Hornets. Poorly parent. Panda MOT and Pyrenees Prep.
GV Tractor Run and the Football World Cup.
Weeknotes first thing Tuesday then over to Bridge Sollars with A for my first visit to Timothy & Birch. Now I’ve been I can see why everyone raves about it. A lovely cafe and it would be very easy to spend a fortune on homewares in the shop. Gorgeous stuff.
Late lunch then had a go at spray polishing the dining table, focusing on the scrubbed clean patches. A lot of smell for minimal restoration.
Pilates in the evening.
To the gym on Wednesday then a catch up with Jean about an unwell dad. We ended up going to the GP in the afternoon.
In other news, I received an email asking if I’d be interested in appearing on BBC’s Escape To The Country, Herefordshire edition. It appears these blogposts do have an occasional reader 🙂 TV fame is not for me though.
Turned this year’s paltry broad bean crop into broad bean risotto for dinner.
Thursday was Panda MOT day, so I dropped it off in Ewyas and walked on to Pontrilas for the gym class, and back home after class taking the footpath along Dulas Brook from Pontrilas to Ewyas Harold, then back over the Common, with diversions up the access track to take a look at No 2 Sunny Bank and to call in at the Doctors to ask about travel vaccinations (mainly for Nepal).
The rest of the day was designated mowing day, on the ride on mower while the “hunting” Honda is getting the once over. The grass was still lush so I did a cut without a collect so it was soon done. My mowing route included the spaces between Phil’s lines of scythed meadow grass. I encountered a grass snake in the orchard:
And then it was time to walk back to EH to collect the car. MOT passed without a hitch. Tidy!
Admin in between included emails about fields and Team Mucho Gusto T-shirts.
Friday lunchtime I headed into Hereford to run some errands and then on to dad and Jean’s to provide some TLC.
Saturday was spent on Pyrenees admin: ordering euros, buying travel insurance, finalising and publishing my Pyrenees Prep blogpost, sorting out field documents and postal voting. Then back to Winchester for Indian Takeaway Treat with dad.
Sunny Sunday morning was perfect for the annual Golden Valley Tractor Run, even if it did clash with the Football World Cup Final, which we watched on and off too.
… until another visit to dad and Jean was required culminating in a trip to the out of hours medical centre by the station for stronger antibiotics for dad’s leg.
I spent Monday morning making three batches of Anglo Indian Apple Chutney with windfalls from the two trees down by the old garden railway. I was planning to use the microwave for all three but I think I may have broken it during batch 1. So the other two were done on the hob. I stuck more closely to the recipe than I sometimes do. 900g apples doesn’t make a lot of chutney it turns out (even rounded up to 1.1kg to allow for bruises, bugs and bites): 3kg apples made 3 x large jars, 5 x medium jars and 3 small jars.
I also had a go at fixing the leaky water butt.
Collected the cut grass in the afternoon.
We’ve heard the tawny owl again, the noisy night time sheep (maybe they are afraid of the dark!) and a trio of hornet visits / removals. They are big but – so far – benign.
In the greenhouse the beef tomatoes starting to ripen and I’ve a cucumber almost ready to pick.
TV: Silo (season 1), The Beanie Bubble, The Power of Parker (ditched after 1 episode).
Podcasts:Â The Forum, History Extra, In Our Time.
Photos: Herefordshire week 190 on Flickr.
Phil: w/e 2023-08-20.