When a man gets the flu...

I'm sure you know everything about it, either you're a man or a woman.
Yesterday I had it thrown at me, but I managed to make it through most of the working day before it struck. Then, there's the "black hole" feeling when I try to sort out what's been happening from then up until a couple of hours ago. 
It was a tough one, I tell you! No kidding at all! Have been swimming in fever around in my bed all last night, and today as well. Luckily the team down in the engine room was more or less finished yesterday, and todays work has more or less been hovering around one of our turbo chargers. There was some problems with it the last time we tried to change it as well, and the same thing happened again with a different cartridge. One of the great mechanics sorted it out in the end, but it took some skills and loads of thinking and looking. My old mate Thorgeir, found where the trouble was hidden... if you remember the guy I snapped back in time around a million years ago?

I like this old window, as you should all know by now anyway. And I guess you all can see why, anyway. Probably seen through those huge Sekor lenses attached to those Mamiya RZ's. The snap is oldish, so I got no idea here and now which film was used. It sure was B&W though!

Well... this post was more or less done just to make you aware of my health, or the lack of it, and to get some real heartfelt sympathy. Man-flu, you know... I've actually seen, in written somewhere, that when a man gets the flu it's serious business! And tell me about it, 'cause I know! 
Right now I'm on every medication you could possibly think of, just to try get the man in me back and kicking at some point tomorrow. I feel a bit better now, so I really hope it's going the right way now. 

Ah... here it is: Broadstreet in Kirkwall. You know you're there once you can actually quite safely drive a car without having to stop in the middle of the street to pass the one coming against you. Oh, and sure, you will know because you are right there by the cathedral. That's a bit hard to miss, to be honest. I was there, with my wife, which means this is more or less exactly a one year old snap.

And it's christmas time very soon! My wife just moved to the cottage today to stay there over both x-mas and new year. All kids are out of the house, and she wanted to have a real quiet time by herself. She's getting visitors though. More or less all the time. I think it's more that she want to go away from the house over to where the waves can be heared all day and night, over to where the sound of silence may be found when she needs it.
We have had very silent and quiet christmases the last few years, and it's good. My wife and my younger daughter will go to the church earlier in the day, then we eat good christmas food... and that's more or less it. And it's all good!
Nothing much happening before christmas either. There's a very few presents to be bought for the small children we still got some sort of contact with, but everything else has been sorted out in a different way, meaning almost no presents at all. Just a very few, and small ones. And that's just the way we like it. 

It's nothing special. Just a crow on a lamp post, back in my home town. And you see the restaurant on the hilltop there, where the town has put some change together to buy new steps all the way from the park. It should be a nice walk, but I have not tried the new stairs yet. I used to go to school straight below that rocky thing in the middle of the photo, and each physical lesson we used to run up and down these stairs just to end off the day like you got nothing left to give. 

Meanwhile I'm over here, in Orkney, at work. And that's what I'm going to be doing until the 2'nd of january. I would rather be elsewhere, but this is my job... and this is the one part of my job that I don't like too much. But I've done it quite a few times now, and it does not bother me too much anymore. 
I hope you all are staying safe and well!! And I hope you didn't get the same flu I got! It's bad, I tell you that.