WHEN I began my last article at the beginning of September, I wrote that it seemed that autumn had well and truly arrived.

WRITING this on the first of September, the weather forecast, the temperatures and the colours all seem to make it clear that autumn has arrived. In particular, I have noticed that some of the bracken has begun to turn.

IN the last article I was thinking about the remote locations throughout the Highlands and Islands where people used to live – and a few still do.

I SPENT last week working away, in the Small Isles. To be exact I was in Rum and Eigg, but on the last day the boat back to Mallaig does a cruise from Rum via Canna, Muck and Eigg, which gives you some sense of the whole group.

I HAVE recently returned from one of my annual working trips to Orkney, and have to say that I enjoyed rather better weather than I have had for several years.

THERE was a time when we were nearly always referred to as "fragile communities" – a term, however justified, of which a number of us grew very tired.

LAST week the Alladale Estate, west of Ardgay, and developments under way and planned there were the subject of a television programme, and it seems perfectly fair to me that I should use this column to comment on what that programme outlined.

I LEFT home about three weeks ago, hoping that when I came back I would see real signs of spring. I don't suppose that many of you will be surprised that such signs are, at the moment, rather tentative!

DURING February it seemed to me for a while that we had returned to the weather we were used to some 20 or 30 years ago.

OVER Hogmanay, I spent a few days with friends on Deeside; we were based in Mar Lodge, which is now owned by the National Trust for Scotland.

WHATEVER it may have been in most people's houses, the build-up to the festive season has been remarkable, so far, for its calm – outside. I mean the weather, of course!

WE'RE often told that in past centuries people in the country based their weather forecasts on the signs they saw around them in nature.

I THINK I should begin by apologising for the absence of this column in the last couple of months; my life seems to have been dominated lately by unexpected events.

AROUND the time when the floods were devastating large areas of England, and folk were asking whether these dramatic events were the product of climate change or not, the BBC was showing a series of nature programmes loosely grouped together under the heading of "Saving the Planet".

BY some slight coincidence, I was able to read the article entitled “Book follows in the footsteps of Scotland’s greatest writers” in the NT of 22nd June, on my return from a week leading a group all around the county.

THE words global warming, carbon trading, carbon footprint, food miles, and so on, have become fairly commonplace in the last few years.

WE don't often think of our own homes as "remote", wherever we live. That may be because "home" is not a "remote" word – with luck, it sounds close and cosy and pleasant, wherever it is.

I AM writing this just before Easter, and the amazing spell of high-pressure weather is still with us. Some days are quite strange in a way, calm, dull and grey, and others dawn clear, cool and bright. Out of the breeze it can be really warm.

I AM WRITING this at the end of a week which has seen us move from possibly the worst weather of the winter (I'm sure we all hope it was!) to a few days of real spring weather with, what's more, real spring sunshine.

AT the end of January a work trip took me to Norway. Initially I was quite excited at the idea, thinking, as you do, of the fjords, high mountains and steep forests.

THERE seems to be some general agreement that January is a difficult month for most of us and, so far, I doubt whether this year has been an exception.

I DON'T often read a daily newspaper, let alone The Times, which I remember used to have the reputation of being an entirely serious publication, an adjective which, it seems, only parts of it now deserve, but I did find a story in it during the quiet days between Christmas and New Year which gave me mild cause to be pleased.

THERE is plenty of evidence to suggest that there’s a lot of affluence about – even if many of us feel that we are not exactly participating in it!

I HAVE often written about the wealth of archaeology to be found across Sutherland and my conviction that we could make more of it - in other words present it, or some of it, in a way which would interest many of us who live in the county and those who come here to visit.

PERHAPS, like quite a number of people, I may have been inclined in the past to think of marketing as something rather closely connected to the consumer society, something not particularly "green".

I AM not entirely convinced that I agree with those who maintain that we have had a good summer, but I am, at least, quite sure that I can give you the date of the last really fine summer day - over here on the West, anyway!

CONTINUING the saga of my trip across the county in June, we spent the Thursday at Balnakeil and Faraid Head in weather conditions which were not spectacular - slowly changing from cold and grey to mild and almost blue!

A COUPLE of weeks ago, I was leading a group of folk around Sutherland. As an official tour, it was a new one for the company for whom I work, but I had, of course, done most of it several times, whether alone or accompanied, and the final few days were spent close to home.

PEOPLE in this country are beginning to talk about climate change almost as often as they talk about the weather, but that is hardly surprising.

I WOULD not want to start a debate about whether women are better at multi-tasking than men, because I'm beginning to recognise that, whereas I might have achieved it once, nowadays it is way beyond me.