A ramble about communication

I had a rotten night's 'sleep'. So, at 4.15 a.m. after six hours of tossing and turning I got up. but who is complaining when this is what greets you? Not me.


A headland of Bayble Bay and the mountains of the mainland of North Western Scotland as seen from GB's on the Isle of Lewis with the sun about to rise at 4.15 a.m.


As anyone who has followed my blog closely will know I have all sorts of crazy passions. One of them is for letter boxes. The nearest letter box to Brother-who-blogs is in Lower Bayble and qualifies as one of my favourites. It is a fairly ordinary lamp letterbox but unlike the mainland ones it has a flap attached to keep the weather out when it's blowing a hooly. that however is not what makes it special. It is, as the estate agents would put it, 'Location, location, location'. Not only is it next to a smartly painted outhouse but the view over Bayble Bay is superb. I shall have to think about my other favourite boxes and do a separate post about them some time.

On a completely different topic; people are either amused, bewildered or pitying that I no longer answer the home telephone or make phone calls - except to family and close friends and even then sparingly. For someone who did a lot of his work on the phone I have become totally allergic to it since I retired. Is it any surprise, I ask myself.....


"This is the fault line for XXX. If you would like to report a fault, press one.
"You have pressed one. If this means you would like to report a fault, press one again.
"Thank you. You have indicated you would like to report a fault.
"The number to dial to report faults is O845 00000000.
"This is the fault line for XXX. If you would like to report a fault, press one.
"You have pressed one. If this means you would like to report a fault, press one again.
"Thank you. You have indicated you would like to report a fault.
" If you are a moron, press one. If not, press one.
"You have pressed one. Please confirm that the equipment is switched on. If the switch is in the on position press one. If not, press two (you moron!)
"You have pressed one. If you are getting thoroughly peed off with recorded voices press 9 and wait for twenty minutes; someone three thousand miles may then talk to you....

No thanks. I'll stick to using my e-mails and letter boxes!
 :

Letter box flap

Being a bit of a nut about letterboxes (see my website) I have been quite interested to see that on Lewis there is a special acknowledgement of the weather. (The normal weather, that is, not the wall to wall sunshine I’ve been having so far.) The primary weather feature is the wind. The second one is probably rain. Add the two together and you get horizontal rain. Elsewhere this phenomenon is so rare that the standard letter box flap is designed to exclude the rain.



Here on the island many of the lamp letter boxes have special additional hinged flaps that you have to lift to post your letter.

Pillar Boxes

 

As I have mentioned previously, over the years I have photographed a wide variety of letter boxes throughout England, Wales and Scotland. I have, at last, put them on some webpages. They can be found at
http://www.johnsbooks.org/letterboxes/index.htm
(Note - this is rich in photos so if you do not have broadband, as the TV adverts say, don't try this at home...)


This is my favourite little letter box – hidden in the mountains above Llanrwst!

Pillar Boxes

 

A Victorian Penfold letterbox
I have previously mentioned my weird habit of collecting fruit stickers when I was younger. Another of the strange things that I collect is letter boxes. Not physically but photos thereof. Every holiday that I go on usually yields some new box to re-awaken my interest. One day I shall get around to doing a web-page of them and then I’ll do a blog posting to direct you to it.


In the meantime I’m made up that even without rambling out of my chair I have found a new one – by proxy - http://rotowhenua.blogspot.com/2008/04/pillar-box-that-wasnt-there.html