Douglas Buchanan 1943-2012
My father-in-law, Douglas (Dougie) Buchanan, passed away in the afternoon last Friday, the 11th of May.
He had been diagnosed with cancer a year and a half ago and told he only had a few months to live, so making it past his 69th birthday was quite an achievement!
Even so, we didn’t expect his death so soon. He was out playing golf less than two months ago, and the scans were good, so we had hoped he might have stayed around a little longer.
In the end, it was a stomach ulcer combined with a chest infection that proved too big an obstacle for Dougie, and he spent the last few weeks in Hairmyres Hospital (where parts of Ninety Eighty-Four was written).
I’ll miss him. Apart from being a loving grandfather (“Pumpa”) to my children, he was a fellow blogger, and like me, he was passionately in favour of Scottish Independence, proudly wearing the “Independence 2014” wristband I gave him until he went into hospital. One of the last things he said was that something needed to be done about BBC’s bias. I wish he had managed to hang on until the Independence referendum — he would have been so keen to go and vote Yes!
He was always very helpful — we have put down a good number of laminate floors together, and he and Ann (his wife and my mother-in-law) wallpapered many of our rooms. He was also very good company and a great host.
He will be sorely missed by all of us.