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!

Colours

I sort of expected changing colours to be a feature around here - but yesterday was completely amazing. The white of the dusting of frozen snow, the watery red of the sun and the reds and browns of heather and dead bracken and the blacks and greys of the rocks. Stunning.

For most of the day it was beautifully sunny and calm and around -6C. It snowed and then rained briefly around sunset and then froze again.

Jussi managed to return Muppet but it was a hairy journey - especially around Crask and Altnaharra where the warming and plunging of the temperature had made a lot of the road thick sheet ice. But she managed it.

Meanwhile Ailsa and I took a walk to the loch - here are some piccies. The loch was frozen and we had a lot of fun skimming ice across it listening it sing.

Hello Durness - are you there?

We've had a lot of jets flying around this week - they've been buzzing about bombing the range near Durness (again) - we hear the deep rumble of the explosions. The jets scare the shit out of the goats, (although in the Borders it seems the sheep aren't bothered).

This cloud mushroomed over in the west this morning. Do you think someone got a little over-excited playing their war games?

Sunrise 08:37, Sunset 15:32

COLD this morning. Here is a picture of the cats water (please add apostrophes at will).

Jussi and Ailsa went out at 6 to feed the goats - I made the fire so they could breakfast by a crackling blaze and then sat out with me morning cuppa cha. So the stunning piece of art below is entitled "Morning Cuppa". I drank it around 7am - still in me jimjams and wrapped in my dressing gown and one of the cats - watching the dawning glow.

Jussi is away now taking Muppet back. The roads she's taken are very small and we are hoping they'll be gritted - she could have taken the long way round via Thurso on bigger roads but there seems to be lots of fog on the east coast so not much better. We were sad to see Muppet go. In the spring we'll be sending goats (kids) to slaughter - I think that is going to be very difficult!

My job today was to continue with the raised bed for the fruit trees - but I can't get the spade to cut through the soil - it's frozen solid - so I'm leaving it for a while. I'll make beer instead - we've got visitors in a couple of weeks arriving under the false impression that there's lots to drink. If I get it started now it might be passable betime they arrive. He's from Cologne anyway - what does he know about beer?

Friday night 13

What is it about nails in doors that makes them so lifeless?

Anyway despite it being so quiet we learned of the problems pickled song bird eater has staying on his feet and from a guy who's tied up his boat for the winter - cos although on a perfect night like tonight - that sea's like glass - and he could spend the night pulling up creels and make £1500 easy - he prefers to stay around at home being a 'general c*nt'.

General c*nt is a common term hereabouts. There's something about it I find endearing.

We walked home from the pub with Ailsa, naming the constellations and spotting shooting stars. It was cold - very crisp under foot - and wonderful.

Friend Gary

I have a friend, Gary. He's the sort of friend you hear very little from - far too busy to keep in touch. But I've had a good sized email from him today. His job involves jetting between Yorkshire, where he lives, and Canada and India trying to coordinate a big project he's working on.

He writes:
in the last 2 years the only time I have been at home for 6weeks in one stretch was when I had to have surgery to remove my gallbladder.......I have 500k air miles with KLM but would swap them for a couple of months of zero travel

And there was me thinking I used to work too hard.

I'm hoping he comes to visit next summer - though you can see the chances are pretty slim. Here's a picture of his boys, Bailey, Cale and Nathan. I'm thinking they'd look pretty darn good knee deep in goat shit!

Sunrise 08:33, sunset 15:34

Yesterday morning Jussi was up at 6 and I couldn't get back to sleep because of the dazzling starlight. Nice.

Today it's slightly less windy than yesterday, but noticeably colder. It is also raining spasmodically and I'm wimping out from raised bed building to give my back a rest and to stay warm. I might go out later - but just now the warmth and crackle of the fire has me in its possession.

Land grab

I went to a meeting this week to discuss the purchase, by the community, of several thousand hectares (about 30 square miles) of land and forestry from the Forestry Commission. The land would be bought by a non-profit distributing company owned and run by the community with finance raised on the back of it's charitable status.

With the land under the control of the community we could ensure that any exploitation of it benefits the community. This is a great idea in theory, and frankly I don't care whether or not it works in practice! The land would belong to the community in perpetuity - eventually they'd get it right.

But one of the objectives of the meeting was to garner some ideas of what to do with the land - what sort of business to establish. The community company already owns some forest and has it's own saw mill, and they have 'added value' to the timber by making flat pack bird boxes. Ideas didn't flow too freely at the meeting.

What businesses would you set up? Do you know of any examples of similar enterprises from around the world?

Philosophy fry up

It's a very nice day today. Little wind and no rain or snow. I can't claim it's warm but warmth means nothing when you're being active anyway (most of the time - remind me to write a post about hunter's reflex some day). So I've been out at last, trying to finish that raised bed for the fruit trees, digging holes and wheel barrowing - hard work - oxygen gasping stuff.

Why?

I came across this quote somewhere - can't remember where but it went something like:

Live each day as if you'll die tomorrow. Farm each day as if you'll live forever.

I find this quite inspiring. The improvements we can make on this little croft are so small, so minutely incremental that it's easy to wonder why and avoid things cos, well really it aint gonna make much difference is it?

Then I came across this (here):

A quote from the Bhagavad Gita, an epic Hindu poem:

“To action alone hast thou a right and never at all to its fruits; let not the fruits of action be thy motive; neither let there be in thee any attachment to inaction.”

I find this one quite challenging, though I do understand it in the context of trying to make changes to avert climate change.

But this is just pure madness isn't it? (here):

“Thank God every morning when you get up that you have something to do which must be done, whether you like it or not. Being forced to work, and forced to do your best, will breed in you temperance, self-control, diligence, strength of will, content, and a hundred other virtues which the idle never know.” - Charles Kingsley (1819 - 1875)

I object to being forced to work - to do things I don't want to do, but I am content with doing unpleasant things because they are contributing to a bigger picture. I think there's a big difference.

Morning post

Two emails of note this morning - one from Chris who's working in Manhatten for a few days. Amongst other things he sent me this poem by Norman MacCaig which he recommends reading aloud over a bottle of whisky. Must buy some whisky.

The second was from Gwennie who sent me some gorgeous piccies of her children. In the absence of permission to post those piccies here is Gwennie herself.

Green Water by Norman MacCaig

Green pool – green pool, the first I ever saw.

An Asiatic swarming of green life

Curdled the clear, the crystal with no flaw,

Soggily see-sawing, a soup of woods,

A brew of sappy stems, emulsion of

Peagreenest mosses – slipslopping under hoods

And howdahs of great clouds whose herds stood still

Over the sliding wind – a wind too small

To heave a cloud on like a glittering hill

But large enough to glaze with glints not green

The broth of greenness till the crystal showed

As liquid diamond lost when scarcely seen

But traitor to it all, till one could stare

At this very self of greenness and see there

The source of all clouds humped high in the air.

Hogger wogger bogger

Eeeeeh lass it's cold. I checked the temperature in our bedroom this morning - using the digital thermometer I bought myself for beer making (which has yet to thrill to the hidden secrets of a goat anus): 6.4C (That's F cold in fahrenheit).

So here's a quick post to praise the hogger wogger bogger! Oh praise to the hogger wogger bogger hogger wogger bogger hogger wogger bogger. Oh praise to the hogger wogger bogger.

(Confession of a plagiarist)

Morning chores

Jussi gets up at 6 in the morning. I don't. Jussi will be taking Muppet back to Aberdeenshire soon - not this weekend - the weather is too bad for travelling. I have to learn the ins and outs of the feeding routine so I can do this for her while she's away. So I was up this morning.

We'd had a fair bit of snow overnight. At 6am, with a slivver of a moon high overhead, it was all whitish greys and blacks and really rather splendid. And windy. The dusty snow giving a good impersonation of sand blasting me delicate wee cheeks.

As I got up to the croft my glasses flew off. So there I was in the dark grovelling around in the snow trying to find my glasses. Jussi and Ailsa helped, lantern in hand, but it was hopelessly dark and the strong wind meant they could be miles away. After 'helping' to feed the goats I headed back to find a spare pair I've had for years and never worn. A reward for wanton consumerism past methinks. Ailsa says my 'new' glasses are funny - kinda mad scientist like she thinks.

Friday night 12

In which we learnt the joys of eating pickled song birds and, if you can handle 6 divided by 3, how you've cracked mathematics.

A quiet night. Bitterly cold. When I mentioned this a neighbour went a wee bitty balistic. COLD! THIS ISN"T COLD. I'LL SHOW YOU COLD - at which point he was dragged away - on account of it being way past his tea time.

But it was good to get out again.

Steady 'n' Snow

This week has been fairly consistently windy. Not windy enough to blow you off yer feet, but certainly strong enough to know about it.

This morning the wind has dropped, turned into the North, and brought snow. Just a steady fluttering, not enough to give more cover than a dusting. Quite nice really. It's due to get worse but I think we'll get off more lightly than 'the interior' and Grampian.

And I've lit the fire - so I've moved office back downstairs and am sitting here listening to the crackle of the logs and getting gently smoked. Today is my deadline for submitting the work, and this weekend we hope to return Muppet (weather permitting), so, apart from the smoke, we'll be able to breathe again.

Business planning

One of the causes of the gloom on Saturday was the fact that Jussi finally managed to link up with a local keeper of goats.

It had taken a long time. This woman seemed to be avoiding us and Jussi had made several attempts over the summer.

Jussi had met her before we moved and we knew that she was struggling to keep her goats happy. On Saturday we learned the depth of this woman's problems, summed up by: "I've given up, I'm just waiting for them to die".

We are fully aware that our chances of making a success of this life are marginal, and we are aware that goats may not thrive here - and we know that we need to be flexible. This seems like a good idea.

Washing up liquid

Service is everything. We ordered some wood for the fire in the 'dining room' - we prefer wood to coal for numerous reasons - including the fact that the fire doesn't draw well, especially when the fire dies down, and this sets off the carbon monoxide detector. Apart from the fact that this is ear-splitting, one does worry. Anyway - it's easier to get a wood fire to either spark up, or die completely than it is with any other fuel.

So we ordered a bulk supply with specific and emphasised delivery instructions, which were ignored.

This meant that much of yesterday was spent with a wheelbarrow shifting the wood the three or four hundred metres to where we wanted it.

Of the many greatest inventions the world has ever seen, the wheelbarrow must be up there with the best. It's a superb machine. The amount of work it enables you to do is staggering. Of great labour saving inventions it's up there with washing up liquid. No really - I mean it.

Feeling better

Yesterday's blog was going to be a tirade. A blasphemous rant. You see the whole of last week was windy wet and cold. And I mean really windy, really wet and really cold. I didn't mind too much - I was working at my desk, and although the cold meant I had to wrap up somewhat ridiculously, at least I was in doors.

But the weekend - well - I wanted to get outside and get some physical graft in. The day started pleasantly enough with a walk to the post office with Ailsa. It was fun battling against the wind. But the walk back got us drenched and frozen through. By the time I'd got changed and warmed a moroseness had slumped itself atop of me and , I'm afraid, I surrendered to it.

Sometimes,in fact most times, the weather outside is nothing like as bad as it feels it is when you're inside. And the best cure for this sort of paralysis is simply to get out.

Today though has been stunning. (All things are relative). The sun has almost been out almost all day, there's almost no hint of wind, and no rain. So we've all had a day of thoroughly good hard work. And we all feel better for it.

Tom's photofest

Thanks Tom!
For more detail click on the piccies.







Generally I think less is more but I've been a bit scant on photographs of late so let's binge!

Sunrise 08:00 sunset 16:00

It'll be a full moon tonight, but I was out at about 11pm last night and the moon was stunning. It was almost as bright as day only strangely colourless and eerie. You just don't get that effect in cities with all the street lights and all, and you can never appreciate just how wonderful moonlight is.

We are entering the season of Leonids and the full moon will interfere with their show - although Jussi should be OK - at 6 in the morning the moon has long since set and there should be shooting stars aplenty. (She saw one this morning - I was still in bed).

Tom has returned home and sent us some of the wonderful piccies he took hereabouts. This is Ben Loyal.

The romance of Highland Homeworking

So here I am working away. Fully layered with thermals and hot water bottle (the best cure for cold feet). Is this because I'm too mean to put the heating on? Not really - there is a panel heater on (low - just to take the sharpest of Jack Frosts teeth out) - but the heater doesn't really help - there's enough thermal mass in the furniture and walls to keep everything nicely refrigerated - unless the heating is on for a long time - but that would be wasteful.

Of course when we've rebuilt our house such scenes will be no more. Our wonderful renewable energy powered heating system in super-insulated house - everything will be toasty. So far we haven't managed to get the plans completed. They've been almost finished for a long long time, but some things just take so long - no matter how many kittens you throw down the telephone line.

I'm plugged in to iTunes - another great cure for cold feet - and I have to hand it to Apple - Genius is genius. My current listening is based around Underworlds cowgirl (Irish pub in Kyoto mix).

The work is assessing grant applications from the voluntary sector on behalf of a grant giving body wanting to promote social enterprise and environmental initiatives. My job is to undertake a detailed assessment to help guide the panel of the grant giving body. Sometimes I find myself being quite damning about these applications and I worry that sometimes this is more to do with my physical discomfort than the quality of the application. But of course I take care to check and assess what I'm writing and to be as fair as possible.

When I had proper job I wrote or oversaw hundreds of grant applications and I know how time consuming they are, and how frustrating funders can be. They ask stupid questions, are very poor at giving you an understanding of what they want to know, and don't give enough room on grant application forms to explain anything properly. On the other side of the fence my biggest gripe now is the sweeping statement. Things akin to 'give us the money and the world will be a better place'. Ok - but why, how, when, how will you know..... Ho hum.

Tom and Mhairi

We've had visitors this weekend and the weather was dutifully dramatic without being grim. It was cold, it was windy, but the sun was out for most of it.

Tom helped me finish the framing for the raised bed I'm building for the fruit trees and then helped me get the soil I'd dug up from the 'loch' into it. His help was massive - two people doing that sort of work have an impact which is far greater than halving the effort.

And Mhairi helped Jussi to clear out the remains of the Nissen hut. They're returning home today in their camper van with gales and snow forecast along the way. Safe home guys!

The weekend also saw the return of the fencers, after a four week absence - and they've made great progress too. Hopefully we'll see then again before Christmas.

It's back to consultancy work for me now. I've set up office in the bedroom so I can concentrate on the work - though truth be told the main thing I'm concentrating on is how cold my toes are and just how wild the driving rain sounds against the velux windows.

Jussi is having to spend time with Crystal who has decided it's her turn to be a bit ill. She'll be fine with a bit of tlc and a couple of drenches to boost her rumen.

Ashden Directory

Google analytics gives me the power to see how many visitors are coming to the blog, and some limited information as to how they are arriving.

I noticed today that I have regular visits from the Ashden Directory. I'm flattered - really - but I can't see how they are coming from that site (and this) to me.

Post election fenzy

Wasting time on the internet is one of the unexpected benefits of this new life. It's easy to resist it, but I enjoy following people's rants and contortions as they battle with modern consumerist dilemmas.

And the election of Obama has set a lot of things alight. ISPs must be desperately trying to buy more storage to accommodate the blizzard of posts/rants/petitions and all that has sprung up in the last couple of days.

These are links to positive things. There are also a load of blogs expressing deep dismay and fear over what Obama will bring. I'll try to find a few worth reading - but really I'm supposed to be working.

A petition to Obama

Dig up the white house lawn

And here is an American tied in knots trying to understand what is going on and what it means to him

And here is an open letter from Alice Walker (author of such as "The Color Purple") to Obama. I like this because of how it expressed what his victory means to so many, but also her wisdom, understanding and insight into what leadership is. (and also the comment about smiles of scissors - fantastic imagery).

Cheese

The cheese making continues albeit at a much lower volume as Bonnie dries off and the winter sets in. But this week Jussi opened a ripened Camembert type cheese she made a few weeks ago. Now that is proper high cheese man. All runny and creamy and goaty and scrum.

Meanwhile there's a herby fresh cheese we'd put aside to give to the manure lady - but we never got round to it. Jussi claims it's matured into a stunning example of the cheese makers art. So far I'm a tad too squeamish to eat a fresh cheese that aint fresh no more - it's my microbiological training don't you know. Still, Jussi appears to be in good health so I may try some for lunch - after I've polished off the remains of the rather spectacular leek potato and parsnip soup I rustled up yesterday.

Sorry - this is supposed to be about cheese. Yesterday was less successful. Judging by the language I think Jussi was trying to make blue cheese.

Blue Tongue is a disease that doesn't affect us in these parts - but apparently we have to vaccinate against it anyway. This may be another impact of climate change. As the climate warms the vectors of the disease are spreading northwards. Should I send the vet bill to George W?

Sunrise 07:44, Sunset 16:15

Yep - it's getting darker. In fact, when it's cloudy, it starts to feel like dusk just after lunch. There's worse to come.

And here are some not very good piccies of Epic.

They aren't very good cos they don't really convey the scale of the project. The raised bed is depicted by the fencing posts - the walls will be nissen hut roofing, re-inforced on the outside by rubble, or a low drystane wall if I have time. The soil level will only be raised by about 10 inches now, but the intention is to add to this over the years. It'll be enough to anchor the trees for a while. The nissen roofing walls should keep the rabbits out but I'll need to keep a close eye on this.

The pond is much deeper than it looks - in places the water is waist deep with another foot or so of very soft mud under that. I've started to shelf the edges so if you step into it you go in about a foot - a warning to proceed with care. The barrow run is from here to the trees in the top left. It's 200 metres or so across rough land, up hill.

Yesterday I was digging up old stands of whins and silver birch from the bottom of these holes. I can't tell for sure, but it looks as though they used to be growing here. That means our 'loch' is gradually filling up, and there's probably quite a bit of decent land to be reclaimed if we can figure how to drain it. The soil, although peaty, is good and deep - it would be worth it if we could.

I should be working on it today - but on Monday I received a lot of consultancy work that needs to be done by Nov 21, and I'm sort of feeling I should at least make a dent on that so I can better judge how to manage my time. But then again I might take advantage of the weather using my lack of sleep last night as an excuse for physical rather than mental labour.

Beautiful dawning

What a stunning morning. Calm, still, dazzling and full of promise.

I confess that I missed the dawn - having been up late watching the US elections. What an amazing night - and what an amazing man. There is hope. If this man can be half as great as his rhetoric we might stand a chance.

Here is Obama's victory speech. It's a bit under 20 minutes but worth watching and worth remembering.

Barack Obama has achieved something amazing. Many things in fact. I don't want to 'go off on one' but last night something very special happened. He is a great man. There is hope.

Peaty soil vs soily peat

I'm trying to prepare a bed for a few fruit trees bestowed upon me by Changeworks when I left.

The problem is that the soil isn't deep enough, it's too windy, and the soil is too acid. So I'm building an epic. A raised bed to shame and intimidate all other raised beds. The mother of all raised beds.

Shifting the earth to build a raised bed is always proper graft. But this over-optimistic moron has decided to use soil from bog at the bottom of the main field (this bog is referred to as 'the loch' by a a lady who grew up on the croft). It's a moronic decision because wet soil is heavy soil, it's far closer to peat than soil anyway, and - and this is the really important point - it's over 200 metres away. Carrying all that soil barrow-load by barrow-load up from 'the loch' is some task let me tell you.

Still, when it's done, and limed, and manured, and dug over, we'll have a bed for six or so fruit trees, reasonably sheltered and in years to come we'll be able to feast on the three or four apples that'll begrudgingly brave the wild windy wet. (It's important to have a vision innit).

But I can't help wondering if it'd be better to burn the soil I'm bringing up - it really is something closer to peat - but how do you tell? Oh - and I may be digging a death trap.

It's supposed to be a pond, and some of the peat/soil clarty cloggy stuff is being heaped by the pond to provide for a stand of willows. It'll be lovely obviously - I mean goats really do love willow. But it's quite likely that in a couple of years time the pond will be hidden by rushes and will efficiently assimilate any fool who decides to stroll across the bog/loch thing. Will this blog entry be used in years to come to support a charge of the manslaughter of some innocent ornithologist voraciously consumed by my loch/pond/trap?

Good luck everybody!

US presidential election day. We need a US president who will be bold enough to lead the world in a response to the threat of climate change. Wars and economic shenanigans will affect the billions of us living on the planet, but they are superficial floss in comparison to climate change. It is the only issue that counts.

So should it be McCain or Obama? I don't know - they've both made only a few encouraging noises. Which one believes in the issue most, and is the most likely to show the exceptional courage needed is a call I can't make. McCain has shown considerable courage in his political past, (but Palin??!?!?), Obama is young and idealistic and maybe more willing to really stick his neck out? Only history will tell, and I fear history will tell us that we were let down by the usual self interest.

Personally, I want the democrats to win and I want the US to have a non-white, non-anglo saxon president - for all kinds of reasons I'll not bore you with!

Friday night 11

Yesterday was my birthday. Today I'm hung over.

One of the locals claims he's bought an Australian crocodile for £6000 and he's building a pool for it. Reckons that as it's a freshwater croc it'll not harm anyone and he's looking forward to bringing it into the pub, on a lead, to taunt the bar staff. I thanked him for keeping us entertained over the last few months and said I'd make it to his funeral if I could.

Tigers!

You may accuse of of being a bit of a fair weather supporter - but actually it's more the fact that highlights of all premiership games are televised on one of the few channels we receive - so it's fun to follow a team, and the fact that its my home town team makes it exciting for me. So I'll support Hull City while they are in the Premiership.

Played Points

	Liverpool							9	23
	Chelsea							9	20
	Hull City							9	20
	Arsenal							9	19
	Aston Villa							9	17
	Man Utd							8	15

Tonight Hull play Chelsea, and then on Saturday, Man United. I'll post the league table here now, as I suspect things may look very different come Sunday.

I am stunningly amazed and greatly amused by Hulls success to date. Fingers crossed for tonight!

Mercury and Gold

One of the goats was looking a bit down in the mouth yesterday - so it was molly coddled and Jussi decided she'd best take its temperature. This is done anally and Jussi decided to do this without my help. The outcome was that the thermometer was inserted but said goat then balked and escaped Jussi's clutches. When she caught up with the goat there was no thermometer.

When I arrived Jussi was tryig to search the ground - straw bedding (but you'll appreciate, quite deep and, erm, wet and browned) with about eight goats nudging her and displaying a great willingness to 'help'. We cleared all but poorly goat out and systematically searched the whole stable. No joy.

Perchance, my love, the thermometer went further in, not out. So I held goat while Jussi poked around 'inside'. No joy.

So we had to search through all the straw and shit again. There was no way we could leave a glass mercury thermometer either on the floor or in the goat.

Straw is quite pretty really. It catches the light and flashes little golden glints (can glint be a noun?) - rather like you might expect a thermometer to glint. So searching through the straw the second time we took a great deal more care.

As we neared the last patch I was preparing for further internal investigations (as it would be my turn eh) when Jussi found it. Oh how I celebrated.

All in a days work...

When dost one don ones thermals?

Visitors in August were disappointed when I snarled at the idea of lighting the fire in August. It may have been a little cold - but if the fire is lit in August what is left when it really gets cold?

Yesterday was cold. Today is colder. Jussi was out to check the goats at 6 and I came down to light the fire (first time success, Mike). I planned to light the fire, get dressed and then go up and see if I could help Jussi with the goats. Trouble was I couldn't move away from the fire on account of the warmth. Eventually the thought of thermals spurred me to action. (In as much as I got dressed - haven't made it up to the goats yet, although Jussi has returned so I'm off the hook for a while).

And I was pleased to see a gritter lorry come all the way to the end of our lane. Hurray for the Cuuncil.

As I write this the snow is flying past the window, almost horizontal, occasionally carrying a little Ailsa with it. I guess this is good news - all the snow must be landing somewhere to the left of us innit. And the thermals seem justified.

But it's only October - what on earth will I be wearing in February?

Fire places

People think I'm mad, but I quite like this fire place. But there is no room for it in our plans. On such a stormy day it's as well to be working indoors. So here is Shona setting about its destruction.

Where are the cats?

Storms? Please ignore that last post - that wasn't a storm - a mere sea side breeze.

This morning I set about extending the drain around the stables. I gave up when I was blown over pushing the wheel barrow. Then Jussi told me about the Nissen Hut:

I guess the removal of the roof had weakened the structure - so plans of rebuilding it need to be, erm, adjusted. Meanwhile the wind had wrecked the coal bunker - and blown it across the garden.

"So that'll be why they tie everything down" said Jussi. Actually she's quite shaken - there's stuff being blown all over the place - it's quite dangerous. And that coal bunker was the cats house. Where are the cats?

Storms

On Wednesday night the TV transmitter was in someway incapacitated by the winds. This matters not a jot except that we missed Heroes.

Last night was even windier. It's not like we were really lying flat on the floor trying to hold the cottage down but it did feel at times as though we should. This morning we awoke to find the garden completely re-arranged. Him up there obviously decided that having rubbish bins next to the door was ludicrous, and as for having a table (a fairly heavy table at that) - well that's just silly - he decided to turn it up-side-down to teach us a lesson.

Most other things seem in tact though. But there are much wilder and colder storms forecast for next week.

This weekend we have Mike and Shona, and the weekend after next, Tom and Mhairi who will be trying out their new camper van. I hope they bring lots of rope so we can tie it down. (That's not such a joke - caravans tied to houses and trees and things are a common sight hereabouts).

Sunrise 08:10, sunset 17:50

Jussi generally disapproves when I 'go off on one' on this blog. But I can't resist this little ditty that I've thrown in to No Impact Man to stimulate some debate. What do you think?

So, to develop a theme I started in Rising from the Ashes:

There are three things I should expand upon:
1. Democracy promotes mediocrity. I mean that democracy naturally tends towards the middle way. Most of the time this is good - but when there is a real crisis, the middle way is often not enough. In the crisis we are in it's very difficult to see a middle way.
2. Democracy panders to the short term wants of the masses. Well it does. It's very rare to see the democratic process elect a Government promising to cut standards of living or even moderate increases in taxes.
3. Democracy lacks the courage to make difficult decisions. Politicians have to be looking ahead to the next election and so politicians defer difficult decisions.

I'm not saying that difficult decisions never get made - but it's rare, and there's a long lead time.

In the environmental catastrophe we are entering we don't have time to procrastinate. We don't have time for the majority to catch up on the need for urgent action. And they may well never catch up - in our world of free speech there are plenty of nay sayers denying climate change has anything to do with human activity - and some of these are backed by big money and therefore get a disproportionately loud hearing.

It's a tough dilemma - there are many examples of malicious non-democratic systems and I fear any diminution of the power of the people. But the thing about climate change is that we NEED to act really really fast or it'll be too late. And although all the little things like switching lights off help, we need a fundamental shift in value systems - away from 'stuff' and towards something else - probably something closer to the values of the worlds old religions - Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam,Judaism etc. We've existed on these values for centuries, and mostly without democracy.

In western democracies politicians are generally try to get elected on promises of more stuff.

And anyway, we shouldn't forget that many (if not most) democracies have substantial minorities who get overlooked and are condemned to real deprivation and suffering. Democracy is good for the majority - but does that make it the best system we can come up with?

Democracy is a relatively new experiment. It's worked very well - but are we now seeing its short-comings coming home to roost?

If democracy can't defeat climate change I suspect climate change will defeat democracy anyway. As populations migrate because of flooding, drought and food shortages and social cohesion collapses, 'democracies' will be forced to enact new powers of control and 'states of emergency'. If this is inevitable, maybe we should be planning now what we want, because I don't think martial law appeals to anyone.

The Love Shack

Muppet, the male, has been busy. When he arrived, all the females were vaguely interested in the new boy, but none of them wanted anything more serious. Day two was a different story! All of our adult females were queuing up for his attention, tails wagging furiously. He did his best to keep them happy to the delight of the children. He started with Margo, swiftly moved on to Bonnie, and split the afternoon between Bonnie and Gwendolyn. The next day was a bit calmer. Margo and Bonnie seemed over their ever-lasting love, but there was still a fair bit of action with Gwendolyn. The children had lost interest by then, so observations became a bit vague. There is a chance that one or two of the goatlings got involved, but whe can't be sure.
Then there was nothing for two days. The poor boy was trying his best to interest the females but none of them let him anywhere near them. Until one of our sleek goatlings, Gwennie, started wagging her tail late yesterday afternoon. Today the two are inseparable.
So - we're confident that four of our seven females have a chance of being pregnant. If the last few days are anything to go by, the remaining two or three goatlings should follow soon. Then we'll have to wait and see if any of them come into season again. If they don't, we can assume that they're in kid! Watch this space...