Swiss Absinthe

03/03/2005

We are promised a dry morning with rain later. At 7.00am, it is freezing with clear skies. The wind veers all the time right round to the southeast. The wind should back to northwest by nightfall, and although we are having dry weather, there is much talk of blizzards and deep snow to the east of us. The coming weekend it predicted to be the best skiing weekend so far this year. The morning news informs us that Switzerland is considering imposing helmets on skiers because the modern carving ski is letting folk ski beyond their capabilities, turning too wide and too fast, resulting in 50 mph car crash style injuries, rather than the normal multiple limb fractures that skiers favour. It is interesting, but not surprising that today also marks the day when the Swiss legalise Absinthe distilling after a fifty-year ban following the consumption of the said gut rot leading to domestic violence. God only knows what it does for your skiing. Only time will tell. We are enjoying the best weather in the country and this has certainly brought many visitors to Glen Trollaigh, from sixty odd ice climbers in the corries to fast jet pilots in turbo prop trainers. These trainees are at least keen to waggle their wings at you, where as the arrogant ice climbers and even worse the howling F16s treat the whole landscape as their own. Dearest Dotty claims that the south facing windows of the Tower of Glen Trollaigh require more cleaning because the F16s fly in at 200 feet from that direction, spewing unburnt kerosene from their after-burners. The ice climbers, equally unthinking just leave empty plastic coke bottles and tissues decorating the landscape. They are, of course committed urban recycling environmentalists to a man; one hopes that they will step in beaver poo in years to come. Not unnaturally, nobody gives a toss about what we country trogs think. The fires are lit, and the frustrations of country living can be calmed with an Ardbeg. Yours Aye, Archie, The Baron Trollaigh.