Retail therapy

Someone remarked the other day - several people, variously, actually - that I've been unlucky with holidays recently. And I have, beginning with the Covid-cancellation, a day before we were due to leave, of a holiday in Cyprus. On that occasion I treated myself to a new iPhone with the money I'd saved - or some of it - and spent a great deal of lockdown exploring the joys of its camera. 

Now the battery is showing signs of needing restoring - I didn't actually know you could do that - and, more potently, I've been suffering from camera envy. The latest model has a wonderful camera, and I've been admiring the clarity of the younger son's recent photos. The cancelled cruise provided us with the incentive - and the uncommitted fortnight - to go up to the Apple Store in Glasgow and buy new phones. (Don't judge me. We all have our weaknesses ...)

We had to wait this morning for the ferries to go back on, which they did at 10am after a night of winds of which we were barely aware - the wind was from the East and our house faces east with a hill behind it, and the sea looked flat to us because it was being blown to the other side of the firth. So it was 11am before we actually got on board, there being quite a queue for the two boats Western were running, and really lunchtime by the time we were ready to shop. 

I took the above photo in Buchanan Street quite near the Apple store after we'd been for a post-purchase bite in a nearby Café Nero, a pleasing branch with bookshelves full of random books and a radio like the one in our kitchen when I was a child (extra photo). Buchanan Street is a bit sad at the moment - beyond the red flags on the left a whole unit is being gutted by builders, the pavement outside piled high with fittings and shelf fixtures - and further up another large shop front seems to have collapsed but may simply be signs of further change of use. But there was a busker on the accordion playing When the Saints and people were ambling in the way of shoppers who have no particular need to be elsewhere and because it's a pedestrian precinct you could hear the voices and not the sounds of traffic. Even after 50 years away from the city, it still feels like home - I have to remind myself that there's not a house waiting for me in the west end. 

We popped into John Lewis briefly on our way back to the car - I yielded to temptation and bought a set of metallic Italic markers to do a bit of calligraphy with - but were still on our way home along the M8 to avoid most of the rush hour traffic. Tomorrow I shall have a go at setting up the new phone (do I have an e-SIM, or is it more conventional?) but for now it's still sitting in the box looking beautiful. 

And I have to do the shopping first ...