Rising above it all

I reckon I'm glad that's today done. The morning was the stuff of farce, really - beginning with The Gas Man, who came to call at 8.45am when I was just finishing my toast. I don't do well with tradesmen while I'm at breakfast, and when he eyed the table off which I was eating, clearly thinking he'd put his grotty bag of stuff on it, then went instead to put it on a chair, I heard my voice say as if confronted by a troublesome pupil: "Don't put that bag there, please - put it on the floor." Apparently he wasn't supposed to, because his ancient clients might fall over it, but I assured him I was coming nowhere near him.

This had just been resolved and work on the boiler commenced when I got a message on Twitter: EE were sorry my WiFi wasn't working and would we please phone this number for assistance ... As Himself has been dealing with this, I let him, but I was soon involved. A charming Irishman called Alan phoned while Himself was still in a 30 minute queue, so he dumped the first call and we spent the next two hours - two hours - going up and down stairs, testing signals/no signals in different parts of our tall Victorian house till our legs and backs ached. In the course of this our television re-connected itself, then the radio tuner, and a miserable trickle of WiFi even got as far as the kitchen ... there's a further disc on the way and he's phoning us back on Tuesday...

While all this was going on, I managed to apply for a renewed driving licence (seems no time since the last one) and write the Intercessions for Sunday. Then I made sourdough flatbreads for lunch and collapsed with the paper - only to realise I'd forgotten to do my Italian in all the bourach and would miss out on a whole day's worth of double points. I was doing this when Di texted - would I like to go for a walk?

But yes! And the photo shows where we walked - above the Holy Loch, starting at Ardnadam, high above the felled forest and the fallen trees, looking towards the Tail O' the Bank. I've not climbed as high for a while; it may be that or just the culmination of everything that is making me so sore tonight. We talked about the effect of the state of society on educational standards - two retired teachers who know it all!

Currently half my family is still driving home from the north of Spain; there was some gig in the south-west of England today that had them crawling for miles, and as a result they've just crossed the Scottish border. I hope they're home before I put the light out!

Extra of the extraordinary light on the Firth this morning - one of my window-hanging photos!