Food parcels (2)

Wow! Thanks Helen.

(Look how cold it is - even the curry paste don't melt the frost)

Winter dawn

Contrary to Mike's comment on the previous post - the main reason I'm not posting is that I've got my balls stuffed into the coffee grinder.

Anyway - here is a little photo essay (how pretentious is that!!).

Jussi had been up with the goats, come back and gone back to sleep. Ailsa hadn't surfaced so I went for a wander. It was about 9ish - pre-sunrise (the sunrise sunset titles I use in the blog come from a widget, but the sunrise figures are early, - we're surrounded by hills so the sun doesn't rise for a good few minutes after the widgets quoted time).

Just as the sun rose the camera ran out of batteries. The photo of the new fence - how good a fence is that? - gives a better impression of the colours as the sun rose, photo's towards the sun are under-exposing the foreground.

All this is a good few days ago- since then it's not risen above freezing - and the hoar is getting very fuzzy and pretty. But I'm too busy to get out with my camera.

second attempt

Sorry about the cricked necks.

Merry Chrismas everybody!

Lie down to view properly.

Sunrise 09:07; Sunset 15:26

Those ancients must have been pretty clever to spot what is only a matter of a couple of minutes difference in the length of the day. For Jussi, far more significant than sunrise is the moonrise, and the phase of the moon. This morning was very dark.

But hey! It's Chriiiiiiiiiiiiismaaaaaaaaas. We run a sort of hybrid Anglo-Germanic (with Scottish influences) Christmas - stealing the best of the indulgent celebrations from all cultures. Normally the 23rd is the big day for decorating the tree (a German tradition) - and friends will know of our huge trees of christmasses past, decorated with real candles - something which often generated much consternation. This year the Christmas paraphenalia is in storage - so we've got a weeping fig and fairy lights. Not quite the same thing but it'll be fine.

The fun starts tonight, with a festive potato salad, the lighting of the tree and carolling - (German obviously, no self respecting Brit would conceive a festive potato salad). Tomorrow we'll stuff ourselves with excess food, alcohol and general consumerism - the English part. This all serves as evidence of the technological superiority of the Germans who manage to spot that the days are getting longer two days before the English. No wonder German washing machines are the best.

Meanwhile the Scots don't really get going until Hogmanay.

Random acts of kindness

Darn foolish idea this, but really, our postcode is:

Kilo Whiskey (how appropriate is that!) 14 7 Sierra Romeo

House number: 119 (no idea how they arrive at this - there's not 19 houses round here, never mind 119.

You can then find the full address here.

If anything comes of this (and of course I don't really expect anything to, but it's fun to wonder) I think I should have a forfeit or dare or something. Ideas welcome.

Somehow I feel I'll either severely regret this, or it'll disappear into the ether.

Food Parcels

A big thank you to everyone who has sent us food parcels. We are particularly looking forward to the one from Orkney via Auchtermuchty, and the great big one from London via Hull is fabulous. Getting things to eat up here is fairly easy - getting really nice things to eat isn't. THANK YOU

If you've not sent your food parcel to us yet you might like to know that we are happy to receive them at anytime - so don't worry about posting dates for Xmas etc.

Thanking you in advance....

Sunrise 9:06, Sunset 15:25

Ooooh - what to do with the extra minute......

After all that talk of stormy winds yesterday I really felt I needed some pictorial representation of all that air flying about. So I went out yesterday with camera - and this is the result.

A very windy day (click on image for more detail).

Sunrise 9:06, Sunset 15:24

The shortest day ever!

After Fridays storms, and yesterdays calm, it's stormy again today. It's not forecast to be as bad as Friday, but as I sit here watching sheep fly past the window (OK not quite), I am feeling a wee bitty nervous.

Ailsa was frightened on Friday night. We put her to bed and her bedroom was filled with the cacophony of tiles slapping the roof and rumbles and screams of unseen things bemoaning the gusts of 85 mph** (according to the forecast I'd seen earlier). We made light of it and tucked her up but both Jussi and I admitted we were nervous too. I've never felt fear like it to be honest - I mean it wasn't like scarey or terrifying - just a deep sense of foreboding, a nervous edginess.

Ailsa and I walked to the post office yesterday and, to her delight, we saw that all the fences had been decorated by the grass - ripped up by the wind and wound around the wire. "Even nature knows it's Christmas".

Today the forecast is maximum gusts 65mph. That's still very windy folks although the weather people don't seem to think it's anything of note. I have a window between 10 and 12 to go get a Sunday paper. The car is out of action - battery utterly dead - and Jussi thinks it's too windy to take the van. What, I have to walk?!!



**137 kilometers per hour, or 40 metres per second

Things people know

Last week, I was chatting to someone and idly mentioned that it'd be the shortest day soon, so the light would be coming back. She said: "Yes, on Sunday!"
Growing up, my mum and dad would always observe such signs of the year passing and so have I. But I've never lived anywhere where other people know this kind of stuff and think it's important! I feel at home.

So - shortest day today, bring on the light!

19 hours 25 minutes

Our first one.

It was fun at first - you know quite exciting really, romantic, and thrilling for Ailsa. But as the day wore on and we started to feel that we wanted more than cups of tea and we were getting a wee bitty hungry, well, the novelty wore off.

They were OK down in the village. For them it had only been 1/2 an hour or so last night. Everyone was very sympathetic.

Sunrise 9:04, Sunset 15:23

This darkness thing doesn't seem so bad. Perhaps it's the joy of being here lighting my way. But then again it's the long slog through Jan and Feb that's the killer.

I'm balls in the coffee grinder trying to get this consultancy work done so not blogging much.

One of the wonderful octogenarian ladies I've talked of before has taken a fall. She's been kept in in hospital. It's difficult to get news of her (that you can trust) - but any fall at that age is bad news. We're worried.

Balls to the wall?

Maybe I should stop complaining about the cold.

But balls to the wall? Do people really say that?

One shirt

Yesterday I was finishing off the MOARB* and actually stripped down to one shirt - and even considered going topless! When I realised that my only reason for doing this would have been to be able to mention it in the blog, and actually it was still quite cold, I saw sense. The one shirt in question was a thick cotton hoodie.

But MOARB is done and limed and ready for the eight fruit trees we are planning to get in January (after the lime has settled).

Today it's sheeting rain and cold winded again. And out of the mists have appeared some fencers - clearly hoping for a christmas bonus. By all accounts the fence they are erecting is top notch - we've had quite a few complimentary comments about it. But given the fence has progressed at an average of around 1 metre per day it bloody should be.


*Mother of all raised beds

Good news: Bad news

GOOD NEWS: We've submitted the planning application for the house. Yeeee Haaa.
GOOD NEWS: I've just got another pretty sizeable consultancy contract.
BAD NEWS: The work starts in a couple of days and will be pretty solid across Xmas. Boo hoo. But like many self employeds its impossible to turn down an offer of work no matter how inconvenient.
BAD NEWS: We spent £200 in Tesco in Wick on Thursday. Xmas treats and things - ridiculous. Still, we got some nice lentils for Xmas dinner. (Joke?)

Sunrise 9:01, Sunset 15:23

Aye - it's getting fair dark of a night.

But the moon has been at it's nearest perigee so we've able to negotiate cattle grids without a torch. The sunsets and sunrises have been stunning - and one day soon it might be warm enough to pick up a camera on the way to ooohing and aaaahing. On Saturday the temperature in the bedroom when I awoke was 9.4C. Pretty warm compared to what it's been - but it's a false hope - there's plenty of winter waiting for us.

The art of cooking red cabbage

Maybe we are lacking cultural stimulation - but Jussi was particularly struck by the beauty of the aftermath of steaming red cabbage. We have a steamer - it doesn't fit a pan and leaks everywhere.

Visitors

The German tourists from last night came to see us and coo over the goats and dream about moving here to open a bed and breakfast. They are sustaining a long distance relationship - both in high pressure jobs and try their best to see each other at weekends, often failing. So many people living lives they don't like and dreaming of ways out. So few get up and go. Why?

In my youth I had a lot of friends fond of quoting "Supposing they held an election and no one turned up" - or something like that.

Well, suppose they invented a miserable capitalist system and no one took part?

Not a terribly intelligent comment but you know what I mean eh?

Hull City drew with Liverpool - 2:2. Fabulous. The result was greatly enhanced by my new homebrew - bottled this time. Excellent!

Friday night 14

When we arrived the clientele consisted of two German tourists and He Who Eats Song Birds. He Who Eats Song Birds had been there for some time and came over to us to complain about the pub quiz team he'd been the leader of last week. They came last and won the booby prize - a cabbage. Apparently his team were delighted on account of being vegetarians, but He Who Eats Song Birds was distinctly unpleased and suspected foul play.

Skoda manual

The battery on our car seems to have given up - it's not keeping it's charge and we have to push start the car if it's been standing for more than a day or two.

But yesterday trusty Skoda exhibited a warning light. It sort of looks like a clock at 8:20 with an exclamation mark. Can anyone tell us what this means?

Der orange Loeffel ist kaputt

Don't call me an orange spoon!

Now I'll not deny that I like to eat heartily. We've had a good few days of biting northerly winds and you need a good SOLID meal after you've been out in it for two or three minutes. Last night was bangers and mash - a great British tradition - (greatly enhanced by my red wine and onion gravy I have to say, not quite so British).

But look what the mashed spud did to my favourite cooking spoon? Should I learn something from this?

Hey ho. Also featured is Ailsa's latest origami. She chose the colours herself.

Show us yer mettle

Regulars may remember this.

There's a story they love to tell here of when Scottish Water decided that the water from the loch wasn't good enough and they decided pipe the water in from elsewhere. They went through drill bit after drill bit as the water main inched it's way, bit by bit (ha ha). The bedrock hereabouts is hard - and it doesn't split or crack or give way at all.

I spent hours with pick axe, chisels and tears trying to get through the bedrock for the lighting in the byre. We still haven't solved the lighting in the byre issue and are making do with portable lights and a cable stretched across from the house. Long term we need a power supply and I'd prefer it to come in underground rather than overhead.

As we had a digger on site for the strainers I asked the man to do this trench - the bedrock had defeated me. Most of the trench was done in five minutes - but there was a stretch of bedrock - maybe half a metre that took over half an hour.

A JCB with a hammer action drill bit. The digger man was placing the drill bit on the rock and then levering the whole digger up so it's full weight was on the end of the drill and hammering down. Oh so slowly the rock turned to dust. Digger main was astonished. (Although the hardest rock he's ever come across was in Laide apparently - there's a smutty joke in there somewhere).

So here's to steel! The astonishing strength and resilience of the stuff.

In one short day (it's winter you know) Digger man underfilled the fencing (fencing over lumpy ground leaves gaps under the fence so Digger man underfilled the length with stones and turf), he cleared up the couple of kilometers of old fencing we'd taken up, - filled up my raised bed for the trees (yippeeee!) and made that trench.

Meanwhile Aberdeenshire busmen exhibit great wisdom.

I have immense respect for Stoney and his pigheaded stubborness - and I share a similar outlook (although I lack his skill, strength, stamina, experience and more besides) - I'm quite happy to work very hard doing things the non-mechnical way - and I take pride in the effort. But that Digger man saved weeks and weeks and weeks of work. It would have been nigh on impossible to get the strainers into bedrock without the digger - and as it was on site anyway I'm full of glee and admiration for the extra bits we got him to do. It cost us about £300 - many weeks of food - but it has moved us forward tremendously.

Explanation

That last post has a German title cos if I'd entitled it "The yellow mug is broken" you would all have been worried about my health. Which is OK thanks for asking.

Der gelbe Becher ist kaputt

Me and yellow mug: we've shared some times eh?

I came in from the fields and grasped at cool coffee with cold and slippery hands. End of yellow mug.

It was partly the cold, partly the shock of having the fencer here with digger to attack the bedrock so we can sink strainers (oh I love the jargon - anyone fancy guessing what a gripple is?). So in homage to the Great Yellow One - here is a recap:
fine-mug
stuck-in-mud
lump-hammer-ahoy
ive-made-itulldoofenow
basking-in-sun
they-came-from-east
another-hard-day-at-office
beer-for-breakfast

sunrise-0837-sunset-1532

Thatulldofenow. It took me longer to do that than I expected - but once I'd started I could stop.

Prolific

It's been a bit of a funny week - strangely average and uneventful. No rabid weather events as we'd constantly been promised (except for the snow on Monday - but it was supposed to get worse than that).

I was out visiting and learnt the history of a local woman who married, had five kids, husband died and she re-married and had five more kids. How did they manage?

Meanwhile the beer is bottled, Xmas presents bought (the wonders of the internet eh?), Xmas cookies are in progress, and lots of other little jobs have been done. My mum has sent me her Xmas pudding recipe, given to her by her mum in 1955 - but I've nothing to cook it in so I can feel a trip to the charity shops next week....

And so life goes on.

Meanwhile capitalism isn't looking like it's getting any better (especially in the UK) and the climate negotiations in Poznan don't look as though they are going to do anything anything like spectacular enough to have the sort of impact we need. In my opinion (did you ask? - I'm sure you did) - we need a seriously heavy carbon tax, perhaps coupled with personal tax allowances. There's an idea floating around that all the monies levied through a carbon tax is redistributed back to people on a per capita basis. Heavy carbon users become net losers and low users get rewarded, Sounds good to me.

Scotland is boasting the most ambitious carbon legislation in the world and continuing to invest in the expansion of airports and roads. Ludicrous - I mean just plain stupid - stunningly so. And very depressing.

Is there any hope? Well, I hope to finish that raised bed for the fruit trees this week. That's hope enough for me for now.

Vision

Had dinner in Thurso last night with Mike from my Runge course (a leadership programme run by the Work Foundation). Very pleasant. We spent a bit of time revisiting the lessons of Runge. For me the most important aspect of the course was the importance of vision in any leadership role.

It's very much taken for granted how important vision is when driving a car. On the way home it was snowing and I couldn't see a thing. Bendy up and down deserted roads scattered with sheep (alive, surprisingly) eating the salt from the gritter lorries. White on white on white on white. (1) the road, 2) the surrounding land, 3) the sheep, 4) the vortex of snow driving into you).

I like driving into snow - there's something wierdly trippy about how the snow comes at you. The addition of random wooly mammals heightened the experience considerably. They just appeared out of nothing giving you the thrill of deciding to (a) drive into it - risking an unhappy ending for all concerned, (b) swerve, risking descent down some unseen precipice (c) brake - risking going into a skid (and combining the effects of (a) and (b) or (d) swearing VERY loudly and going catatonic. I found this latter course to be strangely effective.

Anyway - steady and slow I got home safely and only went slippy slidey on the very last part of the journey. Weeeeeeeeee!