The Soop Kitchen

I sincerely hope all furfriends are tucked up safe and warm inside.
By the way, did you read about the poor polar bear washed up on Mull?? Alive, but presumably exhausted. If any kitcheners in North Britain have a surprise knock at the door in the night, -* be very careful to check first before opening the door*!! ?(Closest I could find!)

Take care Soop and everyone. The wind here sounds dreadful. Had real difficulty opening the car door against the strong wind. Must be dreadful where you are Soop. Hope it's not too bad. How about a wee dram to settle the nerves

Soop, please do take good care up there, and everyone else in the worst hit areas. It`s very windy here, but nowhere ner as bad as some folk are having it.

Hoping you'll survive the storm, all of you in NW Scotland - it looks horrendous.
I dread a hurricane like we had here in 2009 - we had many trees uprooted, several square metres of roof tiles blown off from the barn, and no electricity for 10 days! But no danger from sea flooding TG.
We have a petrol powered generator now, in case it happens again.

The wind is just building up here, heating is cranked right up in case it goes off later. Perhaps I should cooked dinner early, everything is running late today as we had a lie in and didn't go to work (one advantage of being self employed). We very naughtily have not walked the dogs, though the temperature is 5 deg the wind chill makes it seem more like -5. I know the weather forecast said snow, hail and sleet but nothing about it all at once!

This storm is serious. I cannot imagine how it must be for folk living more northerly than Kintyre. Cannot open the door at the moment. I should be visiting the ladies in the care home tomorrow. Hopefully the wind will have eased.

Take good care of yourselves. Best stay indoors. Thankfully we still have power.

Wooosh! That's me being blasted into our Kitchen...

Jud MacSporran has had to tie yet more rope around the Bird Cherry tree. It is rocking in the storm. I have not seen bigger waves than those of today. To be honest I'm expecting the power to be disrupted.

Charleyg Rory is as usual fast asleep on his tartan rug.

I had to empty some book shelves earlier. I had put a special birthday card "somewhere safe". It was such a bad idea. There are now umpteen envelopes of treasured photos scattered across the floor. In fact, I have got into such a mess, that I need to take refuge and catch up with you lovely lot. The stuff in the sitting room will be sorted. Only not just yet!

Oh dear soop it sounds as if you will be out on the roof again holding it down. I do hope that you are able to stay warm and dry and you have no electricity blackouts because of the awful weather in your region. I doubt if Rory will open an eye- as long as he is fed and watered, what else is there to worry about?

Good morning all! Storm Henry hitting here in Co. Down now and building. The pup is loving it, chasing all the mobile objects around the garden. Apparently the wind strength is due to peak here around lunchtime so we'd better batten down the hatches.

Stay safe all GN pals in NI and Scotland! Sounds like you may have to tie yourselves down Soop

Aww! That's so sweet of you, Charleyg He's sitting (reluctantly) on the door step mat. Tortoiseshell is prancing hither and thither. Bless her...she does so want his company.

Am about to close down the computer. Time to reads the newspaper. I am so sorry that Terry W has died. I thought that he was a true gentleman.

Night night...stay warm and dry.

soop I thought that Tara had retired when I chose her around 2 years old! Until last year she would put a paw out of the French doors, if wet, she hurriedly ran in again. Now she will brave any weather even high winds which I do not like to see her out in.

She will go crazy when she goes to the cattery for a week when I have my left knee replaced. She always thinks she has been abandoned.

Rory is entitled to his long days of rest -he knows that he is well loved by both and shows his appreciation.

Charleyg Rory must be about the same age. He has started to do odd stuff...sits on the table in front of the television. Looks to see whether or not he can climb on to the high shelf of the bookcase. Sits just inside the cupboard of the computer cabinet. At the moment he's squashed in between the filing cabinet and the door. I wonder if a form of dementia could be the cause. He's certainly not in any distress. He has lost some weight but we put that down to the success of the diet.

Tara certainly has a lot more energy than Rory. MacS says that he has done his bit. He's fathered kittens. Walked for miles to scrounge for food. Survived many a winter in the wild. Now he's entitled to retire.

soop Tar is around 11-12- I am not sure of her exact age. This is the first year that she has been doing these strange things. Usually she was super glued to me indoors or in the garden and went out if I went to the shops. She would be greeting the car on my return. I do not know if she is in early early stages of dementia.

When I came downstairs this am she had moved a box containing 4 large bags of her biscuits form the door but of course she still could not get out. I have no idea what the attraction is or where she goes, I doubt if it would be far. She is a feisty madam.

Hello my lovelies. It is good to see so many visitors to our Kitchen.

MacSporran has told me that we do have Freeview. We can receive certain channels but not Sky Sport. Apparently that is what our pals have. Hence I was invited to watch the final with them. Novak deserves to be number one. Andy played very well but was not good enough to win the match. I'm still very proud of him. Champagne was on offer had he triumphed. As it happens we raised a wee dram in honour of his spirited performance throughout the tournament.

Charleygirl What age is Tara? We are amazed that she is ready to go out in all weathers...and stay out for such a long time. Rory rarely leaves the house. He sometimes accompanies MacS in the morning when he replenishes the bird feeders. Even so, he isn't eager to venture out in the rain and wind.

Tizliz A visit to our GP is much like yours. Doctor is never too busy to blether. Hopefully you will hear from the specialist soon. I've already waited eleven weeks for a second appointment.
I am sorry that you are feeling lonely. The house must feel strange without your husband's presence.

Loopylou The room in which the exercise bike lives, also houses the computer, piano, easel and a table on which MacS attends to bills and other boring everyday matters.

kitty and anno Our mobile phone coverage is awful. Some days I have no signal. I tend to get a reply from a message that I sent seemingly ages ago out of the blue, by which time I have forgotten the purpose of the original message.

I live at the bottom of a hill (London) surrounded by buildings so there is poor TV reception. Mine is the only house around without Sky but at last I now have decent reception through my aerial due to a superb fellow who worked until he sorted out my problem. He was around the 12th person to investigate. Even I knew that it had to be the aerial because I had no problems with my bedroom TV.

Another miserable day here although there is no wind yet. Tara has gone out as usual, will spend around 12 hours outside, come home, have a bite to eat and then use her litter tray. Why she cannot lift her tail outside I have no idea!

We are in the 5% Tizliz but live in the East Midlands, equidistant from 3 cities. It is nothing to see people wandering the streets of the village waving their arms in the air trying to find a signal.

Ah, I hear that the next storm, due on Monday, is called Henry. The isobars look terrifyingly close on the weather chart.

You forget that soop lives in the highlands and we are the forgotten land. I can't believe how many free channels my daughter gets in the south compared to what we get here.

When mobile phone companies say that 95% of their customers get a good signal, we are the other 5%?

Freeview works through your existing arial. If you don't get good reception that way, you can use Freesat with a satellite dish. My set has Freeview and I still have my Virgin box which gives me HD programmes if I want them. Hope the latest storm isn't bashing Kintyre now. Does this one have a name?

I forgot that my present TV came with it in situ. I bought it around 3 years ago I think.

A freeview box is so much cheaper than that and much older tv's can be converted.

soop all newish TVs have freeview built in you just have to adjust the Aerial, but we don't get many channels here. The best way is to get free sat from sky, you need a dish, a sky box and a one off payment - look out for special offers, cost us £60 though that was 10 years ago . We have sky now as OH likes things like nat geo and history channels. He especially like Air Crash Investigations, which is why he doesn't like flying now.

I am a bit lonely, no going out as the weather is awful, snow, hail, wind and rain. Was woken up at 6.30 on Friday when the bins blew over and the dogs wanted to get in bed with me.?

I have been to the doctors at last only to find she had already written to the consultant. So we discussed her holiday, her and her husband went back to west Africa where they had been helping with the Ebola crisis. Then we looked on the Internet for photos of the dogs I have. Great living in a small village, no problem with doctors appts.

Didn't like the M&S meal I bought, but a good reminder of why we always cook from scratch.

The easel looks good, wish I could paint but I am useless at anything crafty not helped by having an OH who is very artistic and a perfectionist.

Sorry to rattle on but not had much conversation today, the dogs are not very chatty. Friend rang to see if I was ok, daughter texted a few times but OH only rang once because he forgot his phone charger ?

These apple icons are good, not used them before?

soopone buys a freeview box which used to be very cheap. You attach it to your tv by scart leads and many programmes are free to you.

Gosh, well done MacS, just make sure that soop's exercise bike is as far away as possible even put it outside?, won't you?

??? for you ?

soop that "new" easel is very smart.

I am not sure how one acquires Freeview- I only know that it is free as per title and being Scottish------! Maybe google it and you may get some answers.