Posts Tagged: isla
Cycling & Swimming – 10 May 2015
Catching up with Tom and Ray at the Etape Caledonia. Tom talked me through what to do if you have a bike crash in downtown San Francisco, as he’d just done. I may have over emphasised his beat up look, but not by much. The next day we thrashed round the 81 miles in the wind and the rain. 
Tough if you like cycling in the sun, perfectly fine if it’s the grit in cycling that you like.
Before that, a coffee and a sketch to mark the first time all the kids have gone swimming without me.
Kings Cross, waiting for the late last train to Edinburgh.
Outdoors/ Indoors – 8 April 2015
The kids being chased round the garden of Grays Court hotel by Henry the resident dog. Our slightly rowdy bunch spent a warm and sunny afternoon in their elegant, calm garden. 
Back in Edinburgh we are inside waiting for the hailstones to stop and the icy winds to die down. 
Luckily some of the excellent Dr Seuss books are being made into films. We stayed in and watched ‘The Lorax’.
Spring – 21 March 2015
At last, the spring equinox. I like the dark, but on balance, we’re now in the better half of the year.
Sunnier, brighter and a bit more colourful: we’re all quite excited. F & I have a birthday…
… and I have a talk to do:
Just in case you’d like to talk about drawing in Camden on a Tuesday evening.
Tablets and Towers – 26 February 2015
F&I engrossed by the family’s toy tablet.
They can work it effectively, better than their dad on his new Microsoft Surface. The Surface is a classic compromise: unimpressive as a tablet, not that great as a laptop, handier than carrying both around on a push bike.
Some waiting room fish.
Sitting in the lobby of Manchester’s Beetham Tower talking PRS with the nice guys who manage the residential half of the building. The Beetham is a little short of 50 storeys, and half an hour later we concluded our tour on the windy roof. I’d have done a sketch but I needed both hands to hold on and my eyes were shut.
Places to stay in Aberdeen – 21 February 2015
When the ‘quine’ wobbled through reception at 5.00pm, belly hanging out over her pyjama bottoms, leather bomber jacket, no shoes, trailing a toilet roll, I sensed this was going to be a little different from my normal night in a Travelodge.
The next morning, checking out, I mentioned to reception that I couldn’t hear the rowdy night in the street outside for the party going on in the corridor. “Aberdeen at the weekend sir, I can only apologise.”
We spent the day recovering in a beautiful, if unfinished, family house on a farm.
“Which way’s the countryside?” said Innes (he’s a city boy, like me) so we went for a walk to show him.
The next day was back to normal life between London and Edinburgh.
Royal Festival Hall – 27 January 2015
Our HTA Sketch Club joined forces with the London Society for a trip to the Royal Festival Hall. I was inspired by some 1951 illustrations of the design, and by the characters who came along to draw and chat about it afterwards. 
It was a great pleasure to meet octogenarian former architecture tutor Maggie, who set me straight on a few things.
Earlier, I felt among friends with oldest pals Scott, Pete and Dougal…
…and alone hogging a big empty table in an otherwise packed west London restaurant.
Back home with Isla and Fraser.
How to Predict the Weather – 3 January 2015
On the first day of the Christmas break I read an article about how the Romans had used the Twelve Days of Christmas to predict the weather for the coming year, so I thought I’d take a look. 
Starting after Christmas Day (above), watch what the weather does each day and extrapolate that to the relevant month. Now I’m sure that the Augurs had a system to make it seem much more complex than that but that’s what I did. January isn’t looking great but March will be nice. 
Trouble is, it’s hard to keep track even of something as simple as that. Stuff happens: this is Fraser in the Sick Kids (he’s alright now). 
So I missed a couple of months through spending too much time inside. 
I’d recommend that if you’re planning to take a holiday in July you go abroad as it’s going to be very wet here, and if you’re going to visit Edinburgh for the Festival, go for the second half of August. September should be lovely.
Thinking about it, it seems surprising that the Romans would have had Twelve Days of Christmas. Perhaps two weeks of parties, family illness and little exercise have left me a bit confused.
Time to get back to work.
Bananas – 15 December 2014
Bananas:
I dislike the colour, the smell, the texture, the taste, the shape and the word. Everyone else seems to like them though, so I accept them and we live in peace.
Isla and …
…my mum, telling us how it is.
Innes listening, or maybe thinking about something else. He loves bananas.
Heisker – 16 November 2014
Heisker is a wee island off North Uist, and a new face at Gran’s for lunch.
Before that, reading some funny French words.
London, Pumpkin, Derby – 27 October 2013
Scots on tour in London stopping for lunch at Grosvenor’s Neo Bankside
Innes’s third birthday: a Halloween theme.
In Derby thinking: ‘When you think about Derby, what do you think?”
Feilden Clegg Bradley, Pugin, Sir Hugh Casson, Smiths of Derby? None of that: Rolls Royce, Bass’s beer, trains, the industrial revolution and Bonnie Prince Charlie.
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