Anything goes
The Famous Alva Games
Sunday 23 July, 2006
The second Saturday in July is the day of the famous Alva Games. 2006 was the 150th anniversary of the event, so Dan and I went along for the afternoon. Dan had never been to a highland games before and I hadn't been to Alva Games for about thirty years. It was smaller than I recall, but enjoyable nevertheless.
There are a number of foot races, mostly handicaps. The Open 90m is the highlight with £400 going to the winner.
Unusually for a highland games, Alva hosts cycling events. Dan was surprised by this and was even more surprised to see racing bikes being used on a grass oval track. So we have a group of cyclists gong flat out round a grass oval, with highland dancing and heavy events taking place in the middle of the oval. There are six races, four open cycling competitions from 800m to 3200m, organised on a handicap basis, and two youth events at 800m and 1600m.
The Monroes TV Show
Wednesday 28 June, 2006
For those of you who responded to my previous entry about a 1960's TV western called "The Monroes", I can confirm that we are NOT suffering from "senior moments" - the show did exist, albeit not for very long.
The only name I recognised was Barbara Hershey,who played Cath. For further information, see:
- The Monroes @ EPGuides.com
- The Monroes at CTVA
- The Monroes @ The TV IV (with a photo)
Football fever
Friday 9 June, 2006
Don't expect much in the way of activity on the site, from Dan at least, for the next four weeks. You may have heard that the World Cup started today - the prospect of three games each day for the next two weeks is scary.
Still, even as a Scot, I'll be cheering for England. Three lions and all that!
Run, rabbit, run
Sunday 7 May, 2006
On Friday, Dan became the proud owner of a new air rifle, with which he intends to curb the local rabbit population. When he gets time, no doubt he will post something technical. As usual, the web was a great source of information.
Dan never does things by halves, which is one of the things I love about him. Killing things isn't something he relishes but he is determined to ensure that he at least ensures a swift death. So he had sheets of paper with a drawing of a rabbit to use as a target and spent Saturday morning setting up the sights on the rifle and practising. After an hour or so, he was scoring head shots the vast majority of the time. I suggested that we could pin the tattered paper target to our boundary fence with a warning to rabbits "This could be you!". Actually, the rabbits round here are so brazen that he coudl probably club them with the rifle butt and save pellets! (Joke)
Cowboy Cookout
Saturday 1 April, 2006
Dan and I usually have a barbeque for friends in July, round about my birthday. This year, we've (Dan says "what's this "we"?) decided to have a themed event and to ask those attending to make a donation to farmAfrica, a charity we've supported in the past.
The theme for the day will be a western one - no surprise to those who know me. I wanted to have a cowboy / western themed wedding but I was outvoted. I did manage to get "Secret Love" sung at the wedding, but that was all.
My excuse is that, as a wee girl, my favourite TV programmes were "The High Chaparral", "Bonanza", "The Virginian" (James Drury being my first crush). And does anyone remember a programme called "Hondo" and another called "The Munroes", which was about a family of kids in the West, who had a Pyrenean Mountain Dog called Snow?
Muckboots
Sunday 26 March, 2006
Hard though this will be to believe, up until last week, I didn't have a pair of wellies. I wore Dan's wellies, walking type boots or an old pair of rubber riding boots, depending on the conditions and who got to the back door first.
Two things prompted me to change this. First was the snow - my boots weren't much protection and I discovered that my riding boots hurt my feet. Second was a visit from our friends, Carol and Graham. We were all going off to look at some sheep (subject of another post soon) and they (carol and Graham, not the sheep) were both sporting Muckboots. When we arrived at the home of our sheepkeeping friend, she also was wearing Muckboots. Never one to miss a trick, I tried on Carol's (which were a wee bit small, lucky for her) and resolved to purchase a pair.
Snow
Sunday 12 March, 2006
Boy, have we got snow! We awoke this morning to about 6" of snow; it's now seven inches (I just measured it), deeper in places, and still falling. It won't last, of course - rain is forecast for tomorrow. Actually, that's probably more worrying because there's going to be an awful lot of wet stuff then, when the snow melts. Folk up the yard were talking about it yesterday - I was pooh poohing it, saying it would only be on high ground and we'd be unaffected. Hmm. Eating words this morning. Maybe I should pay more attention to the weather forecast or at least to those who have watched one.
New Year plans
Saturday 31 December, 2005
Well, as the bells approach, we're planning for 2006.
Hopefully, we've got two Tamworth boars coming in March (don't want to count my pigs before they are hatched!) and I think we've got our new hens sorted too. If the plan works, we'll be getting 6 Light Sussex pullets and a Buff Sussex cockerel. The pullets are only eight weeks at present so we've asked the breeder if he can hold on to them until they can go outside (they're still under low heat at the moment). They won't come into lay for another three months, but our current lot should start laying again soon. Photos of the new arrivals to follow, of course.
Grassroots mp3
Wednesday 14 December, 2005
For your listening pleasure, we present the 27th August edition of BBC Radio Scotland's Grassroots programme. When we were first approached about featuring in the show we expected it to be a 5 minutes slot, but it turned out we were the show. All I can say is the skill is most definitely in the editing...
Download the mp3 - it's 25Mb wide and 27 minutes 15 seconds long.
Should auld acquaintance be forgot...
Wednesday 7 December, 2005
Last weekend, I decided to go through my address book and write our Christmas cards. In a Christmas magazine I read recently, one of the tips for destressing Christmas was to stop sending cards to those you had neither heard from nor seen since last Christmas. This seemed very sensible, so I wrote my smaller than usual pile of cards.
Today, I received a card from a girl (well, we were then) I was at Queen Margaret College with in 1987. Pam and I haven't seen each other since then but we do exchange Christmas cards every year, usually with a wee note and a promise to meet up next year, which we never keep. But it was so nice to hear from her, and maybe 2006 will be the year we DO meet up.
