Blogger Notes

I'm back in the US, back at work, and almost all caught up on TV, news, and blogs. I had a great time overseas, but I must admit, it's quite a luxury to once again understand what people are saying without straining my ears. I love the Scottish accents, but man, I could never tell what they were saying!

Though there were a lot of differences between the UK and the US (fries=chips and chips=crisps), there was one thing that hadn't changed. The love for Twilight. The buses were plastered with banners, the bookstores proudly displayed the text, and reports of the UK Twilight premiere littered the television news programs. I think my boyfriend had been eager to escape Edward, he feels somewhat inferior to the sparkly vampire, but I assured him
	We didn't get to eat here, but I finally snagged a non-blurry/dark photo of The Elephant House.
I'm sorry, but is this not the best store title EVER?

After London, we spent the day traveling to Cramond fishing village, about forty five minutes by bus from Edinburgh. We had every intention of trekking out along the bridge to the tiny island in the distance. Unfortunately, we didn't check the tide times before we left, and we'd missed low tied by about two hours. The tide already came in and covered the bridge. I still got some great shots of the scenery.


First photo: My boyfriend, Josh's, family. Second photo: Josh standing on what's left of the bridge

Below: This is my favorite shot. I want to paint it eventually. I think the monochromatic blues really capture the mood of the image.

As you can see, I am very cold and trying not to show it. Thankfully, I am a writer, not an actress.



First photo: I must get the name of their fabric supplier. Second photo: Josh's brother Dan in his graduation kilt. I'm in the center and Josh is on the right. Congrats on graduating from the University of Edinburgh, Dan! He now has a masters in creative writing. My boyfriend is pratically the only non-writer in the family (his mother is a poet). I run with my own kind.

On Thursday of last week, we went Loch Ness monster hunting. It's less like I imagine deer hunting would be and more like looking at an image of Where's Waldo. We took a twelve hour bus ride, and our kilt-wearing tour guide proceeded to give us a twelve hour history lesson. Too bad I'm not still in high schoo, because I would surely ace any exam right now. This was the day I outlined my new book idea, but I'm excellent at multi-tasking, so I absored the info while also working on my outline. Though I don't have any pictures of the locations because we didn't actually stop the bus, we did view a few of the Harry Potter filming locations including the spot they filmed Hagrid's hut, the Dragons in Movie 4, and some of the train scenes from Movie 2 where Ron and Harry chase the Hogwarts Express in their flying Ford Anglia.

We did however stop for mountain scenery photos. Here's a few below. I should mention that growing up, my mom ingrained in me the idea that scenery shots should always include one of the family members in the foreground. I'm sure most photographers will disagree with this, but because I'm a good girl and follow the rules, I only have scenery shots with people blocking the beautiful views.



Finally, we arrived at Urquhart castle, which overlooks Loch Ness lake. The monster is there in this picture, he's just hidden beneath the surface. Please be my guest and try to find him. Note that there's a 100k pound reward if you capture the first photographs of him. I would like a cut if you spot him, 10% maybe? See blog readers, I give you the opportunity to win loads of cash here on this blog.


Inside the castle, once again, my awesome photograph skills at work. Well, okay, I can blame Josh this time. There was supposed to be a beautiful shot of lake Loch Ness behind me. Instead, you get a really nice blown out white glow. I just know this was my money shot of the monster. Let's blame Josh for our collective loss.



Don't worry, I punished him for you guys. Here he is in the dungeon.
















Another day at the office for me, lifting heavy stones.





















That concludes my vacation slide show from Scotland. I have some fun blog posts planned over the next few days, I want to post a response to my critique partner's entry about outlining. Plus, I hope to have her here as a guest blogger next week where we'll square off about our different writing/editing styles and why it works well that we're critique partners. (I'm an overwriter, she's an underwriter. I'm a taker-outer. She's a putter-inner. We need each other to condense or expand, respectively.) Thanks for stopping by!