The third chicken is laying. I repeat, the third chicken is laying

No it’s not some sort of code that spies might use when they meet their contact. It is a fact. Our last chicken has started to lay at long last. She is laying consistently since last Saturday. Brilliant. Of course we are now coming to the stage where we have too many eggs for ourselves and we can give some away to neighbours and friends. But that’s good.

Since they are all laying we have now let the chicks come out into the middle garden. They really love it. There is loads to explore and lots of green things, as well as insect, for them to feed on.

It has taken some while. About six months. But there we are.

Breezy

We went out to do some shopping yesterday and every time we got out of the car the wind would start to gust. Funny because it wasn’t the least bit windy when we left the house. As we drove back and turned into our lane the trees were swaying and the leaves were swirling all around the place. We got back to house to find the little greenhouse had disappeared! We found it eventually. There were broken pots and plants and soil spoils all over the place. The bottom of the stairs was covered in about 4 inches of leaves – at one point Bertie thought they would make a good bed, see picture.

Bertie on a bed of leaves. Doesn’t sound too appetising thank goodness!

Large pieces of corrugated iron had been blown across the garden. There were also a couple of corrugated iron sheets that we had used in the walls of the chicken pen that had become detached and were flapping about in the wind. It was terrible. It was aright mess.

Of course there was no point in trying to tidy up in those winds as you’d just be, literally, pissing into the wind. And you know what happens then!

Fortunately the gazebo frame was standing nice and rigid and erect. Good, I thought. Because we haven’t got the top on, the frame is so thin, the wind should just blow round it.

A little while later, La D popped her head round the door and said, “Luomochifa. What was that you telling me about the gazebo frame? About how resilient it is in the wind. Well that’s a load of b******s my old mucker (she does love to put on a bit of a mockney accent now and again) because it’s now lying all twisted and torn.”

I rushed to the window and gazed down on the unedifying spectacle.

“What a mess,” I said

“Are these things really meant to last more than a season?” La D asked in a bored fashion. “We do seem to get through them Luomochifa.”

“We do, my darling. We do.” I replied. However, there is a little bit of an upside in this and that is that the cover was very thin and didn’t provide much protection from the sunlight, whereas the previous one did. So next year we will have to get one with a little more protection. Besides I was bored with this one anyway. So there.

Weather

V strange. Yesterday in the massive breeze, our little outside temperature guage registered, wait for it. Are you ready? 25.5°C. 9th December.  25° plus? Can hardly believe it. It felt so warm. Tomorrow’s forecast is about 3°.

Weird

Christmas

Still nicely understated here compared to the UK. Just about to see the Christmas “thing” get really underway now. Very lovely.

Ciao, mantenere la fede