Puffy old Gal.

It was a busy day on the croft yesterday......well, there was a late start after a breakfast of poached granny's eggs on homemade bread, a short drive to look at some chalets, followed by morning coffee in Fired Art, so I suppose it wasn't quite as busy as it could have been. But once I harvested the first crop of washing from the polytunnel, things started to improve. It took a lot of watering to get earth that has been dry for 6 years at least, to turn a dark brown. I have sown nasturtium seeds, which are refusing to show themselves after a week; basil, parsley, chives and beans, which have a week to 2 weeks to show their shoots or I will be making the tunnel a full time laundry room. I have carrots, parsnips and beetroot waiting to go in and who knows what after that. It's got to be produce that has half a hope of being eaten by someone/something other than the slugs.

While high flying planes were grounded last week, a wee Cessna got airborne and we recieved photo's of the croft from about 1000ft. A friend of a friend who stayed with us recently took them.

Inspired by the London Marathon on TV, I nipped up and did a half Ben. It's amazing how it already seems less onerous. The next big challenge will be to go the whole way and then to add the mile road run. Plenty of time. On the three occasions I've been going up the Ben now, I have had buddy runners - announced and unannounced. There was the young German who hooked up with me and chatted. Then on the day I went up with Spook, there was a man who picked up his pace when I went past him and overtook me when I stopped to take Spook's photo. He didn't say hello or acknowledge me, but kept up the pace, only to be overtaken by the nimble Spook 5 mins later. Today, I was gaining on a man who was climbing fast without being a runner. I got to the big shortcut to halfway just after he had past it and was drinking water at the burn when he arrived after me, red faced but clearly pretty fit (in a not a Ben Runner kind of way.) We didnt' chat, but when he stopped to drink, I headed off and turned down the very steep grassy bank, assuming he would be going to the top. Once I was quite a bit down the main track again, I realised he was quite close behind. He must have taken the grassy bank too, which is very unusual for non runners. I picked up the pace and made the last shortcut before he was in sight and flew down the hill, much faster than my normal training run. I got to the bottom a fair bit ahead of him, pleased with the silent challenge. I wonder if the sight of a middle aged woman puffing her way up the path makes reasonably fit men think they could do better. Little do they know that I have been on the back page of the Ben results for all of the 7 years I have done it (very annoying the year I would have been on an inside page, but they shrunk the print and I was still on the back.)