
WE’RE HOME – the Doyenne and I, that is – after a short break at Tarland. It wasn’t far to go, just a forty minute drive over the Cairn o’Mount and into the Vale of Cromar. (…read on »)

A BIRTHDAY present of binoculars has opened up a new world for me, in a manner of speaking, over the last few weeks. The family all chipped in to help buy them and now I hardly leave the house to walk the dogs without my new toy around my neck. (…read on »)

EIGHT MINUTES past four o’clock in the morning was an unholy hour to be wakened. It was the milkman delivering milk to the “big hoose”. I watched the van lights swing round the walls of the bedroom as he headed off to rouse the next unsuspecting soul who thought he had at least another three hours peaceful slumber. (…read on »)

MACBETH’S AMBITIONS know no bounds, although we rather thought he had abandoned some of his more inflated ones. The Doyenne had both dogs out for their early walk and they disturbed a roe deer which had taken cover in amongst the tangles of the old rhododendron bushes close to the house. Inka was rattling around ahead, oblivious of the drama that was unfolding behind him. The deer took fright at the “bold MacBean” who set off in pursuit a fast as his little sawn-off legs would permit. (…read on »)

A tattie, a neep and an ingin / An ingin, a tattie, a neep / An aipple a day keeps the doctor at bay / But an ingin‘ll dae for a week. (…read on »)

THINGS ON the doorstep, metaphorically speaking, are sometimes the things that get most easily overlooked. For several years I’d promised myself I’d follow the signpost at the foot of Glenogil and visit the Mountains Animal Sanctuary. Well, I’ve kept my promise for earlier in the week I spent an instructive and entertaining afternoon with Rhona who is stable manager at this equine retirement home. (…read on »)

I WATCHED the hare getting increasingly nervous as we got closer. The dogs were hidden behind a wall but the upper part of my body showed above it. Hares are nocturnal feeders and overnight this one had wandered into a small park which is enclosed with chicken wire to combat the rabbits, and now it had forgotten where it had come in. No doubt it had been attracted by the sweet, young grass which has yet to get its first cut of the season. (…read on »)

“IF YOU lie down with dogs you will get up with fleas” – I’ve no idea who said that but thankfully, for a while at least, it can’t apply in this house. Macbeth has had his Spring trim and as usual he arrived home looking like a picture postcard. For twenty four hours, if we’re lucky, he smells fragrant but, sadly, he sees these improving events as an affront to his masculinity and within a day or two he has explored all the darkest, dirtiest corners and reverted to his more normal hideous self. (…read on »)

IT’S EARLY yet for most birds to be building their nests but a pair of wood pigeons has been busy in the holly tree at the back door. I heard their mating calls – crroo coo cu – when I took the dogs out for their morning run. They don’t seem to be getting used to their human neighbours. Whichever one isn’t sitting on the nest, incubating the eggs, erupts from the tree every time we go out. (…read on »)

LAST TUESDAY dawned bright and sunny and it seemed just the morning to drive up the coast to Inverbervie. (…read on »)