Anniversary

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

It was Scott and Lucy's anniversary yesterday and they went out for a sushi meal after work as we and the boys finished off the scraps from the 3 previous barbeques. When they got back, Lucy - the most famous cocktail maker in the West - served up some pretty alcoholic Mai-Tai's:

Today we took the boys to the lunchtime performance of Brave in 3D - they seemed to enjoy it OK - as did Jo. Then we picked up Lucy at work whilst Scott went to get Buster from the Dog Dentist - he had 4 teeth removed today - they were growing in the wrong way.

Guess what? BBQ time again soon - steaks tonight! It's getting near 5 pm now - official opening time for a beer.

Tuesday

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Another excellent BBQ last night - wild salmon, caught and frozen by Scott's Dad, Bill.

After dinner, Scott put Cade through some pre-season conditioning for his football, finishing up with this stint on the trampoline - http://youtu.be/yVSDxI37AYQ

The dogs? I haven't shown them yet, have I? This is the lovely Buster late last night in the garden:

Yes - that's Scott in his jammies beside him.

Holly was lollong around on Jo's knee:

This morning we took the boys down to Medford so that I could get a book at Barnes & Noble. Their treat was to suggest where to go for lunch - they chose Tin-Tin's all you can eat Asian Buffet, where Cade scoffed his way through plate after plate of clams, with a few pieces of sushi to accompany it. That boy sure does have adult tastes.

Tonight Jo's preparing dinner - a ham roast and tatties.

My head is healing nicely, but not my ear - may have to see a Doctor.

Back "home" in Grants Pass

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Our travel here from Idaho ended up fine, but it was a little eventful. We left our apartment in Idaho just before 6 am, which should have been good time to get us to the airport before 7:30 am - a full hour before our flight was due to depart.

We thought we could figure out the road back to the airport OK, and hadn't bothered to print off a map. After all, if we got stuck, I had the Maps app on my i-Phone - but it wouldn't work - I couldn't get a connection. We got to Spokane OK, but had to stop and ask directions to the I 90 - the road to the airport. Those directions were less than accurate, but Scott sussed it out eventually and we did get there before 7:30 am in the end.

No bags to check in - Scott and Lucy were taking them in the truck - and security was no problem, so we were at our gate with loads of time to spare. I noticed there was another flight to Seattle leaving at 8 am - half an hour before hours - and remembering our connection in Seattle for the next flight to Medford was a little tight, I thought I would make enquiries. "Sure" the Alaskan Air attendant said and handed us new boarding passes - "good idea - your inward flight is running half an hour late due to storms in Seattle".

We boarded the plane - which was a large jet, unlike the little prop job we were booked on - and got ready to depart. Captain's voice - "sorry for the delay, but we hope to leave shortly - there's storms up ahead and Seattle airport has got backed up a bit." About 15 minutes later, the plane, which was half empty, suddenly started to fill up. I guess they had decided to cancel the 8:30 am flight and decamp the passengers booked on that one on to the 8 am flight - just as we had done.

Eventually we got going but had to circle Seattle for a while as there was a bit of a queue of planes there waiting for the thunder clouds to pass so that they could land. Even when we got down on the ground, there was no gate available for us to park at, so we had to sit and wait at the end of the runway. Eventually, we did get a gate, but still we had to wait on the plane as there weren't enough ground staff available to get the loading deck out to the plane.

By this time, we had less than 15 minutes before our flight to Medford was due to leave, so we had to find the correct gate quickly and then literally run a few hundred yards. Can you picture the sight of the twa old folk attempting to jog?

We made the plane OK - in fact, we weren't quite last on - and it left its gate more or less on time, but then we had to sit and wait in a queue of planes waiting to take off after everyone had been backed up by the earlier thunderclouds.

In the end, we were only 15 minutes late getting in to Medford, where Jo and I jumped in an airport taxi and headed for our favourite pizza bar - Kaleidoscope - for lunch. We phoned Grants Pass taxis and asked them if they would pick us up. I had to negotiate a price - $75! Our driver was a character and the 30-40 minute journey to Scott and Lucy's passed fairly quickly.

We said hello to Holly again, and met up with Buster for the first time - they were both a little nervous of us at first, but soon came round. Scott, Lucy and the boys eventually got home from their 11 hour drive not long before 5 pm. Lucy rushed to the store and bought a chicken and quickly rustled up a lovely chicken pie for dinner. It was nice to be back here again.

On Saturday, Lucy, Jo and Braeden headed for Medford - Costco and Target - and Scott, Cade and I jumped in his vehicle, also heading due west to play 9 holes of golf at Quail Point. Here's Cade teeing off at one of the short holes:

We've been treated to Scott and Lucy's excellent BBQ's the last 2 nights - ribs on Saturday and rotisserie chicken last night.

Lucy made pancakes on Sunday morning and Scott and I played 18 holes at Dutcher Creek in the afternoon. They're both back at work today so Jo and I are at home looking after the boys.

I've had a bit of medical misadventures since I arrived here. First of all, my ear got blocked with wax and I tried to fix it, and, as usual, made a mess of things and now I'm getting ear drops and trying to clear it up. I'm deaf in one ear now - and it all feels a bit unreal - like you're not part of what's going on - merely an observer. Then I banged my head on the corner of one of the cabinets in our trailer and made a hole that Lucy had to treat for me. Then, yesterday, I broke a corner off one of my teeth and now have a sensitive hole and a ragged edge which is scraping against my tongue. I hope they clear up soon and I don't have to visit the dentist and/or doctor whilst I'm here.

Last few days in Idaho

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

On Tuesday Scott took us down to Cabela's (http://www.cabelas.com/) huge outdoor/hunting/fishing store and we met up with his Uncle Mike there - Scott's Mum's elder brother. We then went for a tour round the Buck Knives (http://www.buckknives.com/) manufacturing plant.


A few minutes away was another lovely lakeside town with its own city beach - Coeur d'Alene:

Mike invited us round to his for a BBQ yesterday (Wednesday) but we managed 9 holes of golf before driving down there:

Mike and Sue have a lovely cosy garden, with lots of lovely plants and water features:

Today - our last full day here before dawn departure tomorrow - has been spent mostly on site at the Rec centre, but Jo and I went for a walk first of all. Here's a panorama of the first half of our walk round the golf course and the resort:

That's all for now - next stop Grants Pass.

Idaho

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

For the older readers - I keep thinking I want to sing out "Ivanhoe-oh-oh" when I say Idaho. (Check out UK TV programme theme tunes of the 60's you younger ones).

Scott and I played racketball yesterday morning. Quite an experience for me - and a 4-0 thumping too (although 2 very close games). I couldn't get the hang of the bounciness of the ball - especially when it came off the back wall - it ran away from me! Mind you, it has been 2 knee operations and 2 heart procedures since I last played Scott at a racquets game - squash. It must have been 6 or 7 years ago anyway - as that's how long we have been without our courts at the Tor-na-Coille, where we last played.

We had thought about a game of golf yesterday but never got round to it after the racketball, then a late lunch. Instead, Jo, Lucy and I set off round one of the lake/golf course walks. I didn't time or measure it, but it was probably 3-5 miles. We stopped to take a photo at the millpond of a lake:

Scott drove us to another golf resort for dinner last night - very nice too - and today we headed for the Water Park - http://www.silverwoodthemepark.com/. It had roller coasters too, but the boys weren't interested - they are both water babies and we spent more than 6 hours there - and they were never out of the water.

Jo's not one for high adrenaline pursuits but she did manage two and a half laps of the Lazy River, plus a little splash in the Wave Pool. See if you can spot her in the crowd striding out towards the waves:

Now relaxing on the decking with a beer, G & T and a large bottle of Pinot Noir!

Seattle to Idaho

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Sitting here in our timeshare in Northern Idaho - we've had some overnight rain, which persisted through breakfast, but it's clearing up now and I'm sure it'll be another hot and sunny day, but I thought I'd take a few minutes out to do a quick blog posting. Facebook has a number of photos etc on it, so I'll keep this short.

Seattle was great and it was nice to meet up with Scott's cousin, Mark. We did the standard "Duck" tour  in the amphibious vehicle - every tourist city in the world seems to have these now. Here we are at the start:

25 bucks this official photo cost us - I had to swallow hard. Our driver, Captain Chaos, was good and certainly got Jo going. She started complaining about the music as we boarded the Duck, but, within 5 minutes, she was up there dancing away, swinging her arms above her head.

We did the Underground tour - pretty interesting and some funny stories, well told. We also spent time at the fountain next to the Space Needle (from the 1962 World's Fair) - mostly waiting for the big fountain to explode:

The flight through to Spokane on the Washington/Idaho border was quick and easy. We had lunch there until Scott and Lucy arrived in the truck to pick us up.

Our first full day in Idaho was spent at the pretty lakefront town of Sand Point, up towards the Canadian border. Nice day all round and we finished it - as we did the day before - with another great barbie on our decking overlooking the golf course, courtesy of Scott - and Lucy, of course. They sure know how to BBQ - lots of practice, I guess.

On our way

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Waiting just now at T5 for our flight to Seattle. Lucy, Scott and the boys are leaving home about now - it will take them about the same time to drive as our flight.

So what have I been up to then? Twice cancelled golf last Wednesday & Thursday, but I played Friday at Banchory and then we were on our Summer Tour down to Dumfries & Galloway - and, boy, did we get lucky with the weather. Friday had been nice in Banchory - 22 C and playing in shorts - but when we drove down on Saturday morning, from about Dundee onwards, it was pretty miserable until we got to the Borders. By the time we teed off at Southerness it was a beautiful afternoon and shorts were in order again. In the end, I played in shorts 4 days running - that's the first time for a while.

On my way down south, we stopped off at Hamilton to have my orthotic insoles/wedges adjusted. So that's them fully fitted now - and so far, so good - no great pains in the right knee yet, although the wedge in the left foot is pretty prominent. Walking the streets of Seattle might be a tester.

Ross is at home - and has a million jobs to oversee when we're away. Good luck, son - and well done to Ross for getting down below his target weight of 12 stone 7 lbs. Now on with the exercise regime!

Bye for now.

A day at work with Luca

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Yesterday was my day with Luca - I took him in to our Aberdeen factory whilst Jo had a bit of a day off, getting her hair done. He was pretty good and Michael and Francis entertained him for a while to allow me to do a little work.

We did a quick factory tour with him as well. We had to take one of our visitor coats and cut off half the sleeves and the bottom half of the coat before he went in to the production areas:

We shared my tuna and sweetcorn sandwich for lunch - Luca washed his down with a glass of Irn Bru. He wanted to draw, so I gave him some paper and out came various shapes of animal:

Did you correctly guess what they all were? Luca told me, but I'm sworn to secrecy.

One week to go

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Exactly a week until we head off to USA - but it's still a bit of a mad time for me. I was away in London this last weekend for my annual cricket visit to Lord's - plus a gig - and some beers, of course (details in my football, beer and music blogs), and then I'm away this weekend golfing down in Dumfries and Galloway - an area I don't really know at all. I get back from there on Monday night and then have to pack hurriedly for our departure to USA on Tuesday morning, squeezing in a couple of hours in the office first of all.

On my way down to Dumfries on Saturday morning, I have to detour to Hamilton for my check-up appointment with the Orthotist. I hope he can do something about the additional stick-on wedges, which keep slipping out of position.

I must be getting anxious about it all - either that or I need lessons from Fergie on how to chew gum safely. I was driving to work this morning, chewing away, when suddenly I bit really hard on the front edge of my tongue. Blood all over the place - how do you stop a tongue bleeding? Never done that before - how stupid is that?

Gary brought Luca over last night - he's with us for 5 nights now - school has stopped for the summer and it saves Gary and Carole some day care costs if he stays with us. Tomorrow morning, I'm bringing him in to the office - Jo's got a hairdresser's appointment.

That's about it for now. I'll finish with one of the photos from last weekend that aren't already published on Facebook or other blogs. This is Dave Williamson, Colin Kilgour and I having a quiet beer in Henley-on-Thames on Sunday:

2 weeks to go!

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Yes, 2 weeks' today we head for USA - but first of all, I've got London this weekend, then Dumfries next weekend - it's all go.

What have I been up to for the last week? Well, some golf naturally - a pretty scary experience in the midst of a thunder and lightning storm at Tarland last Tuesday. Perhaps not the best protection standing under trees with a bag of induction agents (golf clubs) underneath a steel-tipped umbrella? We made up for it with a super afternoon at Kemnay on Friday - great fun, and we followed it with one of our Headbangs in the evening.

I cancelled golf on Saturday and stayed at home in the morning listening to Sounds of the 60's on Radio Two - we got another mention on the programme from Brian Matthews. I played my first game of squash for ages on Saturday afternoon and, in the evening, we watched the Hollywood version of Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - I had wanted to see how it compared with the Swedish originals. It was pretty good, but it all seemed a little hurried to me - the book's a long one and it was like they were trying to cram every detail in to the film - I didn't get that feeling from the Swedish version.

My first hill-walk of 2012 was planned for Sunday morning, but early morning rain put a few of my fellow walkers off and we cancelled it at the last minute. I could have gone off to golf but decided instead to spend a lazy day with the Sunday Times.

Monday morning I was off to Fraserburgh, but I had to get back in time for our annual evening at Balmoral - and what a lovely one it was too.

So that's everyone up to date now.

Father's Day

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

We had a lovely late lunch/early dinner at the Potarch Hotel yesterday - Gary's treat - but Jo, Luca and Ross came long too. I was off duty and didn't take my camera, but Jo did - but will we ever see the photo she took?

One of Luca's paintings has been made in to a tea/coffee/beer mat and this was part of my present - it now sites proudly on my desk:

Perhaps not quite so proud is my Father's Day card from Gary:

I wouldn't say it was an obsession of Gary's but I do recall going to Denmark on business back in the mid/late 80's and I came across a town called Middelfart. Well, I had to buy a postcard and send it to Gary - even then it seems it was a subject that amused him!

Gary also took some photos of Luca and I attempting to lift the famous Dinnie Stones - perhaps we'll see them later?

This week, it's golf, golf, golf - Tarland tomorrow, Banchory Wednesday and Saturday and Kemnay Friday. We've also got a Headbang on Friday night, then a hill-walk on Sunday. Next week's worse - Balmoral Monday, Banchory Wednesday then off to London for my annual trip to Lord's followed by a gig. Just as well it's only 3 weeks' tomorrow until our trip to the States!

Kitchen latest + Father's Day

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Fitters are finished and here's where we're at - painting, lino and new table/chairs now required:

Note new lights fitted.

I received a package from John Lewis on Friday and it contained a new set of pyjamas - in the Olympics design! Now who would send these to their father?:

The kitchen takes shape

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

It's been a week of take-aways and eating out - the new Oriental on Monday and again tonight, the golf club (with Luca & Carole) on Tuesday, and Echt Tandoori last night (Jo & Ross only, as I was at golf).

The fitters reckon they will finish the kitchen tomorrow morning - that would be good. Jo would get to her swimming in the afternoon and we could start to lead a more normal life again. Yesterday's state of play was:

and tonight:

Tomorrow afternoon it's golf at Blairgowrie for me, but the weather forecast is wet again - oh no.

Kitchen chaos

From http://ianrstewart.blogspot.com/

Well, it's been an exciting day all round. Jo spent most of the weekend emptying all the cupboards in the kitchen in preparation for the arrival of the kitchen fitters today. Of course, all the stuff had to go somewhere, and now every room in the house has got kitchen stuff in it!

I got home early from work in good time so that I could see the Olympic Torch Relay coming through Banchory just after 5 pm. The house was in chaos - noise and dust everywhere - and it was freezing. Doors and windows were open and, of course, we have no heating just now - the gas man's visit last Wednesday determined that we needed another Power Flush and meanwhile, we're experimenting with switching different radiators on and off to see if we can clear the black gunge that Jo is daily having to clear out of the system through the filter.

We shouldn't need any heating at this time of year, but the weather has been so poor recently.

I walked down to the High St. to join the throngs who were lining the street, awaiting the arrival of the Torch. Jo couldn't join me as she wanted to stay at home until the workmen were finished for the day. I suggested I would pick up a take-away at the new Thai/Chinese/Asian - it wasn't bad, by the way. The relay duly arrived and took 10-15 minutes to pass along the High St. - I hadn't realised there were so many people and vehicles involved. Finally, the Torch itself:

Back home, the kitchen is now stripped:

The old fridge/freezer is going down to the garage - everything in the new kitchen will be exactly that - all brand new.