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Archive for May, 2012

New Chickens

Posted in Diary Post, tagged on May 7, 2012| 2 Comments »

Chicken come out!I’ve spent the long weekend at home with Scarlett, catching up on stuff and playing in the garden between downpours.

One short note for the diary is that we’ve got some new additions to the BWM household.  Four of them, in fact.  Four new chickens to replace Mabel and Henrietta who were taken by a fox last year.

They’re Magpie hens.  I don’t know much about the breed (I let Scarlett choose them) except that they’re a Sussex hybrid, suitable for our free-range run, and they lay 240 or so brown eggs a year.  With Clarissa still laying that works out at about 20 eggs a week.  Good job friends and family like eggs!

Incidentally, we’ve had no other fox trouble lately.  A few days after us and the neighbours lost our chickens, a fox was killed on the road nearby.  Maybe coincidence, but we’ve not been bothered since.

All I need to do now is find names for our new girls…

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Polish comes from the cities; wisdom from the desert

Posted in Diary Post on May 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

God created Arrakis to train the faithful

Frank Herbert Dune

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A Scene in RiyadhOnce again I’ve been absent for a while.  I’ve got a better excuse than usual this time. I’ve been out of the country for work.

I’ve just come back from a trip to Saudi Arabia, where I went with a small team of business psychologists to assess the senior executives of one of their big companies (which is the sort of thing I do for living).  It’s been hard work, but worth it: it’s an interesting place.  The people are incredibly friendly and hospitable, but the climate is a bit harsh.  I’ve been basking in temperatures of 40+ degrees during the day and 30 degrees at night.  When you walked out of an air-conditioned building it felt like opening the door of the oven.

And now I’m home, to a very soggy and flooded Bedfordshire.  The ditches are overflowing, the fields have standing water and my road was a stream when I arrived.  Home sweet home!

Enough excuses.  More badgers soon…

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