Pigs Might Fly

The weather last few days has been very fine for February but I have not been able to enjoy it as I am, as they say in Norn Iron, 'dosed with the coul.'

I have noticed since I started hanging out with toddlers that I get a cold about four times a year. It used to be only about once or twice a year. Small children are germy little beasts.

Another thing I will not be able to enjoy is a quiet house for Bert is away and there is just me, Pearlie, the two cats, three dogs, 7 chickens and 5 calves. Unfortunately I am responsible for feeding all these creatures. Although the pigs, Lily and Rusty are quite capable of helping themselves. This is to be avoided and I have asked Bert to put all the pig and calf feed in a safe place. He put it in a trailer with sides down, right at the edge, good and handy for a tall pig standing on hind legs. Luckily I got to it before they did so the only way they're getting into that trailer is if they sprout wings and fly.

In fact, must go and see if they have broke out and are rampaging through the yard.

I have very high hopes that I will be feeling better tomorrow.

Postscript. Darn pigs were nowhere to be seen but they had left a trail of tumblings behind them. Pigs are rough. I eventually found them in Bert's workshop where they had broken open a big bag of peanuts intended for the birds. Perhaps they thought eating bird food would help them to fly.

Dog Visitors

Nellybert has dog visitors almost every day. They are nearly as many as our human visitors. Today we had Lucy, accompanied by Clint and Rex, accompanied by Swisser. Lucy is a very good visitor. She farms and does not be in the house much. Of course, like all farmers. when she does come indoors she brings half a yard of filth and dung in with her. Judy does not like her much. Judy was very annoyed to see Lucy riding in the cab of the tractor with Clint. She must have thought Lucy had shocking airs about herself. To console Judy I had to take her out in the van when I went to buy my wine ingredients and my Guardian.

Rex, our other dog visitor, is a sister of Jess and she greeted him as she greets all her litter mates, first by growling and snarling viciously, then by having around thirty minutes of fairly good-natured tussling and tumbling. Rex is a nice dog and much bigger than Jess but he has a sweeter temperament. Of course he shit in the kitchen and his mistress was very cross indeed. I tried to explain to Swisser that other people's houses are 'outside' to four month old dogs and she shouldn't berate him. I also told her that I'd far rather put up with the dog's poop as listen to her shrieking at him. I think she took it in good part.

What To Do When The Muse Departs

Over a week now since I committed a word to The Garden and that was merely a link to another person's blog post. That other person being my sister and that blog post being so damn good
that my poor muse was utterly devastated, became a dessicated leaf and blew away in the breeze.

But I eventually caught it, gathered it up, watered it with tears of salt and am currently trying to breathe life back into it. So while the muse fights for its life in intensive care I shall tell you what I've been doing this past week.

I ate a burger. It was sourced from my local butcher who informed me that sales of burgers have risen sharply since the tales of Tesco and Findus and the rest serving up Old Dobbin have become news. What do I think of this? I think it a disgrace and not because I object to eating horse (although I prefer not to) but because they cheat us and because welfare standards are not being met in these dodgy abattoirs. A few years ago, when things were going well and everyone felt rich because their home was worth close to half a million quid, the fields were full of horses. Now, with the price of feed sky-high, there are less of them. They had to go somewhere.

I finished watching Game of Thrones and miss it a lot. I watched the last two episodes back to back six days ago and what with the thrills and the tension, not to mention sitting in the same position (tensed up to the max) for two hours I've got a sore hip that keeps me awake most every night unless I load up on paracetamol, hot water bottles and wine.

I resisted Game of Thrones for ages even though lots of it was filmed around these parts - Ballintoy, Murlough Bay, The Dark Hedges, Shane's Castle and Tollymore. There were also a few people I know playing extras in crowd scenes. It was exciting to see my friend Danny trading vegetables with another extra in the foreground of a scene supposedly set in the Iron Islands.

I also finished listening to my latest audio book, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. It was dense and far from light and I had to listen to parts of it several times but what a book! I'll carry it with me for ever. Not literally of course because I'm not sure I even have a copy of it. My favourite character? Karenin, Without a doubt. Although I didn't like him as much in Anna Karenina. And now I have started Madame Bovary. I will, I will be well-read!

And Nellybert acquired a time-share in Donegal. How exciting is that? I told Miss Martha and Miss Evie's folks about it today and we are all very excited.

And Ben Reed is spending mid-term break with us. Quite honestly he is The. Best. Boy. Who. Ever. Lived. I might have to do a blog post on him sometime.

There is also stuff about Pearlie but it is far too dreary and awful and I don't want to talk about it. Yet.

A History

My sister wrote this. It is worth sharing.

Painting Time

Martha said,

Granny. I want to put my smock on and paint.

OK. Let's go upstairs and get the paints.

She spotted some acrylic paint.

I want those.

Those are for big people. You can have the ones you used last time. 

But I'm a big girl now. 

Well. You'll have to wear an apron as well as your smock because you wouldn't want to get paint on the new pinafore your mummy made you.

I squirted out a blob of every colour and I showed her how to mix them to make different colours. Red and white for pink, red and yellow for orange, blue and red for purple. She was very absorbed. But before long she was mixing too many colours together and I explained that she would end up with a sludgy grey or brown colour. But she was enjoying herself and I thought it best to let her learn from experience. While she was mixing her colours I  left the kitchen to get something something from the freezer. Evie and I became rather engrossed out there and I started looking for rhubarb to make another batch of wine. We were less than five minutes. When I went back to the kitchen I found that Miss Martha had created a dark, dark colour and....

...she had painted

herself!

Big girls! You couldn't take your eyes off them for a minute.

Fish Girl

Hannah and I took Judy and Jess the puppy to Waterfoot. It was Jess' first trip to the coast and she liked it a lot. The only thing is, she was not happy to share her beach. She seemed to believe that it belonged only to Nelly and all who belong to her. It will not do that she has a growl that would not shame a fully grown German shepherd. This is behaviour we will have to try to modify.

Another thing Jess liked about her beach was the number of dead fish lying around. there were dozens of them and she was happy to eat them as they were. We had to prevent her as we didn't know where they had come from. Later on an old chap told us that there had been a fishing event the previous day and the small ones were thrown back. Jess growled at this poor old fellow in a very nasty and threatening manner. She did not like the cut of his jib.

It must be strange for a small dog to be taken to the seaside and find that someone has arranged an 'all you can eat' buffet, and then not be allowed to partake of it.

It's a tough life being a dog.

In The News

Is it nearly a week since I last looked at Nelly's Garden? Sure doesn't time fly when you're enjoying yourself?

I had the Leitrim Sister up for a few days and the country wine had a very mixed reception. She caught me racking the orange and tasted it then pronounced it rank poison. The raspberry, while tasty enough, was "too strong". I suppose that is a fault of sorts.  Maybe it is too strong for I had one of those hangover thingies the next day and I didn't like it.

The weekend rushed past in a flurry of visiting and being visited. I can say without any fear of contradiction (for if you contradict me, you are just plain wrong) that a lady from Tannaghmore, formerly from Armoy, makes the best soda bread in County Antrim and probably the world.

And Liam Neeson received the Freedom of the Borough in Ballymena today. Miss Martha and her mummy appeared in the local TV news as part of the crowd that welcomed Liam to the Town Hall. I'm sure this will not be the last time Martha appears on a news programme.

 Pictures are screen shots from UTV player

Baby Bliss

Yesterday afternoon Martha and Evie came out to have fun in the snow. As the day wore on I got a bit fretful that the snow wasn't as pristine and wonderful as it had been in the morning but then I realised I was being very silly because at ages one and three snow is simply snow - magical white stuff for playing in and with.

Martha was tremendously proud of her first snowman. She ordered a carrot for his nose but the carrot store was empty. A small onion made an acceptable substitute.

Meanwhile over by the sheds where slushy puddles abound...

Snowed In!

Snowed In......

Well. Not quite. However the weather forecast yesterday was dire enough to have Bert fretting.

How will we get to the shops?

We'll walk!

How?

We'll wrap ourselves in huge layers of clothing and we'll strap rudimentary snow shoes to our feet. You'll fashion hiking poles for us and we'll have knapsacks on our backs and we'll schlep down to Cully through the snow.

I suppose we could do that.

And as we trudge along we can wave at all the normal people driving down in their cars.

Sartorial Failings

I hear that onesies are having a moment and thank God that I am past all that sort of thing. Mind you, dressing like a toddler is no new thing here in Northern Ireland. Many of our young and would-be young have been wearing hooded romper-suits for years now. This year they are often accessorised with a scarf covering the lower half of the face and a Union Jack casually draped over the outfit. Hoods are worn raised.

Bert can sometimes be spotted following the fashion. No hoodies or flags for him but he has been wearing onesies for absolute aeons. He calls them boiling (boiler) suits and he gets them from the pack man or at Killyless Stores. He just doesn't feel dressed without a boiling suit and around home he'll wear one whether at work, rest or play.

Yesterday he went to the cloakroom and pulled a boiler suit from the hook then proceeded to step into it. He had shrugged his shoulders into it and was about to start fastening the poppers when he gave a gasp of surprise. I turned from the washing up to see what was up and there he was, trying to fasten another boiler suit over the top of the boiler suit he was already wearing. See! They're like a second skin to him. He said that he couldn't understand why it was so hard to do up and thought he'd put on weight.

There was another wardrobe malfunction this morning. He is up early these mornings as he is doing civic duty. I noticed that he had on a very nice pair of trousers that I'd not seen him wear before. They fitted him beautifully. They were trousers that I'd bought him at the Marks & Spencer outlet store in Antrim and they'd hung in his wardrobe for more than a year. I complimented him on his appearance. We ate our porridge and he rose to make coffee. I couldn't help admiring how the well cut trews showed off his neat and shapely backside. Then I saw it.

Bert feel your arse!

He groped around it until he came to the big Blue Mountain cardboard label.

It's just as well I noticed that before you got there! 

I was wearing these trousers when I was there last week.

Note to self. Check husband before he leaves house unless he is having a onesie day.

Happy Birthday Get Well Soon

Happy birthday to sister Ganching. I didn't know whether to send her a birthday card or a get well card. What a rotten way to spend a birthday - in bed with 'flu.

Another Blog. Why Not?

I'm considering starting another blog on the topic of making country wines. After all, I've been doing it  for sixteen months now so I must be an expert, mustn't I?

Achievements

I have been feeling rather flat this past week. First of all there was the post-Christmas slump, then there was a nuisance of a head cold and then there was the dank and gloomy weather. Even the antics of the pup were not sufficient to pull me from the doldrums.

At this particular time Bert has to be out of the house during office hours. He is on business that must be done and I am left alone with dogs, cats, pigs and Pearlie. I told myself I had to to pull myself together. So this morning, the first morning of Bert's absence I decided to list my achievements as the day progressed. I made this decision in bed so my first achievement was -

1. Get out of bed.

This was swiftly followed by -

2. Attend to Pearlie's morning needs.
3. Attend to the morning needs of hens, pigs and dogs. Cats do not have morning needs.
4. Get out of bed. (Because I returned there after meeting the morning needs of livestock and old ladies.)

By then I had four achievements and it wasn't even ten o'clock! I can tell you that this cheered me up so much that I didn't even bother counting any further achievements.

Onwards and upwards!

Happy New Year Now I Am Old

Read somewhere today that old age officially begins when one is 59 years old, two months and two weeks. That was, for me, the 23rd November, 2012.

I think I can live with it. After all, what's the alternative?

Happy New Year to everyone, young and old.

My Boxing Day Party

So - after a fortnight's shopping, cooking and freezing I was pushed out of the kitchen at the last minute and Bert took over. I already had the oven loaded with the children's food, pigs in blankets and shepherd's pie. By the time I realised what was going on Bert had all my gorgeous food back in the freezer and the adults also ate pigs in blankets. I think one of them might have got a portion of the shepherd's pie. They also ate some kind of a lacklustre salad, something entirely vile called 'chicken balls' and some insipid naan bread courtesy of Mr Asda. No one got to taste my vegetable curry, Bulgarian chicken or my spicy Caribbean beef. My parboiled potatoes were not roasted. My home made garlic bread was barely tasted. They didn't heat up my delicious red cabbage and no one fancied it cold.

What was I doing while Bert was barking orders in the kitchen? I was conducting wine tastings with some carefully selected and appreciative people, the kind of people that do not eat Asda chicken balls. I served the damson first, They were in ecstasies. Then it was the blackberry and raspberry. It was pronounced even better. By the time we were on the raspberry they were in country wine heaven. Swisser even offered to give me high sums for the rest of it. I told her it was beyond price.

Best bit? Miss Martha singing 'You Are My Sunshine' accompanied by Marty on the banjo.

Evie's best bit? Chicken balls.


Worst bit? When Jazzer got her mitts on Bert's clarinet and created a racket that sounded like a large drake in a bog being run over by a John Deere tractor.

Christmas is Coming

fourpups, originally uploaded by NellyMoser.

These four will be under my feet this Christmas. They will be almost ten weeks old. Big enough to try a bit of turkey.

All I seem to have done this past week is cook and prepare food. And there is still more to do. I have been so busy I actually haven't had time to eat. I certainly haven't had time to blog.

Oops! Must race. The oven timer is bleeping again.

Pot, Kettle And All That Sort Of Thing

Today Bert called me a hoarder. He said,

You know, you're a hoarder.

I said,

I know. And so are you. State of those sheds.

He did not reply.

The reason for this? He was clearing out his a cupboard in his room and was about to bin several boxes of his mother's memorabilia, old letters, postcards and the like.

I said,

She might enjoy looking at those.

Ah. Sure I gave her a packet of them. That'll do her.

Later on I went into her and she was poring over old letters and cards. I said,

There were more of those. Bert put them in the bin.

She said,

Ach! They bring me back memories.

I borrowed her tool for lifting items off the floor and retrieved as much as I could from the bin. Luckily they were newly emptied so there was little else in the bin. She passed the afternoon with them.

Bert's sheds are packed with stuff. I expect most of it will come in useful some day. There are a lot of potential projects out there. The thing is, he'd need to live to 150 years old to complete those projects - if he could be arsed.

He keeps stuff, I keep stuff, his mother keeps stuff. I had a debate with her this morning about whether she should keep an empty plastic soft drink container. She desired to decant her Lucozade into it even though Lucozade already comes in a plastic bottle. She is saving the tops of plastic bottles because she believes that somewhere there is someone who can turn plastic bottle caps into wheelchairs for needy children. I have told her that this is a crock of nonsense but she does not believe me. Yesterday we had a small argument about keeping bottles of spent medicine.

When Pearlie was up and about she collected and hoarded on a larger scale. She still does it although her lack of mobility prevents her from being really serious about it. These days it is newspaper clippings, bottle tops, over the counter medicines and postage stamps. Sure what is the harm? She's done it all her life, it's part of who she is and it doesn't really impinge on our lives.

I collect books, china, photographs, fabric and kitchen equipment. The books and china do take up a lot of room. Bert collects wood, maps, trees and boiler suits. We're all every bit as bad as each other. But he has sheds. And fields.

Meadow Street

Back in the 1970s Northern Irish bars stopped serving drink at 11pm and you were out the door at 11:30pm. If the publican or bar staff did not comply with this rule they could expect a visit from those big lads in green, the Royal Ulster Constabulary. But when you're in your teens or twenties and you're having a good time you don't want to go home before midnight. That is why if Kevin was around we'd often end up back in Meadow Street. Kevin, God love him, did not have the usual family thing going on, his Mum was dead and he lived with his Dad. Ned was a real character who usually spent his weekend evenings drinking in O'Rawes, a pub which, for some reason, didn't seem to have an obligation to close at the usual time. Ned would roll in some time after midnight in the best of form and, if he was in the mood for it, call in to see who was around and have a bit of craic with the company. Though not with me, for I was heart-feared of him.

The Wee Manny and a friend

Kevin had a wee terrier dog called Trouble. Trouble was also a character and danced only to his own tune. He had a back leg missing due to a brush with a moving vehicle but it never kept him back. The leg he lost was the one that he used to balance on when he needed to piss. You'd have thought he would have swapped balancing legs but not Trouble. Instead he somehow managed to balance on his two fore legs while he lifted this one remaining back leg to make his water. It was a sight to behold. Trouble was not one of those dogs who bothered himself with people and while he was prepared to tolerate the weekend invasions of young post-pub visitors he would not take kindly to being petted or stroked. Indeed he would have taken the hand off anyone who would have tried it.

Ned could be sharp too. Sometimes after he'd gone to bed he'd rise again and come down to us and order everyone out of the house. The thing to do was to look down, stay quiet and allow him to grumble himself back to bed. Nobody ever left. Oh - many the good night we had there and even the odd bad one too.

Christmas Night 1976 and I'd just been dumped

I remember one Christmas time when the bars had been packed and afterwards Meadow Street. Someone, I forget who, had a bit of hash and he rolled a joint. I was anxious to give hash a go for I'd never tried it before. The joint made its way around the room, everyone taking just a few drags. At last it reached the girl next to me. I was so excited. But she smoked and smoked and eventually finished it and stubbed it out. Then she remarked, “I don't know what people see in that oul stuff for it never does a thing for me!” I had to wait a while longer for my first smoke of a joint.

A few weeks ago I passed by Meadow Street and I thought of the scores of evenings we trekked there after the pub, not wanting the evening to end. And I thought of a tale that a musician friend had told me. Way back in the 1960s Cream were playing in Ireland. A local music promoter was driving them around and invited the band to stay in his home. The story is that Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce took up his kind and hospitable offer. But what of Eric Clapton? Apparently he was so wasted that he spent the night sleeping in a van in Meadow Street. I'm sure he wasn't the last.

Hardy Fruity Toot!

Happy Birthday Katkin.

That was the day you strolled down the Murphystown Road to hang with Auntie Sheena. You might have mentioned to us that you were going to call on the neighbours.

Pongerooni

Tonight I have rather pungent hands. First of all I moved a chilli plant from this room to the kitchen. It is on its way to Pearlie's room a.k.a the warmest room in the house. Under the bright and unforgiving kitchen lights I noticed that the plant was hooching with greenfly. So that's why it isn't doing very well. On Bert's advice I attacked it with the garlic infusion that Zoe made for the pups. But the spray doesn't work very well and the strong garlic water ran all over my hands. I needed to wash them very hard as my next task was preparing eight pounds of oranges for wine.

After that was done I gave the chilli another drooking with the garlic spray. My hands now smell of orange peel and garlic. Interesting combination. I am now repellent to greenfly, mosquitoes, ants and vampires and shall sleep content tonight.