Missing in transfer

I have noticed that automatic line breaks, inserted in AOL Journals, have not been carried through in the transferred Blogger journals. As a result, you'll find wordsmerged [sic] together. See if it also happened to any of your transferred blogs.

Plugging one of my blogs

Unashamedly plugging my photoblog Atlantic Light, which I am filling with all the pictures I have taken since August 2004. Each entry, related to each day I took pictures, shows up to 3 or 4 photos, with links to more pics (if available) as well as to a diary entry.

Wednesday 19 November

Chucking it down this morning with a strong westerly wind. The temperature, 11C / 52F, is academical in conditions like that. We're supposed to get a dip in temps by Friday, introducing a few flurries of snow here in Lewis. Mainland Scotland and the Northern Isles (Orkney and Shetland) will get rather more of the white stuff.

If you're in the UK, you may have had an email from HM Customs & Revenue that several hundred pounds are waiting for you. You guessed it, it's a scam. Looks convincing, except for the usual pointers like spelling mistakes etc. I copy an article from a local news website:

Trading Standards Officers are warning the public to beware of an email claiming to offer a tax refund.The email is supposedly from HM Customs and Revenue but is actually an attempt to gain personal information.

A spokesperson said: “This email looks genuine and offers a refund of hundreds of pounds in return for sending personal information. It is a scam designed to get people to send their personal information and should be deleted. Banks, Customs and Revenue etc would never ask for such information by email and similar scams should be similarly deleted.”

Remembering

In June of last year, a man of 60 went out canoeing with his youngest son. He was a father of 11, living in the village of Arnol, 15 miles north of Stornoway. That afternoon, the two were seen by a chance walker off the coast by the next village, Bragar. Thinking nothing of it, the walker went on her way, and after a little while came to the beach by the cemetery at Bragar.

Where one of the canoes was found washed up. She immediately raised the alarm, and the Coastguard found the man in the water. He was quickly transferred to hospital, but did not survive. His son was not found for another 3 weeks, in spite of intense search efforts which were carried on quite late in the evening, on account of the long evenings in June.

Whenever I pass through Arnol, I pass the house where the family used to live - I seem to remember they moved away - and feel the sadness. As in all communities by the sea, this is only too common an occurrence. Even in the few years I've been here, several tragedies like this have occurred. Those left behind remain in my thoughts.


View across the walls of Arnol to the next village, Bragar.

Award

I am very pleased to see the resurgence of awards, memes and what have you in J-land. Jeannette (Outside Looking In) passed the Let them Eat Cake award to me.
.
I'll think about who to pass it on to, but it's pretty much done the round - also, I'm not fully back into the swing of things yet, so please don't be offended if I pass on this one.

Reminder

Can I ask everyone who needs / wants to email me, please do so on adb422006@gmail.com, and no longer on pharmolo@aol.com? I'm minimising my exposure to AOL.

Conversely, can I also ask everyone who wants a reply from me (some do) to allow mail from above email to reach their email Inbox. Natalie!!!

Front picture

The pic at the head of my blog shows the beach at Dalbeg [Dail Beag] on the west coast of Lewis, some 20 miles west of Stornoway. This is a short video of waves crashing into the shore at Dalbeg.



Dalbeg itself is a one horse town, consisting of about half a dozen houses, a lily pond loch in summer and plenty sheep. This set on Flickr shows more than 150 pictures of the place.

Have a look

Regina (known as wumzels2 on AOL) has started a poetry journal (Somewhere in Time), and I think it is very good. Can't say I'm much of a poetry buff, but would like to recommend this for reading.

Tuesday 18 November

Overcast day with a few chinks in the clouds. Very quiet weather today, but winds will pick up tomorrow to galeforce.

Last night, I lost Internet service after 8pm, but things are back up now. The ISP advises that it is affecting a large geographical area. I hope it stays on up here, suppose I suffer from internet addiction (winks).

I went to the supermarket last night, and saw a bevvy of flashing blue lights near the town centre, just down the road. It turns out two youngsters crashed their car into the busstation. They were slightly hurt and taken to hospital. Their car was damaged in the incident.

A Question of Perspective

A man was attacked in Germany in 1996 by neo-nazis, which left him paralysed from the neck down. His wife died of cancer in 2000, and he is now contemplating assisted suicide at a clinic in Switzerland. That is all I will say about this story, which continues on this BBC webpage. Read it, and come back here to leave a comment.

Fat cats

With all this talk of fat cats and the credit crunch, I just wanted to feature this well-fed moggie that I found in Hoy last month.

Monday 17 November

Horrible day, strong winds, heavy rain, low temperatures. November at its worst.

I have resized the front picture, in order that it fully fits the screen when the blog loads. It has also been decreased in actual load size (by about 1/3), to suit those of you with slow connections.

Baby P, the 17-month old that was allegedly killed by his parents, continues to make headlines 15 months after his died. The focus remains on the social workers involved. Without making excuses for any mistakes made in this sad case, I have to say that when it comes to deciding whether a child can stay at home or not is an extremely hard call to make. I used to know someone who would take children away from their parents, under court order, and that would always happen in the presence of police. The most extreme case was a baby, taken from its mother the moment it was born. I need not remind you of the emotional repercussions of taking a child away from parents. However, if the health and safety of a child is at serious danger, then a decision will have to be made. Finally, I was not amused or impressed by the sight of two leading politicians shouting across the floor of the House of Commons last week over this, and they were rightly rebuked by Mr Speaker.

Front page

Yes, I have gone bananas with a picture of Dalbeg Beach to suit the title of my blog - Atlantic Lines. I realise it's a bit huge, so I'll be tweaking it over the next few days.

Looking back

Just copying a few entries from 16 November of previous years in Lewis.

In 2004, I had just arrived in the island, and had proceeded to the village of Kershader, some 22 miles south of Stornoway. I was to stay there for nearly 3 months, through winter in this building, the Ravenspoint Centre.



Here is the diary entry for the day

Tuesday 16 November 2004

Woke up to a guy shouting abuse in his sleep, and someone else shooshing him. The two American ladies collected their car at 8.30, declining my offer of being their guide. I set off downtown sunny Stornoway / Steornabhagh. First to the library for a full hour's worth of Internet use. Had about 40 emails waiting. Then to various bookshops, one of which stocked Soil and Soul, a landmark work by Alistair McIntosh. He is not well known outside this region, but is a staunch campaigner for community ownership. He supported the community buy-out of the Isle of Eigg in 1996/7, and managed to stop the development of the Lingerabay superquarry. This would have seen the demolition of an entire mountain for the sake of acquiring aggregates for the building of houses and roads in the UK and beyond. I also unearthed a compilation CD by Capercaillie, my favourite folk / fusion group from these parts. Went to a gig by them, as some know, back in January. Didn't walk back to my digs, no danced home. Just as well it was 11.30pm. It's no use having a CD without the means of listening to it, so I also acquired a portable CD-player. Then there was the matter of my 3 disposable cameras, all used up, which needed to be developed and printed. I would have preferred the images to be on CD-ROM, but that means you have to wait for 3-4 days, and I don't work that far in advance with regards to planning. One shop could develop & print in 2 hours, but not the CD-ROM. Sod it, I went for the prints. The most important one is attached to this journal entry [amendment 16/11/08: this was not the case]. Then I went on a walk down the harbourfront as far as the old powerstation. Sat down on the seawall and was duly joined by a nice tortoiseshell cat, a neutered tom. He rubbed against me as I sat nibbling my sandwiches, wanted to be scratched on the head and a general fuss. After that, he went down the steps to the shore, only to bolt back up them a minute later and disappear into the estate behind me. Strange animal. My bus left town at 2.20pm, heading down the road towards Tarbert. I got off at Balallan (Baile Ailean), to join the little bus into South Lochs. Recognized the driver from years ago. A ten minute journey brought me to Cearsiadar - just say KerSHAder. The hostel is part of a community building also encompassing a shop and a cafe. The volunteers in the shop also run the hostel, which is simple but comfortable. Oh, the only uncomfortable thing about the hostel is the chairs. Eugh. After a longish chat, I went inside. A run-down of things not to do:

- don't close the kitchendoor, the handle is broken

- don't switch off the light in the stairwell

- don't use the shower upstairs

- don't use the third bedroom

- don't leave the central heating on if you don't need it

Ah, it's all a laugh, really. There are only two people in the hostel now, a guy called Joe and myself. He is going round the island looking for a job and a place to live. Exchanged some stories over dinner. Joe cooked onions and potatoes with mince and shandy to drink. The television provided some entertainment, but that was about it for the night.

November evening

Whilst our American friends are beginning to eye up Thanksgiving, here in the UK, it is still more than a month to Christmas. Yes, I've mentioned the C-word. Personally, I do not contemplate Christmas until December 6th.

Here in Lewis, Thanksgiving is also observed on the last Thursday in November. It usually means a day off school for the children, as some may be required to attend communions in church. Shops tend to close after lunch (except for supermarkets and the like). Communions are held every three months.

In Holland, where I am from, Thanksgiving is not a commonly observed religious festival. It is mentioned on the church calendar in September (much like the Harvest Festival in the Church of England, but without the display of harvested goodies). In the Roman Catholic parts of the country, south of the Great Rivers (Rhine, Waal and Maas), the festival of St Maarten / St Martin was held on November 11th.
.
The above image shows St Maarten giving his cloak to a man without one.

The next festival on the Dutch calendar is Sinterklaas / St Nicholas, the eve of whose nameday is celebrated on December 5th. Yesterday, Sinterklaas arrived in Holland on a steamship, surrounded by a posse of helpers known as Black Peters. St Nicholas ostensibly arrives from Spain, and in the 8th century the Iberian peninsula was ruled by dark-skinned men from North Africa called the Moors. Officially, St Nicholas was the Bishop of Myra (modern-day Smyrna in Turkey) but his bones were spirited out of Turkey to Spain after his death.

Sinterklaas will bring a sack full of presents for all children in Holland (Belgium and Germany) on the steamboat, but will fill his sack with children who have been bad in the past year, to take back to Spain. Black Peter, a sort of bogeyman, will make sure it will be filled up to the brim. He will also assist Sinterklaas as he rides his white charger along the rooftops, to drop presents down the chimneys. Only children who leave a carrot for the horse in their shoe will wake up to find a present the next morning.
Sinterklaas, St Nicholas and Santa Claus are in fact one and the same. Sinterklaas will have disappeared on the morning of December 6th.

AOL journals

I have written a Letter to the Editor of the Washington Post regarding the recent demise of AOL Journals. I cannot publish its contents under the terms of service of the Post, but rest assured I have been politely scathing. If anyone else wants to summarise their feelings in 200 words (yep, that's the limit of a submission to the Post), feel free to contact letters@washpost.com.

Sunday 16 November

Quiet day with a bit of brightness about. The weather is set to take a turn for the worse, with a lot of rain and wind about as the new week commences, and a cold snap by the next weekend. I gather that the east of the USA has also had its first taste of winter, judging by the huge low pressure area headed east out of Labrador this afternoon. It will head north into Greenland, where it will be split in two; the eastern segment will bring us winter by the weekend.

Still on the subject of weather, I am watching a tropical cyclone (not more than a tropical storm at present) which has been drenching the Philippines over the past few days. It has turned into tropical storm 26W (meaning there have been 26 cyclones in the Western Pacific this year), and will cross the Mekong Delta, then the Malay Peninsula and could end up in the Bay of Bengal.

Pentalina B

This ship, which I stubbornly continue to call by its original name Iona, is currently covering the freight run between the Isle of Lewis and the Scottish mainland. Normally, MV Muirneag is doing this, but this ship is in dry-dock on the Tyne at present. My picture of the Iona (puh) on Flickr is attracting an unusual amount of attention. 91 views since last Sunday.

I know, it's a nice picture ;-)

Saturday 15 November

Today is the 4th anniversary of my arrival in Lewis. Back in 2004, I had arrived in Harris (which is on the same landmass as Lewis) from North Uist, and took the bus north to Stornoway. The next time I would leave Lewis would be in May 2007.

Today is a better day in terms of weather, with a fair amount of brightness. Rain appears to be threatening, and it is also a lot colder. Yesterday saw the mercury at 13C, this afternoon has it down to 7C, quite a jump by local standards. Colder weather in the winter period usually also brings brighter weather.

Still quiet on the tropical cyclones front, except for one minor tropical storm crossing into the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The worst people there can expect is 10 inches of rain; winds will not exceed force 9 on the Beaufort scale. Fishermen have been warned to stay on shore.

Request

If anyone reads a private blog on here called My Wee Bit of Life, can they pass on a message to thank them for linking to my Tropical Cyclones blog. I am not a reader, and cannot reach them.