For newcomers

At the bottom of each post there is the word "comments". If you click on it you will see comments made by followers, and if you follow the instructions you may also comment and I always welcome that. I have found many people overlook this part of the blog which is often more interesting than the original post!

My blog nick-name is SIR HUGH. I'm not from the aristocracy - my middle name is Hugh which relates to the list of 282 hills in Scotland compiled by Sir Hugh Munro in 1891. I climbed my last one (Sgurr Mor) on 28th June 2009

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Friday 17 October 2014

Busy but not walking

Leg seems to have recovered, more or less, from the the cellulitis type bacterial infection after taking on board enough antibiotic to solve the World health problem, but he still continues to rebel against the whacking I gave him with a branch somewhere around 15th September on my SW Coast Path walk, and which received another whacking when my hooped carbon fibre tent pole, under tension, released itself and struck again in the same place. Leg therefore has two wounds close together on the shin about a centimetre diameter which are not healing well and are still painful, and Leg seems to have the capacity to transfer that pain to me in retribution.

There is also the added problem of the blood clot in Lower Leg, not a dvt, and therefore not too serious, but I am still giving myself daily injections, and attending fortnightly at the hospital for scans, and also at my gp's nurse for attention to the wound. Lower Leg I am told is behaving himself according to the scans.

Of course, I am not whinging. Daughter High Horse may not agree.

I need to rest and keep the leg up as much as possible which I do in the evenings, but during the day I am always busy.

Have you heard of hacking? Buying an item as new and then modifying it to your own requirements, having a high hit rate with IKEA products. High Horse is into this and we’ve bought a bunk bed, from IKEA, for Katie’s birthday later this month, and I have been co-opted to hack.

As bought from Ikea (after the half day you have taken to assemble it)

An elaborate "hack" using two units

Work in progress - finished photo may appear later



Thursday walks with Pete are suspended for the moment - Pete has joined the wounded, suffering from arthritis and is taking tons of pills which he is assured, will, after some time, relieve things.

Today our walking substitute was a visit to a picture framers in the wilds  beyond Kendal used by Pete’s wife who is a talented amateur artist. The mission was to have framed a superb photo of Annapurna taken by David Ensor (David Ensor Travel Photography, www.davidensorphotos.co.uk ). David is the proprietor of Chiltern Lodge b and b at Worth Matravers where I stayed on the second night of my recent walk on the SW Coast Path (highly recommended), he has travelled extensively and organised his own treks to the Himalayas pursuing his passion for photography.

Photo by www.davidensorphotos.co.uk

The picture framer was located in a mini industrial estate hidden under the slopes of Scout Scar in the middle of nowhere. You could hardly move inside the place for stacks of wood that looked as though they had accumulated over a hundred years. It was a pleasure to chat with Michael the owner knowing it was he who would do the job, all so much better than handing over to some faceless multiple in the middle of town (watch out Gimmer - it looks as though I’m going conservative -  small c).

After that, despite not having walked, we still went for our usual wind-down at Café Ambio (located in the newly built livestock auction mart). It was a busy auction day, and as usual we followed the trail to the café of mixed sawdust and livestock leavings scattered, incongruously along the recently laid pristine vinyl flooring. All the farmers, in their working worn tweed suits and waistcoats, flat hats, wellies and boots were seated together at one end of the room, troughing, and telling the tale with lively bavardage - this is obviously a cherished social occasion for them (no ladies), and despite the clinical architecture of the building there was a strong atmosphere akin to attending a shepherds' meet in a seventeenth century pub in the Dales, belied by expensive 4 x 4s and nearly new Landrovers evident outside.

Time-out for the farmers at Ambio

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KATIE UPDATE

Perhaps she may get on The Two Blondes team?
twoblondeswalking.com

19 comments:

  1. Yes i have heard of hacking and I do it quite bit. I too have had to suspend some walks recently as I have had to put up new fencing and a new man cave.
    Currently I am building a new gate for the front of the house. I will post a piccy when completed.
    Glad to hear the leg is on the mend.

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  4. I don't think you are whinging! I think you are dealing with it all very calmly despite the humongous amount of time you are made to waste at the hospital. It says a lot when the most reassured you have felt is with the surgery nurse who is consistent and takes the time to talk to you and listen.

    There is only once place to go to for my hack and that is Dad! I can't wait to see her face when she sees it - she will spend hours playing in this I am sure!

    The photo of Katie was taken by my friend Claire who has an amateur interest in photography but has an uncanny talent at taking children's pictures. She has captured some outstanding frames of Katie and her friends over the summer and I think she could making a very good living from it!

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  6. How well you describe an event I would run a hundred miles to avoid. Let's hope that science evolves sufficiently to allow those farmers - in their excessively adjectival vestments - to reproduce their kind without any intervention from women whatsoever. Developing in pods hung on the walls of the sheep-shearing sheds (or in the back of £50,000 SUVs) and eventually emerging straight into some saloon bar where they may happily discuss the benefits of being plugged into the CAP.

    I suspect there's an irony here. At a guess they may well be anti-gay yet they lead lives full of grudging dissatisfaction when it comes to women; if only they could take the logical step forward and start kissing each other - mottled face against mottled face - thus acknowledging the evolutionary curve they have embraced. And why not? If they are happy in their lively bavardage might they be even happier under the duvet, hugging someone who is also wearing tweed pyjamas.

    There will however be one horrific moment of re-adjustment. When they face a prepared meal for dinner, having always insisted in the past that cooking is something only women do. And cissies.

    Never mind about conservative with either a majuscule or minuscule. That's yesterday's nightmare. What about with a capital U?

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  7. Alan R. - Yes, I have seen a number of your inventions on your blog. Can we have a pic. of the man cave, either work-in-progress or the finished item, preferably both?

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    Comments deleted - If you are like me you always wonder what drama has occurred to make somebody withdraw a comment, well this time I think High Horse inadvertently posted her comment four times - no drama or guilty second thoughts.

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    High Horse - You have got the most difficult job - assembling the Ikea thing, IN SITU, because it won't go through a door, and at the same time keeping it secret from K so she has a surprise on her birthday. Work continues chez moi with the bolt on hack, oops! That's given me an idea, may use bolts instead of screws.

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    RR - I am a bit paranoid about farmers for various reasons aired every now and then on my blog, and which leads me to cling to the stereotype I described, and which you extended into some thing worthy of Kurt Vonnegut.

    That was fantasy running amok - I got the impression you were on a roll and it was only your journalistic discipline that caused you to sign off before writing yourself into the planet of Tralfamadore.

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  8. Yes - I did post four times. Oops!

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  9. I was about to complain about the increasing degree of censorship evident here - but now you have me wondering about how to delete a comment oneself - where is the backdoor?
    I recommend you employ one of those chaps who makes and installs 'bespoke' fitted furniture - there seem to be plenty about these days - and use your your time on . . - oh, no walking yet?
    That's a fine pic of Annapurna - like the fabled painting, it seems to cast a spell, drawing acolytes in their thousands.

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  10. Gimmer wanted to show a photo in comments. I have tried putting a link to a photo from Dropbox but it doesn't go. I have done the same successfully on Wordpress blogs. Anybody any suggestions.

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  11. Gimmer - sadly the Annapurna thing has hit the news this week for the wrong reasons. I have always had an emotional feeling for A. It was where Ian Clough died who I knew as one of the kindest people I have come across in my seventy four years.

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  12. Why has Annapurna hit the news? I'm out of touch. How has all this come from your leg.

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  13. BC - hi John.

    Around thirty people have died on the routine trek to Annapurna in severe snowstorms and blizzards on a high col. A big rescue operation was involved. There were some survivors. It had been described as one of the worst mountaineering disasters ever.

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    1. Thanks for the info, sad that it's tragic. That pass. if it is the Thorong LA. is not easy and is a long way from anywhere. Probably lots of inexperienced people in the wrong place at the wrong time. Still a great shame.

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  14. She looks like a True Blonde to me! Maybe Tiny-Miss-Blonde?

    Hacking sounds like enormous fun, we did a little bit ourselves and have one IKEA bed that has existed in several forms.

    We have some leg-whinging going on here too - poor old Mr Blonde Two rather overdid the cycling thing!

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  15. how about just typing the link in thus:


    https://www.dropbox.com/sh/iwrssgfjnwvdczm/AAA4d_nX7Vy--suIraGlyFhma?dl=0

    which if it does not link directly, can at least be copied and pasted into a browser address box - it came from safari so that would be safest.

    does it work?
    but you will need to add 'why' the pic is added, of course

    I endorse your note about the number of comments on eg this post vs the Glen Affric one - maybe you saw AS' response to my post on his blog: I get the distinct feeling that I may have to emerge from my retirement from public life if this goes on!

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  16. well, i made a proper mess of that -
    wrong file entirely - luckily it probably won't land me in jail:
    at least 'copy and paste' works - in both safari and opera - don't even think of asking about IE !

    here's the correct file link - but I'll leave it to you to explain why I thought it might be aposite . . .

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/rzl0zdbxse02swb/IMG_0448.JPG?dl=0

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  17. I will be on the case later tonight or early tomorrow, and grateful for some fodder for the blog, albeit not potatoes.

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  18. Gimmer has recently returned from a trip to France and amongst his explorations visited a livestock market and wanted to show his photograph contrasting French farmers with the somewhat tongue in cheek picture I painted in this post of our northern English guys.

    Here is the link to Gimmer's Dropbox:

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/rzl0zdbxse02swb/IMG_0448.JPG?dl=0

    You will need to copy this and paste it into your browser because the direct path will not work in Comments.

    The French farmers here appear to be much more businesslike and smart - they could be part of a visiting group of senior executives from Crédit Agricole, and you can well imagine them sipping their coffees with a good Cognac after a satisfying lunch in a local restaurant, compared with sausage egg and chips and tea at Café Ambio.

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