Has Autumn truly arrived in Scotland, or have we jumped directly to winter.

September 24, 2020

Has Autumn truly arrived in Scotland, or have we jumped directly to winter.

Autumn has arrived, trees are starting to colour and the the nights are getting cooler. Yet the temperature, rain and gale force winds could easily be mistaken for the onset of winter.

Busy trying to complete the build and hoping for a few good days. Need to complete the front stone wall as well as the garden room. But that is being put back by the fitters from Greenock. They seem to come up with every excuse in the book to postpone the fitting date. Builders. The majority are always the same.

Anyway, we move on, cheering myself up by listening to music whilst working. Recently started listening to music on youtube music.

For me it’s a new method of listening to old tracks and artist from my youth, stepping back down memory lane. So whilst l’m fitting out the garden room and preparing the stone walls, my new air buds automatically connect to the phone. Blasting out Elton John, Carly Simons and Annie Lenox to name but a few. Plus odd tracks that come up in the mix. The latest was from Bedouine and friends Bedouine, Hurray for the Riff Raff, Waxahatchee - "Thirteen" (Big Star cover) - YouTube very relaxing. Only downside with youtube are the adverts. But it’s worth it to hunt out old classics.

I mention these things called buds, they are in fact wireless headphones.I had bud envy watching the joggers doing their exercise around the QM2 deck, but l wasn’t prepared to pay the £300 plus price tag to become wireless. Fortunately, Alan in France enlightened me, and pointed me in the right direction. Amazon Wireless Headphones, Boltune Bluetooth 5.0 in-Ear Earbuds For about £32. What a steel.

As the nights are drawing in we are settling down to watch some of the box sets accumulated over the years, especially the Scandinavian noir thrillers with subtitles, great when you are getting hard of hearing. Started on Wallander the original, then onto the English version, adapted from the Swedish novelist Henning Mankell's Kurt Wallander novels and starring Kenneth Branagh . Then it was the Bridge. Watching series 1&2 back to back on iPlayer catchup. Now we can’t wait for series 3&4. Tried to get it on our friends Netflix, but it’s not available in the U.K. unless you have VPN internet to cloak your location. So we opened up another box set on dvd, the Killing. 20 hours of absorption during these strange times.

All are so absorbing, we have sent off for the latest series of both the bridge and the killing. Keeps us off the street and away from the maddening crowds who are intent on burying their heads in the sand whilst passing on the Covid 19 virus.

More than 900,000 people have now died from the virus. Friday 11th Sept

Talking about strange. I have been self isolating for the past five days.

Separate bedroom and bathroom. 2m apart from Judith during the day. Staying indoors. I have an endoscopy booked at Ross Hall hospital, and l need a Covid test to show negative and to self isolate prior to going in.

So evenings have been spent busy reading. Judith gave me five novels written by Martin Walker, the author of the Bruno detective series set in the Perigord region of France. All about the antics, affairs and mysteries surrounding the chief of police, Bruno. A passionate cook, former soldier and a true country person devoted to his village. Found them so absorbing l read all five in the five days in the run up to my visit to the hospital.

He has written quite a few books on Bruno, but these are the first five. You won’t be disappointed.

Bruno chief of police, dark vineyard, Black diamond, Crowded grave, Devils cave

Can’t wait to get some more.

By the way, on the run up to going into the hospital was a real farce. Over a two week period l phoned the hospital to get a postal Covid test kit sent out. Eventually it arrived in the post at 3pm on the 11th with me going in on the 14th.

Goes without saying, that l turned up for the procedure at midday only to be turned away. The results hadn’t appeared from the lab in London. So a real waste of time, resources and money.

So now will have to go through the whole isolation procedure again in October. But, on a good note. I have the kit already here ready to do and return in plenty of time. Alleluia!

To celebrate the cessation of isolation l popped into the supermarket and bought some baby squid for dinner. Decided to cook squid and potato stew. One of our favourite squid dishes.

The Rick Stein recipe is served with a garlic, and a paprika rouille. There are two ways to cook squid - either very fast on a high heat, or slow, so that it becomes tender and buttery. The latter is used in this dish.

I got busy cleaning the squid, then sliced it into rings, whilst Judith chopped up the onion and crushed the garlic. Obviously during this process we were sampling a gloriously chilled Sauvignon Blanc from South Africa.

I popped the squid into hot olive oil to brown and get caramelised. The smell was tremendous, especially once l added the onion and garlic along with a nob of butter. Cooked this just till the onions were soft.

Plopped in the chopped tomatoes, poured a good glue of red wine and some chicken stock we had made the day before. Then placed the lid on top and let it simmer for a couple of hours. So simple. And more time to appreciate the wine.

The only other job was to make the Rouille. I just grabbed some ageing white sourdough and ripped it into chunks. Put it into a bowl and added some water to soften it. After another sip of wine l squeezed out the excess liquid and put the bread into a food processor with harissa, garlic, egg yolk and a little salt. Blending until smooth. After which l just gradually added the olive oil until we had a smooth, thick mayonnaise-like mixture.

40 minutes before the stew was ready we threw in the halved new potatoes to cook and absorb the flavoured.

It was rather special. The last time we had eaten this dish was out in France with Jo and Tony at one of our canasta evenings.

The food was just as splendid, but we missed the company and the card game.

The weather has improved which has allowed us to crack on with work outside. The stone wall is now finished with the expensive coping stones on top.(picked 30 up from a clearance in Dunoon) originally they offered 10 for £15. Once in the yard, they gave me all 30 for the same price. Took me four journeys to bring them back. But it was well worth it.

The gas fire arrived, so now waiting for the plumber to turn up and fit. Then again we have been hanging on for him turn up to service the boiler for the past four weeks. Nevertheless, l managed to pipe the central heating into the garden room. All I need now is the radiator.

Our friend in France sends us funnies most weeks. They make me laugh, in it’s necessary to smile and laugh through these troubling times. Hope you have my humour.

Now that you have laughed, cried, been sick or before you move on, just check out this YouTube movie. It’s a terrifically satisfying video of a former NASA engineer in his efforts to squirrel proof his bid feeder Building the Perfect Squirrel Proof Bird Feeder - YouTube. Trust me it’s amazing.

Like most people l have too much time on my hands, I tend to read lots of tweets, articles, snippets and lots of rubbish.

Recently an article surrounding the up and coming phenomenon regarding the antics of middle-aged white privileged women for their entitled attitude, crazy complaints, and outrageous demands.

Especially in retail situations where their catchphrase to customer service is ‘Can I speak to your manager?’

For some reason, this group of people have been given the name Karen. So Karens everywhere are bearing the brunt of a million memes, which mock this stereotype.

At this point a search on Wikipedia took place to learn the meaning of “Memes”. A word l hadn’t come across before.

meme (/miːm/ MEEM)[1][2][3] is an idea, behavior, or style that becomes a fad and spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme.[4] A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols, or practices, that can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate, mutate, and respond to selective pressures.[5]

Anyway, back this highly interesting article “tongue in cheek”

Supposedly, these KARENS who are hitting the headlines all over the world, have a hair style, a specific look.

So here are the hairstyles you should avoid to make sure no one mistakes you for one of them!

What is a Karen Haircut?

The Karen haircut is an inverted bob or lob, also known as an A-line cut. It’s always longer in the front and short in the back. As a result, it creates a sharp angle when viewed from the side. The Karen haircut can be parted in the center or feature an asymmetric fringe and is frequently paired with chunky highlights. While the classic Karen look is blonde, it’s evolved to include many different color combinations.

Early morning mist

B&W garden

The glaziers let me down once again, but at least the plasterer turned up and managed to plaster a third of the room. Unfortunately it wasn’t easy for him, due to the room being open to the elements. So eventually he decided to leave the rest until the windows and doors were fitted. When ever that materialises.

We are now facing new restrictions in Scotland as Covid cases increase dramatically. Up here, households are not allow to mix, and restaurants and pubs have to close at 10pm. Last night the poisoned dwarf banned university students from visiting pubs, as the number of students with Covid escalated.