Hi there! I’m finally starting up the blog again (after a lengthy hiatus). Of course I’ll carry on discussing life here in Scotland, but the focus will shift a bit towards discussion of The Wikiup Project. If you don’t know about it, click the link and find out!

I’ll keep it short today and let the picture speak the thousand words.

Headline One: Yesterday, inspired by our Saturday cycle in gorgeous, summery weather (and an ongoing oil crisis), I made my first journey to work by bicycle — a 20 mile roundtrip.

Headline Two: Yesterday the rain predicted all weekend finally appeared. Oh yes, and it was accompanied by hail.

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The forecast was for rain (it usually is), but sun and heat have dominated the weekend, leading to bikes, hikes, picnics and climbing.

Yesterday was Emma’s birthday. We met Emma, masseuse and one-time Buddhist nun (whom I suspect, but cannot prove, fights crime by night with her Shaolin superpowers) while she and I were purchasing our rides at the Bike Station. We have since gone hiking in the Pentland Hills, but had yet to meet up for any actual cycling. That changed yesterday, as she invited us to join her friends for a birthday ride. (more…)

OK, Peter (Rabbit?) has asked for it often enough, so here it is: the Rabbit Update. (more…)

The writer’s strike being over, I guess I can get back to some serious blogging. Mind you, I don’t really understand striking writers. Who draws up the picket signs?

The last few weeks have kept us busy with mundane bits of just plain living, but there have been a few notable events worth a mention. (more…)

I often find the similarities between my two cities as charming as the differences. Last weekend, in the process of buying Orla a bike, we encountered a bit of both.

The Bike Station is a business/community organization so innately San Franciscan in character, it’s a little bit shocking to find it hidden among the ancient streets of Edinburgh. Every bicycle merchant may be presumed to want to put more butts on bikes, but these lads actually do something about it. (more…)

Did I imply yesterday that I love the Scottish sky? Fickle lover. Today at lunchtime I stepped across the road to Ratho Station’s small grocery store. With brightly sunlit skies, I thought nothing of heading out without coat, hat or scarf. Five minutes later, I stepped out into a light drizzle. Five paces later, freezing, needle-sharp daggers of hail were cutting into my skin. I returned to the office frostbitten and waterlogged. Five minutes later, the sun is shining, with nary a cloud in sight.

Go ahead Scotland, have your laugh. But this isn’t over. Oh no. Not by a long shot.

The Renroc cafe sits on the corner directly opposite our flat, and Tuesdays are movie night! (more…)

The sky over Edinburgh is constantly interesting, often amazing, and occasionally astounding. This evening, for example, (more…)

Saturday we had dinner with our friends David and Karen at their home on the Oxgang Road, out on Edinburgh’s south side. The southern rim of the capital city is neatly proscribed by the M8 motorway: a bulwark against which the tide of Edinburgh’s suburban sprawl crashes and abates. David, Karen and their three children live close enough to this barrier to be considered sentinels, their windows looking out to the grassy hilllands beyond.

Those hills are the Pentlands, Edinburgh’s answer to San Francisco’s Marin headlands: a government maintained green space within easy reach of the city. (more…)