Catch up and vacation movies

We've been enjoying a ridiculously good spell of weather in the UK lately.  It's been 30 C down in London, and sufficiently balmy up here in Aberdeen that I could walk home from Poker Night on Wednesday sporting just a t-shirt - no jumper - at midnight.  Some people say it is to make up for the hideous summer we've had, conveniently forgetting that we had a gorgeous May and June.  Hopefully it sticks around a little bit longer.  The days are getting noticeably shorter, so it's nice to get as much sun as possible while we still can.

We've been social butterflies the last couple of weeks.  We hosted a Beer Night for the Canadian Association that was poorly attended in terms of numbers, but wonderfully attended in terms of good company and excellent British beers.  The night before we joined the Culinary Caravan of the American Women's Association over at the Lairhillock Inn.  It was nice to meet some new people and the conversation was good enough that we could overlook the poor chicken and bacon pie and the criminally libelous impersonation of Banoffee pie.  To be fair to the Lairhillock, the mussel starter was fabulous and Fiona's pork steaks were great.

I had another rugby breakfast at a friend's house this morning to take in the England v Scotland match.  Decent enough game, made much more fun by watching it with people with a vested interest in the outcome.  Now all Canada has to do is beat host and tournament favourite New Zealand by at least four tries and they are into the second round.  I'm trying to come up with events as equally unlikely to occur to complete my similie, but I've got nothing.  At least we will finally get to shave off those impressive tournament beards.  Canada didn't do too badly, beating Tonga and playing the French tough in the first half, but the draw with Japan was disappointing.  If we can keep the All Blacks to less than a half a hundred, it should be considered a good tourney.

We're off tonight to have dinner with an old colleague.  It should be fun as we haven't seen each other in a couple of months.  Next weekend we're off to Dornoch, north of Inverness, for a quick weekend away before Fiona goes on her photography course.

I'm trying to think of things to do while she's away for the week.  I think I'll finally get around to editing the remaining video footage from our vacation.  I had a play around with the footage from the camping trip and am slowly getting the hang of it.  I like a couple of sections of this video in particular.  The game of cards at the beginning always makes me a little homesick.  The 'friendly' banter is typical of what happens when cards or dominos hit our kitchen table.  The second section is what I would like these and future videos to be - good narration, everybody responding naturally - just a little reminder for us, or insight for someone else, as to what it was like to be there.  It certainly beats some of the video up  on the mountain, where the zooms and high winds make it seem like I was shooting shaky-cam footage for the Blair Witch Project.  Sorry about that.  I hope no one loses their lunch...