Woe

We had a waterfall outside – which was rather inconveniently starting to appear on our bedroom wall and floor. The plumber just turned the water off, so that’s us till tomorrow morning – lovely.

Sigh.

Writing about this elsewhere, I was reminded of one of this morning’s readings, from Isaiah 43, which talks about God being with us “when you pass through the water”. So much for God’s sense of humour – we are NOT amused!

Icy

Brrrr it’s cold! After a (rather graceful, for me) slide onto my backside earlier in the day – luckily just outside my flat, so I didn’t have too far to go to recover – I dug out my walking boots and headed into town to do a bit of shopping and (most importantly) visit the Celtic Connections box office. There was ice on the river, and I also noticed that Wellington, rather than sporting his usual traffic cone, was today wearing a much more appropriate and suitable scarf and bobble hat.

Bank Holiday

I have enjoyed reading about everybody’s Bank Holiday (at least in the UK) adventures. Unfortunately, the most exciting thing we did on Bank Holiday Monday was wander on down to the greengrocer to stock up on veg, and we managed to get wet just doing that – so yes, typical Bank Holiday weather up here anyway. We’re so rock’n'roll.

We went for a curry on Sunday night, and so just for my own future reference: spicy vegetable korma / Indian vegetable curry both recommended. Mmmmm. I think the nan breads are getting even bigger.

Today after work I went to my book group, having once again not managed to read the book. Fortunately it is not a scary book group so this was not a problem. I do honestly mean to read the book each time, and usually manage it, but as I am getting busier at work and more stressed the thought of having to get to know a whole new lot of characters and potentially get emotionally involved in a draining story means that I keep putting off starting books until it is too late. I’m a bit like that with films too – unless I’ve seen them already and know I like them, or if it’s one I really really really want to see, I find it difficult to commit to sitting down and watching a film (I think HD finds this a bit frustrating, which is understandable). I still do mean to read the book we’ve just discussed (the others in the group are pretty good at not giving spoilers), as they did rate this as a good one (it’s Irene Nemirovsky’s “Suite Francaise”). Unfortunately we now have to move on, and having pulled a title out of the box that none of us had heard of (I think it might have been suggested ages ago by a member of the group who moved to Dundee a few months ago) it is time for a new start. I have just been on to amazon and read the reviews, let’s just say I have a feeling it might be another “Shadow of the Wind” experience. Fortunately there were lots of 1p copies. I read out one of the reviews to HD and he laughed. We both know I’m going to hate this one. Sigh.

Hidden Gardens

This afternoon we had a lovely time meeting up with some friends for a cuppa and a walk round the Hidden Gardens, which is round the back of the Tramway Theatre not far from where we live. It was a lovely day, and great to be able to sit out on the grass and chat and drink, and I even needed my sunglasses! It was also the first day this year that I have gone out wearing sandals and (horrors) exposing my feet to the world. The weather the last few days hasn’t been very good, so I’m happy that it managed to sort itself out for the weekend rather than being gorgeous on a work day when I’m stuck in the office!

This photo is of HD walking through a funny arty gate sculpture thingy – it had coloured flashing lights which must look fantastic when it’s dark. This picture makes me laugh – I think all it needs is some dry ice and HD saying “Tonight Matthew, I’m going to be ….” for this to be straight out of “Stars in their Eyes”!

The garden has a number of different sections, including a herb garden and a random chimney stack (as the name of the theatre might suggest, this used to be a yard for the trams, but has been transformed into a really interesting space, both indoors and outdoors). Photos from the garden might well find their way onto my Glasgow blog later in the week.

Miscellaneous

Today was a bit of a write-off, and I was unable to enjoy this uncharacteristic good weather as the change in weather (and the arrival of some proper sun to go with the balmy 10 degree heatwave!) led to an evil headache. So I headed home after lunch and spent the afternoon in bed – still feeling a bit fragile but I’ve had worse headaches so hopefully by tomorrow I’ll be back to normal. I remember when I went to Romania the other year I spent the first couple of weeks with an almost permanent headache due to the air pressure change, it took me ages to adjust. I must be getting old.

Yesterday I had my penultimate day of tutorials. It wasn’t the greatest ever as tutorials go, but I did have an unexpected ‘pastoral moment’ where I was reminded of what I was good at when I was health visiting, how much I miss that side of things, and how if I get a job in academia (I’m looking at doing part-time nursing, part-time academia and some consultancy on the side, all of which will I think bring me closer to what I suspect my wider vocation might be) the aspect I will really enjoy is the pastoral, personal tutoring side of things. Not that I’m applying for anything yet, but I am starting to think about how to get a week’s worth of nursing-related study in in the next couple of months to get myself back on the register.

HD has a couple of phone interviews tomorrow; all prayers gratefully appreciated

More snow

Just before it disappears, here is a picture of my courtyard from the kitchen window yesterday. I think the Mediterranean oleanders aren’t really used to snow, somehow.

I loved how pretty the trees looked sporting their white coats. These trees are at the top of Byres Road, opposite the Botanic Gardens.

Snow

The snow hasn’t hit up here as badly as down south, but it has been snowing all day, and, even though I’m not fond of going to and from work on snowy, icy paths it was lovely to look out of the window and see those huge flakes dancing around in the air. This is the view from the window of my office.

And seeing as it’s Tuesday tomorrow, I won’t be overly distressed if there’s a snow day. What’s the betting half the students take one anyway?

In other news, I finished my second draft of chapter 3 today. I still don’t think it’s thesis-quality yet, but it’s loads better than the first draft. Onwards and upwards!

Dullness

Some people may have noticed a bit of a dulling around here.  There hasn’t really been anything earth-shattering to write about.  The study day yesterday went well – the bit I co-facilitated generated plenty of interesting discussion, the second half was a bit over my head but OK, and we had lots of cake provided.  Which isn’t ideal from the losing-weight perspective, but hopefully just one day won’t have too much of a negative impact on my (already large) waistline.

I’ve been seeing lots of photos and hearing about lots of people in the UK having snow, and it all looking lovely and fluffy.  Here a few days ago I counted two whole flakes, but that is all we have seen up here.  Today it is chucking it down with rain and howling a gale, and the most exciting thing we have done is get some stuff out of storage (without entirely planning where in the Stately Pile we would actually put it).  I’m now trying to ignore HD’s tidying spurt, as eventually this means I shall have to tidy up some of the piles of random crappage of my stuff, that I’ve been putting off for ever.

So anyway, nothing to worry about if you don’t see me blogging for a bit – I just don’t want to bore either of my readers to death!

[By the way, my baptism of the keyboard did unfortunately turn out to have been a drowning.  Fortunately my department is rubbish at throwing old stuff away, and I was able to swipe the keyboard from the PC of a student who finished her PhD nearly 2 years ago.  I'm slightly put out that it doesn't match the PC now, but I suppose I can't really complain after my clumsiness!]

Of cold weekends and cool weeks

The barge trip over the weekend was really wonderful – it was ever so cold, but that lovely invigorating dry cold. It would have been miserable if it had been damp, but this just felt really healthy! Yesterday as we were sailing back to the boatyard we were breaking up ice the whole way there (it had been about minus 4 overnight, apparently, so the canal had frozen over). I have put pictures up on facebook, but unfortunately have run out of time to put them on flickr and then here, so they will have to wait till the weekend.

Today I had a lovely extra treat, when I met up with Tractor Girl and shipmate Surfing Madness (who studies in Glasgow as well) for a breakfast coffee. I know it was only a flying visit, but I was really pleased that I was able to be fitted into Tractor Girl’s hectic social whirl and we had a lovely hour chatting and filling up with caffeine – what a great start to the day

And now here I am blogging instead of packing. I have ordered a taxi for 4.30 A.M. (groan) to take me to the airport tomorrow – yes scaryconference is nearly upon me! – but still need to pack and have a bath and generally organise myself. I came home earlier than usual so that it would be all done and I could have an early night, but as usual have faffed about doing nothing remotely important and will now spend the rest of the evening running round like a headless chicken. No change there then.

I’ll see you at the end of the week – hopefully with lots of cool photos and exciting tales to tell.

How posh?!

One of the joys of living in a tenement flat is that we have to use a company of factors (I guess the south of the border equivalent would be a management company – they (allegedly) sort out things like repairs to common areas). Ours is rubbish (as, I suspect, is everyone else’s – I have had no end of “how rubbish is your factor” conversations with various people since being up here), but they are very very cheap, so we’re getting what we’re not paying for, I guess.

Anyway, one of the reasons our particular factor is so cheap is because we don’t pay for a cleaner for the communal areas but do it ourselves – supposedly the two flats on each floor are responsible for their landing and the stairs down to the next landing, and as I’m on the ground floor my responsibility is the close from the front door to the back door, including the front steps. Although it’s technically a shared responsibility, the flat over the close from me is rented so I’ve never bothered asking the tenants to do it – the requirement is for the close to be washed each week, and as it only takes 5 minutes I just think it’s easier to do it myself. Unfortunately, as I’ve been travelling up and down the country each week I haven’t always had the chance to do it, and so it was that it got to this morning and I realised it hadn’t been done for about 3 weeks so I couldn’t leave it any longer. So out came the mop and bucket, and a-cleaning I did go.

Those of you north of the border will be well aware of just how flippin’ COLD it is at the moment. As I mentioned yesterday, the road and pavements are covered in black ice, and of course as soon as I started mopping the close I realised the flaw in my plan. Even though the water was quite hot, it seemed to start icing up as soon as it hit the floor, and I was terrified that one of my neighbours would end up breaking their neck as they left the building by skidding down the steps. So – salt, I thought. I’d put some salt on the steps up to the front door to stop the water from freezing. I thought I had some common or garden cheapo table salt, but it turns out I hadn’t, so I ended up having to sprinkle my steps with posh cracked sea salt! I was just glad I didn’t have to use the twisty salt cellar, as I would have been SO embarrassed!

But, I got back this evening and it seems to have worked, so there we are. If you’re slipping and sliding around your neighbourhood, get out the poncey sea salt.