Saturday 15 January

I am typing this blogpost whilst trying not to be annoyed over the murder being committed on a Chopin piano concerto on Classic FM. The interpretation is laboured, heavy and the pianist sounds as if he has his nose pressed against the score, wondering how he is going to reach the end of that lot of peasoup that Frederic jotted down a century and a half ago. Classic FM tells me that it comes from an album entitled "Bullets and Lullabys", compiled by James Rhodes. Well, how apt.

Saturday started decidedly wild, and it's been a while since we had a gale. The ferry crew wasn't sure they were going to do all the runs today first thing, but I saw the Isle of Lewis heading out at half past two, and no further indication on the Calmac website that there was going to be further disruption. After today's high, 10C, the highest for nearly two months, we are likely to see slightly colder weather with night frosts into the new week.

Here in Scotland, we are due elections to the Scottish Parliament, and the pary-political skermishing is already starting up as the main parties are selecting their candidates. Please don't ask me to explain the system of proportional representation they have in place in Scotland. In practice, you have constituency MSPs and regional MSPs. Yes, I know, it's easier to explain that the universe is based on the square root of minus one. For the next four months we're going to be subjected to all sorts of rubbish, not just from the candidates but also from everybody else who is a party faithful and thinks they know it all.