Steptoe's Yard

At the weekend, Elinor, Alistair, Lola and I took a trip to Steptoe's Yard near Montrose. It's this incredible, enormous scrap/salvage/junk place which spans several barns and a huge outdoor area. I mean, we had all heard it was BIG but we had no idea... When we got there, we wished we had given ourselves more than two hours to wander around; by the time we left, we were all feeling so overwhelmed we were grateful for the time limit!

Here are just two of the barns, to give you some idea:

Here's the stuff I decided I could not justify (don't worry - I did get some plates):

I'm regretting leaving all of them now. Especially the owl. I love that owl.

And here's everything else:

Cruickshank Botanical Gardens

One of the museums we visited on Saturday is in the Cruickshank Botanical Gardens; it was a lovely sunny evening so we had a bit of a wander around.

The Gardens are beautiful - a mixture of carefully tended roses, wild flowers and wilderness. Lola told us she had seen a deer there just a few days earlier.

Night at the Museums

On Saturday, King's Museum and the Zoology Museum were open late, with a whole load of kids' activities going on. Steve, Lola and I went along for a nosy.

To be honest, we were too overwhelmed by the volume of hyperactive children to look at much or take many pictures, but they are definitely worth a visit.

Here are the others attempting cave painting (with, eh, lead pencils...). If you can see a very angry looking cat just above Steve's hand, that's mine.

Clearing Out My Handbag

Between the four bags I use most often, I cleared out:

• 2 more pens than I needed to be carrying
• 1 lipstick (I almost never wear lipstick)
• 1 empty bottle of sunscreen
• 1 empty tub of 4head
• 1 bottle of hand sanitiser (which I put in there for the Sonisphere festival last July)
• My passport
• 4 (monthly) pay slips
• A letter about my ISA
• A voucher for two for one bowling... in Edinburgh
• A Hobbycraft receipt for one fuschia pink ink pad
• An Eteaket receipt (Eteaket is a lovely tea shop in Edinburgh)
• 1 sports-related business card (what?!)
• And tickets for: The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre; Dave Gorman's Powerpoint Presentation; Ghostbusters; and Jeff, Who Lives at Home

This was not as bad as I had feared.

This week, let's have a night out which isn't dinner, drinks or a movie.

 

Why Don't You...? offers you a weekly prompt of something fun and/or fulfilling to do. The full list of 2012 suggestions can be viewed here and previous posts here.

The Week I've Had (20th May 2012)

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Over the Spital

The other day, I was at a meeting in Old Aberdeen; it ran into my lunch hour so I was able to walk back into town slowly, with my camera in my hand.

The road I was walking was The Spital. "Spital" is an old word for hospital; many centuries ago, before all the towns and villages seeped together and joined into one big city, this was considered an empty enough, safe enough place to build a leper hospital. Over the centuries, it has become built up and is now an odd but beautiful mixture of homes from all different eras, many of which are tucked away down tiny overgrown closes.

As fascinating as I find Aberdeen's history (and I really do), I can't do it justice in this post. I'm also not certain enough of a lot of the details to state them here as facts - Elinor and Lola both know far more about this stuff and would spot my mistakes! So enough with the writing; let's get on to some pictures.