A Good Friend

Meet my new best friend.
He is with me for the majority of the day,
He chatters away with all manner of interesting comments,
he can entertain me come rain and come shine,
 and he will shut up exactly when I want him to!
He is my solar powered digital radio.
In the mornings he allows the velvet voiced Harriet Cass to give me the world news on BBC's Radio 4 when the animals are all beginning to stir,and then he entertains me with London Talk radio when I trudge around filling water buckets and shovelling shit.
At Lunchtime Boris and I have our shared lunch whilst listening to the pompous tones of  James O'Brien or the amusing but inane chatter of Jeni Barnett and I am not embarrassed when some local walkers hear me listening to my other favourites such as the ever faithful Woman's Hour when I am digging the allotment or cleaning out the coops
Sitting under the elms when on Foxwatch, the middle class saga of The Archers is always at hand with its comforting plodding story lines and last night the BBC Radio 7 has been re playing a classic 1950 serial Journey Into Space which I have listened to for over a week now , and which is crammed full of plummy English accents and cliffhanger endings- a little piece of history.

My radio friend is a constant. He entertains me, informs me and even frightens away the foxes when I leave him "on guard"......Not much to look at, but cheap to keep happy, I couldn't stand a day without him.

Ending The Day

 I talked in my previous post about my morning routine
Tonight I realised that I have an equally important yet brief evening routine.
After nine pm, the cottage looks warm and cosy, what with the wood burner alight and us and the animals heaped all over the two sofas , yet with a click of my finger within seconds the dogs are all lined up by the back door waiting for their walk.
As we leave the cottage there is ALWAYS a faint THUD, THUD to be heard from the roof of the shed as Albert climbs out of the study window to join us, and every night he waits on the cottage wall for me to rub faces with him as I pass. It is a ritual that both he and I seem to enjoy immensely and has become such a habit now I think that both he and I would miss it greatly if it was to stop

There was no let up in the muggy rain this morning and into the afternoon, so I did go to Theatre Clwyd for a mooch around. I saw a film The Killer Inside Me which has had some brilliant reviews, but turned out for me to be an overblown ultra violent film noir thriller that has nothing new to say about sexual sadist serial killers but did feature a good central performance by the slight Casey Affleck

I did enjoy an exhibition by  Caroline Rudge much more that the movie! Her portrait , paintings  in the Theatre's Oriel Gallery are quite striking and well worth a viewing and has been the best exhibition at the theatre for quite some time.

This afternoon, my head full of women beating serial killers and paintings...I took advantage of a break in the weather to pick my surplus sweetcorn cobs......it's been a mixed bag of a day

Facing The Day



Winnie and Jo

 Animals are like people; some like the geese face the day with an exuberance that is almost infectious whilst others like the ghost hens take at least ten minutes before they haul their fat bottoms out of their hen house in order to take slow deep beakfuls of water from their water bowl (they are the only animals that have to have a bowl of their own)
The field wakes up in fits and starts.
The guinea fowl, I know will be waiting noisily for me to scatter some corn for them before I open the 18 houses for the day. Ivy, the runty female, is now a robust adult bird and with Alf and Hughie the trio are a permanent and welcomed addition to  the old church yard.

The Magpie ducks, separated for the night from the geese,literally whip themselves into a frenzy before they are reunited with Winnie and Jo and together the little knot of five birds totter off to the stream to bathe and drink, content that their flock is reunited.

Boris whistles his strange mournful greeting as I lift him out of his house and stands blinking in the daylight with  rather tatty looking mates Gloria and Theresa behind him as wave upon wave of hens surge back and forth on the grass searching for food after I open each hen house in turn.

This morning the rain has been heavy and just that little bit cold, so I have left the heat lamp on over the runner ducklings for the day.
This daily routine is always interesting yet never changes!

The ducklings are putting on weight and are growing quite nicely but will not be going outside until they are feathered up, I need to clean them out yet again this morning   

I also need to harvest the remaining beetroot, sweetcorn, potatoes,onions and artichokes today, but as usual the rain has started to fall yet again......
I think I may bunk off and sneak to the cinema...I have a credit ticket to utilize!!!

London River

London River (2009) is a movie I have wanted to see after I read my friend Alex Ramon's review of it on his movie blog http://boycottingtrends.blogspot.com/, and I must agree that this worthy movie centred around the 7/7 bombings in London 2005, is a good watch.
French director  Rachid Bouchareb makes London a rather unreal and "foreign" place where two anxious parents from out of town search for their respective children that may or may not have been killed or at least involved in the atrocities.
Dowdy Guernsey farmer Elizabeth, Brenda Blethyn, is terrified of the Muslim surroundings she finds in and around her daughter's empty flat, while elderly African Osmane  Sotigui Kouyaté stalks the hospitals and mosques fearful that his son may be responsible for the bombings in some way,
These two unlikely characters join forces to find out the terrible truths about a day that still haunts Londoners and the resulting story is a masterclass in some outstanding acting. Blethyn breaks your heart as the initially prickly and racist Elizabeth, whilst Kouyate ( who died shortly after filming) is quite amazing as the soulful gentle and mostly silent giant who follows her journey.
Not everything works in this movie. Some of the scenes just  feel too unreal to work properly for a British audience ( The French speaking Police officer/ the non NHS -ish Hospital scenes and a rather sterile morgue sequence are cases in point)
But the acting, especially a towering performance by Brenda Blethyn is what I will remember from this film. and the scene when Elizabeth finally finds out the truth about her daughter, will literally rip your guts out.
8/10

I did it again!!!!

This time at the supermarket!
I called in to buy some things for Chris' tea, leaned over a freezer to pick up a carton of cream!
In front of two old ladies and a woman in a wheelchair I farted VERY loudly
Oh the shame!
Another message to self I am starting weight watchers again!
To make things worse the lady in the wheelchair said loudly and to no one in particular "I do that all the time!"

Pig Sick

I have said this before.... but there is not enough hours in the soddin day!

We were short staffed on intensive care and still had to deal with the admission of another critical care patient in the middle of the night, but the staff on duty were jolly hockey -sticks types and we all pulled together with generous helpings of bubbling hysteria!

Chris has taken Sorrel to Manchester for a spot of "proper" shopping ( quality shops in Wales are seriously at a premium) so without sleep I have tried to catch up with the weekend jobs I missed out on.

The hysterical ducklings are now almost a month old and have just entered their "disgusting duckling period" This is where they constantly wet their surroundings and shit on their own ....feet.....so the inside of the shed looks remarkably like a mucky pig had exploded in it....I cleaned the whole shed out whilst breathing through my mouth and spitted out the odd "shut the fuck up" when they got too out of control which  caused a neighbour from the main road who visits the hens daily with bread titbits to sing out "language Timothy!!!!" as he passed by.

I walked the dogs, made a curry, picked up a load of layer pellets,sorted out Janet's blog bollocks and sought out the owner of Nigel and Brian called Jayne, who will be dropping the sheep down to me as soon as all the relevant paperwork is completed. 

Jayne has some delightful Gloucester Old Spot piglets ............and despite my tiredness all I could think of was "be still my beating heart!!!".............hummm wouldn't a breeding pair be a cracking buy?

watch this space...............

Anyhow....enough of my pipe dreams.......off now to scrub some more hen houses , the dogs need another walk and I have eggs to deliver to the village..............

Perhaps I can catch up with some interesting blogs tonight....humm like I said before...there is not enough minutes in the day!

Brian and Nigel

Interesting things always happen over the briefest of conversations... this is a snippet of a conversation I had on Friday at the animal feed shop up at Lloc


Helen (shop owner): "Are you sick of strimming your field every couple of weeks or so?"
Me: "........Yes?"
Helen: " Does your lease cover you for grazing animals"
Me,  a little uncertainly: " yes but not horses!"
Helen " do you want a couple of sheep to keep your grass down?"
Me; "ok"
Helen : "That's good!"

so Brian and Nigel will be arriving in the week I have repaired the Church wall and the holes in the fencing anyway, and of course the new fencing between my field and the Church yard is robust and safe, so there will be no escapes into the village. Natural grazing will make the field look a little neater, though I will have to organise the hen feeders to be situated out of the way of hungry ram mouths!!!)

Last night we all had a lovely meal at my brother and sister-in-laws home. Chinese Chicken, a huge leg of lamb, mouth watering sausage meat, roast parsnips, potatoes,a whole array of cooked vegetables and a sponge pudding the size of your head.! I could hardly waddle to the car!Just what the doctor ordered after a particularly busy day at work!
Working again  today.. this time on night shift!

The wrong Hat

 Sorrel is visiting and we all went to a rather stormy seaside for a brisk walk this morning ( I didn't have the heart to tell Chris his hat was NOT a good idea

This evening we all went to the BARROW in St Asaph for a nice meal and I have just managed this quick blog before bed! I am working from 7.30am to 20.00 pm tomorrow then we are all off to my brother's for a meal... so apologies no blog tomorrow!
How will you all cope?