Bad news come in threes and the last week was no exception. It’s all been about bridges and holidays.
First of all, Channel 4 said it was going to have a new game show. Contestants will have 20 days to build a bridge in the imaginatively entitled show, The Bridge. Like that is going to work well.
Then, that most famous of spans, Tower Bridge in London, ground to a halt when some cheeky cockney stuck some pie and mash in the gears and put it out of action. Technical problems? Yeah right, guv.
Then the grim news came that the wonderful Bernera Bridge is disintegrating. The powers-that-be think the facts about it should be kept from the tender ears of Bernera people, but we all know it’s rotten through.
Unseen cables are corroding inside. The bridge built by my father and many others’ fathers, too, to change the lives of islanders beyond all recognition, could disappear in a storm.
Now they have had to give local people a wee clue – the council has imposed a permanent 7.5-tonne weight limit on it. Oh heery vore, as we exiled Berneranians say.
It’ll stop a lot of visitors to Great Bernera – visitors like fire engines, bin lorries, even, perhaps, some ambulances. Coal lorries, larger campervans and building projects could all be forced to stop in Earshader – across the channel, in fact across Loch Roag, in fact across the Atlantic.
The islands’ council has still to tell us about their plans to make sure those who dwell on God’s Own Island will not be forgotten. The natives are getting restless. They need action.
It was a mighty struggle to get that bridge. The government said no, not happening, go away.
They didn’t care about us. I mean Bernera people in general because I wasn’t actually there then.
New MP Malcolm Macmillan demanded it in his maiden speech. Still nothing. It was only when my old man and his mates threatened to make their own causeway by getting their hands on “some dynamite and rough stuff” to blast every hillside until they had enough rock to walk across the channel on their own homemade causeway.
That would have blocked the salmon runs to the nearby fishing estates. The influential toffs who owned these posh lodges and their pals who joined them every summer panicked.
“By jove, prime minister, we have to do something. These ghastly peasants on Great Bernera are revolting. What do you mean you have known that for a long time? Ah yes, I see what you mean. Very funny, prime minister.”
Then the government suddenly found a cool £70,000 going spare – on condition the revolting men of Bernera forgot their amateur civil engineering aspirations forever.
Nice one, Dad, neighbour Murdo, neighbour Peter et al.
Celebrations broke out when our brilliant white edifice was opened in July 1953. Nearly 4,000 people turned out to see the ferry replaced by the first example of pre-stressed concrete girders being used in a UK bridge.
Today, it is whispered it will cost £5 million to replace and could take up to five years. That’s a long, long time not to have a bridge over troubled water.
Then again, that will be because my old man won’t be there this time. Maybe they could get that Channel 4 show The Bridge to do it. Obvious, innit?
Properly constructed bridges must withstand very bad weather – like Storm Francis. Which reminds me, Stormy Daniels is also making the president of the US feel a cold draught. So is his wonderful big sister Maryanne Trump Barry. She was recorded being unkind about him.
I met and interviewed Maryanne Trump Barry when she jetted in here with The Donald in 2008. Even though she is a retired appeal court judge, she was lovely and has visited Lewis many times over the years.
She donated £158,000 to the Bethesda care home and hospice here in Stornoway. Darling woman, so lovely. Not many judges one can say that about.
Darling contacts in Applecross called me to tell me what Boris was up to. One tale, which I somehow doubt, was that the PM was out jogging during his holiday with Carrie and wee Wilf. He is said to have stopped for a breather on a bridge railing and fell backwards into the river.
Before his bodyguards could get to him, three lads who were fishing nearby ran up and pulled him out. Boris was grateful and offered the kids whatever they wanted.
The first lad said he would like to go to Disneyland. Boris said: “No problem. I’ll take you there on my RAF Voyager prime ministerial plane with the red, white and blue tail fin.”
The second lad said he needed a new pair of Nike Air Jordans. The PM said: “No bother, my lad, and I will even sign them.”
The third boy looked glum. He would soon need a wheelchair.
Boris says: “Really? You don’t look injured.”
The lad says: “No, but I will be after my dad finds out I helped pull you out.”
