Nondescript and busy

As I start writing this entry, I have no title - at the moment, nothing suggests itself. Perhaps it's because today seemed at once nondescript and busy with an odd variety of tasks and experiences, beginning with the usual need to get the morning Italian practice done before it was too late. I was still on my last exercises when Himself announced that the organ repair man was on the ferry and could he have his coffee now please, before he went to collect him? He then disappeared and didn't come home, chilled to the marrow, until well after 1pm. 

Meanwhile I decided that such a mild day (12ºC) was suitable for planting the few bulbs I bought a couple of weeks ago, so I was out crouching on the patio clearing pots, digging compost and planting - some golden crocuses and some anemones - and arranging some thorny branches over the pots to deter the cats that come round to find a loo. Then it was upstairs to write the intercessions for tomorrow before allowing myself to watch the video of Janey Godley's funeral in St Mary's Cathedral in Glasgow. My friend Kelvin, the Provost of the cathedral, preached the best of sermons - hard to hit just the right note for something like this, but he did. Then Himself returned and took me up to the church to move the Advent wreath - with his help - into its correct position. It's heavy. I'm feeling it now...

A brief crash with the paper after lunch was all I allowed myself before I went out to see if anyone had managed to supply the brand of Beta-blockers that I need because they don't have talc in them. The town was actually a bit of a nightmare: I got into the chemist just before they shut up shop because they were right in the  middle of the revelries that accompany the switching-on of the Christmas lights. There were the usual rides from hell - the one that wheechs you up in the air and then drops suddenly comes to mind - and the noise was appalling. I retreated along the road to the other end, found another pharmacy open but unable to help, and carried on, despite the arrival of some rain ... and wind ... to the West Bay, where there wasn't another soul and the only sound was the pounding of the waves on the shore (top left).

Leaving the promenade, I ducked up a narrow road to the only other shopping street in town, where the Primary School takes up half of one side and the lively wine bar that is the bright spot in the lower photo. The street was deserted, but the wine bar was throbbing with people talking, drinking wine, eating this and that - and I thought, not for the first time, what a brilliant idea it was of the vintners to develop in this direction. 

And that was it, really - but the Christmas presents that I've begun to order are now filling my inbox with notices that they're on their way and I've just had a rare inspirational moment about something else I can buy. 

But not tonight. Tomorrow is a busy day. For a change ...