A combination of local council paranoia, the usual insanity from Health and Safety, and a doom and gloom announcement by the police closed Scotland on Thursday 8th December.

Yes a big storm with strong winds was forecast but was this reaction really necessary? It started with some local councils deciding to close the schools. Very soon the majority had followed suit. No doubt they were panic stricken that if they were the ones to remain open and someone was hurt that they would be lambasted or sued. People had to rearrange their work plans around this.

Then the police issued a statement that no one should travel anywhere between 2pm and 9pm. The media latched on to this and embellished it with doom and gloom predictions of death and destruction. Companies therefore closed down and sent their staff home. The result was gridlock on the roads as so many people attempted to get home before the expected Armageddon.

Egged on by news reports, a mass of humanity fled Edinburgh leaving it eerily quiet and awaiting annihilation.

In the end things did get a little breezy. Certainly there was damage to some parts of the country. But then this was not a perfect storm. It did not bring with it mass destruction. Most of the chaos was caused because common sense departed first. The police advice not to travel made people travel, closed businesses and created mayhem. In the background the media fed the frenzy duping everyone into accepting the inevitable.

How fitting that the storm was named Hurricane Bawbag which became a worldwide trend on Twitter.

If we had all turned off the TV and the radio, and not read about the impending disaster, I wonder whether we could have carried on as normal and let it all blow over.