Personal bits and bobs, plus miscellaneous observations
Having been somewhere, or knowing a bit about a place, always makes it seem a bit more real when it is in the news. This past year, for instance, Haiti has been very much in my mind, what with its earthquake, cholera outbreak, massive rebuilding task and so on. It’s one of the countries I…
Today, we returned home from being away with family for a few days over New Year. It is a funny sort of day – not least because of the looming prospect of going back to work tomorrow. Not normally such an intimidating prospect, but then I have been off for a month. It’s been a…
The last few days have been very relaxing – spent mostly eating, sleeping, playing games and going for walks. Wherever you are, have a grand Hogmanay and all the best for 2011.
So, 2010, eh? What a year. Volcanic ash, Nick Clegg, Wikileaks and no doubt other things I can’t quite remember just now. Last year was a pretty monumental year for me, but this year has been just as much so. The first big highlight of the year was the launch of my first book, Up…
Longtime readers will know that I am really not a fan of Facebook. I never really thought it did anything that other things (eg this blog, or email, or Flickr, or – gasp! – talking to people) didn’t do. However, I joined a few years ago to give it a try, and found it tolerable…
The other day, there was a power cut in the house. My first instinct was to switch off the laptop, the only source of power for the iPhone which was, thankfully, fully charged. I know, I know – priorities. Only then did I think about other practicalities, such as ensuring the windows were closed to…
No sooner are we back from Austria, than I am already pondering another adventure. I returned home yesterday to a delightful piece of news on the Explosions in the Sky mailing list. Not only do they have an album coming out in the spring, but they are touring Europe in May of next year. I…
It was our wedding anniversary this weekend, so I took Nicole away for a wee trip to Graz, Austria. It was a secret, and Nicole didn’t know where we were going until we arrived at the gate at Stansted airport on Friday morning. We stayed with some wonderful friends of Nicole’s that she hadn’t seen…
It seems that getting released from captivity is the new black, lately. First up, an update on Kieran, whose kidnap ordeal at the hands of an evidently bonkers Greek ship captain I wrote about here and here. Again, just the short version, but the good news is he’s been released. Whether or not he will be…
My good friend Kieran – he of aidconvoy.net, which features in Up The Creek Without a Mullet and receives 10% of my royalities – is currently working with an organisation called Road To Hope, who are one of many groups attempting to break the illegal siege of Gaza by taking much-needed humanitarian assistance overland through…
I had a busy day yesterday. I took the dreaded “red eye” 0647 train to Edinburgh for a day’s work, and then had a couple of interesting engagements in the evening. First, due to a chance encounter at a recent Highland Literary Salon gathering, I was invited to the equivalent literary get-together in Edinburgh, which…
I’m not sure if you saw the 24 tweetathon by Greater Manchester Police the other week, where the force aimed to tweet every 999 call they received. It was a fascinating insight into the work of the police, and while some of the highlights were amusing, the main themes that came out the day’s experiment…
I’ve somewhat neglected the blog of late, but my feeble excuse is that things have been busy. Not that busy, really, but enough such that, with a slight motivation gap, has left me not having done much worthy of reporting. Finding the time and motivation to get stuck deeply into writing the sequel to Up…
Nicole and I went for a walk near Achnashellach on Saturday, a lovely neck of the woods about an hour west of Inverness and served by the spectacular Kyle line. It’s a great spot for walking and hiking. South from Achnashellach runs a path to Glenuaig, and although it is a beautiful area and Saturday…
As I posted last week, I wasn’t feeling well and so was having to take it easy on the writing front. That was something of an understatement, it turned out, because I ended up spending five days in hospital with appendicitis. I was feeling thoroughly awful when I went in, but after five days of…
It’s been a busy summer, what with moving house, going to Spain and work being quite hectic. Therefore I’d been looking forward to this week and next to get some writing done. I’m behind on my own personal deadline for writing the sequel to “Up The Creek Without a Mullet”, and part of the problem…
I can’t remember why, but I have missed the last couple of Doors Open Days in Inverness, which is a shame as there are a number of places I’ve always been keen to get into. On Saturday, it came around again, and I was able to get into the castle (the sheriff court) and the…
Friday night saw me at a whisky tasting, organised by the same friend who organised a tasting last year which I blogged about here. It was a very fun evening – dampened only slightly by the miserable Scotland performance on telly in the background – in which we tried five rare or unusual malts, from…
As you may know, there is a contest on for the leadership of the Labour Party. It will elect a successor to Gordon Brown, the UK’s worst Prime Minister since Tony Blair, and the contest is relatively wide open with five candidates vying for the job. You may also know that I am a fairly…
Blog posts lately have been few and sporadic, due to a number of things, not least our home internet connection only just being set up. This means I can catch up on a whole host of things I’ve been wanting to write and photos I’ve been wanting to upload. I’ve also had plenty writing to…