A bright spot

Today's been busy, the kind of day when you don't seem to stop but have no sense of actually achieving much. I suppose I did achieve a full larder, by once more getting out just after 8am on a sunny morning to do the supermarket shop; I did three separate loads of washing and dried it all outside before the promised rains arrive; I read the online Scotsman from cover to cover; I kept the radio on at lunchtime to hear when any results might come in ...

But I was especially pleased to get a text from my friend Charlie. That's him in the bottom left corner of my collage, and he wondered if I could bring down another couple of copies of my poetry collection for his shop, where he's already sold some of them before the last lockdown. I trotted down after lunch; walked along Argyll Street - and was, frankly, shocked at the number of shops that have closed. It was a real relief to come to The Trading Post, a new venture opened, again, in time of Plague to showcase and sell local crafts and artwork (and my book!) as well as to function as part of The Meeting Place, a charitable organisation  which "offers friendship and a safe space to chat for people who identify as having issues with their mental well-being within the Cowal and surrounding areas." It's a tribute to its organisers that the shop sells so many lovely things in such an attractive space, and right now it's a welcome sight.

After that we had yet another late afternoon walk through Benmore Gardens, where the rhododendrons are still offering interesting stages in their flowering and the leaves are like green froth on the trees. We saw a scampering red squirrel over the bright mossy grass, and in the quiet air we could hear a cuckoo calling. I'm going to choose one of the oodles of photos I took, just because ...

I watched the rolling update of election results on my phone as we drove home. It's always a good feeling when the candidate you've voted for, both as the party's candidate and in the election, comes romping home, and that's what's happened in Argyll, and I'm very pleased that Angus Robertson took The Baroness's former seat in Edinburgh. But I'm completely at a loss when it comes to Hartlepool and ...well, England. I don't get it. 

The next instalment of Scottish Democracy in Action tomorrow ...