The shared table

We've had five new baby lambs safely delivered on our farm - with no help from us whatsoever.  Phew!  Dodged a bullet there.  Bettie heroically delivered three.  She was pretty big, and very uncomfortable. We've got perhaps one more to come and have pretty well given up on names.  We started with chalky but then a few more chalkboards arrived and now we are struggling to tell them apart.  Did you know you are not allowed to call a blackboard a blackboard any more?  Head farmer and husband found this out in the local hardware store recently searching for blackboard paint to put up on a wall in our preserving room.  He was momentarily denied service by a surly store woman as she corrected him over and over again, saying 'No we don't have blackboard paint.  We have chalkboard paint'. So that's how the little guy on the left got his name.  There's a theory on farms that once you have a name you don't end up on a plate.  That will certainly be the case on our farm.  These little guys will grow up on this five star animal resort being none the wiser.  And costing us a small fortune as ute load after ute load produces more bags of animal feed with not much grass around, for the privileged mouths and beaks on this property.  Unfortunately they all support the shared table philosophy, that what's in your bowl is also mine when you're done with it. The chooks are eating the leftover lamb feed pellets and the thought of this now entering into our food chain via eggs scares me - just a little.   About 11pm every night Bennie our best in class cocker spaniel sneaks down the stairs to polish off the cat's food provided we haven't given Max's food to Minnie as she sits at the kitchen window looking in like something out of the movie Oliver, just not quite so undernourished.   Max won't eat anything that isn't out of a can or pouch and Bennie's gastronomical experiment with eating blood and bone out of the garden beds ended badly all over my new lounge room rug.  So food is a shared experience in my home.  Sometimes I wish it wasn't though.

The locals here even look different

In Bennie's former life, before moving to Tasmania we used to go for a walk to the local coffee shops. And where we lived, there were many.  He would sit under the table and stair longingly at waitresses until he got their attention.  What was hard to explain was that those cute puppy dogs eyes are all about the toast she was carrying and not so much about her. These days there's not much coffee on our walks, and definitely no toast stops.  He's done well considering he's not 'off the land' as they say.  He's had to adjust to new surroundings.  He's learnt that chickens lay eggs that must be delivered without breaking onto the back door mat.  Not an easy task for a dog, but rewarding if you do break them!  He's learnt that roosters are not to be messed with and there are some seriously good smells in the veggie patch when blood and bone gets throw around.  He's now trying to get his head around baby lambs.  They sort of look like a dog...a kind of poodle perhaps?  They don't smell like a dog and they don't play like a puppy at all.  In fact he looks a bit bewildered by them.  Having been a high achiever in his puppy school years, Bennie thinks all dogs should have the same schooling as him.  I imagine he introduces himself to all animals as 'Hi I'm Bennie, best in class what's your name?'  This would be pretty well lost on a bunch of sheep who neither sit on command or stay when told.  Before moving here we used to walk past the local community veggie garden that had a bright red, life size sculpture of a cow in it.  Bennie used to bark at it every time and tell it off for being there I guess.  He's not quite so cocky these days.

Unable to defrost my dining room

Saturday gave us a Spring teaser.  A little warm breeze and some sun to soak through your skin.  Today no sign to be had.  The south wind coming under the gaps and cracks in my old house have come directly from Antarctica without so much as a stop for coffee.  My hallway is like a meat keeper.  I'm tempting to hang a side of beef in the dining room just because I can.  I have had a vase in there with a single hydrangea flower sitting above the mantle since about March this year.  It never died.  It's just frozen in time.  And again the wearing of three layers of clothing is a necessity to get from one part of the house to the other and as I write, I feel the wrap of my leggings and long pants around my knees.  Spring does this.  One day it's hard to bend your arms from the Kathmandu coatings and the next day you are peeling off the layers wondering if your hot flushes have returned.  It will be nice again not to have to gather kindling and babysit the wood fire.  Not that we don't love our seasons.  Just some of us enjoy the winter more than others...like Max.  He moves from electric blanket to fireside and return.  Like the slow movement of a herd (of one) seeking greener pastures, he has an internal radar for warmth.  He's a winter fan.  He's dead keen on the side of beef idea as well.