In other news...

I saw a wonderful sight yesterday morning.  A young deer running down my street.  Must have crossed the bridge over the M77 that leads into Pollok Estate.
It didn't seem scared.  By that I mean is wasn't bolting hell for leather down the road, but is was out of sight before I managed to grab a camera and get to the door.
Considering where we live is bordered on 2 sides by the estate, on one by a road and on the other by a railway, I reckon it's chances of heading back into the estate were pretty good.

Work as an extra

Well, after doing no extra work since World War Z last August, I've received a text about 11 hours on Monday for the BBC.  I've got back saying yes, so I just need to wait and see if I'm picked now.
Fingers crossed.

Karate and walking

This weekend mostly revolved around not slobbing out.

There was a karate course in Largs, that ran from Friday afternoon, to Sunday lunchtime, but I only headed down for the Saturday practice.  There were four sessions on Saturday.  The first had started not long after my alarm went off (7.00am).  I got there for the 10.00am session, and stayed for the 2.30pm one as well, before heading back to Glasgow, utterly knackered, and avoiding the post-dinner 7.00pm session.  It was a brilliant, day, and next time I WILL do the full weekend.

On Sunday, I got up early again, and fired up the breadmaker so that Karen would have warm just made bread when she got up.  While that was baking I started to watch Ran (Akira Kurosawa movie based on King Lear), but once Karen got up, and the cats wanted attention, subtitles became a pain (can't read them from the kitchen), so I put it off, and got ready to go walking.

We jumped in the car and headed off to a forestry park near Gartmore (between Aberfoyle and Drymen) to do a walk that the book said took just over two hours, that the sign at the car park said took and hour, and that we did in about 40 minutes.  So, we looked at the board and found another waymarked route, and off we went.  In total we got our 6 miles in, and once back at the carpark, sat on the riverbank and had a coffee before coming home.

Just beautiful

Why have I never heard this song before?  This is simply stunning.  Moby is a genius.

The ongoing clearout

So, I've started the clearout, and I've a bag of dvd's that I'll take to Missing sometime this week.  (If anyone is interested and want's a bargin, give me a shout pronto)

I've also got my Praktica 35mm SLR and 3 lenses, along with a camera bag, flash and autowind, that I'm open to offers on. (Does anyone still use film?)

I've also (finally) got rid of the massive brick that was the ancient desktop, and also my Dell that blew up last year (not as spectacular as it sounds).  I stripped the hard drive, dvd drive and ram from the laptop first.  I'm passing the dvd drive and memory to a friend to use himself, and I'm keeping the hard drive to see if I can get an adaptor that'll let me use it as an external drive or something.

So, not having a desktop, there's no need for a computer desk, so when I get home, the allan keys are coming out and it's getting stripped.down and binned as well.

In place of the computer desk, I'll be making a wee trip to Ikea for another bookcase, and that'll take care of the boxes of books that are cluttering up the spare room and making it unuseable.

So, that's my (cunning) short term plans.

Next time we'll take the bikes.

Yesterday we drove down to Troon, but rather than parking in the centre of the town, we parked in the South Beach car park just as you get into the town.  Then, we walked out of town over the hump back bridge, and followed the cycle path through the country - and at one point along the side of the main road to the airport - to Prestwick, where we sat outside with coffees at Mancini's on the seafront, before having a wander along the main street, before walking back to Troon.

Unlike the cycle paths in and around Glasgow, this is a really nice scenic route stretching all the way along the Ayrshire coast.  We met a lot of people both walking and cycling, as we went.  Something else we noticed.  Outside of Glasgow, strangers are friendlier.

Anyway, I've made up my mind.  Once we're back from holiday in June, I'm getting roof bars and bike racks for the car, and we'll head down again with the bikes this time, and cycle from Troon to Ayr.

If you can get down with your bikes (train maybe), then it's a really nice route.  Give it a try.

That naked feeling

Why is it I feel naked if I forget my watch.  It's like having an itch and trying to resist scratching it.  I mean I'm sure that when I forget my watch, I go to look at my wrist way more than I do when I'm wearing it!

So the alternatives are don't check the time at all.  After all, in the words of Douglas Adams, "Time is an illusion.  Lunchtime doubly so."

OR

Use my phone to keep tabs on the minutes ticking away.

Either way, today is a chronograph fail.

WHW update

It's officially off.  We got a week in Menorca for £50 more than it was going to cost to walk to Fort William.
Go figure!

West Highland Way and being ripped off.

Our plan to do the WHW in June looks like falling through.  The problem is partly to do with the fact that we'd planned to use a bag carrying service (£40 per bag for the duration, with unlimited stops) to ferry the rucksacks between stops, so that all we had to carry was a daysack with provisions for the days walk.

The "proper" campsite outside Balmaha is a caravan club site, and has a minimum stay of 2 nights.  Now, my reading of this is "while not actually saying we don't want the backpackers walking the way, in reality, we don't want the backpackers walking the way".  So, we're left looking at another option where someone will be there to receive the bags from the company transporting them.  Sallochy campsite is partly manned, and I've still not heard back as to whether there's provisions for receiving bags.  This means a stop in Balmaha.  Bunkhouses are already full, so that's not an option.  So prices so far for one night, have been between £75 and £100.

Now, this would be repeated at Bridge of Orchy, so £150 - £200.  Then there's the two nights at campsites (approx £20 a night), the hostel at Fort William (again about £30) and the train back to Glasgow (God knows what that will cost).

Add in food and drink, and you're looking at spending AT LEAST £400 - £450 for five days "camping".  looking online, we can get a week in the sun flying from Glasgow, with B&B accomodation and preety much guaranteed good weather, for just over £90 each.

Now, I'm sorry, I really really want to do the WHW, but I don't want to get screwed over in the process.  I know the summer wild camping ban is there to stop drunken idiots from starting fires, and causing trouble along the side of Loch Lomond, but the knock on effect seems to be hotels and B&B's cashing in big time.

Holiday at home.  Get financially screwed.  You know it makes sense.

Latest happenings

So what have I been up to lately?

The planning for doing the West Highland Way is under way.  This weekend I'll be booking into two bunkhouses and that should be us sorted.  The training walks are already underway, and have been good so far.

The karate is going well this weather.  I'm averaging three classes a week, which is brilliant.

After the Easter weekend, I'm going to use the bike to commute to work again.  I've not done it since Hurricane Bawbag kicked in and trashed the country.

So, that's my State of the Nation at the moment.  Nothing new, but things are coasting along reasonably nicely.

Northern Lights from the ISS

Stunning.

Journey through a wormhole

So that was Kinross

Spent the weekend in Kinross, at the Green Hotel, and very nice it was too.  We spent most of the time driving round looking at castles and ye olde worlde things.
Total claim for the weekend was 2 castles, 1 round tower (in the Irish style - there's only two like this in Scotland.  The one we visited was in Abernethy), and a really cool pictish stone.

In the wee graveyard in Abernethy, we saw a wildcat, and got talking to a really nice guy from Skye who was visiting his sister who lives in Abernethy.

I'm seriously discovering how much I'm NOT a city person.  I could quite happily live in any of the wee places we visited at the weekend.  I especially loved the wee beach at Burleigh Sands.  (pic below).  So, come the lotterly win, and I'm outta here :-)

More cool science

Lego in the lab.  using Lego Mindstorm to make robots for use in the laboratory.  Seriously cool, and a brilliant excuse to get Lego on the Christmas list again.

Simple harmonic (and non harmonic) motion

A team at Harvard set 15 pendulums of different length in motion at the same time and filmed the result.  The website with the info is here

If you just want to check out the video, here it is below.  It's really pretty cool (from a geek perspective anyway)

.

Play

While not the kind of music people would probably associate me with, I do have a liking for *some* dance/electronic/trance type stuff.  I've just re-discovered what an amazing album Play by Moby is.  It's totally awesome.  I got it when it first came out, and played it to death, and this is probably the first time I've listened to it in years.

It's so good when you go back to something on a whim, and it resonates.

If you've never heard this album (and how could you not have?), then do your ears a favour.  It's dance music for people who don't do dance music.  Remember, this is the guy who's also done hardcore (as in punk) stuff as well (Animal Rights).

So, what are you waiting for?

Buchanan Castle

Yesterday we headed up to Drymen to do a walk starting from the car park on Stirling Road, and heading out into the countryside, before looping back and into Drymen again.

The highlight of the walk is the spectacular ruin of Buchanan Castle.  In castle terms, it's not that old - it was built in 1854, and serves as the seat of the clan Graham.
During the war, the castle served as a hospital, and it's most famous patient was probably Rudolph Hess, as he was treated here for the injuries sustained when he crash landed in Scotland.
After the war, the roof was removed to avoid paying rates on the building, and as a result, the weather took it's tool on the interior, and gave us the stunning ruin that still stands today.

Buchanan Castle

The rest of the walk takes you out into some beautiful countryside.  We found a really nice spot to stop for lunch, next to a small waterfall on the Doghouse burn.

Despite the threat of rain, the weather was really nice, and when there was no shade from the trees, it was actually pretty warm.

I've put a route map up on the Walk Highlands website in case anyone fancies giving it a go.  It's as accurate as any of these "click on a map to plot your route" things is.  Apparently you can download the route for your gps if you want.

Anyway, a really nice 10k walk in a stunning part of the counrty.

My SF collection. The state of the nation.

I need to have a book cull.  Plain and simple.  There’s not enough  room on the shelves any more.

When this realisation finally filtered beyond the barrier in my brain that says,  “No!  You can never get rid of books”,  I started scanning to see just what (potentially) could go, and when I worked out what it was, it came as a bit of a shock.

Charles Stross, come on down.  You’re books and my bookshelf are about to part company.

Why is this a shock?  I’ll tell you.  Charlie’s books are a good read.  In fact, they’re a great read. BUT, will I be re-reading them?  Possibly not, so they’re prime candidates for eBay (unless anyone reading this fancies them, £1.50 each or 5 for £5 (I’ll list them later).  The reasoning behind their imminent demise is quite simple.  Although they are cracking reads – and they cover the whole spectrum of sf, from space opera to cybercrime and virtual worlds – they don’t give me the certain thing that the SF books I love do.  And that is a sense of wonder.  It’s not there.  I’m sorry Charlie, it’s not.  You’re books are very clever, but I can’t help feeling that there’s almost too much going on.  There’s no real sense of awe, and that’s what I loved about SF when I first picked up Asimov* and started reading.

Don’t get me wrong, I will continue to read your books as and when they come out, but as to whether they get permanent residence alongside the Moorcock, Heinlein and Reynolds, that will be decided on a book by book basis.

(* Asimov, for all he was probably the first SF writer I read, and still occasionally read, I don’t collect.  This is purely because, to me at any rate, his books come over as very dated now, whereas, there are others from the same period, who’s stories time has been kinder to.)

The next generation of manned spaceflight

Books of late

Just finished reading The Woman in Black, and really enjoyed it.  Good old fashioned ghost story, of the kind they jsut don't write any more. (well, obviously they do, or I couldn't have read this book, but you know what I mean)
Might have to dig out the M R James soon and give that a re-read.

At lunchtime today, I nipped into the library in GOMA, and took out The Kraken Wakes by John Wyndham.  It's just one of a host of classic sf/fantasy/horror, that I should have read but haven't. So.... time to catch up then.

Kindle reading is currently A Game of Thrones.