Just a bit windy again

Saturday 19th February 2011
The bad weather continued but the wind got worse. The barriers were close all afternoon after a car got hit by a large wave on No2 barrier. The windscreen was shatttered and all the front passenger side of the car was crushed in. (Water is heavy stuff and a few tons dropping on a car from a great height is not good for it.) Fortunately there was nobody in the passenger seat and the driver just got a few cuts and bruises from the windscreen coming in.
Rumour has it that the unfortunate driver of the car was a council employee who is responsible for deciding when the barriers are to be closed and re-opened. This may however be wishful thinking on the part of the rumour mill as most people are against the council having any say on when it is safe to cross, believing that it is up to the individual to decide if they can make it. I personally think that if it was left to the individual then there would be many more accidents. There are always people who think that they are immortal but I suppose that if they are allowed to decide for themselves then at least they can not blame anybody else.

The trouble is that as soon as somebody is killed or has their car swept off the barrier into the sea, everybody would be blaming the council for not closing the barriers. They just can't win.

The weather was slightly better on Sunday and Monday and during dry bits I took down the stone wall by the garage and shifted a load of soil banking to make room for a wagon to deliver the new (new to me) shed.
Hopefully the shed should be arriving on 5th March. All that i have left to do before it comes is to take up the poly-tunnel frame. this should be an easy job but I bet that when I start, I find that it is concreted in. I can of course, always angle grind it out but then I will have to figure out a way of putting it back up again afterwards. We will have to wait and see how it goes. Fingers crossed that it will just be hammered into the soil but would you rely on it staying up in an Orkney gale without concrete.

Last week at the U3A meeting, Pam asked the speaker from the Scapa Flow Partnership about some archeology courses that they are involved in. We got an e-mail from the course organisers today with some attachments . The courses are designed to teach people to assist the proffesional archeologists doing surveys, excavating and cleaning and sorting finds. I think that we will both enrol on the courses. It will be interesting to go out and work on some of the digs. I wonder if they do "Sunny day digs" just for fine weather helpers.