Monday 29 June 2009

Summer delights







Maybe I'm still a bit loved up from my virtual weekend at Glastonbury but I really really am enjoying the summer. The weather is absolutely superb and the veg patch is doing us real proud. So far we are only really eating thinnings, but in the last couple of weeks we've hardly had a meal without some contribution from the veg patch.

The time input is pretty significant though - weeds grow considerably better than veg - and we've only had a couple of days of rain since Easter, so there's lots of watering to be done. The last few nights I've set out to water around 10:30pm - which is a joy in itself - with technicolor skies over gently shimmering seas. On Saturday I remembered to take the camera - the sky was uncapturable - but here is a homage to the garden. The light's a bit strange, but it was nearing midnight.

Festivals

Gawd! Am I glad I didn't go the Glastonbury this year. It's a good idea to avoid festival with too good a line up on too many stages. I mean how would you choose between a re-formed Blur and a re-energised The Prodigy? No, better to stay at home glued to the telly into the wee hours letting the Beeb select the best bits from all the performers, with a bottle of whisky and a sense of wonder.

Oat tails

Ok - so that should be oat tales - but the pun amused me. Did you know that wild oats - the seeds, walk across soil? It's a dispersal mechanism powered by fluctuations in moisture levels. But I digress.

How is it - you phone at 8 in the morning and ask if you can make the 50 mile or so trip to pick up straw and oats and arrange to meet in the farm yard around 11, you get there, load up with straw and ask about the oats to be told there's none left, they were sold for milling a couple of weeks ago? How difficult would it have been to mention this at 8 in the morning?

It seems to be a Highland trait - an unwillingness to disappoint, or to delay disappointing until the last possible moment. Sometimes it feels very close to deceit, lying indeed, but I don't think it is a malevolence, it is more a wish to appear to be being helpful.

But on this occasion it brought forth something close to panic. Jussi had left it til the last minute to get the oats, knowing that we had an arrangement with this farmer to take all the oats he had (now that is getting closer to deceit, or betrayal perhaps). It's summer, late in the oat year as it were, and very few farms have stocks of oats available for sale. Said farmer, in a fit of genuine helpfulness, or remorse, suggested a few places we could try, and even tried to phone a couple.

With the spectre of having to face a host of hungry goats that evening we set off in earnest. As we neared our first lead the van started to massively overheat. It was turning out to be a grim day indeed. But we limped on and arrived at a rather splendid farm, scattered with rare breed animals. Timidly we enquired as to their oat situation. Yes they have oats - about 125 tonne - and yes we can have some - and we're very lucky - they should have been sold already but 'they' had not turned up to collect it - and yes they can put some aside for us to keep us going through the summer - and yes here is a watering can of water for the van - and no there's no need to pay for the oats now, we'll settle next time.

phew

Saturday 27 June 2009

Amputations

Jussi's laptop died a few weeks ago - but she now has a shiny new thing wizz bang whallop. PCs are cheap I'll say that.

My laptop is in need of repair - looks like it's going to cost the best part of £300. But of more concern to you is that blogging may slow down a bit. And guess what - to get my laptop fixed I have to send it to Edinburgh.

Thursday 25 June 2009

Scotland leads the way

Yesterday the Scottish Government enacted legislation committing Scotland to cut it's carbon dioxide emissions by 43% (on 1990 levels) by 2020. It sounds astonishing, but it is no more than is needed if we are to prevent the worst excesses that climate change promises.

Three cheers for Scotland and everyone who worked so hard to to the the bill through.

Meanwhile, back in the USA, campaigners are struggling to get a bill through that will see green house gas emissions cut by around 20% (on 2005 levels) by 2020. US campaigners are proclaiming world leading status for the bill. I don't think so.

Not only is the 20% target measly, but it's baseline is too high. From 1990 to 2005 US greenhouse gas emissions rose by 16% - so the US target would get it back to a little below 1990 levels. So you can see just how brave and monumental the Scottish target is.

But Scotland is such a tiny country. We need the USA to take the lead and be much braver and bolder. We need the USA to be able to go to Copenhagen in December with the moral authority to push for much bolder targets across the globe. So far they are failing miserably*.

And for a bit of context:
Per capita tonnes carbon dioxide emissions (2004)
  • 20.4 - USA
  • 9.8 - UK (Scotland is on a par, but slightly less)
  • 9.8 - Germany
  • 3.8 - China
  • 6.7 - World average

And remember that a great deal of the China total includes all the manufacturing it does to supply Western markets with consumer goods. This is why it is fallacy to point to Chinese coal fueled power stations. Climate Change is caused by Western excesses and it is we who must change the way we live. So well done Scotland - and c'mon USA - you can do better!

*We should welcome the US bill - it is a huge and rapid turn around from the climate change denying stance of the Bush administration - but - ooooh we need so much more.

Tuesday 23 June 2009

A scythe in time


So with the strimmer unable to strim out came the scythe. Of course we looked at the helpful (and often hilarious) 'how the scythe' videos on YouTube later that night after a few drams (which might explain the hilarity). Anyway - it turns out the scythe is a pretty effective beast - it's better where the grass is longer so it has something to grip - and on our uneven molehill ridden lawns it can be a bit tricky - but nonetheless a pretty respectable job - and a whole lot more pleasant than strimming - especially when Rebecca does it for you.

Ailsa took the piccies - so the safety goggles I'd been wearing while strimming still had a use to get that ye olde country oooh aarrr look.

Thin summer salad

Tis the season to be thinning tra la la la la la la la la la. So last night our meal was accompanied by a salad consisting entirely of things from t'garden.
  • Baby spinach
  • Baby chard
  • Parsley
  • Baby parsnip
  • Baby fennel
  • Baby dill
  • Baby lettuce
  • Baby spring onions
Scrummy yummy yum.

Fusion

To mark the longest day, and the arrival of visitor from the South, we had an evening* on Saturday. In preparation I set about reclaiming our lawn - which had become something of a wild meadow. It had grown so long because it had taken me a good too many weeks to track down a 50 ml bottle of two stroke oil (and found lots of 1 litre bottles - but that's just a waste).

It was with a little guilt that I went off a-strimming. Some months ago I had badgered L&C for a scythe that they'd promised in the foggy past. But somehow the mental effort of getting the strimmer going was considerably less than the mental effort of getting to grips with the scythe. C - who has a way of speaking such that his words burns permanent neurotic paths - said two things to me when handing over the sythe:
  1. Make sure it's sharp - it's a lot easier to use when it's sharp.
  2. I've no idea what you want the scythe for.
Indeed - what did I want the scythe for when I've got a strimmer? Was I on some weird no carbon masochist trip?

So there I was - feeling a little guilty strimming away. After a while the strimmer started to sound a bit funny. I stopped and took the head to bits and couldn't figure anything was wrong and put it back together again and continued. A few times. Eventually half the strimmer head went flying across the garden.

Aaaah.
So there was something wrong afterall.

I collected the bits together and discovered that most of the plastic elements had fused together - clearly everything had got way too hot. Mmmm. I tentatively opened up the body of the strimmer to find lots of metal filings - a sure sign that something isn't right. Like probably irrepairably knackered. Probably caused by trying to do too much work - cos the grass had grown too long - I knew I should have fixed on the brush cutter.

Another mechanical gizmo meets it's match. Ha! How dare it imagine it could continue to work in my hands!

*It might have read better if I'd written 'soiree'

Friday 19 June 2009

More travel tales

I forgot to mention. The drive home from Lairg is about 1 1/2 hours - you can do it in an hour if you really want to arrive with lambs stuck to yer bumpers - but on Wednesday I drove home from Lairg and encountered 4 cars. Where else in the UK can you drive for that long and encounter so few cars?

Today we're going to Wick for straw and oats and shops. I watched the weather last night night and went to bed resigned to constant rain all day. As it is I've woken to glorious sunshine. Of course it may not last but it's a nice start and a stark example of how the weather people so often get our weather very very wrong.

Meanwhile the met office have released their local climate projections for the next 100 years - which gave rise to the headline in the Beeb last night "London as hot as Bagdad" - you can find the maps and stuff here - worth a look but it's difficult to interpret - there's a lot of stuff on this website I've not yet looked at though. Anyway, whichever way you look at it things are changing - and very fast - and up here the most obvious threat is winter flooding with communities being cut off for days or weeks on end (because there's so few roads and a lack of alternative routes when one road gets washed away yer stuffed). Highland Council is doing what it can to plan for these things already - cos they've had quite a few instances of roads being washed away in the last few years - and a couple of years ago the A9 was washed away and in that one event the Council used up all their spare bridges.

Eh? Yes really - Highland Council keeps a stash of spare bridges for emergency use. One example of why climate change will hit poorer countries far harder than it'll hit us. But some of those projections are extreme - and not beyond the realms of possibility. And if the progress of past projections is anything to go by, in a couple of years time it will be predicted that the more extreme scenarios are more likely than they are currently estimated to be.

Planners - that's everyone from Councils to small businesses - are being urged by Government to start factoring in these projections in their risk analysis and contingency planning. No one is expected to get it right - but at least start considering it now and try to have some contingencies in place. A tough call without a doubt. It may be the Government realises that everyone needs to start thinking about these things - it may be that Government hasn't got a f*cking clue what to do and are so are passing the buck.

Thursday 18 June 2009

Salt and vinegar?

Hold on to yer seats! I went to Inverness yesterday. No really. How exciting is that?!?

I went to spout off. I love spouting off, and I realised yesterday that I seriously miss it. When I worked I used to spout off all the time - and one of the great things about being a CEO is that when you do spout off people feel obliged to listen. Eeeeh, them w'e days.

I was in Inverness for a consultation the Scottish Government is running about their proposed climate change adaptation strategy. Thrill a minute stuff.

The workshop only lasted the morning so I spent the afternoon wandering around Inverness, mainly charity shops, and feeling aghast. You have to realise - I've not been to a place as big as Inverness for about a year. It all felt very odd.

The rest of the time I was in search of material to use to make a wind break to protect the fruit trees. I found some stuff in Homebase - but at over £3 per square metre I baulked. I found some at Highland Industrial Supplies but they wouldn't sell me any less than 50m rolls so again I declined (and bought a fishing rod instead - "Fathers Day" I told myself). Then today I read Jo's blog and so now I'm captivated by the idea of using scaffolding netting - I suspect it might not be cheaper than garden netting - even though I think gardeners are taken for a ride over the cost of most things - but it will be better quality and should be strong enough for all kinds of other uses I can't possibly imagine.

I knew it was time to head home when the sun came out (the whole day in Inverness was steady heavy rain) - and it was very pleasant pootling up the A9 in the evening sun with a string of cars behind me (I obstinately stuck to a steady 60mph - it must have been sooooo frustrating for all the traffic behind me who obviously had to get somewhere really really urgently).

I stopped off in Lairg for something to eat (fish supper! - another treat). I've mentioned before about the economy up here being very poor. There are countless examples of people and traders being incredibly frugal and eeking out every penny's worth - but the chippy in Lairg takes the biscuit*. Once the (as it turned out - very good) fish had been cooked to order I was offered salt and vinegar - I eagerly accepted. Swish swish with the salt pot, and then - not splodge splodge with the vinegar as you'd expect - but phussst phussst. The fish supper was gently misted with vinegar using one of these.** Now you might think this might be in homage to Heston Blumenthal or something - but in a place whose best selling item is probably deep fried frozen pizza I doubt it. It's about saving money. I must keep visiting that shop - cos eventually they'll think of a way of limiting the amount of salt they give out - can't wait.


*Can a chippy take the biscuit? Should they take the batter? or the deep fried pizza?
** I struggled to find a piccy of one of these - and this piccy comes from a strange blog - if you can be bothered to look.

Monday 15 June 2009

Bug Hunting




For some reason only known to those who know, the school was closed today. So Ailsa and I set off on a bug hunt. It was quite a walk - four hours or so - and we saw lots of bugs and flowers and lochs and grass and - yeah yeah you get the idea.

So here is our little picture gallery - most of these are in focus - we took many others but as we approach the middle of the year it's too warm for the little blighters to keep still.

Bombus Terrestris - the buff tailed bumble bee - just about the commonest bumble bee there is.

A fly. Ailsa has a special little bug collection kit but generally it was easier to get the piccy if the bug was on natural surfaces, like this intricately woven fabric of our rucksack.









Fungi infecting nettles. All the nettles we saw had these growths on them - which might be the rust fungus Puccinia urticata - but what do I know.
















Pooh. Don't know what - thought it might be an otter, but it doesn't seem to look like the otter pooh commonly found on the wideworldweb so my guess it's something else.

We also saw lots of small grass hoppers - impossible to get piccies of them, a dragon fly thing, ditto and countless butterflies, some unusual looking ones too - but they all insisted on fluttering off when they saw a camera.




Thursday 11 June 2009

Untitled

Sometimes, most times, titles for blog entries are easy to find - but alas today I'm bereft of ideas - not a good sign considering that today is a word smithying day for me.

Yesterday was glorious. Apparently Englandshire is getting flooded again but we just basked and baked. Apart from a brief interlude clipping goats feet I spent the entire day weeding. I love weeding - it's a completely zone out task, requiring little concentration so yer mind can wander wildly - and there is real satisfaction in leaving the veg patch weed free (for at least an hour - I mean the weeds return with astonishing speed).

Today it's much cooler and, apart from a brief interlude clipping goats feet, I intend to finish off a funding application for a local charity I've got myself involved in (at a recent meeting I was elected to the committee - someone proposed me, all agreed - the timing was perfect as my face was buried in a huge hunk of the most glorious home made fruit cake ever - I was in no position to object). I drafted the application last week and sent it to a select few asking for comments using 'track changes'. One of the select forwarded it to the entire universe asking it to send comments to me - and many have, but strangely none of them have used track changes.** So there's an agonising ploughing through of ideas to be done - just finding their comments is hard enough in some responses. Hey ho.

** That's a tricky sentence innit? - it - many - Mmm!

Wednesday 10 June 2009

Cowboys and injuns


When pootling about, alone, laughing out loud, nay even giggling, is a pretty rare thing I think. Well it is for me anyway. But this did verily make me laugh. I mean - what is it? Weeeeell - it be a wigwam, built for my runner beans to climb up. It's held together by baler twine, wont survive the wind, the wood is probably too thick for the beans to use (maybe?? I dunno), and generally probably unfit for purpose. But it was fun making it.

The Lupins came from Lulu last year - doing well eh? As are the tatties, which are now earthed up with marigolds planted between the row - apparently good complementary planting - but Jussi wanted marigolds cos she has big plans to make handcreams.

Tuesday 9 June 2009

Mama know best

Goat herds have leaders - a matriarch who leads the herd to grazing, to shelter etc. Gwendolyn is our matriarch and Jussi has enormous respect for her and often, I think, goes a bit far in projecting intelligence upon her. However, one of Jussi's more likely projections is that Gwendolyn is a weather forecaster.

In the morning, after the goats have had breakfast - if they sit lounging around for an hour or so before they go out - it's going to be a sunny day all day. If they rush out to graze after breakfast it'll be raining by noon.

Another apology

That Cheapskate jazz collections on the sidebar. Soddin awful most of it.

Sunrise 04:11, Sunset 22:21

I'm on a bit of a go slow on the old blogging front - something I apologise for, to all those who check in daily. Gets to be a bit dull innit.

But I am trying to avoid sitting at the computer - the weather is good - there is lots to do in the garden, and when I do sit staring at this screen there are a number of bigger projects I really ought to be getting on with.

The goats are fine, the kids are alarmingly large, the garden is rampant and the weather is good. Meanwhile, as stated by a labour MP recently, the Labour Party fiddles while Gordon burns. At least I voted - there must be some very sorry people in Northern England whose 'protest' - ie not voting - allowed the BNP to get two seats. Dreadful.

Saturday 6 June 2009

Thank you!

Phew - nicer weather returns. Thank Gawd.

We had big plans to go to the Scrabster Harbour Festival today - featuring....wait for it....can you guess?....bet you can't....a 1956 doube decker bus. I mean it would have been worth the 70 odd mile round trip eh? Alas Ailsa has pals performing in the Mod so she's off to watch them and I can continue earthing up me spuds, while Jussi fiddles with her PC (she's lost all internet connectivity - it's a bit like having your aorta removed).

Friday 5 June 2009

Grovelling apology

A couple of days ago I rejoiced at the cooler, wetter weather. I'm sorry. I didn't foresee the mercury falling so low that snow would smatter the croft this morning. It is now too cold. And I'm sorry.

SORRY!!

Can we have the nice weather back now...please.

Wednesday 3 June 2009

Home win

Last nights menu:
Home made home grown chard and home grown home made goats cheese soup with home made home grown sour dough bread followed by home made home grown rhubarb crumble.

Tuesday 2 June 2009

It's over

Phew - what a relief. The temperature has plummeted - it's a good 10C cooler today than of late and it's good to feel the icicles sparring with my toes again.

The weather really hit on Friday. I fell over. My ankle! My ankle! F*CK.

So the last few days I've been laid up. Excused from kid feeding duties has meant I could lie in in the morning until - oooh 7:30 at least. Luxury. And all that weather - perfect for being invalid. Only, in truth, it's been too hot for me. So maybe I've spent a bit of time lounging outside, but then rushed indoors to escape from that funny bright round thing in the sky.

But the garden is going ape. Why do weeds grow so much better than the things you actually want to grow? And if I decided I wanted to cultivate ground elder would I have to spend all my days trying to get rid of lettuce and carrots and stuff? Maybe I should try it.

We had a family day out on Sunday. A rare thing and very enjoyable. We went to Durness and explored a bit, and sampled a bit of the local inept hospitality. We stopped in a cafe for a bite to eat and only had to wait an hour or so for them to make up two sandwiches - a forgivable delay as there were already two other people in. Both were apparently single middle aged women, sat at separate tables, each scribbling in notebooks, one pausing from time to time to look out of the window with a pair of ridiculously over-sized binoculars. What were they writing?

"The tranquility has just been shaken by the arrival of a young family"
"I can see a rock"

I don't know. Anyway, after quite some time, one of the women was approached by the 'waitress' with a steaming micro-waved potato generously coated with lurid orange goo (I guess it was cheese), she looked up from her notebook with a look of what I can only describe as panic, and repeated in an alarmed voice:

"Ni! Ni!" I guess she was foreign, probably a Python fan.

The proprietor/'cook' rushed out of the kitchen area, looking doubly dashing on account of the white cooks trilby and fag packet in breast pocket admonishing the waitress - "No it's the other lady". Lucky he was around - Ni was on the verge of heart attack. Food handed to rightful customer we all returned to stupor.

Our sandwiches arrived some time later. I'd just like to mention at this point, that although it is good to have freshly made egg mayonnaise, it's best not to make it by cracking two eggs into a bowl - micro-waving until the egg and bowl have become one, then mashing with a fork and the addition of a gollop of mayo. No siree.