Harvesting the good, the bad and the unexpected

Unexpected
On her way back home Ailsa had spotted a clump of field mushrooms - so as soon as she reported this I asked her to take me to where she saw them. Just up the road from our house, on the verge, she proudly showed me the mashed remains of a good few fine looking mushrooms. Why is it that kids can't resist kicking mushrooms? Anyway - there was one good one left and we proudly brought it home - "that'll do for tea".

Bad (or just plain confusing)
Ragwort thou humble flower with tattered leaves
I love to see thee come & litter gold...
Thy waste of shining blossoms richly shields
The sun tanned sward in splendid hues that burn
So bright & glaring that the very light
Of the rich sunshine doth to paleness turn
& seems but very shadows in thy sight. John Clare, 1831

Now then, like many I suspect, I think of Ragwort as a poisonous plant that must be rooted out at all costs. Our 'lower field' has some ragwort growing and yesterday Ailsa and I went out and uprooted the ten or so plants we could find and sealed them into plastic bags and popped them in the bin. Good deed for the day.

Then this morning, I interneted to find the truth about what I should do with ragwort. (I often work like this - I'll do something and then check if I've done the right thing afterwards. A cleverer person (like Jussi) checks how to do something and then does it).

Well it seems all is not quite so clear cut. For a kick off there are lots of plants that look like ragwort - and therefore a bit of careful identification would have been in order. Secondly, up rooting is suggested by many as actually helping to spread the plant - although Defra does have it as a recommended control method if there's only a few plants.

Oh well. I did my best. Next summer I'll identify before acting and take more care over the uprooting part. Both Ailsa and I are fine this morning so I suspect the advice to wear layers of protective gear when handling them is a bit over stated.

Good
For me, pancakes should be light, and if you're lucky, crispy round the edges and served with nothing more than sugar and freshly squeezed orange and lemon juice in the rough proportion - how many oranges you have:how many lemons you have.

Jussi has an altogether different notion. She adds things to the pancakes as they are cooking - anything from potatoes to bacon and usually with lots of onions. Her pancakes tend to be darker, thicker and stodgier than mine and many a pancake day has been ruined by me coming home from work - all exhausted and stressed - and complaining about her pancakes.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Jussi has been completely consumed by looking after our new goats and getting to grips with what to do with all that milk and cheese and I have been getting grumpy about doing all the cooking and cleaning. So last night Jussi offered to kill two birds with one stone and cook pancakes made from goats milk. My reservations about her pancake skills were totally subsumed by the luxury of having a day off from cooking. All I had to do was harvest the mushroom (see above) and pick some dill, parsley and chard for the fillings.

Cooking, and especially timing the cooking - allowing for two trips to the goats either side of eating - is difficult. Jussi, who is pretty tired anyway with the stresses of learning animal husbandry and the rest, found the cooking of the pancakes very stressful. They were plonked afront of us with the challenging words "Just try and be nice about them OK?"

Well.......they were fantastic. I don't know if it was the goats milk, the fresh garden ingredients or the computer game Jussi played each time she put a pancake in the pan, but they turned out a real treat. I think I'll try goats milk yorkshire pudding for a toad in the hole tonight.

Jussi's latest cheese offering, which will be ready later today is Coulommiere. That'll be a Scottish coulommiere like. Not the French one which takes much longer to make. I can't find a web reference for the Scottish one and Jussi wont tell me what it's going to be like. Not sure how it will go with toad in the hole.

Phantom beginnings

Yesterday Ailsa was up at 6 to help feed the goats, back down the cottage for 7 to eat breakfast, back with the goats to help milking, back in the cottage by 8, in her school uniform and off to school at 8:30. What a hard working country lass she's being.

Only trouble is.........

At 9 we got a call from the school asking us what to do because, in fact, school doesn't open for another day. So the poor wee thing trudged home again.

Jussi and I felt guilty about this - but Ailsa was blaming herself because she had Monday 18th marked on her calendar as back to school day. Still we made a celebration of the extra days holiday and what a fine day it turned out to be.

Complementary planting my *rse (with a capital *)

The theory is that you plant nasturtiums by brassica and the cabbage white butterfly makes a bee line for the nasturtiums and you have happy cabbages.

Bollocks.

The practice is you plant nasturtiums by cabbages and said butterflies swarm to the cabbages. Those cabbages no where near the nasturtiums are fine.

The greatest success of the garden this year is chard. I'd never come across chard until I holidayed in Croatia a few years ago - but it's thriving here. Why don't Brits make more of this fantastic leaf (and stalk) vegetable? Maybe it's because chard is best served drowning, and I mean drowning in garlic.

Last night I made pasta with chard and tomato sauce, served, rather delectably, with dollops of goats milk crowdie. Tonight it will be chard and potato (and crowdie) moussaka. Well, when I say moussaka.....

Changing habitats

One unexpected result that may be related to climate change is the re-emergence of the tiger in England. I refer to Hull City of course. And they beat Fulham yesterday.

Now I've never been a Tigers fan but it is great to see them in action in the Premiership. I am a rugby league fan - and watching Hull FC in the Challenge Cup final is something I'm definitely looking forward to.

C(ghghghg)-Uuuu-M-on you Ulllll(aaaaaaaaagh).

Cutting carbon

The wait for the Guardian was so long I just plain gave up. Clearly this opens up a whole new route to carbon salvation. Shops should have a compulsory four hour waiting time between ordering and receiving goods. I reckon this would be particularly useful in fast food shops and would go a good way towards carbon and waist reduction.

The carbon impact of not buying a multi-section newspaper would be quite difficult to calculate - and unfortunately it would need to be off-set by me 'watching' the Olympics instead. I say watching - I slept. But I did wake in time to see that 100 metres final.

For more practical ideas (and quite fun some of them) for individual carbon reduction take a look at http://www.carbonrally.com/ and thanks to lamarguerite for the lead.

Weekend Treats

Yeah! It's a Saturday - the sun is blazing, and it looks set for the day - and there's a light wind to keep the midges down.

I've decided to treat myself to a Saturday Guardian this morning. I mean morning in the loosest sense of the word, given that morning papers don't arrive here until about 12:30. (Sunday papers on the other hand, arrive by 10am). It's 10 am now, I've been up since six, and the wait had better be worth it!

This all reminds of a conversation Stoney has been having with our man on Raasay about the nearness of emergency services. I came across this map which shows travelling time to our nearest hospital - and we are only in 30-45 minutes zone, which aint bad, though frankly you'd struggle to make that time without driving like a loony - especially in Summer when there's camper vans trundling along around every corner. Even then, that hospital doesn't look too well set up to deal with anything serious. I'm not complaining, and it was something we considered (briefly) before we moved here. But it is an aspect of rural life that people sometimes overlook.

Outdoor life

This morning Jussi said she was feeling all tense. I asked her if she was going camping. Oh how we laughed (well ok - not much actually).

After a pleasant morning the rain has now set in. It's the sort of rain that looks like it'll last a few days. Fortunately we got another trip to the beach in yesterday so the rain feels like a bit of a refreshment from the sun-bakedness we've had of late. I've got a bit of extra consultancy work to do and Jussi and Ailsa are planning a trip to Thurso for the weekly shop. I think Ailsa has big plans - she's been raiding her piggy bank again.

Sunrise 05:36 Sunset 21:04

Floods in Edinburgh and Dunbar and Fife, mud baths in Aberdeenshire - but we continue to have a fine summer. We've had just enough rain to not worry about watering the veg patch and plenty of warmth to make swimming in the sea a pleasure (the water is cold - you can warm up by rolling in the sand).

Even the flowers are cheering.

Ailsa goes back to school next week.

I've finished the consultancy work I was doing and the goats, although not fully settled, are getting into a routine. So what am I going to do next? I wont bore you with a list of possibilities - but there are many things to be done and many things I could do. Oh the opportunity. Oh the joy and the freedom.

Jussi has made a crowdie. (I can't find a decent web link to Crowdie - but it's a traditional cheese - claimed to be introduced by the Vikings - Jussi makes it with whole goats milk, not skimmed cows milk as most web references suggest it should be).

Apocalypse Now

I love the smell of goats breath in the morning. It's a smell beyond compare - all your worst school dinner cabbage nightmares come true.

Bonnie is not milking well. She doesn't like her milking stand for a start at it's my job, morning and evening, just before breakfast and just after tea, to sit at the cabbage end of her mollycuddling and feeding delicacies such as willow herb and sycamore branches to try and keep her occupied while Jussi does the milking. I fear for my fingers especially as my judgement is numbed by the clouds of digestive gasses I'm engulfed in.

As a smell, it's worse than the steaming reek of damp commuters on the 0738. As an experience it's far far better.

Still, to freshen up we all went swimming on Tuesday afternoon. It was fun playing in the surf but boy was it cold! This wasn't captured on film because Jussi wouldn't let me take the camera. Such a shy wee thing.

Nettles no more

Just an exuse for a goat piccy really - but this area used to be thick with nettles.

Bonnie's rack

The milking bench that Bonnie doesn't like. She kicked over her milk this morning so here it is after a washing down. Made from pallets by Jussi of course.

Work captain - but not as we know it

Tying up willow herb for drying. I mean it's a job to be done but especially on a day like today you can hardly call it work can you?








And once it's tied up it's hung to dry.

Big Sis

We had a very enjoyable weekend with Jenny here. In the main Jussi had things to do for the goats so Jen, Ailsa and I went off and explored lots of beaches and archaeology. I think Ailsa is getting the idea that archaeologists are strange people who look at piles of stones and speak gobbledegook - this is a contradiction to what I've taught her previously - which is that archaeologists spend their days sitting in pools of mud, in the pouring rain, singing Beatles songs (Balfarg 1985). But we did find a very nice homestead broch in the valley up behind Armadale House.

Of more interest to Ailsa was swimming in the sea - at every available opportunity. It was freezing - Jenny and I stayed wimpering in the sand dunes at the very thought.

It rained in Saturday so we went to Thurso to see Wall-E. A strange film - Jenny warmed to it's anti-consumerist message, I thought it tried too hard to be worthy and lost the fun it should have had, and Ailsa, in her 8 year old logic, thought it was just the saddest film she'd ever seen.

Piccies were on Jenny's camera and we didn't have a cable that fitted to download them - sorry.

And thanks for the meal on Sunday Jen.

Cheese ahoy

Sorry this was eaten before piccies could be taken. But Jussi used the first lots of milk to make a curd cheese (like cream cheese only crumblier cos it's not had cream added, apparently). She made 6 flavours - garlic, garlic and herb, plain, black pepper, paprika and herb. And very fab they were too.

We had it for lunch yesterday, on sourdough, and tea, on baked potatoes. Tonight we'll probably be having it with corn on the cob, or with chard and pasta.

Yesterdays milk is currently becoming yoghurt. So I need to think of imaginative ways of eating lots of yoghurt. (Hanging up-side-down with feet tied to the rafters perhaps? Too kinky probably).

This morning Bonnie kicked over her milking bucket and all that beautiful milk was wasted. This put Jussi in a bad mood - but I'm quietly relieved cos it's one less goat milk product to worry about how to cook. But that's very bad of me.

Wild food

Rosebay willow herb - aka fire weed. Goats love it and it's now in flower and we are collecting as much as we can. It's quite scary feeding it to goats, who want to rip it up by the roots - even when you're handing it to them. Currently we are using it to lure Bonnie on to the milking bench - a contraption she is taking rather a long time to get used to.

Surpluses are being hung from the rafters to dry - they'll make for a wee treat in the long winter months ahead. What I didn't realise is that humans can eat it too. I doubt Jussi would allow us to deprive the goats though.

So far we've harvested a couple of car loads. If the weather changes this week we might go down to the forestry between Altnaharra and Lairg and get us a van full. (The weather just now is very still - and even when bright and sunny as it is this morning the midges are in full party mode.)

at the feedstore

"And I'd like a sack of alfalfa as well please"
"What sort of alfalfa?"
"What sort have you got?"
"Forage, cereal, nuts"
"Oh I'm not sure - not nuts though - forage I think"
"What's it for?"
"Goats"
"You'll want alfalfa then"
"Yeah that's what I asked for"

Beauties

Ok people here are piccies of the new goats. Gorgeous Anglo Nubians.

The black one is Bonnie, and he youngster is Flavia. Ailsa and Flavia seem to have formed an instant bond.

They haven't settled in properly yet - Bonnie has to work out her place in the hierarchy. The other goats are looking upon them with deep suspicion.

But look at those udders. Lot's a milk which once we have a clean milking area sorted, will be getting made into cheese. (For personal use - there's much more to do before we can start selling it).

Wild Life Park

Ailsa is delighted by the state of the cabbage patch. Tickled with glee she comes out with all sorts of "Aw" "Cute" and "Cuddly" sort of noises. And I'm not allowed to pick all of them off....

Meanwhile my mum has sent me a collection of booklets on organic gardening. I read the one on slugs with great interest and discovered that slugs are useful and that there are carnivorous slugs that eat other slugs. The book is full of helpful hints about controlling slugs - but the message I took away is 'give up you'll never win'. Actually the coffee grinds seem to be doing the trick - I can't claim to be slug free, but I'm getting quite partial to the extra je ne sais quoi they add to lettuce salad.

We have a very rare species of bumble bee nesting in the garden.

The main cucumber plant now has three leaves - the biggest of which is almost as big as just a bit under half my thumb. But the dill isn't going to waste. A couple of nights ago I forgot to put a bag of frozen peas back in the freezer. So last night we had pea soup made with parsley and lots of dill from the garden. It was delish.

Jussi is away at the Black Isle show today. She had hoped to be there for a couple of days but Margo's mastitis put paid to that. I think she intends to spend buckets of money on things I'll turn my nose up at and say we don't need, and collect an Anglo Nubian milker and a kid. We about to drown in milk. And our diet will become goats cheese (omelette, pie, en croissant, con pan tomate, au naturelle, en croute, provencale, in vivo, you get the point). I might also attempt goats milk soap sometime down the line, but not for eating obviously.

I'm busy (well ok I'm not really - but I will be soon) tidying the house cos big sister Jen is coming to stay for a few days.....

Margo

Margo is a Saanen, mother of Matilda. When we collected her on Sunday the previous owner milked her before we left. There was clearly a problem - clots in the milk. The previous owner didn't seem too worried.

But milking Margo has been difficult and yesterday Jussi was in Thurso and so checked in at the vets to ask their advice. Their diagnosis was mastitis which needed treating immediately. So Jussi returned with a heap of pharmaceuticals.

Treatment goes like this. We put a collar on Margo which I grip and then with my legs I push her into a wall to keep her still. This is so we can 'milk' her and this degree of force is needed because having mastitis is making the milking uncomfortable. Yesterday we had to give her an intramuscular shot of antibiotics. Jussi had seen the vet do this to Gwendolyn, and we also have a video showing how to do it and with the war cry "I am my father's daughter" (Jussi's father is a doctor) she plunges the syringe in. I was pinning the goat so I couldn't move and Jussi waving the hyperdermic about was quite scary.

Then we have to insert a syringe (no needles this time) up the teat and squirt in another antibiotic solution. This is very difficult, not least because the application is made for cows and I think they have bigger teats - but so far Jussi has been reasonably successful and is getting better at it. I asked Ailsa to take piccies of all this but all she managed was a few interesting piccies of assorted bottoms.

After all this unwelcome attention we molly cuddle her for a bit and give her some treats.

The milk we got this morning was better than we got last night - so the antibiotics are doing the job and all should be fine by the end of the week.

G+3 A bit of a routine

So it's a bit early to claim we have a fully embedded routine - but here is the outline, written especially for all those on the 07:38 Dunbar to Edinburgh commuter tin. This photo diary was compiled by Ailsa - who has an interesting idea of what is photogenic.

Jussi's alarm goes at 6 - minutes before our second alarm which is a cockerel alarm clock banished to the bathroom but we can still hear it. Jussi and Ailsa get up and go off to feed and water the goats. I stay in bed.

Around 7 they return all hungry and worker-looking and I toddle down and force a cup of tea into me while they wolf their breakfasts.

Around 8 we all go up to do the "milking". As you see above it's not really milking at the moment but we are getting something akin to milk which is thrown away. Then we get the older goats into the same house as the goatlings and release them to the fields - they are invariably reluctant to go to the fields so there is a fair amount of coaxing and cajoling which would no doubt cripple an experienced farmer with mirth.

Then there's always a few odd jobs to do - Ailsa tidies, this morning Jussi and I re-arranged some hurdles, and usually I walk the perimeter of the electric fence to check all is OK - but I forgot about this this morning.

Around 9 we return to the cottage - Jussi makes a heavenly coffee and we settle to check emails etc. Ailsa whines a lot and gets to watch the telly for a while. Sometime around 9:30 Jussi will exclaim "Where the feck are the builders"

Later Jussi will go up to make something - this morning it's fitting feeding racks for the new goats coming tomorrow, and I will settle to do some of the consultancy work I've got at the moment. That's about as far as the routine goes - though something similar is shaping up in the evening.

I might miss Lennie's bacon rolls, but this beats the shit out of commuting and sitting in an office all day long. I mean hands down.

Too many vitamins

Jussi came back to the cottage about 11:30 - demanding an early lunch. She was quickly distracted by emails - sending "We've got goats!" messages to random friends. By 12:30 I was getting hungry and as Jussi was engrossed in her laptop I decided to go up to the garden and pick us some fresh lettuce (I had plans for marmite, peanut butter and lettuce on sourdough - yum!).

I also checked the goats. And there was 'sickly' Gwendolyn standing looking bemused on the wrong side of a bedraggled electric fence.

So lunch was postponed while Gwendolyn was re-united with her pals and the electric fence repaired.

But how the hell did it happen? It took her less than an hour for to escape and we cant figure out how she did it. And unless we know what happened we can't take preventative measures.

Ailsa is on the case - she's taken her lunch and a couple of Asterix books up to the croft so she can sit and watch the goats. I've suggested that she needs to take up playing the flute - then she can spend all day serenading them. It would make for a quieter life for me anyway.

Slowly they venture forth

Today, Ailsa is wearing a jumper designed knitted by Jussi. The design is reminiscent of the colours of the Sutherland hills in Autumn.

The goats were quite shy of their new surroundings - and it was their first ever contact with an electric fence which did little to settle them. But they are out and enjoying the nettles. They'll be gambolling in no time.

Goatlings

We have 4 goatlings - I can't name them yet, but the black ones are British Alpines and all have names derived from Gwendolyn, and the white - a Saanen - has a name derived from Margo (Ailsa insists on referring to Margo as Mango - after a Mii I created (on the Wii for those who don't know). One day I'll post a picture of Mango.

Gwendolyn

The vet looked at the off-colour Gwendolyn and confirmed travel tetany. He also noted Jussi's colour - very clearly a bit new and green and prescribed calcium and magnesium, vitamin and broad spectrum antibiotic. We await the bill. I strongly object to the routine use of antibiotics and might have questioned this had I been there (instead of blogging!).

However - here she is half an hour later already looking much better - and fit for some adventure.

G + 1

Day one of the goats and Jussi and Ailsa were up and 6 to go off and make sure they'd settled in. Of course they hadn't. The old matriarch - Gwendolyn - was unhappy, not eating and distinctly unhappy looking. We think this is transit tetany, the cure of which involves a huge sub-cutaneous injection of calcium and magnesium (not the pure metals....). Jussi phoned the previous owner - the advice was a banana, bread and call the vet.

Jussi is delighted that Gwendolyn likes sour-dough bread. I think they'll get along just fine.

And then there's the vet - who I think I've just heard drive up - so I'll go see how that's going. And I'll remember the camera too. I think I'll then begin a new series of postings called "vet bills".

G day

Up at 6, away by 7 for the long drive into darkest Aberdeenshire. When we arrived all I wanted was a cup of tea - but we had feeding troughs to dismantle, a van to load with feed and hay and feed bins and frightening-looking medical machinery. Then we had to empty a couple of goats of milk (also called milking I guess), tag the goatlings and and. Eventually I got a wee cuppa while the paperwork was sorted. Then the goats were loaded onto the trailer and home we not quite sped.

In all this excitement the camera stayed in the van (sorry!).

As a quick aside, I need to sing the praises of the van - it coped superbly with what was a heavy heavy load. ("La la la laaaah la la"). Good. Done that.

I'd been a bit nervous of towing - I've never done it before - but it was a doddle. The worst bit was having a police car behind us for about 10 miles. I wasn't sure if the speed limit far a van towing is 40 or 50 - so I stuck to 45 and they didn't bother us. The hardest part of the journey was was circumnavigating Elgin. The town signs proudly pronounces: "Elgin - making an impression". I'd like to suggest a change to that, it should be "Elgin - making you dizzy". Sooo many roundabouts. As I was a long van towing I decided the best way of negotiating roundabouts was to make full use of every available lane. I think somewhere inside of me there's a budding trucker.

I even managed to reverse a couple of times.

When we got back we had to transfer the goats from the trailer to the stables. This went virtually without incident - only two out of the six managed to escape.......

Friday night 9

It's gala week so the pub was heavin'. We were just getting into the swing when we were called away due to a largely imaginary attack of illness on our daughter. Honestly!

Anyway -- Grrrr. There was no Friday night.

Today there has been more gala-ing - a grand procession of five floats lead by a troop of bagpipers and then all sorts of fun and games in the school field. Our friendly mohican was dressed as a nurse complete with fishnet stockings. It was fun and I was better at archery and haggis throwing than Jussi. There's much more tomorrow but unfortunately we'll miss it as tomorrow is truly G Day........And we think we're ready for 'em. It's sooo exciting!

Truly madly goatly

All stops are out for getting ready for G day. The weather has come in but it's not too bad. We have a working electric fence and Jussi is making doors and bits and bobs like a mad doors and bits and bobs thingy. Meanwhile I've accepted some consultancy work - it's a lot to do in a short time scale, but money is money and at this stage in the business I have to take on anything that comes my way.

The really good news is that Ailsa has a sleep over tonight so there will be a Friday night in the pub. Looking forward to it. The campsite is looking full so there's a chance of some exotic specimens to offset the usual suspects.

New roof for the goats (2)

So here it is! There's a gable end to finish but it looks like a roof eh?

I can proudly claim to have helped to build this - I passed the box profile sheets up to David to attach - a very important job I'll have you know.

I'm posting a picture of how it looked in September last year - real progress (but a slightly depressing reminder that it's not always hot and sunny here!). The shot looking inside features on of Jussi's magnificent doors.

Things are looking good for goats on Sunday. Meanwhile I've taken on some consultancy work which Jussi aint over-joyed about and my underpants keep falling down. Is this because the elastic is spent or because I'm losing weight?

And Jussi has been forwarding me messages from a guy in Caithness who's got some piglets for sale (saddleback x largeblack). I'm torn over this - surely it would be a mistake to take on pigs on top of goats at the same time - too much learning to cope with all a once? But then again we'd manage wouldn't we? And have some fabulous pork/ham/sausage for the winter. The jury is still out on this one - what should I do what should I do?

In and around Wick

We headed off in the van and spent most of the day running messages for friends and buying more kit for goats. Bleedin' expensive all this animal husbandry stuff ye know.

We also visited another goat keeper. I've met a few now. They are all mad.

When Ailsa got bored of being in the van she was given the camera so here is a picture of Wick, and of a small wind farm outside Thurso (with apologies for the fly-splattered windscreen).

Snaehoha

Hidden in nearly every clump of grass around the croft is some old piece of machinery. Its a joy to unbury them and wonder.

I reckon this magnificent beast - named Snaehoha by Ailsa - was a turnip shredder to open neeps and the like for feeding to animals. It has lost it's plunger - but I wouldn't have thought it would be too difficult repair and we will if ever we need to. It is a magnificent looking thing.

We are bringing together a vast amount of scrap iron as a result of unearthing these tools of crofting past. One day, I tell myself somewhat foolishly, I will build a wind sculpture out of it all. It will clang away all night and frighten off all the ghosties, whilst providing a sort of aural security blanket - once we're accustomed to the din that is.

New roof for the goats

Here is a not so particularly useful picture of David the joiner putting on a new roof for the middle of our three outbuildings. This will be finished by the weekend (despite the thunderstorm we are currently enjoying - though I doubt David is). This level of joinery is far too advanced for Jussi (and me - but then I'm not far short of useless anyway).

Jussi spent yesterday making beds for the goats out of pallets. We can get used pallets free from Allens of Gillock, and you can make anything from a good supply of old pallets. At least Jussi can. I'd hoped Ailsa would take piccies of Jussi's work - but her feet are far more interesting.

Fences

One of the people who have promised us goats visited on Sunday - they seemed happy enough with the set-up we have here, and had lots of useful suggestions about how to improve things. It looks as though we are on for the goats and on Sunday we'll make the 8+ hour round trip to Aberdeenshire to pick up 2 saanens and 4 british alpines.

Unsurprisingly the fencers haven't come up with the goods but we have 200m of electric fencing as back up. There's four wires here and as we were putting in the bottom level I was saying to Ailsa that I should really cut back the undergrowth before we lay this wire - but I didn't.

Then I decided that I needed to cut back the undergrowth (which otherwise shorts the fence) and got out the strimmer. I would say I was almost 1/4 of the way round before the strimmer caught the fence and mangled it. Then I had to dismantle the strimmer to get all the wire out of it, and splice the shredded fencing back together.

Note to self: - I really don't have to be quite so completely stupid. I knew it would happen and it did and it took an hour or so to undo the damage caused.

"What can I do?"

Oh the joys of school holidays. Ailsa was bored so I sent her out with the camera and asked her to take some record shots of how things are progressing. She took over 50 pics - 22 of them of her feet. The next four posts feature the useful piccies. Here are some thistles - we've yet to try to eat them.

Her best friend has returned from hols to discover they have chicks - so Ailsa spent all day Sunday ferrying them around (completely unnecessarily by the sounds of it), falling in mud and being attacked by what Ailsa calls gad flies (we call them clegs or horse flies). Yesterday she helped me to put up the electric fence.

"Daddy, when you lie on your back in the water like that, your nipples look like udders"

There - proof we went swimming yesterday - I couldn't make a comment like that up.

It was great fun and we spent nearly two hours in the water. The water was warm in places and freezing in others. And we finished it off with a fish supper. Fab.

Crops

We've had a good crop of visitors this week - Struan and Grannie Denise from Dunbar and Wick on Thursday, a neighbour last night to help with a grant application and Rowanne and family from Dunbar today. And a good smattering of trades people getting things moving on the croft for good measure. And the weather has been perfect - hot and sunny with a warm warm breeze. In fact today it is too hot to be outside just now so I'm in hiding until late afternoon when I'm hoping we'll all go off to the beach and get some of that North Sea swimming experience.

Hopefully the weather will stay tomorrow when we are expecting one of the people who have offered us goats to visit. They want to assess our set-up to make sure the goats are coming to a good home. Fingers crossed for that one - although there is still the spectre of the outbreak of goaty TB to scunner these plans.

Cleaning walls

These are the walls Jussi has been cleaning down. A nasty job indubitably.

But we have a wee problem - this end wall of the three outbuildings collapsed after the old roof was taken off in preparation for a new roof. One step forward two steps back - but remember, the man who made time made plenty of it.

Heraldry

When we are hugely successful and world renowned we will have a coat of arms made. It will feature rampant thistles, cucumber passant and invisible goats.

But lo - the cotyledonous leaves are leaving - these are real leaves man! We'll have cucumbers before the end of the world. The eagle eyed amongst you will spot that there are in fact two thriving cucumber plants in this picture. Riches!

Well done Lulu and Christian

Jussi has had a bit of a rough time over the last week - with all sorts of conflicting messages about the arrival/non arrival of goats and battling to get trades in to do much needed work in preparation for said goats. Of course trades the world over have a motto "There's no hurry - the man who made time made plenty of it" - but up here they've really taken this to heart. Things are coming together, and reasonably quickly - but it all feels so agonisingly slow if you happen to be in a hurry.

Lulu and Christian leapt forth and rushed in as Jussi's moral support. Although Jussi took care to visit the bottle bank before I got home, there is enough evidence to suggest that alcohol played a fair part in that supporting activity. As did a very creamy fish pie the cooking vessel which I somehow ended up washing up.

So thanks to you for the support, the bespoiling of the thistle party, the straw, and for not being too thirsty and leaving a fair few tinnies for my refreshment.

Someone has been reading my diary

I've been on holiday, and someone knew about this in advance and told all their friends about it so that they could party madly while I was away. Personally I think it was the thistles what did it and they recruited lots of support to binge on my garden - including buttercups, dog rose and the ever pervasive ground elder.

Sunrise 04:51, Sunset 21:54

I'm back - and boy is it hot up here. Fabtastic. I've got loads to update you with and the return of the camera will mean there'll be piccies to enhance the whole experience.

But I've just had a call from a consultancy firm asking if they can add me to a team they are pulling together for a tender. Of course I said yes - which is why, on this glorious day, I'm sat in front of my laptop rather than being outside - and why am I blogging instead of doing the little bit of preparatory work they've asked me for? Mmmmm

Delays

There have been some delays. Most importantly, the goats are delayed. I just had a call from a new goat-keeping friend to say that there's an outbreak of TB in goats so movement may be restricted for a while. So - no goats tomorrow.

The joiner was coming to put a new roof on the stable yesterday, but he got delayed because he had to finish off something else first. He offered to do it today, but he was keen to go to the Caithness Show in Thurso and I didn't have the heart to make him work instead, especially since the goats are not coming yet. He'll be here on Monday (fingers crossed).

The fencing, of course is not done yet either, but at least the materials are here and everything is ready to go as soon as the grant application is put in and approved. That's assuming I can get hold of the fencer.

Meanwhile, I've started clearing up the main stable. I've moved all the wood I (and the previous owner) had hoarded in there, taken out all the mucky stuff and started on brushing off the walls. It's starting to look good and it's a cracking Plan B if the roofing is delayed some more. And I have restored power to the croft! Simon's demolition work had left a lot of the wiring frayed, but now it's all lovely and safe again. The joiner will be pleased when (if?) he turns up. And I can use my new power-washer to clean the stables!

Neighbours

Jussi here - my first post! I couldn't leave you guys hanging like that, wondering whether the bale is still in the van etc., so here goes.

The bale is not in the van anymore! I called our favorite neighbour, and right enough, he had a tractor with a loader sitting in his shed. Said neighbour is working, so he couldn't come and help. He asked if I had driven a tractor (no) and whether Simon is around (no!), so he got another lovely neighbour lined up to help. First thing this other neighbour arrived with the tractor and got the bale out. Sorted. I was happy. But that wasn't enough for him. The next day I was expecting a delivery of fencing materials, 1/2 lorry load's worth of materials. I had been warned that the drivers would swear a lot if they had to unload the lot by hand, so I was keen to keep the tractor. But the tractor was nearly out of diesel. So the neighbour drove the tractor all the way over to his place, put some more diesel in, and brought it all the way back. And all that before going offshore in the afternoon!

Lovely neighbours.

The fencing stuff arrived the next day and they managed to unload it fine. The tractor didn't help as much as I'd hoped and there was a bit of swearing, but nothing too bad.

Back at the croft

Jussi is working her guts out.  Today she's been to Gillock and bought a van full of stuff including roofing materials for the goat shelter - this will be fitted on Friday.  On top of the roofing material is a giant bale of straw she managed to buy near Wick.  But how to get it out?  She's thinking of tying a rope around it and driving away.   But she's trying to find a neighbour with a forklift to help her out.

Oh and she's bought feed and feed bins and all sorts of other bits..... she even found some free pallets - something she has a wee bit of an obsession about...

She might get round to blogging - I'll do my best to find ways of blogging if she's too busy - or knackered as she is now - to keep you up to date.

Art attack

Ailsa and I are in Hull and so far we've managed to go to Hornsea - decided it was too windy to row on the mere but we had fun in the sea and fantastic fish and chips ( the best ever!) and mushy peas of course.

Today we've been at the Yorkshire sculpture park.  Great fun - lots of room for Ailsa to run about - but unfortunately she walked Ted into a Sophie Ryder sculpture and he know has a very nasty looking cut on his nose (Ted is blind - Ailsa was leading him and was a bit too enthusiastic about the approaching art.

The Deep tomorrow.

Soooo busy

That I can spend a couple of hours catching up on others blogs. Here's a veg patch to die for...

And another post from the same blog - these guys are totally strapped for cash but still manage to hold to their principles. I think we might have to do some thinking about how much we compromise our ideals. Then again shopping locally would nigh on double our food bills and we still wouldn't be buying local produce, and we'd lose a lot in quality and variety.

api.home

This blog is getting quite a few referrals from "api.home". Can anyone tell me what this is?

Panic

The trip to Inverness went well - though I seem to have got a bit of Ness's revenge (a bit like Montezuma). The van now has a tow bar - what a proud moment - if only Jussi hadn't taken the Camera to Hamburg I could fill the blog with stunning tow bar piccies.

Tomorrow I go to Edinburgh, then on to Hull then Durham returning late July. And there's so much to do today. The place is a tip.

I'll not be blogging for a couple of weeks - but there's a lot happening while I'm away and I've invited Jussi to keep you up to date with the grand arrival of GOATS! Can't promise she will - she'll be busy like. And she'll be panicking like something that panics a lot and is really funny but I can't think anything just now.

I'll leave you with this little thought provoking thought from Tom Waits who's currently trying to shake the cottage down curtesy of a very loud iPod - (one of the very great joys of living no where near anyone):

When you hear sweet syncopation
And the music softly moans
T'aint no sin
to take off your skin
and dance around in your bones.

How many degrees of sad git?

I watched a prog on the box last night about Anthony Minghella (he who wrote and directed Truly Madly Deeply, The English Patient, The Talented Mr Ripley etc).

The most startling fact about him was that he went to Hull University (no really). While he was there he developed a friendship with the playwright Alan Plater. Now my mate John's mum was a close friend of Alan Platers and I often used to have quick hello's with him. This puts me two degrees of separation from Jude Law, Juliettte Binoche, Alan Rickman, Juliet Stevenson, Nicole Kidman, Gwyneth Paltrow, Matt Damon and.......in fact I almost feel like I live in Hollywood, where, instead of re-heated curried mould, I could be eating like this. (Well LA is almost Hollywood innit!)

But I guess as claims to fame go it's not that good. Not as good as my mate Tagd's mum who used to share a river boat in Paris with that woman from Planet Gong.

Which reminds me that I always meant to tell you that it is really weird driving across the flow country, windows wound down with Gong blasting out.

The original meaning of weird is: "having the power to control destiny".

Integrity x 3

That soup didn't sound so nice did it? Well I wrote the recipe before I didn't cook it. I didn't cook it cos I found a jar of curry paste and so I made a curry from exactly those ingredients - I fried the spuds to accompany it - and it was wonderful. Most intoxicating. It'll be even better tonight.

I finished the work I was doing for Changeworks. Well I didn't exactly finish it - more I've stopped doing it. A bit dissatisfying really - I'd have much rather got it closer to completion, and I seem to have spent a lot of time researching and thinking and only written a few (tens of thousands of) words. Now I'm at a complete loss as to what to do..........

So I rushed out and chased the remaining sheep off our land and restored the fence where they'd been getting in. I have to be early in the morning to go to Inverness - I fully expect our fields to be full of sheep. But hopefully not - and the grass will have a couple of weeks to recover before the goats arrive.

Emergency food

I'm running low and don't want to shop until I go to Inverness on Thursday. (I'll go to Tesco - they've kindly sent me a £4 voucher (if I spend over £40) and a 5p off per litre of fuel voucher too.

So here is my emergency food for tonight.

Smelly pink Potato and Spinach soup
INGREDIENTS
A bowl of boiled potatoes found hiding at the back of the fridge
4 or 5 spinach plants. Chopped very finely- the stalks are getting a bit woody.
Half a yellow pepper - be sure to discard the squidgy bits around the edge.
A tomato
A couple of onions - those two will do - it's only soup.
A bulb of garlic - if you've got it use it.
Stock cubes herbs and spices as the whim takes you.
Cheese
Oooh look there's some celery left as well

METHOD

1. Throw the tomato away - it's too far gone.
2. Do your best to chop the onion - but be careful soft slippery onions are dangerous. Chuck them in a large pan with butter/oil to fry off
3. Peel as much as the garlic as you can be bothered with and add to the onions
4. Chop the pepper and chuck it in along with the chopped celery - you can do this one handedly with a bit of practice.
   
5. Add to the pan the white bits of the potato - greeny blue or furry bits can go in the compost along with the tomato, the edge of the pepper and the blood stained onion skin.
6. Add a random selection of stock cubes, herbs and spices - but not too much of that one! Oh dear.
7. Add water.
8. Finely grate the cheese. Pay particular attention to the really hard bits - you've lost enough blood already - and they are surprisingly difficult to dissolve.
9. Add the spinach
10. Whizz up with a whizzer
11. Add the cheese and stir until you get bored of waiting for the hard bits to dissolve - a good tooth brush should get them off your teeth later
12. If, after all, you decide you have the courage to investigate the white fuzzy lump in the freezer and it turns out to be peas - add them and boil for a bit longer. If it turns out to be salt cod, think very, very carefully.
13. Best served in a clean bowl (the last one!)
    
14. Allow to cool while you have a good big dram of the cheapest whisky (which is all that's left). It'll cushion the blow.

I hope you laughed. In a few weeks I'll have perfected this recipe, maybe it'll help to recession proof me.

What an extraordinary recession! Surely we've never had a recession before that smashed into us with so little warning? Many of us have wondered for years how the credit card economy was going to end - I wonder if we're about to find out.

The third leaf (2)

Bizarrely the third leaf so joyously reported yesterday was a mirage. Looks like I'll have to wait a bit longer for those cucumbers.

Perhaps I'm hallucinating - a product of being on my own for so long. There are a number of other strange things happening which I believe to be related to the absence of Jussi.

Most obviously is the sink - it seems to be filling with dirty dishes - and the area around the television is getting pretty tricky to navigate around too. Normally this doesn't happen. Even when I put the water heater on so there's a tank of piping hot water....those minging dishes just don't go away.

And then there's clothes. I did a wash five days ago and hung it out on the line to dry and it's still wet! When Jussi hangs out washing she brings it in a couple of hours later all crisp and dry. I don't get it - I must be doing something wrong.

And then there's food. I seem to be running out.

The third leaf

I deserve a drink. A celebratory toast. One of my cucumber plants has developed a third leaf. I can't show you a piccy cos Jussi has the camera - but rest assured it's almost as big as the original two. They do look sad though - patchy and white, still - I'll be catching up with Liz in no time.

But I'll hold off brewing vinegar for now.

Sunrise 04:21, Sunset 22:21

But I'm still refusing to need any lights when I go to bed - and so far only a few bruises to show for it.

Ellie and Kier visited on Saturday. They left again on Sunday morning, just enough time for a tour of the policies, excessive alcohol and to nurture a lust in Kier for a wii.

I was supposed to be working on Sunday but somehow managed to spend most of the day watching the grand prix and Wimbledon. Bad Bad Boy! I'm working better today though - and I'm expecting it to be a zero human contact day (although I briefly saw a neighbour on Saturday and he's promised a visit sometime this week to talk fencing).

Human Contact 2

I know this doesn't really count, but I've just had a visit from a young, jolly and enthusiastic couple. Jehovah's Witnesses. I mean Pulease!

Unfortunately I was in the middle of working and didn't really want to be disturbed, which now they've gone I somewhat regret. They were fresh faced young things and it would have been fun to have a cup of tea with them I think. And work is driving me nuts anyway. Still I sent them off with a smile on their faces (one smile, two faces. Mmmm).

I've spent most of my life having little time for religious people. I used to think that belief in an almighty was an abdication of human responsibility. I'm much less judgmental now and attach greater importance to the spiritual and the humility of deference to a spiritual existence.

But then again, Jehovah's Witnesses are loonies.

Friday night

Advance notice - there'll be no Friday night. In fact today looks like it's a zero human contact day - not even the postie. Of course I was spoilt yesterday - postie and a trip to the shop and a phone call with Tom.

But I'll have visitors tomorrow. Ooh!

Human Contact

Actually contact with any living thing apart from flies and woodworm beetles (under strict instruction from Jussi to squish them on sight) would be welcome. Although there's the cats of course.

Jussi phoned from Hamburg yesterday - the only human contact. It's hot there - that kind of hot where everything grinds to a halt about noon. After a lunch of potatoes and green sauce followed by ice cream and red sauce - you go off and hide in cool shade at the bottom of the garden with the mosquitos and rotting plums. Around 4pm out comes the gin and you cool off with gin lime and ice. Nice. Happy Birthday Elizabeth (yesterday).

Those sauces don't translate so well. Green sauce is sour cream with all kinds of fresh summer herbs and chopped boiled eggs - it is amazing. And red sauce is basically summer fruit puree - equally fantastic (and not in the least basic - Elizabeth purees all the fruits by hand - it's a big job, but then she does go for industrial quantities).

I reckon yesterday was the hottest day we've had here. The mercury must have soared into the high teens - and it was coupled with a really balmy westerly which is what made the biggest difference. And I might not have those sauces but I'm cooking with celery (an ingredient banned by Jussi). Yesterday was celery simply braised with garlic, peppers, garlic, tomato, garlic, onion, garlic, potato, a pork chop and garlic and cabbage.

Today human contact will come in the shape of a phone call from Tom at Changeworks. Later I might go to the post office and refill our electricity stick (Scottish Hydro have given us a new meter - we don't have power cards anymore, we have a stick - doesn't sound like progress does it?). But I'd rather save the trip to the post office until tomorrow. Don't want to spoil myself.

sunrise 04:14, sunset 22:25

Hold on tight! My readership is falling off. This is because I am neglecting the blog.

Chestnuts
There's lots of reasons for this - but mainly it's because I'm trying to focus on a big piece of work I'm doing for Changeworks. I delude myself that if I don't blog I'll get more work done. So far it's not quite working that way but I still have high hopes. Another reason for the lack of blogging is a crisis of confidence over what the blog is - is it a public diary, a social commentary, inane and perhaps amusing ramblings - or what?

Anyway, Jussi and Ailsa are away in Hamburg leaving me here 'to get more work done' - ah that old chestnut again.

Sporting Heroes
The weather is glorious, I'm watching Wimbledon for the first time in decades - and thoroughly enjoying it - and wondering if I'll speak to anyone today. Yesterday human contact came in the form of a delivery driver.

I'm amused by the fuss over Andy Murray's remarks about not supporting England. For any English readers please be assured that a Scot who supports any English sporting endeavour is a very rare thing. It's in their blood. It's not so much that they like to see England lose (well sometimes maybe) it's just more that they prefer to see the other team win.

I had a similar problem during the football over that last couple of weeks. Obviously I was supposed to want Germany to win. But as hard as I tried I always found a reason to want their opponents to win. Many English people will understand that - they just need to take those feelings and transpose them to Scotland and they might understand Andy Murray's comments.