Deify Plums

Today was the perfect day. Really.

I slept in, and woke up when I was ready. I had a lovely lunch at the Fruitmarket Gallery Cafe (cheap, too), then wandered down to Princes Street.

It was a beautiful day. Clouds rolling through the sky. Warm, but not hot, and with a light breeze. I wandered in a new direction, down George Street. I found an adorable modern jewellry gallery, and got a pair of earrings. And then I found the good Waterstone's.

The Waterstone's on Princes Street was small and didn't have what I was looking for. But this Waterstones, on George Street, had everything. I picked up a big Scotland Road Atlas (for tomorrow's adventure), and found a new Moleskine Large Ruled Reporters Notebook. (Aside on the Moleskine: its the perfect writing notebook. Good quality paper that's thick enough to write on both sides. Because the binding is at the top, my hand doesn't cramp at the edges orf the paper, and no space is wasted. Thick cover, with an elastic band that keeps it from flopping about. Plus, it's small enough to stick in my purse and leave plenty of room for everything else.). This was the fifth store I'd gone in looking for a new notebook, as I'm almost finished with the two I brought with me from home. And this was the first store that had what I needed.

The Good Waterstone's has a cafe inside, where I got what might be the world's largest cappucino. It was a very comfortable cafe, with a good vibe, so I pulled out my notebook and wrote a bit.

When the world's largest cappucino had been drained, I got to do one of my favorite things, wander through a bookstore. The shelves beckoned to me, but I remained relatively restrained. And I had them reserve a copy of The Crow for me, so I wouldn't have to worry about finding it when it comes out on July 3. After the bookstore, I wandered some more, and found a Starbucks with outdoor seating.

And today, Starbucks came through. Like a champ. First, I was finally able to purchase lemonade! For some reason, lemonade appears to be a code word for "Sprite" in Europe. And I love lemonade - not sprite - lemonade. Just lemons, water, and sugar. This lemonade had some lime juice in it as well, but it's as close as I've had in weeks. And it was wonderful. The second way Starbucks came through was that this was my view when I paused in my writing and looked up.

I came home to drop everything off, then headed back to the Grain Store for dinner. When I walked in, they greeted me like an old friend, even though I've only been there once before. I got my "usual" table, and kind of felt like I'd just walked into Cheers. I had a nice leisurely meal, enjoyed the atmosphere of the stone walls, candlelight, and wooden tables, and wrote more. I had soup, and venison (mmm. bambi.), a strawberry ice-cream-like dessert, and coffee. As we were chatting before I left, the owner, Paul, confirmed that Ullapool and Orkney were good choices, which was, of course, a nice confirmation to hear.

This one day was exactly what I'd envisioned when I planned my trip. Relaxed. Writing a lot, but having it flow naturally, and finding that it reads well when I go back through it. Calm. And fun.

So now you know what I was looking for. It was so nice for that ideal to actually come true.