200 Old Counts

03/12/2006

A southeasterly howler whistles around the Tower of Glen Trollaigh tonight, carrying hints of rain that may thaw the ten inches of snow that has cascaded upon us in the past twenty-four hours. The weather came from an unexpected easterly leaving, the ridges bare, however filling every nook and cranny to leeward with metres of snowdrifts. One might hope that this heralded a great Sunday of profit for our struggling ski resort operators, but this was not to be as the police, overburdened on a sleepy Sunday morning simply closed the snow gates on the A82, A9 and Glen Shee, cutting the slopes off from their tens of thousands of customers desperate to spend their hard earned salaries in Scotland. When will the completely hopeless Scottish Executive join up their policies? One notes that the engineers have reported on the failure of the parliament roof; apparently, one and a half bolts were “missing” from the collapsed structural member in question, however the engineers were unable to tell when the bolts disappeared. O.K., when are we going to stick them back into position, and who are we going to sue? Answer was there none. Doubtless the same answer to the question, why are we paying 202,000 people lone parent benefit, when there are only 165,000 registered lone parents in the country.

The snow has brought traditional pursuits to the Tower; Firstly, the chasing about with buckets to catch the drips from the many leaks that only appear when snow sticks in quantity to the old roof; Secondly, the entire household turn out to construct a sizable snowman in the kitchen garden. After this chilly event, and as everyone was in the kitchen around lunchtime, I let Lachie open two or three bottles of Fitou sent over from Tuchan by Felix, and pretty fair it was to, although I was a bit miffed when I read the label, “ Ancient Comte”, a little too strong I fear! Yours aye, Archie, The Baron Trollaigh.