Ai! Laurië Lantar Lassi Súrinen!

First off, the important things:

Or, in the world of the Lord of the Rings, it is Bilbo and Frodo's birthdays today. Indeed, I have been very remiss here, as this whole week has been Tolkien Week, and never a word have I said of it, 'til now. I did do a display of Tolkien books at the library, have worn my Tree of Gondor earrings every day this week, as well as my Argonath pin, whenever I have a collared shirt, allowing such excess. Beyond that, I have been reading Splintered Light, which is a very good book for appreciating Tolkien's theories of language and how he used them in the creation of his legendarium. And since it is the birthday of two such admirable and excellent hobbits, I intend to have a small glass of the very fine Connemara Whiskey I got in Ireland to celebrate the day.

And for the rest of this post:

As the very wise might have guessed from the Elvish salutation at the head of this post, Autumn has come and leaves like gold are falling…. Or rather, the pine needles like gold are falling… though, to be honest, Autumn pine needles tend to be a bit more copper than gold. Still, we must face it: Ah! Like gold fall the leaves! is far more poetic than, Ah! Like copper fall the pine needles… though, yet again, having just read that aloud in mine ain heid, I must say that I like the alliteration in “copper” and “pine”, as well as the sympathetic resonance of the “f” in “fall” against those other two…

Let us not be side-tracked. Autumn has come! This is a great relief to me, as the beginning of this month was most appallingly warm, with temperatures rivalling the hottest of summer days. I canna thole such weather. It is soul-destroying. But, the second week came, with an easing off of the temperatures. Though it was still summery weather, the evenings were cooler, and there was gold in the aspens – just a glimpse, a few bright coins amid the whispering green. And then the winds started, beautiful sea-loud winds, roaring in from the west, driving great tumbles of clouds before them. The skies were a rush of gleam and shadow. Rains came, and hail-storms. The air was redolent with the smell of wet earth and pine. Between the storms, the sun shone, pleasantly warm, but no longer hot, and there was an edge to the wind.

As usual, I contracted my yearly case of Autumn wanderlust, and take to the hills as often as I can. (Perhaps, due to the cruel vagaries of Life, I have been a bit more motivated than usual to turn my face to the mountains—and for that matter, the meadows and the streams—from whence cometh my hope. Who can say? It is no matter of concern to this entry, whatever.) The result is sketches in my book, such as the following.

It is also, occasionally, the opportunity for pictures, taken with the crappy little camera on my ancient flip phone… when I remember to take it with me (which is seldom, as I part of the joy of rambling is to be incommunicado) and further remember that it is there, and can be used to capture the moment. Sometimes, the crappy little camera does better than anticipated. Behold:

 
And that, my friends, while not exactly an explanation for the months of silence since the poetry contest (Perhaps the hitherto mentioned cruel vagaries of Life are to blame?) it does, at least, show that, despite turning into a wandering maniac, who regularly unnerves the populace by following the aberrant flight of a butterfly, in view of a beach full of vacationers, I have not managed to fall into holes, nor drown in streams, nor become stuck in quicksand, nor walked off cliffs. That might not seem so big a thing to you, but to me, it is enough.

Maððums

One of my jobs at the library where I work, is to sort through the boxes of donations we receive. I go through the books and divide them into categories: 

 - The ones we can add to the Library's collection

 - The ones that are very fine, but we have no use for, and which the Friends of the Library sell in the lobby.

 - The ones that are very decent, but a bit on the older side, which we set aside for a big everything goes sort of book sale, which occurs three times a year. Stuff as many books as you can into a bag, and we'll give it to you for $10!

 - And lastly, the books that do not fit into any of the above categories, and which we pass on to Better World Books. 

It is quite a fascinating job as the books that come through the donations can be quite diverse. Some are most excellent. Some are quirky and fun. Some are downright inappropriate. And some, I regret to say, are health hazards, and I am covered in dust (but, please God, let that not be spiderwebs) when I am finished. Some are just plain ridiculous, and you wonder what, exactly, possessed anyone to buy such a thing, much less hang on to it for years, before deciding to bequeath it to the Public Library. At some point, I am going to do a funny post on some of the real winners we've received, though I regret to say that that post will not feature pictures of the 20 volume series on microwave cooking - yes, you read that correctly. Apparently, microwave cooking is so complex as to require 20 volumes to cover it all.

Today is not the day for a funny post. Today is the day I brag about how I made out like a bandit with the donations. (The best thing about sorting donations, is that you get first dibs on whatever strikes your fancy. I love that.) Today, someone came in with a lot of beautiful old books.  I was up to my elbows in dust and crumbling pulp fiction when she arrived with them, I was shaken with great joy at the sight of civilised literature. I sort of pounced on the new stuff... and oh, golly, I was in heaven. Here is what I hauled home:

 

There was a book on swords in it! 

 

It is a very cool book with illustrations like these in it:

 

There is fold-out picture of the Bayeux Tapestry:

 

 The original must be staggeringly impressive, as this wee, fold up version just keeps coming and coming:

There is a copy of the Odyssey:

Translated by none other than Lawrence of Arabia:

 

There is this incredibly beautiful leather bound Latin book, containing the Sacred Liturgy for Holy Week and Easter Vigil.

 

See how beautiful it is:

It has its own cover:

Which is beautifully braid-stitched:

And the interiour is just as comely:

 

There was also this charming little folio:

Which upon being opened, contained drawings like this:

 

There was an Anglo Saxon Reader! 

 

Which contains a good deal of Anglo Saxon verse:

And finally..... There is a very simple little book called Word-Hoard:

 

Which is merely what its title page implies - a word list - but, oh, I got ridiculously excited about it. I jumped up and down, and felt very foolish and ashamed afterwards... but not sorry. I got excited about this entry:

not merely because it is the word sweord but because if you look closely at the blurry little shot, you will see the word maððum. Those two crossed 'd's - ðð - those make a 'th' sound, so that words is mathom, and I know what a mathom is. It is a treasure, an object of value, etc. Tolkien uses it in The Lord of the Rings for the nicknacks which the hobbits accumulate. But I am using it as the heading of this post, because that is what I came away home with today - maððums!

 

No, I Didn't Die.

Yeah, my resolution to be a better blogger has gone the way of all such resolutions, and this space continues to languish with neglect. I am going to blame it primarily on summer. It is mostly summer here . I do not like summer. I do not do summer. My toleration for heat is next to nothing. There is some swelling of foot and ankle, dull headaches, sleeplessness, lassitude... I get cranky. I take it out on people. I become a harpy. My family - who inexplicably love me - don't like me much during this time, but hey, neither do I... and I don't like them either, so we're even.  I read an article recently, about Seasonal Affective Disorder - which is usually a winter-induced condition. According to the article, however, it can, occasionally, be  caused by summer weather. Tempting as it is to say that I suffer from SAD-ness, I am man enough.... woman enough.... adult enough to own that I have a deficiency of self-control, and not excuse myself on the grounds of weather. I'm just saying that it is good to know.

As I said, I am blaming my silence primarily on summer. That is my story and I am sticking to it. Although... there really was a good reason for not posting.... once upon a time.... a long time ago.... back in May. I was on vacation for the first time in a couple years.  Life, you know. Sometimes, even if one needs a vacay, it is just not the time for such things.

I went to Scotland, and it was lovely. I stayed here:

From homeaway.com

It was verra wee, and comfortable and cosy:

It was in a place called Portobello, a Firth-side suburb of Edinburgh. It was removed enough from the city to be very quiet and nice, and yet, if I walked down the road a wee step, there was a train stop, and I could be in the High Street in a mere 5 or 10 minutes.  There was a lovely little burn, and a forest walk, just outside my front door. I spent a lot of time wandering there:

The Burn

The Walk

The grass in Scotland is often full of little daisies - sometimes a lawn will be quite white with them. I think these are properly known as Marguerites:

Marguerites

It was also very close to the Firth - only about a mile away, and a nice easy stroll. Sometime, I walked by the water, and watched the storms come in:

The Beach at Portobello

And sometimes, I walked along the red side walk of the Promenade, where there was a place to get Nutella flavoured ice cream! Nutella. Ice. Cream.... I miss that stuff:

The Promenade

Incidentally, the Scots seem to have a rather curious attitude towards springtime: once they decided that it is spring, by golly, it is spring, whether it is still cold enough for a coat or not.  People go to the park, and take hikes in the hills. There are food vans about, selling hamburgers and ice cream.  Young ladies in strappy sandals pick their way around puddles. Now, this attitudes is actually quite familiar to me, as I live in the mountains, and have observed men outside in a snowstorm, snow-blowing 2 feet of snow out of their driveways, whilst clad in shorts. What surprised me was the number of people in coats, eating ice cream in the rain. At first, I was merely amused, but felt no particular urge to follow their examples. The shear number of ice cream cones walking about, however, began to prey on my mind, and before I had been there many days, I was actively prowling about for a place to get some, and joined the legions of folk, eating ice cream, in un-ice-cream-like weather:

Ice Cream in Princes Street Gardens

I have been to Scotland before, so I didn't do the touristy things, like going to the castle:

from everycastle.com

 Nor did I go to Holyrood Palace:

from visitscotland.com

I did, however, go for a hike, one bright, and very windy day, up on Arthur's Seat, and the Salisbury Craigs, that are part of the old parkland belonging to the palace:

Salisbury Craigs

Arthur's Seat. There is a fantastic view of everything
from the top, but the wind was so fierce, I thought I might
get blown away, so there are no pictures of it. 

It takes a couple hours to walk around the whole area  and though it is not really a rigourous hike, there is no denying that it is a good stiff walk. This is the first time in a couple years that I was able to do a good stiff walk, and I enjoyed it exceedingly. I even took a selfie, which is an accomplishment for me, as usually I avoid being on any side of the camera... and I was using a disposable Kodak camera:

Hello there!

I particularly avoid taking selfies, as a general rule. I tend to face a camera as though it were a firing squad - squaring my jaw, and looking it in the eye, and challenging it to do its worst, which it obligingly does. Sisterly advice told me to tuck my chin, and look at the camera from under my eyelashes. Since I was taxed with bringing home pictures of myself in the scenery, and since I would rather crawl into a hole than ask a complete stranger to shoot me with my bright yellow, cardboard camera, I practiced taking my own picture. Sometimes they turned out pretty well:

Mahri - Agent of SHIELD (See my shoulder?)
Taking a Selfie in an old cemetery off the Royal Mile 

Sometimes they did not:

I will look happy in this picture, if it kills me

Sometimes, I look confused:

I know that button is around here somewhere... tuck the chin...
look up through the eyelashes....

So mostly, I stuck to pictures of scenery, such as this loch, with a flock of birds circling above it:

Or this building, which I believe is a ruined abbey:

Or this curious bit of graffiti:

Gollum Discovers Facebook

And one day, I Went On An Adventure. I caught a bus in Edinburgh, and took a long, very scenic trip through the Borders, to a place called Innerleithen. I got off near the Post Office, and walked 2 miles of country road to Traquair House - the oldest continually inhabited house in the country. 

Outside Traquair House

If one is fond of history - as I am - it is an excellent place to visit.  Mary Queen of Scots visited there with her husband, Darnley, and her rosary is kept in the little museum.  The family are Catholic, and traditionally Jacobite, and the entire estate is steeped in that history. I had a blast touring the place.  There were two libraries, full of the widest range of books, from the philosophers, to popular fiction, and everything in between. 

I am demonically pleased to be in your library.

There is a semi-hidden room at the top of the house, where the family's priest would have lived. It was illegal to house a priest, while the Penal Laws were in effect. There is a secret staircase behind the bookshelf in the priest's room.... well, it isn't secret anymore. The bookshelf is opened, and one can escape through the low opening, and down the steep, narrow stairs.

I escape through the secret staircase. Apparently, I have not
grasped the severity of the situation.

Traquair House receives no state funding - or very little at any rate - and they support themselves by means of tours, craft sales, and .... beer making. The beer making is sort of a happy accident, when the old brewery was rediscovered in the 60s. All of the equipment was in perfect working order, so the brewery was restored, and they began brewing their own beer:

from taleofale.com

There are also the Bear Gates. You cannot get into Traquair House through the original gates - they are locked, and have been locked since Bonnie Prince Charlie went into exile after the Jacobite defeat at Culloden. The Laird of Traquair chained the Bear Gates shut, and vowed they would never be opened again, until a Stewart sat on the throne. And they are locked still:

I was not ready to come home at the end of my trip. I was enjoying myself very much - and, incidentally, eating far too much fish and chips... with malt vinegar, of course. But home I must come, and I think I am finally resigned to being Here and not There.