Bruno on one of his sick-leaves
Christmas arrrived faster than I could’ve imagined, time flew and I was kept busy by one of my Office assistants being ill most of the fall. Nothing fatal, but enough to keep me busy, mess upp my schedules and make me worry a lot…
And all of the sudden it was time for the local Christmas market! And there, there was Santa and his Christmassy seagull! There were plenty of visitors despite the rainy & windy weather, and everybody seemed happy despite the windy wetness…
Look, here's Santa & his Seagull!
Christmas dinner was dominated by a divine piece of smoked leg of mutton – I demand some sort of a rerun for Easter!
On Boxing day we were hit by a ruthless storm with 30m/s in the huffs & puffs, that did a lot of damage to trees and left plenty of homes without electricity. Some still are powerless… We were fortunate enough to be without electricity for only 12hrs, and fortunately we had a fireplace and plenty of candles to keep us warm and cosy. Not to forget my irreplaceable Dynamo Radio, which I tend to keep fully charged for occasions like this… I bought it some years ago from the internet, it was quite valuable, around 100€, but I think it’s worth every penny. Brilliant to keep with you while working outdoors – and even better during power cuts…! Due to that we’re used to “hop around” in the darkness walking the dogs, all the flashlights were in shape. The best information I received however from the neighbours daughter that drove by, she told that the area around the ferry was like hit by a hurricane, that explained that we’ll be without electricity for a bit longer… During the storm-even if our house was on the windbreak side- it was a little scary to go outside. At one point when visiting outside I heard some trees cracking further up on our property – it felt better to go back inside… We ended up having approx. a dozen of trees blown down by the storm, fortunately none damaged people,dogs or buildings!
Near the ferry
The stormy weather isn’t over yet – yesterday Mr Wind decided to blow on our side of the hill – this time “only” something like 20m/s, but the house was shaking, the chimney was howling, it was snowing horisontally and there was some sort of wind chill factor even indoors!!! 😀 I ended up stuffing newspaper in the cracks in the bedroom wall logs, by the window… Fortunately it changed direction at som point of the evening. This time the electricity hung around all the way, and no trees gave up…
Experiencing frequent storms (one more on the way tonight again) makes you think & wonder about how dependant we have become of that frizzy stuff coming along the lines… And they still try to make us buy more electrically powered stuff, as well letting us understand that wood heated homes for instance aren’t enviromentally friendly. So may be – but if it’s a quiestion of surviving in the winter – there’s nothing beating a fireplace and a wood heated stove (which I miss by the way – heating the grill isn’t an option in 20m/s winds..). Fortunately some foods can be wrapped in aluminum foil & cooked in the fireplace. I’m still for windpower-an vertical wind turbine on the roof would’ve been plenty useful this fall and Christmas in so many homes! The problem is that nobody can own the wind – why it’s made as an unattractive option.. Silly! Once I win the lottery I’ll invest in one of those, or maybe I’ll just build one myself….! 😉 http://youtu.be/F2w9k3miNrs Strangely enough – it’s when it’s windy we get in trouble with the electricity – and that’s when wind power would be so efficient…!
Wishing You a great year for 2012! Gotta go, time to get prepared for the next storm up ahead tonight!
Dressed for surviving at the windy & rainy christmas market
Looking For Santa 