• The Seer’s Stone
  • The Dodo Dragon and other stories
  • About Sheila Crosby
  • A Breathtaking Window on the Universe

A Solar-powered Water Heater

Some time ago we decided to go for it and get a solar-powered water heater. The financial planning wasn’t much more than a wet finger in the air, but we think it’ll pay for itself in about 5 years, and it should last for 10. So we ordered it. Or at least we thought we ordered it, but there was some sort of mix-up, and the firm that sells it…

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Meeting the Devil

The devil arriving at the fiesta, San Miguel, Breña Alta La Palma has several fiestas where the devil appears. On Saturday night I went to one in San Miguel, a little village in Breña Alta. It started off like most fiestas – a band playing in the village square, with a couple of kiosks selling drinks and snacks, and a stall selling cheap kid’s toys. Then, a little after 1…

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The not-so-elite X box

Remember the Xbox 360 elite on e-Bay and couldn’t use because it arrived during a power cut? The e-Bay advert said it was “unused, with intercooler and present”. As soon as the power came back on, I emailed the seller to ask about the present. He said it’s that you can download games from the Internet instead of buying them. That’s a present? The official X box site says that…

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Upcoming fiestas for St Michael

Tuesday 29th September is the feast day of St Michael the Archangel, who is the patron saint of La Palma. St Michael is a big thing in Tazacorte. The fiesta there has been rumbling all all month, but the main event is the Fufu horses, which will dance at 9 pm Monday, followed by a parade of floats. In San Pedro (Breña Alta) at midnight on Saturday or very early…

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Candlelight

Well my son’s pretty much healed up. His main problems now are: The nasty scrape on his elbow is slow to heal. Major back-to-school-itis, and Frustration. The frustration is because he spent all his birthday money and savings on an Xbox 360 on e-Bay, and it took over a week to arrive. And when it finally got here, we had a power cut. The whole island was blacked out for…

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Re-birth already

New needles on a burnt pine tree, Fuencaliente It’s been raining intermittently for a week or so on the east of La Palma, so I went down to Fuencaliente to see whether the forests had started to re-grow. And here’s the result. New needles on a burnt pine tree, Fuencaliente It’s not happening everywhere yet, but I didn’t have to hunt either. I took all these photos the first time…

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