A sunset touch

We gave ourselves an extra half hour in bed this morning, but I have to say that once I'd tidied up and done two wee loads of washing I caught up with elevenses time and spent the rest of the morning rooting out some T-shirts and stuff for next week. This routine at this time of year usually involves checking to see if the trousers that were fine when you wore them before the winter set in still cope with your Christmas-enhanced waistline; it's a terrible thing to find yourself on holiday with waistbands that kill ...

After being in for most of yesterday - the trot across the road to choir practice doesn't really help - we were determined to get out for a walk today, and eventually drove down the road to the sunset at the Ardyne. Before we had a brief wander along the shore, we marched up the hill past the farms for a mile, just to get the heart-rate up, and were rewarded with some glowingly dramatic light on the birch trees and the huge, half-dead tree (sorry - I'm no good with species) at the top. In fact you can see the gnarly branches framing the top corner of the above photo of the moment when the sun transformed the clouds above Bute with dramatic effect. In the end, we never did get our walk along behind the beach; we met a couple whom we often meet there and chatted for so long that it was getting dark. 

I've just been out looking at the stars - they're amazing in a clear sky. And it's past midnight and whoever is staying in our neighbours' house (for I think they're away) is playing the television absurdly loudly so that it sounds as if there's a war going on in our hall. Thank goodness our bedroom is on the other side of the house ...