The Isle of Mull

Today I returned from a week away on the Hebridean island, Mull with my boyfriend and my sister.


We left on Saturday catching midday ferry from Oban to Craignure, then on to Tobermory with me driving so my boyf could have a ferry-pint (something he considers a real treat). We spent the afternoon exploring Tobermory, watching Wales beat Scotland in the rugby and relaxing in our holiday home.  This is the view we had from our front windows (with finger for added effect...).

On Sunday my boyfriend got his first taste of driving on the Island with a trip to Calgary Bay. This beach is a large white sandy bay but it looked as though there have been some recent storms, as there was a lot of seaweed quite high along the shoreline.

We drove around the North-West of Mull looking at Ulva, Gometra, and the Treshnish Isles.  It was a lovely clear day though chilly (with an icy sea - temperature verified by a toe test).


Monday morning we had a lie in then headed out on the extremely bumpy single-track roads to Salen, wandering along the road by the old pier and exploring Aros Castle.  We saw a herd of red deer in the fields around the castle, and some birds along the coast.

We visited the bookshop and bought ourselves Highlands and Islands Monopoly to while away an evening in then settled down with some chicken chasseur in the cozy warmth of the cottage.


To be continued.....

A week in the life of... TC

Sunday - Tax return deadline loomed.
We made pizzas with a friend whilst watching Dancing on Ice as she marked her school books and I completed my tax return! (yeah! 1 whole day early!)

Monday - Dentist.  Had a horrible filling that really hurts still - they did something to the nerve to protect it from decay and as it didn't really hurt before, it now is worse for the treatment.  In the long run I realise I'll be glad they did it.  I worked during the evening.

Tuesday - School & Brownies
Leave the house at 07.30 to start work at 09.30.  After school I do a wind sectional for orchestra til 16.15 (no lunch break this week due to extra lesson a pupil needed).Drive home hitting rush hr traffic for the entire journey arriving home at 18.30 if I'm lucky.  Brownies starts at 19.00 and as we have 2 trips coming up there was a load of admin to do when I got home. (working out how much cash we'd actually received and how much is due, plus doing emergency contact lists and a bus list - I won't be there for the 1st trip as I'm working, so it all needs to be done early).

Wednesday - early start
I leave at 6.30.  I run a group at 8.30, another at 10.50 and a final one at 1pm.  I do a couple more individual lessons then it's HOME TIME - early.  I'm back in Glasgow before 5pm.And relax!

I had booked a restaurant for the evening, to encourage us to go out.  We went to Cail Bruich - which is a Scottish food restaurant - and it was delicious.  During dinner a friend texted to invite us for a drink at a pub which would be on our way home anyway so we met him.  It was fun.  His girlfriend gave us a lift home too- bonus!

Thursday - Office job day.
I felt a bit rubbish this week which I can probably put down to the drinks I had on Wednesday night.  Nothing fun to report.

Friday - Office day then office party!

It had been 3.5 yrs since we had a departmental night out.  When we have brought it up with our manager she has said that the Boss was not interested, or that they could never pick a date.  One of my colleagues decided that we should just pick a date, see how many people could make it, then go for it.  So she picked yesterday.  And all but 3 people said they would come!  Theoretically.

Of course there were a few last minute cancellations, but we ended up with 15 attendees.

It also ended up that our Boss picked up the bill!  Awesome.  Although I mucked up the credit card thing and he actually had to pay for it rather than putting it on the company card as they don't accept American Express.

It was fun.

adele

I would not have considered myself a fan of Adele although I have liked her work to date.

I have just watched her Live Lounge session for Radio 1 today and it is AMAZING.  I would have to say she has to be the best pop act we have in the UK currently - certainly the best singer by a country mile!

If you're in America I don't know if you'll be able to watch but I'll put the link up for anyone who stumbles along and wants to watch.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/sessions/2011-01-27_adeleliveloungespecial

Tax Month

hahaha... I can tell I'm getting close to doing my tax return now - I'm back on my blog!  As procrastinating goes this is usually one of the last things I do before cracking on with the work... so WOO HOO - Tax here I come.

Happy Very Belated New Year!

Well the year started very well with a lovely long weekend in Crianlarich in a rented house shared with 4 good friends.

Crianlarich is beautiful.

Holiday highlights:  Food was wonderful and company excellent.  We won a pub quiz!  Then found out it was meant to be for the coach party only, and we weren't supposed to have entered.   They let us keep the prize (see photo!)

We walked approx 10k from Crianlarich to Tyndrum over the hills through lots of ice.  It was really hard!  And fun.  Many sections of the path were thickly coated in a sheet of ice.  The ice was very slippery.  We also had to cross 4 frozen rivers (would have been fords had they been running so you could step over the shallow stoney ground! Instead they were ice rinks which one of our friends crossed on her bum!).

So now it's back into the grind, and as ever it's tax-return month so I'm avoiding doing it by pretending to be far too busy... which means I can't blog.

Merry Christmas!

I'm going to head over to your blogs soon to see how you have been getting on.  It's been the typical Christmas build-up here with concerts, shopping, making stuff.  Busy enough to keep me offline.

I probably won't be round much til after the New Year so would like to wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year a bit early.... (that's it done!)

snow experiment

It's a bit hard to see... but the experiment was excecuted perfectly, however in my amazement I poured the remaining boiling water down my arm.  What a doofus!

Still - it was worth it.  Made my day.

It's s s s s so c c c cold... brr.

I tried chucking a kettle of water into the air today not thinking it would really do anything.

It made snow!

It's THAT cold here!!

Sad! And Happy.

Well Brownies has been snowed off for 2 weeks in a row.

Last week my DC (also halls boss-lady for church) texted me to cancel Brownies. One of those times when I think a phone call would be better as I'd have had better explanations for my kids when I rang them all if I'd know WHY exactly - Icy?  Slippery? Heating problems?

This week we were to have the division christmas concert, but the snow here on Monday closed the entire city - shops closed, trains stopped, buses were cancelled... I haven't been to school for a fortnight.  I'll be skint - now glad I bought so many presents on my credit card this year!.

Anyway - my house must be pristine I hear you remark, with all this time off.  Haha... or not.

I am going to do some work now - practise I mean.  Yippee.

UK Weather-Watch

Well it has all gone a bit Wintery in the UK!

We have had a lot of snow here lately and I feel as though I am on permanent weather-watch.  At the moment it's 5am-ish and I am awake for two reasons:  My boyfriend snort-snored suddenly extremely loudly scaring me out of my slumber, and I've got to get to Anstruther on Sat for work and don't fancy my chances much.

However the weather forecast is changing every time I check.  It is also not correct - the current weather on the BBC website (generally more reliable than elsewhere) is wrong.   Visibility here is excellent - says v poor - and we have no snow and have had none all night.

I would like to book a train for this weekend but don't know if they'll run.  There also is no train station in the village I'm playing.

I would book a bus but none run in the evening so I'd be stuck there overnight.  Car it is!

On Sat when the snow started we were so excited that we grabbed the nearest clothes (I was in PJ's - it was midnight) and headed out.  I had just done a xmas gig - so the Santa hat and heeled shoes were out... I also have on 3 jumpers, a coat and a scarf. Looking good, eh?!

 Gleneagles - Saturday day

 A tree.  I like it - snowy and crisp against beautifully clear blue sky.  

This was Gleneagles too - I have lots of photos as I was playing the Girlguiding Centenary Fanfare for the last time (fingers crossed) this year and got a lift up with one of the event organisers so arrived 2hrs early with nothing much to do.  I played for a while in the hotel til someone came in to prepare the room for the do, then went for a walk in the snow.  New snow is fun - I can't help myself messing it up! 

Got an East Coast train on Sunday morning - view from the train of the coast South of Edinburgh.

OUR SNOWMEN!

Jen pointed out (in comments) that there are dietary requirements for many of her Brownies.  There are a few in mine, but no vegetarians.

For my Halal req Brownie we used profiteroles (without the cream filling) - I tried it and it tasted nice.  Just like you'd imagine dry profiteroles covered in white choc might taste.  It also looked quite good but was much more difficult to do as she had to dip each profiterole in the choc and roll it around, then skewer it and stick the 3 lumps together at the top of the stick.

As to our milk and egg allergies - they can have the things IN stuff... and there actually wasn't anything in the marshmallows other than the gelatine (which clearly would rule out veggies).

For the nut allergy I checked EVERYTHING but there was no 'trace nut' warning on any of the items.

The Marshmallow Snowmen came out like this:

I ate most of mine... it was so sweet it made me feel sick!  I binned the bottom marshmallow.

This week we are making these: Chocolate marshmallow snowmen

Not my photo - this was from the blog below.  I only hopeours can look this cool!

http://susanbanderson.blogspot.com/2010/01/my-little-corner.html

I NEED A HOLIDAY!

I really really really want to go away somewhere to do fun things in the days.  Roll on New Year!

Brownies - Winging it again!

I started re-planning tonight this morning.

We have a board game thing that my assistant started in my absence and has a bit of work left to finish off... so what to fill the rest of the evening when we have use of the big hall?

Board game-themed party games!

We will play:  human noughts and crosses, plus game-themed fishes or any other group games that use names I can think of.  We might do charades or Who am I/20 questions... will be fun!

Photo - for no reason other than to make me happy.

It's FRIDAY!!!!!!!!!!

And I already have that Friday feeling!  It's going to be a good one - I can tell.

In order to maintain this optimism I am now heading to bed.  See you in the morning... evening?  Tomorrow perhaps.

Peace Globe 2010 & link for Travis

If you're baffled by the Peace Globe thing (why have they appeared all over the internet again?) go here http://mimiwrites.blogspot.com/ to find the answer.

Personally I'm not sure about the peace globes.... I don't know if they make a difference, but I'd like tolerance and understanding to be more widespread, as that's the basis for peace, right?  So I'm posting this year after a 1yr absence, as a reminder to myself as much as anyone else - if someone does something you don't understand, if someone has an opinion you don't share - think twice before you condemn it.  What makes it right? What makes it wrong?  Are you qualified to make that judgement? 

Hey Travis - check out our dancing show.. this was good I think.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/vt0kc/

Meaney

I am horrible.

My considerate boyfriend asked when I was on the phone to him today what he should get from the shops as he would pass them on his way home (in a 'what would you like' way).

My response went something like this: "I don't care what you buy.  This is my only 2 hrs in the house now until Sunday between 8am and 11pm - when am I going to need anything?!!"

What a horror!  In my defense I had already explained I was really tired and was going to try to grab an hour of sleep before going back out to work tonight...  But I was still a bitch.

bwah ha ha

Halloween... night out... started badly!  Finished well!!!!!!!

Earlier I did a gig - I forgot my trumpet mouthpiece.  A trumpet is made up of only 2 parts:  trumpet & mouthpiece... so it's a very stupid mistake.

I did the gig - it was ok.

As I left the church my shoe caught and the heel broke.

I was then pulled over by the coppers after making a mistake at an amber light (def amber) - and was charged.  That's £60 fine and 3 points.  For goin through on orange with a taxi on my right getting in my way distracting me........

However I then attended the end of a gig by funk band Fnuk.... and it was great!  A good 3 hrs of boogying later and I'm happy.

Incidentally: the police told me to go out.  I was just following their advice..... ha!

As I plan to fascinate all...

I wish to inform you that I did have cheese tonight - in left over red pepper & tomato soup (that I made on Weds for a friend) with bread.

It was delicious.