Time, like an ever-rolling stream...

Life is slightly boring at the moment, though not unpleasant in any way. I do like to see people and go places from time to time, and that's severely restricted (and likely to get worse, if our virus figures don't improve soon). I find it slightly trying that people like us, who wear masks when we go into shops and buses - but frankly hardly ever do go into shops and buses - and who would visit friends and family carefully, with the windows open and sitting on opposite sides of the room, are having our lives curtailed just so that silly people should be discouraged from going in large groups to pubs and having big house parties. However... there we are. It could be worse. It may well become worse.

A little excitement is being provided in our tiny street by the chap who's bought the house opposite. The old lady who lived in it died about fifteen years ago, and her son, who lived in Glasgow, used to visit for the occasional weekend. But in recent years he didn't even do that, though did occasionally instruct roofers to patch the roof or whatever. So it was in a fairly bad state. Anyway, the son has now died and it's been sold to a family who are, reasonably enough, having major works done to it. Unfortunately this means that our tiny street is cluttered up with vans, which our next-door neighbour does not like. And then yesterday, gas vans arrived to dig up the road for the installation of gas pipes. Yesterday was also the first day that our landscapers were going to come to fix the ex-hedge area, using a digger. However, they'd have had difficulty accessing our house, so I put them off and they're now coming on Monday - I hope. 

The new owner seems affable enough but I'd have liked him to be at least a bit apologetic about our having to postpone our landscapers, for whom we've been waiting for some time; but he wasn't. More seriously though, our next-door neighbour is very miffed that the new chap didn't inform all the neighbours that the digging-up was about to happen. Our street is a dead-end, with only five houses and a total of seven occupants, so it wouldn't have been a major task to ring people's bells, and for those of us who normally back out of our driveways into what we regard as the turning circle (now a big, fenced-off hole) it's a bit tricky. Ah well. I wonder whether I should gently mention to the new neighbour that it would be better to communicate more with the rest of us ... or will I just keep out of it? 

I'm spending/wasting far too much time quilting my African fabrics quilt, but have also been doing a bit of sorting of the archives. It's so hard to throw things out - letters from dead friends and relatives (actually, I'm going to stop kidding myself that I might do that) and photos of the family (but we have literally thousands of those). 

There are minor triumphs. Here are some postcards written by their neighbours to my grandparents in the early 1970s. I found these in my mum's stuff and it wasn't too difficult to decide that they weren't examples of deathless prose or wit. 

I know who these people were - the Browns lived up the road and were friends of my grandparents, and the Hoggs lived next door and weren't particular friends, though pleasant neighbours. But it's interesting that Mrs Brown signed herself as C Brown - such formality. They were more than passing  acquaintances (Netta was her daughter and slightly younger than my mother). And Violet Hogg signs her husband and herself as V and J[ohn] Hogg on the postcards. Such different days and such boring messages! Though actually the Hoggs' postcard was from what was then Rhodesia, which explains why it was "really" hot. I wonder why they went there? I have a vague idea that they had family there. 

No such exciting trips for us, but we still go for regular walks along the same old roads. All these leaves will fall off these trees in the next few months, and someone will have to sweep them up, fortunately not us.

Meanwhile the river flows steadily down to the sea, uncaring that our lives are slipping away, as have the lives of my grandparents, my parents, the Browns, the Hoggs... 

I'd probably be a bit more cheerful (though I'm not really uncheerful) if someone would come and buy Daughter 2's flat. But since it went on the market on July 31, there have been only three viewers. Such bad timing, as it turns out. 

And yes, Margaret, Mr L has regrown his beard. He shaved it off but then decided that - I don't really know - he no longer liked his face or something? I myself think it's a very fine face, and it's far less wrinkly than mine (could I grow a beard to hide the wrinkles, I wonder?) but anyway, it's back for the moment. 

So yes. Nothing's happening. But this is better than something terrible happening, and we'll see the Edinburgh grandchildren tomorrow so that's good. 
 

Plodding on through semi-lockdown

Nothing much has been happening except lots of quilting of my African fabrics quilt, some walks and some gardening. Oh, and in Son's case, a mouse. He was looking after the children (4 and 1) by himself while his wife was at work when he became aware that the cat was looking with interest at the radiator. This was because there was a mouse behind it (brought in, doubtless, by the cat). Son attempted to extract the mouse, which promptly ran up the inside of his sleeve. After a bit he managed to decant it into this empty jug. Meanwhile, however, his little son had taken the opportunity to remove a packet of cereal from the kitchen cupboard and empty it over the living room floor. Ah, the joys of parenthood. 

Landscapers are due to come on Wednesday to deal with the ex-hedge problem. The boss seemed confident that they could use their digger to hoick out the roots of lilac and leylandii and do various other things necessary to make the ex-hedge area into a beautiful... well, smooth ... area of lawn with no lilac suckers. I hope he's right. I decided to dig out some plants in the corner here, or to be more accurate I decided that it would be good if Mr L dug them out, in order to make the lawn wider in this funny triangular bit at the end of the garden. Mr L doesn't normally do any gardening but he's usually willing to help with my heavier destructive plans. 

I think I slightly broke him on this occasion, however. 

The whole thing doesn't look too bad from a distance.

Close too, however, it looks dire. See how the poor lilac hedge is desperately trying to grow again? It's doomed to failure, or at least I sincerely hope it is. 

I've been digging out the middle, inactive bits of clumps of irises (they resisted strongly) and doing general tidyings up. What with that and too-intensive hand-quilting through fleece, I'm a bit achey in hand and leg. It's not so easy to get up and down when weeding my way along flower beds as it used to be; though I have now acquired an old-lady-kneeler, with handles, which does help. Couldn't be getting old, could I?

It's getting quite autumnal now, which makes this new lockdown thing even more tedious than it did in spring - when it was new life, flowers, birds and so on. It's not so easy to entertain in the garden in autumn and winter, in Scotland. 

One has definitely had enough of 2020 and its shenanigans.

Still, autumn can certainly be pretty. And when autumn comes, can spring...? - as Shelley didn't quite say. 

Getting around in a lockdownish way

Yesterday we climbed up a bit of a Pentland hill to Swanston. It was a sunny day but very windy. 

It must be peaceful to live up here, apart from people taking your cottage's photo. 

There are two golf courses, though it must have been quite difficult to play accurate golf in the stiff wind.  

 And there's the city, suddenly stopping at the main road. It feels a long way away. On the horizon are Arthur's Seat and the sea. 

Since lockdown, we never seem to have any change to give to the grandchildren as pocket money, so today we walked along to the bank to get some. There was a queue of about ten people waiting outside, most of them fairly elderly, and it took about forty minutes before we reached the door. Not ideal, especially if it had been cold. However, the chap gave Mr L £50 in pound coins, which will last us for a while.

Then we walked home and Mr L washed the coins, to be on the safe side. This is presumably the nearest he'll come to walking into a bank wearing a mask and demanding money which he later launders. 

I'm having quite fun quilting my very bright quilt. 

Today, somewhat on an impulse, I decided to go to visit Daughter 2 and Littlest Granddaughter at the weekend. It involves taking a bus, a train, a tube and another bus, but on the other hand I have a nasty feeling that if I don't go soon, the opportunity to do so may not arise for a while. Mr L decided to stay at home. He's not the mad, reckless fool that I am. Also, Daughter 2's flat is quite small. I sleep on a sofa but he's a bit larger and needs a mattress on the sitting room floor, which is all a bit more of a faff. 

Her Edinburgh flat, by the way, is not selling. It's been on the market for, I think, six weeks now and has had two viewers, both in the first week. Sigh. There are just too many similar flats on the market at the moment and evidently mortgages for first-time buyers are hard to get. Still, we only need one buyer, and maybe Mr L will be showing him/her around this weekend. You never know. 

The distant chains are clanking... but we're still out and about

Well, I've returned to using Picasa because Google Photos makes some of my pictures very blurry. I Googled the problem and it's clearly a common one, but we couldn't find an easy explanation of what to do about it. Annoying. Anyway, we climbed Corstorphine Hill yesterday, looking longingly at the golf course... .

It was a beautiful day - almost like summer, except that the sun's getting low in the sky. Look at the length of those shadows, and it was still the morning. 

This oak tree was completely leafless at the beginning  of lockdown and look at it now. What happened to those months? - gone like a dream. We were so pleased that at least it was spring when everything was shutting down. It's not spring now. 

The willow herb is almost over now - just a faintly pink haze in the distance. 

But it has a silvery beauty in the sunlight. 

Today we walked in the Botanics. Autumn crocuses. Hmm. 

There's still colour in the herbaceous border, but look at those shadows again. It was only about 11.30.

Google seems to think these are tulbagia, which I'd never heard of. They seem to be a kind of allium. 

 And these viburnum berries are spectacular. 

I've bought quite a few bulbs and put them in pots, prior to planting them out in front of the proposed fence which is to go behind the ex-hedge. 

The virus figures are up again. England is having more stringent restrictions imposed on it from today - only six people are allowed to meet together either inside or outside - unless in a pub or restaurant... . I'm sure we'll follow suit soon - though our Great Leader will probably want to make it slightly different, just to show how independent she is (and incidentally, confuse us). 

Meanwhile I'm having fun quilting my very bright quilt. 

(The Lassie! You're still there! I do think of you from time to time. Your little ones must be quite big now. Lovely to hear from you!)

Not exactly lockdown but quarantine instead. Thanks, system. Week 22

The hedge chaps came. Poor things, it was very hot.

They set to.

They worked away.

 And here it is(n't). Gone.

I've certainly gained a lot of space, but you couldn't yet describe it as garden. At the moment it looks dreadful and is completely untillable. As I expected, there are stumps (soon to be ground down by a stump-grinding chap) but also lots and lots and lots of lilac suckers, ivy, stones, heaps of earth etc etc and huge quantities of roots. There was also the remains of a fox, which had lain down and died some time ago in the far corner of the garden, behind the sitooterie (or arbour) made by Mr L and Daughter 2 twenty years ago. Mr L dealt with the ex-fox. It's one of the things I keep him for. I don't do dead things. Well done, Mr L. The sitooterie is past its best, so will also have to be dealt with, as will the heap of rubble left by the previous owners, upon which the sitooterie was built. (On the rubble, not on the previous owners.)

So... I think I'm pleased. I'll be a lot more pleased next year, when it's smooth like a bowling green with a clematis-clad fence. I hope.

Thank you so much, by the way, to the commenter from Malaysia. Goodness, that's a long way away. I tried to look at your blog but my computer screamed in red at me that I mustn't, because it was very unsafe, so I didn't. But hello anyway.

Still no word of Biggest Granddaughter's lost test. Quarantine is over on Monday for her anyway so it hardly matters now. But it doesn't exactly inspire confidence in the system.

Quarantine - Covid week 22

Well, Biggest Granddaughter's Covid result didn't come in the suggested 48 hours (which would have been Monday morning if they work weekends - unclear) and indeed it hasn't come yet, and when Daughter 1 phoned up to enquire, it turned out that it had got lost. Or at least, there was no record of the test ever having happened.

Which is, you know, somewhat irritating, since it means that we all have to remain in quarantine for - not really sure how long. I must check. At the beginning of lockdown everything was clearcut, but as time's gone on the rules have become more complicated. The rest of this week, anyway. Biggest G and her brother thus have another week off school, having been back for a day and a half.

Sigh. Next time she has a little cough... well, I don't know. She's prone to little coughs.

So here's a photo of my pincushion. Daughter 2 borrowed it for a minor repair and returned it prettily arranged in flowers, which it wasn't before. This was my granny's pincushion, from her workbox that I inherited when she got dementia. She was born in 1885 and I imagine she made the pincushion. It doesn't actually look so worn to the eye. Daughter 2 and Littlest Granddaughter went home on Sunday, so it's nice to have a little reminder of them.

And here's our hedge. It's an annoying hedge, planted by the previous inhabitants of our house and added to by random nature. It's mainly lilac, with some leylandii, a wild rose, a cotoneaster, some holly... and it takes up a lot of room in our small garden. I love lilac blossom but the plants are very vigorous so we keep having to cut the hedge back, which very much limits the number of flowers we get, and lilac also suckers like anything. We recently got chaps to prune the hedge and when I muttered under my breath that I wished it wasn't there, the boss chap said that they could remove it. And theoretically they're going to, tomorrow.

I'm somewhat dubious that they'll be successful because there are a lot of stems, with all those suckers. He said confidently that they would grind the stumps, and I asked our horticulturist friend, the Minor Celebrity on Scotland's gardening programme, and he said that the suckers would be discouraged if the main stems were gone. So I'm pinning my faith on the experts.

It's about five feet wide, which is why I want rid of it - I'm excited at the idea of an extra five feet in the garden. But I'm worried that it'll look like the Somme battlefield with suckers, instead of the extra sward I'm planning to create.

That's if the chaps come tomorrow. It's been wet this week and so it could easily rain, and anyway he only hopes to come if they get the morning job finished. I think our hedge will take them more than one afternoon.

Ah well. I hope I don't regret this. (I suspect the chaps might.) I suppose I shouldn't really let them come because of the quarantine but they don't need to come through the house and I'm not planning to do anything apart from watch in horror from the patio doors. And anyway I'm as sure as I can be that there's nothing wrong with any of us.

Still kind of lockdown, week 21, seeing offspring

Littlest was sitting at the piano, singing "Twinkle twinkle, little star" and accompanying herself (with two fingers, and not with the right notes but with a nice regular beat). I'm not taking this as a sign that she's going to be a performer like her father. I'm sure this means that she's going to be a fairly musical corporate lawyer. 

I took her to the playpark. "I looking out to sea."

She discovered that Playdoh cuts nicely with scissors. Who knew?

After one and a half days back at school, Biggest Granddaughter came home with a cough. She's otherwise perfectly well as far as anyone can tell. She's prone to coughs whenever she gets a cold, but nonetheless we all realised that it might just be The Virus, since she's been down south on a visit to her other grandparents. Not that there's much of the virus down there or here at the moment, but to be on the safe side, her parents nobly took her for a test on Saturday morning (results in a few days). So they then came round, but we stayed out in the garden. Littlest Granddaughter loves playing with her big cousins, or - to be more accurate - following them around, copying what they're doing and asking them lots of questions. They're remarkably patient.

At one point Biggest Granddaughter found herself a chair, a rug (yes, Scotland in the summer) and her Beano annual for a nice quiet read. (The Beano is a comic.) Littlest stood beside her. "I want to see. What he doing? Why dat boy chasing dat dog? Why dat man got a big nose? Why he looking cross?.. ." Poor Biggest.

Here is Littlest today, looking at "Me and My Cat?" by Satoshi Kitamura. It's a very funny story about a boy who gets turned into his cat, while his cat gets turned into him - all by mistake, by a witch who came to the wrong house. I greatly recommend it for children of maybe four and upwards, but I'm quite glad she didn't ask me to explain it.

And now she and Daughter 2 are back in London. It was so lovely to have them for a whole fortnight - when will that ever happen again? - but the house is very empty without them. I hope we'll see them again before too long, but in these uncertain times... who can say?

Sigh. I do hope Biggest's test is negative or else the extended family will all have to quarantine... at best. We're actually all fairly sure it's just a cold, but I don't know that we're basing our diagnosis on anything except that the virus seems unlikely, she seems well and it would be terribly inconvenient if she did have it. But I still think she doesn't. Strange days, though... .

Hardly lockdown at all, and yet... week 18, Monday to Wednesday

On Monday I went down to Daughter 2's Edinburgh flat to get the official photos taken for the brochure. This is one of them. Annoyingly, I now see that the slightly badly ironed (by me) loose covers, which were fine to the eye or in my phone photos, look rather squashed with the photographer's better lighting. Ah well, the buyers aren't buying the sofas (though in fact they'd be welcome to have them).

I wondered why the photographer had moved the shower screen out over the bath till I realised that if he hadn't, he'd have been reflected in it. 

Can you see the subtle difference between the actual bathroom and Daughter 2's drawing of it? Yes, the blue bottle is between the mirrors instead of to the right. This is because, after considerable struggling on Mr L's part with the uncooperative wall, the right hand mirror ended up slightly crooked - you wouldn't notice if you couldn't see the faintly uneven gap between them. Mr L may try to rectify this later (or he may not) Meanwhile, the bottle hides it. 

Yesterday we went with the Edinburgh Two to Dalkeith Country Park, where they did lots of things like this. 

And today they came here and played with Brio.

Biggest Granddaughter decided to make a smiley face with it. She quite likes making layouts but not in such a dedicated way as her brother.

So we made cupcakes. She said they were bears, but this principally consisted in giving them chocolate button ears.

Then she devised a game in which she and I had a speed-drawing competition. We had to draw 42 pictures as fast as possible (which was quite fast, hence the lack of finesse) - of subjects of her choice, both of us drawing the same thing. Fortunately I had the presence of mind to give mine scribbled titles, because she then decided that we had to mix them up and pair them. At least we could thus remember what they were supposed to be.

Like this.

This one was easier.

These are all mine. Well, you try differentiating between a door, a secret door and a close-up door in ten seconds flat.

She claimed that the one on the right was her fish. There was also a ghost, which this somewhat resembled.

And this one was hard! Again, not worthy of the Sistine Chapel ceiling but Michelangelo wasn't being raced by a 7-year-old who was keen to finish first. "I've finished! Stop!"

How I love them.