A day with the chaps

I've just found via my Fitbit that I've walked almost 9k today without really noticed it, for the first time in what feels like weeks. We had a bit of last-minute shopping to do in the morning (when you discover just before a holiday that you've run out of Marmite ...) which meant braving the crowds in the supermarket on a day when I'd meant to avoid the place like the plague. But my chaps - #1 son and our two grandsons - arrived in time for lunch; we had pasta followed by Christmas pudding, complete with custard (by request) and flamed in brandy and then walked off all these calories in a quick march along the Ardyne road by the sea as the air-thinned blade of the moon appeared, followed by the Evening Star...

So far, so poetic - but the boys charged onto the tiny strip of beach left by the high tide and became completely absorbed by heaven knows what: stones, skiffers, seaweed, random seabirds. You can just make them out in the photo, mainly because Alan (11) had a bright orange jacket on. By the time we were heading back it was considerably darker, with a red glow in the Western sky and the honking of innumerable unseen Canada geese in the field inland. It had become considerably colder than I've felt it for weeks, and it was just lovely in the way these unplanned outings can be.

A couple of hours later they were away again, fortified by cake and tea, and we were left with the washing-up. 

Extra photos of the sky over Bute just because I have two left and who knows what the morrow will bring?