Monday/Tuesday

Straight up to Fraserburgh on Monday morning, then back down in the evening for squash at Kippie - couldn't play Crathes because of team match there. Dick and Archie joined us for a beer at the Legion. Jo was late home from work and was not long in when I got home.

Spoke to Ross about his interview on Wednesday and told him that the only thing stopping him from getting the job would be his appearance - i.e. get your hair tidied up! Don't know if I got through or not - he said he would get it tidied and I even gave him £20 for it - we'll see when I get home tonight!

Had a restless night - awake from 2:30 a.m. Going a bit slow again today but will maybe try and go to gym and see if that wakens me up or not.

Still waiting for Lucy's response to the options I outlined for Florida next year.

The weekend

We didn't, after all babysit Luca on Saturday night - it's next weekend. We watched the Scorcese film The Departed, but it was disappointing.

Gary stayed over last night - he was up at Donald's and didn't fancy the drive home late at night. He got up pretty smart and went back to Inverurie and Jo went along later, after church for a couple of hours.

I golfed this morning - pretty cold and winter greens for the first time - then squashed this afternoon. Tea was braised steak and syrup pudding - lovely!

Well, the weekend's over - back to the grind in the morning!

Holidays 2008

Nothing has come up yet for our preferred locations on the West Coast next year, so it's possible that we may instead take the boys to Florida for the first time.

There's plenty of good accommodation there, including some of the Marriott options. There's Marriott's Grande Vista Resort (https://www.my-vacationclub.com/resort/home.do?resort=gv) and Horizons by Marriott (https://www.my-vacationclub.com/resort/home.do?resort=ho). They both offer typical Marriott quality 2 bedroom, sleeping 6 or 8 accommodation. This usually means a double bedroom and another with two double beds, with one of the rooms possibly being a "lock-off" - plus a lounge with convertible sofa and a kitchen.

There's also a few non-Marriott places available, some of them offering 3 bedroom accommodation, such as Fairfield Star Island Resort (http://www.starislandresortorlando.com/index.asp).

Don't know what's best - tried to phone Interval for advice, hoping they might be able to tell me what type of units were on offer and whether they were ground floor or not, but they can't tell you until you've booked!

Saturday morning

Oh - forgot to say that Ross has an interview next Wednesday at Concept - fingers crossed!

We also finally received the invoice that Stan England has been promsiing for months for the deposit for the stairway at the back of our house - and it includes the cost of the windows that he installed a couple of years ago and never billed us for!

Friday

I waited at home for the builder to show up to do the harling on the wall and replace the coping stones, but he never showed up again, so it'll be another irate phone call to Everest, who completed the drive a couple of months ago, but never finished the last bit off.





I then nipped in to the village for a quick haircut before heading to Jacquie's to dictate the minutes of yesterday's board meeting. She had been baking for a charity do this weekend and I tried some of her marvellous ginger cake.





A quick visit to Bannatyne's, then in to the office - it was Ian McFadden's retirement and we took him out to the Cock and Bull for lunch - very nice. Didn't have much time back in the office before heading to the beer fest again for a couple of hours work behind the bar, then dash home, grab a bite, then head for our bus back in to the festival.





Slight embarrassment at the start – as we left the Burnett in our coach from Peace's, another coach from Lees of Lumphanan pulled up. I had phoned them 3 times the week before and they never called back with a price, so I assumed they weren’t interested, so contacted Peace instead. There were a few irate phone calls from Mrs. Lees who claimed she had left a message on my answerphone, but I never received it, and anyway, I never accepted or acknowledged it, so why did she assume the booking was confirmed? I guess we won’t be able to use them in the future!





The new venue of Pittodrie was generally well received and we had a good attendance on the bus – in fact, too many! I had originally booked a 24 seater, but thought we might get a couple more, so increased it too a 33 seater. In the end, the owner of Peace Coaches brought along a 36 seater, but even this wasn’t enough on the way home – we picked up several stragglers at the festival who wanted to get back to Deeside and had to use the spare disabled seat at the front and one other was found hiding at the toilet at the back! It was a very nice coach but the owner banned us from taking our chips on board – disaster! Mind you, a few were smuggled on.



Going a bit slow this morning - in fact, Jo is still in bed and it's approaching 11:00 am now. I'll head in to the festival again this afternoon for a couple of hours work then back home - we're babysitting Luca tonight - Gary's taking Carole out for her birthday.

Next week, I'm back down in Glasgow again - Colin, Malcolm and I are going to see Squeeze on Thursday night and I will stay with Dawn again - Barry's house is still in turmoil. We need to talk about Dad again - Barry and Dawn say he's looking very good just now, so best to leave his medication as is. Dawn went out and bought him new clothes - and threw out all those terrible old trousers and sweaters he has been wearing. We need to complete Power of Attorney documents soon as decisions will no doubt have to be made in the future for Dad, who is not really capable of making them himself nowadays.

I'll head back to Banchory on Friday as we have the celebration football match for Dan's 65th birthday, followed by a curry.

Wednesday/Thursday

No football this week, but at the beer festival every day setting up. Not much to do the last couple of days, but official opening to the public is 4:00 pm tonight and I'm doing a couple of hours behind the bar. Hope the punters turn out at the new venue.

Still been very wet and dark the last couple of days - dodgy drive up to Fraserburgh this morning, with lots of flooded roads. Forecast is for snow on hills, but it's actually sunny as I write this.

Lucy has decided Florida is her preferred destination for next year, so I'll need to crack on now and get some accommodation booked!

Another dark day

Tuesday was almost as dreich as Monday - wet and dark. I went to Fraserburgh to work - bought myself a replacement watch strap, tried to get my hair cut (failed - shut for lunch) and had a bite to eat with Michael at the Lighthouse Museum.

Made it back down to Pittodrie to see how preparations were going for the beer festival - no problems, my services weren't really required, so I hung around and chatted with the guys for a while before heading off home. Grabbed a programme first of all - some strong beers on sale - ca' canny!

No response from Lucy about some of the possibilities for next year's vacation - perhaps she's been too busy?

Gloomy Monday

Carole's birthday, but it was a dark, gloomy day with daylight barely showing. It was also Luca's appointment at the hospital but we haven't heard yet how it went.

Read Lesinas latest blog this morning - well done, Lucy - keep it up!

Jo came home from work ranting and raving about the traffic and threatening yet again to retire soon! She did manage to pick up a new pair of winter boots, however. Mind you, they don't have heels so she's going to have to buy another pair to wear with trousers!

We spent most of this evening watching TV with our respective laptops on our knees - me surfing for possible holiday locations in USA next year. None of our preferred locations on the West Coast have come up yet, although there were quite a few others available in July - plenty of options always available in Florida and Palm Springs - also Nevada (been there this year) and a few more exotic ones - Mexico, Eastern British Columbia, Arkansas, Tucson Arizona, Breckenridge Colorado, South Carolina, Park City Utah, Williamsburg Virginia and an interesting one in the city of Gatlinburg Tennessee, not far from Dollywood!

I guess much depends on how easy it is for Scott, Lucy and the boys to get to any of these places.

Beer festival start-up work starts tomorrow so I'll be working there for a couple of hours each evening this week.

Active weekend

Friday night's football was good but, as I said before, it was tough on the old body - although I was up a few times in the night, unusally for me I managed to go back to bed and sleep a bit - didn't actually get up for good until 9:30 am - almost unheard of!

We had arranged squash doubles at 3:30 after which we intended to go to the golf club to watch the big match, but I couldn't find my racquets and we started and finished later than planned. The club was mobbed and I made a quick body swerve and headed home for a shower and my own TV, joined by limp-along Colin, who still had his space boot on to protect his Achilles.

The match was a heart-breaker with Italy scoring in the 1st minute, which galvanised Scotland and got them back in to the match. Scotland equalised and could, and probably should have gone in front in a pulsating second half, but Italy stole the match in the 2nd minute of extra time to eliminate Scotland from next year's Euro Championships in Austria and Switzerland. Ah well - at least we don't have to try and organise tickets and a trip there next June!

The Kilgours and Stewarts went to the Douglas for a bar supper, which was very nice - much better than previous occasions there.

Sunday was golf in the morning - a little damp, but not too bad - played OK again, but Jas deservedly won the money this week. Back home for lunch and then out for more squash doubles at 4:00 pm, after which Malcolm, Harry and I had a chat about where we might stay in Cape Town next year. Need to make decisions soon, although at least the flights are now booked.

Jo made a lovely braising steak for tea and we had Christmas pud and custard to follow. Very nice, but I've now left the table with Jo and Ross in full flow on politics and religion, prompted by a programme on TV about Palestine etc.

Wed/Thu/Fri

Survived the football on Wednesday evening, but it was only 4 a side and it was tough - felt a bit sore when I got up to travel to the Broch early Thursday.

I left the Broch early and thought I would pop in to Rae Circle on my way home as I was passing through Inverurie, but I forgot Carole works on Thursday so I just headed home and rested for a bit before heading out for our headbang at Dave's. Jo was also home early to get her hair done - although I never saw the finished product until Friday evening.

The headbang went well - see team photo above - and Dave laid on a nice curry for us all.

Friday was a bit slow but I was again playing football at the Beach - good game, but my body's sore again today. Playing squash this afternoon before heading for the golf club to watch the big Scotland - Italy match - fingers crossed!

Oh - and the Piper yesterday featured the photo from last Friday's Torphins Golf Club prizegiving - see above.

Nothing yet in any of the press about the rumoured sale of the Tor-na-Coille hotel - but news must come out soon.

Post Armistice Day

Sunday afternoon by the TV watching the Dons getting humped by Hearts was not the most pleasurable experience, but the golf in the morning had been good - I won - pity the season's ending - I've just come in to form the last couple of months.

Malcolm G came round with some brochures from Cape Town, which will come in handy as we research what to do and where to go when we go to SA late Feb/early March.

Monday was quiet enough in the office to allow me time to go to Bannatyne's at lunchtime then slope off sharp in the afternoon to play squash at Kippie with Keith, Harry and Richard. Archie joined us for a beer after his work-out there.

I was back at the gym on Tuesday evening - partly to work off the frustration of an e-mail I received in the afternoon, which seemed to pull the plug on the deal for us to buy Daniel's Sweet Herring - a project I have been spending months on.

Tonight (Wednesday) I'm playing football again - Dave is picking me up in a few minutes. He will be able to take all my stuff for tomorrow evening's headbang so I can travel light then.

That's all for now.

Saturday night

We went to the Church hall for an evening of Malaysian food, with proceeds going to African charities. The Douglas was the first pit stop and we were joined there by the Masons and Kilgours.

At the church, the Hodgsons and the Orrs were also at our table, along with an American couple whose names I unfortunately forget. It was a BYOB evening - even plates, cutlery and glasses had to be brought along, but it went very well, even although we were last to get our food, by which time I was starving.

There was a raffle and I won the Tower of Treats - see silly photo above. Each box contains different things - chocolates, mince pies etc.

Weather looks kind this morning so golf is on. Plans for the afternoon are to watch the Dons play Hearts on Setanta.

November update

Got another row from my daughters about not keeping my blog up to date, but there have been mitigating factors - anyway, here we go.

After everyone went back to Oregon and Cornwall, it was back to the old routine again - except I still hadn't completely kicked off the bug that lay us low for a while.

The good news was that Gary and Carole's move in to their new house in Inverurie went very smoothly. I went out to see them on the day they moved in and Jo and I also paid a quick visit last Sunday. Carole's Mum arrived on Monday and Jo, Ross and I went over for fajitas on Wednesday evening.

I've been out every night this week and my plan was to have a really lazy Saturday. I haven't done any manual work today but have spent a fair bit of time on the computer - mostly making enquiries about holidays next year!

On Monday, Colin, Dave and I went to Moshulu in Windmill Brae - a first for all of us. It's not a bad venue - similar to the Lemon Tree in many ways. Dave is a fan of Tom McRae (http://www.tommcrae.com/) but I didn't know his music and I only went because Malcolm had to pull out. The crowd was appallingly small but he managed to make light of it - and he was excellent.

On Tuesday, I travelled down to Glasgow and went to see my Dad then met up with Barry for dinner at Dawn's. This was the first chance I'd had to see him since he was taken in to hospital when I was away. I was pleasantly surprised - he wasn't as bad as I had feared - although he does need a tremendous amount of support services now and it's a fine line between whether it's better for him to receive them at home (his preference) or elsewhere. It's probably just a matter of time, but, if we can be assured that the support is there and reliable, it's better to try and keep him at home as long as possible. Barry feels the burden as he's not ready yet to trust the support services but he's agreed to give it a go. He and Dawn are arranging meetings with the medical and social services teams and I'll go back down for these.

I slept in Kieran's bed and got up early and drove up to Aberdeen - good trip until I hit Portlethen then crawled all the way to Bridge of Don.

After supper in Inverurie, I played football at the Academy then it was up early on Thursday morning and up to the Broch for the usual Thursday management meetings. Back down to Aberdeen in the afternoon and then I met up with Gary and Ross at Archibald Simpson's for some beer and curry before heading off to see AFC playing Lokomotiv Moscow in the UEFA Cup. The joint was jumping and we were joined by Malcolm and Matthew Grigor, who were also going to the match, which was a sell-out. Jas was also there - not for the football - only the beer! It's Wetherspoon's annual beer festival just now and there were some amazing beers on sale - some at just £1.09 per pint! The weather was appalling - driving wind and freezing sleet and the result was not quite what we had hoped for (1-1), but we enjoyed it - although it took us ages to thaw out afterwards!

Late home again and off at the crack of dawn on Friday to meet up with the Scottish Government's European grants awards team in Fraserburgh. I did my song and dance presentation then headed back to Aberdeen, where I got the call that I was needed for Friday night football at the Beach. Enjoyable match, but I then had a hectic chase up to Torphins to get to the Learney Hall in time for the golf club's annual prize-giving. I picked up my trophies (Veterans' Shield for the 2nd time and the Learney Cup for the 1st time) and felt like a bit of a yo-yo as I also had to get up 3 more times to pick up Syd's and Bill's trophies as well! (See my trophies above - hopefully I'll feature in the Piper next week and forward that photo as well).

Finally I arrived home but then went out again to meet Colin and Ian Sharp and grab a bite to eat at the Douglas - some excellent fish cakes. On the walk home, Ian told me that he'd heard that the Tor-na-Coille might be sold to CALA. Dick phoned me today with this news as well - although he thought it was a consortium of CALA and Bancon - perhaps Ian (MD of Bancon Homes) wasn't being completely open with his information? All of this would tie in with the recent sighting of surveyors in Arbor Court measuring the tree lines etc. We all know eventual development is inevitable and it need not necessarily all be bad news. There's even the outside possibility that a developer could view the squash courts as a potential asset and open them up again - wishful thinking, perhaps?

Tomorrow (Sunday) we are meeting at the golf club to decide on next year's destination for our Iberian Cup. It's our 10th outing and I've proposed that we celebrate this by going "on tour" to Florida. I've had some support for this idea but expect some opposition as well. An alternative that has been on the agenda for the last few years is Marrakech - strongly supported by some, but totally opposed by others ("too Muslim"). A safe backstop is a return to Tenerife next November.

Before that, we've got to organise the smaller trip for our Desert Classic in February - much less controversial - none of us want to go back to Dubai and Cape Town has been selected this time. Jo's worried about my carbon footprint, however!

Next week, we're hoping to conclude the long drawn-out acquisition of Daniel's Sweet Herring in Grantown. Looks like we will be signing the deal on Friday - just what I needed - we're having our first winter headbang at Dave's on Thursday night (no free Fridays in November) - so could have a bit of a head on Friday morning!

Also finalising arrangements for Dan's 65th celebration oldies football match on 30th November - to be followed by beer and probably curry - and there's the beer festival the week before that as well! The diary is filling up fast - we're heading down to Manchester on the weekend of 8th/9th December to see the United - Derby match.

Better go lie down now!

Late October

Been a busy couple of weeks and I haven't been able to keep the blog up to date. Lucy, Scott and the boys arrived on Saturday 13th. I picked them up at the airport and expected them to flake out after an hour or so, but, no, the boys kept right on going until bed time and quickly adjusted to the new time zone they were in.

On Sunday, I flew out to Spain for a week's golf but got an immediate message that my Dad had been taken in to hospital again. I'm afraid the time has come for him to have greater care than can be managed by him living at home alone.

Lucy and Scott had planned to go down and see him on Tuesday anyway so a slight change of location to the hospital was no problem. They spent the night at Dawn's before driving through to Edinburgh to meet Jo and fly down to Cornwall to see Kelly and Craig.

We all arrived home about the same time on Sunday evening - me armed with the Iberian Cup after a successful week's golf.

The weather was still so nice on Monday that Scott and I walked across the road for 14 holes of golf and a couple of beers. I invited Colin down to join us and Jas also turned up by chance.

We had a great day out at Landmark on Tuesday but it was the prelude to several days of illness for Jo and I. Braeden had alerted us by his vomiting and early return home, but he seemed to recover quickly, whilst Jo and I still don't feel great. I had to take Weds and Thurs off work but staggered in for a couple of hours on Friday.

Gary, Carole and Luca came over on Friday and we all had a take-away curry - at Lucy's insistence - then watched the various holiday photos.

Only a few hours of restless sleep were possible before we took the Lesinas off to the airport for the redeye on Saturday morning. Jo and I got home and set about cleaning up, but ran out of steam about lunchtime.