The Straw fairy’s have been visiting my Hay Barn. I took a walk up to the top of the goose field which borders on to my meadow and ends in the very bottom flat bit of the valley so that there is a lovely view all around the neighbours, down towards the village and up towards the vineyard miniature houses (Pincer Haz) and the forest beyond spilling over the crest of the hill.  My Hay barn is the last shack on the left as you walk down this part of my garden belonging to George and Mildred. So I was very surprised to see that the previously empty barn, which had only a thick carpet of goodness knows how old straw, drifting in the bottom and far to prone to field mice, rats, spiders and many mandible carrying creatures for me to search in there for any usable fodder, at a level about five inches lower than that of the slatted wooden sides, it was now stacked up with a good little hill of rather wet and soggy but fabulous straw.  I think that the straw fairy next door was being very kind because I did ask him last month where I could buy some for the bird beds and he dismissed my suggestion at actually paying for straw and threw a bale over for me bless him. Not a word has been said. I expect he came when I was out. OR, it was one of the times when Lazi was barking his head off and I was ignoring him like I usually do because he barks all blinking day long. Anyhow, thank you very much Straw Fairy whoever you are, I will put up a little prayer to the organic goods gods tonight in your favour.

There continue to be wet soggy ducks in the pen. The chickens are tending to go to bed early, I think they are not that keen on the rain, but they will put up with it for the sake of finding food.  I always have to persuade Lilly and Mrs Duck to go to bed and get out of the rain.  I had a little chuckle yesterday when I discovered that George goes all fluffy when wet.  He looked slightly indignant at my smirk and turned his back and walked slowly away from me when I leaned over the gate and called out ‘Having a bad hair day are we George?’  He looked like he had been blow dried by a beauty student on her first day at college.  Definitely needed some ‘feather gel’, a little ‘down moose’ and some D & G (Duckche and Goosebana of course) hair straighteners.

1 egg today, temperature a steady 7 degrees C or 44 F all day and all night. Finally stopped raining this afternoon for about three hours after four days of continual rain. Oh well it gives me an excuse to catch up on some sleep and rest a bit, because my chest is a bit tight at the moment, and work is an effort.

9^th November

No eggs tonight. But it’s no problem because my egg drawer at the top of the door of my fridge is now full.  I actually don’t eat eggs that much. I think I will have some pancakes tonight as a treat.  I really like custard so I need to find out how you make real custard instead of instant which I can’t get here. And of course meringues are good for using the egg whites and as my ancient Russian gas cooker only has one temperature, slow, meringues would be ideal.  Only problem being that if I am going to have the oven on that long I will have to sit somewhere else in the house with the window open wide to the cold and the rain because, I’m allergic to the gas fumes. Isn’t life just too complicated sometime’s. I think I will stick to scrambled eggs on toast. 

Lazi actually did get my attention this afternoon, because even his barking does change to “Mum come here, honestly I’m not kidding, there really is something going on and someone close to our house and I’m not just barking in reply to the dog in the next village” so I duly came to have a look and right down my garden, through the chicken pen, past the geese and the apple trees, all the way past the stand of fir trees, the other side of the fence and at the bottom set of trees and bushes that line the back end of my now crushed and scruffy meadow, there was a four by four kind of modern car on the other bank of the stream, with people walking out and around it.  I have no idea why someone was playing with the overgrown, toad infested ditch that serves as a stream.  I am most puzzled about how they got their car there.  It is quite a steep drop from the little tarmacadamed lane that runs along halfway up the far slope of the valley to give access to the vineyard houses.  It would need a Sherman tank with good stout mud repellent caterpillar tracks to get up and down that cultivated hill. Especially in this rain. Normally I would have done the Hungarian thing (actually any country folk would do the same, here or in the UK) and decide that this was the appropriate time to go and inspect the bushes on my side of the stream in the guise of having a good nose and finding out what the heck they were doing there. But I was too wheezy today to contemplate the long walk through the mud and wet uneven ground. So I just stayed in the doorway for a bit and watched them from under my little porch.  My eyesight is pretty rubbish and I think it would be a good idea for me to buy some binoculars for this sort of ‘Im watching out for my land’ kind of nosy prying.  The ones I brought with me from the UK have stopped working since they started to rattle.  I used to watch the birds with them, so I miss that. The eagles here are fantastic. I forgot to mention them before when I gave that seasonal bird lecture a couple of days ago. Anyhow my ‘not actually on my land’ visitors disappeared when I was looking in another direction, after about ten minutes.  So I cosied back up by the fire in front of the telly for another hard afternoon in the countryside.

I have to just tell you that I am a huge fan of an American singer called Josh Groban. And today is the day he is launching his new website, so I am very excited. I know it is not normal for a woman in my advanced middle age to be coying over a twenty something young singer like a teenager. But he just gets to me. His songs are sooo fabulous.  I actually did join his fan club which I have only done once before in my life and that was in the 1970’s when I was a teenager and it was Donny Osmond’s fan club, so you can imagine that over 30 years later it has been quite a shock to my family that I am reliving my youth by being an official ‘Fan’ again. Actually it was quite a shock to me too that I wanted to join a fan club at my age! Anyhow, had to mention why I am so excited. Of course, the US of A is about six hours behind me so I may have to wait until this evening before I can go online and see all the fabulous new fan stuff.  Oooo I hope he comes to Hungary or at least Vienna which I could drive to when he tours next year with his new album. Sign! (Author puts little girl back in her box and resumes narration of the real world)

10^th November

I can’t believe it is still raining.  Well at least it is not going below zero at night. I did piles and piles of washing today as I had my bath this morning and I use the water to soak my clothes in and then rinse and spin them in my top loading washing machine. I actually do ‘walk’ on my clothes in the bath to knock off the mud etc.  My Mum took a picture of me doing this last year. I will NOT be publishing that particular image.  It’s not that I am that poor that I can’t afford the water or the electricity for the washing machine.  It is the old problem on the very small waste water tank that now lurks, waiting to misbehave, in the corner of the chicken pen.  So I enjoy getting back into my bath and walking up and down on my muddy clothes and smalls.  It is reminiscent of a very old episode of ‘I Love Lucy’ I once saw, where she was dancing around and around inside a huge half barrel wine casket, crushing the wine grapes the old fashioned way. I think the scene is featured in the film Pretty Woman. The water is usually pretty cold by the time I get back in, so if you can remember the look on Lucy’s face when she puts her toes into the cold grapes, that is about the same kind of face I make when I get back into the cold bath water.

On the chicken front, I am seriously worried about the sexual orientation of my cockerels. I watched them today and they were standing side by side on top of the big bird trough facing each other.  Their beaks were no more than an inch (about 2 cm for those of you who are too young to remember feet and inches) away from each other. And in this position of literally gazing into each others eyes, they stayed completely still for a good ten minutes.  Now it has been suggested that this is a prelim to a cockerel fight, but my cockerels don’t fight with each other.  They have the occasional face off with the hens when they won’t co-operate for copulation purposes, but I have never seen them fight each other since they matured. So the only conclusion I can come to is that maybe I should make them a candlelit supper with heart shaped corn bread, and a pink box of heart shaped corn chocolates!

12^th November

I found out today that I have to take my car into the garage as soon as possible.  I have had this letter offering me a service from the garage that I bought my car in, for about two weeks now.  But I thought it was just an offer reminding me that I should have my car serviced every year.  Luckily I decided to show it to my Hungarian friend when she came round to help me move some roses.  It turns out that my piece of paper with the stamp on it, runs out tomorrow. So she rang them for me and we are taking the car in on Monday. Just as well I thought to check it out at the last minute.  Bless her, she told me not to use the car at the weekend.

We visited the chicken pen.  Honestly I don’t know why but Rambo started going for the gate and then Zebra joined in.  Iren had told me that they went for her when she has put them away for me, but I always said that Rambo would go for her but Zebra on the whole was quite calm, unfortunately, this turns out to be false. Zebra really doesn’t like her. I don’t know why. I have never seen him so aggressive. As you know he is larger, with prettier plumage than Rambo and much fatter, fluffier feet, so it’s a bit like being attacked by an over stuffed pillow decorated with feather boa’s, but it doesn’t detract from those rather nasty looking talons. I can’t imagine why he is being aggressive like that.

13^th November

Yey, the sunshine is back. It’s a lovely warm sunny day. Windows open, gas off.

I was a bit delayed putting the chickens to bed tonight.  When I went to gently manuveur (I am trying the goose traffic control system on the chickens and ducks to see if I can train them to obey it like the geese do) Lilly and Mrs Duck, plus one cockerel in to join the others in the chicken house, I suddenly realised in the gloom that there was a little black head sticking out of the nesting box.  She was coopied as low down as possible trying not to get noticed, but obviously the poor little hen had gotten ‘caught short’ very near dusk and just had to go and sit on the nest to try and lay the egg before bedtime.  Once I was in the pen she was far too frightened to jump down.  So, I opened the chicken house door wide and stood back by the far gate.  She still wouldn’t come down and now Mrs Duck as usual had followed me and Lilly was going for another quick puddle by the path. As the gloom descended I realised that I did not have my torch with me, so I was talking to her “come little hen, out of the nest or we are both going to get caught out in the dark, and you know I don’t like the dark.  I don’t mind if you don’t lay the egg until morning, it is not a problem.”  She put her head on one side and hopped up on the ledge, then with a little flick of her right wing, jumped down and curved her decent so that she landed almost inside the hen house. Bless her.  She looked back and kind of nodded at me, then strutted in to bed for the night. After I had persuaded Mrs Duck that she could not come in the house with me because Lazi would assume I had brought him a snack, and so ‘air traffic controlled’ her into the house, along with Lilly and the cockerels, who did their usual obstruction of the door routine so that Lilly has to barge through in between their long legs, I checked the nest and sure enough I had three eggs again today. Well done girls!

14^th November

It is still lovely and sunny but a bit windier today. It was about 16 degrees today. 3 egg day. The chickens are obviously enjoying the sunshine too and think it’s spring and the cockerels are crowing their heart out. Actually they are getting a bit annoying because they won’t shut up. Maybe I will mix a little flour into their corn bucket with some water and the sticky mixture will shut them up for a bit.