A day of two halves ...

This morning was a tale of failure and impotent rage - and that was before I heard about Salmond's Alba party. I was up early, face on and ready to go - and then I checked and found I'd booked the midday slot for collecting the messages from Morrison's, rather than the 8am one I've come to prefer. Why? Clearly losing it. Deep breath, take shoes off again, have breakfast. Four hours later, I'm ready to try again. Still no text notification that my order was ready, but still - get down to the shop and see what's what. Nothing. That's what was what. Was I sure I'd clicked the final button? Back home to check; back down to the shop to say I'd done everything I should have. Now I'm given a slip of paper with a phone number. Am I about to find a live person on the end of the help line?

Yes, I was. At this point I have to confess I was wondering if my recent system update had messed with my settings - but no. The man on the other end of the line could see my order (which by this time had vanished altogether on my screen, replaced by an "empty trolley" sign) and was able to do something to make it "live" again. Apparently Morrison's system is groaning under increased demand, and they're tweaking it. I was fairly ready to do some tweaking myself ... I'll bring you up to date tomorrow when I've tried again. At 8am. 

The afternoon gave us some sunshine and a bit of blue sky, so I'm blipping Loch Eck from my customary viewpoint but without the usual louring sky. There were some very pregnant-looking ewes in the field nearest the track, but further off, near the river, there were the tiny figures of lambs and the air was full of their little wails and the guttural responses of their mums. And once more we were soaked in the last ten minutes of a walk.

And I've just spent an exhausting couple of hours with the rugby. Very cathartic, and a good antithesis to current political news. With both French and Scotland represented in my family, I should have been torn - but I wasn't. Not in the slightest. What a game! 

And not a portly politician in sight ...