Great Scottish Swim

So here I am in the car driving, (I'm not obviously) through to Strathclyde Country Park for my one mile open water swim in the loch. The act of typing this on the phone is not unlike the feeling I am experiencing in my belly all shoogly and unstable.

It's the nerves you see. I may be getting on and unlikely on any sporting endeavour to come high enough to stand on the winners podium but the adrenalin still flows with the only competition being myself and if I do myself justice. The training gone well I have covered the distance a few times in the build up so the mile distance is achievable. The wet suits been swim tested in open water the sepentinr in London so here I am,

A mile I know is not far if you are a big swim type but for an avowed land mammal like me it's a challenge a big challenge. I've swallowed and spluttered water in almost every session and have a lurking sensation that I'll sink. However the wet suit is very bouyant and there are plenty of safety staff.

It should not be too chilly but I'm sure I can cope. I'll draw on my outdoor education courses from school when one had to undertake a swim test irrespective of wether you were to hill walk or canoe. It was probably about 100-150 metres but I went to these places in winter and a deep Scottish loch in February is not the warmest place to be in just a pair of trunks!

Wish me luck T minus 80 minutes....,,


-- Post From My iPhone

I have a hearing problem

So here I am waiting for the plane home to the land of the compassionate release, "The Best Wee Compassionate Country in the World" sign now hanging over the arrivals lounge in Edinburgh Airport if not already there it can't be long surely.

Yes a hearing problem I know it's hard to believe with lugs like mine but I'm not talking about becoming deaf I'm talking about acquiring super sensitive hearing, just call me Fegrig the bat. I'm sitting here minding my own business and a chap 25 metres away has shared his plans with me regarding his next corporate take over.

I didn't ask god or anyone for this gift or had an electrocution experience in the style of Mel Gibson when afterwards he could hear womens thoughts in that movie of his but here it is big lugs sooking in all that noise.

The takeover price is a bit expensive seemingly and perhaps wrongly it's based on 2011 valuation, would you credit it?

But wait my enhanced powers have ceased, what has happened? Ah wait the gob on legs has stopped strutting around like some preening peacock making loud mating calls to potential Mrs Peacocks and he has stopped talking, there is a God!

Perhaps the poor unfortunate on the receiving end of the call had a cerebral infarct due to the overwhelming noise and is now being rushed to ER as I type?

The next time I hear this kind of pap assailing my ears I think that I should also strutt around chest out and loudly vocalise some story dredged from my nursing experience. Perhaps from my senior surgical placement on urology, my stint in the surgical theatre and the time I witnessed ( for life saving purposes) the removal of......well let's just say that the peacock tonight would not be as preening. Escape! flight being called and I trot off like some recently rehomed ex battery hen escaping from the noise of the battery shed.

Oh no he's on my plane! This fact alone would move me to campaign vigourosly against the use of mobiles on BMI flights. The thought of gobby peacock guy spouting forth on his favourite topic "me and how important my business is" with no escape for one hour would try the patience of any of my fellow passengers not just me.

Perhaps collective action would ensue in the style of flight 57 with gobby trussed, stuffed, muffled cries demanding release. By then of course my hearing problems would return but this time I think I can feel deafness coming on. Pardon?




-- Post From My iPhone

Whats in a name?

Good Morning!
It seems so long ago that I wrote anything down. Of course the old constant of why would anybody be interested in reading what I have to say? But what the heck it's a Mind Health Thing, the 21st century diary?

So the winter is coming and in our house that means getting the wood burning stove fired up. The use of the wood burner is a cyclical event, with the collecting, storing, chopping and splitting of the wood taking place generally in the spring/summer, with the fruits of this labour being burned in the late autumn/winter.

We get our woods from various sources including waste wood from DIY projects that would normally end up in land fill! Last weekend four large builders sacks full from a building project - a house extension. This week we have been offered cut leylandii trees.

Now these trees have a bit of a reputation as the delinquents of the garden growing out of control, becoming the source of neighbourhood disputes. I don't think one can blame the trees though, in the same way that you can't blame the dog for sniffing peoples pheromone emitting areas and of course it's poor parenting that results in an uncontrollable child.

So anyway back to the trees they also have a reputation for being bad for the stove so I thought I would trawl the web to see if this is true. I came across several forums of a wood burning stove nature and some of the user names employed by authors made me giggle and had me thinking what influenced them to choose the names?

Ancient Yew, Tree Beard, Ash, BarbieQ, HatchtheMatch, Firestarter - slight concern at that one and my favourite Clem the Crem.

What good names have you come across?

Back to the wood prep
Fegrig