With my remaining disease being gout it was down to eating loads of cherries and drinking nothing but water. Well gout and a pulled abdominal muscle – done after reading a New Scientist article about people thinking about exercise getting fitter – so I thought about situps and managed to pull a muscle – perhaps I should have thought about a warm up first?
Struggled back to gutbusting and swimming (and swapping disease notes and symptoms in the steam room) and started to walk off a splendid lunch in the Wheatsheaf at Swinton – first Hume Castle, then Edin’s Hall Broch near Abbey St Bathans (we planned to dine at the nice riverside restaurant which was sadly closed when we got back all sweaty in the hot hot day) and finally up to Duns Law (ok we drove most of the way up) and a fabulous view over the Borders (especially if you turn your back on the leaking Scottish Water pumping station) – the stone marked on the map commemorates the Covenantors and is way overgrown – although there were iron age settlements on top of the hill.
As another solution to avoiding long term gout medicine (Allopurinol) I decided to turn to God and became ordaned in the Universal Life Church – officially Reverend Michael Forsyth although I cannot do funerals or weddings in Ohio, Missouri or New York. Not too sure about the legal status in the UK either – perhaps I can perform a marriage ceremony for the sheep and cattle – I would have to buy the wedding kit though with leather bound bible (I guess my faux leather Koran won’t work) although I must check if it includes a slaughtering ritual for the lambs as well as the funeral side. They didn’t even mind me listing this tome as my favourite book
Finally my bullock castration movie has made it onto Google Videos – although it doesn’t appear to be categorised under Children’s Documentaries as I asked. 39 seconds long and you have to install the Google Video player first.
Feeling better so it is back to Sadistic Jim and GutBusters, with us looking like demented Thunderbird puppets in the water and planning ghost walks around Kelso out of the pool.
