The snow which looked fairly fearsome this morning is now on the retreat and so far disruption has been minimal-the milkman got through at 4AM as usual in his electric cart. He seems to get everywhere without difficulty and we have never known in 71/2 years for him to be off sick never mind miss a scheduled delivery. The Postie arrived in time as well and our kind neighbour,Wednesday being his day to get the Grudian, made the journey to and from B-o-T ok. On the other hand a meeting in Duns that the wife was meant to attend was cancelled and Chirnside School was threatening to send children home if the snow got worse which it hasn't-in Hutton at any rate. The thaw is anyhow on-and attempts to toboggan a complete frost, or rather lack of it. But The Met map is still an ugly shade of Red all down the East Coast with huge flakes centred over Hutton and with this thaw followed by a hard frost tonight and more dsnow could yet cause problems. Anyhow stores are in, the emergency lanterns being recharged, ditto the mobile phone. The usual problem is the 'interruption' in electricity supply as Scottish Power delicately puts it. Four years ago the the 'interruption' lasted eight days and the Old Manse, with its gravity feed Raeburn became the bath house and soup kitchen for the whole village. Happy days-especially for us as we were in Norn Ireland! 45 people in the old manse plus us and a tiny
grandchild, and no power (needed for the Central Heating) -4C outside would not have been much fun. It was also nice to receive a fat cheque-£200 or so from Scottish Power for the inconvenience we had not personally suffered.
But with possibly nasty weather around one can really worry about rural isolation-roads dicey, no shop for 6 miles, bus not running, no power and denied access to the www -thats hardship for you. Fingers crossed, now that Mr Fish has gone, it won't happen
