Beachcombing

After an eventful few days late last week, this week has started quietly -- in fact, super-quietly with more than 12 hours sleep last night for me! Ahhh. Nice.

Last Friday James had to make a statement at the police station; he was interviewed by the policeman who was first "on the scene" on Thursday. Silly, but I was almost slightly offended that they didn't want a statement from me, too, but after hearing James recount the events I was pleased I hadn't needed to! He remembered loads about times, sounds, clothes, positions and other scene details... I really can only remember how I felt -- not much use for the police, I'm sure. I did sit in on the interview, though, and it was interesting to hear about police procedures with this kind of incident. They were also able to tell us about the man -- where he worked etc, and a little about his family. Sadly, he has three sons -- none of whom were actually on the Island when he died. The youngest is 21.

James was informed that there will be an inquest at some point (because a death occurred in a public area) and he may be required to attend and give his statement again. It appears at this stage that it was an accidental death, although the police told us that the postmortem hadn't been done yet. Of course, this being Jersey -- with a population of just 90,000 -- word got around fast and we know people who knew this man. All very sad -- his family must be devastated, especially his kids who were all away at the time.

So we had hoped for a quiet weekend, of course! We were the Hares for the Hash run on Sunday, so we set the trail on Saturday (it's marked with flour, sawdust and chalk) and ran it with the pack yesterday. Pretty sore legs today from all those steep, steep hills and stony beaches.

And that brings me to the "beachcombing" part of this post... We've run on a few beaches now, and it's so interesting what gets washed up on each of them. Or what's naturally found on them. The beach we ran, ok -- limped -- across yesterday was scattered with teeny-tiny bright yellow shells and empty oyster shells. It was also really steep and pebbly rather than sandy. Our beach, on the other hand, is very sandy but steep and stony only immediately beneath the sea wall. At the end near our house you can find all kinds of treasures... but mainly balls! Golf balls and tennis balls so far -- and two 20-pence pieces last week, too (wedged into a rock and totaly sanded smooth). On the beach at St Brelade's Bay, there're wave-tumbled, smooth pieces of coloured glass and lots of pieces of coloured, broken china. Then all the fishing stuff... pieces of net, frayed rope, escaped buoys, chunks of styrofoam... If Jersey was a deserted island I'm absolutely sure you could build something impressive using washed-up junk. Hmm, reality TV idea. It is interesting, though, how certain things wash up only on certain beaches. I suppose it must depend on the weight of the object and the type of beach... or something?