and my daily blog is now available there!

New website is launched...from tomorrow the blog will only be available at http://www.davearcari.com

I CALL the National Park Authority first thing to try and establish who the fallen trees belong to….the guy that deals with all that stuff is out for the next few hours but I leave a voicemail and he calls back to say he’ll come and check things out later.

I take advantage of the dry weather to go out and fix part of the fence and also repair the shed door. It’s not perfect but better than the gaping hole that was there before.

The National Park guy arrives and we go and check out the fallen trees. He suspects they are on National Park land and goes off to the office to check. He calls later to say, yes, that are their trees and he’ll get a tree surgeon along tomorrow to look at the best way of clearing them.

I tie up some loose ends on the new website then get Margaret to go through everything. Some of the online shop functions aren’t working properly so I spend a while sorting it all out. Pretty much ready to go-live now so I create the January eNewsletter announcing the new website and a whole bunch of gig dates and schedule it to go out around 11am tomorrow.

It’s still wet and the wind’s picking up again. Maiju and Juuso are off to Edinburgh today and decide it’s better to leave before any more roads are closed by fallen trees or flooding. It’s been great seeing them and we’re quite sad to see them go but we’ll be in Finland in April which will no doubt be on us before we know it.

With no idea when the power will be back on we decide to go into Glasgow and get a camping stove for times like this…we also need to get some shopping in. In Tiso’s we find a compact gas burner for fifteen quid and a couple of spare gas cylinders then we stop in Costco for a baked potato before hitting Tesco for food and fuel.

It’s dark when we get back but…the electricity’s back on. Hurrah!

Margaret’s exhausted and dozes on the couch while I catch up on emails and stuff and then I make a stir-fry for dinner – a little earlier than usual in case the electricity goes off again.

After dinner Margaret goes to bed and watches some stuff on the iPlayer on the iPad (the TV’s grubbed again ‘cos the satellite dish on the side of the studio/office has been totalled by the falling trees) and I do a little work on the new website. Although there’s a fair bit of tweaking and stuff I make it live so I can check things properly…I’m not expecting there’ll be many website visitors tonight and I can finish things off tomorrow.

I only just get into bed and settle down when the electricity goes off again!

The studio/office is hit by a fairly substantial tree

WE”RE WOKEN early by the wind…sounds pretty scary outside. Then the power goes off. I fall back to sleep hoping everything will be OK and back to normal when we get up. It isn’t.

Apart from no electricity, there’s  a big fuck-off tree blown over  and lying across the office/studio roof and another even bigger one looking a bit precarious. Our gate is lying a few metres away, another big plant pot smashed and fuck knows what else damaged.

I go and investigate the office/studio situation in the pouring rain while Maiju and Juuso go down to the pub – which has it’s own generators for time like this – to get some coffees for breakfast.

I have a chat with our near neighbour who’s suffered a bit from the fallen trees and he seems prepared to bring round his digger, chainsaws and other stuff to help clear the fallen trees. Until we do so we won’t know the real extent of any damage. I call the insurance company helpline to make sure we’re not voiding any potential claim by clearing the trees ourselves – they say it’ll be OK to move them.

The fallen trees are actually on National Park land so I can’t help wondering if the responsibility for clearing and any subsequent liability for any damage might lie with the Park Authority. I call them but, of course, there’s no response – they’re on friggin’ holiday!

Juuso is keen to fix our gate so we get some tools together and spend 1/2-hour in the horizontal rain getting it fixed. He’s a dab hand at all this fixing malarkey.

By this time it’s getting dark and when we go inside there’s nothing we can do except sit round the fire and play guitar, banjo etc by candlelight. It’s relaxing and fun and we’re quite intrigued  how it’s only 5pm but feels like midnight!

Maiju and Juuso have booked us a table for dinner at the Oak Tree. Just as well really, as without power the best we could manage at home would be a cheese sandwich! We’re treated to a fantastic meal, loads of wine and then we enjoy a few more drinks through in the bar with all our local pals…it’s a popular place tonight as no-one here or any of the neighbouring villages has any electricity. The Oak Tree’s annual January 3 ceilidh party has been cancelled, but we all have a fantastic night anyway.

It’s Maiju and Juuso’s last night with us at Loch Lomond so we stay up for a few more drinks in candlelight before falling into bed in the wee hours. We’ll miss our Finnish friends but our now well-pickled livers will be looking forward to a rest

Would have been nice to go with them but there’s too much stuff needing done. Margaret gives the house a good tidy up and I head to the office to try and solve the server issues surrounding my new website.

After a few more hours of pulling my hair out I eventually get things running in a kind of a way. A lot of the database stuff seems to have been corrupted or messed up in the transfer and upload processes but at least the core technical functions are operational.

We finish of the whisky tasting we started last night!

It’s dark by the time Maiju and Juuso are back so we sit round the fire and have a couple of beers before dinner.

After we’ve eaten we decide to finish off the whisky tasting we started yesterday! We watch a DVD of Rory Gallagher live at Cork Opera House while we work our way through the remaining whiskies and Maiju keeps track of our ratings/scores.

The running order – starting with our favourite and  ending with our least favourite goes like this….Glenlivet, Loch Lomond, Benromach, Glenmorangie, Glen Grant, Glen Moray, Old Pulteney, Whyte & McKay, Dalwhinnie, Bells, Glenfiddich, Tomatin, Auchentoshan and Edradour. Phew! That was quite a few over two nights…

Juuso and I try out some Hohner 'Little Lady' miniature harmonicas during our whisky tasting session

WOW. Another Hogmanay celebration been and gone and first blog entry of 2012. Although we’re up late, there’s little evidence of hangovers – Mikey’s the only one really suffering.

After a lazy breakfast Juuso and I spend some time in the studio messing about with some of my newer songs, with Juuso improvising bass on an electric guitar. Maiju and Juuso have suggested an exciting project for 2012 which we hope to get underway when we’re in Helsinki for Stompin’ at the Savoy in April. Watch this space

Margaret spends the later part of the afternoon in the kitchen cooking a roast, Yorkshire puddings etc for dinner and then we all sit around the telly and watch Sherlock before returning to the dining table and embarking on a whisky-tasting session. Maiju and Juuso brought a huge selection of whisky miniatures back from their road-trip up North and we manage to get through about half of them..Maiju keeping notes on our sore/rating of each.

The loch's pretty high when we go for a awalk to Milarochy

YET another long lie…and a few sore heads this morning. It’s Mikey’s birthday – and although I’m pretty sure we wished him happy birthday at some point before bed, we do so again over breakfast.

It’s not as wet and windy as it’s been the last few days so Maiju, Juuso and I take a walk to Milarochy and back while Margaret and Mikey nurse their hangovers.

Mikey’s made a special request for my Italian sausage pasta for his birthday dinenr. While I’m getting  preparations underway Maiju and Juuso watch the Highwaymen concert/rockumentary on DVD.

Mikey and Juuso still celebrating as we head home...

We’re all trying to pace ourselves seeing it’s Hogmanay and manage to hold off going to the pub to meet everyone ’til after 10pm. The place is buzzing and we enjoy a few drinks before heading home for the bells – call me weird, anti-social or whatever, but if I’m not playing a gig or we’re not away somewhere else, I like to bring in the New Year in our own house.

Once we’ve had a few years and welcomed 2012 we head along to friends along the road who’ve invited us along. There’s a good crowd of pals and we have a fantastic couple of hours making merry and being roped into drinking games before we wander back along the road for one last nightcap then bed.

We have a fantastic night at Betty & Joe's

A LONG lie and big breakfast (erm…brunch, I guess) helps me recuperate from the punkrockblues excesses of last night.

After four or five hours of pulling my hair out I’m still not able to get the remote database that’s the back end of my new website running properly. I’m incredibly frustrated – especially as I’d rather spent the day with our guests. Think I’m gonna forget about this until after New Year.

We’ve been invited along to Betty and Joe’s for dinner and we’re accompanied on the walk up the loch side by Dog (the cat) who yells all the way. Homemade broth, Betty’s famous turkey and grape pie, chocolate and raspberry sweet, cheese…accompanied by beer, wine and whisky and good craic makes for a grand night. Everyone has a great time.

It’s nearly 1am when we leave and guess who’s waiting outside for us? Yup, Dog (the cat)! Not a huge surprise really as we heard him squawking outside the window a few times over the course of the evening. That’s why I call him Dog.

Jonny, jonZip and I get together for a few songs at the end of the show

AFTER BREAKFAST I go into the office to try and get the new website sorted….cracked the online shop problem yesterday so I set about getting the CD, merch and download pages in shape.

Margaret takes Maiju and Juuso along to Betty and Joe’s for a coffee while I crack on with web stuff and get the car packed for tonight’s show in Glasgow.

We head off as soon as they get back and give Maiju and Juuso a whistle-stop tour of the west end and then spend an hour at Kelvingrove Art Galleries before rolling up at the Captain’s Rest. Juuso helps me get the gear ion and we have some food before Jonny and JonZip arrive for soundchecks. Soundcheck goes good and we run through some stuff we’re gonna try and play together at the end. A couple of the songs are a bit chaotic and a challenge for yours truly using open tunings but it should be alright

The venue fills quickly and great to see all our Buchanan pals out in force…and some Glasgow folks I haven’t seen for nearly 20 years!!! It’s great so many pals and folks have turned out but it’s hard to speak to everyone before showtime.

JonZip takes the first shift, then Jonny, then myself….we take a break and then do the whole thing again and finish off with a bunch of songs together and a manic rendition of Auld Lang Syne.

Suddenly the night’s over and we’re packed up and in the car on the way home..Mikey, Margaret’s youngest, is with us too. I’m pretty shattered by the time we get home but still manage to sit and have a wee nightcap before baling and heading off to bed.

I make up set lists and runs through the songs for tomorrow night’s punkrockblues show at the Captain’s Rest in Glasgow and sort all my gear out in readiness.

It certainly is stormy – the wind seems worse than the hurricanes a few weeks ago – and even going across ot the studio/office is like running the gauntlet of airborne debris.

Dog (the cat) relaxes while we have dinner...I'm sure cats aren't meant to lie like this!

Margaret goes shopping while Maiju and Juuso take a trip to the next village while I work on the new website. I’m hoping to get it all finished today ready for upload tomorrow but I come up against a wall trying to sort out my online store. The WordPress html editor seems to fuck up all the code and add extra stuff in that makes things like option drop-down boxes (ie: for t-shirt sizes) not display correctly. It’s driving me nuts so I check out some of the zillions of eCommerce and Paypal plug ins for WordPress but none of them look the way I want and they’re over-complicated and clumsy. Back to the drawing board. Investigating the raw code I try some edits and strip the Paypal button code right back to basics and…looks like it’s worked! It’s taken all day to get to this stage and I’ve run out of time ‘cos our pals Duncan and Irene are coming for dinner.

The wind has really been taking it’s toll. It’s pitch dark outside, howling gale and pouring rain. The shed door has been ripped in half and is banging in the wind, coal bunker top is off, the BBQ cover is ripped and ruined and the lid’s disappeared of the bird food bin. Margaret stacks a pile of brick against the remains of the shed door and then we get a rope and desperately try and tie the fence and gate up. Oh, and the front gate is off it’s hinges again. Fucking wind.

Still, we manage to get all the dinner preparations underway before Duncan and Irene arrive. The green curry goes down well and Margaret’s chocolate pots are a treat. As usual we have a great night round the table and my intentions of being in bed before midnight are well out the window!