Highland Line Number 29

Welcome to our new blogspot. Now we will be able to share photos with you more easily. Lynn will even be able to put up an album of quilts eventually. She is writing a little something here nearly every day. This will enable us to tell you some of the "side stories" that don't make it into the monthly Highland Lines. Feel free to bookmark and visit this site when you feel like "looking in" on us.

We are having brilliantly bright and sunny days and the most amazing night skies. If we stand behind the house, so that the light from the streetlamps doesn't intrude so much, our view is astounding. The sky is inky black and each star stands out as though on velvet. The last several nights we haven't actually found the moon but the rest of the sky is clear as can be. Of course, you know what comes with clear skies like these in winter: bitter cold and frost that lingers. These conditions create magical landscapes, especially fields filled with shaggy red Highland cattle or the now heavily pregnant ewes. (It's hard to believe that on some farms, lambing will begin in just a few weeks' time.)

Cold as it is out there, Donald has been playing 18 holes of golf virtually every day since the last Highland Line was sent--and his game is showing it, too. Yes, it's cold but he dresses in warm layers. The Comrie golf course is on a hill which is bathed with sun (if there is any) all morning long, so that and the exercise helps keep him warm. Enthusiasm takes him the rest of the way. Donald is currently teaching and/or teching one online course and consulting on another. This keeps him at the computer when he's not out playing golf.

Work on the house has happened in a couple of short and very productive bursts but the lulls in between are maddening. About 10 days ago, after over a month with no activity, the roof trusses were delivered. Our builders put up all the side wall framing that day. Unfortunately, that's all they could do until rented scaffolding could be delivered from Perth. Meanwhile, we can now very easily see the shape and dimensions of all our new spaces as well are where the doors and windows will be. On Monday of this week the scaffolding arrived and was erected. Now it's almost like being caught in a spider's web because we have to pick our way carefully out the one entrance that will allow us easy access to the car. That's also the way we must walk to leave the house—or even to collect the mail--because there is no direct access from the front of the house because of the combination of scaffolding, building materials, and other obstructions. And, of course, it's getting darker inside the house with these two layers surrounding us. (See pictures below.)

Bill, our contractor, stopped by yesterday morning with a handful of bills to be paid and the unhappy the news that our builder, who has turned to other jobs in this interim, will not get a crew back to our job until Friday of this week at the earliest. While this week is slated to remain sunny and cold but dry, we are supposed to be getting some nasty weather during the month of February. So we are not "best pleased" as they say around here. Bill says he will continue to "pressurize" the builder, which doesn't mean he'll make him into plywood but rather that he will keep the pressure on him. Using a rather quaint term where we might have said the builder "pulled a fast one," our contractor said that the builder "has been a wee bit naughty with me" for not only is our builder involved in another job, but it's down in Dumfries (where we went for our anniversary break at the end of December). Bill has taught us some local building-related words that we find curious and quite funny. For example, floor joists (and roof joists, too) are called "dwangs" in Scotland and "noggings" in England. What we'd call "firring strips" are called "declivity pieces." And the existing parts of the house that will have to be torn down prior to the additions being built, are called "downtakings."

To change the subject, January has been quite a month for music. Each January Glasgow holds its annual Celtic Connections Festival, with Celtic-related musicians, singers, and dancers from all over the world performing in a variety of venues over a period of 2 weeks. For years we have looked forward to being able to attend the festival to see some of our favorite performers and to get to know new ones. Unfortunately, we couldn't get tickets to all the events we would like to have seen but the one concert we attended in Glasgow's Concert Hall was most enjoyable and quite eclectic. There were Gaelic singers from the Isle of Lewis; set dancers from Kerry in Ireland; a lovely singer from Donnegal; fiddlers from Scotland, Ireland, Quebec, and Brittany; step dancers from other parts of Ireland; and a small combo of Irish musicians to accompany all the dancers. We drove to this concert (through rush-hour traffic and pouring rain) and had a pre-concert meal in the concert hall restaurant, The Green Room. It was a superb meal, in a unique setting, with friendly and helpful service as well as a most wonderful view over Glasgow's Buchanan Street. http://www.grch.com/grch/index.cfm?&pid=152&mid=150 We easily found a place to park in the multi-story carpark across the road from the venue which charges only £1 for the whole evening after 6 pm. And we didn't even get lost once! We thorough enjoyed this event that we have looked forward to for so long.

On January 18th, the Strathearn Music Society featured the Dunedin Consort. http://www.dunedin-consort.org.uk/. The 3 men and 3 women who performed for us (the Consort are a coterie of musicians who form various combinations for programs and touring) gave us music from all eras and countries in a delightful range of tempos and moods. It was one of the most well-received programs in the subscription series and, we understand, a case of "back by popular demand" as the group had appeared a couple of years ago while we were back in the States for our first visit. We are so glad we didn't miss them this time around.

Last Sunday evening, we went with another couple to the new concert hall in Perth to hear one of Scotland's best-loved singers, Barbara Dickson. She has been performing and recording since she began on the folk music scene back in the late 60s. Her career has moved from folk to pop to shows and even film theme songs. We have one cassette of Celtic folk music which she recorded about 10 years ago, which we have nearly played to shreds, but we had never seen her in person. What a treat! She performed a wide range of music, all superbly arranged, and accompanied by a 5-piece back-up group of consummate musicians. It was one of the most satisfying concerts of its type we've ever attended.

Last Friday night, Don went with our friend Haig Hamilton to Stirling for their annual Burns Night Supper. http://www.robertburns.org/suppers/. While they were away doing that, Haig's wife, Trish, and I took ourselves out to the Royal Hotel in Comrie for a leisurely evening of fine dining. (You know, of course, that we're referring to Scotland's national bard, Robbie Burns. If you've had a hard time reading his poetry because of the Scots' words, you can find translations on the Burns Website http://www.robertburns.org/inenglish/extracts.shtml.)

Lynn has finished making all the blocks for our summer bed quilt, has joined the blocks together in rows, and now has to decide how to quilt it and whether to do it herself. The quilt is made from Provencal fabric we bought in Paris back in the summer of 2000 and so is very cheery to work on at this time of year. The studio is in the process of gradually getting packed up and so she will have to make a decision fairly quickly. Meanwhile, she's also begun cutting out pieces of blocks for a special wall quilt so that she will have some hand-sewing to do while she has no access to either her studio or her machine.

We are in the process of planning our annual spring trip back to the Bethesda area and hope to see some of you soon. We appreciate your keeping in touch and hope this finds you well and contented.

Love,

Lynn and Don