An awesome sight.

The unknown gentleman ( I'm assuming it's not a lady ) who writes 'poems' has put his latest offering  up on the town notice board. He is not at all happy that the council have allowed restaurants and cafes to expand onto the pavement. This would seem to be grumpy retiree syndrome of the highest order. The words 'greet' and 'fie' tell me he's a real local.

A fine sunrise. We have the beach to ourselves apart from the lady with the yappy  Pomeranian. 

Half an hour later, as we head back to the car, a small army of students come  running down the sand towards us. The arrival of exam season is clearly triggering the healthy body, healthy mind interconnect.

By the cafe we meet a professor walking his two very fine labradors. He wonders if France has become ungovernable. His view is that a 'technical government' is the only solution. We think it more likely Macron will resign in order to 'reboot' the political scene. Our conversation drifts away as we watch thousands and thousands of high flying geese pass overhead heading due south. A literally awesome sight.  Does this mass migration mean the cold winter weather is about to hit us ?

The installation of the new sewer pipe continues apace. There are three more weeks to go if Scottish Water are to complete it on schedule. The workers seem to start early and finish late which may indicate that pre-Christmas overtime is not an issue and that the Royal and Ancient are taking a keen interest in the rate of progress.

Even though it's a Saturday there must be thirty workers busily digging trenches  when we pass by.

Back at The last wee house before Denmark one of the farmers has left us some Brussel Sprouts harvested this morning  from the field by the Doocot.

The English food critic who visited the Anstruther fish and chip shops has now moved on to Scotlands capital city. In its lack of restraint the decor of the restaurant he's visiting looks more Glasgow than Edinburgh. The man with the vacuum cleaner at the 1:08 mark seems suitably unimpressed. What would you do if someone doing this sat beside you in a restaurant ?  :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An5pOfiaV3M

Good news :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sN5cA8ZUjI

Fake Vermeers :https://scottsumner.substack.com/p/school-of-rembrandt-fake-vermeers

Battery life

 

The young BMW salesman is on the phone bright and early. " Just a wee courtesy call to make sure you're enjoying the car and know how to use all it's features ". This is a not so subtle way of reminding us to fill out the manufacturers survey scoring our pre-purchase sales 'experience'. 

A chilly minus three this morning. Lesson #1 about the new car -  if you use the heater to defrost the windscreen the battery drains very quickly. In fact it drains remarkably quickly. The promised 50 mile range seems to fall by half. Heated seats, ambient lighting and a system that projects the instruments onto the windscreen all seem to 'gobble' range.

The sacred turf of the Old Course blanketed in frost. The fancy 5 star hotel by the treacherous 17th hole busy but not full.  We discover from a Texan visitor in a Stetson that father and son golfing  tours are an American thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNBPLB9lrD8  Mothers and daughters and non-golfing sons are presumably happy to fend for themselves at Thanksgiving.

'Quiet Please' notices appearing on doors in town. Exam season proper starts a week today but some poor souls are already being tested. Lets hope they have the consolation of finishing early.

The shoe repair shops mechanical mascot has not yet been decked out for the festive season. I'd give it a week before a Santa hat appears.

The esoteric things you find on Substack. Purdah :https://www.ggd.world/p/can-architecture-reveal-the-spread

Borderline bizarre. A comparison tasting of local fish and chip shops :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qmiz-tT-vs

New options to stay near Edinburgh :https://www.penicuikestate.com/

A time to be thankful.

 

A late November afternoon. The first of the planets already glinting in the sky. Both Saturn and Mars spectacularly bright.

The days lectures drawing to a close. Back pack wearing youngsters come rushing out of seminars and head home....or to a bar.

The first Christmas gathering of the year glimpsed through a brightly lit window. There's a gaudily decorated tree and the sound of someone playing the piano. People are wearing red party hats. The clink of glasses and the murmur of laughter waft onto the street.

The owners of the old houses by the castle haven't returned home yet. Give it an hour and all the windows on this side of the street will be lit.

Evensong is underway in chapel.  A few late running choir members sprint across the lawn ignoring the 'Keep off the grass' sign. A college porter looks at them judgementally but says nothing. 

Absent the tourists and the golfers the town is quiet and you could almost believe you'd stepped back fifty or a hundred years. In a hectic world the peace of a small, unchanging  town by the North Sea is something to be thankful for .

And for friends and family in the States a little 1950's Thanksgiving music. They don't make them like this anymore  :https://youtu.be/zEyLFqapbP4?t=26

Here's some optimism:https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/the-best-case-scenario-for-trumps

A poor mans Oscars ceremony.

 

6 months late but the new car is finally here. The colour is better than we'd feared.

The garage has one of those 'unveiling' ceremonies. These are always slightly embarrassing. In France and Italy a boom-box would play something 'lively'. Here,  the mechanics and receptionists are called in to watch as a sheet is pulled back . It is rather like a poor mans Oscars award night. Even though you know what you've ordered there is a feeling that something suitable has to be said as you catch sight of your new compact SUV.  'The Font' pipes up with 'How marvellous'. Although brief this seems to hit the right note. There are smiles all round and the youngest of the receptionists claps. She is then told to go and answer the phone.  After the ceremony everyone shakes our hands.  The salesmen are slightly better at hiding their boredom with this routine than the mechanics who stifle yawns and would clearly prefer to be back listening to the radio and talking about football. How many times a year must they go through this customer interfacing purgatory ?

In France we were always given a bottle of indifferent champagne at the end of a new car ceremony. Here the sales manager calls us to his office and presents us with an aluminium cup with a screw cap. We think it's a thermos cup but we could be wrong. It is exquisitely machined and possibly expensive but we're none the wiser what to do with it. Neither of us enjoys drinking from metal containers and twisty Scottish roads make downing coffee while driving a dangerous proposition. Are we supposed to buy some sort of liner ?  Is it really a thermos cup ?  Suggestions welcome. The young salesman tells us that we'll soon be getting a survey from the manufacturer asking about our pre-delivery experience. " It's really important " he says in a way that makes it clear his bonus and his job depend on it. We tell him we're delighted. He beams.

The new car is much smaller than the Volvo and therefore ideal for the short,  angled parking spaces in town. It is also much, much narrower which provides a surprising degree of intimacy between driver and passenger. The best thing about it is that the safety  systems don't slam on the brakes every time a bicycle comes within 50 yards. In a university town there are lots of bicycles and the Volvo was forever throwing a tantrum.

To celebrate the new arrival  we stop off at the bakers for a wholemeal loaf and a Christmas cupcake ( for Angus ).

Shetland music :https://youtu.be/RWmS5m_1irE  And for anyone in London at the end of the month the singer will be reading from his new book at St Columbas :https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/standrewsbookfestival/mallachy-tallack-colin-macintyre-harmonies-in-words-and-music/e-qybqgq

Turkeys:https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/why-are-urban-turkeys-thriving-180985433/

A relaxing Danish view of the wee town :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBtAYujTd6o

The new car ?

The old Volvo is cleaned out before being taken to the BMW garage. A small mountain of 5p pieces are removed from the glove box. The last difficult to remove traces of PONette fur are hoovered out of the back. Any possible 'unpleasantness' over the trade-in price was resolved with a robust phone call with the dealer. Now the new car is about to arrive neither of us can remember why we couldn't have lived with this old one for another year or so. There is some distant memory about wanting something smaller to fit into the tight parking spaces in town. We've opted for a car in Cape York Green. On the manufacturers website this colour seems more sludge grey than vibrant green. 

This mornings excitement is provided by the postman. His Royal Mail van seizes up as he's reversing out of the courtyard onto the farm track. It makes a loud grating  noise we can hear from inside the house. It refuses to move. We drop him off in the village to await the repair team.

The sea decidedly rough today. The more adventurous fishing boats have left the shelter of the bay and headed out to sea. The less adventurous remain anchored offshore.

The cormorants, disdainful of the strong wind, sit on the jagged rocks where the little river meets the sea. They really are masters of the ocean. In the wheat field by the heron pond a flock of curlews are too busy doing whatever curlews do to notice us as we walk by. I'd always thought Curlews were small things but it turns out they're remarkably large birds. 

There's a choice of parking spaces in town. I'm guessing this is a pre-exam revision week and the lecturers don't have to be in for nine o'clock tutorials. We find a free spot by the exam hall and walk to Starbucks where we are the only customers.

When we get back home the RAC has come out to deal with the broken down van. I'd expected the Post Office to have its own fleet of mechanics but farming the function out to the RAC must make more commercial sense. The response time to this remote spot is certainly impressive. The mechanic can't get the engine started so opts to pull the van away. A small crowd of villagers gather to watch. In the country you make the most of excitement where and when you can find it.

Romes water supply :https://thebulletin.org/2024/11/when-romes-fountains-run-dry/

Greatness revealed :https://x.com/FaildVideo/status/1860657081793249662

What we used to eat on planes : https://theclub.ba.com/october-2024/en/flavours-of-flying/

Party planning.

 

Strong winds bring clearer skies and warmer temperatures. The weekends penetrating sleet and torrential rain have gone. This tail end of Storm Bert is accompanied by gusts of 70 mph which slow the morning commuter run into town. We follow a long line of cars proceeding cautiously along the coast road. In these winds the few cyclists we pass aren't so much brave as foolhardy. Out at sea the bay is dotted with small ships sheltering from the weather. One offshore supply boat seems perilously close to the rocks by the heron pond. The farmer will keep an eye on it. The waves on the beach are spectacular and the surfers are out in force again.

Exams start on December 6th and run through to the 20th.  Their proximity may explain why there are so many students in the towns hostelries on Sunday night . They seem to be enjoying themselves while they still can. Four first year Med students are loudly lamenting the fact that they are scheduled to sit their final exam on the afternoon of Friday the 20th. ' The last of the whole bloody lot ' observes one, unhappily. They decide that travelling home straight after the exam will be 'nightmarish' and opt to travel on the following Monday. This provides time for  a monumental Friday through Sunday night post-exam 'thrash'. 

The new Asian supermarket is a 'compact' affair. We are surprised to note that it sells exotic delicacies like Polish luncheon meat and Irn Bru.

Carol services are now being advertised.

The cannabis resin store has closed. Workmen are already busy getting the premises painted for the new tenants. I wonder who is about to set up shop ? Whoever would have thought workmen would start work so early ?

This morning town is quiet. That  catching your breath calm that comes before the onset of Christmas and the exodus of the youngsters. Later this week the St Andrews Day celebrations will take place. There will be street dancing and the town pipe band will lead a procession down to the beach for a firework display. Let's hope this mornings 70+ mph winds don't return.

Seems someone is worried about Iceland :https://www.aei.org/op-eds/iceland-chinas-trojan-horse-in-europe/  

This seems to be good news : https://jabberwocking.com/raw-data-fentanyl-overdoses-have-dropped-dramatically/   And here's more ( section 4)  putting it in context :https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/at-least-five-interesting-things-cda

Cluster in the cloister.

The weather has been awful. Simply awful.

Storm Bert brings 60 mph winds, thick cloud and heavy rain. Sleet is soon thrown into the mix. Our morning round of supermarket, dry cleaners and Post Office are all visited in double quick time. In town a couple have chosen a rather wet day to get married. The wedding guests cluster valiantly in the cloister to avoid the rain. There are some kilts but in these icy winds most of the male attendees have opted for trousers. Umbrellas are the fashion item du jour but, sensibly, no one tries to use them.

At the farm shop we meet the polite young American family who are renting a cottage in the village. She has got a good job teaching at the local private school ( she is a dab hand at using the IT system and has already been put in charge of the timetable )  and he is doing something 'techy' in quantum analysis at the university. Their children have taken to the Scottish school system like ducks to water. Do four or five year olds even notice what country they're in ? They would like to buy a house but have discovered that good village properties near St Andrews are as rare as hens teeth.

The couple are out ordering a turkey for their Thanksgiving dinner. The husband tells us that his role, when not doing cryptoanalytic things, is to debone the turkey legs before rolling them in a chestnut and raisin stuffing. They roast the breast separately. They have bought parsnips and pumpkins in the farm shop but are finding fresh cranberries hard to track down. Frozen ones, it seems, aren't the same thing. We wish them luck.

By mid afternoon the sun is setting and the chill factor rising. We dress up in as many layers as possible and head off down the track to the shore where we peer into the gloom before quickly heading home. Angus heads into the wine cellar to set aside a case of Fiano d'Avelino for the village Christmas gathering. 

It has been a day for reading by the fire. This book by Alan Taylor has been the best - and most surprising -  of the year to date. I thought the whole US Civil War, Mexico, Canada, Caribbean history thing would be as stodgy as the local bakers croissants but the book is well written with a slight hint of amusing cynicism. Possibly the best, or at least, most informative book of the year. The author writes well so I'm not surprised he's a Pulitzer Prize winner.

Who knew that Algeria used to be the worlds #1 wine exporting country ? Post independence wine was seen as being French colonialist and unIslamic. A huge proportion of the vines were grubbed up. The author contends that without Algerian wine the French troops in WW1 would have mutinied on a grander scale than they ever did and the war would have been lost.

Wolfgang Munchau is a must read for developments in Europe. Here is his website which is well worth visiting once a week :https://www.eurointelligence.com/

He has a new book on what's going wrong in Germany.  It's a slim volume so can be digested in an hour or so. The bottom line is that  Tesla and the Chinese are making cars that are better and cheaper than their German rivals. The automotive sector is huge in the German economy and old precision mechanical strengths don't pass muster in a sector where the action has moved to integrating software and battery technology. This is where Germany ( and Europe ) lags. It may also explain why the Euro is in free fall against the dollar.

French music :https://ulkaraghayeva.substack.com/p/on-french-music

This is not what Scottish wild salmon companies want to hear :https://reason.com/2024/11/22/i-tried-lab-grown-salmon-heres-what-it-tasted-like/

A hidden gem.

 

The improbably named Storm Bert is set to sweep down from the North today. The weather forecast calls for blizzard conditions and occasional southeasterly gales which will be severe near coasts.  This maybe a day for staying close to home.

On the radio this morning we learn that the childhood home of Matt Gaetz was where the movie The Truman Show was filmed. Both of us ponder this information  in silence but are unsure what it means - although it surely means something profound. There then follows a segment on British v American roads. Potholes seem to figure prominently in the analysis :https://www.construction-physics.com/p/how-good-are-american-roads

Our highly touted restaurant experience in Edinburgh  was so, so. 10/10 for service, 8/10 for ambience and 6/10 for the food. Angus started with duck liver pate but the Crostini were tooth shatteringly hard. Would I have even noticed this if I was younger ? The main courses were hearty and robust. These terms can be both a virtue ( when done well ) and a vice ( when not ),  The lengthy and incoherent wine list hid an exceptional bottle of Margaux that seemed to have been priced as if  a decade of inflation hadn't happened. This mispriced gem elevated the evening to the simply wonderful.

This weeks reading included this book on the Mueller Investigation which was well written and punchy although a little after the event.

I didn't want to read either of these two books but succumbed. They were perfect for taking on the train.  How in heavens name did we allow these people to become Prime minister ? 

Back in town the gloaming starts at around 3:30. An hour later it's dark.  In the fading afternoon light the cathedral looks 'romantic' . The fibre optic cables that are being laid are progressing slowly. In fact that should read ' agonizingly' slowly. This might be due to the fact that where ever the builders dig they come across 15 centuries of human activity.

The ticket machine.

Down to Edinburgh on the train. It's bitterly cold on the platform so we venture into the station waiting room. This is pleasantly warm and has recently been esoterically decorated with a collection of jigsaws showing pivotal moments in British railway history. The completed jigsaws seem to have been stuck directly onto the waiting rooms walls which is odd. The presence of the jigsaw puzzles  may speak volumes about how railway employees on a quiet station between Dundee and Kirkcaldy pass their time. There has been talk of closing the stations ticket office and replacing it with a second automated machine. This would not go down well with students or foreign golfers trying to navigate the intricacies of UK rail travel.

It's still daylight when we leave Leuchars but darkness falls quickly at this time of year. An hour later we arrive to find that Edinburgh is testing out its Christmas lights. The castle is being floodlit  in a sort of honey orange hue. Scotlands capital city, it has to be said, looks wonderful on a cold, clear skied, November night. The gritting machines are out in force - a sure sign that snow is on the way.

It's years since we ventured inside the American chain  hotel we've chosen to stay in. I remember it as having very long corridors. At some stage in recent year it's been updated with glass pillars and shiny black marble floors. This combination is perhaps more Malaga than Scotland but is inoffensive. There's a crowd checking in so we have to wait in the lobby which gives us a chance to admire the Christmas decorations which look very corporate. Brits may have stopped going to China but Chinese tourist haven't stopped coming to the UK. A large bus load from Shanghai are  being welcomed by the cheerful Scottish staff. The Chinese tourists incomprehension of English as spoken by the Scots is total. The Shanghai group head happily  off to the bar to try the whiskies on offer. So as not to waste time they ask for their luggage to be taken directly up to their rooms.

On George Street marquees are being put up. They stretch all the way from Charlotte Square to Frederick Street. Marquees are a very clever way of getting people out spending and enjoying themselves in the winter months. Edinburghs festive season encompasses both Christmas and - an even bigger event - Hogmanay.

Further down George Street large , red, Christmas trees are lined up along the middle of the road. It seems that on top of everything else the town is celebrating its 900th anniversary as a Royal Burgh. We are in two minds about red Christmas trees.

We go for dinner to a restaurant that has been recommended to us. The menu promises much, some of which it delivers.

How we spent our time :https://onepercentrule.substack.com/p/how-people-spent-their-time-in-the

Chinese food :https://chinesecookingdemystified.substack.com/p/63-chinese-cuisines-the-complete

Our common ancestor :https://www.quantamagazine.org/all-life-on-earth-today-descended-from-a-single-cell-meet-luca-20241120/

Scotlands fertility :https://www.boomcampaign.org/p/scotland-is-the-south-korea-of-the

Flying by.

As soon as you comment about something on the blog 'things' mysteriously happen. An overly friendly salesman from the BMW garage phones to say the new car will arrive in the UK  tomorrow and transportation will be 'expedited' so that it arrives in Scotland by next week. We 'tentatively'  arrange to collect it from the dealers on Tuesday. I think of making a snide comment about the experience to date being a great advert for the Chinese car industry but keep this thought to myself.

Term time rushing by. Exams now getting perilously close.  A throng of determined looking teens head along the pavement from the lecture halls towards the library. Usually, the library is a quiet place. Now it's bursting at the seams with panicking youngsters wishing they hadn't partied quite as hard. Looking through the windows I'd reckon there must be a couple of thousand of them in there. 

A few clouds offshore but ( so far ) no sign of snow on this side of the bay.

We wander down to find what the construction work next to the R&A is all about. Our neighbours Bridge Club information was almost right. Scottish Water are indeed building a new water main. This will supposedly be completed and operational within three months. Angus wonders whether three months will become six months or a year. Play on the Old Course it is claimed will not be interrupted.

This man is always worth reading :https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-phantom-campaign

Art Deco :https://www.fashionablylatetakes.com/p/america-was-supposed-to-be-art-deco