Stop Gap

We are used to a certain level of mayhem at Rock HQ, some animal inspired, other at our creation (usually mine) but today for some two hours chaos reigned supreme. All thanks to Thor the Boar.

After yesterdays debacle where he climbed out of the new pig pen where the beds were soft, girls aplenty and food twice a day, in preference to standing under his beau, Apollo the Gypsy Cob, plan B was put into action.

Plan B entailed putting him back in the pig pen and then watching to see his favoured exit, heading him off and putting a robust obstacle in the way.

Sorted.

The magic blue bucket of food was summonsed, the door to solitary confinement opened and what should have happened is Thor follow bucket and Plan B enacted.

What actually happened was Thor ran straight to his not so secret entrance to Corral OK, shoved his way through a ring feeder and began courting Apollo. William, the Welsh Cob took exception to the sudden appearance of pork and while I tried to work out why the allure of the blue bucket failed, he began to make life threatening Kung Fu moves on the randy pig.

Thus began a race up and down the runway with Apollo being chased by Thor being chased by William while Hetty tried to hide on to of the muck heap.

Kayleigh the agoraphobic goat had all her worst fears about outside confirmed when she stuck her head out of her stall to see where her breakfast bearer had got to and saw the above menage a trois hitting her gate at full speed. She bolted before the earth moved, William fell on his backside, Apollo and Thor made the return journey just in time for the magic blue bucket, gripped by yours truly, to regain its former allure and within seconds bucket lay abandoned (ungripped) on floor as cow, pig and two crazy horses claimed ownership.

Drastic action was required to bring some form of order the chaos, Apollo was to be the sacrifice, plan being that he would be led from food scrummage, Thor would see the love of his life departing and dutifully follow and at some point be persuaded to join the waiting sows.

This might have worked had it not been for Apollo's desire for freedom rather than pork and once in the yard bolted down the lane with the amorous sausage factory in pursuit. William watched Apollo disappear and threatened to join him but was persuaded to stay by my beautiful and oh so patient wife's voice of absolute authority.

Just as fast as Apollo disappeared he returned, the cause of his velocity immediately apparent, Trevor the pocket rocket hanging on his tail. As they careered along the lane William redoubled his efforts to escape and at one point had his front hooves over the five bar gate. Chester safe in the stable began to kick the door, add to this the sound of the magnificent seven barking encouragement you might begin to understand why I had a SOHF.

Thor was now oblivious to the equine carnage at one end of the plot and somehow I managed to get him in with the girls. Apollo trundled past, slower now and was halted by grabbing a handful of mane and some veiled threats, he was happy to go back to the Corral OK.

Trevor was happy that no ponies bigger than him were roaming free.

Pulse rates began to return to normal, I got the necessary tools to sort the pig pen and order was in the process of being restored.

Despair took on a whole new meaning as Thor, having been in with the girls hardly long enough for a coffee yet alone form a meaningful relationship, was now back in the lane and hell bent on finding his pony.

I wont go on, but imagine more of the above but with much more swearing and threats to fetch the gun until finally after an hour and forty five minutes a very sulky boar was "persuaded" to get back in with the sows.

This time no chances were taken, Tracey stood guard while I ran (well sort of, a quick walk) to get the fencing tools. In the time it took he was out again, but this time his secret was revealed, he doesn't climb five bar gates, not completely, on two of the gates that make up the pen, the spacing in the top bars is everso slightly wider than the other four, so pig climbs up, pokes head through and then slithers through the just wide enough gap flopping on the floor the other side, he then climbs out over the stock fence.

Several planks of wood hastily nailed into the gap and the boring boar was/is contained. He is now sulking, but at least he is where he should be and not sausages (yet!).

And we were only two hours late to a lovely lunch cooked for us by a very good friend who also gave us some runner ducks to come home with. And a cake for little t, and toys for little t, and lots of happy memories.

Day 4 30 30 lvl 10 endurance hill 12.1 km (Regatta de Blanc, The Police)

Sing if youre winning

The low cloud and heavy rain could have put a real downer on the day.Pulling on yesterdays mud caked wet clothing really wasn't my favourite part of the day, neither was finding a helpful Berner had moved an equally mud covered boot out into the rain the happiest of moments.

The poor Ryelands looked wretched as they considered the pros and cons of staying out in the rain for breakfast or seeking shelter. The lure of calories temporarily brought them from under the eaves of the cottage.

The winners were the boys, they were reinstated in their luxury appointed stables yesterday forsaking the mud of Willow Rise and Oak Bank for dry bedding and piped music (prog rock) Thor was also winning as he is in the med bay on a deep bed of soft hay at the back of the stable with hot and cold running apples. Poor lad has developed a limp, the fact that this coincided with torrential rain and his favourite pony being put indoors is surely just a coincidence.
So as the icy rain ran down my back and my dry boot became wetter than the wet one when it stayed in the mud of the pig pen while I carried on a few steps it had the makings of a real SOHF day.
But as my day starts with beaming smiles from our apprentice smallholder I just felt like singing.
Sing if your winning.

Spare tyre

The camera gremlins have been evicted, well and truly. The poor shop manager who really hoped he had seen the last of me and my SOHF when he gave me a brand new version a few months back was super helpful when I explained that the new one was as good as the old one, useless. I was instantly invited to choose a different make and so have a Nikon to break now. In fact two Nikons as I was given a DSLR as a present and have the pocket version to us day to day.

Exciting photo opportunities are everywhere at HQ, so here are a few of the spare tyres left by a generous donor for our green house project. Not looking forward to the inflating them with dirt part of the plan and I now realise I should have specified they should all be the same size, however these will all be put to use, eventually.

The equine members of the gang have taken to the new concrete floor in the Corral OK, if taking to it means avoiding at all cost. They can be found everywhere except stood on the hard stuff. This includes on top of the mountain of gravel, back in the mud or balancing on the well top. Misty has tried to help clear up the mud by wearing it.

One thing after another

Its been a Sam and everything day, one small disaster after another which looking back will be funny but all have served to create mayhem here at Rock HQ. First light there was a very loud Moo, my shell likes detected that the utterer of the Moo was a lot closer to Rock HQ than she should be and definitely the wrong side of the cottage from where she was left. Yes Hetty was now back in the garden having jumped two fences and negotiated an open gate (left open not by the PGOOR but by the SAS) and was loudly complaining of the bullying antics of the Pocket Rocket who had forced her from the breakfast table. Time was too short to sort her or him out so she was fed and told to get on with life until naughty pony was spoken to about sharing.

First light also provided an opportunity to find bank card, bank card loss is serious matter but as it was lost between Vic and front door its unlikely that empty bank account is going to be further depleted by ner do wells. It was high on the embarrassing factor though as bank card was new bank card replaced by bank after I had lost first one in car park in town a few weeks ago. This set off a real comedy of errors as bank replaced lost card by posting new one to old address, several visits to bank where I explained carefully that I lived where they sent my bank statements and could I please have my new card, not to a house I used to live in five years ago. This was then sent but no pin number, that was sent to old house too, twice, finally new card arrived, old number failed to work it, new card seized, new card, new number arrived, both at right house but new number failed to buy petrol as new number needs to be activated at banks cashpoint, as no banks cashpoint is in our town (two horse towns don't need a choice of cashpoints) cannot activate card but can draw cash from other banks machine, no real problem except now lost new card. Goat eaten card is likely scenario as evil beast followed me around but feel less than inclined to report animal consuming plastic to bank so after long and pointless search under gloating scrutiny of evil horned beast decide to fess up and report I need new card to bank.

The bank card pales in insignificance compared to the lost keys saga. Front door key is kept where I cannot lose it, in the front door. Yesterday while looking for bank card found self shut out of HQ. Beautiful and oh so patient wife let muddy SOHF monster in mumbling about goats and cashpoints and dutifully joined in search for card and keys. No keys. This morning after three hours were expended on searching for keys and similar on card I was stood by kettle making refreshing beverage pondering how do we get cash from bank to buy new locks when a stifled cry from beautiful and oh so patient one alerted me to strange turn of events. Keys had now been found, centre of dining table, next to my car key and glasses. Now how two people managed to miss keys centre of well lit table, next to car key and glasses, a table that I checked several times is a mystery. Tracey is not prone to practical jokes, I am, but I know better than to play one that wastes so much of my true loves precious time so neither of us were responsible. That leaves only one explanation, Heidi the ghost. Heidi does exactly what her name suggests, she hides things. So far bank card has not been returned but we were grateful for the keys.

The SAS launched a joint attack on the large metal object in the kitchen we laughingly refer to as a cooker. The two highly trained SAS operatives frightened the rayburn into submission and it roared into life. They left, so did its cooperation and its back to sulking in the kitchen refusing to bake beans. They also left gate open see top of page for consequence.

Faced with sandwiches again I was stood contemplating ham or fish and just mentioned to patient one that at least nothing else could go wrong. It was at that point six black and white rabbits hopped past the kitchen window followed closely by a small pig.

Oven ready

Relax! This isn't one of our random recipes, I mean lets face it this chicken is hardly a mouthful so not worth the trouble. This is in fact DD, a Buff Orpington chick that had nearly, as can be seen by the pic, ceased to be. First thing this morning DD was an egg, and then by breakfast was half an egg and a lot of wet fluff and cheeping.

So we left her (lets hope, please let it be a hen, we have more cockerels than red wine so the coq au vin equation is causing a glitch in the matrix) to get rid of the other half egg and all was well. Mother hen was watching over her, what could go wrong? Well, bird brains are not really massive and chickens have more eyeball than brain, and as we have had chicks commit suicide 21 seconds after 21 days hatching we should have known better. By lunch time when I was having a serious SOHF over a DIY disaster (thinking it right, doing it wrong, again, or rather, foiled by cheap metal screw, but hey, I wont blame the screw, much) time out was called by Tracey my beautiful and oh so patient wife and an exped to the hen house was ordered by way of soothing my ruffled feathers. Headcount, only three chicks, wheres the egg/chick thing gone. Much searching through straw.

By sheer chance DD was not crushed by yours truly as he knelt in the hen house searching for expected chick. As I shuffled backwards out of the door (who built this thing, ooh guilty!) my hand brushed against something cold and soggy. More chicken pooh I thought, but checked anyway on the just in case principle. There lay DD. Looking very much as ex chicken. As I laid it on the hen house roof Tracey and I cursed chicken brains and our not having brought it in when half egg. Oh well. Nature is harsh and all that. DD gasped. Only one thing to do with a hypothermic chick at deaths door, to the Rayburn. So DD was put in a pie tray and cooked at 150 for one hour.

The result, DD cooked to perfection and is now sat cheeping on the top of the Rayburn as it thinks the huge metal object is its mum. Bless.

DD?

Deaths Door obvious really :)

Harvest festival!

Getting this years bumper crop of plums off the trees and sorted as either pig treats, jam, pie filling or the flavouring for plum vodka posed a few minor problems but my bright idea of placing a piece of ground cover material seemed the ideal solution.

The plums would fall, good old gravity, you can always rely on it, then they would roll down the steep slope of "the garden" and collect at the bottom en masse thus allowing bipeds at Rock HQ to make the necessary quality control checks. Hetty saw the need to come over and check that preparations were good enough and the exercise began.

The sudden arrival of so much fruit prompted further arrivals, Piggle and the Mangalitzas (Not a failed 80's band, but the trainee providers of future pork based products)took it on themselves to "assist" in the quality assurance, while Hetty wandered round in the background like an out of work bouncer and cleared anything missed by the greedy pigs.

Provided they stayed clear of the main harvest I was unbelievably tolerant of this poor behaviour but Piggle soon discovered that there was no need to search the undergrowth for goodies.

Here was a great big stash which cut out the leg work. Sensing a SOHF, Piggles backing singers legged it back to the big pen where several buckets of grade 3 plums were distributed amongst the better behaved (read bigger so unable to exploit hole in fence) where they joined in the fruit fest. Piggle didn't take the hint so she and her minder tucked in and quit when totally gorged on juicy fruit. Piggle staggered off to the pen to sleep it off while Hetty made an issue of my trainers. Having salvaged what I could for human consumption I manfully repaired the fence once again, with some success. End of play saw all but Mangalitza piglets the right side of the wire, meaning my repair had simply reduced the size of the aperture available to curious pork. Last time I looked the three little pigs relaxing by the pool with Hetty making sure only ticket holders got in with them.