f4f3 | The diving bell and the flutterby posting, or, "Christ, is that the time?"

Well hullawrerr...

Lots of stuff since the weekend started.

We did one of my favourite things, and left for the cottage almost straight from work on Friday, and despite the dark and an unprecedented amount of traffic heading for Argyll, we were at the cottage by eight.

It's been too long. The first time since I went back to work after New Year, in fact. The pile of mail was bigger than ever, and I did my usual dig into it, sorting adverts from bank statements from the very occasional hand written letter. Buried in there was a letter from someone I was once close to, and I'm not at all sure how to reply to it. But that will work itself out with time, the same as everything else.

We had an excellent take away from the Taj, a nice bottle of something or other that had been left over from New Year, and watched 24: Redemption (your punctuation may vary). It was quite good, livened up by the mixture of familiar characters ("Ooh! Tom!") and REAL actors, like Robert Carlyle.

We slept in late on Saturday, had brunch in bed, and then turned down a drive to the Oyster Bar for lunch in favour of scavenging for dinner ingredients in Lochgilphead. The standard of produce on the main street isn't as high as it would be if we went nearer to the suppliers (11 miles south for seafood straight off the deck, 30 miles or so back to the Oyster Bar shop for everything) but I like being able to walk from the local butchers, where we got the beef fillet and some fresh veg (oh, ok, and two slices of square sausage for my breakfast on Sunday) to the deli for scallops and cheese (except I forgot to buy cheese). The scallops were froze, where Dougal's would have been on ice, but they still seared up a treat.

On Sunday we tidied up and waited for our guests to arrive. It's brilliant having children around at the cottage again, and we set out (after some beans and toast) to conquer Dunadd, despite the Picts throwing bogies at us from the heights. When we got back to the cottage Peter and I fought out a titanic struggle over the Monopoly board (he was a deserving winner) while

unblinkered and little E made Valentine's cake.

parthenia14 wibbled and had well deserved wine.

We had communal spag bol, garlic bread, lashings of wine, and Valentine's cake. We then joined in not watching Mission Impossible 3 (complete, utter tosh) and retired around midnight, a couple of drams to the good (I had the unpeated Caol Isla,

parthenia14 had two Laphroiags, and

unblinkered stuck to the 'Laddy Infinity.

It's still a little too early in the year for the drive down to Glasgow in the morning to be at its best - I left at 6.15, and the sun wasn't up until about 7.45, but it's still a pleasure, even at that hour. I stopped off at Dumbarton for Marks and Spencer prawn sandwiches, and was in work by 8.30. I have to admit that I was good for nothing from about three this afternoon, but now I'm home to a very quiet flat, a nice glass of Sauvignon blanc, and a new (to me) Lyle Lovett album. Tomorrow I'll have brilliant company again, but for tonight it feels pretty good to be on my own, listening to Lyle's muskrat rambles on the piano, and coming down...