Escape...

Today was the first time I've been off the Cowal peninsula since October. Seven months - I'll not say in Dunoon, because we've been in the surrounding countryside for walks - stuck on this side of the water, looking across, cutting my own hair. I rather like the lunatic picture that conjures up, as if I stood there distraught, hacking constantly at Medusa-like locks ...

Enough of fancy. Along with Himself, acting as chauffeur partly because of the difficulty of securing a parking place nearby, I was off on the 9.40 ferry to The Other Side to visit my hairdresser, whom I hadn't seen since the end of September. (Himself didn't have to languish - he was meeting a friend for a walk and man-chat, which is always A Good Thing and not something, to my mind, that chaps do nearly often enough.) I was swathed in plastic, with a mask on, no coffee (my hairdresser isn't allowed to serve my customary espresso under current regs) and no magazines (though he does have cards at each station where you can scan a QR code and read unlimited magazine articles on your phone: I got fed up peering at mine without my specs on.) My hair is now considerably shorter and a good, vibrant flame colour - he's a marvellous cutter. Such a relief!

When I'd finished, the café next door had opened for lunches, so I was able to pop in for a double espresso to go before the chaps arrived - in their two cars - to say hello/pick me up. (I went with Mr PB) We were home in time for a late lunch, which began in the sunny garden but was swiftly resumed indoors when the clouds came over and the temperature plummeted. It's weird weather. My extra photo comes from this morning: it shows the deck of the Western Ferry looking forward to where a neat little naval ship is causing our skipper to alter course to avoid it. We weren't encouraged to get out of our cars (or "mingle" on the car deck) or I might have done better, but it was a neat moment and lets you see down the Firth towards the Cumbraes on the left and Arran on the right.

My main photo comes from a walk we had before dinner, and I'm really pleased with it, as I think it has a faintly surreal, arty look to it. The Rothesay ferry is crossing the Firth to Wemyss Bay along a knife-edge horizon against a dark sky full of ... sleet? Hail? Arran is hidden behind a shower; the dark tongues of land are Bute on the right and Cumbrae on the left. To the stern of the ferry is a tiny yacht heading in the opposite direction, and the sea, sheltered from the NE wind, has a wonderfully metallic sheen. 

I may feel like having this enlarged for my wall some day - not only because of the image, but also because I was feeling so much better than I was yesterday. Michael the Hair had a good deal to do with it - but so did you, Blippers, with your supportive and empathetic comments. Goodnight!