To Friday, 10 October, 2008, Oh Buster...

Well, we had a few good days with sunshine, then yesterday and today it's been back to normal. Rain, rain, rain. During the dry spell, Jim and I managed to fight back some of the brambles that were gradually surrounding some of our specimen trees near the boundary. There are mountains of the things and we really have to do something about them or the meadow will disappear along with the trees. It's a slow job though. Still, if we do some now and then, I suppose it has to help.

There are 3 larch trees here and they were tiny when we moved in.

Note the big pile of brambles on the left



















Buster the wanderer hasn't come home tonight. In spite of the rain, I thought I'd better take him for a walk. It's so wet, I walked along the little road which leads to the woods and the lake. I figured the woods would be far too wet and slippery. All went well until we were on our way back. As we passed the O'Brien's farm, he just vanished. I turned round and he was gone. I looked either side of the road - no sign. I imagine he's headed back to Dillon's Wood to play with all the dogs there. They really like him and fed him last time. We'll have a trip there in the morning. Bloomin' dog.

I hung around outside for a while, then thought I'd start cutting back the brambles from the drive, this is the road up to The Deenery, which is ours. Time flew by and Jim, who had gone into Gort to hunt and gather, arrived home about 6.30 and I was still outside. He decided I was totally mad and pointed out that I had a very dirty face. I worked on for another 20 minutes until it started getting dark. I had to change as my clothes were pretty wet! Luckily we have a kreel on which to hang the wet things and Jim has lit Stanley so they should dry out.

My arms and back are aching, but I'm sure it's only temporary. I had gathered some autumn leaves for pressing when I walked Buster, which were very wet so I gave them a quick press for a couple of hours to get the worst of the wet out and have just put them in fresh newspaper under a pile of books. Wow, Buster has just appeared. He seemed very hungry so maybe he hasn't been fed by anyone else. 20.45. At least he's home and busy tucking into his food.

Jim's cooking duck so I'll finish for now.

Duck was lovely, though not much of it! With roast potatoes, mushroom sauce and broccoli, it was a good meal.

Buster's slept all evening, at one point we were both asleep on the settee and Jim took a photo. How unkind!


















Yesterday we popped into Mrs Broderick's cafe, which was humming. All the talk was of the economy of course. Dare we admit to having some money invested in Iceland? Jim took some photos there too, but in one I look awful and in the other Anne does.


She does the whole thing for charity.



The lovely Anne Broderick












Both of us together. The charity box is on the far left of the counter










One of the big jobs we tackled 2 days ago was felling the 2 remaining trunks of an ash tree. The first 2 trunks had both fallen at various times in storms and we were worried that the rest would follow. It wasn't an easy job but we somehow managed it with me on the end of a rope and Jim with the chainsaw. Now we have lots of wood for Stanley too and the view has opened up amazingly. I took some photos of that event too.

You can see the 3 separate trunks and the ladder at the ready






















The last trunk is resting on the sycamore tree behind. We did manage to pull it to the left so that it fell to the ground.










Look at that blue sky. It was a glorious day on Tuesday, really warm. The contrariness of our weather.