[Updated with a couple more photos and the usual insightful comments. Thursday 11 Feb, 2016.]
It snowed here in the city: you can see what's left on the cars in the background. Alice usually tries to leave them out, or make them fuzzy, as they spoil the important bits of the picture - that's the window boxes and us. This time though, we wanted to emphasise the cold weather.But the bulbs are coming up all the same. Good on them.
It was very chilly and we still needed our winter extras on. Ba's ears are particularly sensitive. She's impatient to have our own little bit of "Proper Nature" nearby. But see: that hyacinth is pushing its way even further up. Isn't nature wonderful?
And now for something completely different. Alice went to a funeral: she did sort-of know the deceased person, but not terribly well, more by repute from a mutual friend of theirs, than in person.She went along mainly because she knew one of the people who'd be travelling up from England for the event ("Up". Oh dear, there we go again!) and several others who lived much closer, so it was a good chance to catch up with them all.
She got out her special funeral hat for the occasion. This is a very old photo, from her dear Godmother's funeral in 2005. Her face is all blanked out as Alice doesn't want to appear in what is really my blog. We ended up going on a day trip just because of this hat. See below.
I hid in her rucksack during the service, so as not to seem disrespectful in the crematorium chapel. Still, one piece of music played was Yellow Submarine during which most of those gathered joined in with gusto, Alice included.I got to come out for the "Wake". Technically the term is properly used for the period between the death and the funeral, see Wikipedia. But some people believe it refers to the practice of friends and relatives visiting and sitting beside the body. Sometimes it was even to make sure the "dead" person didn't wake up.
This event was a sort of post-funeral party with food and drink and lots of chat. See this interesting article on changing customs around death today. Everyone had been asked to "dress up", so Alice wore her posh waistcoat, and I had my red feather boa on. No-one really took much notice of me though, so when we got home, we did a mockup of how I should have been posed.
Click on the photo (and any of the others) to see larger versions. Silly old Alice had managed to lose her special funeral hat, so a day or two later we went back to the pub to see if they had it. Captain Hook, posted outside the Dalriada, was less scarey in daylight and even Ba was happy to sit on the hilt of his broken-off sword with me. I had to insist that Alice resist the temptation to spend hours and hours digitally "repairing" him... What is she like!
They didn't have the hat, but it had taken an extremely long bus journey to get there, so went out to the beach for some (very) fresh air.
[Later: the hat has apparently been rescued, but hasn't yet found it's way back to Alice.]
It was quite nice to stroll along Portobello prom, but when we tried to sit and admire the view accross the Forth Estuary, we nearly got blown right off our perch! Holding on tight, however, we could admire the sight of snow on the Lomond Hills in Fife. Do click on this one!The island is Inchkeith. There is some fascinating information about it on Wikipedia and some photos taken on the island at a website intriguingly called Abandoned Scotland. See below for the guide to the view.
We ventured out onto the beach itself briefly.There were paw prints as well as those from human shoes beside us. It's a popular spot for taking dogs for walks, whatever the wind and waves are doing.
Although the sea was quite a long way out, the reflections of the sky on the wet sand were very pretty indeed.
[How often do I need to remind you to click on Alice's carefully edited photos? Go on, just do it!]
While Ba was looking for shells in the sand, I sat on the breakwater (well tucked in against the wind) and caught sight of this lovely rainbow.It was so clear at the time, but it doesn't look quite the same in a photo, I'm afraid.
Ba actually found some really super shells, but they were very sandy and unpleasantly smelly, so had to be washed at home before they and Ba were posed and photogaphed.Alice so loves doing these photoshoots, and spends just ages "Getting it right." It can become rather tedious for us. She tells me her father was just the same, so she sometimes got fed up herself, back then. Not that her experience seems to have made her any different!
Of course there wasn't all the digital wizardry we have nowadays, just hours in the blacked out bathroom-darkroom.
Look closer. Isn't that big shell gorgeous!
This is the next-best background we could find that was the appropriate beachy colour.
It's a nice little collection of cards, isn't it? I especially like the colourful stamps on the one from her distant cousin in America. We had to get Alice to buy us the BB8 card, so we could give it to her on her birthday. She's pretty crazy about that new Star Wars droid. Hence all the links in the previous two blogs and this one.
Rapido looked like the best part of the menu - and of course we had an icecream dessert as well!
She also gave her these lovely red tulips, which cheered up Ba no end.
She's been very depressed by the dark, cold, wet winter, poor thing. And staying indooors so much doesn't suit her at all.
Alice took a special photo of just one tulip blossom, looking right into it.Click on it. Wow!
She played about in her editing programme to create one that was blue with splashes of green, but Ba was so agitated by the un-natural sight, I had to veto it. Alice was rather miffed, as she likes to show off her nifty abilities, but compassion for our suffering friend won through.
"What about the bellows?" you may ask. Aah haa. Looks a bit like some big bellows, doesn't it?
Bet you'll never guess where I am.
You'll have to wait for the next post (which could be simply ages yet!) when we'll put you out of your misery and reveal just what and where it really is.
