Saturday 7 November

Bright and sunny this morning, with the odd light shower. A procession of anvil clouds along the southwestern horizon made me fear the worst, but so far, not much rain. Overnight, the mercury went down to freezing point. A bit unusual for this neck of the woods.

Tomorrow is Remembrance Sunday, the 91st anniversary of the Armistice that brought the First World War to a close. Here in Lewis, nearly 2,000 dead from both world wars will be remembered at a ceremony at the War Memorial. Anyone who has ever come into Stornoway from elsewhere in the island will be familiar with this prominent landmark. The below image shows its aspect from the main road coming up from the south.



Apart from this memorial, another 15 memorials are dotted all over Lewis. They will be the local focus points in tomorrow morning's commemorations.

Towards the end of the year

Yes, you read that correctly. It is November 6th, and to me, the year is slowly heading towards its conclusion. Long gone are the light nights and bright days of summer. Only yesterday did I look out to the southwest at twenty past four in the afternoon, and did I see the sun? No, it had set a couple of minutes before. The tourists have all headed home, with the exception of the odd customary winter visitor, here to experience the ferocity of the Atlantic winter storms. It has been dark for nearly four hours by the time the ferry comes in, at 8.20pm. If I see it coming in, as the curtains are drawn after nightfall. In summer, it comes in at 12.45 am, and it isn't even fully dark. Not now. When it leaves at 7 am, it is still dark. I walked past the slaughterhouse earlier this week, and caught the smell of beasts, newly discharged into its interior - to emerge onto our dinnerplates at some stage. The lambs that were gambolling on the machairlands in April and May, perhaps? Not a thought worth entertaining for too long. The verdant green, to use that dreadful duplication, has been taken off the moorlands and replaced by the dull browns, yellows and black of winter. Autumn, now firmly in charge, has been thoroughly wet, and any thought of venturing into the moors have to be dispelled. Snow, although not in the forecast, is a growing possibility. As is hail. During my first winter here, five years ago, I grew accustomed to the sound of the wind buffeting the house and hail (or rain) clattering against the windows. So much so, that in fact I could not sleep if there was no wind or hail. But I had a very restful winter in 2004/5. My abiding image of my first winter is that of a flock of sheep, crossing a snow-covered road late at night, seen in the yellow glow of the streetlights - when I was staying in an outlying area. Another memory is that of the hurricane in January 2005 which battered these islands with winds of up to 134 mph, taking five lives with it.

It is now November 2009, and in just over a week's time, on the 16th, I will be at the 5th anniversary of my stay in Lewis. Much has changed for me in that time, some of it for better, some of it for worse. In 8 weeks time, the first decade of this century will be over, as we head into 2010. The pace of change in these islands is slower than elsewhere, but change does happen.

Evening notes

A quarter past nine, and it's about 3 hours ago since the power came back on. Have defrosted, but so have some things in the freezer. Anyway, candles and an open fire helped the atmosphere.

There is a row in these islands about the location of a centre, dedicated to St Kilda and its heritage. Last week, the steering group recommended the village of Mangersta in Uig (West Lewis). The two other contenders, Harris and North Uist, are crying foul. We shall see what happens at the next steering group meeting on Thursday, November 12th. There were allegations of moved goalposts.

I was very sad to hear of the shooting at Fort Hood, TX, yesterday afternoon local time. At last reading, 13 people are dead and dozens more injured.

Friday 6 November

Pouring with rain and strong winds today. An enormous contrast to yesterday. Not much on-line time today: the power is off for electrical works in the house and I have 60 minutes of battery power to work with until the electrician is finished.

Thursday 5 November

Guy Fawkes night tonight: if you're letting off fireworks, please be careful.
- keep pets indoors with lights and music on
- light fireworks with a lit cigarette, not an open flame
- stand them in a bottle
- have a bucket of water or sand ready for the dud ones

- do not hold anything in your hand
- never throw or direct fireworks at people
- check bonfires for wild creatures before setting them alight
- use firelighters to help a bonfire on its way, do NOT use accelerants like petrol

It's a brilliant, sunny day in Stornoway  - this is the second day running we've had sunny weather in defiance of the forecast. The temperature is 11C, quite normal for early November. The barometer has risen steadily, from 970 mbar on Tuesday to 995 mbar today. I think I prefer this to what is currently bearing down on Nicaragua: hurricane Ida. This system will come ashore this afternoon (GMT) and deluge Nicaragua and Honduras with up to 25 inches of rain. Even if it doesn't make it across these countries, Ida will be claiming lives due to flashfloods and mudslides.

More later.

Social networking - one columnist's view

I read the Press and Journal newspaper, the regional paper for the north of Scotland. One of its columnists is UK columnist of the year. Not if her outpouring in today's P&J is anything to go by: prejudiced to a P. Read for yourself - http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1446590

Hurricane update - 4 November

This afternoon, a tropical depression has formed in the far southwestern Caribbean Sea. It is located about 125 miles east of Nicaragua and is moving northwest. System 11L (Ida) could already be a tropical storm and will certainly be at that intensity at landfall, in the early hours of tomorrow (GMT). The main hazard is rainfall, and Nicaragua and Honduras could see 15 to 20 inches (375 to 500 mm) of rain, with possible maximum amounts of 25 inches (625 mm). Mudslides and flashfloods are a distinct possibility.

The National Hurricane Center carries 3-hourly updates.

Wednesday 4 November

A very nice, sunny day here in the Western Isles and it's been dry all morning. Hardly any cloud in the sky, although there is a breeze going. The starlings, sparrows, finches, greenfinches, doves and other small fry is still having a good old go at the birdfeeders - they don't go far when I go out to rake up the last of the leaves. When a hooded crow came in to have a look, they retreated to a safe distance in the tree, and did not resume eating until after the black and grey crow had flown away.

A baby is in hospital in Edinburgh, suffering from botulism. The 16-week old from Fife was admitted on September 19th, and is in a serious but stable conditions. I am surprised to hear of botulism in November; the disease, caused by a form of Clostridium bacteria, is commonly transmitted in hot weather, when the temperature in ponds etc exceeds 27C / 80F. It is carried by ducks, and that how the bacterium reaches humans. The clostridium bacterium lives in soil, and does not require oxygen for its life cycle. Tetanus is caused by another type of clostridium, and the hospital infection caused by Clostridium difficile takes a hold when someone's immune system is weakened.

The war in Afghanistan continues to claim the lives of servicemen from the States and the UK; five British servicemen were killed by an Afghan policemen who fired on them. NATO forces ousted the Taliban from power in Afghanistan in 2001, following American intervention in the wake of 9/11. The Taliban have resorted to guerilla warfare, using roadside bombs as their most effective means of killing the foreign troops. The situation in the country begins to resemble that of the 1980s, when Soviet troops tried to take control. The purpose of the war is beginning to recede into the background, as not much progress is seen to be made. Elections were held recently which were far from devoid of fraud, and President Karzai, who was reelected by default after a challenger withdrew prior to a rerun of the poll, has pledged to root out corruption.

Tuesday 3 November

Day started out very wet, but it is clearing up nicely now, and the mainland hills are even trying to put in an appearance, from 60 miles away. Spoke to someone this morning who may be a relative of one of the men, lost off a ship during the First World War off the Butt of Lewis. It was a converted trawler, the Thomas Stratten, which hit a mine on 20 October 1917. Seven others lost their lives on her that day. This entry is dedicated to their memory.

I am very pleased with the notion of "a post a day" that is going round this month. I hope many more people will rediscover their blog and find they can write more on there than on Facebook or Twitter.

Radovan Karadzic, on trial for war crimes in The Hague, has made an appearance in court, in spite of previously stating he was boycotting proceedings. He says he needs another 10 months to prepare his defence, to work through 1.3 million pages of material. The court will determine whether this will be allowed or not. It has already become clear from prosecution statements that it appears likely that Mr Karadzic was personally in charge of a lot of the war crimes, allegedly committed under his aegis.

Monday 2 November

Bright and sunny this morning with some light showers. Over on the east coast of Scotland, they have more than just a few light showers: flooding up to 4 feet deep is affecting towns from Inverness to Aberdeen to Dundee. Arbroath is cut off by flood water, Stonehaven and Aberdeen, further north, affected by floodwaters. The rain has moved away into the North Sea. The weather charts indicate that a low pressure system will take up residence over northern Scotland this week. The result will be reasonable weather here in the northwest, but awful elsewhere.

The proposed windfarms in southeast Lewis are in serious jeopardy today, after it appeared that European Union regulations on protected species could be invoked. These regulations stipulate that any area, housing golden and sea eagles, should be regarded as a species protected area, even if the area is not currently subject to such a designation. This ruling was used to turn down a windfarm application for a site near Inveraray, Argyll, which had 10 times fewer eagles than are around in Lochs.

Closing the day

Eleven minutes to eleven in the evening as I start to write this post. My header pictures has been changed once more, and this time it is not a landscape picture - it is quite typical of this time of year. The time was 8pm yesterday evening, and I went to the shop to try to get a copy of my daily rag (the Press and Journal). It had of course sold out hours before. The street is in an industrial area of Stornoway - yes, those are private homes on the right of the picture. I like taking pictures at night, and have devoted an entire set to them on Flickr.com.

I have sorted out my subscriptions on Google Reader, and noticed quite a few blogs that were on there which were no longer in existence. The mess, caused by my ill-advised link-up to Blogger, has been sorted - I have a group of blogs that I monitor regularly; the rest are a repository of links.

Spent the afternoon and evening watching an episode of Colombo and one of Poirot. And managed to find the score for the tune for Poirot, so I can now play it on the keyboard. Should be interesting. For now, we're heading into a week with a lot of wet weather. November here we are.

Illicit drugs, the advisor and the government minister

At the moment, the British government is involved in what I can only describe as an unseemly row of the 'screaming' variety. He is at loggerheads with the head of the drug advisory council (I should really say: former head) on the classification of cannabis as an illegal drug. The government have reclassified cannabis to category B, up from the less severe category C. The advisory council have advised the government to downgrade cannabis, but the government have declined to follow this advice. The head of the council, Prof Nutt, has attacked the government over this decision. The government in turn, has asked the professor to resign - which he has done - for interfering in government policy and acting outside of his remit.

This is very harmful to all parties involved. Other members of the advisory council are quitting as well. At lunchtime, we were treated to the spectacle of a Home Secretary raising his voice on BBC TV to put his point across that he really felt the council acted out of order.

Rather than sitting down behind closed doors, and if necessary shout their heads off at each other, this is now being conducted in the full glare of the media spotlight. As a result, the credibility of both government and council is undermined. The misuse of cannabis, an illegal substance, is a major problem in society across the world. In my personal opinion, cannabis should remain classified as a category B substance. On its own, it is a harmful substance. Smoking it is more harmful than tobacco, as the amounts of tar inhaled are far higher. Cannabis can bring on florid (overt) schizophrenia in those individuals predisposed towards that incurable condition. Furthermore, there are thousands of people who can tell the horror story of a relative or friend using cannabis, then as a result, moving on to the use of heroin or cocaine. Cannabis is not an innocent "soft drug".

However, it should be borne in mind that its use is widespread, and a pragmatic approach, along the line taken by the Dutch authorities, might work. Cannabis is a proscribed substance in Holland, but the authorities will not prosecute anyone found in the possession of a quantity, sufficient for their own personal use. They also do not prosecute the owners of so-called coffeeshops, where cannabis can be purchased in small quantities. Anyone found in possession of large amounts of cannabis, clearly intended for supply, will be prosecuted with the full force of the law.

There is this misconception that cannabis is legalised in Holland. It is not. And anyone returning from Holland to the UK or any other country, in possession of a small, user's, quantity, will be liable to prosecution and a criminal record.

Sunday 1 November

A wet day in Stornoway. Not as wet and windy as is currently the case in northern England and southern Scotland - more than 2 inches of rain and winds up to 60 mph. Autumn is now firmly in charge.

I am very displeased with Blogger and Google Reader today. First of all, I am unable to manage my Followed blogs on Blogger, and when I tried to do that on the Reader, it messed up my arrangement of blogs on there. I have nearly 400 subscriptions (not all blog, but put that count at 350). Adding Blogs I Follow was a big mistake. Things rearranged themselves, and I'm find myself going through that unwanted addition to put it all back.

Some football fans, travelling by train from Edinburgh to Aberdeen last night, were dressed up as sheep. Those in the UK will be familiar with an advertisement, showing a railway station and a train full of sheep - and one man. The fans decided to have even more fun and set one "sheep" alight. Two people were hurt and taken to hospital in Kirkcaldy, on the Fife coast. Others were arrested and are assisting police with their enquiries.

If you're in the States

Don't forget to put your clocks back one hour - we already did that in Europe last week, so you can do it as well. Trust me, you can.

A 78-piece set of cutlery

Was removed from a woman's stomach, according to The Sun newspaper. Not one of my regular sources of information (their claim to fame is a bare-chested lady on page three). However, the woman who was the subject of the newsitem in the Sun had been swallowing forks and spoons, so had to go under the knife (sigh, I know) to have them removed. It appears she was suffering from a psychological disorder.

A year ago today

All our blogs were being erased from AOL's servers. A few days ago, Yahoo closed down their Geocities websites, but at least they were being archived. Our journals were summarily deleted. Why they could not just be archived as well is beyond me. The result has been a depletion of regular bloggers, if only because a large number of us have moved on to Facebook and a few to Twitter. Others have simply stopped blogging. A great shame, and very poor customer service from AOL.

Anyway, let's not look back in anger, and move forward.

Tomorrow is All Hallows, when we remember those that went before us. Let us keep in thought those who are trying to come to terms with a loss of a loved one, whether this be recently or in the more distant past.

Saturday 31 October

Happy Halloween to all who celebrate. Please keep it nice.

Typhoon Mirinae has barged through the Philippines, and has left 10 people dead in Quezon Province. The storm is currently headed west, away from the archipelago, and will reach Vietnam in a few days' time. Mirinae is the 4th typhoon to hit the Philippines within 2 months. As you know, I monitor tropical cyclones closely. My relays on the Tropical Cyclones blog make for dreary reading, and hide the impact such systems have on people on the ground. The Philippines are squarely in the firing line, and flooding is always the most severe impact that typhoons have there. The website of the Philippine National Disaster Coordinating Committee, which yielded the above casualty figures, reveals what actually happened.

This entry is dedicated to the memory of
Sarah Mae Vargas and Rodrigo Rodriguez, Camarines Norte; hypothermia
- Louie Alano, Catanduanes; Hypothermia
- Flora Estacion, Camarines Norte; Drowning
- Tirso Ramos, Cavite; fell from roof
- Edsel Laviña and Roderico Cabardo, Laguna; drowned
- Marge Taiño and Julieta Zagure, Laguna; pinned under collapsed wall
- Edwin Capayas, Quezon; drowned

Friday 30 October

Wet and windy today, and it will get a lot windier before the day is out. We are under warning for a gale this afternoon, after this load of rain has gone through. It is autumn and don't we know it. Typhoon season continues apace in the Pacific, with typhoon Mirinae barreling into the Philippines, bringing winds of 100 mph and double digit (in inches) rainfall figures.

The Internet could see the advent of website addresses in scripts other than Latin (what you are reading now). Russian, Arabic and Chinese will be introduced on November 16th, and URL's in those scripts will appear by the middle of next year. Half of all internet users use an alphabet other than Latin.

More later.

The Archers - Phil Archer's actor dies

To those in the UK, Radio 4's soap opera "The Archers" is an institution. First aired in 1950, the agrisoap is an almost daily companion after the 7pm news, with the strains of Arthur Wood's "Barwick Green" heralding the start of 15 minutes of trial, tribulations, love, hate and intrigue. The Archers is the longest running soap, nearly 60 years on radio. One of its principal characters was the patriarchal Phil Archer, portrayed by Norman Painting - and the BBC announced this evening that he has died at the age of 85, following a 9-year battle with bladder cancer. Painting wrote nearly 1,000 scripts for the series, and recorded his last episode on Tuesday. This will be broadcast on 22 November.

I have listened to the Archers for 26 years, and although "Phil Archer" had only rarely been making an appearance, I was sorry to hear that the actor, Norman Painting, had died.

Thursday 29 October

Overcast with only the odd drop of rain. Although it is only ten past four, it is already getting dark and in a minute, I'll have to put on the lights. The lighthouse across the bay is already working, as is the beacon in the shipping channel beside it. Temperatures are quite acceptable for late October, with the mercury at 14C.

A St Kilda centre is likely to be built in Lewis. A project group has researched three applications, from Leverburgh (Harris), Cleitreval (North Uist) and Mangersta (Lewis), for locations for such a centre. Placing it in St Kilda itself is not practicable, due to the remoteness of the archipelago - 45 miles away in the Atlantic, and more often than not inaccessible as a result of inclement conditions. Mangersta is a small township in the far west of Lewis, 40 miles west of Stornoway. On a clear day, St Kilda is visible from there. The island was evacuated in 1930, at the request of the population. At the centre, to be built at Mangersta, life and culture on St Kilda is to be celebrated.