Chaos

One of those mornings when nothing goes right. I had to catch a bus before going to work for some routine testing at the hospital. Not an Amsterdam hospital, but one in a nearby town. Getting there wasn’t too bad, I was early, so it took the usual 30 minutes. Getting back took twice as long because of the traffic. It always amazes me, so many cars, all travelling in the same direction, standing still half the time. I am so glad I can cycle into work every morning and am not dependent on any kind of public transport. I’ve reached the stage where I don’t mind the rain, and plenty of that this morning, or the occasional flat tire, which means an hour walking home. Twenty minutes on your bike is a good start and end to a working day.

Actually, thinking back, I never really did mind the rain. I remember when I went to secondary school, cycling every day to the other side of town. When I had just started, thirteen years’ old, and it was pouring down. My mother was waiting for me at home, worried about me cycling in the rain, and I had actually enjoyed myself. It helps clear your mind and wake you up.

Then, when I finally got to work, a request to go and pick up some train tickets at central station before one o’clock. That meant going straightaway because of a meeting from 11 to 1. And I was supposed to finish a report this morning. In the end I gave up. Sometimes you just have to stop resisting and give in. I finished my report in the afternoon instead, and postponed a few other things.

Meanwhile, after all that rain, around 11, there was some glorious sunshine, the kind that makes you want to go out and walk for miles and miles. It was a good day for walking, really, in spite of the rain. I can just imagine what the dunes looked like today, and what it would have felt like to walk in the wind and the rain. So was I doing sitting in an office all day?

Well, I had a couple of meetings, very interesting. A change of cast means a change of meeting. You can see it happening. We used to be a steady group of six, meeting every week to discuss current matters and take decisions. We still are six, but a new chairman, and that makes a huge change. It will be interesting to see all this develop over the next few months.

The rain had stopped when I cycled home, so I could go running again. Strong wind, so I ran a slightly shorter route, but it was good anyway. Now that I’ve started I want to stick to it.

After dinner an old episode of Bill Oddie’s second series on birding. This first episode I ever saw of the series was all about Shetland, and I remembered parts of it very clearly. I guess it was one of the reasons why I went birdwatching up in Shetland last year. Watching the programme now I could remember thinking how wonderful it would be to see these sites, and I can remember visiting them. I saw the Phalaropes and Red-throated Divers up at the Lake of Funzie on Fetlar, the huge Gannet and Guillemot colonies on Noss, and managed to get within a few feet of the Puffins, and I got to Mousa to see the tiny Storm Petrels come back to their nests late at night. Oddie captures the magic of Shetland very well. Now I want to go back again.