The bees are currently asleep. In Scotland, when the temperature goes below 10degC, they form a cluster around the queen and go into a “torpor” sleep. The most important thing for them at this point is to keep the queen warm so that she survives through to spring.

Meanwhile, I’ve been looking at more ways to use honey and wax – the very traditional uses that have been common for centuries. Honey is messy and takes a bit of work, but is incredibly rewarding. I love watching the amber gold pour stickily into the jars after filtering. I’m constantly amazed at how the flavour can differ so much, depending on what the bees have been foraging. I decided last year (2021) to revamp my labels as I’ve now got a better idea of the kind of image I want to promote – not so much a “traditional” look but rather a modern and natural look and although I can’t claim that it’s organic honey (I’ve got no control over the pesticides that may be being used in the gardens nearby) I wanted to have an eco-friendly look as well.

I decided to use the name/label my sister had invented as a play on my name, and it has made people smile when they see it. At least, they should remember the name of my label. I had to include the standard information that is required, which means putting a “best before” date (even although everyone know honey can still be edible after 1,000 years).

The bees are currently asleep. In Scotland, when the temperature goes below 10degC, they form a cluster around the queen and go into a “torpor” sleep. The most important thing for them at this point is to keep the queen warm so that she survives through to spring.

Meanwhile, I’ve been looking at more ways to use honey and wax – the very traditional uses that have been common for centuries. Honey is messy and takes a bit of work, but is incredibly rewarding. I love watching the amber gold pour stickily into the jars after filtering. I’m constantly amazed at how the flavour can differ so much, depending on what the bees have been foraging. I decided last year (2021) to revamp my labels as I’ve now got a better idea of the kind of image I want to promote – not so much a “traditional” look but rather a modern and natural look and although I can’t claim that it’s organic honey (I’ve got no control over the pesticides that may be being used in the gardens nearby) I wanted to have an eco-friendly look as well.

I decided to use the name/label my sister had invented as a play on my name, and it has made people smile when they see it. At least, they should remember the name of my label. I had to include the standard information that is required, which means putting a “best before” date (even although everyone know honey can still be edible after 1,000 years).

For the first time in AGES I took the bus into Edinburgh. Actually, I hardly ever take the bus, but since getting my free bus pass it seems that it would be sensible to use that mode of transport. Besides, parking in Edinburgh is a real pain.

I had forgotten the sound of “tarum-bump … tarum-bump …” as we went over the joins in the Forth Road Bridge. Since the new bridge opened several years ago, that’s always been the way we cross the river. The view from the bus windows was also just that little bit different from the car window on the new bridge. I forgot that I was wearing a mask.

When I first moved out of the city to relocate in Fife, I remember that quite a few friends point blank refused to come and visit. It was too far. But I could come in to visit them, and meet up, and do “things”. It seemed a bit churlish to point out that it was exactly the same distance, and visiting me was easier for parking. However, more often than not I decided to just travel in. It was easy in the evening when we decided to go to listen to live jazz. The roads were quiet, and it took no more than 30 minutes door to door, sometimes just 20 minutes. There was always a sense of escape as we crossed back over the bridge. Although we still had a few miles to go, the crossing of the Forth symbolised escaping from the city. Was it just imagination that the air cleared as well?

Edinburgh was looking spectacular. I walked along the Gardens underneath the Castle, and even the local drunks looked as if they were enjoying the fresher air and being outdoors. I had a moment of anxiety as I climbed the stairs out of the gardens – quite a few people were walking along that bit of pavement and it looked difficult to negotiate a “social distance” safely. So I looked straight ahead and just kept going to cross the road. The idea that I looked too serious and un-friendly briefly crossed my mind, but it seemed more important to get across to the quieter pavement safely.

I met some lovely friends for coffee and we chatted about what we’d managed to achieve with venturing into the world again, and visits to family, and little outings. It was good to share the balance we’re trying to get in our lives as retirees and in the “vulnerable” group. We parted with promises to do it again very soon, and I expect we might just manage to make this a regular meetup, if we can even manage to find a time when we’re all free.

There are different laws in European countries about the right to use public buildings and panoramas in photos. There is a move to make all EU countries follow the same laws. 

More information on http://youcan.fixcopyright.eu/thankyou/ 

First attempt to embed an Adobe Slate photo story

Oh dear … it’s been a year since I’ve written a post on this blog. It came to my attention because some people have started following the blog. I hope they weren’t looking for up-to-the-minute ideas!

So my task for the next few days is to write some interesting blog posts.

:-)

We’re approaching another Burns’ Night (25th January, for those who don’t know) but this year I’m really looking forward to the BBC programme about one of the major inspirations to Burns – Robert Fergusson.

The information about the programme is on http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/2sxS8SRnPQRw0LTg44FxCjp/the-incredible-mental-health-legacy-of-the-man-who-inspired-robert-burns, which also has a trailer for the documentary.

Every year the Fergusson Society lay a wreath on his gravestone in the Canongate Kirkyard

What’s the best way to share a video on a blog? After having a quick look at the WordPress video add-on, which is quite pricy, I decided to try a work-around. First, I created a movie trailer on the iPad, using iMovie. This gave me a video clip that was short, but not short enough for flickr (which allows 90seconds only). So I had to edit the trailer, also using the iPad. I imported the trailer into the iMovie project folder, which allowed me to cut a little bit off the beginning and end (I couldn’t find a way to crop or change the trailer on iMovie).

This gave me a shorter (58second) trailer, which I then uploaded to flickr. It was plenty small enough (I’m allowed up to 500MB of video on flickr, and this was 21,678KB), but it took several tries before flickr accepted the upload. For some reason (haven’t worked out why) I kept getting an error message saying that the upload had timed out. Eventually I used the built-in “old” uploadr on flickr, and that worked.

This gave me embed code to embed in this blog. The embed code is in the “share” drop-down menu on flickr.

So here it is!

When we got married, my new husband brought along a fish tank with 4 angel fish, 4 scarlet tetras, and several albino corries. The we bought a blue samurai, which unfortunately didn’t last very long. He was very beautiful, with his long fronds, but he didn’t get along with the others very well.
Since then two of the angel fish have died, both within a very short time of each other.
And today another one decided to go and join them in fishy heaven (well – actually just a different kind of water supply … ).
So why is it easy to see fish come and go and not get too worried about it? Is it because we eat fish? Not that there would be very much protein in an angel fish. They didn’t have names, so maybe that makes it easier to flush one away (oops!)?
Or do we expect that as fish don’t have feelings, there’s no need to have feelings about them either? Is it a case of projecting onto the animals the emotions we would feel, and so if there’s no communication of feelings then we can’t respond to them?
That doesn’t bode we’ll for meeting aliens from another planet …

Meanwhile, the one remaining Angel seems to be a bit more lonely.