picture is provided by the aerial ballet department.

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The calm before the storm

Today’s guest picture is another from my sister Mary’s sunny visit to Bath.

We got up to another grey and miserable morning here although once again it was unseasonably mild.

Mrs Tootlepedal is partially recovered but by no means back to full working order.   She is very touched by the good wishes expressed by readers of the blog.

The grey morning was much improved by the arrival of Dropscone for coffee and his already excellent scones were improved in my case by adding some of Mary Jo’s gift of saskatoon jam to them.  In my view, Dropscone’s plain scones and saskatoon jam are a match made in heaven.

After he left, Mrs Tootlepedal and I set about getting to the bottom of whatever it was that had made our phone line go dead and our internet flicker intermittently. By using our powers of deduction and a small screwdriver, we found the problem and cured it, probably just in time for the town’s power supply to be knocked out be the coming storm Ophelia.

Ophelia has been wreaking havoc in Ireland but it was extremely calm here in the morning and early afternoon.   Our neighbour Liz popped into to ask if we had seen the sun.  We went to have a look.

It was very odd.

The camera found it hard to record the clouds and the sun both in the correct shade but this is definitely how the sun looked.

It kept changing colour as the cloud of dust passed and I had several goes….

…until finally it got too bright for both me and the camera to look at.

It was sufficiently striking to make the news later in the day and the experts say that it was either Saharan sand or Portuguese wild fire particles or both that had provided the film of rusty colour.

After lunch, I had a look round the garden.  The light had improved and the bees and hoverflies were back on duty again.

A late astrantia has come out to join the poppies.

Lilian Austin and Special Grandma add a delightful feminine touch.

Mrs Tootlepedal is going to make more of the ornamental strawberry next year.

But the most exciting thing in the garden is the new tray under the bird feeders which means I can start feeding the birds again.

It is a heavy duty plastic cement mixing tray and Mrs Tootlepedal drilled the neat hole in the centre of it to let the feeder pole fit through.

It was warm (66°F) and fairly still so I took the opportunity to go for a short cycle ride in my outdoor gym and stopped for pictures on my way.

It was rather gloomy as I came back to town on my first lap….

…but I headed down to Skippers Bridge to take a couple of pictures because I feared that if the storm is as windy as predicted, there may be few leaves on the trees when it is gone.

On my second lap, there were a few drops of rain and then the sun came out.

Nowadays, the gloomy predictions of storm and tempest are often worse than the reality so keen are the weathermen for us not to be caught unprepared for bad weather so it will be interesting to see what scenes like these will look like in a couple of day’s time.

I looked round the garden when I got back.  I found some more colour.

…and then went in to see how Mrs Tootlepedal was.  She had been well enough to do a little work in the garden while I pedalling but she is still a bit fragile.

Although the light was fading, I looked at the bird feeders through the windows.

A gloomy sparrow and an astonished blue tit consider the sodden pink pellets

A blue tit sits and thinks

A sparrowhawk flashed through the garden without it catching anything or me catching it.

It astonishes me how quickly birds find out that food of one sort or another is available.  I said to Mrs Tootlepedal only yesterday that I hadn’t seen a sparrowhawk about for weeks.

In the evening my flute pupil Luke came and we had a productive time.  He played at a practice of  our local orchestra yesterday and felt that he had been able to play quite a bit of the music.

In the evening, I went to the Camera Club meeting.  Ten members turned up and we were treated to a very interesting and varied selection of photographs from winter scenes to remind us of what is coming, through stunning local wildlife portraits and action shots and striking black and white studies to a record of a recent African safari, complete with lions, rhinos, hippos and elephants.  We were very well entertained.  One member had brought in some very beautiful large prints which led to a lot of discussion.

The flying bird of the day is having a rest.

It is blowing hard as I write this. Fingers crossed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A varied day

Today’s guest picture comes from our daughter Annie.  As well as enjoying the delights of Venice lately, she also sampled a beautiful evening at Clapham Junction before she left for the continent

It was another day of variable weather but at least the rain was sporadic rather then persistent which was a relief.

I started the day by going to Longtown in the rain to pick up a new pair of glasses.  The optician has to deal with an extreme difference between my right and left eye and has given me a rather neat bifocal lens which he hopes will let me read with both eyes at the same time.  This will be a novelty if it works.

When I got home, I had time to have a coffee and the last slice of the oat, plum and ginger bake before I had to put on my sombre clothes and go to a funeral.  There was a good attendance as the funeral was for a local hero, Jimmy Maxwell, captain of Langholm Rugby Club in its most successful period ever, a rugby international and the chairman of the Common Riding committee for many years.

To us, he was the man who as a builder had done many alterations to our house when we first arrived in Langholm and who was responsible later on for putting in the ties that hold the house together and keep a roof over our heads.

Luckily the rain had stopped by the time that we came out of church.

I was sitting in the kitchen after the funeral when a knock on the door heralded the arrival of Sandy with two friends, Fred and Irene, who wanted to look round the garden.

They are regular blog readers and wanted to to take the chance to measure my pictures against the real thing.  The enjoyed a garden tour and took an apple each with them as they went on their way.  Fred is just off to Africa where doubtless he will find interesting things to photograph.  I noticed as we finished our tour that the nerines beside the bird feeder are beginning to look their best.

Mrs Tootlepedal returned from Annan where she had been receiving treatment for a painful toe and was very pleased with the results.

I had to spend a bit of time getting everything organised for a trip back up to Bentpath in the evening where I was going to give a talk to the Women’s Institute there.

I did think of fitting a short cycle ride in but another heavy shower made me unthink.

There was time to watch the finish of the Tour of Britain stage before I checked on the weather again and went out for a short walk.  My plan was to take a variety of photographs which might help to demonstrate some good and bad  things to do with a camera and which I could use in my talk later on.

I started beside the river.

Considering how much it has rained, the river was quite calm as it flowed under Langholm Bridge

The view up stream from the bridge

A local resident getting ready to fly

Then I walked up the Lodge Walks and across the Castleholm

I went from broad views to small with this fungus in a gate post

And this moss garden on another gate post

I spent some time trying to convey a feel that the trees are just beginning to turn but there wasn’t really quite enough contrast

The selection of oak galls gets ever gaudier

I was peering at the the final few flowers on the rosebay willowherb….

…when I was joined by a bee and a fly

I left the Castleholm, crossed the Jubilee Bridge and made my way home.

Warbla looking cheerful in the evening sun

My old school looking a bit neglected. No use has been found for the building since the new school was built across the road.

A hoverfly in Mike and Alison’s garden which kindly opened its wings to make a better picture for me.

When I got home, I found Mrs Tootlepedal talking to two more garden visitors.  It turned out that our neighbour Isobel had brought ex Langholmite and now Canadian resident and  blog reader Joyce to see the garden in real life too.

It was very nice to be able to put a face to a long time reader and commenter.

Joyce particularly enjoyed the fabled compost bins and was pleased that I give the credit for the garden to Mrs Tootlepedal, the gardener and don’t pretend that I do all the work myself.

I just had time to make a sausage stew for my tea, cook a batch of rolls which Mrs Tootlepedal had shaped earlier in the afternoon and pack my stuff into the car before it was time to go up the road to Bentpath.  I checked the weather before I left and saw no need for a rain jacket. Needless to say, it was bucketing down when I got to the village hall, a mere six miles north of Langholm and I got quite wet getting the stuff from the car into the hall.

After the ladies had had a business meeting, I got down to business with a run through of various styles of camera and lenses and then a slide show of the pictures that I had taken for the recent flower show competitions with a demonstration of how they had been edited and a run though of the afternoon’s photos from the walk with some explanation of why some had been reasonably successful and why others had been failures.

The talk seemed to hold the interest of the audience…..

…who kindly posed for a mass portrait afterwards.

The possibilities offered by photo editing led to some questions after the talk.

This was followed by an excellent cup of tea, sandwiches and cakes.  Giving a talk to the WI is always a satisfying experience because if anyone is skilled in providing a nice cup of tea and cakes, it is them.

The moon was out as I drove home.

No flying bird of the day as that dratted heron was too quick for me when it took off.

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A social circle

Today’s guest picture comes from my friend Bruce who was struck by the elegant simplicity of this device for opening all the windows of a glasshouse near Denholm in one fell swoop.

The forecasters tend to look on the gloomy side of things and although we were promised a morning of rain,  thunder and lightning, in the end we got nothing more shocking than another heavy shower and the arrival of Dropscone for coffee.

Dropscone was due to play in a golf tournament near Denholm in the afternoon so he was a bit apprehensive but unless he was very unlucky, he should have been all right because the rest of our day here was fine, often sunny and quite pleasantly warm for once too.

This let me get out into the garden to pick some of Mrs Tootlepedal’s carrots.  We are plagued by carrot root fly so Mrs Tootlepedal has been taking extra precautions this year and they seem to have paid off.  Carrots have joined the beetroot and wild raspberry jam in the home produce section of our kitchen.

The wild raspberries produce a rather ‘pippy’ jam but it does have a very good flavour.

The scientific rain gauge shows just how heavy our brief showers have been…

…but I was able to get out into the garden to do some dead heading and tidying up.  The last of the delphiniums are now assisting the compost.

By early afternoon, not only was the washing hanging out and drying quickly but the poppies were holding their heads up in a very satisfactory way.  I didn’t photograph the washing but I did snap a poppy or two.

 

Once again the bees had not been discouraged….

…and I was particularly pleased to see a small tortoiseshell as well as the more common large white.

The tortoiseshell was hiding in a box ball but I should be able to get a better picture in a few days if it keeps coming to the garden.

I had received an unexpected letter from Germany a few days ago and in it, a lady who has started to read the blog fairly recently introduced herself and told me that she would be coming to Canonbie.  She added that she would be happy to share a cup of tea, a biscuit and some conversation with me.  We had a mutual friend in a colleague who taught across the landing from me in Langholm Primary School some forty years ago.

A cup of tea alone is a considerable inducement but when a biscuit is added, who can resist so I got on the fairly speedy bike, readjusted my new mirror and set off to cycle down to Canonbie by my usual route.

Instead of looking for wild flowers today, I thought that I would look at views on my way.

There was no shortage.

Whita Hill seen from Chapelhills

Looking down over the Esk valley from Tarcoon

Cows at Mossknowe

Cows at Mossknowe: taking the longer view

View through my favourite trees at Grainstonehead

Testing the zoom: The Liddle Viaduct at Riddings seen from Grainstonehead about a mile away.

The old road passes Woodhouselees

As you can see, it was a beautiful afternoon with the added bonus of not being too hot so that when I got to the house that I was visiting, I was in good order to pay a social call.

My welcome was very warm and the tea was refreshing, the biscuit nourishing and the conversation interesting.  It was useful to get a view of Brexit and Britain as seen from abroad as our press is generally very insular and we don’t have much of a view of what is going on over the Channel.  I was pleased that my blog had lead to such a sociable and informative occasion.

I stayed an hour and then cycled on home and took one last view on my way.

Whita seen from the old A7 near Irvine House

I thought that the completed silage and the puddle gave a good reflection of our changeable weather.

The wind was very brisk again and I was happy to find it pushing me back up the hill into Langholm.  We should be grateful for the brisk wind, as it has been helpful in getting things dry after the heavy rain showers.

When I got back home, I had enough energy left from talking and cycling to mow the greenhouse grass and trim back the climbing hydrangea so that it no longer threatens to block our gutter.

I see when I look at the picture, that the trim might need straightening up a bit.

I also had time for a look at two flowers, a nicotiana, a favourite of Mrs Tootlepedal who loves the scent in the evening and a red astrantia, which has waited until the paler varieties are dying back before making an appearance.  As regular readers will know, I dearly love an astrantia so I was very pleased to see this one finally coming out.

I was also pleased to see a water lily in flower.  Often when rain fills up the pond, the water lilies get drowned.

It has started to rain again as I write this. We have several more days of sunshine and showers to come but if the balance between the rain and shine is the same as it was today, we won’t complain too much.

 

 

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Messing about with the buttons

Today’s guest picture shows a peacock which was observed by Dropscone on a visit to Leeds Castle in Kent during  his recent holiday.

Although there were hints of sunshine offered by the weather forecast for today, they were not forthcoming in actuality and we had a chilly, grey day with a nipping east wind. I started out by going up to the Moorland feeders with Mrs Tootlepedal to act as reserve feeder filler.

When we had filled the feeders,  she sat in the car and scanned the horizon for exciting raptors (in vain) while I sat in the hide, hoping for exciting new visitors (also in vain).

There was a shy woodpecker….

…who was soon replaced by some more forward great and coal tits.

There was a seed pilfering pheasant….

…and a great quantity of chaffinches and siskins…

…but when two other bird watchers came into the hide, I wasn’t too unhappy to pack up and leave them to it.

On our way back to the town, we stopped at Skippers Bridge to check on the work.  The workers must have faith in their scaffolding….

….because the water was foaming away not far beneath their feet.  They are making good progress though…

…and have built up a lot of new facing.  The man on the right was being fed stones to pack into the space behind the new wall.

If they keep on at this rate, it won’t be long before they are finished.

While I was on the bridge, I stole a glance at the parapet.

I did have some idea of going out for a chilly pedal when we got home but the fact the I would have to face the nippy wind on my return journey persuaded me that making some leek and potato soup was a better plan.  We have still got several leeks in the garden so there will probably be more soup before the end of the month.

I watched the birds in between times.

I enjoyed the goldfinch on the right landing on a wing and a prayer

I am so used to seeing our birds that I sometimes forget just how pretty and colourful they are.

Instead of cycling on the slow bike, I took pictures of the belt drive and the solid back tyre which together with the hub gear make it almost maintenance free…

…even if they may make it a little slower.

A fresh crocus caught my eye.

The promised breath of springtime.

I did get some exercise in the end though as Sandy came round for a walk in the afternoon.

The promised sunshine stayed well away and we had a rather grey and featureless stroll.  In fact things were so dull that we started to see what pressing buttons on the camera might do.

A smart filter made a striking job of this track view.

I did say that it was rather a grey day…

…so I took a rather grey picture to go with  it.

We thought that we would look to see if there were any snowdrops at Holmhead.

We found several…

…hundred.

We were still pressing buttons on the camera and we found a handy setting which will pick out a single colour from a scene.

We were like children in a sweetie shop.

It was a pity that Sandy didn’t have a brighter jacket on.

I even showed the button to Mrs Tootlepedal when I got home…

…but she kept remarkably calm.

In the evening I went out to the first meeting of 2107 for our Langholm Choir, ‘Langholm Sings’.   We had a good practice, which started with some familiar music just to get us in the groove.  I noticed a few familiar mistakes were still in the groove too.  We ended the practice with a couple of new pieces and these were very enjoyable so the new season looks promising.

The flying bird of the day is a female chaffinch looking for a male to give her some space.

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Hard going

Dropscone did Forth bridges while he was in Edinburgh.  He went over the rail bridge by train, walked back over the mile long road bridge on foot and found time to take this artistic misty picture of the new crossing in between times.

We had another fine day today but it was decidedly chilly and never got above two degrees in our front garden all day.

I started the day off by going up to the Archive Centre to print out some sheets for the data miners and I had to watch my step pretty carefully as I went because there were some slippery spots on the way.

When I got home, I had a moment to look out of the window…

Two goldfinches threw themselves so far off the feeder in their battle that they almost reached some sunshine…

…but by and large, the birds came and went anonymously.

I had arranged to have coffee with Sandy and when we had finished our cup (and a slice of fruity malt loaf), we set off for a walk.

The good thing about a little freezing weather is that it makes our often soggy and boggy tracks and paths very suitable for walking along dry shod so we enjoyed a very pleasant two and a half mile walk in good conditions.

We went up Jimmy’s Brae and followed the track to the Beck’s Burn

We weren’t expecting to find much of interest to photograph on our way but thanks to adopting a very stately pace, many things caught our eye as we went along.

A leafy tree is bonus at this time of year after frost…

…but we have had very calm weather on the whole which must have helped the leaves to stay in place.

Up on the hill, the hardy cattle grazed placidly.

We got into the woods and I was taking a picture of this wall, which has been overtaken by tree planting…

…when I had a closer look at the twigs of the tree on the right.

A reminder that days will get longer again

As we walked down the slope to the bridge across the Becks Burn, a tree trunk arrested us.

Sandy tried to capture the fungus on one side of the trunk and I admired the luxuriant lichen on the other.

Once across the burn and through the woods, we followed the road down to the Auld Stane Brig.  We followed it slowly though, as there were a thousand little icy treats to look at on the way.

Even the fence posts were worth a look.

It was quite surprising to find a bit of lichen that wasn’t covered in sparkling ice crystals.

We finally got going again and crossed the bridge…

….and went along Gaskells Walk.

I was keeping an eye out for hair ice as I have seen it here before and I was not disappointed.  We saw several specimens before we finished our walk but none of them were terrifically photogenic.  These were the best two.

There was some fungus still to be seen as well.

There was a ray of sunshine on a frosty glade beside the track and it was so appealing (to me at least) that I have put two pictures of it in.

Eskdaill Street  and Castle Hill were bathed in sunlight when we got to the top of the bank.

We walked to along to Stubholm and then came back along Eastons Walk, thoroughly satisfied with our outing.

Sandy went off home and I made some carrot and potato soup for lunch.

I had a look out of the window while it was cooking.

A robin was very busy trying to get into the blog.  It is hard to believe perhaps that all the pictures are of the same robin, taken within minutes, but they are.

I don’t know another bird that can change its shape so much just by turning its head.

The chaffinches approaching the feeder were less anonymous now.

I was going to do something interesting after lunch but the need to practise songs for concerts came first and then a visit to the chemist for a throat gargle and some joint ointment came second.  By the time that I was thinking of a third thing, it was almost dark so I had a cup of tea and another slice of fruity malt loaf and that was enough excitement for me.

The evening was devoted to tootling.  First my flute pupil Luke came and we made progress on a Telemann canon and then I went off to play trios with Mike and Isabel and we made good progress on our new Mozart trio.  It would be hard to find a better use for a cold winter’s evening.

The flying bird of the day is one of the chaffinches finding a little light over a frosty lawn.

 

 

 

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The Met Office having a laugh

Today’s guest picture is a second look at the Chew Valley Lake by Venetia.  It shows the surface of the water dotted with what she thinks is a vast quantity of coots.

We had one of those days today which are politely described as “changeable” but which might more honestly be described as utterly miserable.

To be totally fair, there was a sunny hour in the morning but as I was stuck in the Information Hub not giving information out, the sunshine was wasted on me.  I had passed a colourful gutter on my way to the town centre….

…and enjoyed the poplars in the park as I crossed the suspension bridge…

…but by the time that I came home, the leaves had been swept up by the street cleaner and the rain had started again.

Two hours in the new information palace is a good deal better than two hours in the old hub.  It is warm and comfortable and as you can see the Market Place through the window, there is always something to watch in a quiet moment.

Sandy came round with a cup of coffee which helped the time pass painlessly.

I took a quick look at the garden before I went in.

Viola and clematis thriving in spite of a heavy night of rain.

Azalea and hosta showing that it is autumn though

After lunch, Mrs Tootlepedal headed off for a visit to the council dump and I put a week of the newspaper index into the Archive Group database and then considered a walk.  I had to go back up to the town to pay a bill so I texted Sandy to see if he would like an outing but he declined the opportunity.

He must have felt quite pleased about this decision as it started to rain as soon as I set out…

It was grand weather for ducks.

….but I stuck to my task and the rain relented after a while and I had a damp but pleasant stroll round the Castleholm and the Pheasant Hatchery.

In spite of the gloom, I snapped away as I went along.

The Lodge Walks

The felled trees showed why they had had to be dealt with.

More hole than tree in this conifer

A fungus on the felled trunk

A fungus on one of the felled beech tree stumps

In spite of the low clouds, there was no shortage of sights to catch the eye.

A view across the Castleholm

And another

Pheasants at the pheasant hatchery

The path past the pheasant hatchery

Leaves beside the path.

The view upstream from the Duchess Bridge

The river had risen a lot after some heavy rain.

I looked over the manse wall as I  got near home and enjoyed the sight of one of the minister’s more decorative friends.

Mrs Tootlepedal had got back by the time that I returned and had even had time to make some delicious scones.  As it started to rain heavily again almost as soon as I got in, I was doubly pleased to be in the kitchen in these circumstances.

My flute pupil Luke came and we enjoyed some duets and then it was time for a quick tea.  Mrs Tootlepedal went out to the Buccleuch Centre to see a ‘live’ presentation of Cosi Fan Tutti from the Royal Opera House and I waited for Sandy to pick me up to go to a Camera Club meeting.

The fact that the rain was coming down in buckets by this time might have accounted for a modest turnout at our meeting but if we were short on quantity, we weren’t lacking in quality at all and had a very good set of pictures to enjoy.  As this was followed by tea, coffee and biscuits laced with good conversation, it was felt to be a worthwhile evening.

The flower of the day is a striking poppy….

…and the flying birds are a flock of the pheasants who would be well advised to learn not to fly up like that as people approach.

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