Week from hell

This has been a tortuous week work-wise; we're all on our knees under the stain of it all and staggering about under the certain knowledge that it probably won't be good enough anyway. The physical signs of stress have been apparent for a few weeks now and that is a concern: not least for my fellow commuters. It's only my by now well-honed training in the art of forbearance that has kept the bodies from piling up around me; that and the realisation that, contrary to a great deal of evidence to the contrary, there aren't actually more irritating people around, it only feels like it. The last time I was so frequently boiling over with irritation, I was in my early 20s. Still, hopefully two of the biggest projects can be finished off next week, just in time for the next load of work to be piled on from a great height. I feel like Garfield in that cartoon when he's looking up and all you can see is his chops on the top of his head, presumably looking at the accompanying "WHY".

Meanwhile back at the ranch Knickers has been settling in and making herself very useful indeed as poo picking Queen and maker of horse dinners Extraordinaire.I've only managed perfunctory doings with the boys this week and didn't manage to do them at all yesterday, but we did get lots done (poo picking and reprising the rancid, sodden mess of the left side of the field shelter, which has suffered from all that rain. I spoke to Pheel about it, who had the marvellous idea that we use some of the giant pile of wood chips that he put in the picadeiro for us only last week. So my big task for the day was to clear out the straw and lay a deep covering of wood chips (9 barrows). I've yet to see what it looks like today but the great thing is that it's biodegradable, we have an inexhaustible supply, and can just keep adding to it. So this might be the answer to our problems. We didn't really want to put a permanent base down as that would mean not being able to move it around, and we bought a mobile one for just that reason.

Otherwise, we bought some solid poles to fence off areas of the girls' field, to give the reseeded area a chance to regrow, and it's now long very very green and lush. This is going to be very useful for pasture management. They do have quite a light footprint anyway, being small and unshod, although the area around the field shelter is best described as a quagmire. I'm really glad we opted to reseed with the more natural grasses, as although they take longer to establish they form a denser mat of roots and that helps the ground hugely. All the fields are looking quite decent given the amount of rain we've had and everyone being out 24/7, which is encouraging. I'm toying the the idea of cracking open the haylage  but can't yet bring myself to wrestle with a large bale every day, trying to persuade it to part with bits of itself. Maybe there's a knack to it that I haven't yet discovered. I have armed myself with many hay nets, to help during the week.

Meanwhile, all the water butts are overflowing and we are wondering what we can do with all this water - thousands of litres of it. At worst we have a pump to drain it away into the ditch next to the road but it would be nice to reuse it. You can get some purifying tablets to use it as drinking water, which might be useful in the winter when the taps and pipes freeeze on the yard.

Today it's windy but at least not lashing down yet and I really must do something with the boys as the main priority. Off to shower and get on with it.