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Yup, we drank the beer. We had two barrels from Seil:- Thistle Tickler, which we emptied, and Oyster Gold, which was my favourite. Probably a bit foolish to drink the strongest beer on offer for nine hours but we can't be sensible all (or even some) of the time! And two barrels from Mull:- McCaig's Folly, which kept the dark beer lovers happy, and Island Pale Ale which was quite fruity and sharp. I think it is great there are so many breweries out there, and even living on Coll it isn't too difficult to get it delivered. And it was a great way to spend my day off; selling beer or cooking!
Shame about the weather, wet was annoying, but it got cold too so we didn't drink quite as much beer as last year.
The raft race had six entries, although one barely floated, and barely made it beyond the start. Last year's winning raft hit the front early and never looked like being caught, although a team of visitors chased them all the way. The bar staff's raft proved to be a bit unstable with generally at least one team member in the water. The biggest raft was crewed by the airport boys. It took six of them to carry it into the water, but surprisingly enough, it floated! No wet suits for these guys, they just walked into the water in boots and boiler suits! The raft was very stable, but proved very difficult to steer, and eventually they accepted the offer of a tow back.

Next weekend sees Big Noise playing in the hall, and the Ceilidh season kicks off the following Tuesday with Fergie MacDonald.

We have a new monitor. It is flat, takes up half the space on the desk (the real one) and fits far more stuff on its screen. I thought having a bigger screen made the writing bigger, but no, you don’t have to move the mouse wheel so much because so much more is on the page. So I think it is a good thing. But he went away to fit a kitchen, not fritter money away in PC World. I worry what he was really looking at, although he says he didn’t trust MacLennans enough to get a monitor on Ebay! Trouble is, I can’t find anything, all the icons on the desktop have moved position.

I’ve got a bit behind with the blogging. The fishing dance with The Sandy Brechin Band was brilliant, exactly the right number of people for the hall, and I won some Pipers Gold in the raffle and sold lots of burgers and got home in time to have three hours in bed before getting up again. Fishing was good for the village fishing competition with experience triumphing over youthful enthusiasm. The oldest boat, Rafiki, with Ruth Sturgeon skippering caught the biggest fish and the biggest total catch. Ruth fished at the first fishing competition 33 years ago. Marc ably demonstrated how not to climb the ladder up the pier. Rule one, Do not let go of the ladder with both hands to pass up a heavy box of mackerel. If you do all the fish fall in the sea, they managed to land one fish, but at least he didn’t fall in as well. The beach football was won by White Lightening (again), proving they can continue without Graham’s silky skills. JA donned a Project shirt (unbelievable) and probably put them into the final on his own, saving three penalties and scoring one in the penalty shoot out at the semi-final stage but they lost the final in the last minute of extra time. Six teams entered and the president of the Coll Association was asked to permanently leave the pitch after he momentarily confused rugby with soccer. Sadly the Lochmaben boys were busy with their tents. Lots of people went to the bingo and raised £200, but I wasn’t one of them.

The runway at Colonsay is finished and Coll has a new bunch of workers. Islay must have a special training school for runway builders, I can’t think why else so many come from there. We are about to get some tarmac, it is very very imminent. There is a meeting on Monday to discuss the logistics of the road repairs. I may have to re-discover the ‘joys’ of cycling.