Summer has arrived

Officially, meteorogically, as it's now June, we're in to summer - although it's actually been a little cooler than last week's highs.

This morning we had a little treat - Kelly FaceTimed to show us Asher has started walking - at last! Kelly confirmed they are moving to Chris' unit at the end of August - so bang goes our free accommodation! Anyway, now we know for sure they're not going to be in Semaphore next year, we can perhaps think about planning our next trip.

We're kind of booked now for our UK road trip - from 8th to 16th October - but still haven't done anything about the Fringe yet. Talking about Edinburgh, Jo was back down there again yesterday for a brief shopping trip with Anne Mason, and she managed to see Ross briefly as well. He'll be on his own as from tomorrow as Lizzie is returning to Banchory - what a shame.

Also going through a life change just now is Dawn, who has now sold the former family home and moved in to a flat with Jordon. We'll see them in a couple of weeks when we have another family lunch gathering in Glasgow.

I took Jo down to Stonehaven yesterday to catch the train down to Edinburgh and packed my bike as well so that I could take a brief wander round the Mearns. I cycled through Dunnottar Woods and up to Dunnottar Castle. It was a lovely morning for a short, but hilly, ride:

It was exactly 50 years ago yesterday that the Beatles released Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - as most of you will have heard. I'd prepared a special show for River Dee Radio, but got caught up in a golf tie and never made the transmission - Gerry and Andy had to do the show on their own.

That's yer lot for now.

Blogging again

I'm back. It's a quiet Sunday - we were entertaining again last night and it was pretty late when we got to bed - probably about 2 am. At our age, anything past midnight is a killer.

We've had some great hot weather - almost touching 30C. It was perfect for our Friday afternoon hillwalk as the temperature at the top was only low 20's. Everything is growing and there's pollen everywhere - covering the cars and even our newly refurbished bench:

I was finishing off the painting of the iron railings on our balcony yesterday and the little yellow dots kept landing on the wet paint - pretty annoying, but nothing I could do about it.

On Thursday, we finally got the chance to travel down to Edinburgh to see Ross. He was working most of the day but we spent some time with him before, during and after. He's now working for Barney's Beers (http://barneysbeer.co.uk/), who have a stall at the Flea and Food Market, down East Market Street, near the foot of the Royal Mile:

If you look closely that's Ross serving a beer to some customers at his stand - the second one along

It was a fairly quiet Thursday so Ross was able to sit out in the sun with us for a while:

Jo and I went away for a while - did some shopping, then went for a bite in the Halfway House, where Ross joined us again. We strolled down the Royal Mile and stopped for ice cream floats to cool us down in the hot sun. Ross had to get back to re-open the stall so we walked back with him:

Jo and I went down to Teuchter's Landing in Leith - it was mobbed - and we met Ross again after his work and before we had to catch our train home. It was really good to see him again - he's had a hard time, but he's fighting his way through it.

Last Monday, we had lunch with Jacquie Howden, who I worked beside for over 30 years. She was widowed at the end of last year and we had said at the funeral that we would catch up with her when we got back from Australia.

I'm halfway through organising our trip to London in October. We've decided to make it a bit of a road trip, taking in Liverpool, Winchester, perhaps Chester plus some old haunts. We'll take in a show - or two - in London and go to the Wine Fair.

I've made no progress with the Fringe yet, however. If we go, it'll be later on in August as we need a bit of time after returning from USA.

So that's a quick summary of some of the things we've been up to in the last couple of weeks. My work with CAMRA has been keeping me fairly busy as well - as has River Dee Radio. What's coming up over the next few weeks before we fly to Atlanta on 29th June? A fair amount of golf for me - June is always the busiest month of the year - lots of outings and matches to play. I just hope my knee stands up to it. I've been curtailing my golf to little more than once a week, whereas I had originally planned to try and play more this year, but haven't been able to.

On my low days when my knee hurts most - usually after 10 or 12 holes - I've often speculated that this might be my last year of golf. I sincerely hope not, but it is troubling me. Do I carry on playing golf and making my knee worse, bringing the inevitability of another big operation ever closer - or should I refrain from golf and stave off the date of the knee replacement for a while? Dilemma. I'll see this year out anyway and decide then - I'm already committed to a number of events this year and I'd like to try to complete them before deciding.

So, on that low note, I'll end this blog post. Bye for now.

Back on blog

Hello it's me again. Been busy. To follow on from my previous blog post, I did finally finish the restoration of the old garden bench that Anne and Leslie Mason were throwing out:

I played Gleneagles on the last Friday of April - there were 12 of us going, but there was one late withdrawal so I got in touch with brother-in-law Brian Hanson and he agreed to come along - and ended up winning it! I was being driven down to Gleneagles so I was at the golf club nice and early to organise my gear. What a beautiful morning it was:

Still on a golf-y theme, I was playing at Banchory last week under cloudless skies and two planes traversed high above us, leaving jet trails behind them:

Momentarily, it looked like a giant St. Andrews cross but I don't think the picture quite does justice to what we saw with the naked eye.

Last weekend was our first Boat of Garten outing this year. Whilst it was a glorious 21C further west, it was positively Baltic at Grantown on Sunday - although thankfully dry. There were 16 of us there and I was the organiser again as I won it last time, but I am phasing out of organising all our golf outings - as I've done for nearly 30 years now - and am passing it all on to others in our group. I've still got plenty of other interests, so don't worry, I won't get bored. There's River Dee Radio and our Freewheelers cycling group for starters.

We've got the second in our entertaining/dinner evenings coming up on Saturday and again we've been hit by a cancellation - although thankfully we got a bit of notice this time so we were able to find replacements - coincidentally the couple who cancelled the last time!

Trying to organise our trip to London in October for the wine fair just now and hoping to see a show or two at the same time, but what a cost the West End is nowadays!

Need to get organised for the Fringe as well - plus another trip to Edinburgh to see how Ross is doing.

End of the month update

It's almost the end of April and it's been a couple of weeks since I updated this blog diary, so here goes.

Of course, on Easter Sunday, Gary, Carole and Luca came over for dinner - Jo was delighted they could make it. The eggs were all labelled and hidden in the house but it didn't take Luca long to locate them all and a chocolate feast followed.

The golf season is in full swing now and I'm trying my best to play a bit more than I have done in the last few years since my knee op - I've been partially successful, but my left knee still troubles me after 10-12 holes and my scores reflect that - usually a good outward half followed by a much poorer inward nine. This week, I had a tie on Sunday, a Seniors match on Monday, our usual Wednesday Quaich and then it's Gleneagles tomorrow (Friday). I was also picked for the Seniors match today (Thursday) at Culter, but I pulled out as I knew this was at least one match too much.

Last Saturday we had friends over for dinner. It was due to be the Cooks and the Corbetts, but Dan was a late withdrawal due to illness. We were fortunate to get a late replacement in Ken and Irene Page. Archie Cook had a sneezing fit at the table and knocked his glass of red wine over, spilling all over Ken's trousers and his seat. All was well in the end, however, as we managed to clean everything up OK.

I've been recording some more shows for River Dee Radio and have updated our schedule so it now reads:

• Sunday - 1970's part 1
• Monday - 1970's part 2
• Tuesday - Body Parts (new)
• Wednesday - Rock & Roll
• Thursday - Cigarettes & Alcohol (new)
• Saturday - Female Fronted Bands

(We don't do Fridays just now)

The two newest shows can also be listened to and/or downloaded at:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/fin7ittfhykk99t/BP.mp3?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6sl0wfrumsji7x0/C%26A%20final.mp3?dl=0

Andy & Gerry did the two 1970's shows when I was in Australia but the rest are me solo. I'm hoping however that all three of us will get together soon and do some more live and pre-recorded shows.

We've now ordered the replacement shower cubicle, shower and cistern for our WC. Last night we had a meeting with the fitter, who happens to live nearby in Birch Grove - right next door to Jo's pal Anne.

I'm currently attempting to restore an old garden bench seat that Anne and Leslie were throwing out. It's seen better days and I'm not sure how well it will come up, but I'll persevere anyway.

Who/Algarve/Easter

I'm back from our golfing trip to the Algarve - all went well and I managed to play all 4 days, something I didn't think I would manage after the first 2 days when my knee was really bothering me. I fear, however, that my golfing holidays are becoming too difficult for me and the time is not too far distant when I won't be able to join the rest of the guys. This year should be OK as long as I don't overdo things, but next year could be more challenging.

On the Friday before I flew off to Faro, I went to see The Who in Glasgow at the relatively new SSE Hydro, a specially designed music/entertainment venue that seats 12,000. The gig was good and, although the sound was satisfactory, I expected slightly better from a purpose built hall - but I guess that's largely a factor of the size of the place.

On Saturday, Jo and I went over to Raemoir Garden Centre to take up the offer of a free scone and coffee that she gets every year as a regular customer:

It's been a great week if, like me, you're a Partick Thistle fan. First of all, on Saturday, the club with the joint lowest wage bill in the Scottish Premier League, clinched their place in the Top 6, thus avoiding any lingering prospect of relegation and securing the club's highest league finish for nearly 40 years. Then, in midweek, the club announced a plan to build a new training centre/academy that should ensure a steady supply of young talent in years to come - all funded by a couple of Jags' fans who won £160m. on the Euro Lottery a couple of years ago. Good for them.

The journey to the Algarve went well and we were blessed with excellent weather. The only minor blot was the hotel we were re-assigned to. Its location in the heart of Vilamoura Marina was excellent but it wasn't really of a standard that we expected - very cheap, basic furniture in our apartments and poor quality ingredients at breakfast. I was sharing with Keith Gray and here we are on our huge balcony:

While I was away, Luca attended football camp and two of the Aberdeen players came along and he got their autographs:

You can't miss him - right in the middle with his hat on.

We've finally got round to getting our damaged en suite shower room sorted and have ordered a new enclosure:

Easter Sunday tomorrow and Gary and Luca are coming over in the afternoon.

April action

(Remember if you're viewing this by email, that it's better viewed directly on the blog - particularly the photographs - at http://ianrstewart.blogspot.co.uk/)

There's been a gap of a couple of weeks again between posts, but I'm not losing enthusiasm for keeping my diary going - just been busy that's all.

My 3 consecutive days of golf when the clocks changed and the season started didn't work out too well - it was certainly one round too much for me, so I'll need to be careful next week in the Algarve when we're playing 4 days in a row - albeit in buggies. I squeezed in a couple of short cycles too, plus a coastal walk from Newburgh to Blackdog (see http://bvhill-walkers.blogspot.co.uk/ for details and photos).

Dawn came up to Banchory on Saturday for a well-earned short break which finished yesterday when I took her back to Aberdeen to catch the Gold Megabus back home. Gary and Luca came over and joined us for a curry at the Derbar on Saturday night, then, on Sunday, Dawn and I went for a walk along the Deeside Way to Milton of Crathes, where we met Jo for a coffee and scones etc. Jo, still troubled with her hip - and back - caught the bus home from there, but Dawn and I walked up through Crathes for the long loop home.

On Monday, Jo, Dawn and I took a drive up Deeside, stopping first of all at Burn o' Vat -

The upper path was a little too precarious for Jo, so she had her own sit-in protest!

Looking over Loch Kinord

Next stop was Ballater for a spot of lunch in Rock, Salt and Snails before heading further up the valley to Balmoral where we decided to do the tour of the estate -

(Jo and Dawn aren't phoning home - they're listening in to the audio tour!)

We got back to Banchory in time to grab fish suppers just before Gary and Luca arrived. It's Easter school holiday fortnight and his parents are working, so Luca is with us until Friday night. On Tuesday morning, Dawn, Luca and I cycled out the Deeside Way to Buchanan's where Jo joined us for some lunch. Of course, being a creature of habit, Luca insisted we stop off at his favourite river bank at the Platties -

The slight gradient back up from the Way to the main road was a bit too tough for some -

After lunch at Buchanan's, the 3 cyclists headed back home via the Banchory Circular Paths. It's a pretty good trail, but there are a few bumps and, if you're not concentrating properly on the surface, it's easy to take a tumble - and that's exactly what poor Luca did. He wailed for a bit and we all walked the next 100 yards ot so, but soon we were all back in the saddle and made it all the way home, where Luca exhibited his war wounds -

On Wednesday morning, we all walked along to the village and this allowed Luca to climb up and slide down his favourite hill -

The video Luca insisted I took of him sliding down can be viewed at https://youtu.be/8Ncohq-4IjY. I then drove Dawn in to Aberdeen and came back to Banchory and took Luca up to the driving range to hit a few balls.

On Thursday morning, Luca and I went back to Inchmarlo driving range, but this time we cycled there. He hit about 80 balls and was pretty hot and tired - this was one of his better swings -

Tomorrow evening, Gary comes to pick Luca up. I'll be long gone by then - down to Glasgow to see The Who with Dick Taylor. It turns out Dick is a closet Who fan - he bought 2 tickets, thinking Theresa would come with him, but she wasn't interested so he asked me - and I was delighted to accept. Dick's driving and we're leaving at 1 pm and won't get home until nearly 2 am - a long day, but hopefully worth it.

Catching up again

It's been a while - over a fortnight. Probably one of the longest gaps between posts in this blog. I'll try hard to remember what's happened over the last couple of weeks.

We had Jayne Williamson's 60th birthday party at Finzean Town Hall on the Saturday after my birthday and, of course, there's been the usual rounds of cycling and golf, plus a CAMRA branch meeting and our biannual visit from our IFA to review our pension funds and do our ISA's for this year. Then there was Jo's birthday - Gary, Carole and Luca paid us a susprise visit - with cake - on Sunday night - and we got another one on Tuesday when we went over to Inverurie:

Not forgetting the flowers that arrived:

Before that, we'd been down to the Deeside Way to meet Gary at the halfway turn point in the D33 run:

Jo and I had a nice meal at the Derbar on Monday night - although we were the only people in the restaurant apart from those coming to pick up carry-outs. Last night (Wednesday) I attended the long overdue meeting of River Dee Radio helpers to try and sort out an organisation and iron out the technical hitches - many of them inevitable in a start-up community radio project.

I've also had to acquire another network drive to hold our data, photos, videos etc after discovering that the one we had (which had a 3 tb capacity) was apparently full - even although our files took up less than one-third of this space. It took some research to find out that the version I had didn't have a recycle bin that could be emptied, so every time we deleted a file, it didn't really disappear - it was just inaccessible! Grrrrr.

So, for the past couple of days, I've been setting up the new one and trying to make sure that everything is properly backed up - a tedious job.

Another "project" we now have is completing a 1,000 piece jigsaw that Colin Kilgour gave us. He got it as a Christmas present and recently completed it and has now passed the challenge on to us:

I dumped the recent brew - the 3rd in a row to fail. Don't know what I'm doing wrong - although this batch was past its sell-by date. I'll try and summon up the courage to try again some time.

The clocks spring forward this weekend, so signalling for me the start of the golf season proper - and I'm planning to play a bit more this year prior to heading off to USA July/August - always assuming my left knee stands up to the challenge. I'm hoping my daily exercise regime will pay dividends. The first test starts tomorrow - 3 consecutive days of golf. Wish me luck.

Post birthday post

(If you're receiving this by email, always remember it's better viewed directly on the blog at http://ianrstewart.blogspot.co.uk/).

Apart from our first Headbang of the year last Friday, there's not too many diary entries since my last blog post until my birthday on Monday this week.

Gary and Luca paid us a quick visit on Saturday afternoon - after Luca had been at his judo - hence the attire in this photo:

On Sunday I headed in to Pittodrie to see Thistle play Aberdeen in the cup quarter final. What a disappointment - the game was rubbish and Thistle lost. Double whammy.

Monday was the day I entered my 69th year and the day started with a FaceTime call from Down Under. We missed Kelly's first call, so she sent a couple of photos through:

We did get to speak to them in the end, however, which was a nice start to the day. Then, at 6 pm, Gary showed up unexpectedly - bearing gifts too - chocolate and beer, of course. It was just a quick visit, but he took us up to the Tor-na-Coille for a quick drink before disappearing, leaving Jo and I to have our planned meal.

The hotel is under new ownership but they've not changed much yet so it was pretty much as before - a bit dead, although the food itself was OK. When we got home, we had another FaceTime call - this time from Oregon - all four of the Lesinas were home early and wished me a happy birthday.

Yesterday (Tuesday) I had another physiotherapist appointment. By now, my groin strain was much less painful, although I still couldn't do some of the exercises the physio had prescribed for my knee. Despite this, she said my knee appeared to be in good shape with the surrounding muscle built up a bit more. She gave me some more exercises to do but basically felt she didn't need to see me again. I agreed with her, but said that I hadn't really tested the knee out with many lateral movements - as in golf - and what would happen if my knee regressed again when the golf season starts? She left the appointment open until the end of April, by which time I should have a good idea of whether matters had improved or not.

One additional quirk I raised with her was the note on the pack of K-tape I bought on the internet, which advised not to use it if I was on blood thinners. She - and all of her colleagues - had never heard of this being a problem. Strange.

Over at Rae Circle, Gary had baked a lovely chocolate cake and we lit the candles and sang the song - if you want to hear it, try here - http://youtu.be/gGY6jjuiy0o. Now the photos

Typical camera shy Carole

All Inverurie photos copyright Luca Stewart.

Week 2 back home

Two weeks on and still no jet lag - amazing. Jo's not been quite as lucky - she's still tired a lot of the time and waking at earlier hours than normal.

The weather in the first 10 days after our return from Oz has been excellent - so much so that I played golf on both Sunday and Monday. We didn't have to go to Inverurie on Tuesday as Luca was away on a ski-ing trip with his school.

Wednesday and Thursday were spent in the Central Belt. We spent Wednesday afternoon at Dawn's. She looks after Kieran and Julie's Mara in the morning and we arrived just in time to see her before she went off to Nursery in the afternoon:

Barry and Helen had been down at the MG Owners' Club and the Caravan Club Show in the Midlands, but they drove back early and we took them to the Three Craws for a meal before spending the night at theirs.

On Thursday morning we drove over to Elderslie to see Mary, who's been suffering a bit recently with high blood pressure. She seems to be recovering now, however. In the afternoon we drove over to Edinburgh to see Ross and Lizzie. Storm Doris was forecast to wreak havoc over the North of England and South and Central Scotland but, although the M8 was very wet, we didn't have much difficulty with our travel.

Ross has had a terrible start to life in the capital. The job he was promised by his pal Harris has come to nothing and Harris is now winding up his business and has taken on a salaried job, leaving Ross to scrabble around looking for odd bits and bobs of work anywhere he could find it - but it's not the best time of year for this and he's struggled to get more than a few hours a week of low paid work.

Thankfully, just before we arrived at their flat, Ross got some better news with a couple of offers of more regular work, so we hope that's a corner turned now. With little or no money between the two of them and bills to pay, it's been almost impossible for them to have any kind of social life until now, so Lizzie's first impressions of life in Edinburgh have not been positive. We'll see what happens when their current lease ends in October, but we wouldn't be too surprised if they came back to Banchory.

On Friday, Jo went swimming with her pals in the afternoon, whilst I joined up with 4 of mine to go for a walk on Hill of Fare from Echt to Raemoir. I hadn't appreciated there would be so much snow this far north and the underfoot conditions at the top were very tricky, which led to me straining my groin and having to hobble for most of the second half of the walk, which turned out to be a little longer than planned at 15 kms:

A hot bath eased the pain a little last night, but today (Saturday) it's worse and I'm pretty immobile - no golf for me tomorrow. I had actually planned to go in to Aberdeen this afternoon for a CAMRA meeting - the annual one where our branch decides which pubs in our area should go in to next year's Good Beer Guide - but the bus I had planned to catch didn't show up and the next one would have been too late, so I'm sitting here watching the Scotland - Wales rugby international and listening in to the football scores. Come 5:30 pm, I'll need some liquid medication - although how I'll get to the pub, I don't know.

I've checked online as to what to do with a groin strain and they say I should ice it and strap it up - and take Ibuprofen. I'll start tonight.

To close - a photo of Jo on holiday wearing the new top she bought whilst we were away: