(A Very Polite) Bollox to Brexit?

Season of open fires in the Sitting Room

Good progress on all fronts for this post.

Progressing especially well, this Help-X 'session', 10 days with Judith and Vicky. I have gone in constant fear that they will use up all the jobs and we will have nothing left for them to do, they are so fast and efficient. Having mowed their way round all the nominal 'lawns' and grassy places, I sent them off yesterday to 'top off' all the old nettle patches in the sheep (East) field. One had the mower set to its highest setting (and no grass-box), the other the brush cutter.

Sheep field mowed in stripes

The brush cutter is quite bad for vibrations into your hands and wrists, so we always advise the volunteers to swap over every hour, to avoid anyone getting coal miner's "Vibration White Finger" (OK maybe not that bad).

A bit lost in the acre field. Our 16" cut mower.

As I said, my intent was for them just to buzz off the old nettle flower-stems, but not only did they run both machines out of fuel, they had started to join up the 'dots' running the mower between clumps of nettles till it was easier to just mow the whole thing like a lawn. We have, I suspect, the only sheep field in Roscommon mowed in neat stripes. They have not, in fact, taken much length off the grass, so we hope they have not damaged our supply of winter grazing.

Towser is in the sink here and has both girls "at" him!

The girls have also fallen more and more in love with the dogs and are now always found with a dog on their lap during 'down time', bathing the three on one occasion and now taking them for their daily walks, either down to the bridge or out across the big local bog, 'Kiltybranks' (a favourite walk of mine before I got sick).

Veg lasagne, Medical Student style! Delicious.

We like our volunteers to cook us a meal from their home-place (if they want to). Vicky and Judith went for a superb veggie lasagne and very delicious it was too. They also expressed an interest in trying our goose eggs but NOT in cooking them as we would for breakfast with toast 'soldiers'. They wanted them 'a bit stiffer' than I had described the 'UK Dippy eggs', so a 12-14 minute boil rather than our ten. They like the yolks to be nearly set.

Goose eggs for breakfast, Cheers!

Then for bread, they had a slice of my good sourdough each on-the-side and in Judith's case buttered and smeared with jam so she could swap between egg spooned out of the shell, and mouthfuls of bread/jam but ne'er the twain shall meet. Each to their own, I guess.

Finally on the Help-X-ers for this one, they took today as a day off going touristing to the coastal town of Westport. I dropped them to the railway station for a 10 am train and collected them again at 20 past 7. Elizabeth and I had an easy, free day.

Brushing the dogs out after their shampoo.

But what of my Brexit reference in the header. When I am not just focusing on this, my own blog, I sometimes wander over to the one being written by the brother, Mark.
  http://caretowers.blogspot.com/
Mark is similar to us in having retired early and now 'living a dream' but his dream (as is only right) is very different to ours. He was never a one for the farming. He and his wife (Susan) spend their days travelling all around the world, cruising or rolling their own holidays, walking nearer to home, seeking out good eateries or interesting shopping in cities. They are an amusing read on occasions, especially knowing Mark well and being able to see how he is seeing things.

His most recent post has them headed to London to see an exhibition of "affordable art" but accidentally clashing with a gazillion other people packed like sardines into the train, headed for the "People's March" for a 2nd Brexit Referendum. The 'madding crowd' had them changing travel plans quite a few times as they tried to get to the art and then later to Fortnum and Mason for some shopping and I was chuckling away at his description of the polite, middle-class, 'protesters' obediently leaving their placards with the Fortnum's door man while they nipped out of the march for a little shopping on the side, presumably to collect them later. Nice one Mark.

Winter Draw(er)s On....

Trump towers?

In the last post I alluded to my passing, and Liz's more passionate, interest in the US Elections and the big horse-race between Trump and Clinton. There can not be many people now left in our orbit who do not know that Trump shocked 'em all by winning, leaving a trail of formerly confident Clinton-ites upset, angry, baffled and plotting revenge in his wake.

A more reflective, considered response from the British Isles
papers by the next day. 

By early morning it was all sweary disbelief on Facebook and Twitter, with the Irish and British national papers going to print too early to know the result. By the next day, when they could do their Trump headlines, they had all had a chance to put together more reflective, considered reports. Now I am way too much of a beginner at this to add my opinions to the learnéd prose but I am going to sneak in one observation for what it's worth. Feel free to skip on by. It all looked to me a bit like the UK's 'Brexit' vote with the big majority not really voting on the issues but just wanting to give authority a bloody nose.

I was feeding a neighbour's cattle while he
is in hospital again. Love this fine Charolais
head.

Clinton obviously represented the governing elite, Washington, the White House and Democratic Party centre. Trump no doubt did not, but also, in my humble opinion, did not really represent the "other party" either. He seemed to have snuck in 'despite' the Republican grandees and was portraying himself as his own man; his followers could still vote for him and still feel sufficiently 'anti-establishment'.

The Irish Times had a lovely picture of a baseball capped, bearded 'good aul' boy' Trump supporter at the victory bash rushing at the photographer and doing two middle-finger salutes; real "F**k you and the horse you rode in on!" stuff. Like the British government and their Brexit problems, the US government on both sides (all sides, maybe) is going to have to react to this urge by the majorities to smear their noses across their faces. Meanwhile we have what we have, Brexit and Trump.

One of the turkeys tries his hand at
 'magnificent' up on the fence.

Aside from that excitement. it is all fairly quiet here. Steak Lady has gone on her hols to Malta so invited Liz to borrow her car for the duration. This is a regular treat for us, and Liz catches a train down to Silverwood-land, stays the night to catch up with her Mum, sees her off in the 'Sparks' taxi to the airport and then high-tails it back up here in the smart red buzz-bomb hot-hatch. We are a 2-car family for a week or so and then we have to give the whizzy racer back. Liz used to enjoy driving it to work where all the gang would say in impressed amazement... "New car, Liz?" By now they are all wise to the 'play' and just say "Uh huh.... borrowed Mum's car again then, Liz?"

Liz has now graduated to 5 needles at once knitting this
tubular sock-leg. Definitely NOT a game to play when there
are 'kattens' to help.

Heavy rain has been the order of the day and we are, once again, slopping around in a bit of a mudbath. We are not alone. I was over at Sue and Rob's today and he, too, was bemoaning the quagmire in some of his poultry pens.

One or two workers struggle up into the 'attic' to see why
there is suddenly daylight streaming in. Plenty of 'brace comb'
on these frame-tops. 

Warm enough today, though, to be able to crack open a beehive without killing all inside from hypothermia. After 2014/5 when my smaller colony perished from cold, damp and condensation, I like to snug this hive down tight before the frosts. I take off the un-used 'super' (honey store) box(es) and fit a blank 'box' (eke) into which has been fitted a tight-fitting slice of stiff house insulating foam. This gives the bees 3 inches of 'snug' between their brood box and the stainless steel sheet of their roof and stops any 'chimney' ventilation with all the hot air disappearing up through their roof.

All the spare hive boxes and bits go into
dry store

It worked last year and there was no repeat of the 2014/5 disaster. I whip off the eke in April or May before there is any chance of the hive overheating and put the super back on to give the workers space to store their spring time nectar gatherings.

Trying to get a crisp cat's eyes pic. Not bad, but not as crisp
as I would have liked,

I think that'll do you for this time. Just a few more pics because I had them.

Bobby the dog came a-visiting so I tried with him too.

Random cow.

Growing old gracefully? Reading glasses for me now.

Keepin' it 1600

It might be mid October but the sap's rising in Co. Roscommon.
This in-calf heifer got in with the 'boys' by mistake.

The reason this blog avoids the wise blogger's 'troika' of taboo subjects (politics, religion and money) has less to do, in the first case, with the wisdom and more to do with the fact that politics leaves me cold. I am delighted to vote on the day and have enough interest to make sure I am voting 'sensibly'. I then take an interest in the results but once they are in I pretty much put the whole malarkey back in its box till next time.

Whole leg of pork gets its dry-cure

Contrast that, if you like, with Liz's driving passion to eat, drink, sleep, knit (?) and work through every minute of the pre-match analysis, then stay up all night while the results roll in AND, afterwards, to stay well abreast of things and in touch with all the expert moves and howling gaffes of the candidates and politicians in power. This applies equally to UK, Irish, Euro and American elections as well as all the sideshows that come along in the form of referendums (referenda?); Yes Equality, Brexit, 'Repeal the 8th' and the like. When Liz is on her deathbed and some young relative asks, "Any Regrets, Auntie Lizzie?" I suspect that up there will be that when the results of the Blair/Labour Landslide were rolling in on that famous night, she went to bed in the early hours and missed the fall of Portillo.

Incidentally, the pics in this post bear no relation to anything written as, obviously, I do not get a lot of pics of political 'slebs' out here in Roscommon. But, where was I? Ah yes. If UK politics leave me cold and Irish Politics just confuse me (more on that later), the American politics have, up to now, left me frozen in a hypothermic torpor. Then the Trump/Clinton thing happened. Suddenly I am amused, amazed, appalled and wide awake, watching in horror as a country I always assumed would do the steady, sensible thing and occasionally get brave enough to make a Lady (gasp!) or a Black Guy (gasp!) President seems to have gone steaming happily off the rails. I am no expert and I have only recently been paying attention but it seems to me that our Mr Trump has got to be the Republican nominee despite no-one really wanting him there, despite them fearing that he is a loose cannon who might say the wrong things, watching him like rabbits caught in the headlights as he does just that, and now no-one knows how to undo the nomination. We seem to just have to go with this and hope that the election undoes him for us. There is wry comment about "a man like that getting within reach of the US Nuclear Codes"

Nugget enjoying her freedom

My recent interest has been helped by that relatively new thing in US Politics, the subscriber (cable) channel, political comment "pod cast". Liz has latched onto 3 main feeds in this - namely "Keepin' it 1600", "538" and "NPR Politics" (links at the bottom of this post). They have funky, modern, website-y names (the 1600 refers to the fact that the White House's address is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, there are 538 'college' votes in the state-by-state elections and NPR is National Public Radio) and comprise a small group of well informed, lively, experts (plus, sometimes guest panellists) just discussing the latest events, gaffes, TV debates or electioneering moves as if they were sitting in a pub relaxing and chatting.

Annual Pig Census arrived 2 days late for our two.

These are subscriber channels, so they feel no need to stick to BBC-style political correctness or balance and the language can wander into "fruity" if they are more excited or appalled than normal. Many of those taking part have 'done it for real' previously, for example running Barack Obama's campaign(s). I particularly like the 'Keepin' it 1600' one and, despite my professed dislike of such stuff, find myself asking Liz regularly, "Anything new from the 1600 lads?" If there is, we sit down and listen to it together and I then harass Liz with all manner of 'how does THAT work?' questions and we check out the latest graphs and graphics.

A morning moon.

It will all come out in the wash, I guess, on November 8th. Then I can put it all back in its box. "PussyGate" defeated by "Human Decency"? I have got to thinking though, how good it would be if we could get some of these political pod-casts going in Ireland. I said earlier that Irish politics confuses me. I come from a world where you knew (for a while!) what you were voting for - the Tories were the 'management', Labour was for the working class families and Union types and the Liberals were somewhere in the middle or were the only ones interested in stuff like organic farming, green issues and so on.

In Ireland we have the two big parties (Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael - FF and FG for short) with no obvious policy (or recent record) differences between them. Even local political activists can not give you a clear answer if asked why I should vote FG or FF. A commonly held view is that these 2 became the main parties during the Civil War (in the 20's), with one voting for partition of the country into Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State (as being the best solution they thought they could realistically get), while the other party wanted to hold out for independence for the whole land mass as one entity. This conflict divided communities and villages, pitted brother against brother and father against son and for many it still rankles. They vote FG or FF now because in the 20's blah blah blah. They are still fighting the Civil War through the ballot box.

My frustration at not being able to get answers which matter to me (you know - pensions, Brexit, rural broad band, water supply, support for village life and , yes, even small holders) had me thinking how good it would be to get a few of these podcast discussions up and running, to hear what intelligent, informed, politically savvy people (Nate Silver with his statistics, Adrian Kavanagh - Irish University lecturer "whose main research interests focus on the geography of elections, with particular reference to the Republic of Ireland") are saying is good, bad, sound or unsound politics. Then I'd be able to go to vote having half an idea what I was voting for, rather than the 'attrition' method I use currently. (Not him or her because they support X, nor her because she won't say whether she supports Y or not.... ah well, that just leaves these ones then.... now what is '1st preference'?)

And now, just in case you are still awake, three links generously provided by Liz to those podcasts. Good Hunting.

https://theringer.com/keepin-it-1600-podcast-politics-election-jon-favreau-dan-pfeiffer-220924af4c94#.u1kxp2g1k

http://fivethirtyeight.com/tag/elections-podcast/

http://www.npr.org/podcasts/510310/npr-politics-podcast

A Mum-Seeking Missile

Our two new kittens, who came to us on the day after Brexit-vote day (24th June) are, we estimate, now 4 months old. They are big and lively and have long out-grown their willingness to stay contained within the Sitting Room so we leave that window ajar for them and have taught them to come and go through it so that they get access to the whole garden and yard.

Chip (boy)

They are, however, a bit small  and silly yet to be able to cope with a chase or an attack by the terriers. Deefer would possibly be OK on her own but the 'pups' in pack-mode are a different species, rushing in teeth-first, desperately trying to get in faster than their sibling. Real 'red mist' stuff with no thought to whether this is allowed prey or just ratty vermin needing several bites and shakes to kill it as fast as a dog can. The kittens have showed a tendency to try to get back into the house through the other (non-Sitting Room) windows or doors, which would (and has) land(ed) them in the doggy parts of the house. A mad scramble then ensues to rescue the silly kitten and secure the dogs. We have to remember when we open the Sitting Room window, to close all the others far enough to prevent kitten ingress.

Chivers (girl)

We have started to warily try out some controlled 'meetings' and looking at options like crating the kittens in a room to let the dogs get a bit familiar with them and calm down the killer instinct a bit. Liz tried one yesterday where the 'pups' were locked in the bedroom and Deefer was allowed access downstairs. She apparently walked right past the kittens to go steal their food. Progress of a sort, we guess.

The Araucana x game cock-bird always
manages to look totally demented.

This morning, though, a rude awakening of a new sort. We were lying there semi-asleep in the last few minutes before my alarm goes off (07:30) with the dogs scattered over the duvet as normal. I had every reason to think the alarm would sound, I would get up and then prod some snoozing dogs into action so that I could take them out for a 'comfort stop'. Suddenly all hell broke loose and the three dogs were charging about the bedroom down and around each side of the bed, round the foot-end or over the top (and us).

Guinea Fowl also managing to look demented. 

They can't actually get under the bed as the space is full of suit cases, crates of bed linen and 'other season' clothes but the spaces are small enough to allow in cats and Soldier in particular likes to wake me up for (his) breakfast by playing with the dogs and winding them up. In the half light I assumed he would be, as usual, on my bed side table 'asking' to be let out (and then fed downstairs, of course). Then I saw the real cause of the chaos - a kitten was running around and diving under the bed whenever a dog got too close for comfort. Luckily he was still intact and Liz, awake and out of bed in an instant was able to scoop him up while I tried to hold all three dogs at a distance. Obviously we had left too many windows open and the bedroom door, and the kitten had woken up, then gone out, come back in through the kitchen and hunted us down in our sleep. "That boy is like a Mum-seeking Missile" was Liz's comment. Luckily, no harm done and a lesson learned.

K-Dub hacks off render with the medium
sized kango hammer. 

Meanwhile, work has started on the kitchen extension. First job once the site had been cleared was to hack off the render on the house side of the new space, so that we get a lovely attractive stone wall in the kitchen, instead of the stippled "gravel-dash". The plan was to hack off this, rake out the (pointing) cracks between stones and repoint with pale mortar which will contrast with the beautiful dark grey of (we hoped) the lovely quarried, shaped stones.

Raking out the old pointing and the 'gobs'
of render in the cracks

We were not at all sure that the stone would be beautiful, of course. Plenty of the internal walls proved to be a right old mess of concrete blocks, old bricks and re-used rubble. But 'no', we were delighted to find quality stone work with big blocky 'coin' stones at the corners and well bonded rows of good stone throughout. Some of the coins are 13" high and one was a gorgeous black stone which will make quite a feature. We were also delighted with how "handy" (well) the render came away. You can be days chipping away inch by inch. You don't know till you start. The kango-ing, raking out and then wire-brushing were all dusty, messy jobs and my hair felt like a Lego man's one-piece plastic wig by the end. It was pure joy to be able to get into the shower.

Lovely stonework revealed. 

Since these pics were taken we have moved on. The plumbing has been moved to accommodate the new roof (mainly sneaking the vent 'stack' out sideways through what will be a block-work in-fill mini-wall so that we do not have to make a big hole in the new roof). We have also measured up and now ordered all the timber for rafters etc. That should arrive tomorrow. More on this in the next post.

The Buff chicks are a month old now. 

Tonight we will be a bit more careful with the windows at lock up. By the way, I love that the spell-checker on this site offers you 'mango' for Kango. While trying to work out what a Mango-hammer might look like, I am also trying to see tropical fruit used to remove concrete render from the outside of a house.

Chivers Marmalade

Love the old beans tin protecting the exhaust on this old
bog-hopper but I can't help thinking that protection is a bit
late in arriving.

One of those days today that seem to be so full of "stuff" that you get to the end and say, "Wow! That was quite a day!" For Liz too, though she managed hers totally out of synch with everybody else by pulling an all-nighter. Brexit of course with its BBC coverage all through the night as the results rolled in and hacked off at least 48% of the nation. The referendum is now done and dusted, of course, and you will know the result unless you have seriously been trying to avoid it. We are not sure what happens now and how it might affect us in Ireland either from the 'Brit living abroad' aspect or from the Northern Ireland border angle - all we really know is that David Cameron is baling out by the October Tory Conference and the replacement (BoJo? Gove?) will be left to lie in the 'bed' they have just made. Good luck with that, lads.

A picture for Liz's boss of one of the
planters currently being built by the
scheme lads, at Lough Glynn church.

Locally it meant that Liz stayed up all night to watch the results coming in and had taken today off work to recover, as is her normal wont at anything election-based (Ireland, UK or USA). This gave myself and Charlotte (of the mini horses) a clear field to put into action a cunning conspiracy which had been a few weeks in the planning. I have not been able to say anything on here yet, obviously, but the plan was to secretly find a new kitten and bring it home to Liz. The conspiracy had involved a number of friends all sworn to secrecy but all putting feelers out to find someone with kittens they were trying to re-home.

Marmalade kitten - "Chivers" of course (pic by Liz)

Our little mission over to Mayo-Liz's place to collect the Marans hatching-eggs bore fruit first as a volunteer-led rescue centre based around a Claremorris vet had suitable youngsters and the timing could not be better with Liz possibly needing cheering up after the Brexit thing. We managed to appear with kitten as she was waking up from her catch-up slumbers

Honeysuckle growing in our hedge - we didn't plant it.

She was as delighted as we were sure she would be so we got all brave and put Phase 2 into action. We had found out in Claremorris that this little marmalade lad was, in fact, one of a pair of 'left over' kittens, all that remained of a litter of 5, and by taking one we were splitting up 2 siblings. We guessed that when we told Liz this she would agree that we should take both, which she did, so a quick (pre-arranged) text to the vet's confirmed us returning to Claremorris tomorrow morning to gather up marmalade #2 and bring him/her back to his/her brother. We suspect these 2 marmalades will get named Chivers and 'Little Chip' (which unbeknownst to me is another brand of the orangey breakfast delight.) More pics in the next post; Chivers is not that keen on us yet or getting his pic taken and we don't want to stress him out.

Guinea Fowl 'Belvedere' shouts from
the top of our road gate.

The cat-wrangling, though, was fitted into a full day. K-Dub is now sporadically back from working in the big smoke, so I am back into the buildering. We are currently filling and sanding (K-Dub) and painting (me) the place. I had also taken my foot-trimming shears over with me so that we could trim the feet of the three goats, Billy, Nanny Óg and 'Henno' the kid (him for the first time). Then after all the cat-based fun I needed to run Charlotte back to Sligo but via nipping into Supervalue for kitten based supplies (kitty litter, food, kitten-milk, bowls) before whizzing home to do long-overdue dog exercising etc

You're a funny colour for a Buff Orpington chick. Are you SURE
you're one of mine?

On the calendar, not only was there written "Brexit Vote" and "Brexit Count" but also "Day 21 for box #4 Broody". This hen had done a marvellously consistent job sitting in her quiet nest box in the proper chicken coop (where they are ALL meant to lay and sit but the word does not seem to have gone round!). All around her hens were trying to sit on fresh air or getting hooshed off nests while other poultry wanted to lay eggs in the nest like a cuckoo, eggs were getting trampled and broken, or thrown out of nests with half-formed embryos in them.

Black babies. Nigel Farage would never approve.

Box #4 broody, once we had dropped in 3 blue eggs from Sue and Rob just to try her out, sat there serene and did the job properly for 21 days and came due on Brexit day. We think she hatched at least 2 of these on the day because those babies were buzzing around, as dry and fluffy as day-olds this afternoon. They look like they will definitely need letting out of the box (it has quite a high lip) tomorrow. They look quite cute in their black (Araucana) fluff next to their huge golden Mum. More pictures of these guys soon along with the kitten pics.