Uncategorized

Bicycles! They’re great! I used to have two in Aberdeen for my regular sojourns there, but they both got nicked from the BBC’s supposedly secure bike park (not only that, but not a single person who works at the Beeb in Aberdeen noticed they’d gone; or the freshly-sawn chains lying on the ground). I still…

….or ‘the gate’ in English. I am fascinated by the remnants of old sheep-gates you find throughout Shetland, where old fences have rotted away…they tend, for some reason, to be on the edge of cliffs. This has prompted various flights of CS Lewis/George Macdonald/Tolkien- type fancy concering their possible use as gateways to another, even…

Here’s the new song, Welcome to Bobland, in all its Garageland glory (what a great piece of software…if only I knew how to use it!). Download or just listen online, and remember, if you do meet Bobby Z on the Cairngorm railway, do tell him that Shot of Love is the great underrated album, Self…

The tragic and very sudden death of my accountant, Bob, has meant that for the first time in a decade or more I’ve been having to pore over the income and expenditure of the Morton endeavours. Failing completely to understand anything at all about capital allowances, written down values and all that gubbins, I simply…

Much as one deplores the activities of those Devonians who have been ransacking the containers of other people’s stuff washed up in Lyme Bay…one can’t help but be amused by this…

…has just arrived. There is snow on Ronas Hill! It’s cold and changeable but relatively survivable – one of these days when you really want just get on the all-weather gear and head for the remotest parts of Northmavine, such as Uyea, the Lang Ayre or the top of Ronas Hill itself. Good to see…

Lines on the occasion of Mr Bob Dylan buying a house in Nethybridge… I was living in a caravan in AviemoreWith a rescue greyhound called JoeAnd a Polish girl called PerditaIn the first of the winter snowsAnd the condensation fell like rainEven the dog wore a plastic suitPerdita went back to KrakowShe was suffering from…

…is remarkably easy. No excuses. Well, all right, one or two: The Tom Morton show is completely unscripted, and occasionally things can become a little fraught, what with technical breakdowns (we had a weather-related loss of my connection to the BBC yesterday) and the need to do four or five things at once ( check…

A truly dreadful trip home on the MV Hrossey, 14 and a half hours of misery, not really because of feeling sick in the dreadful conditions, but just the discomfort and inability to sleep. Susan reminded me that I once wrote: “The difference between the ferry and the ‘plane is this: On the ‘plane, you’re…

Terribly saddened to hear late last night about the death of Harry Horse (Richard Horne) and his wife Mandy. All day I’d been wondering about the identity of the couple found dead in Shetland. Devastating to find it’s people you know and admire so much. It’s all over the papers, as I suspected it might…