Well, OK, it was several days ago since I made that posting from a free wi-fi hotspot. It’s the first one I’d ever made. Of course, you’re wondering why I happened to be in such a small place? Settle down, for there is a tale to tell.

For the past several years, Daddykins has been going on holiday to Scotland. You know. That place, north of the border, where men are men and banknotes are ridiculous.

Each time, on the way back, there has been a little break in the coach trip, stopping off at Jedburgh, especially the coach stops at the Woolen Mills. Technically, it’s your very last stop in Scotland to pick up souvenirs, haggis and 500ml bottles of coke at £1.60 a pop (!!!!).

Now, some of you can’t have failed to notice that I’m off work this week, and I mentioned to my dad that I’d like to dust off the camera. He had a think, and decided that Jedburgh would be a good place to visit. Not only did it have some stuff worth photographing, he could fill up on his haggis supplies.

He’d planned for this to go ahead on Thursday, but I’d already made plans. These plans involved going with Andy The iridium Fan to photograph the soon-to-be-demolished college in the town, which he is currently attending. Unfortunately, due to some odd piece of health and safety regulation and/or insurance clause, which I still can’t get my head around, ATIF was able to go around, but I wasn’t. Hmmmm. Apparently, it was OK for him as he is a student there, but seeing as I’m a “member of the public”, I’m cast off as some type of leper who’s going to throw himself down the stairs, break every bone in his body, and sue them for every shiny penny they have.

Needless to say, because these two appointments clashed, the trip out was postponed to Friday.

Thursday night saw me check out Jedburgh on Google Streetview. It’s not a big place. One thing that caught my eye as being particularly interesting was a signpost saying “Free Wi-Fi”. Admittedly, I was a bit drunk at the time, so I registered it, but didn’t think any more of it.

Friday came, and after a totally unnecessary tweeting session about my struggle to get out of bed, I eventually surfaced. The tweeting session ended with my announcement that I’d just hung 28 pairs of socks out. You suddenly realise that your life needs a new direction when you tweet about your fucking washing.

During this moment of dullness, I suddenly remember about the free Wi-fi, and as an experiment, I would take the lappy along for the journey. After all, I’d never actually used a public wi-fi point. Would it be successful? Well, OK, I’ve taken all suspense out of that question by the post before this one, but I’ll continue on with this. I’ve not had a rambling post about nothing for a while.

Ahem. We get our stuff together… and by that, I mean, Daddykins throws his coat on the back seat, and I stagger down the Mercuryvapour Towers driveway with enough electronic equipment to set up a small country. It gets loaded into the back of the car, and we set off.

The car gets filled up with fuel, and I head off to Lidl, in order to fill up with some supplies for the journey. 18 bags of crisps, uncountable bags of Haribos, and a 99p bottle of Irn Bru. I suddenly felt like a six-year-old as I carried the bag of ket to the car. By the time we’d made our way to the King Oswy roundabout, I was halfway through my first bag of onion rings. I do like Lidl’s cheap crisps.

Now, the journey up to the Borders went pretty much without a hitch, except for being stuck behind an Asda lorry for half the journey, and a sheep jumping out into the road which almost hit the car in front. Nopw, just because it took me ages to find these photos, I’ll show you a photo of the afore-mentioned lorry.

Naturally, as we approached Scotland, I had to stop for some pictures.

The weather was overcast, as can be seen in those two pictures, and I’d inadvertantly set the camera to ISO 1600, meaning that the majority of them came out badly. I’d managed to set the camera correctly before we arrived at Jedburgh, however. The first stop, and potentially the only stop was the afore-mentioned Woolen Mills. They sold haggis, and had a toilet. Therefore, daddykins was in his element.

Unfortunately, they had a toilet, but no longer sold haggis. This was a disaster, and it was the first time I’ve seen my dad gutted for a while. 90 miles, and not a shred of animal stomach to be seen. Obviously, the natural thing to do would be to travel into the town itself, and see if a local butchers stocked such delight. This dropped us off into a car park which seemed familiar. Yes, it was the one I’d seen on Google Earth, with wifi! We left the car, and passed a butcher we’d seen on the way. Everything in this shop looked delicious. Especially the display of stiry-fry mix in the window. If we’d have had some fresh meat at home, several large spoonfuls of this, along with some chicken would have made an awesome dinner. Just like homer Simpson once said… “Ahh, dinner.. the time of the day between work and drunk”.

Mary Queen of Scots’ house was literally behind the shops where we bought the haggis from. Seriously, I must have looked like the ultimate English tourist, as we entered the house museum. Haggis in one hand, camera in the other. After a look around the exhibits, I headed off into the grounds to take some photos.

All in all, a very nice place. We returned to the car, and after spotting the “free wi-fi” sign which I’d spied on Google mere hours earlier, I grabeed the laptop from the back of the car, and switched it on.

Now, the lappy doesn’t go many places, mainly due to its size, and its dwindling battery life, so this would be the first time it would have connected to a public wi-fi spot. I’d never actually done it personally, so I didn’t know what to expect. I “ooh”ed with excitement, as it found a wi-fi signal, and began to connect me. Obviously, there were a few disclaimer screens, accompanied by the biggest lie of them all… “I have read and agree to the terms and conditions”. Before I knew it, I was staring at my homepage (which, at the moment, is AOL. Don’t ask.). On goes mercuryvapour, and I make that posting. Cor! It only bloody worked. With the interwebs at my fingertips, I wondered what else I would do. On went the webcam. I was able to watch the grounds of Mercuryvapour Towers. I had a brief blonde moment, as I stared at the gravel driveway, wondering why the car wasn’t sat on it. Answer: I was in the car. In Scotland.

I uploaded a few pictures to flickr to verify it actually worked. Indeed it did, meaning that the following photo…

… albeit of a pretty normal Thorn Beta 5, became the first time I’d uploaded a flickr photo outside of England, only 11 minutes after I’d originally taken it!