Almost daylight :-)

Bit of a panic on this morning when I turned on the bedroom light and saw that it was 6:58, normally I’m around the Beallach Ruadh by then and not still in my bed. The Beallach Ruadh being around three miles south of here on the way to work, I was out of my bed in a shot and already scrabbling around in the bedside cabinet for my ‘lucky underpants’ before it dawned on me that it was Sunday.

The red wine of last night had been the ‘sleeping draught’ and the shot of adrenalin when I saw the clock my coffee so I just got up and got on with it No sooner had I sorted myself out than the patter of tiny feet came down stairs to see what was going on. My boys palls were staying the weekend (just for a change ) and the first one was up and ready for action. The feet are hardly tiny at size 10 and he’s much taller than me but he’s always keen so off we went.

Into the workshop first with the Panasonic and a great big pair of pliers to try and remove the SD card, much to my surprise it almost fell out!! I’d had several unsuccessful attempts at removing it yesterday before the ‘memory card locked’ message came up.

Anyway this morning the card came out easily but minus the little grey switch for locking it so I’m thinking that that is what jammed it in the first place and now it’s floating around in my camera body somewhere. I can’t see it and no amount of shaking or sucking with an industrial vacuum cleaner revealed it

Still the camera seemed OK so we just got on with the feeding after I’d admired all the hard work the boys had done yesterday moving rocks and gravel. This they’d done without being asked and a fine bit of work it was too. OK the Honda had a broken foot rest and we’d no petrol left, but hey, ‘you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs’

Bracken was the first to get fed as she was in the barn next to the workshop heavily ‘in pig’, still a week to go but it’s a good place to feed her up and keep an eye on her. Bracken, our most handsome Tamworth always has a real time of it when farrowing so we like to keep her nearby. In the barn there’s electric light, more room, plenty of bedding and you can get there from the house without wearing wellies and oilskins

Then it was into the ‘net shed field’ to feed Jamie Lea and her six piglets

 

before going out onto the hill to feed Bramble and Toots.

That wee Toots is a noisy little pig and a right little character, the only one of Brambles litter that we kept to fatten we were a little unsure what to do with her. Normally we’d keep two or three as pigs are gregarious creatures but poor Toots got left on her own when all her siblings got sold. She was so distraught that we put her out on the hill with the big pigs and she settled in just fine.

We were a little worried that Bramble would start feeding her again but she didn’t. We thought she’d get bullied at feeding but she stood her ground, I suspect that Rocky could be a problem when she gets larger but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it

After that it was into the generator shed to don my face mask and top up the 24 x 2v cells that make up my 1000ah 48v battery bank. I know that shed is a riot but I’m dealing with it, honest, you have no idea how much cr4p I’ve accumulated over the last thirty years. That wooden slatted bench above my head was from a police SPG Transit van I used to have http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Patrol_Group when I first moved here. It’s days of ferrying riot police superseded to moving goats, sheep and other crofting essentials I really must put some of this stuff on eBay, Volvo wing mirrors circa 1970, spark plugs from Morris Minors, points from Vauxhall Viva’s, Datsun oil filters, Ford Cortina service kits, the list goes on and on

All too soon it was time to head to work for my ‘favourite day’ Only two sailings, a fried breakfast, some cleaning, maintenance, paperwork and drills.

 

Launch the rescue boat

and most importantly clean the Old Girl

and go for a wander

up to Raasay House

After all that and the final run at 16:00 we tied up the Loch Striven in daylight, well almost, the lights were on the pier but by my next Sunday in two weeks time they should be off and I’ll be driving home without lights

Where to start ??

A full five days since I last posted, even when at deaths door with the ‘man flu’ or completely trashed at a Rockness I’ve managed to post a few words every couple of days. It’s been so long since I was on here I’ve forgotten what I’ve done, actually that’s not hard, I can’t remember what I did this morning let alone on Thursday. Luckily I have the bombproof Panasonic DMC FZ38 to assist with that

Thursday

The first full and exciting day off work when the shed arrived was followed by a day, that were it not for my parents could be described as pointless. Now the Dude used to have an account at the Post Office but they have in the interests of ‘progress’ stopped that so we had to open him an account with the Bank of Scotland. Well, OK we didn’t ‘have to’ but figured that it would be easier, after all I’ve had four accounts with them for twenty odd years and wifey for the same. Of course when you phone up you can’t actually speak to the branch that knows you ‘face to face’ you get someone in Edinburgh with no concept of geography who insists that you go into a ‘local’ branch with passport, birth certificate, utility bills and photographic ID.

Obviously their computer tells them that Kyle is more convenient than Portree, or they’ve made so many staff redundant  that Kyle branch is the only place with a person in it capable of operating a computer. So we leave at 7:15am in the dark to catch the 7:55 ferry. The appointment is not until 14:00 but we thought we’d make the 100 mile round trip more worthwhile with a visit to Ma and Pa on the mainland.

 

And I can’t remember which one of the Cuillins http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuillin this is whether its Blaven or Garbh Bheinn but it looked pretty spectacular in the grey light of dawn.

They day at Ma & Pa’s involved a little fettling of the water supply and an awesome bean casserole before  heading back to Kyle and the bank. The 14:00 appointment at http://www.bankofscotland.co.uk/ consisted of a photocopying of all the relevant documents we’d brought and an interview with a lassie ON THE PHONE in Lochcarron !!! Now what the heck is all that about ????? is there no one in Portree or even Broadford who is capable of operating a photocopier ???

Friday

I wont even start about our next visit to the social work department in Broadford to hand in (yet again) passports, utility bills, and driving licences but eventually we got home in the dark and fed some very hungry pigs. Friday was yet again a trip off Raasay, though this time not until the 10:55 ferry.

Rocky our Tamworth boar was going to Skye to serve a couple of sows at Kilmuir. He’s a bit of a wimp so we weren’t sure how he’d react to the journey, but as it turned out he was ‘brand new’ and seemed to enjoy the ride.

You can always tell how happy a pig is in a trailer by how hungry they are and Rocky wolfed down all the treats we gave him

His new home for a couple of weeks at least was not only the residence of some fine young and pretty girls but also the repository of some fine garden furniture.

This beautiful chair being made from whisky casks and they’re well tested for durability in the wilds of Kilmuir.

 

Rocky soon settled in so we left them to and set off  for Portree and a spot of shopping

passing the MV Hebrides at Uig on the way.

Posting on Friday night went ‘t1t5 up’ in favour of kitchen design for the new house, it was about time wifey and I got down to the ‘nitty gritty’ of budgets on the ‘new hoose’

 

A couple of years ago we’d met Oliver Kieren of the ‘Free standing kitchen company’ http://www.thefreestandingkitchen.com/ at the ‘self build’ exhibition at the SECC in Glasgow and were much impressed by the quality of their oak units. OK they’re probably made for buttons in Vietnam but it’s all recycled European oak and pine with not an ounce of MDF or chip board. It’s not cheap but the quality is excellent and the cupboard doors open 180 degrees, I hate these poxy modern units where the doors only open 90 degrees

 

I know, it’s almost £1000 but hey, it’s real wood with a granite top costs you sweet FA to have it ‘fitted’ and you can take it with you if you move

Saturday

Well this is where my ‘week off’ went seriously wrong, it started off just fine with the boys being all revved up for action. ‘The boys’ being the two ‘R’s that we’d acquired on Friday night on the way home.

We started off by repairing yet another puncture on the quad trailer and changing its wheel bearings,

 

before heading over to Torran to clean up a few salamis

A cloth soaked in vinegar soon had the mould off,

and a few hours of running the Lister ST2 generator dried them out out

The snake in the grass

That done we headed down to the old traditional landing place of ‘Port Arnish’ to check on the boats there and cut some telegraph poles.

It was pretty wild down there, the worst I’ve seen it in a long while in fact but we soon had a few poles cut and loaded into the trailer to take home.

They were cut into 7’ lengths to use as strainer posts up at the new house/barn site and after lunch we attempted to install them but the 60mph winds and hail showers got the better of us.

After the abortive strainer post installing session that involved everything getting covered in mud and hail we gave up and returned home via the post box at the end of my drive. And this is when my week went severely ‘tits up’ with a letter from SEPA http://www.sepa.org.uk/ that was nestling in my post post box ‘at the end of the road’. A letter that could only have been inspired by someone with a grudge who reads the blog, a letter that almost made me give up on the blog. That was until today and I spoke to SEPA at 9:30am OK I’d not slept or eaten for two days due to the worry, which should give the ‘snake in the grass’ some comfort, but all seems peachy now and things will take their course

Sunday

The strain of the ‘snake in the grass’ took its toll, I was in my bed at 20:30 on Saturday night and spent most of Sunday replacing the heater motor on the ‘Old Girl’

And I’ll finish this off tomorrow, it’s 22:30 and I’m shattered