Ill Again

It's getting beyond a joke; I have yet another head cold so nothing much is getting done at the present. I was hoping to regail you with pictures of my newly tiled workbench and wall but I can't see properly to finish it at the moment.

So currently I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself. I think it calls for a whisky and green ginger wine to make me feel better. Hopefully I'll be posting those pictures soon.

A Few Dry Days

The rain finally held off again – we’ve had well over last November’s rainfall already this month – and I was treated to the wonderful sunrise above the other morning.

A day and a half of dry weather meant that I could venture out to put the last panel on the new shelter. I really should read the packets better, this lambris was only 7 cm wide rather than the 15 cm of the previous I’d used. I was really thankful for the nail gun since the narrower pieces were more warped than the wider. Even so it only took an hour or so to pin and screw it together.


When G put the hay into the hayloft he brought down some roofing sheets that were there. I’d seen them from a distance but not paid them much attention but I think I’ll use them for this shelter. I need to get some smaller sheets to span the roof with an overhang but once I’ve got those it shouldn’t take to long to get the roof on.

I wasn’t the only one taking advantage of the sunny weather yesterday.


I spotted this stripless tree frog by the front door, I hear him quite often but he usually is well hidden.

I also have another companion in the garden; this is the Sussex cockerel who’s decided that he’s not to enamoured with the small world of the chicken run and pops out for an hour or so each day before returning to the flock.

Tree Trouble

With all the leaves falling I was able to take a good look at the large poplar tree that’s on the edge of the chicken pen just behind my house.

This tree had partially come down during the small hurricane that went through here in 2006, in fact the day before I saw the house for the first time. It’s also the tree that had a hornets nest in it and G, after bravely spraying the nest for me had looked into the hole they were in and said that the tree was really rotten at the base as well.

What I saw this time rather worried me, a large piece of branch had broken off the top and was hanging in the tree caught on another branch. It was raining and very overcast so I didn’t bother with a photograph.

Overnight we must have had some more wind because the branch came down. I must have some guardian angels because the branch fell in such a way that it missed everything it could have hit, like my roof or my animal trailer.

To give you an idea I managed to put this composite photo together.


The fallen branch is about 5 metres long (15 ft). I’ve been debating over the future of this tree and the two other large poplars planted alongside the house and this has sealed their fate. Today I had a tree surgeon round. There was much intake of breath so I think the quote is going to be rather high but then you wouldn’t find me climbing a rotten tree to take it down piece-meal. The other two can probably be felled in one piece but there is a possibility that one of them might take out some of the new fencing posts. Needless to say I won’t be racing to put the fencing up along that stretch.

As you can see the weather yesterday was lovely and the evening sky was a treat too.

A Sunny Day Again

It’s been rather wet here for the last few days but out of the blue yesterday was lovely, sunny and warm. C and S from the next village popped by on their way back from the bank. We’d arranged to try and put up the new alpaca shelter on Monday as C thought he would be busy on Tuesday. Monday morning the weather was terrible so no shelter. Happily the bank visit passed quicker than expected so did I want to start the shelter that afternoon? You bet I did.

While C went home to change I raced round and collected together everything we would need. Rail spike sledge hammer, drill, screwdriver, metaposts, the kit of parts I’d started last week, dumped it all into the trailer and set off for the field.

It took C about an hour to get the meta posts hammered in and the basic frame screwed together. It was so much easier with the two of us; it’s the little things such as when you are on your own drilling the pilot hole and then fixing the screw requires going up and down the step ladders to change pieces of equipment and pick up the screw where as I was able to pass things up, and hold onto the tools not being used. I swear that if we were really meant to do DIY we would have been born with at least one other pair of hands.

After that it was on with the cladding. C zoomed off round the shelter leaving me a bit redundant so I grabbed the lasure (wood treatment) and followed him round painting as fast as I could.

It turned out that I’m three pieces of cladding short to complete the shelter so rather than put up the wood we have and then find I can’t get similar we decided to not put up the last section, which will be at the front right. I’ll buy more cladding this afternoon and when we have the next dry spell I’ll pop that on – yes it’s raining again today.


Hazel, as you can see came to check out the new building. The piece of wood on the ground at the front is part of the roof. I’ve yet to decide what I’m going to use for the roof and it’s final placement will depend on what I choose and how long those roofing pieces are but once I make the decision it shouldn’t take more than a day to finish.

It’s so kind of C to come and help out with this as it took the work from what would have been a long day for me down to 4 hours to produce what you see above. C will be back sometime, as long as the weather gets better to saw off the overlapping edges. The panels are constructed in situ because the ground isn’t level and it allows for that and any twist that may occur as the metaposts go in. It may not be the best looking structure but it’s not something that’s supposed to stand for centuries and as I’ve remarked before my alpacas have yet to use the one I made for them a year ago. However I think they will use this one as there is currently no other shade in these fields and it will take a bit of time for trees to grow.

Not Much Sleep

I like quite a few people am rather tired this morning having decided to watch the results of the American elections. I managed to stay up until the west coast declared and the magic 270 was passed, 5 am here. What a night; trying to get my head around the voting system in the States. It’s so different to the UK system and I couldn’t believe how long it took to vote.

In the UK you can nip in and vote before or after work while in the States you needed to take a day off work, some queues had a wait time of 5 hours or more. After that the ‘calling’ of the states based on exit polls; I think if this was done in the UK there would be quite a difference between what people said they voted and what they actually did in the privacy of the voting booth and that’s if they did tell you. I for one wouldn’t say as I believe in the right to a secret ballot. Add to that the fact that people have been able to vote for the last month and that in some states some military votes wouldn’t be counted at all unless the populous vote was tied:- it is just such a different system but then it is a vote carried out over a much larger area and with so many more people voting than anything I’m used to. To put it in context, President Elect Obama won nearly as many votes as the population of the UK, 61.5 million.

I’m glad I watched, as the TV endlessly said, it was history in the making which ever way it went and I hope it will enable a fresh start in the way the USA is perceived by the rest of the world.

The Wood-Fired Cooker

With my continuing colds and the deterioration of the weather here, I decided it was time to light the ESSE. This is the first time I will have cooked using wood, barbeques apart, and the first time I’ve burnt plum wood. My neighbour had a lot of problems getting plum wood to burn although Ann and Regis use it all the time with no problems and have a blazing fire.

So it was with great trepidation I lit the first fire; it barely caught. It did produce a lot of smoke to start with, which was great as I took the opportunity to check there were no leaks in the chimneystack where it goes through the loft.

The basic building here can be a bit ‘interesting’. The chimneystack is a stack of hollow square bricks. Fine so far but the path from the kitchen to the roof is not vertical so my chimney has a curve in it. Add to that, when I went into the loft area on moving in, I discovered that the exhausts for both the extractor hood and the propane water heater just passed through the kitchen ceiling and vented into the loft! Hence why I wanted to check out the integrity of the chimneystack.

All was fine and I went back down to keep an eye on the fire. I reasoned that I needed to build up an ash bed. My neighbour who had the problems with the plum wood insisted you don’t need one but somewhere in the depths of my mind I have the recollection that wood fires need an ash base while coal fires don’t.

After about 4 hours the fire finally caught properly and the oven temperature gauge began to rise. Encouraged by this I started some bread. I still couldn’t get the oven into the hot zone but did manage to bake 3 large loaves and some buns.

By now it was evening and the next test presented its self. Could the fire last overnight? I added a few logs and closed all the dampers and went to bed.

Yesterday when I got up the cooker was cool but there was still a good glow in the ashes so I added more wood, opened up the dampers and waited. After about an hour I had a good blaze going again and this time the cooker heated to the top of the hot zone.

Time for more baking and yesterday it was buckwheat pancakes (because I had the flour and it let me see how well the ‘hot’ hotplate worked); some spice biscuits and some gingernuts. All were great, cooking times are a bit hit and miss, generally baking seems to be quicker. I’ve also put a casserole in the slow oven that’s looking good and should be perfect by tonight – the original slow cooker.

So I’m really happy with it, not only do I have hot water all day, it has a back boiler, I have a source of heat in the kitchen, I can cook more or less whenever I want (the other cooker is electric and takes quite a time to warm up as well as being expensive) and it keeps my cup of tea warm too. And if all the above wasn’t enough it can iron too, I think I’m in love!

Colds, Colds And More Colds

Having got through my depressed spell I’m raring to catch up on everything. I even started a healthy eating regime, making sure I did take the time to get my 5 a day and not opt for a burger or egg sandwich for my main meal just because I was tired and couldn’t be bothered to cook for myself.


So why, oh why, have I had a cold ever since? I’m just getting through my 4th cold in 4 weeks. Just as I think I’m getting over the cold, I start sneezing again. At least the last 3 have only been head colds and not gone to my chest like the first. On the plus side I should be gaining immunity.


I think I should go back to a chocolate and chips diet and see if that gets rid of the colds, this healthy eating is killing me!