Well we have officially had gales for nine days straight. The average for January is seven days of gales, however they are not normally together at the start. To be fair in 1993 there were 19 days of Gales.

On the 5th January the MV Braer ran aground off Sumburgh and released 87,000 tonnes of crude oil. She was carrying twice the amount as the Exon Valdes. Therefore people feared the worst. By some stroke of luck. The storm that added to the accident also saved us. By all account’s the motion of the waves and wind emulsified the oil.

We did get oiled beaches, but not what was expected.

Friends who lived up here smelled the oil on the wind 50 odd miles away. They were out checking theirs and their neighbours fuel supplies as they thought they had developed a leak.

I remember watching things unfold on the evening news.

To be honest this morning was a bit like ‘wind… what wind?’ Yesterday I could hardly stand and today I couldn’t have flown a kite. My good lady took this photo when she was out with the dog.

We got off easy.

Power kept on, but the other side of the hill was off. Funnily enough anywhere that had their power poles replaced due to being destroyed last winter were fine this time.

To our knowledge the worst that happened to our place was that the bin lid fell off and we lost a strip of felt off the pony shed.

My colleague lost their hen house and pigsty roof, oh and this was the Shetland hotel!

The road on the other side was closed for ages as the fire brigade had to assess the building to ensure it wasn’t going to fall down.

From what I remember strongest gust was 89 mph yesterday.

Please be advised this hasn’t got a happy ending!

You have been warned.

A bit of a hard one to write. Sadly we had to let Bella go today. She bled 5 times since yesterday evening. The vet went to do the op on the teeth and sadly her blood tests showed that she was failing fast. She basically was losing platelets so her blood wouldn’t be able to clot.

They therefore couldn’t do the operation as she was also so anemic that caused a problem, dehydration was setting in, so they put her on a drip which thinned the platelets more. They had a blood transfusion set for tomorrow but they couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t delaying the inevitable. They also couldn’t be sure that if she started bleeding then she wouldn’t stop.

They think that she may have had some form of tumour causing the bleeding.

We therefore had to make the extremely hard decision… I am a firm believer of it’s better to be a day too soon than a day too late.

First off, thank you to everyone who passed on positive waves and good vibes and also for asking after her health. Well the good news is she is still with us. The bad news is she still hasn’t had her op. This is primarily because of the weather. The boats have been somewhat erratic of late.

They wanted her on drugs prior to the op to basically thicken the blood. Unfortunately they didnt have any left…They were really good and sent Esther to the pharmacy (the human one) with a prescription for Tranexmatic Acid. From my understanding this is what you give haemophiliacs. So although she is still bleeding at times is it a bit of a dribble, rather than the sudden gush like normal.

If you want a graphic idea of what I mean, get some nice runny red paint and fill about half a cup of it then drop it from about a foot and a half. Oh yeah,… for the full effect get someone to chase you through the house while doing this to simulate trying to get hold of the dog while she is getting upset. Repeat once or twice a day.

Needless to say stress levels were a bit high during these episodes.

Honestly though she is a lot brighter than before the medication. We reckon blood loss would have made her very lethargic and feeling like crap.

Esther is phoning the vet tomorrow to see if they have any ideas on a timescale as the tablet’s run out in three days.

So here is the old lady in her usual pose…

I did a little job today in that I replaced the rope around the fire door and glass. The glass is held in by 4 bolts and a piece of metal that sits up against the glass. Top two took a bit of coaxing but with the help of the impact driver they loosened. Bottom two we’re an absolute sod. Suddenly I felt a sharp pain below my right eye.

Turns out this tiny bit of metal had sheared off and took off like a bullet…

Can you guess who wasn’t wearing eye protection. To be honest I generally don’t when I am screwing or unscrewing something. Maybe I should start.

Sadly no painting tonight as everything was aching.

Hopefully I will get on with it tomorrow!

Flippin Heck I put myself to bed at 16.00 yesterday and woke up at 12.40 today. That’s a twenty hour snooze. I think I may have needed it.

I moved one of the sockets up about 2cm today to allow the skirting board a bit of a lift too. That just about finished me off.

I didn’t even try to get anything painted this evening.

Hopefully normal service will return tomorrow.