WIND. (03/02/14)

I am still suffering from severe wind. It’s not too bad down in the bottom of the glen but it increases exponentially the higher one goes. I think it’s called heart burn. It’s a fine day here but not fit for walking. Tomorrow still looks like a good day so I’ll pray the buses are running up the mountain and that we can have a good walk down. the company that run Cairngorm Mountain are really struggling. They have only been open for about three days in the last fortnight.

Today the dogs and I caught the bus into Aviemore. Another cockup. It’s a Bank Holiday here but the shops were open. The buses only run a Saturday service so I had to adopt hurry up mode or would be left stranded again.

  This signal box is out of all proportion to the traffic on the main line. I suspect half of it is redundant now. The tracks in the foreground lead to the steam engine shed. There wasn’t anyone around but there looks to be a few coal bunkers and lots of scrap this and that.

This is the area Douglas pointed me at. I’ll be back for half term when the steam trains are running. There is a wonderful old engine shed on the far right behind the old bridge. I would have walked to it but some clown and left a crane in front of it. It is a bit of a tip but then even tips have possibilities.

This is the underpass under the railway. It could be much better with a bit of tidying or none at all.

Aviemore is just a necessity. It’s not a town to enjoy but it has shops for food and dozens more for outdoor clothing. It has a wonderful station and bus services to everywhere. I will be back because it’s great to walk the dogs for half an hour in an area so beautiful.

Now I read an article which I found a little difficult to comprehend. The Scots or some of them would like to be self governing. Whatever your views on this it matters little to England. We still tick over, we still eat and some of us still wade, paddle or boat through flood water. If London had been inundated things would have happened. London enjoys 60GB/s internet I enjoy 1MB/h. Sod HS2 just roll out cable. No-one would need trains except for fun and nostalgia.

All Alex Salmond wants is to be a proper Prime Minister. It’s what Dithery wants as well, fat chance. Alex met Mark Carney last week to discuss Scottish Independence and fiscal or fishing matters or summat. Alex wants to have his new independent Groats, Sheckles, Haggises, Salmons, whatever, tied to the pound Sterling. Mark said this is unworkable.

Bugger me! Are all bankers daft? Is it a requisite for the job, that one has no foresight and no hindsight? The Irish Punt was tied to the pound for donkeys years. It worked fine Bostonians donated dollars that were converted to punts and then used to purchase semtex to blow us English twats to bits. All the Caribbean, but for the French bits, and half of Latin America are tied to the dollar. Is it me? Or have we hired another half witted ignoramus. We used to send all our head bangers to Canada and Australia. I suspect our chickens are coming home. 

It is possible that Mark with a good Irish name like Carney is just having a laugh, taking the piss a bit. I wish he’d stop. We hired him to run the Bank of England and not as a stand up comic. We already have six hundred and odd of them in Westminster.

Have fun.