The Dans

Mr and Mrs Dan tuck into a hearty breakfast after their early
flight into Knock Airport. 

In which we enjoy a lovely visit from Friends of the Blog, Dan and Dan, now Mrs & Mrs Dan. We fondly refer to these two as "The Children", because they are like the next generation down. Danielle's Mum is favourite cousin and play mate from Liz's youth, Cathy, who herself visited us earlier in the year. Dan and Danielle have been coming for a couple of years and set off on their scenic tour of Connemara, where Dan proposed to Danielle, last year. They were married this Summer on a cruise ship off the coast of Italy, hence 'Mr and Mrs Dan' now.

Dan accumulating animals. 

These two are the perfect kind of guests - they are immediately at home and relaxed on arrival, they slot in like members of the family. They make no demands on us - we do not feel the need to entertain them or make small-talk. They love the food that we serve them, enjoy the drink and sleep like logs in the spare bedroom. Dan is comfortable enough to slope off and take video-conference calls to do with work, or hide himself away and do a bit of "school" work (he's doing a distance course with LSE at present).

Danielle decking the halls. 

Danielle loves the livestock and can't wait to get out and round catching up with all her old 'friends', missing the ones who are no longer with us and greeting the new arrivals. She's actually on quite a hard-driven mission to 'evolve' from the vegetarian she used to be, to a high-welfare carnivore, but more of that later.

Dans relaxing in the evening.

My first job, then, was to nip over to Knock airport and collect the pair from their early flight. They'd been up since 04:30 and were due to land at 09:35. It was a frosty morning and Liz had sent me off in Mum's snazzy red, nearly new, chequered flag go-faster striped Skoda buzz-bomb. "Be Careful", she said, though I was not about to do anything silly in that low-profile tyre-shod hot hatch. Even so the run out nearly became a story in itself (and the ruin of a good weekend).

A venison supper.

Luckily I was only doing about 40 kph when I hit the black ice just beyond the local bridge. I was very grateful for a youth spent as a fan of motor rallying, messing about trying to rough-house our cars on any snow, ice or gravel we could get access to. The back end of the car stepped neatly out of line and I knew to whip on some opposite-lock to kill the slide before I got anywhere near the soft verges. Roger Clark would have been impressed by my graceful, crossed-up, drifting "moment". I took it even more carefully for the rest of the run and actually arrived a bit late, but luckily Ryan Air did the same to the Dans' wheels-down time, so we all matched up. I brought us all home with equal care.

'Shedders' admire the new premises.

I was briefly interrupted in my hosting at that point by a call on my camera-man services. The Men's Shed are getting a 'branch' (OK, a shed) in local town Balla-D, so they are doing tea and cakes at their new premises and could I come along and take pics for their website. I had not met 'Men's Shed' up to now though I'd heard of them.

A new space for the Shed. An old garage in the back streets
of Balla-D. Rent €0, which can't be bad. 

They are a charity set up to help give a safe and purposeful space to men struggling with general loneliness, or mental issues, drink or depression where they can find company which is not in a pub. That is probably a very bad 'flavour' of what they are about - I will do a fuller paragraph in a future post (when I know more, myself!)

So while I was gone, the gang started to decorate The Tree. This was once Liz had moved it a few times deciding where to put it. This was Danielle's first go at doing a 'real' tree. It is now a tradition here that Tree dressing comes with warmed Glühwein. Liz also lit the open fire in that hearth to get a really cozy, Christmassy atmosphere going.

Turkey 'stag' - brother to the one who went
just over 9 kg oven-ready. A whopper.

I mentioned that Danielle is on a mission to move from the kind of veggie who refuses to eat in any restaurant which had venison, rabbit or game on the menu (Don't try to understand, she says, I was young and foolish), to a relaxed carnivore who is happy to eat any meat grown "as well as we do it". At the last visit she was happily posting to Facebook, montages of pics of her cuddling piglets, feeding the full grown pigs and then enjoying the roast pork.

9+ kg oven-ready turkey.

This time she'd expressed an interest in 'helping' to slaughter something, maybe a goose. She wanted to be there and see it done, she said, though she might not actually want to do it herself. Well, it so happened that we had a couple of male ('stag' or 'tom') turkeys who needed finishing for Christmas, one for the Silverwoods, where Liz would be heading once she'd dropped the Dans back to the airport.

A fridge full of turkey.

I agreed, then, to let her watch. I was curious to see if she'd 'cope'; I suspected she could. She is that kind of tough underneath. I talked her through what I was planning and what she'd probably see and also what might go wrong and what we'd need to do about that. Then at 6 pm, when it was good and dark, we went out with head torches on to do the deed. Danielle was OK but maybe a bit shaken by the minutes of flapping and twitching it takes a bird to go still. She was happier when she could see the limp head hanging there, eyes closed and me able to poke the eyes with the billhook point to demonstrate the lack of 'blink' or reaction. Fair play to her. 

Dans and Dogs. 

This bird was bagged up the next day and taken by Liz down to Silverwoods for their Christmas, after dropping the Dans to the airport. I knew it was a heavy one - I'd carried it out to the killing place under my arm and then back, swinging from my hand by the feet - but I thought maybe 5-6 kg. Liz plucked and gutted it and then weighed it by hopping on/off the bathroom scales with/without it. Just over 9 kg was the amazing result. Easily the heaviest we'd done so far and quite an achievement for one of these old-breed, fully free range Bronze breed birds.

Fairy lights all up the fences and over the Tígín roof.

With the guests gone and Liz back down to Silverwood-land to mind Mum for some more days, I was home alone again. This time I had an even better supply of left overs in the fridge (venison, paté, rillette, soup, savoury flans, cake...). I also had two definite jobs. I had to string up the outdoor fairy lights and ice the cake. The lights are now in two strands by 25m so we can run them right down the drive and all over the roof of the Tígín but my it was cold messing about with cold, frosty fencing and cold ladders. It was pure pleasure to come indoors, warm the hands and start the icing.

This year's cake design might be seen as "a bit weird" by some critics (you know who you are!) but it made me smile and I thoroughly enjoyed trying to conceive of it and deliver it. I wanted to do it with one of our Oxford Sandy and Black (OSB) pigs which are, in icing terms, a nice bright combination of orange, black and pink. The only way I could come up with of getting OSB in there and having it a bit 'Christmas' was to borrow the OSB out of the singer's name Bing Crosby.

So there you have it. I am sure it will be every bit as delicious as the ones with Santas, polar bears and penguins on them.

And there, I think, I will leave you. Lovely having you, The Dans. Welcome back any time.

Hey! Those are MY Legs!

2 Calendars from the OSB Facebook groups. Pork on the left and
whole pigs on the right. 

As well as the Village Calendar, which I have already described in this blog, we get involved in a number of others. For the Village one, Liz is the main 'mover and shaker' and my contribution is in the photography and sometimes, collecting the box of printed ones from the printers (DS Signs of Ballaghaderreen, in that case).

Those are my whole legs on the left, being cured for the 'Parma'
style hams and bottom left on the right hand calendar is me
serving this year's pair their Guinness for their 6 month 'Birthday'.
Both these pics have appeared in this blog.

2 others come out of the Facebook groups for the breed of pig we have kept for the last 2 years, being 'Oxford Sandy and Black' or OSB for short. One group is for the pig keepers and breeders, so tends to go in for proud pics of people's lovely healthy pigs or cute piglets. The other is for the meat-production and charcuterie side so attracts the butchers, sausage makers, bakers and chefs. A lot of people are in both groups though I guess there are those who like their pigs as pets and friends and draw a veil over the original purpose of keeping OSBs. I have no problem with that. Each to their own.

All quiet in the Autumn sunshine. Pig Paddock.

I am in both groups and enjoy posting nice pics of our pig activities throughout the year and I was delighted when the lady in charge (Kim Brook) posted that she was assembling these calendars for 2018 and had liked some of my pics. She wanted clearance to use them which, of course, I gave.

Blue has been up on the chicken house roof. 

Both these calendars follow the same format, with not one big picture per month, but little montages of 5 or 6 images. They are very reasonably priced, so I bought one of each and, leafing through them I was delighted to find 3 of my pics, all of which have appeared already in this blog (and in my Facebook feed, of course).

Bobtail with three of her 4 ever-bigger chicks. We love the little
'Mini-Me' on the left, almost certainly a pure-bred Buff Orpington.

My pic of the pair of whole legs being cured for the 'Parma' style ham is there and the one of me crouched down with this year's pigs, serving them their Guinness at 6 months old. Both these are on their respective May page. Then on the December page for the 'meat' calendar is our old chum, Help-X Frenchman, Augustin. That neatly solves any problem we might have finding a small Christmas Present should we need one but shhhhhhh. Secret Santa! He may still be reading this.

This tiny rooster has avoided the cull by charming the Lady
of the House with his lovely iridescent green tail and red cape.
Green and red, so obviously he picked up the name 'Mayo'. 

Not much else going on as we cruise gently in towards Winter. I have already covered that the village drama group have settled on a play (Anyone Could Rob a Bank) which sounds like a real hoot of a hilarious farce. All parts have been cast and all other main jobs handed out. We'll say no more at this stage as I don't want to be stealing anyone's thunder or letting any theatrical cats out of bags.

Horse chestnut buds.

The cull of spare roosters has been parked up for now. We finished the biggest and most troublesome 6 and it has now gone very quiet and calm. The remaining young pretenders are keeping a wise low profile and not challenging our status quo or, indeed, trying to seduce any of the original ladies. If they keep that up, then they can stay for now. No more Death Warrants will be issued.

Always the last to go to bed. The ducks would hang about in the yard waiting for Mr Fox if we let them but they are happy to be shepherded home to the safety of the barn by about 5 pm. Everyone else is away and perched up long since. On that note I will also wish you readers good night too.

The 'Ros Go Rummage' easy stroll.

If Ros Go Run is not for you

Then we have something else to do

A gentle walk with clues to find

An easy test for eyes and mind

Give it a lash, you’re on a roll

The Ros Go Rummage easy stroll.

With the hugely clever and artistic ode above (cough), we introduced our newest project to the world. Well, our latest little bit of it, anyway. Friends of the Blog will know that we get involved each year, in the village's annual Half Marathon and 10 km runs, under the banner "Ros go Run". We join the roadside support, cheering the lonely runners on, man a watering-station and have painted a big bed-sheet sized encouraging sign which says "Downhill from here". Liz gets heavily involved in the admin, planning, publicity, links to sponsors and organising on the day. All good so far.

Buggy-rider Archie Naughten and his support team snatch a
quick "selfie" outside our gate. 

This year the committee liked the idea of doing something for the kids and non-running family who, having delivered their runners to the start at the local sports ground are left with little to do for the 2 hours+ it takes most of them to get round the half Marathon. They came up with an easy, child-friendly Treasure hunt or "rummage race" where they "runners" would have to progress round an easy loop of roads armed with a sheet of 10 clues in rhyming couplets, spotting signs or toys and things we had tied to the hedge or gateposts. 

Cousin Cathy gets cookery tips. 

The purple 'angry monster' pictured, for example, we tied to a tree which the farmer (presumably as part of his 'GLAS' (subsidies for greening / ecological stuff) efforts) had mounted three bat-boxes. Our clue was...

"An ash tree here has boxes three,

for bats to roost (and have some tea),

A scary monster guards the nest,

How would you describe him best?"

Not that hard then.... all the kids had versions of "angry purple monster" on their answer sheets. They all got lollipops as a prize. We were amused to find that some competitive parents entered with their kids and took over, wanting to run round and dragging the kids, who could barely keep up, round in their wake. 

Cathy experiments with flavourings in soft
goat's cheese, mustard, garlic and chives,
honey etc

Another good feature of this day was an entry by a team who are fund raising for a local family all of whose three boys have a genetic disorder, 'Duchenne's Muscular Dystrophy'. DMD is incurable and, tragically, leaves the sufferer pretty much unable to walk by age 8 and not looking forward to a long life. The oldest boy, Archie Naughten is currently being 'prepared' for an attempt on the Dublin Marathon which he will do riding in a special buggy, pulled/pushed by a team of three athletic, fit support runners (Four in the full-length Dublin event. They are a lovely crew and the Ros go Run Team have very much taken them to heart. They got a massive welcome. They had the Archie team runners set off half an hour before the un-assisted runs started and there were gangs of supporters from, for example, the Under 11 GAA clubs with signs and cheering children etc. They were very grateful and posted numerous pics on the Facebook page. They all, and especially Archie, enjoyed their day.

Roast pork rack-of-chops and a nifty savoury flan

I just missed them here, coming out of the front door just in time to see them finish taking a 'selfie' with my sign as backdrop but then running on before I could get down the drive to hail them. Never mind. I spotted the selfie pic on Facebook and commented upon it, which got me into a nice conversation with one of the ladies who was still bubbling over at the welcome and the support they had received. She also gave me permission to use that pic on the blog. Good luck with the Dublin Marathon you guys. Ours was just a warm-up, I know.

Latest book by my
grew-up-living-on-a-sailing-barge friend
Nick Ardley. 

Because Cousin Cathy was around and visiting, she was inevitably press-ganged in to help and enjoyed going round setting out the clues and helping down at the GAA sports centre on the day. She came round again with me later to tidy up the rummage course. That was her final day with us (this time round!). Liz had to drop her to the airport on the Monday for a bit of a tearful 'goodbye', apparently. She had thoroughly enjoyed her little stay, which was a Birthday present from the family and promises to return soon. You're most welcome, Cathy.

Happy 6 month Birthday, Empress and
Pride! Enjoy your Guinness. 

On Tuesday, the piggies hit a landmark birthday, 6 months. Because we do not go with these pigs much past 7-8 months (and never the full year), we make a big fuss of them today and they get a can of Guinness poured over their meal.

No, I didn't steal any of their Guinness! 

These two have been brilliant. No trouble at all. They are, you may recall, variety "Oxford Sandy'n'Blacks" (OSBs) and were named Empress of Blandings and Pride of Matchingham after the PG Wodehouse fictional 'Heaviest Pig' Show entrants.

Pigs at 6 months. Empress on left, Pride on right.

Readers who are uncomfortable with the idea of eating named (or indeed any) animals, may like to skip this paragraph. We have estimated their weights by the standard "Length x Bust squared" method and think they are live weights of around 70 kg today, so they are nearly 'finished' A couple more weeks and we will be booking them in for their final car-ride to Webb's in town and training them to run up into the trailer to get fed in there. That way, on their final morning, they are no trouble to load. I will miss them, but I am sure we will enjoy the pork, bacon, sausage meat, brawn, Christmas ham and 'Parma' style dry-cured legs and the dogs will enjoy the ear-flavoured dog treats.

Breaking up the curds from the latest batch of goat cheese.

I think that is about it for this one. Just a couple more pictures because I have them, so I might as well post them.

Confused Muscari. Why are these grape hyacinths leppin' into
action in September?

The two male turkeys explore the spud-patch in the tunnel.

Interesting yellow fungi growing in a dead hawthorn.

All Good Things

All good things, so they say, must come to an end, and we are now at, or coming to, the end of some crackers. Once again, I do not have many pics specific to these subjects (at least, not ones I haven't already used), so I will fill in with some nice '365' pics. That is one of the "things" anyway, so it works... ish. The other two are Christmas itself and my week of being curator on 'that' Twitter account.

We would normally dismantle Christmas here at some convenient weekend between New Year and 12th Night, demolish the tree, pack all the 'stuff' away into its crates but we were both enjoying this one so much that we had decided to do the job on the 5th (the 12th Day and all that). However, one of the delightful kitten-cats (we think) did a very smelly poo, we thought, under the tree and Liz, faced with a pot-holer style elbows-down crawl under the low branches to locate and remove the offending item, unilaterally decided that enough was enough. Demolition day is today!

Some of the hens are coming back into lay at last and the
surviving Marans hen has started (dark brown egg)

This afternoon, then, we have been finishing Christmas including me going back over the rooftops etc and all along that 48m fence you have heard about in other posts concertina-ing up the fairy lights. We're done. We both agree that this has been our nicest and most enjoyable Christmas for a while though it is hard to pinpoint any specific reason. Everything about it seemed to go off well from the start - planning, lists, preparations, the visit and everything we wanted to do. The food and drink were well judged and superbly executed, the present buying/giving was a success and the subsequent wind-down has been beautifully relaxing. Peace and good will to all reigned. We are all still smiling even as we pack the paraphernalia back in its crates. May we have many more as good as this one was.

Horsehair caught on a fence.

I noted in the previous post that inter-leaved through the back end of this Christmas was my week of being curator of the @smallholderIRL Twitter account. That too went very successfully and well and seemed to hit the right note(s) and has met with widespread thanks, approval and praise. That is always nice because you are always aware that you are firing off these soundbites that you think are funny, wise, appropriate, pithy or what ever but the 2500 followers out there are 99% unknown to you. They might vehemently disagree with your opinions, not find your quips funny, be irritated by your timing or tone. Some (we call them 'trolls') are just miserable gits who get their kicks by saying rude, nasty or provocative things just to see if they can get a rise out of people. All life is there and it can be tricky finding the right approach.

First 365 pic of 2017?

Lovely when you do though. I was fortunate in my assigned week running from St Stephen's Day (Boxing Day) to New Year's Day, so I had a couple of rich veins from which to draw my 'copy'. I had all the 'Wren Boys' tradition on St Stephen's Day, all the leftovers cookery, cold turkey sandwich jokes etc and then I came up with an inspired plan for New Years. Again, no idea if it would work - it might have fallen flat. I decided to 'First Foot' any followers who might not have a bloke to do it, or might not have heard of this Scottish tradition.

Happy New Year! First Footing 'treats' for the
Twitter account

I had set the account up during the day, telling them what to expect and all about First Footing, told them they needed to have the back door open before they open the front, to let the old year out, then I'd "arrive" (on Twitter) to greet them and hand them (a picture of) the plate containing the bread (signifying food), coal (warmth), salt (savour) and whiskey (good cheer). It was easy enough to do and went down OK - there was a reasonable smatter of comment, 'like's and thanks, though I did get the impression that most were a bit flummoxed and plenty had either gone to bed early or were at a 'proper' celebration with real First Footers. Ah well.

Icy Puddle

Nobody boo'd me off stage anyway and I woke up that day to run the account till 5 pm. when I had to hand in the 'keys' so that boss-lady (Margaret Griffin) could set it all up for this week's curator, a lady who does her small-holdering in up-state New York (would you believe - the account does 'foreign' guests now and then). This lady is currently amazing us all with tales of farming among her neighbouring 'Amish' folk and lovely pics of the area with snow on the ground and all those lovely Amish horse-drawn carts and buggies trundling through it. She tells us that they sometimes see bears and moose strolling about. They are, I think, only 'small' by USA standards - she talks of 100 head of cattle including a 60-70 head milking herd of Holsteins. They are within spitting distance of (I think I have this right) a National Wilderness Park called the 'Adirondak Park' - a MILLION acres of wilderness!!! Makes my week seem quite pedestrian!

Incoming female Mute Swan. I thought for a while she'd
land on my head but luckily she veered off. 

Also now in its final month, a project of which I have spoken countless times since we started back in February 2016 (and before it was actually born). This is our '365 Lisacul' thing, a photo 'diary' of the year (actually 366 as it was a leap-year) in, of and from the 18 townlands around our village. This was Liz's 'baby' really; she had borrowed the idea from our good friend Nathalie Banaigs who was in charge of the one done by Faversham, the town we lived in in the UK. This with Nath's blessing, of course.

I agreed to be the safety net / back stop. I would take at least 1 (actually always 3) usable picture EVERY day without fail from 1st Feb 2016 to 31st Jan 2017. I am delighted to be able to say that, so far at least, I have delivered this with no missing days. It has had its moments and frustrations and I have been unable to make some of the pics I had dreamed up work but over all it has been a blast. I have learned a lot and certainly hunted down all manner of nooks and crannies in the 'patch' which I would probably never have been to without the incentive.

I guess I know more bridges, lanes or corners where one townland finishes and another starts, than do most of the locals. I have also met lots of lovely people whom I would not otherwise have encountered. Plenty of them stop in their cars when they see me nose-down in a ditch trying to get just that angle on an orchid or something, or trying to pick my way through a bog where they know there is no safe path! Oh, so YOU'RE the camera guy!

New Year's Day sunrise through the trees.

Well, just 28 more photography days to go on that one - wish me luck. I'm not out of the woods yet. Then Liz and the team have the fun job of selecting which pics go in for what day. She has 30 contributors at this stage. It would be quite fun to be a fly on the wall that day.

Roast lamb, sprouts and chestnuts.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we are now settling into the New Year and starting to think about 2017. 2 livestock issues are pressing. We are off to meet our prospective piglet supplier in a couple of days. This guy is a new breeder of Oxford Sandy and Blacks (OSBs) who was setting up last year when we got our pair of gilts from our man in Kildare - you may recall that we had only to do the short drive to Boyle because he was driving up here anyway. It was to this new guy that he was going, to retrieve a sow, to take her back to Kildare to get her 'in-pig' (pregnant) by one of his home boars. Secondly, we have some duck eggs in our buddy Sue's incubator. These were laid by our surviving duck and we hope, fertilized by our surviving drake. Those two (William and Mary - some kind of connection with the 'of Orange' royals due to the Duck and Orange thing) are now our "parent generation" thanks to Mr Fox removing all the competition. The slap of tiny webbed feet is expected any day now (5th to 8th -ish). This will be our first Christmas (Re)Stocking. Geddit? OK, sorry. I'll save the witticisms for Twitter.

Somerville and Ross

One of my annual name plaques for the pig ark.

Welcome aboard, Somerville and Ross. No, not the 'Irish RM' ladies, but this year's brace of gilts (female pigs) who came to us at 9 weeks of age, just yesterday. Regular readers will know that our pig-gathering missions are usually a bit epic - 2 hours+ drives down to Kildare where we take Charlotte and a substantial picnic. This year could have been slightly further as we had locked onto a breeder in Wicklow but by happy chance the guy was heading up this way this week and suggested we rendezvous with him and pigs in Boyle market square, just half an hour's drive away.

The new pigs - Ross on the left, Somerville right.

We had not decided for 2016 which variety we would try this year after going with Tamworths in 2014 and Berkshires in 2015, having worked our way thus through the likely varieties coming from the Kildare breeder (FreeRangePigsIreland.IE). We had briefly toyed with the idea of his "Iron-Age" pigs (a Tamworth x WildBoar) but worried that they might be a bit tusky, mean and dangerous. Then our good friend Rob found in Facebook a group associated with and promoting the variety "Oxford Sandy and Black" (OSBs) including in Ireland. I joined the group and put out a shout asking if there were any OSB breeders at all near us.

The piglets in the dog-crate in the back
of our car.

Step forward, Dermot A of Winetavern Farm in Stratford, Co Wicklow who is a little further away from us that even the Kildare guy but hey, we thought, shove a stop at Silverwood's for refreshments into the mixture and you still have a workable mission. We placed our order last 'back end' and then kept in touch with Dermot through the winter while the piglets cooked, then farrowed, then weaned. When I phoned last week to confirm that we were still on, he told me of the plan to come up to Boyle, where a friend and earlier customer needed some boar-piglets castrating and also his breeding sow collecting for bringing back to Dermot's boar in Wicklow. You may have spotted that this could well lead to OSBs from Dermot's bloodlines being available soon as close to us as Boyle. This puts a whole new slant on the 2017 choices!

Dermot's truck signage

Dermot turned out to be a superb bloke, keeper of 100 pigs on 3 acres, well experienced in pedigree breeding and showing, full of helpful advice but also very very practical, relaxed and easy going. He knew that we did not want these gilts for showing or breeding from so he had selected for us a couple of girls with slightly 'wrong' colouring - they are meant to be 'sandy' coloured (from blond through to very ginger) but well spotted with black splotches. One of ours has too many black spots and these joining up into 'patches' which would be a breed-fault at a show, the other not enough spots. If you know us at all you'll know we don't give a fig for 'show standard' (hence our three "nearly-westies"). We are more about healthy animals, meat quality and flavour. I only mention the spotting in case someone reads this who knows OSBs, sees the pictures and judges Dermot, us or Somerville and Ross negatively.

Home now and briefly rested in the sun.

The piglets are utter charmers and already more friendly than either of our previous 'batches'. Previously I have unloaded the pigs and they have vanished into the straw bed from whence you take a good month persuading them (with food and general schmoozing) to come anywhere near you.You eventually manage to get them to accept a tickle of the ear or a scratch of the back and then a tape measure round their 'bust' when trying to estimate weight. No such reticence with these ladies. We dropped them in home at about 3pm yesterday and left them to sleep off the trials of the long journey (3.5 hours all up). I took food into them this morning and never saw them - just rustling straw. Lunchtime I saw them but they stayed (not very well) hidden. But this evening I took them more food and 2 heads popped up out of the straw bed, and they came trotting over to get their noses into the food bowl while I was still holding it. I was able to stroke a back with no resulting protest or scarpering.

Clean straw. new home in our pig ark.

Thanks to Dermot and to all involved in this pig story. Charlotte agreed to come with me despite the lack of long car-ride and one of Liz's picnics and was as superbly practical and helpful as ever, especially at the stage where, in the open of Boyle car park, we had to transfer 2 wriggling piggies from Dermot's 4 x 4 to the crate in our car. C just grabs them by the back legs the way you are supposed to do, and walks over with piggy dangling from her hand head-down, completely subdued, quiet and relaxed. No harm done and no pigs vanishing between the parked cars into the traffic or local shops.

A full house for the village play on Thursday night

While I had C's undivided attention, when we were back here we had a good long chat about pasture improvement (re sheep), I captured Nanny Óg so that she could do a hands-on examination of kid-filled abdomen (they were kicking!), ever bigger udder and tight vulva (not ready yet), and she also demonstrated how to start halter-training our new ewe-lamb Rosie. My plan is to start Rosie this young so that by the time it comes to her first shearing (Spring 2017) she will accept being sheared while standing up the right way as we did last year for Sue's ewe 'Pink'. This is so much easier (on me and the sheep) than the upside down wrestling commercial method we have to use on Lily and Polly and (possibly) Myfanwy. M is quite tame so she may take halter restraint OK.

This is all you can see of Liz in her prompters
'cubby hole' off stage-right if you are on stage.
She is well hidden from the audience, obviously.

In a busy week, the only other thing we have had time for has been the village play, where Liz has been co-opted as 'prompt' as well as costume-seamstress and a variety of admin functions (tickets, booking, obtaining props and raffle tickets etc). I have become the official photographer. Final night is tonight even as I type this but if this showing is anything like the Opening Night and Thursday, then the whole will have been a huge and delightful success. They played to 3 full houses (It seats about 110). It has gone down enormously well and is much talked about as being a very enjoyable night well threaded through with loud laughter and audience members snorting into tissues or cheering with joy as a popular character from an earlier act comes on stage again. The actors (3 are complete novices) have had to learn fast how to pause while laughter dies down before continuing with their lines and Liz has had to learn that they have stopped for a good reason, and do not need prompting, not because they are frozen in fear! It has been a good thing and everyone is quite tired and looking forward to tonight's final performance - there are solid plans for the entire cast and crew to adjourn to the pub for a wind-down drink. More on the play and stuff on the Lisacul website, as ever. I am off down there soon to watch the end of it and join in the celebrations.