This is Amber. She's is she whose hidabed I'm sleeping on.

We never met before I met her in the coffee shop.

YES, I PICK UP THE LADIES IN THE COFFEE SHOPS.

Not really. Our mutual friend Kelly was all 'Rosie, Amber, Amber, Rosie' only not really because she was in Oslo at the time.

Still. This was me trying out one of her memory cards because I'd stupidly left mine in this little computer here. Yes, I have two. I'm just stupid.

We were in a Starbucks, in Glasgow. Starting off the day by crying over the fact that Scottish Starbucks don't have our favorite things (mine which is shaken iced black tea and lemonade mixed together, hers which is full leaf earl grey). Still, I tried one of their 'lemon frappuccinos' which, with the inclusion of 'frappuccino' made me think it contained coffee, did not contain coffee. It tasted exactly like the thing I wanted, but in slurpee form.

Hm. There is someone yelling a drunken song on the street. By himself. On a Tuesday.

Here is where we were walking aboot:


It was spotty rain, but mostly nice. There was a woman in front of one of the galleries singing opera. She was really, really good (and Canadian!).

Amber took me down all sorts of back streets and hidaways I never would have found myself. When our bellies were getting hungry like she took me down this little winding alley filled with whitewashed little pubs with strings of lights hung up between the buildings. I wish it had been dark; it would have been beautiful all lit up.

"What kind of food do you want?" she asked.

"Derrrr," said I.

We were having a hard time selecting. The smells coming out of the places were phenominal, though that might have simply been because I was getting hungry.

I wish I'd taken a picture of the alley, but my camera was not enjoying her memory card and took a long time to boot up, and I didn't feel like whipping out my camera with so many people so close by.

However, I did take a picture of the sign you see here on the right. It was in front of a pub called 'Brel Pub'. I wondered if it was named after the French singer, Jaques Brel. (It was.)

This sign, in particular, is a good example of Scottish signs. That is to say, I understand each word as it stands on its own, but when you jam them all together, they make no sense. I looked at this sign and did not understand why it was outside a pub.

So, rather than be the donkey that starves to death between two equally delicious bales of hay, we decided to go in to this pub and ask the staff about the decline in illegal logging.

We did not get as many details as we were hoping. Apparently the fellow who generally puts those up was off today, and none of the other staff had read the article in question. Still, we decided that the sign, plus the fact they had 'extra cold' Guinness (basically it just means cold) means we stayed.

They had advertised, as one of their happy hour specials, a 'sausage casserole' and bashed potatoes.

"It's bangers and mash," says out waiter, an East Indian fellow with a thick Scottish accent.

So that's what I got. I like bangers and mash a lot.

It looked like a little turd.

A DELICIOUS LITTLE TURD.

But honestly, I gotta say, although it was very good bangers as mash, I still prefer that which you can get at the Ship and Anchor, in Calgary. Very good bangers and mash.

But really, the Guinness here can't be beat. It has the best head of any Guinness I've ever had. Amber tried to convince me that I ought to take a picture with the fellow who served it, and announce on my blog that the man had given me the best head I've ever gotten.

I considered it.

(Hi, mom.)

But then I didn't.

On to other things now.

Here is a lamppost.

It's been there a while, I think.

Or it's just being taken over by a very enthousiasic plant.

And on your left is a row of apartments, or 'flats' (if Fergus is reading this, for he will make funny sputtering noises if I don't at least try to talk Scottish) which were, apparently, used way back in the day. Remember rading the Jane Austen type novels, and everyone went to town for the season? These are some of the apartments they'd stay in. They had big bay windows looking into sitting rooms and a green place far to the left for horses. Most of them are businesses now, and the basements have been converted into residences.

And here is your archetecural porn for today:


That is all. It is sleep time now.