vivdunstan

Pleased to see SNP win our constituency Angus South. And also pleased to see Greens win a couple of constituency seats in Glasgow and Edinburgh. Our SNP MP Stephen Gethins has been newly elected as the MSP for Dundee East, so we will have a Westminster by election upcoming in our seat. But that's ok. Also happy that the Liberals continue their long-time history with Fife North East. Will be interested to see how the regional vote plays out. I voted Green for the regional list.

Martin had a very brief lunchtime visit on Friday to Broughty Ferry harbour, after he’d dropped off loads of books for me to Broughty Ferry Oxfams. It was the first beautifully sunlit day for many weeks, so he took his big camera and got some great photos of birds. He’s uploaded loads to his Flickr account, but here is one I liked the most.

Starting to watch a Sky Arts broadcast (recorded, and available on catch up for those with Sky) of Nicola Benedetti and friends (including a classical guitarist and an accordionist) in concert. We had tickets for her Dundee show in the autumn but had to bail out after I was too direly ill with a heavy cold to be able to go. The same tour’s concert in Belfast was filmed, and includes lots of folk-themed music. So yes, we are getting to see it after all!

Martin tonight: “I go for months, and the only mammals I see are grey squirrels (and dogs and cats). And then today I see roe deer and otter!”

This is in his usual walk, to the wooded river valley just near our home. He walks there, a short distance, from home each Saturday.

The otter was swimming happily in the lower Dighty Burn. It was cartwheeling over and over in the water for ages. He's never seen an otter in the wild before.

Photographed in the back garden of Martin’s company STAR-Dundee today.

Continuing my reread, and another one I couldn't remember, which is particularly surprising given a strong Dundee element within it!

( spoilers )

Last night’s episode of BBC Scotland’s Landward includes a marvellous report about the dolphins in the River Tay by Dundee 🙂 Is on the iPlayer in the UK.

Northern Scotland had some pretty impressive thunder and lightning today. Including us in Angus. Checking our broadband (part fibre) router log, our Internet went down 12 times between 2.54pm and 4.17pm, during the height of the thunder and lightning storm this area experienced all afternoon. I'm so glad Martin was at home today. Key roads around Dundee were flooded, as well as the Overgate Shopping Centre. Martin was home for a dental appointment, and also took loads of books to Oxfam's, and library books back for me. But luckily that was hours before the storm hit. We had quite a lot of lightning he says (I was asleep!), but the main thing was the very loud constant rumbling thunder for hours. Oh and because he'd taken the day off the frequent loss of Internet didn't affect his work.

We also lost broadband Internet connection briefly around midnight/1AM on Monday morning, though that was just before a power cut hit (luckily briefly!) 5500 properties in DD5 and DD7. But yes, been a bit of a week.

New glasses picked up from the optician. Although it has been interesting seeing afterwards how polarised glasses can cope - or not - with mobile devices like smartphones. Funky colour effects! Luckily this will not be a major problem for me. But I do think the optician should have warned me before. It's also been a good heads up to warn Martin not to go for polarised glasses in future.

But that aside I'm very pleased with my two new pairs of glasses. I am asleep for so much of the time that the polarised sunglasses don't get much use at all. The non polarised clear glasses are worn at night when I'm awake and watching TV. Though living in Dundee, which is particularly renowned for being especially sunny, all year round, I do prefer dark sunglasses when outside in the day, and they are very much needed then.

Today's afternoon outing also saw us enjoy a snack/late lunch in a nearby cafe/deli before I went to the opticians. And grab a punnet of more fresh Monifieth (the town where we live on the edge of Dundee) strawberries.

Just checking for local cinemas near us showing the Doctor Who finale on 31st May (they're screening the last two episodes of the current season together). It's on in the Odeon (just up the road from us, in Douglas) and Cineworld (in Camperdown). And that's just in Dundee. We will be watching it at home. But yup, it's broadcasting in many UK cinemas. Vue too.