Sunset notes

The sun is going down on a day that finishes a lot brighter than it started. About an hour or so ago, the sun finally came out, brightening up a day that was dismally wet and grey.

I am very pleased that the Vatican is taking a dim view of the ambiguous apology, issued by Bishop Williamson over the matter of denying the Holocaust. Apparently, the bishop has not retracted his views that there were no gas chambers used to kill millions of Jews, and that there were "only" 200-300 thousand Jews killed at the hands of the Nazis. At the moment, the declaration features on the front page of the Society St Pius X. Read for yourself.

Ryanair is considering charging for the usage of toilets on their planes. I've never liked Ryanair, and that little snippet of news sent them down the pan for me. Yep, awful pun, but totally intentional.

Remembering Today - 27 February

Today on this day in the First World War, this man lost his life in the service of King and Country. RIP.

Gunner JOHN A MACLEOD
Last address in Lewis: 12 North Beach Street, Stornoway
Regiment or division: 2nd/1st (Ross) Mountain Bty., Royal Garrison Artillery
Service number: 301378
Date of death: 27 February 1917 at the age of 23
Killed in action
Interred: Salonika (Lembet Road) Military Cemetery
Memorial reference: 841
Local memorial: Lewis War Memorial

Remembering Today - 26 February

Today on this day during the First World War, these men lost their lives in the service of King and Country. RIP.

Sergeant GEORGE MACDONALD
Last address in Lewis: 52 Bayhead Street, Stornoway
Regiment or division: 1st Royal Fusiliers
Date of death: 26 February 1915 at the age of 20
Killed in action in La Bassee
Local memorial: Lewis War Memorial

Seaman GEORGE MACAULAY

Last address in Lewis: 3 Keith Street, Stornoway
Son of Murdo and Annie Macaulay, of 3, Keith St., Stornoway.
Regiment or division: Merchant Marine, HMHS Glenart Castle
Date of death: 26 February 1918 at the age of 24
Ship sunk by U-boat in Bristol Channel
Memorial: Tower Hill
Local memorial: Lewis War Memorial

WARNING - Bank charge phonescam (UK only)

Yesterday, a judge ruled that it was lawful for people to recoup their excessive bankcharges. Only the Office of Fair Trading has to make a final decision before the process can start for ordinary people.

Scammers targeting the Highlands and Islands have been cold-calling people on the phone, saying they will recoup those charges (which may amount to thousands of pounds in some cases). They ask for your personal and bank details - and you may find your bank account plundered as a result.

If you want to recoup your charges, you have to write to your bank - it applies to charges from 2001 to today.

Friday 27 February

You may remember my epic journey from Holland back to Stornoway, which took 55 hours rather than 12 on February 2nd (3rd and 4th as it turned out). Well, I am being reimbursed by the airline for part of my expenses - the ones I incurred because of the booking error.

Meanwhile, I'm looking out at a very wet day here in the islands, not much wind, but it is raining steadily.

If you don't like your job, don't mention it on Facebook, or anywhere else on the open Internet. It can get you fired.

Wanted: readers

The BBC say the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books on their list. How many have you read?

Instructions:
1) Look at the list and put an ‘x’ before those you have read.
2) Tally your total at the bottom.

Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
x The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
x Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
x Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
x To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
x The Bible - some of it. Had no choice :-/
x Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
x Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
x Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
x Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
Complete Works of Shakespeare
Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
x The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
Middlemarch - George Eliot
x Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
Bleak House - Charles Dickens
War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
x David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
Emma - Jane Austen
Persuasion - Jane Austen
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
x Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
x Animal Farm - George Orwell
The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Atonement - Ian McEwan
Life of Pi - Yann Martel
Dune - Frank Herbert
Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
x A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
The Secret History - Donna Tartt
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
On The Road - Jack Kerouac
x Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
x Moby Dick - Herman Melville
x Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
Dracula - Bram Stoker
The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
x Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
x Ulysses - James Joyce
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
Germinal - Emile Zola
x Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
Possession - AS Byatt
x A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
The Color Purple - Alice Walker
The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
Charlotte’s Web - EB White
The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
x Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
x The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
x Watership Down - Richard Adams
A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
Hamlet - William Shakespeare
x Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

26 out of a hundred.

I wonder what other books should be added to this “top books” list though?

Visit to Ness

Went to Ness (North Lewis) this afternoon, and took the opportunity to engage in more snapping. It was a grey and very chilly afternoon, although the temperature was not that low (8C). The moorlands look very brown/yellow, and the houses appeared to meld in with their surroundings. Nothing much moved, it was very quiet in the area. Ness consists of more than a dozen hamlets, which are contiguous with each other. Total population is about 2,000.


Port of Ness


Port and beach at Port of Ness


Herding sheep by car

Thursday 26 February

Overcast, grey and drizzly, with visibility barely at 1 mile. Not much wind. The overnight gales never materialised; the strongest winds occurred late yesterday afternoon.

Investigators have started their work in piecing together the cause for yesterday's aircrash at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport in which 9 people died. Three of the dead were crewmembers. The wreckage will be removed once the on-site work is complete; a specialist lab in Paris is analysing the cockpit-voice and flight-data recorders.

Locally, the revolving door scenario at the Arnish Fabrication Yard continues. Later this year, the industrial site will reopen to manufacture windturbines for the better part of 2009. The machines are destined for a marine windpark off the coast of Cumbria, northwest England. The Arnish Fabrication Yard has had a number of operators in the past few years, none lasting much longer than a year at a time. At one point, the site was closed down whilst turbine towers were still being made. As a result, the intermediate product was shipped to Denmark for completion - and one of the towers was lost overboard in a force 9 gale on return. It presently provides a habitat for marine life at the bottom of the North Sea somewhere between Denmark and Orkney.

Amsterdam crash

Nine people are known to have died when Turkish Airways flight 1951 came down near Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam, at 0931 GMT this morning. The Boeing 737-800 broke up into three pieces. Eye witnesses state that survivors started to emerge immediately after the plane came to a halt. It was seen to stall, then crash to the ground. The crash site is close to the A9 motorway, which was closed whilst motorists stopped to look.

Schiphol Airport has since reopened, allowing a plane to land which is carrying friends and family of those on board. The cause of the crash is not yet known, but a loss of power appears likely.

Wednesday 25 February

Although the day started very wet, the sun is out and it's all blue skies. The forecast mentions gales, which are due later today. For the moment, we have a westerly wind force 5.

An airliner has crashed just short of the runway at Schiphol Airport near Amsterdam, Netherlands. There are reported to be about 20 injuries, and the aircraft broke in three pieces on coming down in a recently ploughed field. This is also hampering rescue efforts. Whether there are fatalities is as yet unclear - latest report quote 5 deaths. Am following a live TV-feed from NOS.nl (in Dutch) via the Internet.

Prime Minister's Questions here in the UK has been cancelled followed the death of the young son of the Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron. Ivan Cameron, aged 6, had been suffering from cerebral palsy, and was born severely disabled.

Remembering Today - 24 February

Today on this day during the First World War, these two men lost their lives in the service of King and Country. RIP.

Leading Seaman DONALD MACDONALD
Last address in Lewis: 34 Lower Shader,
Son of Donald and Peggy Macdonald, of Shader, Stornoway.
Regiment or division: Royal Naval Reserve, HMS Mars
Service number: 3947/A
Date of death: 24 February 1919 at the age of 29
Influenza at home
Interred: Barvas Cemetery
Had been demobilised a few days before his death
Local memorial: North Lewis, Borve

Seaman DONALD MACIVER
Last address in Lewis: 26C Leurbost,
Son of Murdo and Mary Maciver, of 26, Lurebost, Lochs, Stornoway.
Regiment or division: Royal Naval Reserve, HMT Recepto
Service number: 3242/B
Date of death: 24 February 1917 at the age of 38
Died of pneumonia after being rescued from mined ship
Interred: Crossbost Cemetery
Local memorial: North Lochs, Crossbost

Remembering Today - 23 February

On this day during the First World War, these two men lost their lives in the service of King and Country. RIP.

Private GEORGE MACIVER

Last address in Lewis: 24 Vatisker,
Regiment or division: Seaforth Highlanders
Date of death: 23 February 1917
Killed in action
Lewis Memorial: Back

Seaman DONALD MURRAY
Last address in Lewis: 21 North Tolsta,
Regiment or division: Royal Naval Reserve
Date of death: 23 February 1919 at the age of 21
Invalided home, died of illness after joining Fife Constabulary
Local memorial: North Tolsta

Tuesday 24 February

Pretty non-descript day in terms of weather; some brightness in amongst the clouds, and the mercury anchored firmly just below the 50F mark.

Bad news from the Cairngorm Mountains, 30 miles south of Inverness, this afternoon. The body of a man, thought to be that of a 48-year old hillwalker, missing since Sunday, has been found. A search, involving up to 90 people, had been on-going since Sunday for the Inverness banker, who had gone to the area to walk with his dog. The animal has not been found.

Scotland's First Minister, Alex Salmond, has gone to the United States for a meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He thereby beats Gordon Brown, the UK Prime Minister, in visiting the new administration. Mr Salmond, the leader of the Scottish National Party, has told Ms Clinton that Scotland is "yearning for freedom". The SNP came to power after a narrow victory in elections to the Scottish Parliament in May 2007. They advocate full independence for Scotland. Mr Salmond is a member of the Privy Council, which directly advises Queen Elizabeth - and Her Majesty is known to be rather disinclined towards having her United Kingdom split up.

In the nearly two years that Mr Salmond has been in power at Holyrood (the Scottish equivalent of Westminster for the UK), I have come to know him as a shrewd politician who thrives on conflict. Rather than talking to the UK Prime Minister, which is a most rare occurrence, Mr Salmond is content to snipe at Westminster and blaming them for all the woes of Scotland. The First Minister, from my perspective, can safely be described as blinkered, in that he jumps at anything containing the word Scotland.

The worst example goes back to August 2007, when he attended the unveiling of a statue in Helmsdale, Sutherland, which celebrates the departure of several hundred people for a new life across the sea, and the contribution the Scottish diaspora has made in places like Canada and Australia. Whilst wholeheartedly applauding and commending that undeniable contribution, I feel that Mr Salmond should also have condemned in the strongest possible terms the inhumane way in which people were kicked out of their homes in Strath Kildonan (near Helmsdale), Strathnaver, Skye and many other areas of the Western and Northern Highlands - to commence a new life elsewhere. No, we should not live in the past, absolutely true. But neither should we fail to learn from it, something that I do detect in the current climate at Holyrood. This is 2009. Not 1746.

Zimbabwe

I just did not believe my eyes today, when the BBC reported that more white-owned farms in Zimbabwe had been seized by supporters of president Robert Mugabe. It is precisely the seizure of those white-owned farms that has led to the current food crisis. I can only describe as an act of breathtaking lunacy, to continue a policy which has been proven to be catastrophic in its consequences. Even though Mr Mugabe came to power by ousting a white racist regime, that of Ian Smith, those whites who elected to stay behind were prepared to work for the people of their country. There was a time that Zimbabwe could sustain itself in terms of food. Taking over those farms has destroyed that capability. I despair.

Politics

Reading journals written by American bloggers has raised my awareness of politics in the USA. One of the events that drew my attention was Hurricane Katrina and the delayed response and inadequate preparations to that natural disaster. Other pointers were problems acquiring health care as experienced by some of you.

I enjoy reading some of the entries, made by our own Dirk, who professes to be politically incorrect and questions aspects of government politics, irrespective of the colour of the government of the day. All governments are accountable to their electorate, and it is that very electorate that holds the power to remove them. Which has happened to the administration of President Bush in the last few months.

No administration holds the support of 100% of its population, and it is to be expected that supporters of President Bush do not like the policies being implemented by President Obama. As an observer from outside, I'll be careful in professing my preference; but in the past, I have been severely critical of Mr Bush on various aspects of his foreign and domestic politics. Mr Obama promises much, but we'll have to wait on delivery.

A video came my way today, which described President Obama as a dangerous communist, who will cause the destruction of America. Yep, and I've just had kittens. It reminded me of the McCarthy years, in the 1940s and 1950s, during which Senator McCarthy conducted a witch hunt of all who might have had alleged communist leanings. British readers may have watched an episode of the series "Who do you think you are", which researches the ancestry of well-known personalities - tonight's was Zoe Wannamaker. Her father moved to the UK in 1951, after it became clear that his past membership of the communist party made it likely that he be called in front of McCarthy - and put to jail for perhaps not answering. Nearly 60 years have passed, and the world has changed. But communism, however demonstrably discredited, is still a dirty word in certain quarters.

Monday 23 February

Overcast, grey and drizzly. It's quite mild outside, about 11C, which I also found out when I went to the Post Office and other shops earlier this morning. It was actually pretty busy in the town, by Stornoway standards.

Do I care about the Oscars? No. A film is never as good as the book it is based upon.

An animal disease, bluetongue, is slowly marching north through the United Kingdom. The disease is carried by mosquitoes, and has become prevalent in continental Europe. Discussions are going on whether vaccinations should be carried out in the Western Isles, which are 20 to 60 miles from the Scottish mainland. In the last week of March, the Chief Vet for Scotland will attend meetings in Stornoway and Benbecula to hear the views of crofters, who do not feel that it is necessary to have these vaccinations. This link carries the official policy from the UK Department for Food and Rural Affairs.

Edit: The link mentions midges, rather than mosquitoes. They are different species of insect, and I'll try to find out which is actually the carrier

Organising

Been organising a few things today, the weather being grey and boring.

Regular readers may be familiar with my rather large collection of digital pictures, now numbering in excess of 18,000. Of which 1,000 are scanned images of prints, taken from film. Flickr offers the facility to put them all in so-called sets and collections. However, I have several hundred sets and the site tends to freeze when I have the temerity to create yet another one. A large number of sets is named after one of the villages in the island of Lewis. My latest foray to Callanish added to that particular set. I have this idea to put the pictures for each village in some sort of publication, either on-line (and) or in paper.

The (almost) daily Remembering Today entries on this blog are an offshoot of my local history project Faces from the War Memorial. When I compiled the information for the 1,300-odd names on the roll, I forgot that the many Mac's also have their surname spelled Mc - something which I now have to chase up. Bearing in mind that I have also printed the list (through Lulu.com), I not only have to update the on-line version, but also the wordprocessing file. My screen is a wee bit crammed when I do this. At the moment I'm about one-third of the way through this task. In other words, I'll be at this for some time to come.

Remembering Today - 22 February

On this day in 1917, these four men from the Isle of Lewis fell in action in the Second Battle at Kut-al-Amara in Mesopotamia, present-day Iraq. RIP.

Sergeant NEIL MORRISON

Last address in Lewis: 4 Dun Carloway,
Son of Angus and Annie Morrison, of 4, Doune Carloway, Stornoway.
Regiment or division: 1st Seaforth Highlanders
Service number: 130
Date of death: 22 February 1917 at the age of 36
Killed in action in Kut
Memorial: Basra Memorial, Iraq
Memorial reference: Panel 37 and 64
Lewis Memorial: Carloway

Lance Corporal DONALD MACLEOD
Last address in Lewis: 12 Garenin,
Regiment or division: 1st Seaforth Highlanders
Service number: 3/6965
Date of death: 22 February 1917
Killed in action in Mesopotamia
Memorial: Basra
Memorial reference: Panel 37 and 64

Private DONALD GUNN
Last address in Lewis: 5 Knockaird,
Regiment or division: 1st Seaforth Highlanders
Service number: S/7070
Date of death: 22 February 1917 at the age of 23
Memorial: Basra
Memorial reference: Panel 37 and 64
Local memorial: North Lewis, Cross

Private JOHN M MACKINNON
Last address in Lewis: 8B Ranish,
Son of Mrs. Christy MacKinnon, of 8, Ranish Lochs, Stornoway.
Regiment or division: 1st Seaforth Highlanders
Service number: 317256
Date of death: 22 February 1917 at the age of 21
Killed in action in Mesopotamia
Memorial: Basra
Memorial reference: panel 37 and 64
Local memorial: North Lochs, Crossbost

Remembering Today - 21 February

On this date in the First World War, these two men lost their lives in the service of King and Country. RIP


Private DONALD MACLEOD

Last address in Lewis: 20 Fivepenny,
Regiment or division: 1st Seaforth Highlanders
Date of death: 21 February 1915 at the age of 34
Killed in action in Givenchy, France
Had previously served in Egypt
Local memorial: North Lewis, Cross

Seaman COLIN MACKINNON
Last address in Lewis: 15 Ranish,
Regiment or division: Royal Naval Reserve, HMT Carlton
Date of death: 21 February 1916 at the age of 23
Ship sunk by mine
Local memorial: North Lochs, Crossbost

Sunday 22 February

Overcast, grey but reasonably mild. Temperature of 9C this afternoon, not too bad for late February. Looking at the longer range forecast, it appears that the worst of the winter is over.

Over in Australia, a day of mourning has been held for the 209 known (and more unknown) victims of the deadly bushfires that raged in the south of the country two weeks ago. The risk of more bushfires is increasing as conducive weatherconditions look set to move in.