Everything is shut and we are old.

Monday 29th November 2010
There was more snow overnight so all the schools are closed and most of the bus services are cancelled or restricted.

Our road is still impossible without a 4*4. Fortunately we have a builder with a 4*4.
Although he was not due up here until this afternoon, Duncan came up to see if we needed anything from the shops. All we wanted was milk but it was very good of him to be looking after the old folk stranded in the snow. The fact that when he came back, he had forgotten to get the milk in no way detracts from his very good intentions.

Again it was a lovely morning and the walk with the dog was a real pleasure. When we were down the village I noticed that the big Burray wind turbine was turning again.
It has been out of action for 3 months or more. I am told that there was a gearbox fault but why it took so long to fix it I do not know.
They must have lost a lot of money. Burray Community Association get £30,000 a year from the turbine so presumably they have lost about £7000. As there are about 350 people in Burray then that is about £20 each. I had noticed a huge crane at the turbine a couple of weeks ago but I haven't noticed it working until now.

Tuesday was another lovely day. Just after dawn the shades on the sky and the sea were spectacular. I took a photo but it does not really do it justice.
It makes me realise how fortunate we are to live here. Most days when I take the dog into the garden first thing I just look round and feel lucky (then there are the days when I tell the dog to hurry up or I am going back inside without her).

On Radio Orkney this morning they announced that some schools were open. They listed them all and then said that although the council site said that North Ronaldsay school was shut, it was in fact open. This announcement struck me as a total waste of time. There are I think, only 2 children in the North Ronaldsay school and they are both from the same family. They also live close to the school so probably already knew or had recieved a phone call. Come to that why would North Ronaldsay school shut anyway it's a small island. You can get anywhere in a tractor and most people have one.

As it was so lovely again and as Duncan forgot the milk yesterday, Molly and I went down to the shop for a couple of things. Molly made a new friend of a golden retriever that she met in the shop. None of those silly rules about "No Dogs" in the shop. Even the shop owners dog is often in there on a little dog bed in the corner. Molly made a bee-line for a box full of tennis balls but I restrained her.
I should have taken more notice of her as it must have been a premonition. When she was playing with Jock in the field late this afternoon, we managed to loose our last 2 tennis balls in the snow.

Snowed in!

Sunday 28th November 2010
There was more snow overnight so there was no chance of getting out in the car.
It was really calm with hardly any wind and not to cold, so when I went for a walk down to the beach with Molly, it was really pleasant. Nobody was about and there were no cars on the roads.
Sometimes there are 2 or 3 cars that pass us while we are walking down to the village so it was nice not to have to be listening and looking out for cars and dodging traffic.

As we were snowed in and couldn't do anything, Pam had me making merangues with some egg whites that she had left over from some baking. I got the Kenwood out and started to whisk them up when I smelt a burning small followed by a loud Pop. It is sods law that I have had no problems kneading loads of bread dough with it but a few bits of egg and it breaks.
I had a look inside and checked on the internet and it seems that it is probably just 2 capacitors (whatever they are) so I will have to take it to OTE who assure me that they can fix it.
No more bread until the snow stops then.

Snow place like home.

Saturday 27th November 2010
This morning everywhere was covered in snow. The views from the house to The Hope and across to Flotta and Hoy were great.

If you were feeling really festive then you could say that the flare on flotta was reminiscent of the candle on a Christmas cake.


It was not possible to get up our road so I thought I would drive to The Hope to post some parcels. On my way down to Burray village I met some people who had abandoned their car because it wouldn't get up the hill. It was however, to late to change my mind so I carried on.
Just across the barriers there was a 4*4 parked upside-down onits roof on top of a stone wall,(another hint about driving conditions).
The car had been driven by a young girl from The Hope but she was not badly hurt which is surprising.

Surprisingly I managed to get back home in the little Yaris although the last 1/4 mile was in first gear. I think that if I had touched the accelerator or brake on the last bit up the hill to the house then I would have slid all the way back down the hill. However, all's well the etc.

After all that excitement I just sat back and watched Babe, Pig in the City. That's one of the advantages of being old. You can watch kids films on telly and nobody takes the piss.

Would I whinge about prices?

Friday 26th November 2010
First things first. Pam has complained that I did not put up a photo of the back of the house without the scaffolding, so here it is.

Note the green and environmental brownie point earning air source heat pump on the back wall. I should now have a guaranteed ticket to Greenpeace heaven (If they forget about working on nuclear bombers in my sinful past).

We ordered the flue pipes for the stove that is going in the new living room today. Now you may think that 5 metres of flxible pipe and a few other bits should not be to much of a drain on the poor old bank balance. Oh how wrong you would be.
£361, I repeat £361. The £61 I can understand but where they get the other £300 from is another of life's unfathomable mysteries. One bit of flexi pipe, a bit of tube, a couple of clamps some cement and glue. The first house that we lived in was originally built for less than that. I wouldn't mind but we allready had the bloody chimney, all we needed was something to stick up it. I think that we ended up being the ones who had something stuck up them.

It's a good job that at least we got the stove cheap. When I say cheap, it was not really cheap, it was just cheaper than the extortionate price that they were originally going to charge for it. The reduction in the price of the stove was supposedly because it was an ex-display model. I have yet to understand why they knocked about £250 off the cost of a sodding great lump of black painted cast iron just because it had been on display. Has the price of scrap cast iron suddenly plummeted in the last few months? Certainly not by that much. Anyway if they want to knock the price down then why should I argue. (Unless of course it was vastly over-priced to start with.)

The brickies finished dishing the floor for the shower and drilled the hole in the wall for the aforemnentioned expensive flue and Duncan went to Kirkwall and ordered the timber flooring. I think that Pam knows how much the flooring will cost but she hasn't told me. I suggested painting the concrete floors. We do not need any sort of covering as there is underfloor heating but apparently we still need to put something expensive on top of the concrete.

At least I think that we are nearly there and next week may see a lot of changes. Then we can probably live in it for a few weeks before it is repossesed to pay for all the "little extras" that we have.

End of whinge for today. You will have to wait until tomorrow for the next installment of superwhinger.

We're getting there

Thursday 25th November 2010
Today was a landmark day for the extension. The scaffolding finally came down so that we can get an idea of what it will finally look like.
I think that it looks OK and it will blend in a bit better as it ages. At least it is beginning to look less like a building site.

In the evening it was Molly's obedience class. She has not been for two weeks. Last week the barriers were closed and the week before that the trainer was sick. Because of this I thought that we may have missed something and she may have forgotten some things even though we had practised at home.
There was one new thing that the others had done last week but Molly learned that in 2 goes and then proceeded to do everything better than any of the other dogs. (If she keeps that up I shall have to stop referring to her as "the disobedient dog" or that f****** dog"). At the end of the lesson the instructor came over to me to make sure that we would be continuing into the next class next year. She said that Molly has real potential for dog agility, so I gave her an extra bit of raw sausage meat but she didn't want it so I gave it to Molly instead.
It is Molly's beginners test next week so she probably peaked today and it will be all downhill now and go pear shaped next Thursday.

They told me lies. It does get cold in Orkney.

Tuesday 23rd November 2010
People always say that Orkney doesn't get cold because the tail end of the gulf stream get up here. They tell lies. There was snow on the top of the Hoy hills, some heavy snow showers and it definitely was not warm. However, having said that it doesn't get really cold, well not upto Staffordshire standards but I am getting old and do not need temperatures of minus 10 degrees.

We won a boat trip on the Children in need last friday and went to Radio Orkney on monday and paid for it but I had to contact the boat owner to arrange when to take the trip.
On Wednesday I phoned him up to see if there was any time limit on when to take the trip. Fortunately I can take the trip any time that suits me and I can leave it until next spring or summer so will probably use it when either Barbara or Gareth come up. The problem then (which I should have thought of before bidding on the auction) is that I will now have to pay for another boat trip for whoever comes up second.

Anyway, back to the plot. While I was chatting to the boat owner on the phone I asked what the boat was normally used for. It turns out that he dives for scallops and will sell them live in their shells from Burray pier for between £3.50 and £4.50 per Kilo (about 10). We can see the boat going in and out from our front window so next time I see him coming in I shall have to rush down to the pier and buy some. I love scallops but when you get them from a restraunt they cost a fortune and you only get 3 or 4.

Opening Hours

Monday 22nd November 2010
A very Orkney sort of day today. I didn't get much done but I went to post some parcels this afternoon. Unfortunately I had forgotten about it being half day closing at the Post Office. Many shops up here still have a half day closing. A thoroughly good idea as far as I am concerned.
I used to work in a shop when I was younger (many many moons ago) and for the convenience of customers we were of course open all day on saturdays. Some customers however seemed to think that for us to take half a day off in the week was very selfish of us. They would of course never think of working on a saturday themselves, especially if they did not earn any extra money for doing so. We even had customers wanting us to be open christmas morning so that they could collect meat for their festivities. As it was we had worked about 100 hours in the week before christmas and slept in the back room of the shop because it was not worth going home.
(Whinge Over)

The other side of the coin here was illustrated when Pam dropped into the dentists this afternoon. She wanted to make an appointment to replace a filling that had dropped out. The dentist told her to come back at 7:15PM and he did it then.
I don't think that many dentists down south would do that. The doctors here have the same philosophy. Patients are treated as individuals to be helped if possible and not just inconvenient work unitsthat must be endured.

Innactivity rules OK

Friday 19th November 2010
The house was full of a seemingly random collection of several building trades all day. I hope that Pam has allowed for the cost of tea, coffe, cakes and biscuits in her budget for the extension or we may go bankrupt.

When I refer to Pam's budget for the extension, this is not a hard and fast budget that bears some resemblance to the expected costs. I feel that it is more like a government estimate in that you know right from the start that there is no chance of it costing less than this amount, it is probably going to cost a great deal more than you are being told and the final bill will have very little to do with the original figure.

It was Children in Need today and Radio Orkney had an auction in the evening. We bid on a few things and won a boat trip round Scapa Flow and a week in the kennels for Molly.
The whole auction raised nearly £19000 and they are expecting more donations in the coming week. With all the other fund raising things going on, the total raised in Orkney will be between £25-30,000. That's about £1.50 per head of the population of Orkney. If the rest of the UK did as well then they would raise about £80-90 Million.

Having spent so much money on the auction, I went into withdrawal and did nothing except walk the dog on Saturday or Sunday.

A marine engineering company has been working down on the links in Burray village making huge circular things out of big lengths of plastic pipes. I was mystified as to what they werebut I have been informed that they are cages for a fish farm.
They have been put together very quickly, just like a giant welded Lego set.

On Saturday morning while walking Molly, I was talking to a man down the village and he says that the cages are for a fish farm in Hoy but he doesn't know where.
(It's surprising who you talk to and how much you find out when you have a dog with you. Perhaps the CIA should send people out walking dogs all over Russia.)

On Sunday morning, while doing my nosey parker bit out of the front window, I noticed a strange boat in Water Sound.
It turned out to be a tug which was to take the bits of the salmon cages to Hoy. When it came back up the sound towing 5 or 6 of the cage frames, it looked like a mother duck with a row of little ducks following her. They still have some bits down the village that they have not finished making but I suppose they thought that they may as well get these ones out of the way while the weather was good for towing them.

Windy and wet but contented.

Wednesday 17th November 2010
It was a nice traditional almost gale force Orkney morning and the forecast was for worse so I decided to go on a U3A walk in St Mary's. Just to make sure that we would get exposed to the full force of the wind, the walk was round the coast.
I have seen bunches of crazy old people wandering round the countryside in all weathers before and now I am one of them. Oh the joys of senility.
It was actually very enjoyable and I was surprised that there were some lovely little coves with shingle beaches so close to St Mary's that I had not seen before. I was quite surprised that there were no seals on the beaches as these coves looked ideal but then the beaches were rather shallow so maybe they are under water at high tide. Several people commented that they thought that it would be a very pleasant walk in good weather. Damning with faint praise. Still it was better than sitting around the house.

The forecast was right and later on the weather got worse until they closed the barriers at 5:15PM, just in time to stop all the people returning from work in Kirkwall from getting back to Burray and South Ronaldsay. Some people had already decided not to try and cross anyway and 3 people had sustained damage to their cars while trying to cross, mainly damaged windscreens. (I don't think that windscreens are designed to take a few tons of water descending from 10 feet above the car when a wave comes over the barrier.)
A lady in Burray shop said that she got across but lost all control of her car on the barrier because it was just aqua planing all the time.
Maybe they let people off work early if they think that the barriers may be shut. Otherwise half the population of the two islands would be stranded in the bar at The Commodore waiting for the barriers to re-open.

Thursday dawned even worse. Force 9 south easterly gales so the barriers were shut again and presumably nobody got to work. After the wind eased off a bit I decided to go and have a look at the barriers like a well behaved tourist.

Number 3 barrier from Burray to Glimps Holm was OK but No 2 barrier from Glimps Holm to Lamb holm is always the bad one and it was this one that was shut. The weather had been improving for a few hours and the tide was half way down but it was still having waves breaking right over the top. Even if it had not been closed, it would have taken a suicidal idiot to try and cross it. There are plenty of them round here though.
They opened the barriers later in the afternoon and I was supposed to be taking Molly to her obedience class in Kirkwall at 6:30 but I decided against it as high tide was due about 8PM. This proved a sensible decision as the barriers were shut again at 7:30 so I would have been stuck until midnight when they were re-opened.

The waves had also badly damaged the road on the other side of Holm Sound so the council have shored it up with sandbags. The waves move 125 cubic foot concrete blocks off the barriers so I do not think that the sandbags will be overly effective.

Nothing but builders and dead seals.

Sunday 14th November 2010
A lovely day so we took Molly to the beach for a run. (Loose again with her string). She was being much more obedient than normal, even fetching the ball back instead of running off as normal. Just as we turned back Molly legged it off all of a sudden at a great rate, ignoring her ball altogether. I assumed that she had figured that we were going back and was going to abscond before we could get her in the car but when I got closer to her I saw that she had found a dead adult seal on the beach. Fortunately I managed to get to her befor she had a good roll in it. (It had been dead for some time and had a really fascinating aroma according to Molly.)

Monday had a fantastic dawn and was another lovely day (that's 2 in a row, and in winter too) Molly won out all round as she was out with Jock twice and also had a walk to the village.


Duncan stripped the plaster board from the corridor before insulating it so now even less of the house looks fit to live in. When you see the bare stone walls you realise why they built them 2 1/2 feet thick. It was because they were fishermen, not builders and there was more chance of a wide wall standing up. Very little mortar and a lot of stones just balanced. If you keep it thick enough then there is very little skill in getting the wall to stay up.

On Tuesday we had a full house, Duncan and Hamish, Brickies, Electricians, Heat pump installers, plumbers and Gavin doing the decorating. It cost us a fortune in tea and I had to go to the shop to get another couple of litres of milk.
They all got a lot done though and at last it looks as though things are coming together. Duncan was so rushed that he couldn't spare the time to go to Kirkwall for plaster board and insulation so I had to take hisvan down and pick it up for him. What is the going rate for van drivers?

I was going to go to the RSPB AGM in the evening but the weather was worsening and I was not sure if the barriers would be open for coming back so I gave it a miss. I will no doubt get my wrists slapped.

Waves, Tides, Seals and Dogs

Saturday 13th November 2010
When I took Molly for a walk down to the beach this morning there was a seal quite close inshore near the village. It is the first time that I had seen one in Water sound. Duncan informs me that every now and then there is one there and that Jock jumps into the sea and swims off to try and catch it. He is a very nice dog but labradors are not the world's cleverest dogs.

Pam and I went to an exhibition on wind and tidal power in Kirkwall. I expected to just drop in for 15 minutes or so for a quick look round but we ended up staying for about one and a half hours. In addition to the renewable companies, the national grid, The crown estate, Marine Scotland, The Orkney Islands Council and others had stands explaining what they were doing.
It seems that whatever happens there is going to be a lot of money and development coming into Orkney in the next decade or two.

We had a nice lunch at The Strynd and came home to see Scotland had been trounced by the All Blacks and to watch England beat Australia. (I thought that I must remember to mention this to Duncan)

All was not bad for rugby in Orkney though. They won their match against Cumbernauld today and this puts them second in their division. This is not bad as they only went up to National division 3 this year and they have to play most of their away games with weakened teams as not everyone can always get time off to travel.

Another Stony Faced Wife

Friday 12th November 2010
Friday was a calm but overcast day. I heard on the radio that that today was the last day that the Westray Wife was to be displayed in Kirkwall museum so I thought I had better go and have a look at her.
This is not some sort of island voyeurism. The Westray wife is a 4500 year old venus figure found on Westray earlier this year. She has been on display on Westray during the summer and in Kirkwall for the past couple of months.
Maybe she is not your idea of the ideal woman but 4500 years ago they didn't have Playboy or Penthouse and there were not very many women about anyway. She was probably the height of desireability to stone age man. As a bonus, she is very quiet.
Fortunately we already knew that she was only about 2 inches tall but apparently some people have been disappointed because they had only seen photos with nothing to give a sense of scale and expected a large statue.

I must admit that I did not think that she was particularly well made but then if you are trying to carve one rock with another rock and a bit of bone then the amount of finesse that is possible is probably somewhat limited.

At last the Northern Lights (but we missed them)

Thursday 11th November 2010
Thursday was a beautiful day so i took Molly down to the beachand sat about on the sand throwing balls for her. It is the first time that she has been loose on the beach since she started refusing to come back. The string with a stick on the end works wonders. She knows that I can catch her easily by standing on the string so she doesn't bother to run off and even comes back when she is told to.

Thursday night there was a splendid display of the northern lights but as is the norm, we missed it. I did not know anything about it until I read Radio Orkney's Facebook page on Friday morning when they had a spectacular photo of them. I suppose that there will be others so no panic. Next year is supposed to be a peak year in the solar activity cycle so there should be lots of good chances to see them.

A trip out for Pam

Sunday 7th November 2010
When I was down at Windwich yesterday I noticed a path across the fields which I thought Pam may be able to make even though she is still recovering from her op.
We went up to give it a go and apart from one dicey bit on an awkward stile, Pam managed OK. So she finally got to see some seals and pups. I was pleased as I had begun to feel guilty about going off and seeing things when Pam was stuck in.

To make Pam's day even better, we went to Kirkwall where they were having a "Girls day out". Most of the shops had opened especially which they do not normally do on sundays. They all had their prices reduced and so I went overboard and bought a pair of warm gloves (Men were also allowed to buy things). I do not know what Pam bought and I am much to tactful to ask.

At night the wind came up very quickly and by midnight it was a force 9 severe gale. The noise of the wind howling outside and rattling the door of the porch and the letterbox scared Molly the brave dog. I had to go and let her in from the porch so that she could sleep in front of the stove in the living room before she scratched the door down. As soon as I opened the porch door Molly shot into the house with her tail between her legs as if the devil was after her.

The gales lasted all day on Monday and were from the south east so the barriers were shut until 3:30PM so loads of people from Burray and South Ronaldsay had an involountary holiday. It stayed dry though so Molly and I had a very bracing walk down to the village and back. Fortunately the wind was with us on the way back which is uphill.

On Tuesday the gales stopped so we thought that we had better get out while we could. We just toddled off to Stromness for lunch but then that's what you are supposed to do when you are retired.

Wednesday was Molly's day. Not only did she get taken for a walk but Jock came up, so she went out into the field with him twice. To top it all, when we came back in from the field the second time, Duncan had gone off to Kirkwall for something so we got Jock into the house. This is not as easy as it sounds as Jock will not even go into Duncan's house. I am not that Jock will ever come in again after being bounced at incessantly for about 20 minutes until Duncan returned and rescued him.

Seals, seals and more seals

Saturday 6th November 2010
The Scapa Flow Rangers have an organised walk on South Ronaldsay to see the beaches where the seals are pupping down so I decided to go along even though I had found some beaches with seals at Burwick.

The walk started from Windwick where we had been before and seen no seals but half a mile further round the coast there were several bays covered with seals. The seals were very tolerant.

The ranger reckoned that they may all dive off the beaches into the water when they saw us but they were not really bothered. I should imagine that they see enough people wandering up to look at them to realise that people will do them no harm.
It is a long time since there were any seal culls on Orkney so they have no reason to be scared. They did keep their eyes on you as we walked round but when we sat down they just got used to us and ignored us.


We must have just missed a pup being born as the mother was still covered in blood and gunge. Some of the other pups were quite well grown and one was having swimming lessons. Its mum was encouraging it and was sheltering it by putting herself in between the waves and the pup. When a bull seal came near she gave it a real telling off and ushered her pup back onto the beach.



When the pups were suckling, I was surprised at how far back the teats were. Judging by how long it took some of the pups to find the teats, they were probably as surprised as I was.

I even managed to try the video bit on the camera. Not brilliant but maybe better next time.


After I got back from Windwick we went off to the Burray Community Cafe where they had a Pre-Christmas sale of local crafts. I will not say if Pam did or did not buy several expensive presents just in case, dear readers, one of you should be the fortunate recipient of any such items at Christmas.
Somebody in the cafe said that it was compulsory for all Burray residents to attend and it did seem a bit like that. At least I am getting to know who a lot of them are, mainly because of Molly the dog.
It is surprising how many people stop and chat when you are walking a dog. There are some though who do not know my name but do know that I am Molly's owner.

Another week whips by

Friday 5th November 2010
Well it is a week since I put anything on the blog but then not much has happened.

Well, when I say "nothing much has happened", I really mean that nothing that I consider fascinating has happened to me in my isolated little life. People elsewhere will have been born or died and no doubt great events have occured but they have all passed me by without leaving a ripple.

Insular little sod aren't I.

Last Monday was not a bad day for the start of November ( see we are getting towards winter so days are not now "nice", they are sometimes "not bad"). Anyway, it was not a bad day so when I took Pam down to the surgery in The Hope for routine maintenance, I had a wander round and up to the pier. As you will have come to expect, there were no waxwings.

On the subject of nature, Orkney must have a reasonable number of otters near us as there were 3 run down by cars last week. Two of them near the barriers and one further away in Kirkwall. Admittedly the otter population is now three less than it was but if otters are becoming normal road kill then they must be reasonably common. Well that is my logic anyway. Of course, like waxwings, the place could be littered with otters but I would never see one.

The RSPB have caught three stoats in the past couple of weeks but as there are not supposed to be any stoats on Orkney then that is not quite such a welcome sign. They have been humanely shipped off to somewhere in Fife and released. Orkney bird watchers have been asked to keep their eye out for stoats and photos of stoat footprints have been put on the internet. I would think that it is very unlikely that a birdwatcher with his/her eyes to the sky would see a tiny stoat footprint in the sand. Even somebody wandering along looking down at the sand all the time would be hard pushed to see them.


Tuesday and Wednesday were windy and wet. I don't mind the wind to much but I do not like driving horizontal rain so we stopped in most of the time. I just took Molly out into the field for a play with Jock a few times during the dry intervals. Jock was confused as he normally guesses where the ball will go and gets there before the ball lands. Today however, it was anybody's guess where the ball was going once the wind got it.


Thursday
was supposed to be even worse. The forecast had given force 9 gales but it turned outto be a pleasant day.
It was the birthday of our friend Dave from Holm today so we went down to drop off his card and a load of definitely unhealthy cakes that Pam had baked for him. As we were in Holm, I had a quick wander round the loch and round the bay a bit. I think that the path goes a long way round and it seemed as though it may be a nice walk with plenty of waders and ducks if you like that sort of thing. I will have to go for a longer walk round sometime.

Friday was the second day on the run that Jock has not been up so Molly was pining away. I have sorted Molly now so that she can not run away in the field. I have a long piece of string with a lump of wood tied to the end. When this is tied to her collar she can run round towing the lump of wood and I can stamp on the string to catch her.

You have to give it to Molly though. She figured out straight away that when I bend down towards the string, I can reel her in so she comes to me. If I do not bend down then she just legs it.

Pam got some new lights for the living room the other day and I had to put them up today. Previously we just had bare bulbs dangling and glaring bright light everywhere. Now we have two pretty ornaments on the ceiling that Pam likes but the room is darker so I will have to get a table lamp to go next to my chair if I want to read (or eat a lot more carrots). Heigh Ho.

In the evening there was a bonfire down on the beach by No 4 barrier. We did not go down but saw some of the fireworks from the garden. Molly was definitely not impressed. She was not frightened but was fascinated by the lights and wanted to get over the gate to go and see what they were but she was annoyed by the bangs.