In defence of Inverness

Today’s WordPress Daily prompt is:
You have three hundred words to justify the existence of your favorite person, place, or thing. Failure to convince will result in it vanishing without a trace. Go!

♥

Inverness © Addy

Most people who travel to Scotland will visit Inverness as it makes an excellent base for the aspiring monster hunter. However, once they’ve stared out over the loch and concluded a rogue wave was indeed the monster they move on, speeding down toward the world-renowned hubs of Edinburgh or Glasgow, relegating the wee city that could to become ‘that place I slept in when I went to Loch Ness‘.

Which is a shame. For there is so much more to Inverness than lochs and monsters.

For a start, there is a rich and vibrant music scene, with venues such as Hootananny, Ironworks and a wealth of pubs offering local and international musicians on a nightly basis. Whereas the exceptional Eden Court provides a wide range of entertaining, educational and inspiring live theatre and international cinema.

History, too, is richly served. Culloden Moor, site of the last pitched battle fought on British soil, is minutes away. Whilst a little down the road are the Clava Cairns; always overlooked in favour of the more promoted neolithic sites but equally impressive all the same. Fort George is on your doorstep, as is Craig Phadrig, the Caledonian Canal and the Black Isle.

There are altruistic options galore, a wide selection of local and international cuisine and the greatest bookshop in the world!

So the next time you’re in Scotland, forget the glory of Edinburgh or Glasgow and spend a week exploring the city at the heart of the Highlands. Savor its flavor, relish its laid back approach to this crazy thing called life and inspire yourself with all it has to offer.

I guarantee the moment you stop seeing it as a stopover for monster hunting is the moment you fall in love with one of the greatest cities in the world.

And c’mon? Where else will you find a castle that looks like it’s been constructed solely from pink Lego bricks?

Inverness Castle © Addy

Teaser Tuesday: The Lore of Scotland

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading.

Anyone can play along with Teaser Tuesdays! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• Be careful not to include spoilers! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My teaser today comes from The Lore of Scotland: A Guide to Scottish Legends by Jennifer Westwood and Sophia Kingshill. A quite magnificent (and inspiring) collection of the stories that haunt the castles, villages, lochs, mountains and glens of the Scottish landscape.

An Organic Owl

Being a massive fan of owls (I used to stroll down Inverness High Street on a Saturday morning just to see the owls at the owl sanctuary charity tent every week) I couldn’t resist reblogging this.
It is quite wonderful :)

lakelectric

This was made by a friend in the USA I just think it’s brilliant

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{NSFW} 05. If you don’t ask, you don’t get

Day 5: What was your first kinky sexual experience?

This is home…

After much cursing, switching it off and on again, more cursing, hurling it across the room, even more cursing and promising to take it out for dinner and a movie…the camera on my phone finally decided to start working this weekend!

I think it may have had something to do with promising she would definitely get lucky at the culmination of the promised date, but not knowing much about the inner working of a phone’s mind, who knows what the problem was!

As a result, I can now show you my home. Aren’t you lucky people? :)

In order for you to have something to compare it to – plus show you how far I’ve come/how bloody hard I’ve worked – let’s first take a look at where I used to live.

Where I used to live… (circa 2010)

Where I live now… (circa present day)

My lounge room…

My bedroom…

My Kitchen…

I decided not to show you the bathroom. It’s a wholly unexciting room that contains a toilet (we’ve all seen one of those), a shower (we’ve all seen one of those, although some people seem to need lessons in how they work), a sink (it’s white, and well, a sink) and the linoleum floor is even harder to clean than the kitchen’s is!

Yes, I’m fully aware I live in a place that most people would describe as “dodgy”, hell, I’ve used far worse words than that over the months! But you know what? I really don’t care. Compared to where I used to live this is heaven; I have a roof over my head, a bed to sleep in, my own toilet, a freaking awesome doona cover and a bread board that would deliver a helluva whack should I ever need to defend myself.

This is home, and no matter what anyone thinks of it, it’s a darn site better than living on the street :)

Sorry, couldn’t resist. I’ll seize any opportunity to visit Narnia :p Plus, it’s kinda apt!

 

{NSFW} 04. Hints of kink

Day 4: Any early experiences that, in retrospect, hinted at your kinks?