Tag Archives: US Presidential election

Hopetoun Garden Centre

1 July 2024 billpaterson1@me.com 3 Comments

We visited Hopetoun Garden Centre back in 2018 and although it’s only a 15 minute drive away we haven’t been back until now. There are just too many garden centres closer to home. This is a good one however, with lots of architectural stuff. If you are looking for a statue of the Three Graces you’re in the right place.

Elections

On a week where the Great British Public go to the polls to elect our government for the foreseeable future there were several thought provoking signs amongst the plants here. Having been bored to death by the efforts of those campaigning to be our next Prime Minister, this sign seemed to strike a cord.

Rearranging the calendar

This one at the entrance commemorates a non-event in 1782. Could July 4th 2024 be another?

A sign at Hopetoun Garden Centre — It was a Wednesday

Nothing definitely happened from the 2nd to the 14th September 1753 mainly becuase these days just didn’t exist. They had to disappear to bring Britain into line with the rest of Europe that used the Gregorian calendar. There were riots by folks who thought the government had shortened their lives by eleven days. Can’t imagine that people with birthdays on any of the missing days would have been too happy either. This was also the year in which Britain declared January 1st to be New Year’s Day; something Scotland had done 153 years earlier, in 1600. We like a party!

Bottoms

Anyway, all this nothingness is not advancing your sconological knowledge one iota. The café area is large and called The Orangery. It’s self-service and we were lucky enough to get the last cherry scone. There was plain and fruit but we thought the cherry one to share suited our mood. No cream but a nice little pot of jam and some Irish butter completed the ensemble. I usually get stuck with scone bottoms as Pat snaffles the tops. On this occasion, however, she offered me a portion of the top so I could experience its delicious crunchiness. It was really nice and potentially a topscone had everything else been in place.

We have our election in four days and the US has theirs in four months. The prospects there might even be worse than the UK’s. One candidate doesn’t seem to know what day of the week it is and the other refuses to believe it’s Monday because he thinks it’s a conspiracy by Tuesday people. Does the world need better than this right now … yes it does!

EH52 6QZ tel: 01506 834433 Orangery

///emotional.zone.driftwood

Our Trossachs correspondents have reported from the good ship Fingal, a floating hotel which we reviewed back in 2019. Back then the scones were round and excellent but evidently they are now square. Scotland is rightly proud of its square sausage but we have never come across square scones before. In 2019 we thought Fingal was perfect for itinerant millionaires so we had better start saving if we want to sample square scones for ourselves..

Ordinary, Scones

Cairnie Fruit Farm & Mega Maze

3 November 2020 billpaterson1@me.com 7 Comments

What do you do on a cold day of torrential rain with five and seven year old granddaughters. Take them to the Cairnie Fruit Farm and Mega Maze …. of course! Secretly, we thought we might lose them in the maze and then sneak off for coffee and a scone while they tried to find their way out. It turned out that the maze, in the shape of a sunflower, was carved into a field of corn-on-the-cob or maize … so it was actually a maize maze. Even an amazing maize maze because it was vast. It was also extremely muddy with the rain getting worse by the minute.

Never mind we were sure the girls wouldn’t last more than a few minutes in these atrocious conditions. Not a bit of it, they were having a ball and, even after an hour, they were not in the least inclined to leave! On the other hand we were cold wet and only thinking of shelter and scones. Eventually we persuaded them to leave and we headed to the cafe.

Sooo Scottish

When we arrived the large car park was almost full, the adventure park was busy and the extensive cafe/shop was busy busy as well. Our daughter, who has been completely ruined by living in London, observed “This is sooo Scottish, what are all these people doing here in this weather?” Of course, there were strict COVID regulations everywhere but we soon found one of their socially distanced tables and discarded our sodden outer garments.

After a bacon roll and some lovely hot coffee we shared a fruit scone with a little tub of Cairnie jam. Although there was no cream we thoroughly enjoyed it. Maybe it was just the relief of being somewhere warm and dry? The texture was good but, all things considered we decided it fell short of a topscone accolade.

More fun

Racing cars at Cairnie Fruit Farm — F1 at Cairnie

After we finished, guess what? The youngsters wanted to go back out to the adventure park. Helpless in the face of such excited unbridled enthusiasm … out we had to go. They went on the zip slide, roundabouts, racings cars and everything else. Now the rain was monsoon-like and we were soon back to being soaked and cold As far as the girls were concerned, however, you would have thought the sun was shining … sodden but not a care in the world. It was all we could do to eventually cajole them back towards the car. Bribery may have been involved.

A week is a long time

All in all, we had a wonderful day in spite of the elements throwing everything they could at us. Elsewhere, Trump and Biden have been throwing everything at the Presidential election. Today, however, is judgement day when voters go to the polls. Incredibly, fear of the democratic result has meant that much of the US is boarded up in anticipation of violence. Such are the divisions in the world’s most powerful country.

The result will probably not be known until the end of the week and by that time we may find ourselves in different circumstances. The UK, apart from maybe the NW of Scotland will be in lockdown. Also, because of the desperate events in Nice and Geneva the terrorist threat level in the UK will also have been increased. And who knows, Trump may still be in power.

The farmhouse at Cairnie Fruit Farm — Cairnie farm house

Thumbs up

In spite of everything we must stay optimistic and look after ourselves and those around us. Be cheerful! If a couple of kiddywinks can do it in a cold muddy maze we can all do it.

KY15 4QD tel: 01334 655610 Cairnie Fruit

Ordinary, Scones

Main Street Bakery

23 October 2020 billpaterson1@me.com 3 Comments

Honestly, the things we do for our readers! Here we were in Callander attempting to expand your sconological knowledge and encountering great difficulties. Some of the cafés were closed, some were open but did’t do scones and others we had alraedy reviewed on previous occassions … argh! The weather was also being very Scottish. And you though this sconing malarkey was easy! Suffice to say, as we gambled merrily along Main Street, we came across the Main Street Bakery. No idea how it got that name!

Internal view of Main St Bakery — Who is that?

Café??

In the window they had a display of scones that looked quite good and a sign saying “fresh coffee”. Seemed worthy of investigation. Turned out it was tiny and because of COVID they were only allowed a maximum of two people in at a time. Gadzooks, there was already an elderly gentleman sitting there. He said he was leaving soon so we told him to hurry up so that we could get in. Okay, it wasn’t quite like that but he did kindly vacate the premises and we were in, yeagh!

A cheese scone for Pat and fruit one for me. It soon became very obvious that this is a bakery with a coffee machine and not a café as such. COVID means they can’t put all the usual stuff out on the table. So while the seating area was being sanitised my scone was being buttered and jammed behind the bakery counter. Thank you COVID!!

Rules and regulations

Tea for Pat and coffee for me. Tea was no problem but the lady said I would have to get my coffee from the machine?? I said I would have tea instead but then she offered to make me a cup of instant. Instant it was. So there you have it! A pre-loaded scone, a polystyrene cup of instant coffee and some plastic cutlery. Bet you wish you had been there! To be fair the ladies keeping this place going were doing their best and we quite enjoyed being able to sit for a while and watch the world go by outside.

The coffee and the scone weren’t actually that bad but Claridges, it most certainly was not! No topscone here. While these ladies were looking after us they were also dealing with a constant stream of customers buying from the bakery. It gave us a pretty good insight into how the hospitality industry and everyone in it is having to adapt to weird circumstances.

Santa?

Andy Burnham has not been pushed out yet but his campaign to get increased support for Greater Manchester has had some effect. Now that London has become ‘high risk’ as well, support has been increased for this level … typical! Here in Scotland the lockdown restrictions have been increased and won’t be relaxed unti November at the earliest. We are starting to worry about Santa! How will he cope with all these restrictions? What happens if he catches coronavirus. Has Boris got a contingency plan for this looming crisis?

The US Presidential election is also looming. As humble sconeys we are completely impartial and have no opinion one way or the other but please please don’t let it be Trump!

FK17 8BD tel: 01877 330374 Main St Bakery FB

///spud.ooze.bothered

ps our Bathurst correspondent has been in touch to show us the excellent results of some homebaking and the effect of a sconefest on their friends. Looks like these were topscones!

Following a recent article in the Sydney Morning Herald he has also announced that he and fellow correspondent, the New South Welshman, are inspired by scones to take on a new 400km bike trail.

They won’t be doing it until next year but we are already anticipating some interesting Aussie scone reports. Good luck to both.

Scones, history and a dollop of politics