Freezing ...

We the arrival of the much-heralded high pressure over Scotland today was interestingly cold - not a cloud in the sky, not a breath of wind. I hung out towels first thing this morning and took them in as dusk began to fall; I cannot say they were any drier than they had been, but they smelled nice. I stomped off over the frosty pavement down to the Pilates studio, where the class was diminished by several seasonal absences and where our teacher worked us more arduously than I've experienced in a long time. I staggered back up the hill for a coffee and to do my extra Italian for the day (don 't ask) as well as putting together a couple of sandwiches in individual containers to have a picnic ... in the local cinema.

As soon as Himself was home and changed into more suitable clothes we were off back down the road to the local cinema, which was showing Conclave at 1pm. What a terrific film! I loved the book when I read it several years ago, and this was the best possible realisation of it I could have imagined. The acting - Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci inter alia - is superb; the sense of space combined with the claustrophobia of the conclave wonderfully conveyed; the terrific  sound that envelopes the listener in the meal-time muttering of the assembled cardinals in the refectory was done full justice by the tiny cinema's much improved sound system. We sat utterly engrossed for the two hours, we ate our sandwiches, we drank the green tea we'd bought on the way in  - and we were completely undisturbed by the audience, of which there were perhaps 5 as well as us. If you get the chance to see this film before it lands on the telly, do go - it's immense. 

The sun had gone off the town by the time we emerged; we came home for more tea before Himself went out again for such essentials as salt (for the paths) and chickpeas (for curry) while I changed the sheets on our bed as the cotton ones were becoming a tad chilly when we got into bed. (Now got the warm ones I bought two years ago - a revelation.) By the time I'd wrestled on the king-size duvet single-handed I was exhausted, but I managed to iron a shirt that's been looking at me for a couple of weeks and order some more Christmas presents.

By this time I had a ghastly headache - a back-of-the-neck job again, probably with looking at the computer screen after a couple of hours in the cinema - and decided to call it a day. I've been dozing over undemanding telly since dinner, and midnight is still 30 minutes away. 

As I only took dawn and evening shots from my windows and I reckon it's a bit tedious to keep posting them, lovely though they are, I'm going more abstract today. This is a photo of the ice just beginning to re-form on our glass-topped garden table, which was white with frost in the morning, then melted in the sun. Now the sun is gone and you can make out the line of the first re-freezing across the bottom third of the photo. 

Shall I dream of clerical elections tonight?