Sunday, April 13, 2008
The Hills Are Alight.
04/13/2008
Apart from the tradition of liberating the Tower of Glen Trollaigh Christmas Tree in December, only April provides any sport with “The Forestry”, when we yokels set about our traditional muirburn. Regulars will know that this ancient fire raising allows us to clear away un-grazed “white” grass and encourages fresh new shoots to appear, timed to avoid disrupting ground nesting birds and provide fresh bites for lambs and calves. For some reason lost to me, Prof Ernest Guy PhD and bar, objects strongly to our wielding of the mega power blow torch on the Bens and Braes, indeed he sets up a commando operation to keep us in place. This is a bit rich from an industry that for forty years has sent hill ploughs through every ecological and archaeological site in Scotland, however ever one for a challenge we have completed our muirburn on schedule, often burning at night fuelled by Something Scottish or aided though our new tactic of sending the bucket and spade brigade in the wrong direction. One only has to phone Fluffy Stuff HQ with a reported and frankly unlikely siting of some avian rarity. This guarantees a wave of beards in small green vans in eager anticipation of a clip-board moment shooting off on the required compass bearing, whilst we criminals pocket the Swan Vestas, don sturdy boots and head for Tom na Trollaigh Ridge.
Dearest Dottie’s splendid pair of pins have been exercised on the Austrian pistes along with a jolly group experiencing our first ski party town, where groups of chaps wearing matching funny hats and rude T shirts, slowly succumb to large amounts of booze. All harmless enough and the locals are delighted to take their loot. Our week of mixed weather was enlivened by good company and good food with the occasional visit to watering holes where fascist sing-alongs seemed to be the order of the day. Always one to find out something useful, I was taken from the jostle of Innsbruck Airport to the nearby Tennis Club to wile away an hour or so of flight delay eating and wine tasting. This club is now a Trollaigh Top Travel Tip almost compensating for the terrors of using this quaint tho’ dangerous Airfield.
Returning from the slopes and a family gathering in Dorset I spent a minute or so in the sunshine catching up over coffee with unread issues of The Oban Times. I think their sub editors must be given special licence to conjure up their headlines. I feel sure that I would never get away with the tongue in cheek “Lochaber Police Disappointed in Levels of Violence” or the quoting of a well respected Argyll Councillor following his chairing of a contentious planning meeting, where the committee and officials were booed from the hall; “Although the majority were disappointed, the meeting was held democratically.” Mr Sub Editor, I know not who you are, however may you live forever and keep fuelling the Trollaigh chuckles.
Hooting Owls accompany the nocturnal dog walks, Black Birds, Cross Bills and Oyster Catchers join the morning rambles. However it remains cold in the dry northerly air stream, not much sign of spring apart from nodding Daffs and Tulips. Hey ho, hopefully better to come. Yours Aye, Archie, The Baron Trollaigh.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
BST or not BST
03/30/2008
This weekend when time springs forward to British Summer Time the old arguments about daylight saving are delivered by the usual cranks with more crackpot theories than giggles from Charlotte Green following the “pee in a jar” incident. Personally I do not have much of a view on the subject as along with 90% of the population of the North Argyll Glens I do not change my clocks, preferring to stick to Greenwich Mean Time or Universal Time Constant as our Euromasters insist on calling it to avoid the blatant Englishness of the use of Greenwich. Let’s face it an hour either way makes no difference in these lonely parts where hostelries tend to be fairly flexible with their opening hours.
I suppose it all depends on one’s beliefs and the past weeks have certainly shown a lot of them to be built on severely shifting sands. I seem to have been stuck in small spaces with believers of every hue justifying their faith in the integrity of banks, the existence of God, Gordon Brown, and the resurrection, not forgetting the holy grail of the total terror and certainty of Global Warming. The later seems to be backed by the ridiculous number of beardy PhDs who publish learned articles based in the early arrival of blue night moths, so it must be true even when it is obviously blatant balls. Even a gentle tease will bring down the fury of melting ice caps on the baronial bonce from the doom laden believers. Frankly I am not prepared to have some chap from Bathgate sticking his gizmo up my motor’s delicate exhaust pipe to fine me £66, when Johnnie Chinaman is building ten coal fired power stations each and every week. It makes just as much sense as the board of HBOS filling their boots with shares the day after the price collapsed following despicable rumours about the bank’s solvency, or perhaps the huge boost in oil extraction now that super profits seem guaranteed on the reserves which will last us for centuries to come.
Recently various things have reminded me of the wonderful, though infrequent letters I used to await with unbridled anticipation from my father whilst I was away at school. Looking back it must have taken him quite an effort to compose these beautifully written mini diaries of his week/fortnight/month one assumes prompted by my mother. I must try proper writing again rather than this electronic thing, if only to broadcast the mystery of the skeleton in the tent at Bridge of Orchy, a story that father would have loved, where is the Audi that accepts the keys found in the tent? Communication also explains my long absence from these pages for those of you still interested. My laptop was seized at the beginning of March and chaos followed in all our systems as Big Brother considered my recent stay in Switzerland. Now that I seem to be in the clear dearest Dottie has invested heavily in a new room that looks a little like Houston Mission Control and I have been warned to stay well clear of this “off limits” area. However, the call of shopping has attracted all the girls away for the day and I have managed to hack into a document that I can publish, although switching the whole ramboodle on was enough of an effort. Yours Aye, Archie, The Baron Trollaigh.