Saturday 16 April

Thirty of the famous Lewis Chessmen are currently on display in the Museum of the Isles on Francis Street in Stornoway. The figurines, cut from ivory in the 12th century, were unearthed in 1831 at Ardroil; a competing school of thought places the original location of the find at Mealista, 6 miles to the southwest. The exhibition will remain at the Museum until September 12th. On the 13th of that month, a small number of figurines will be on display at Uig Museum in Timsgarry. The most noteworthy feature of the Chessmen for me was their size. Only a smidgen over 3 inches tall. I sought permission from Museum staff before taking some of the below pictures.

5 years ago today

I found myself drawn into the world of social networking by blog on Easter Sunday 2006, when blogger Pamela Hilger, AOL screenname his1desire, passed away after a 9 month battle against cancer. She had been logging her fight on her blog "One Girls Head Noise", until 7 April. The outpouring of grief that followed her death was quite breathtaking, and showed that a community on the Internet could care as much as a group of people who knew each other face to face. Two years later, I received a comparable level of support at the time when my mother passed away unexpectedly.

Since then, a number of other bloggers have left us, leaving their keyboards silent. This post is dedicated to their memory, as well as to the spirit of J-land which has survived the upheaval of October 2008, when AOL closed down their blogging service. Many have left the land of blog, but the advent of new social networking services like Facebook and Twitter have ensured that we can keep in touch.

J-land lives!