It's mud news week!

In our 21st Century lives, it's often not possible to distinguish the cycle of the year in any tangible sense, beyond a vague notion of what is being marketed by retailers. Easter eggs? Must be January 2nd. Santa hats? Probably mid September.

One of the joys (and occasionally that phrase is uttered between gritted teeth in the brunt of some horizontal weather) of living a more elemental Orcadian life is that the cyclical nature of the seasons is much more obvious.

There's the rather prominent effect of the passage of the setting sun back and forth along the western horizon. There's the holiday time-share experience of summer and winter migratory birds: skuas swapping skies with berry-ravenous redwings; and long-in-the-beak oystercatchers giving way to long-tailed ducks.

But this weekend, a more subtle change occurred, close to Tense Towers and close to our hearts. The muddy field entrance, just over the road from our front garden, cattle-poached and unprepossessing, has brought a little piece of Winter to our doorstep. And although these birds are resident in Orkney throughout the year, only during the colder months do Snipe choose to visit our immediate vicinity. They are very welcome.

Boat blogging

Any plans we may have had for Saturday were ripped up when I received a request, late on Friday, to attend a problem with a client’s customer in Caithness, across the Pentland Firth on the Scottish mainland. Our lifestyle, though occasionally idyllic, means that I cannot afford to miss out on a work opportunity when it arises. So, after running a local errand this morning, I was able to catch the lunchtime ferry out of St Margaret’s Hope, then drive from Gill’s Bay to Thurso, arriving on site by early afternoon. An hour and a half later, the problem was rectified, I was bidding farewell to a happy customer and heading out into the sunset.

Literally…

Outside the customer’s premises, looking across Thurso Bay towards Orkney (centre).

Or litorally…

From the edge of Castletown, looking across Dunnet Bay.

Foreshore…

From the top of a dune by Dunnet Bay.

For sure…

From Dunnet Head (which we can often see from Tense Towers if the visibility is good), with Orkney tucked away behind the lighthouse complex.

By the time I reached Gill’s Bay, darkness was creeping over land and sea, the temperature was beginning to drop and a slippery frost was forming on the damp ground. The ferry wasn’t due for another two hours. Reason enough, then, to repair to the terminal building for a bowl of hot soup, a slice of cake and several mugs of tea.

It’s all in a day’s work.

This post has been written (though not uploaded) aboard m.v. Pentalina, as she makes her way northwards, back across the Pentland Firth. In another few weeks, it will be three years since I made this self-same journey to become a resident of Orkney. I must admit, if anyone had said to me, four years ago, that our lives would be as they are now, I would have thought it utter madness. But in a very good way.

Round up

It's almost the middle of November and there's not much bloggage to show for it. This is normally indicative of a loss of muse (as opposed to 'mouse') or, as in this case, a chap just being so busy with consequential stuff that there's not been time to put finger to keyboard.

Yes, I do type that slowly.

Any road, here's a quick digest of my month so far, as seen through the eyes of my phone.

Eday can be windy?

A panoramic view of Kirkwall harbour and bay

Our Lass would like to get all shabby chic with this cabinet...

but the last person to lay a brush on it was my grandfather.

A sunny and showery day on Hoy...

when I attended this event.

The lowdown on the Scapa Flow Visitor Centre and Museum

Mus musings

Folks keep asking me about the mouse. Maybe it's to take their minds off other stuff, y'know, focussing on something inconsequential to prevent the dread thoughts from breaking through. Whatever they might possibly be?

Well, there have been developments on the rodent front. By the end of October, no mice had been harmed in the writing of this blog. In fact, by that point, several days after the new carpets were fitted, I was only giving the traps a cursory glance to confirm either the presence or absence of an ex-mouse. Life was good: the house was cosier, our feet were warmer and commensals were fewer. Then I thought to check that the bait was still in the traps (yeah, you're right, I was checking first thing in the mornings, before my eyes were properly dialled in). Guess what? Nothing. Clean as a whistle. 

So I'm pondering "Can a mouse lick off all the peanut butter without springing the trap?" and "Wood lice? Do they even like peanut butter?"

As there had been no further mouse scat, we couldn't immediately answer those questions, so I reset the traps (by this time they were located in the garage, rather than the lounge) with good old-fashioned cheese. Within a few hours, we had us a dead mouse, and we blithely wondered whether that was the end of the matter.

On the following Friday, after several days of zero readings on the mouse-ometer, I retired early as I needed to be up at six the next morning to catch a ferry. As I went to switch off the bedside light, something scurried from under a wardrobe and dashed behind a chair. Bearing in mind that we'd just been watching a tv programme featuring a tarantula, my reaction was reasonably calm.

Yep, it was a mouse. Oddly, decades of wildlife watching can't be unlearnt in a trice, so we spent an interesting half hour contemplating our options, whilst the mouse explored the room. When it sat in one of my slippers and stared back at me, I felt that the time to do something was probably now. Chuntering about lost sleep, rodents with an unerring sense of bad timing, and much else besides, I brought the traps from the garage and placed them in the bedroom. We then spent another half hour watching the mouse run over the traps, dislodging the cheese and caching it under our bed.

Hmmmm.

My next plan wasn't rocket science, but I needed something to work in a hurry so I could get some shuteye. In fact, forget rocket science, a rock would've been simpler, though the cleaning bill may not have been. I shut all the doors to the corridor in the centre of the house, save for our bedroom and the hall. Once the mouse was herded (ok, maybe not 'herded') into the corridor, it was reasonably easy to trap it in the hall, then open the front door and chase it out. A very temporary solution, I'll admit.

Now, my trip to Caithness (hence the early ferry) turned into an overnighter, so that Our Lass spent Saturday night alone. Almost. She was awakened in the night by a clattering in the corridor, which manifested itself as a mouse repeatedly trying to run up a small set of stepladders (the 3 step variety, just bought, unwrapped, but not put away). As we live in a bungalow, this meant that she could now legitimately sing "I saw a mouse. Where? There on the stair. Where on the stair? Right there!" a la 'A windmill in Old Amsterdam'.

Having taken advice from Sian on Graemsay as to how to catch a mouse in an emergency, Our Lass deployed an empty cereal box to good effect and released the wee beastie in the field over the road. Let's upgrade this solution to the status of 'mildly temporary'.

My return on Sunday was to tales of night time derring-do armed with only a cardboard box, plus pyjama-ed excursions to the Great Outdoors. I don't think either of us were expecting this to be the end of the matter.

Right about now, I recalled the umpteen lectures on hygiene that First and Second Born received when they were out with the RSPB, as teenagers, on mammal trapping surveys. Always wash your hands after handling mice/shrews/voles. It also hit home that the problem might be bigger than we had first thought and that it needed to be nipped in the bud. Harsh, but true.

So, confirming that the garage wasn't mouse-proof and probably impossible to make so, I ensured that the door from the garage to the kitchen was mouse-proof, and also rebaited the traps in the garage with walnuts. Firmly tied to the triggers.

Sure enough, after at least eleven days on the run, in and around Tense Towers, the Bonnie (or Clyde) of Mus domesticus tried one raid too many, its slipper snuggling days were finally over.

I can't say that I blamed it for trying, clogs must be quite chaffing in comparison.

RGB

Red, Green, Blue, the primary colours, or a video format.

These things weren't foremost in my mind when Our Lass and I went for a short walk this morning. However, that changed as we wandered along a muddy track, across some rough pasture and onto a seaweed-strewn beach.

First up was a female Redstart, at the edge of some willow bushes and frequently flitting down to the ground with a beautiful tail shimmer. Then came a pair of Greenfinches, feeding in a weedy area of Docks and Thistles. And finally, the hoped-for colour match, a Bluethroat hopping through the seaweed, looking for invertebrates, in the company of several pipits.

There were one or two Starlings present as well...

This is just a few of them. It all got rather dramatic when a male Hen Harrier flew by and a huge murmuration suddenly gathered to confuse the predator. There was one unsuccessful 'talons out' lunge towards the Starlings, but it seemed as though the tactic of 'strength in numbers' paid off.

Further along the coast, a battle of a different kind was in full swing, as two species of lichen struggled over ownership of a rock.

Near the Brough of Deerness, Our Lass stood on the clifftop, contemplating the waves, the solitude and what the heck is he doing with his phone?

I was trying out the Panorama function, which didn't result in a fly-on-the-wall documentary exposé of some politician's wrongdoing, but did look like this...

Dressing up for Hallowe'en

Hmmm.

The BBC, in a news article on their website, described the Mexican 'Day of the Dead' tradition as, "Mexicans traditionally celebrate the Day of the Dead with a family picnic beside their relatives' graves or in front of a decorated shrine at home." And somehow, because of James Bond, it is now a 'parade, complete with floats, giant marionettes and hundreds of dancers and performers.'

I guess this is how customs and traditions change over time, so that the original meaning is gradually lost as each generation add their spin or twist to proceedings. Great for tourism, but not quite the soulful, reflective family occasion it once was.

I feel much the same about Hallowe'en. It is very different now from when I was a youngster (ok, that was a long time ago), but even back then we didn't spend much time remembering the dead: saints, martyrs and the faithful departed. 

So there's not a whole load of dressing up at Tense Towers at this time of year. It is left to others, including this wee fellow...

You're probably thinking, "Is that a Dunnock wearing too much make-up and a mask?" Well, the truth is stranger still. This small bird is a Siberian Accentor, which breeds in the Ural Mountains region of Siberia and overwinters in south east Asia.

Usually.

However, this Autumn, following a long period of easterly winds, several individuals have been recorded in the UK for the first time. One made it to Sandside Bay in Deerness, which is just down the road from Tense Towers (well, just down the road if your point of reference is Siberia!) so, as alluded to in my previous blogpost, I went to see it on Thursday.

After watching it feeding for about 15 minutes, I was pleasantly surprised when it eventually hopped closer, until we ended up on the opposite verges of a muddy track. It was rather confiding, tolerating the presence of weird humans in clothing drabber than our own member of the accentor family, the Dunnock.

Very fitting

Today, we are having new carpets fitted in half of Tense Towers, to replace the ones ruined in a burst pipe incident during the Summer (yeah, I know, burst pipes are more of a Winter thing, but we like to go against the flow).

I recall writing on this blog, years ago, about a carpet fitting in another time and place. A swift search of the word 'carpet' produced a couple of pages of results, mainly featuring swathes of wild flowers, but also an intriguing one about habitat loss (here) and also the post I had in mind (here)*.

So, 2009, eh? Just as Middlesbrough Football Club were relegated from the Premier League. And here we are, seven long years later, Boro newly returned to the top division and the imminent arrival of cosy floors at the latest Tense Towers.

Well, I say 'imminent'. The day booked for the fitting was tomorrow, but a call earlier in the week asked if we could re-arrange for today. As this wasn't a huge problem for us, we agreed, and I adjusted my preparations to ensure that rooms were empty of furniture 24 hours sooner than planned. Now, the original start time was eight o'clock sharp, and one of our number didn't check whether this timing was the same for today's rearranged appointment. Hence, we were up, showered, dressed and breakfasted by the required hour (quite a shock for Our Lass, as she's still recuperating from her knee operation and quite partial to a lazy morning in her PJs). It's now 09.15 and I'm beginning to suspect that we're not first on the To Do list.

[... a bit later, after a trip to the local shop for a pint of milk and a few packets of scrumptuous biscuits]

Orcadian custom seems to dictate that hot beverages and ample crunchiness are on offer for any visitors. At least, that is the impression I have garnered, following several years of carrying out work in other folks' homes. Refusing the offer of refreshment is not an option, and on several occasions, my colleague and I have had to sit at a lunch table groaning under the weight of bread, sandwich fillings, home bakes and a huge teapot. Yep, some days it's a tough job.

Oh, speaking of visitors, we had one the other night. Our Lass and I had spent the evening emptying most of the furniture out of the guest bedroom and the study, cramming stuff wherever we could in the lounge, kitchen and garage. By bedtime, half the house was rather echoey... echoey... echoey and the other half was very, very snug.

The visitor? Oh, we didn't find out about that until yesterday morning. When I opened the lounge curtains, I was greeted by the sight of a trail of small black droppings along the window sill. In my befuddled, just awake, state, I mused on the options: bat or mouse, as their respective droppings look similar. Then, realising that not even the approaching 'festivities' of Hallowe'en would produce an indoor bat, I trudged off to break the good news to a somnolent Our Lass. For the avoidance of doubt, when crushing the droppings, they didn't crumble to dust to reveal a myriad of insect body parts. Definitely a mouse, then.

Whilst watching Autumnwatch on television last night, we were incredibly pleased to be told that a mouse urinates 3000 times a day. Thanks, Chris, that was a fact I would've happily not known in present circumstances.

To be fair, it's that time of year. The harvest's in, the weather's deteriorating and all a wee beastie wants is a warm, dry place to be. Unfortunately, our lounge, complete with additional double bed, boxes of paperwork, a filing cabinet and sundry other bits and bobs, wasn't in the ideal state for a quick game of Hunt the Rodent. Despondently, we dug out the peanut butter and a couple of traps and opted for patience over proactive. This morning, there's not a sign of said mouse. Nothing in the traps, no more droppings, narda. Oh, ok! So our house isn't good enough, eh? Offski'd at the first opportunity and not even a "Goodbye"? Humph!

Well, on the plus side, the carpet fitters have turned up, Our Lass has manned the kettle whilst I went on a twitch (sadly so, dear reader, more info in due course) and then I took over tea and biscuit duties whilst Herself was whisked off to the sprawling megatropolis of Kirkwall for a 'Ladies who do lunch' session with Sian from Life on a Small Island.

* Please note, for this blogpost, you have been spared the awful carpet-y puns of the 2009 version.