Freezing Friday

It's been a great week of bright, sunny and still weather - but freezing. Minus 6C when we woke this morning. Bit tricky cycling, but I've managed a couple of short rides, the latest of which was this afternoon, out delivering CAMRA's quarterly newsletter to the local outlets.

Our new settee arrived yesterday:

Jo much prefers it to the old one, which is now with Ross and Lizzie in Edinburgh.

Dawn's coming up on Sunday and staying for a night or two. She's got a job to do in Aberdeen on Monday afternoon.

Headbangers show 2 is now on River Dee Radio between 7 pm and 8 pm nightly - http://tunein.com/radio/River-Dee-Radio-s274232/. Show 3 is being worked on - hopefully finish it tomorrow afternoon.

The GP had a good look at my left knee on Tuesday. I told her about the problems I was having with it and the fact that the surgeon had told me when I got my right knee replaced that my left knee would eventually need done too - but it didn't feel the same as the right one did prior to the operation. She therefore suggested a period of physiotherapy initially and, if that doesn't work, then it would be the orthopaedic surgeon.

I've finally booked our road trip to USA next year - and it's quite an odyssey:

• Fly to Atlanta 29th June and spend 3 nights there
• Pick up hire car and drive east to Savannah for 3 nights
• Make the short journey over to Hilton Head Island and spend 5 nights there at Marriott's Harbour Club at Harbour Town (http://www.marriott.com/hotels/travel/hhhht-marriotts-harbour-club/?scid=bb1a189a-fec3-4d19-a255-54ba596febe2)
• Shortish drive north to Charleston for one night
• Drive west to Asheville for one night
• Then Nashville for 2 nights
• Memphis for 3 nights
• Fly to Oregon on 17th July
• Return home - 14th/15th August

I'd always talked about doing a bit of a musical/blues heritage tour - my initial grand plan many years ago was to pick up a Winnebago and drive to all the musical hot-spots, including Nashville, Memphis and Clarksdale, but also New Orleans and Chicago - and possibly Austin as well. In the cold light of day, the logistics of that are pretty horrendous - and the Winnebago idea only works if you can find suitable places to camp/park - and it appears that most of these are well out of town, so I've opted for city centre hotels instead and restricted the itinerary to a more manageable level.

As I've said before, there's no point in us waiting much more at our time of life to do the things we want to do - do them now, while we're still spared!

Edinburgh etc

Got back from Edinburgh on Sunday evening. It was cold down there - but I think it's even colder here - although beautifully crisp, with lovely blue skies. The hard frost put me right off going out on my bike today, however.

We took the train down, arriving just in time for lunch on Friday, which I'd booked at Tom Kitchin's gastropub, the Scran and Scallie (https://scranandscallie.com/) - and it was really excellent - especially the Plum Tatin, washed down with their recommended dessert wine. Here we are:

Anne and Leslie came down later and joined us for dinner at night at the Loon Fung, preceded by a couple of pints at the Cask and Barrel.

On Saturday morning, Jo and I walked down to Ross and Lizzie's new flat. They're settled in now, having been there for 3 weeks, but their work plans have been deferred a little, so they're now looking for some casual work to tide them over until the New Year.

Ross had made some soup for us - and bacon butties - a nice breakfast.

From there, it was the Wine Gang's Xmas Fair for the rest of the afternoon. Some nice Aussie wines there, including Penfolds:

We had dinner on Saturday night at the Guildford Arms. Sunday morning was relaxed - a late breakfast at the Filling Station in the Omni Centre, then coffee and a scone in Jenner's before catching the train home.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) I'm off to the Doctor's to see about my knee, then we're off to Inverurie as usual, but I have to be home by 9 pm as we're finishing off our latest recording for River Dee Radio. Apart from that, nothing much else planned for this week other than a CAMRA branch meeting on Thursday evening.

I've booked our flights to USA next year now. We're flying to Atlanta, Georgia late June, then doing a big road trip, which takes us east out to Savannah, then Hilton Head Island and a Marriott property there, then up to Charleston, Asheville and further west again to Nashville and Memphis, after which we fly up to Oregon for a month.

Oh - and we've just ordered a new settee for the TV room - it arrives on Thursday.