The Pitiful Cat ............

Hullo ma wee blog,


I'm lying on the bed. It's late afternoon and The Lovely G and one of her friends are downstairs in the lounge watching a movie on DVD. Lorraine is here staying over and will help us celebrate the 1st August, Switzerland's national day, tomorrow when some of the family come for a special Swiss meal. Lorraine and The Lovely G went to Switzerland together for a short holiday late last year and since then she's been enthusing about all things Swiss to all and sundry, so we have naturally included her in the invite to this years family bash. I've left them to it as I still feel choked with this damned cold and am feeling, if not somewhat antisocial, that I don't want to be around people in case I pass on the dreaded lurgy. My flu has left me with a chesty wheeze which brings coughing fits when I lie down for any length of time.

I too have a DVD on up here and have been engrossed in the film 'Babel' starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchet when I become aware that Jess, who has been in the room with me for a companionable couple of hours, is lying watching my chest rise and fall and appears to be listening to the cacophony of wheezing, whistling and low groaning that is coming from me with every breath. My awareness of her has changed the rhythm of my breathing and she now looks back at me. She has what I think is a sympathetic look on her face, although I might be wrong. She is lying on my right a few feet away down the bed, head towards me and her tail contemplatively twitching across the last few inches of  its white and ginger tipped length. She slumps over onto her side and stretches both front paws out towards me, arching her back and stretching her spine as she reaches away with her back paws. In front of me her nearest paws spread themselves momentarily and show claws of gleaming sharpness as she yawns in an eye closing movement before twisting her head upside down to gain another perspective of me perhaps. She remains, one front paw stretched towards me, the other crooked back on her chest, tail curled questioningly in mid air, in an almost pantomime catty posture as she watches, watches, watches.

I smile and make a soft noise at her which causes her stretched paw to come even closer as she turns more into an inverted curl, lying on her back. The paw now moves down until it comes in contact with my thigh and, contact made, she pushes gently against the material of my trousers. She begins to purr softly as if to say "You're doing it all wrong! This is how it should sound!  It's easy - I can even do it upside down!"

I'm sure she's smiling at me.

blooming cat!

The Air Show

Yak-50 Aerostars do their stuff

Hullo ma wee blog,

Friday night my older brother and his wife came to stay over. As can often happen we ended up staying in the kitchen chatting across the whole evening, long after we had finished our meal of hot chicken and pear salad followed by strawberries and blackberries with cream. The two bottles of wine we had opened ran out and we moved comfortably on to coffee until Gordon realised that it was after midnight and he was struggling to stay awake after a hard week at work. So, we cleared away and headed off to bed.

That was close!

In the morning we had a late breakfast as planned and we got our gear together and set off to go to the Scottish Air Museum Airshow at East Fortune, about 20 minutes away from the house. It looked like the weather was going to deteriorate across the day, at least that was the forecast, the best of the weather being in the morning, which was a bit of a worry as the flying demonstrations were to take place across the afternoon. As you can see from the photo's the sky was quite dull but thankfully rain held off for the whole show and only started as we headed off for a bar meal before Gordon and Charlotte set out for home on the other side of the country once again.

Three question marks???

Unfortunately, yet again, I was suffering from the early effects of a head cold which got increasingly worse as the day went on, to such an extent that I was secretly relieved that we were not going to be entertaining again that night. Once we got home I headed off for a hot bath and bed. Sometimes only solitude will do

Douglas Skyraider

Catalina Flying Boat

Local talent

two ladies who believe that size does matter!

Hawker Hunter

And the Supermarine Spitfire.......

See you later.

I hate the flu..........

Hullo ma wee blog,

My razor-shredded throat wrenches yet another lung-destroying cough from a windpipe made of sandpaper raw flesh. My nostrils, stuffed full of tightly packed mucous laced with shards of glass, force pressure jets of pain back along my sinus to ears blocked with clay,  reverberating with every agonising whisper yet resistant to any attempt by external sounds to enter. My head is being beaten mercilessly by a Brazilian samba ensemble on speed and the drummer from Spear Of Destiny's nastier, but more rythmic, big brother. They seem to have been locked in competition inside my head for days. I force open eyelashes stuck with tapioca and let in blinding light to eviscerate my retinas with lightning bolts.

 Still alive then.

 I groan, in manly, near silent agony, shielding the worries from my nearest and dearest, who gather round in a candle-lit vigil, singing hymns, praying for the soul not yet departed. I heroically leave my deathbed propped on legs of straw and head barefoot to the bathroom over cold concrete floors strewn with glass, nails and edge on razor blades, joints aching and now retching phlegm like some neglected Victorian victim in the final throes of a gruesome terminal disease, as my loved ones reel back in fear and dread. Ice cold, shaking and with cold-sweat dripping from my suddenly emaciated body, I endure the vicious onslaught of nostril-evacuation while I perform the necessary last rites of ablution.

I return to my hard, unyielding bed, pull the thin, meagre sack-cloth covering over me and surrender myself to the unalterable course of this brutal viral infection rampaging through my weakened being, calling for my darling wife to contact the medical profession and advise my cold cadaver will be with them shortly. I give permission for my corpse to be used for study, for the benefit of humanity. Several medical conundrums will surely finally be resolved. I lie comforted by the sure and certain knowledge that my life insurance will see my lovely G rest in luxury for the foreseeable future. I close my eyes and try to fade away quietly - for her sake.

I hear a bell softly ring and a distant sing-song voice calls mournfully,

"Bring out your dead. Bring out your dead."

I bloody hate the flu.......

I take a last look at the lovely G.

"Your looking better. How about making me a nice cup of tea?"


see you later.........

Laid Low/Sweet Chariot......

Hullo ma wee blog,

Be warned - my mum would have thoroughly disapproved of discussing this kind of thing.......

Late Thursday night brought the onset of sudden and frequent stomach pains which kept me awake in bed with a hot water bottle clutched to my front and several visits to the loo to try unsuccessfully to throw up. The new day saw phase two ushered in by complete exhaustion and a distinct aversion to food or drink of any kind, {to understand how unlike me this is the closest analogy I could offer is for you to think of Winnie the Pooh turning his back on hunny!} so I spent the day in bed, which is totally unlike me, apart from a couple of muscle stretching journeys to loo and the front door to move the mail, which I couldn't even be bothered to open.

I slept from the lovely G's lone departure at 7.00am until 12.30 and after a pointless attempt at a cup of tea, on until about 5.00 when I decided I would watch a January sale bought DVD of one of the Harry Potter movies. I had seen one of them, the first I think, at the cinema and enjoyed it but not seen any more, so at three for £10 I bought the back catalogue. Starting with the first, I lay in bed with Jess determined to have either her head or her tail between me and the screen until ten minutes in I was fast asleep. I woke to find that the movie had played and returned to the main menu so I decided that HP wasn't going to work his magic for me today. A short hunt of the DVD's took me to 'Amelie' which is, to me anyway, such a feast to the eyes, ears and brain cell, that I popped it in and again settled down to peer around a rejuvenated Jess and her various body parts. In ten minutes I was comatose again and stayed that way until at 8.30 I was wakened by a call from the lovely G who was on a pre planned night out with the girls from work.

The next thing I remember is waking up aching in the dark with the lovely G warm beside me. I headed for the loo and then, feeling a bit more lively, for the kitchen with thought of a cup of tea and just a simple bit of toast high on my agenda. The clock pointed out it was 3.50am as I sat down and turned on the laptop to check mail and anyone posting from the blogs I follow. I was relieved to be feeling more than just a wee bit better until my body showed this was just a feint done in the worst possible taste by asking, quite insistently, that I attend the smallest room in the house.

And so, phase three is with me and with some temporary time off for good behaviour, I have spent the morning so far ensconced on a chariot of china white.


what joy........

see you later {probably much later}