Shetland is a pretty boring place, isn’t it? Nothing much happens up there, except fishing.
Mind you, I hear they grab a boat and burn it to cinders every January, so I’m not really sure how long the fishing is going to last either.
I jest, but in recent years another lucrative sideline has been developed, which is giving a wee extra income to many up there and bringing some of the best-known Scots celebrities up to work as well.
I am talking about TV production and specifically the cops-and-murderers TV series, Shetland.
I must be honest. I did look in a few times since it began in 2013, but I saw nothing to grab my attention.
There was too little action, and many of the actors were just sitting there in a nick, talking in that funny accent.
Not just the accent, but the dialect is something else. You may eventually work out that a peerie lass is a small girl. Some also say ting instead of thing.
Now a new series has started so Mrs X and I decided to have a gander since we found it’s based on characters by Ann Cleeves, who wrote the best cop series of all, Vera. We loved the first episode but, you know, we didn’t really know the context.
Two or three weeks ago, we decided to try the iPlayer and start at Series 1, Episode 1. It has taken over our lives.
We loved Douglas Henshall in Shetland
We are binge-watching and some nights we have watched three episodes. It is utterly fantastic.
We loved Douglas Henshall as the put-upon Detective Inspector Perez but he’s now retired and the new double DIs of Tosh Mcintosh and newcomer Ruth Calder are coping well with the body count which is even higher than long-running Midsomer Murders.
Proper storylines, sometimes a bit close to the knuckle about the oil industry, and vistas which are almost as magnificent as the Western Isles. Not bad.
It’s bad though that Christmas is here. Christmas commercials on the box, the shops are playing the same tired old Christmas songs and decorations are going up everywhere. It is commercialism gone mad. Now there is a name for it – Christmas creep. I thought that was the dodgy Santa Claus I heard about a few years ago. It is actually when shops go Christmassy early to try to extend their busiest season. It is a deliberate ploy to lure you in.
The latest news about the long-awaited CalMac ferry Glen Sannox is not great. She has a problem with her anchor that apparently no one noticed until now and may delay her coming into service.
Of course Glen Sannox build is going to be delayed
May delay her? Of course, it will delay her coming into service. After eight long years of incompetence, do you really think people at the Ferguson Marine shipyard in Port Glasgow will now suddenly do the job they are paid to do and fix the so-called mechanical gypsy thing that could prevent the anchor from being pulled back up, and on time? Hah, not a chance.
A guy who used to work there was telling me that Ferguson Marine is a now very forward-looking company and very hi-tech.
All the plans for each new ferry are shown on big computer screens and not on charts as used to be the case.
He told me: “A while back, the boss came and said he was pleased to tell us that Ferguson was now a paperless office. That was great, until we needed to use the bathroom.”
It is also great that the Christmas spirit has come to two older guys who were sitting in the Criterion Bar in downtown Stornoway when I was in there the other night.
One of them looked at the other and mumbled: “Haoi cove, where are you from?” The second man whispered: “Point.” The first man looked astonished and again mumbled: “No way. I’m from Point myself. It’s a small world.” The second man then looked again at the first fellow and hissed: “What part of Point?”
The first fellow muttered: “Shulishader.” The second man went big-eyed again: “No way, I’m from Shulishader myself. What a small world indeed.”
The first man peered at the second man: “What school did you go to?” The second man stuttered: “Aird School, class of fi-fi-fi 55.” The first man scratched his hairless head. “No way. Aird School? I was in the class of 55 myself. Well well, it’s a small world right enough.”
Just then, another customer came into the Crit for a swift half before his bus and said to the barmaid: “What’s fresh the night?” The barmaid says: “Oh, nothing much. Just that the Macdonald twins are drunk again.”
Iain Maciver is a former broadcaster and news reporter from the Outer Hebrides.
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