Lawrence of Inverurie


It’s been yet another sweltering day in the Shire and the dust storms are gathering.
Folk down south in England-shire have been  blessed with the odd thunder clap along with some marginally lower temperatures. But us folks, up in these north-eastern realms, have been denied even a modicum of drizzle.
My neighbours are complaining. Not about the weather – they are in the main soaking in the hot sun – but about the dust. Folks in the likes of Cairo are used to such troubles as each year a few inevitable sand storms envelope the city. The temperature drops to a balmy 5 degrees C or so and both the pyramids on the Giza plateau and the door to your flat are sand blasted almost to oblivion. Masking tape and tightly closed windows are to no avail as the inevitable detritus of the desert storms march through the gaps.
It’s the same in Inverurie. A new secondary school is under construction just at the foot of my long garden and the sand dunes will no doubt form a part of it. The groundworks have just been completed and at long last the founds are under construction prior to the moving in of the steel erectors, then the cladders and then the roofers. I wouldn’t care except that the builders of the new edifice have piled up a few mountains of desert dunes. There are hills of earth, a few small piles of stones and a huge mountain of sand just a stone’s throw from my back door. The stones present no real problem but the sand is blowing all about and a small covering of dust covers everything in the vicinity. Cars, windows and the recycling wheelie bins bear the scars. I even found a slurry of sand in Lucy’s drinking bowl today.
A neighbour has complained and seemingly the head-construction-engineer is intent on covering the desert sands with some kind of clingfilm. In the mean-time I am praying for rain and anticipating a dramatic Peter O'Toole moment in the early morning sun.
Duncan Harley is author of The A-Z of Curious Aberdeenshire
The theme tune to Lawrence of Arabia can be found @ Lawrence

Location: Inverurie AB51, UK

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