Weekend; energy returns

The bathroom now has a wall, more or less. The stud work of 70 x 45mm timber awaits the sliding/pocket door mechanism which lies in its component pieces in a large cardboard tube on the bedroom floor. Plywood on the inside and plasterboard on the outside can come after the basic electrics (first fix) are in. Clerestory windows will be built in-situ to share light between the landing and bathroom – light from east and west.

So that was a bit of Thursday afternoon and all of Friday. In the evening I went into the magic room (views of loch and oak woods), switched on, plugged in and turned up for a bit of a guitar racket before supper. At eight thirty as I played a buzzard rose over the near woods, dark against the pale loch, except its languorous hovering was not quite that of a buzzard and I ran to grab binoculars and alert Tash. We climbed the rise between us and the neighbours and for five minutes watched an osprey; a treat we’ve waited over six months for.

Currently there’s a set of low tides we can’t explain as we’re closer to neaps than springs. The loch seems to be an anomalous zone when it comes to everything we’ve learnt about tides and tidal flows, but these low tides represent opportunities for observation and a bit of foraging, chiefly for some less pearly mussels though…

…Tash found our first live queen scallop, but generally the species still eludes us. This is a puzzle as otters (and or gulls?) leave collections of fresh shells on prominent rocks all the time. Perhaps some attentive snorkelling will pay off.

In the oak woods primroses, wood sorrel and wood anemones are appearing in the moss under the fabulous twisty oaks of indeterminate age.

So Saturday was a rambling kind of day, shore and woods, and today a day of home tasks – Tash went to release some of her tadpoles to a nearby pond to make more room in the Pyrex casserole and I put up more hooks for a swelling collection of stainless steel.

and then the garden, spuds in, seaweed on, rescue currants and raspberry canes planted and a few roughly shaped steps on an incomplete path.

Some thought is now needed to make sure the build doesn’t get stranded. I’m waiting to hear from the electrician but need to order guttering, talk to Andrew about final drain connections and some landscape shaping.

The external water tank and integral pump need to be ordered and fitted; better make some lists!