Free Raw Spirit by Iain Banks

air. They had a really neat-looking and colourful program running on their computer in the still house, displaying and controlling all the valves, pipes and containers the raw materials for the whisky have to negotiate on their way through the process, which – computer and remote control apart – is pretty standard whisky-tech. Traditional, in other words.
    The whisky itself represents the Highlands in Diageo’s Classic Malts range, so is pretty well known these days. The 15-year-old has a light, new-mown-grass kind of smell to it, very green and scenty. There is a hint of peat and some sweetness, but it’s the dry, herby notes that hold sway, making Dalwhinnie a light, zesty kind of dram, something you could put in place of a fino sherry at the start of a meal, or take, diluted perhaps, instead of a dry white wine. Not really that similar to most Speysides, then, and practically on another planet compared to an Islay dram.
    After saying goodbye to John at the airport there’s a quick dash to Toby and Harriet’s farm so Oliver can dump his bags then he, Ann and I zip round to Bruichladdich. We’re running a little late and it’s on this journey, on a cheekily tightening bend sculpted into the dunes north of Bowmore, that I discover the Land Rover’s ability to set its tyres a-squealing. My passengers forbear to make similar noises, but I suspect it’s a close-run thing. We proceed a little more circumspectly after this and arrive safely at Bruichladdich, which faces across Loch Indaal towards distant Bowmore.
    Bruichladdich is a distillery on the way back. It was closed between 1996 and 2001 and has anyway tended to be one of the Islay also-rans. Most malt drinkers would know it’s an Islay even if they might not be certain how to pronounce it (with Bruichladdich and Bunnahabhain, luck has handily put the two arguably most tongue-twisting whiskies on the one island, and even had them start with the same letter). Your average malt tippler might also have a vague recollection of a light blue bottle label and a rather un-Islay-ish lack of peat on the nose, but that would be about it for anybody who wasn’t already a committed fan of the stuff.
    This could all be about to change; there’s a new guy in charge called Duncan McGillvray who has a reputation as an adept marketeer, there are new – and very interesting-sounding – expressions on the way, new technologies and old traditions are blending harmonically and there’s a general air of optimism and energy about the place. Maybe it helped that we visited on another sparklingly sunny day, though I think the sunniness was more in people’s disposition. It also matters a great deal to the people we talk to – and should probably matter a fair bit to us consumers – that the distillery is owned not by some giant impersonal multinational, but by a consortium of people who live on Islay itself, so any money made here is likely, largely, to stay.
    I get out my little Black n’ Red alphabetically indexed notebook and prepare to start Covering The Story.
    Notes: a note
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    Taking notes; this is not like me. I usually just remember stuff, or very occasionally jot briefly in my diary if I happen to have it on me, or scribble something in the margin of my telephone list or CD list. Long ago in my wallet I used to carry a tiny notebook which I’d made myself; it was smaller than some stamps I’ve seen – I can write very small – but that was back when I was about twenty or so and having loads of ideas all the time; now I’m officially a boring old bastard of nearly 50 I don’t have the same number of ideas these days and so have no pressing need to have a notebook always to hand (mind you, quality not quantity; a lot of those so-called ideas back then were just god-awful puns).
    What I should really do, of course, is use a Personal Digital Assistant; one of those tiny hand-held computerette thingies you can write onto and use as sketch pads, diaries, GPS displays