Autumn begins

I think meteorological autumn began ... two days ago? Yesterday? Anyway, today looked and felt autumnal, and though the real rain only came on for the afternoon it was murky and grey all day. It was also pretty still, so that the sea lay flatly until a ship went by and then curled like an old-fashioned hairstyle, smooth on top and curled inwards. 

We opted not to go to Pilates today because we really had too much to do and the classes tend to make us fall asleep in the afternoon. As it was, I was late getting up, partly because of doing Italian in bed and partly because I just couldn't waken up. And then I realised I had to make bread to have some for the next couple of days and to come home to, and I had to do a washing because I was running out of knickers ... But after some coffee and some discussion about flight times I felt sufficiently switched on to put some stuff in my case and find the things I'd not thought of until today. 

I was delighted to find that the booking reference our travel agent had supplied found our flights on the BA app - sometimes group bookings in the past have proved impossible to deal with except at the check-in desk, and I always feel happier if I've got everything on my phone. Himself has dealt with the organising of this holiday, but I was able to spend some time completing the necessary info online. 

And yes: we did go out for a walk. We just walked along the east bay seafront as far as Kirn and back, stopping en route for another totally random conversation with a man who was sitting in the rain on a bench, sheltered by a large umbrella, smoking a fat cigar, beside the tub of nasturtiums which forms the right hand window of the collage. When we passed him on our return he hailed us and turned out to be a former US Navy resident of the Holy Loch base. He was a couple of years younger than me, had had his first child in Dunoon, and loved to come back to stay with the family who'd been their friends in the 70s. We ended up talking generally about politics and politicians; we thought he was probably a Republican. By the time we walked on you'd have thought we were old pals. All very strange. 

The first photo in the collage is of a chimney stack I only noticed today for the first time after living here for 50 years. I loved the way these two houses, with their determinedly different windows and paint colours, are bound together by this extraordinary little shared architectural feature.

I'm glad to say all this cheered me up a bit; the dreary weather and the sense of isolation brought on by preparing to go away (am I alone/slightly crazy in feeling this?) was bringing me out in great waves of melancholia. Better now, I'm happy to say - a nice glass of wine with dinner helps with most things!