Right now at 7.50am I should be out in the garden. I have loads of pre prepared excuses for not being there. The grass under the electric fence is too wet to cut , there is still a chill , I need to waitt a while as my full English breakfast is still on its downward journey. See , excuses excuses.
Actually I intended do write a Belgian ramble here every Friday until you get collectively bored out of yuor brains, so please let me know when that time comes. Just post up Y A W N.
Ok its not Friday yet, but this friday I am off to buy some livesstock. A few cheap sheep I have heard about. They are getting divorced, the people not the sheep of course. Rather oddly the sheep are not part of the seperation deal. I would have thought they were between , " you keep the settee, I will have the table " and " you take the cut glass, I will take the silver " Anway Kevs razor sharp buying tactics are going to buy himself som cheap cheap sheep. Why ? Informants inform me that they are both going to be renting flats.
I also need to freshen up my chicken family. A new cockerel is required, and this always causes a little excitement in the family, even to my sons, both now well over the animal/bird naming age, you would think. The last cockerel was named after a big fat Belgian politican. So it was hoped that ' Luke ' would become a big fat cockerel, albeit a little more useful than a big fat Belgian politician. Alas my son was duped with the purchase, and it turned out to be a minature variation. A brave lad mind, who always tried his best in the nooky department. He really needed a ladder though.
My sons are organising a party here soon. Or ' PAR EEE ' as they like to pronounce it, thanks to that foul, rude but very funny ' shameless '
Last years party was very odd. I was despatched to the train station with two cars to collect eight of his friends. They were from Antwerp and he had met them the previous year. I got there just on time, and saw seven teenagers with all the camping gear. The deal was that they were going to camp three or four days on one of my fields. We would feed them , water them, and in return they would spend a few hours a day assisting me in emptying a barn.
At the station I called them over to the car. I told them that my son was expecting them. At the time I got some odd looks which I put down to them, well, being teenagers. They all climbed in. The short drive back was quiet, the odd words like ' very kind ' and hospitable people here '
Back at home, my son came to greet them. He turned to me and said " wrong ones dad " WHAT !!!!! was the only word I could muster. The real group had been delayed up the line, and had phoned in my absence. to cut a long story short, we ended up with 15 campers, and the barn got done a lot quicker. Beer supply went down a lot quicker as well.
" we just thought the locals were so friendly " was the general reply to my question..... " why did you get in my car " They also added that they thought I was just a kind local. Yeah right, an oh so English person, turning up in an old London taxi. Anyway all is well that ends well.
When I leave the keyboard, after this ramble and a quick dip into BBC news , I will venture into the undergrowth. I am going to make a shelter for four sheep. I am using pallet boards for the job. Six should do it, four for the sides angled out a little and two for the roof. Then I cover the roof and sides with chicken wire, add lashings of long cut grass and top it off with branches from a pine tree I have just trimmed ( butchered ) I will let you know if it works or not. I got the idea from a French site I think. Oh it also involves a bag of nails.
I visited our old neighbours from a few years back, yesterday. A farming couple. I have been gathering little snippets of their life for a while now. They lived through hard times as kids during the war. They know what it is like to be poor and survive on little. To me they represent a dying breed. Folk that require little to amuse themselves, an almost gadget free life, simple and quiet. I turn up at 8am, they like that. I get breakfast there. Always the same. Bread, butter, cheese and ham. Power packed coffee as well.
Our discussion was about butter. A while back they sold a lot of farm stuff. Years back they made butter. They still have a pile of unused paper that the butter was wrapped in. Must be old, as their tel number on it is something like ' 367 ' I was offered all the equipment to make butter. I declined as I do not keep cows. For me it seems one jump too far. A local couple with a small holding bought it all. It felt right for them to have it. Anway the butter conversation.
The young couple are finding lost recipes for butter. Early signs are good. Despite the terrible economy here, and their high prices, they are selling. Belgians tend to like quality food. Offer an older Belgian a non Belgian chocolate for example, and it is really seen as an insult. Eat less but eat better is the motto of the older generation. One of the recipes that interested me was butter with hazelnut flavour. It involves putting hazelnut leaves and stems in the butter and leaving for eight days. This is done in March when the sap rises. I will try and get the exact details if anyone is interested.
The conversation moved on to cutting nettles. I was commenting on how I hated strimmers. The noise, the vibration, just everything about them. He agreed politely but his strimmer is a big mother, I can tell you, so he was just being polite I guess. He ushered me out to his barn. Pointing up to a beam he said " pick one, its for you " I looked up and saw several sythes. Six I think. I picked a long blade one. The blade was very sharp. The last time it saw action was in the 60s. The wood handles were woodwormed to death, the rest being quality steel was in A1 order. He took it from me and proceeded to weld steel to it for two new handles. He is 77, and shuffles around the house a little, but give him a manual job, and his heart starts to pump like a 25 year old.
Topic: Belgian ramble number two (Read 3720 times)
