Field work is on hold as the weather is still terrible, not as bad as in England but bad enough to bog the sprayer. Two tractors were not enough to perform the rescue, so we had to resort to the digger. Still, it filled up a rather boring, wet afternoon that would otherwise have been spent on combine servicing duties.
The local paper has a column by our First Minister, I found this bit quite a shock, so I have decided to share part of it with you all:
"This last weekend, I was delighted to visit the New Deer Agricultural Show, where I had met with the local members of the National Farmers' Union. Like our fisherman, local farmers are a breed apart - hardy men, with no fear of hard work - and I greatly value the opportunity to meet with them on a personal basis to hear at first hand of the issues that they face on a daily basis. There wouldn't be many who would choose to enter farming for their love of paperwork and form-filling. Though many of them have risen to challenge of the sheer weight of bureaucracy that they have to contend with, I am firmly of the opinion that much needs to be done to simplify the administrative systems with which they must engage.
When I started out in my professional career in the civil service many years ago, in what was then known as MAFF, the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries & Food, my mandate was to do all that I could to assist those industries to develop and grow in the most efficient and profitable way possible - and that is the mind-set to which we must return. Far too much energy is wasted going into ways of stopping things from happening - our job as politicians is to make things happen." Alex Salmond 27th July 2007.
I was left quite speechless by this, being used to politicians whose main aim in life is to stop us doing anything. Indeed the last administration's aim seemed to be to force a new clearances. I wonder if he will be able to deliver on this as yet another problem has appeared in the UK's Rural Development Programme.
Enough of the politics, the household is in turmoil due to the possible arrival of child number five. This one is coming with more unconventional means i.e. adoption (not certain to arrive or even what sex age etc,social workers can and do change their mind). Anyone who thinks farming is tough has obviously never had anything to do with the Social Work department. This has been a process of a number of years and a lot of disappointments, we have learned a lot about Family Policy and Family Welfare in the whole of the UK, some of it not for the faint hearted but children are just great, so we feel privileged to get the opportunity to parent No5.