Whimsy fountain

A certain Scottish newspaper offered a 20 per cent voucher off all gardening plants today at a certain garden centre.

Well, I rushed there armed with my voucher only it was blowing such a gale that I daren't venture out into the display area.

Instead I bought a book on "30 -minute gardening", offering tips and tricks for a great garden super-fast!
I am all for that. OK not quite in the spirit of a dedicated gardener but what the h.... our climate is so fickle these days that some days we are jolly lucky if we get 30 minutes of weather to do gardening.

On my way home I stopped in the pouring rain and blipped the Nineveh fountain in Bridge of Allan.

It was one of those potential blip pix I was keeping for a rainy day.

And today is that rainy day.

The fountain, with its cast iron Doric column, was built in 1851 as whimsy by a local landowner to commemorate the excavations going on at the time at the site of the original Nineveh (on the River Tigris in modern day Iraq).

Who would have thought genteel Bridge of Allan some links, even tenuous ones, with Iraq?

Today this Victorian spa town promotes itself vigorously to the tourist trade and next month will be hosting the first ever Vintage Day, which will include a street party.

Some Edinburgh folk, for reasons best known to themselves, refer to Bridge of Allan as Ponte d'Allan.