Song.

 

The chill weather isn't deterring the golfers. Down by the club house there's already a group of twenty or so waiting to tee off. A Dutch father with his teenage son ask if we can take their photograph by the first tee. They say 'Wow ! O Wow ! ' with a strong accent that becomes  ' Vow ! O Vow ! This sounds ever so slightly comical to Anglo Saxon ears. 

Not every golfer arrives in their own private helicopter. For most it's the golfing experience of a lifetime. It would seem that since working at home became a thing the number of folks playing golf has soared. One gentleman informs me that before Covid he and his buddey were the only folks on his local Pittsburgh course on a Wednesday afternoon. Now it's booked up solid.

Outside the chapel a tour group from Alabama are singing. It's a church group. Their pastor is overcome with emotion at standing in a spot where John Knox once stood. Angus can't help but think that this is the first time in a long time that John Knox has unleashed such positive emotion. An American academic once told me that prior to the revolution John Knox was seen as the father of the country. 

The wee town still full of cheerful  country dancers. Peering into the exam hall there's a mass of kilts. The janitor , who is being paid overtime to keep a watchful eye on things, says the dancers like the exam hall because it has a sprung floor. Tonight is the grand dance off. Coffee cups are the janitors pet peeve . They leave rings on the furniture. Wet umbrellas are also a bete noire of his.

All three seagull chicks are still alive. Two are doing well. The third seems to be two to three days behind its siblings in the flight department. Mother and father continue to keep a watchful eye on the wee thing. There must be a hundred or so young gulls bobbing around on the rock pools below the castle this morning. After their first flight their first chance to swim ? I enjoy these invisible rituals of a small seaside town.

Problems with the construction. The concrete floor in the conservatory has been badly laid. It's not even and has to come up again. A pneumatic drill is hard at work all Friday. Dust gets everywhere. There is nothing like a pneumatic drill for generating dust. The builders will be back in force today. Angus is glad he negotiated a firm fixed price contract with a penalty clause if things stretch beyond mid-August. That gives the builders another ten days to get things finished. The door in the 'cabin' is now in place but the small roundel that's due to be set into the wall is still 'en route' from Germany.

A new hotel in Paris. Could a place be any more French ? :https://www.lafantaisie.com/