Men in shorts...

Playlist
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Splinterheart
John Coltrane - Dakar
Various - Last 12 Months Jukebox
Ford Pier - Meconium
Elton Dean's Ninesense - Happy Daze
Ryuichi Sakamoto - Playing the Piano
Tim Friese-Greene - 10 Sketches for Piano Trio
John Coltrane - Trane's Coming (Box)
The Besnard Lakes - Are the Dark Horse

Up at 6:45 and some considerable time spent updating various websites re the upcoming release of the new LP...

Post breakfast, into town for a meet with Dr Prog at the library at Midday...

Pre the meet, into HMV and then to FOPP - looking to purchase a 5CD box by John Coltrane I'd seen recently in Fopp for £8...

No luck at HMV but secured it in Fopp - of course I have three of the five albums already but I was justifying the purchase in that one of those three was an illegal burn and I was getting two LPs I don't already own...

At the library, interesting albums by Elton Dean's Ninesense, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Tim Friese-Greene were borrowed before we headed to Uncle T's for a coffee...

The Doc tried unsuccesfully to show me pics of his new niece - here he is telling me to have some patience...



..of course he'd saved them to some obscure folder on his machine that he could no longer find...

Down to Avalanche where I found an album by Rheostatics' live keyboardist Ford Pier in the £1.99 Heavy Metal albums section - it pays to trawl...

Then back to FOPP - nothing purchased by either of us on this visit - though I noted the Coltrane box was now £10...



With the doc heading off to an art exhibition I made my way up to the Royal Mile - noting another Edinburgh flower shop of significance to me..

This was once Reptile Records...



...where Anne once sold a Sombre Reptiles tape to a young man from Macclesfield...

And so it was today, Anne and I were meeting up with Macclesfield Craig and the lovely Gail - one year almost to the day since we enjoyed the Manchester Pride Parade...

We walked through the crowds up to the castle...



...and I noted this which I'd never seen before...



We enjoyed some street entertainment...









This year, around four, instead of dancing to a Girls Aloud mega mix in a gay bar, we found ourselves having a wee drink on the Grassmarket - and Craig provided me with two albums by recent Canadian (and therefore good) favourites of his, The Besnard Lakes...

To Armstrong's Second Hand Clothing Emporium - where I last bought something in 1980 - Craig found a tasty shirt...

Another drink, at Black Bo's...





...where our tales of recent Modern Dance outings led Gail to express a desire to see the show we saw on Thursday...

So, up to the Festival Theatre...



...and tickets were secured and fish & chips were enjoyed from the restaurant next door - although, due to the crowds, we ate al fresco in the theatre courtyard (or "staff car park")...

Drinks in the bar and then we made our farewells and walked down to Princes St in the rain for the bus home...



Enjoyed some new music on the cans from Coltrane, the Lakes and the borrowed discs whilst watching "Match of the Day", post a Tivo'd "Law & Order : Criminal Intent"...

Fell asleep to the footie...

A good day...

Highlight of the Day : Craig and Gail up from Macc...