Hometown is Edinburgh (surely one of the most beautiful cities on Earth). I now live in a gorgeous part of Perthshire, and am lucky enough to be able to work from home. A lot of my pictures are taken in the countryside around Crieff.

I'm a keen hillwalker (completed the Munros in 2006). Between 2009 and 2020, I was the owner of a lovely, lively fell terrier named Lucy. Within 2 weeks of adopting Lucy at the age of 18 months from a local rescue service, I discovered (to my cost, literally) that she chased sheep, and so for the next 11 years I essentially gave up hillwalking because I knew that, despite all the training we did together, I could never trust her not to do it again. And walking with a dog on a lead on a hill was just too hard. Now that I am dog-less again, I am trying to make up for some lost time in the hills before I'm too old. Sometimes I climb hills with friends who are still doing their first round of the Munros. Mostly, though, I go out on my own because I want to be free to take my time and stop frequently just to look. I am revisiting the Munros I did in bad weather the first time round -- hopefully in good weather this time round -- because I want to see the views from those mountains! I met a young woman on a hill recently who described this as a 'Redemption Tour' of the Munros. It's not that, exactly, because I never felt that those first rain-soaked, misty, viewless walks up mountains were wasted. Scotland's mountains are beautiful, whatever the weather, and my navigation and map-reading skills -- and my confidence -- certainly improved as a result of all that walking in bad weather. However, as a kind of shorthand to explain what I'm doing, 'Redemption Tour' will do.

I've been on Flickr for a long time, and have learned a lot about photography from the photos I've seen here. However, I know that I'm really more of a writer than a photographer, and so my photos are largely here to illustrate what I'm thinking about. They're a kind of photographic journal. For this reason, I take photos of anything and everything. Because I often share quite personal information alongside my photos, I took a decision a few years ago, to make most of my images -- and my thoughts -- visible to just a small group of Flickr friends. If you're in that group, it's because I trust you. Some of you have been my contacts on Flickr for a very long time. You are someone whose photos I love, but even more importantly, I've appreciated our interaction on Flickr -- and even, occasionally, our friendship outside Flickr, too.

For me, Flickr is about interaction, and for this reason I don't have large numbers of contacts. I'm puzzled by people who follow my photostream, and fave my photos, but never leave comments. To be honest, I'm not that interested in knowing that you like my photos; I'd really like to know WHY you like them. However, I guess some people are shy, and I also know that people will have lots of different reasons for being on Flickr. I don't assume my reason is best.

On the other hand, if you fave my pictures or add me as a contact, but have no photos to share, I will block you. Same goes if your photostream seems to be inactive, or appears (to me) to be offensive.