Colin Harvey – author

With the eruption in Iceland knocking even the General Election off the headlines yesterday, I thought that I’d check that my friends up there were okay, since the BBC were making it sound as if the Four Horsemen were on the move — even checking with some rent-a-pundit whether we were at risk from all this flying ash (which begs the question; what are we expected to do if he says “Yes, we’re all going to die”?).

I got an interesting reply, which I’ve paraphrased here.

Then he added with typical Icelandic humour, “So now we are not just dealing with corrupted businessmen and politicians, but mother nature as well. But in some ways we are relieved having something else to talk about than Icesave.”

That last by the way, refers to the bank which Wee Gordy Brown decided to lock down using anti-terrorist legislation, which was clearly what it was designed for. Not. Of course you should trust us with these powers, the politicians say…we’d never dream of misusing them…

I realized as I got up this morning that I only have five more days of holiday. I have no idea where the time went, since we seem to have done very little, but it seems like only a day or two ago that I was waking up on the Friday before Easter and thinking, three whole weeks of no uni!

They, whoever the mysterious ‘they’ are –aliens perhaps, or tribal elders?– say that time passes faster as one gets older. What they don’t really hammer home is that it hurtles by as if you’re on the Cresta Run, so that the seasons seem in memory to become a series of stop-motion snapshots; flick! It’s winter and snow carpets the ground; flick! now it’s spring and leaves are shouldering their way out of the buds. flick! Now it’s summer, and heat and languor hover just above ground level. flick! Here comes autumn again…

But for now it’s spring, and out in the garden, the wildlife is stirring…

Another one of the weather/light related blog posts over at suite. Are you beginning to sense a recurring theme here? <g>

A view from chez Harvey this morning.