OMFG - my first half marathon race report

Uncharacteristically I am at a loss for words over last weekend. As you will know my half marathon was looming and last minute preparations were sub-optimal at best, what with the hamstring strain, the wasp attack, getting soaked to the knicker elastic bring the mares in during a storm, stabbing myself in the eye on a blade of straw and falling in a patch of nettles. I was not going to ride on Saturday, just in case I fell off and broke something that I might need (like my mind). Having read that REST was the main requirement, I tried to do that but ended up mucking out 5 stables under the guise of "pottering about".

And then the day arrived: Sunday! It began with a 4:30am start - argh. I woke up from a dream where I could not get to sleep, flapping about not getting enough rest before the marathon. In the end I got about 5 hours I think, having woken at 2am and then really struggled to get back to sleep. Not. Nearly. Enough!

You may not ever have pondered the practical requirements of what it takes to prepare for race day but let me tell you this. No matter how much you would rather die than eat breakfast at that hour of the morning, you gotta chug it down. All I could manage was half a bagel with peanut butter and a banana. No matter how much you would rather grab that extra half hour in bed, you gotta get up and move around, drink lots of coffee to ensure all, er, evacuations have been completed. I didn't want to contemplate what getting caught short in the middle of a marathon would look like, and there are horror stories everywhere about runners' trots. Ack. Then there's the hydration - this is good and easy but a matter for serious consideration when you have a bladder the size of a pea. Then there's the energy gels, the protein shakes, the electrolytes - it is a serious business.

So, leave the house at 5:30, drive to work in SE London to leave car, since the earliest train was never going to get us there on time. Arrive 6:40, get train to London Bridge and tube f*ckery meant a lot of additional walking etc to get to Hyde Park Corner before 8am (!) for race start time of 9am. Spend at least half an hour queuing for the loos (vital, this) and in the end leave Sid and Noodal in the baggage queue while I went to my starting funnel (blue). In fact the entire journey could be described as a serious of emergency visits to the loo, interspersed by a variety of transport mechanisms.

So the other thing about participating in a race with 16,000 other people is that it takes ages to get started, as everyone goes off in their various funnels, according to their expected finishing time. I was hoping to finish in about 2:08. By the time we got to the starting point we'd been standing (and stretching and jumping up and down) for about half an hour. It's a challenge trying to keep your muscles warm, as well as trying not to accidentally punch anyone in the face while attending to the warm bit.

So eventually we were off! I had my race strategy mapped out, which was to set off at a steady pace and then move up a gear from mile 7. I very much enjoyed the run around London, past Buck House, through Trafalgar Square, along the Embankment, past the Eye and so on, also enjoying the other runners dressed in outlandish costumes - and feeling a whole new respect for them. It's enough of an achievement to run a half marathon in my view, let alone attempting to do so while dressed as a squirrel, or a giant penis.

Anyway. By the time mile 7 came along I realised that there was going to be no going up a gear and that I would do well to maintain current pace. Argh. I was hoping to be spurred on by the ignominy of being passed by people older or more rotund than me, but all I could do was think elbows and keep putting one foot in front of the other.

The last part of the race was through Kensington Gardens - who knew it was so bloody big. This was a real trial. I had to stop and walk twice until I realised that walking was worse, so I just kept on. I saw Sid and Noodal once on the course; they saw me three times :) The thing that really kept me going and digging deep was the supporters, lots of random strangers shouting "come on Rach" that meant more to me than I will ever be able to let them know. Hopefully my smiles of gratitiude were enough to convey it. Luckily I had had the presence of mind to fortify the latter half of the race with a stirring mix of Noisia, Pendulum and Parov Stelar. Even more luckily I realised on Saturday night that I had not yet synched my iPhone and came very close to leaving the sodding playlist behind on iTunes. That would have been very bad.

By the time we got to mile 12 I was muttering darkly about why anyone would do this voluntarily. Then back in Hyde Park on the final straight a runner fell over in front of me, so I had to stop and help her. She was very dazed and upset (I can just imagine) but she was ok after a few moments and carried on. I knew by this point of course that I wouldn't get near my time but in any case I couldn't just pass by.

Eventually, there was the finish line. ARGGGHHHHHHHH. Felt a moment of purest delight and gratitude, which was then swamped by screaming quads. Not even the merest glimpse of an endorphin rush. This from the woman who can give herself an endorphin rush pretty much on demand by the simple expedient of listening to her favourite running tunes while driving home.

Had to then walk miles to find Sid and Noodal - the event was MASSIVE and I must say I resented every sodding step by this point - lol. All I wanted was a coffee and a doughnut but the queues were mahoosive so we just went home. The tube was torture; packed to the rafters with running types and me not knowing what to do with myself, wishing only for a teleportation device. Eventually made it home at 3:30pm, so a very long day indeed. At least dehydration kept the need for the bog at bay.

Most people would have had enough by then but we knew that there was a heavy bank of rain approaching, so there was the matter of prepping four stables and getting the girls in before the heavens opened. And then - finally - some rest :)

My chip time was 2:26:09, so well off my target pace but not really surprising considering the run up. However, I did beat my brother in law Tom's first half marathon time so that is good :)

So long as nobody mentions the R word to me for a while, I'll take some well-earned rest and start to think perhaps about doing another one.

The upshot is that I have raised almost £1000 for the Brooke, so very very chuffed with that!

Lentils are the new beans

I love beans. Beans occupy the opposite end of my particular food spectrum to aubergines which, as we know, are Satan's vegetables. Beans are good; borlotti beans are best. But too much of anything can dull its splendour (except for Lusos, obviously), so it's important to branch out.

And so I've been experimenting with lentil recipes. I love lentils. Lentils occupy a spot right next to beans on my personal food spectrum. Lentils are good; beluga lentils are best and make for some extremely good vegan recipes. The basic recipe below can be wrapped in blanched cabbage leaves and baked (nom), wrapped in tortillas or tacos, or topped with boulangere potatoes and slapped in the oven.

The basic recipe:

Fry an elegant sufficiency of garlic in olive oil, add finely chopped onion and celery; season with salt, black pepper and oregano and cook slowly until softened. Add chopped peppers and mushrooms, stir for a few minutes then add a small amount of water and a vegan stock cube (Kallo for preference) and bring to the boil, letting the stock reduce to almost nothing. Add chopped fresh tomatoes, a pack of ready cooked Beluga lentils (or cook separately if you have more time than I do) and let it simmer. I like to add a bit of Vecon and a splash of tomato puree for depth of flavour.

To make it quicker I have taken to peeling and chopping the tomatoes then getting them cooking while making the sauce.

For the boulangere potatoes, put five or six good sized whole unpeeled potatoes in plenty of water, bring to the boil and cook slowly until quite tender (but not thoroughly cooked). Either leave to cool or embrace the Great Hot Potato Peeling Dance, as I do. Slice about 1/4 inch or 2cm thick. Meanwhile fry up a couple of sliced onions in olive oil until soft.

Put the lentil mix in the bottom of an oven proof dish and layer the potatoes and onions on top, brushing the top layer with a little olive oil. Lush!

My day

Every now and then you have one of those days when you're glad to be alive and all is well with the world. Since there exists balance in all things in nature, it is only to be expected that you will also experience Other Days, days where the only reasonable course of action seems to be winding down the window of life and yelling "you fuckers!" out of it with great gusto. If my day today was a vegetable, it would have definitely been an aubergine, and you may know by now how I feel about aubergines. Yes. Satan's vegetable.

So. Up very shortly after five to do the horses and set off for work at around 6:50am. Bit of traffic on the M20; accident. No biggie. Outskirts of Lewisham however: very gnarly. In a fit of thoroughly undeserved optimism, particularly in view of a complete lack of (a) satnav or (b) even the most vestigial sense of direction, I decided to seek out a back route.

It started off pretty well actually, good little route through the surprisingly genteel Lewisham Park until I realised I was heading back towards the main Lewisham roundabout (always gnarly), and opted to carry on a beating my path of discovery a bit further. Big mistake. Crofton Park, Forest Hill, even Catford FFS and finally, finally, some while later, back on the main sodding drag exactly where I had already been, heading down to Lewisham roundabout. Much gnarly traffic, an increasingly turgid bladder, a rumbling stomach and a petrol tank best described as "terminally flaccid". Eventually made it to work some two and a half hours after I set off.

There's only one thing to do after such a journey, which is to go and seek out the biggest soya cappuccino known to man and repair to the office, rocking quietly back and forth while consoling oneself with caffeine, a cheese and tomato panini and the prospect of a meeting about how to clear a building containing anything up to 1000 students in the event of a fire.

So all is well, I'm in the meeting and I'm two thirds of the way down my cup of coffee when suddenly, out of nowhere, an unprovoked Attack of the Anarchic Epiglottis. Paralysed just long enough to send a quantity of coffee lungwards, it provoked an explosion of fluid over the immediate surfaces, including but not restricted to table, colleagues and building maps. As a result of this experience I can say with some authority that the reach of one mouthful of coffee can be quite surprising when expelled at great velocity.

Often after a day like that I like to self-medicate on the way home with the liberal application of some heavy duty dance music on my favourite radio station, Project FM Live.I am also by now quite adept at letting some often rampant WTFery on the part of other drivers wash over me while I make my painful crawl back through the Lewisham badlands. After twenty years of driving I've pretty much seen it all. Broken down all over, had my Beemer totalled by a French lorry (Lewisham roundabout), thoroughly murdered one Volvo and one MG ZR (head gaskets), been pranged, done prangs, been cut up, etc etc.

But today two things happened which I have never seen before and which raised the bar on car-based fuckery to a whole new level. Episode 1: in a two lane road waiting to turn left onto the A2, behind a bus which quite reasonably in view of its width and turning circle of a small oil tanker straddles both lanes. I pull up next to a guy in a van. My peripheral vision clocks that he is becoming quite exercised by this and he inches forward aggressively, cuts me up and starts ranting and raving at me while I sit quite legitimately in the outside lane. WTF. He's still ranting as he sails through the lights. Perhaps he's had a bad day.

Let it wash off as he roars in front of me and takes up the one car-length spot outside the junction box that I might otherwise have taken had I not been so rudely undercut. No matter. Wait for the lights again, but there's nowhere to go that won't cost me money. Last time I inadvertently ended up stranded on that junction box it cost me 60 quid, so I wasn't about to do that again. Quite reasonably, as far as most people are concerned. However. I couldn't help but notice that the sausage eaters in the car behind were becoming rather irritated by this rampant adherence to the rules of the road, gesticulating wildly and swearing with sufficient vigour to presumably cover the inside of their windscreen with a fine film of spittle. The lights going red were the final straw and, unable to wait a moment longer, they swung round and flew past me at at least 3000mph, still gesticulating with sufficient vigour to allow the fact that the lights were red to escape them, only to come to a screaming halt right in the middle of the junction box. I do not ordinarily like to indulge in karmic incorrectness by wishing misfortune and pestilence upon my fellow man, but on reflection it wouldn't hurt at all for Karma to sprinkle her fairy dust on them, perhaps in the form of a 60 quid fine.

Eyeballs, mainly

So a few weeks back Noodal and I were doing lates during a power cut and, in a bizarre and truly random twist of fate, I leaned down to pick up a hay net and wallop! stabbed in the right eye by an errant blade. The event took out a whole weekend in a fog of pain but, being quite blokeish about these things, I resisted all entreaties from my nearest and dearest to go to the doctor, relying instead upon a giant bottle of Optrex and a shed load of Nurofen.

A few days later I was able to see and drive etc so all returned to normal. Except that I have a tendency to rub my eyes when tired and soon learned that there was a residual sensitivity in the eye which forbore me to continue this habit. So I worked with it and stopped rubbing my eye, until last Sunday night when I must have rubbed or knocked it in my sleep. It woke me up at the time and in the morning it was quite sore. Still, must carry on, I thought, up at 5:30am for the 50 mile drive to work, record breaking 6.5km at the gym (proud) and on to a series of meetings and a number of hours spent interacting with a computer before driving the 50 miles back home, by which point the eye was rather painful. Really rather painful.

By Tuesday morning it became apparent that I was in no fit state to drive or look at computer screens and the day was spent in degrees of agony, even the act of blinking an ill-advised activity. Nevertheless I hoped that some miracle would restore it to some semblance of normality by Wednesday morning, but it was not to be. I relented and called the surgery for an appointment.

I recounted events to the doctor, who frowned disapprovingly, and only brightened when he said a corneal abrasion might lead to an ulcer if left untreated. "Ahhh", I said, "uveitis?" "Ooh", he replied with a gleam in both perfectly functioning eyeballs, "are you medical?" "No", I said, "but I once had a horse prone to uveitis". The gleam faded, and he sent me off with a prescription and a note to take to A&E.

Parting rejoinder to the doctor was a quip about having to wait six hours in A&E with a throbbing eyeball. "I shouldn't think it will be that long", he said, not unkindly, "just take a book or a newspaper". I resisted the urge to scowl at him and say " a BOOK? Are you mad? Do I look like I am in a fit state to read a BOOK, you highly educated cretin, you?" For the ultimate irony is that the one time I am confined to barracks on enforced rest, I am utterly unable to read or fritter away endless hours on my laptop, in the way that I might otherwise wish to do. Arrggh.

Sid drove me up to the hospital and for a miracle we were seen straight away.The eye was examined by a nurse wielding a slit lamp (which hurt, but I was stoic) and pronounced full of dust and in need of a rinse, after the precautionary application of some anaesthetic drops. A rinse, you say? A rinse being a litre of saline being passed over the eye while I leaned over a sink. A second nurse did this and she was a very interesting character; head hunter in the city, body guard and animal nut, which was all very nice but it did not distract my body in any way from wanting to employ all necessary defensive tactics at the sight of someone coming at me with a plastic tube and trying to get at my injured orb. Bodyguard or not, she really struggled with my eyelids and eventually proclaimed them the strongest she had ever come across - what an accolade!

Back to the slit lamp and the eye was pronounced cleaner. Ah good. I really didn't want to go through all that again. Nurse said she wanted to try and curl my upper eyelid up and over a cotton bud, or some such, in the search for other abrasions or foreign bodies. What she didn't realise until after several failed attempts (ow!) was that she was dealing with the world's most powerful eyelids, and had to give it up as a bad job. She did a fluorescein stain to show the extent of the abrasion (verdict: "significant") and gave me some ointment, which as we all know is much better than drops. Chloramphenicol, my saviour. It seems there is no conclusive research as to whether or not an injured eye is better covered. In my case better not until at least the act of painless blinking could be restored, but I took to wearing Sid's wraparound shades at all times, which did help a bit.

During Thursday and Friday the eye was supersensitive to light, really bad. I had to close all the curtains and approach the rooms with no curtains with great caution.  Days best descried as boring and painful, but I was at last able to tolerate an eye patch, which really did seem to help with the resting process.

And today - oh glory, with praise to all available deities - much much better! I still have to wear the shades outside but what a mercy. I celebrated by riding Q and then going into the village to do a spot of shopping and exchange eyeball-related horror stories with various shopkeepers. The girl in the deli - her uncle was hit directly in the eye by a squash ball and they had to *take the eye out* in order to treat it. Mark in the veggie shop - as a kid, a mate of his flicked a rubber band at a kid, which hit him in the corner of his eye and actually lodged between the eyeball and the socket. They had to take his eye out too to retrieve the band. Arggh. The moral of the story is that no matter how bad it is, it can always be worse. Just imagine for a moment how that would be. And then quickly do something else.

Anyway. So the eye was holding up well so having been stuck indoors doing very little for days on end, I took the dogs out for a run in the forest as a further celebration of return to normalcy. Never to be taken for granted, the ability to look around and blink and go about one's business without staccato bursts of pain issuing like a tsunami around the eyeball.

The other moral of the story of course is never to do lates during a power cut.

Some thoughts about the sharing of principles

"Studies show more people are able to stay active in animal advocacy with a lower level shock value on these pictures. So many good animal advocates are lost when they could have helped so much. But if you misuse your power and throw pictures in our laps of gory, horrifying, shocking slaughter photos without one petition, or one cause, or one movement or action, well then you're just risking losing the people who could have helped you, by being repulsive for no reason except to share someone else's report. Where is this exactly or who is responsible, no one knows. Don't risk burnout of those who really care by abusing your issuing powers." - D.M.

This is a very interesting point to consider. On the one hand, for me it has been life-changing because it sent me back to vegetarianism and giving up milk and as much dairy as possible, and I am very happy for that. On the other, sometimes I really can't handle it. In my view it is a social responsibility to be aware of the repercussions that one's actions have and to make an informed choice instead of one dictated by social standards, and act accordingly. But I kind of have a foot in each camp. I don't believe myself to be a "lemon sucker" as a result because I've taken the trouble to find out and make my choices by confronting things I find deeply disturbing and unpalatable. But sometimes I still can't handle it. For the most part though I would rather put myself through it for the awareness than not.

I've also been thinking about that continuum of hypocrisy on which we as animal lovers all exist. There are those who define themselves as animal lovers yet eat meat at one end and committed vegans who seek to eschew all forms of cruelty from their lives at the other, and all manner of variations in between. At the moment I can only truthfully define myself as being somewhere in between. Finding that dairy is really no better than meat, I have given up milk and dairy products - with the notable exception of cheese. I don't eat meat and I am actively choosing cruelty free beauty and household products, but I still wear leather. I see no reason not to eat eggs from my own happy hens but I confess to a weakness for cake which is not made from our eggs.

My point is that I know I have quite some way to go in terms of living a life that supports my principles. That said I believe passionately in being supportive of people making more ethical choices as a more positive and productive way forward than castigating them for the things they are not doing. Although I understand the passion that drives it, because I feel it myself, there is nothing more off-putting to the on-the-fencer than a militant vegan or vegetarian who persists in shoving their views down others' throats. Within that though there is still a vitally important place for raising awareness. My own choice is increasingly to share articles which are informative which might get people thinking and talking but not to share anything truly horrifying.

Consider. This time last year our household began our journey by giving up milk, after a particularly heavy discussion about the vagaries of the dairy industry and the hypocrisy involved in a position which eschews the eating of veal while drinking milk. Shortly after this I stopped eating meat because it reawakened me to the things I knew but had chosen to not think about. Hitherto we'd been getting our meat from local farm shops, the sort where you can see the animals living more natural and happy lives. But the turning point happened when it dawned on me that no matter how good the husbandry, the bottom line was that there was no avoiding that horrifying journey to the slaughterhouse, and all that entails.

When I announced that I was going vegetarian, Sid's reaction was "oh Christ"; imagining no doubt confrontations, inconvenience and a certain amount of haranguery. Don't worry, I said, I'm not going to make an issue of it if you don't. And I haven't. Neither has he.

Since then there have been some very interesting discussions that I don't believe would ever have been possible had I chosen to adopt a combative stance. The net result is a household that is roughly 90% vegetarian and a great deal more consideration on the part of the meat eaters concerning the provenance of their food. Sid, hitherto a confirmed meat eater, has been talking about giving up meat for a month. I can't tell you how awesome that is.

Something to consider, no, about the benefit of awareness and education over castigation?

The dress saga

So House of Fraser had a January sale and I found a couple of treasures while perusing their pages, the highlight of which was an L K Bennett dress knocked down from an unreasonable sum to a really quite tempting and attainable one. Congratulating myself on the imminent acquisition of one excellent bargain, I ordered the dress and a small selection of other items without hesitation.

A few days later and a box arrived bearing my spoils. Splendid, I thought, tearing into it with some considerable enthusiasm, for I loff L K Bennett - albeit usually only from afar in view of aforementioned weighty price tags.

All other items were exactly as anticipated - except for the dress which, no matter which way one held it up to the light or from which angle one viewed it, bore all the hallmarks of... a jacket. An L K Bennett jacket, true enough, and the right colour, but a jacket nonetheless.

Awash with emotions which could reasonably be gathered up under the heading "disappointed", I lost no time in getting on to their Customer Services department to politely enquire after the obvious error. Not to worry, their standard auto responder seemed to imply, simply reorder on our web site and return the item that was sent in error. Mmph, I thought, slightly disgruntled, but went ahead as directed.

But wait! Said dress was no longer available! Arghhhhhh. I duly fed back this information to the good people at HoF, wailing about being on the point of missing out on this great and much coveted bargain through no fault of my own and enquiring as to what they intended to do by way of recompense.  No, they replied, it is definitely still available. A quick search showed that in fact two sets of the same dress were listed, at different prices. One indeed was sold out but wait! the other one showed one dress remaining in stock, in my size and everything. It must be meant to be. So I placed another order and gaily awaited my parcel.

A few days later saw the arrival of another box.Splendid, I thought, tearing into it with even more enthusiasm than I had the first time. See if you can guess what was inside.

Yes, another jacket.

Working as I do in a front facing, customer service-oriented environment, I appreciate more than most the great importance of not taking out one's impotent rage on the poor sap whose misfortune it is to answer the phone when some sort of fuckery has taken place, as above. So I left it a few hours until my vital signs had returned to normal, and called them up once I was in a position to conduct myself in a friendly and amenable manner. The nice customer services lady (Jane) and I even bonded over the incredulity of being caught up in this improbable web of crapness not once, but twice. We left it with Jane placing the order herself directly with the warehouse to offset the possibility of any further malpractice and parted on splendid terms; I to await my third parcel, and she to do whatever the hell it was that she needed to do next. She even put it on free express delivery for me and gave me a tenner off.

The third parcel arrived yesterday. It looked a bit small to me but nevertheless I pressed ahead with the ceremonial opening, pushing down that little voice which was attempting to set off all those little alarms I have set up around the boundaries of my psyche to guard against attacks on my sanity and general wellbeing.

See if you can guess what was inside.

A skirt.

An L K Bennett skirt, true enough, and the right colour, but a skirt nonetheless.

There is only one thing to do in such a situation, which to give oneself over utterly to the undeniable humour of it all. Indeed, we speculated as to what might arrive next, were we to continue along this path which we knew by now to be strewn with veritable boulders of ineptitude and chasms of crapness. Some pantaloons, perhaps, or a playsuit. Maybe a coat of arms. By this point the mind was boggling freely while galloping off cackling into the middle distance.

On the plus side I now have a nice bargain L K Bennett suit. Less positively, it's clear that it was just not meant to be with the dress.

Jane and I thoroughly enjoyed this new development on the phone today, concluding with irrefutable logic that clearly, clearly there was some sort of issue lingering between what was listed on the web site and what was stored in the warehouse, all cunningly bearing the same product code.

So I ordered a Hobbs dress instead.

More vegan recipes

I spent some time over the weekend making a feast of Indian food, as follows:

Two of the recipes are Madhur Jaffrey's; spicy chick peas and green beans and peas with ginger and coriander, with rice, bombay potatoes and a red lentil curry that I was inspired to recreate after having a very good one at the Natura cafe at Goldies last week.

The green beans and peas were delicious! I cooked them with a little oil and stock in a frying pan, covered for five mins then reduced the stock until there was just 2-3 tbs of water left, then add 1 tsp sugar, 1 tbs chopped ginger and 3tbs of chopped fresh coriander.

The chick peas are a real favourite; vegetable oil, garlic and onions, softened, then added ground cumin and coriander, the chick peas, 6tbs of chopped tomatoes plus a little stock, cook for 5-10 mins then and paprika, cayenne pepper, garam masala, lemon juice and fresh coriander. All the better to be simmered for a while.

The lentil curry was based on my preferred tomato base (see prior blog) then added red lentils and spices.

Nom.

Some favourite vegan recipes - curry

As promised here are a small selection of vegan recipes. Apologies for the delay; this was caused by being accidentally brutally stabbed in the eye by a blade of hay which rendered me utterly unable to do anything significant with a computer screen or make any real progress with the book which arrived on Friday and which I have been awaiting with great anticipation for some 12 months. Anyway.

Vegan Curry
This is quite time-consuming but worthwhile.

Ingredients
Tomato base
8-12 plum tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped,
2 sticks celery, finely chopped

Curry base
1 tsp each of black mustard seeds, black onion seeds and cumin seeds
1 clove garlic
thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, chopped
1-2 tbsp madras curry paste and/or home made curry powder
1 onion, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
2 medium potatoes, preferably parboiled in skin, left to cool and chopped
1 sweet potato
1/2 cauliflower/broccoli
selection of green beans, courgette, whatever to hand
small cup of red lentils
handful of cardamom pods
1 large tin of chick peas
fresh coriander

Tomato base
This is not essential but it's a really good base for a curry as well as a pasta base ragu. I find with vegan food you have to work a bit harder to get that depth of flavour and that it is well worth doing so.

1. Skin the tomatoes by scoring the skins and placing them in a bowl of water for 30s.
2. Chop the tomatoes and season with salt, black pepper and a good glug of olive oil.
3. Saute the garlic in olive oil then fry the onions very slowly until translucent.
4. Add the celery and cook for a further 5mins or so until soft.
5. Add some water, enough to cover the onions and celery, a vegan stock cube and raise the heat to reduce the volume by at least half. Add seasoning. This will intensify the flavour. You can use white or red wine if you have some handy.
6. When the stock is reduced, add the chopped tomatoes and another lug of olive, then cook for ages over a low heat. Ideally a good hour - the longer the better. If the tomatoes are not good quality you could add a bit of brown sugar to round the flavour.

Meanwhile, get started on curry base.

1. Heat some vegetable oil to a high heat, then add the seeds and cook until they start to pop.
2. Take off the heat and let it cool.
3. Add the garlic and ginger, cook for 30s.
4. Add the onions and cook for a minute or two.
5. Add the curry paste or powder and stir to mix thoroughly.
6. Add the veg in the order of which takes longest to cook, stir.
7. Add enough water to cover, the lentils and the cardamom pods, and simmer for ages.

When the tomatoes are nicely reduced, sweet and tasty, add to the curry base. Cook the whole on a low heat - long and slow is best. Finally, add the chopped coriander chick peas and serve with boiled rice, quinoa or cous cous.

Remember to taste at every stage and adjust seasoning.

NB make sure your stock is vegan. I love the Swiss Vegetable Bouillon but this is not vegan - they doa vegan version but it is not as good. Kallo do a great vegan stock cube.

Enjoy!





 

Of prevention being better than cure

This may be a bit gross so please do not read if eating or if you have just eaten or indeed if you are a bit twitchy about bodily fluids.

So Sid has for ages had a sebaceous cyst on the back of his right thigh. It has sat there for some time but grown larger and last week it started weeping. By Friday it was quite painful but, being a bloke, Sid resolutely refused my exhortations to get to the doctor, dammit. The more I insisted, the more French he became. There is a quotient attached to such a balancing act, beyond which it is inadvisable to tread.

By Saturday he was in quite a lot of pain and the thing was huge, hot and very angry, so I stopped by at the pharmacy (actually for T's eye drops) and asked the pharmacist whether I should take him to hospital. One slightly patronising look ensued along with that "there there little miss don't be alarmed" thing that medics and vets are so damn good at (I wonder if there is a module for this at med school that pharmacists also get to take) and he assured me that it would be fine and could be lanced and drained at our local surgery. Alrighty then. Suitably reassured, I went back home and told Sid that the doctor should be able to deal with it and that he was to make an appointment first thing Monday morning come hell or high water. The rest of the weekend passed for Sid in a haze of significant pain while the rest of us were off poncing around in slightly irregular circles in our best breeches at a local competition venue.

Monday morning; I call from the gym (while toiling away on exercise bike) to ensure that the appointment has been made. 3:50pm. Good. By this point the site was a big tempestuous boil of a thing throbbing with pus. Arrange to leave work early and hotfoot it down the motorway to get home just in the nick of time to transport the patient. Doctor: "oooh, very impressive, I'm afraid this has gone past the point of antibiotics or anything we can do here. You'll have to go to hospital". Argh. She makes an immediate call to the surgical team and packs us off to Hospital A.

After a suitable interval we arrive at Hospital A, register the patient and await the triage nurse. Upon being seen, he informs us that they cannot do the surgery there as they have no emergency facilities, and that we need to go to Hospital B. He goes on to explain that the two establishments share a switchboard and, as such, the doctor is unlikely to have been any the wiser about which hospital surgical team she had put on standby. Marvellous. HOWEVER! Since we are here, we cannot be allowed to leave until he has been seen by a doctor. Further waiting. Eventually we are seen. I sign a disclaimer to take responsibility for transporting the patient to Hospital B, thus offsetting any liability on behalf of the Hospital A. Sid is in a lot of pain, with elevated temp (38.6) and heart beat (114).

We arrive at Hospital B, some while later. We register at the desk and I explain about the referral and how the doctor said we would not need to wait in line at A&E. The receptionist is equally resolute that we must wait nevertheless. Meanwhile Sid is looking increasingly grim and getting hotter and more feverish. Those hospital reception seats are not built for comfort at the best of times, and especially not when you have a boiling cauldron of infection on the back of your thigh.

Eventually he is triaged for the third time that night and finally, finally is taken to a room where he is triaged again. I felt like having "no allergies, no diabetes, temp 38.6, tachycardic and nil by mouth all day bar two extra strong mints" tattooed on his forehead. He is put on a drip and has a canula fitted. Actually that's the other way around isn't it. By this point it is around 9:30pm and the lack of food, coffee etc is taking its toll, not to mention the worry as he is looking rather green. I feel like my insides have been scooped out and left in a pile somewhere, to be replaced by a small handful of pips. Nip out quickly for a snack only to find I unwisely offloaded all my change to the barista at work that morning for a soya cappucino and a panini and the pathetic choice remains of machine coffee of a bag of crisps. Opt for crisps. Stale crisps, just for that extra little cherry on top of the midden heap.

Approximately an hour after being transferred to the room, he is wheeled up to surgery, though not before the surgeon (young, posh, friendly) has been in to add his comments to the impressiveness of the site. Even for a relatively simple procedure - albeit one accompanied by a galloping infection - it is difficult to watch your loved one being wheeled off to go under the knife, but the theatre nurses, well practised at this sort of thing, were great. Off he went and off I went to wait for him to come out of surgery. Three nights of very poor sleep must have caught up with me and I think I must have dozed in the relatives' room, waking periodically when my back or butt started to throb unbearably after spending so many hours sitting on so many uncomfortable seats. On the plus side, pretty sure I didn't start dribbling.

The nurse came by about 11pm to tell me he was awake so I was able to see him, sitting up, looking rather more perky, certainly less green, and talking about kebabs. We had a cup of tea and after making sure he was ok, I left him for the night and drove home, rather sedately due to fatigue and the crash that happens once the adrenaline gives way. Wander the corridors for a while (seems I am only person there) before finding the exit courtesy of another snotty medic who insisted on speaking to me in a slightly too loud and certainly too patronising tone, just to finish me off. Unfortunately I was too far gone to take her to task by saying "My dear doctor; I fully appreciate the elevated status that you inhabit on the social ladder and I also appreciate that you are probably inured by now to treating all your patients as the proletariat fuckwits that they undoubtedly are in comparison to your lofty intellect and 15,000 years of training, but please, in the name of all that is holy, employ those formidable powers of observation and just recognise that I've had a hell of a day of stress, worry and sitting on your bloody uncomfortable chairs, and spare me the patronising manner, capiche?"

Home, a tin of soup and bed. Slept like a king with three cats piled around me. I don't think I moved all night, though whether this was to do with the fatigue or being pinioned by cats, or some combination of the two is not clear.

Sid was finally discharged about 2pm and we finally got home around 24 hours after the whole thing began. The wound has been packed and dressed and will need to be be changed daily by a nurse for the next week or so. This sounds innocuous but is in fact a brutal procedure comprising the brisk cleaning of the wound from the inside out by a nurse possessed of only a passing concern for the patient's comfort or nausea levels. The district nurse will visit at the weekend and I just know Sid will insist on me being there to see the wound.

The medical staff are being evasive about how long it will take to heal, this large crater in his leg that is subjected to a vigorous daily scrub. Sid's mum, in her capacity as "un oiseau de mauvaise augure" thinks it will be a good month.

The moral of the story for Sid  is that it's always better to get to the doctor sooner than later, even if you are a bloke. For my part, I learnt that levels of common human decency are much higher in other departments than in ours.

En vacances

When you live on a farm with as many animals as we have, holidays are hard to come by. Last year was a relay event to ensure coverage but this year, by the grace of Noodal, Sid and I spent two and a bit weeks on a much-needed driving holiay in France taking in Brittany, La Rochelle, the Dordogne and the Languedoc-Roussillon. And Orleans on the way home.

We set off at 3:30am after only minimal sleep to catch the Eurotunnel, leaving a rainy UK behind for a torrential downpour in Calais (the sort where even the windscreen wiper setting marked "frantic" barely suffices) followed by around 650km of driving to stay with our dear friends Stu & Rhi in one of the most westerly points in Brittany - this was a triumph of caffeine over common sense, particularly as the satnav sent us the long way round. We spent a lovely couple of days with them, eating a lot and refusing to drive. Most notable eating experience (aside from Stu's amazing butter curry) was the creperie where there were a surprising and most welcome number of vegetarian options. I had a filling of potatoes, cheese, egg and mushrooms in mine, and polished off two further crepes stuffed with banana, caramel and Chantilly cream. I could have died.

Next stop La Rochelle several hundred more km later, stopping off at La Roche Tremblante (which, as the name suggests, is a HUGE rock balanced so precariously on a hillside that one person can make it wobble. Even more awesome, a rock shaped exactly like a mushroom (Le Champignon!). We also stopped off at Carnac to see the stones, which I have wanted to see for a long time. Unfortunately you can't walk among them in the summer, but as this is to protect the vegetation, one mustn't grumble. Temperatures started to climb as we sat on a rock with a baguette for an al fresco (or in this case, al forno) lunch before continuing south.

We had a couple of nights in La Rochelle and on reflection one would have sufficed, notwithstanding the distances travelled. We did the Old Port and the aquarium, which everyone (ie those who left reviews on tripadvisor) raved about but which we found a poor third when compared to Lisbon and even London. Still, Sid got an awesome photo:

Next stop Perigueux in the Dordogne. I fell in love with this region, so beautiful and lush, it was a feast for the eyes and the soul. Less optimal for the vegetarian (or pescatarian in my case), the fact that this is foie gras country and you can't move for it. Veggie options are best described as scarce. I knew this would be the case and had already reconciled myself to the need to subsist largely on omelettes, cheese and fish. Some places literally had nothing that I could eat on the menu. However, we found a fab little place called Le Clos St Front for our evening meal and was assured of a lovely veggie starter and fish for main, so we booked a table for that evening.

This was one of the culinary highlights of the trip - the restaurant itself was extremely "sympa" with an outdoor terrace in a beautiful old courtyard. My starter was an artichoke salad with mixed leaves and a few strawberries and raspberries which set the whole thing off superbly. The main was turbot en papillotte with fondant potatoes, green beans and petits pois. Sublime. The thing that really set it off was the dessert, a millefeuille with apples and a caramel sauce made with beurre sel which quite took my breath away. The service was first class and we particularly enjoyed nice touches like the amuse bouches, local aperitifs (Lillet) and digestifs. We walked back to the hotel singing "j'ai bien mangé, j'ai bien bu..."

Next day was the excessively pretty village of Montignac and a visit to the caves at Lascaux, another site I had wanted to visit for such a long time - chiefly as a result of my love of Jean Auel's Earth's Children series. You can no longer visit the actual caves because the passage of bodies through them was causing all sorts of unpleasantness in the form of spores which were affecting the drawings, but the painstakingly created replica is well worth a visit. The whole thing took 20 years to create. We visited another grotte in the afternoon with a fabulous array of stalactites and stalacmites - to think it had been there undiscovered and unmolested for centuries!

On to Cahors for a one night stopover which, after Montignac, was something of a letdown. In fact, one might reasonably describe it as a shithole. Just to top it off, I had the worst meal ever, a salad with prawns and salmon. I must say the establishment promised little better, being one of those brasserie chains, but we were a bit stuck since we landed in the middle of a Blues festival and the place was heaving. But Jesus, it was rancid. And the hotel! It was like a blast from the Seventies, with none of the good bits. We took a view and were on the road by 8am next morning, replete with pain au chocolat, some diabolical coffee and a firm resolve never to go back there again. In fact the only good thing about Cahors is its relative proximity to the Languedoc.

We arrived at our final destination, a little village called Brissac le Haut, next evening after another epic drive, where we'd booked a gite for a week. Our gite was part of a chateau in the mountains and we had to take some wonderful winding mountain roads to get there and I learned that I love driving in the mountains. The views were spectacular! And so were some of the climbs. The last ascent into Brissac to the chateau was awash with hairpin bends - the combination of the two meant that the air was fragrant for a while there with the smell of burning clutch as our fully loaded Beamer made the last push to the top. Erk. But it was worth it for the view from our bedroom terrace:

 We did all the stuff we wanted to in the Languedoc: we visited some beautiful little villages such as St Guilhem le Desert;

we walked, went canoeing and swimming in the Herault, a truly beautiful river with the clearest water and teeming with life - fish, snakes, crayfish etc;

and spent some quality time in the pool which was extremely deep and as such several degrees colder than the river, but fab just the same:

And so back to Blighty after two days of driving, with an overnight stopover in Orleans. 

Since we were on the road so much, I had the opportunity to form some impressions about the driving habits of our Gallic friends. While I consider myself to be a committed Francophile in many respects, I now know that this does not encompass the way in which they drive, quite literally, nose to tail and will conduct spontaneous lane changes into a space which one would hesitate to chuck a fag paper into at speed, with something that can only be described as gay abandon. Even as a seasoned driver in places like central Lisbon, I was shocked. And the fabled Peripherique in Paris, which we did roughly a quarter of on the way home, is like this but on amphetamines. Driving to work this morning, I remarked to myself just how civilised British drivers are - even the ones in white vans - by comparison.

Weekend in Somerset

We spent the weekend at a hotel in Somerset with a bunch of friends to celebrate a birthday. The hotel is a massive affair set in several hundred acres of parkland and a number of activities were planned. First off Nordic walking, which is essentialy normal walking but with poles. Poles are helpful in helping you get up capacious hills and in striding along with longer strides than you might do ordinarily, but otherwise largely vestigial. It was a beautiful day and lovely countryside with lots of fresh clean air, so a really good start. Afterwards we went to the gym and did a quick 10k on the bikes, followed by a swim and sauna. The hotel also had a room they called a "tropicarium" which was essentially a sauna room for lightweights that none of us really saw the point of.

The hotel had two restaurants and in the one where we had a table booked that night, the menu didn't look too promising, especially the vegetarian options. In fact I probably came out of it better than the others, having chosen a brie, apple and gooseberry (?) tart, which turned out to be very nice - not least perhaps because there turned out to be only one gooseberry in said tart, which I thought was rather random. Everyone else had an assortment of overcooked meat and what looked suspiciously like Smash.

Later we sampled the entertainment, which turned out to be a rather shabby cabaret followed by a DJ, who took some convincing to play anything we wanted to dance to but which was aided by the copious consumption of vodka. We ended up on the dancefloor to the bitter end, pleading for one last tune before staggering off to bed. Not, however, before we got chatting to an older couple who appeared to have (a) swinging tendencies, (b) some very minority tastes and (c) designs on the pair of us :beats hasty retreat:.

On Saturday morning we went walking at a deer sanctuary nearby, where we got to feed them and cuddle some of the friendlier ones. The sanctuary is run by a chap who is passionate about deer and has been for years, who went from seeing some wild deer once in a forest to now running this large sanctuary for more than 100 of them on 80+ acres. And I thought our own slope of creature keeping was a slippery one! What a great (and somewhat wild haired) guy, and the facilities were excellent. It's lovely to meet people who are passionate about doing their best for animals in the way that he clearly is.

Lunch back at the hotel was followed by wine tasting, dinner, a tribute band and more vodka-fuelled dancing until 3am, this time unmolested by swingers although Sid proved a hit with the ladies - lol.

Considering that we rarely drink we managed to escape the after effects of the night before quite neatly, which was nice. I had a back massage then went swimming and spent some time in the steam room, before a very light lunch and what was billed as a chocoholics' tea party for the girls and target shooting for the boys. The tea party was a fest of chocolate based drinks and cakes served as afternoon tea, where we all ate our own bodyweight in choccie doings topped off with champagne and strawberries, until we could no longer move and felt rather green around the gills. Luckily dinner was not until much later, so we had the opportunity to crash and recover for a couple of hours before trying the other restaurant, an Italian. I had vegetarian antipasto (very good) followed by rigatoni arrabiata and absolutely no dessert, vodka or further dancing.  

It was a great weekend and I am very glad to have tomorrow off before returning to work.

More doings

I can't believe how time is flying past at the moment. Since my last stud blog we have at last received word that we are now DEFRA-approved AI technicians, qualifying us to inseminate our own and other mares. Setting aside the impressive range of facial expressions that this news brings to bear in non-horsey chums, it is rattlingly good tidings and we are very excited! We are just waiting for the ground to firm up a bit so that we can install a dummy and stocks, then of course there are the relevant accoutrements to acquire and we are ready to go.

Also, the worm has finally turned and at long last I have begun to assemble my beans in some sembalnce of order to start getting out and about with Q. Last weekend we trucked over to a friend of my trainer's, who had invited us to hack out with her. Following carefully given instructions, off we toddled - me marking off landmarks of note, Q doubtless wondering what was occurring. When we arrived and parked up, I went in to tack him up while Kate was riding in her school. At this point there was no small amount of crashing, banging and yelling  in the trailer and I did wonder what sort of fire-breathing creature she might reasonably expect to emerge at any moment. What she didn't realise was that this was just me - lol. Only kidding.

We had a lovely hack around her property, which is absolutely stunning and makes our place look like a postage stamp - and not even one of those for large letters. Q was on excellent form and it was clear from the expression on the back of his head (in which things I place great store) that he was having a whale of a time, bless him. We had to come back along the fence line where a number of horses were charging around enjoying the sun, so naturally enough they came barrelling up to check out the interloper. If you've never sat on a stallion while he is prancing and issuing forth deep throated rumbles that resonate throughout your entire frame, well it's quite a thing. But he is a very good lad and accustomed to being ridden next to fields full of horses doing star jumps and other activities of an athletic bent, so I didn't even have to deploy my emergency shoulder in. He was a star and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Better still, we now have a hacking bud!

Today we went out for a lesson at another arena about 20 minutes' drive away. We had to park up quite a few hundred yards from the arena and negotiate a range of interesting sights and sounds as we made our way through the yard. I was quite glad I'd opted to lead him down as he passaged and yelled his way along the lane, yet still maintaining an eye for mum. When we got to the arena I couldn't help but notice a small Welshie galloping up and down along the fence line, squealing in the most high pitched, ridiculous whinny I've ever heard (something like what I imagine might happen if you accidentally sat on a hamster), which really lit him up and made me reconsider whether there might be a place for religion in my life after all.

I did let him have a quick look around but got on as quickly as possible since the idea is to get him used to going out and dealing with many sights and sounds, and me to dealing with him dealing with many sights and sounds by getting straight on and not faffing about. There was certainly no lack of forward but he settled quickly and we had a good lesson, notwithstanding the squealing pony. Very pleased with him and we hacked back to the trailer to finish off.

Otherwise, I've decided to stop eating meat again after a number of years having fallen off the wagon. Surprisingly enough it began with a switch to soya milk at Sid's instigation: the surprise being that Sid loves his meat. I've always refused to eat veal which, given its position as a by-product of the milk industry, does pose a bit of a quandary for the milk drinker as he has pointed out. So the household has sitched to soya milk and it got me thinking again about the welfare issues that caused me to spend a number of years as a vegetarian, and, well, here I am, feeling very happy about it.

Roundup

Clearly, I have been remiss in my blogging activities. This might have something to do with the fact that I have been as busy as buggery at work, staggering home with barely enough energy to collapse by the fire and be fed an assortment of home cooked loveliness by Sid or Noodal - for which, thank dawg.

Perhaps the most surprising development chez Luso Towers is that Sid "I'm French I am and I will eat and drink as much and as often as I like" Johnson has gone on a health kick. Yes folks, it's true. Long walks with the dogs in every wood and forest and beach within a 30 mile radius are no longer enough: indeed, he's had his bike fixed and has been out cycling in those same woods and forests like a man possessed. And now that he's bought me a bike as well, a whole new chapter has begun.

A couple of weekends back we went cycling in Bedgebury Forest. Given that I haven't cycled on an actual bike in more than 20 years and my prep was a rather wobbly sojourn around the yard one night after work to the background accompaniment of one snorting, bug-eyed stallion, it is perhaps unsurprising that I was a bit agog at the idea. This wasn't helped by the fact that the car park at Bedgebury was positively awash with clumps of professional-looking cyclists when we arrived, and Sid repeatedly saying "God, there's some really serious cyclists here", over and over until I barked "ARGH!  That's not helping!" before retreating back into my spike-infested, angst-ridden bubble to contemplate the dash I was about cut with my obviously brand new, virgin bike replete with newbie wobble, blood-free knuckles and horse hair-coated fleece and clearly non-cycling attire.

Off we went, Sid like a man born on a bike, and me resolutely not. He roared off with something approaching gay abandon down the hills while I inched along, one hand permanently on the brakes and experiencing some consternation at the idea of riding in a straight line while CHANGING GEARS, let alone freewheeling at 40kph headlong down a muddy, stony track. That being said, it didn't take me long to gain some confidence and I soon caught the bastard on the uphills, repaying the favour by roaring past him going "wheeeee!" and "wow this is ace!". In the end we did about 9k and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Next day we went to Dering Woods, with the dogs this time and a much more technical ride, as I believe they say in the trade. By technical I mean replete with hazards such as mud, roots, fallen branches and wayward Labradors. I'm not sure I'd have been able to do it without the experience of the previous day, but once going we had a fab time. It was Five Go Mad in Dering Woods, only with Sid, Rach, Dora, Willow and Franklin D. Husky instead of Julian, Dick and Anne, George and Timmy the dog.

Since then we've all joined Endomondo and have been enjoying a pleasant competition about who cycled the most. During the week my efforts must be confined to the gym where hitherto I have done 10k max on the bike, but with the goad of Sid pushing 14K upwards I did first 16k and then 18k, on consecutive days. Running has gone out the window for the moment.

However I think we've overdone it a bit as we did bugger all this weekend and everyone was feeling sub-optimal at best, so I missed my planned hack with Liz "balls of steel" Roberts on Saturday and also lesson with Mandy on Sunday. Argh.

Back at the ranch, today is day two of weaning for the Noms. Yesterday was really quite stressful as reported in the stud blog, but today things are more settled, with the Noms doing less fence walking and yelling. I went to see them tonight when I got home from work and they came running over for some reassurance and some hay. Little Nom started belly slapping whilst enjoying a butt rub and Gualter took the opportunity to get down and have a good roll. They were quite anxious first thing this morning but are slowly settling. Meanwhile the mares are doing well and hanging out with Q at the fence. Q finds any change stressful particularly when it involves his mares, so he spent yesterday getting himself in a complete lather, quite literally, running up and down the fence line. We've left T in his all weather area today to avoid excessive blokeishness; he's quite content there enjoying his own special horse TV (Dan's horses on the walker) and with his goatie girlies, especially after a good workout with Dan. I am quite relieved that it's done as I wasn't looking forward to it. So far so good.

Otherwise, we have sent off our application for the AI Technician course, a feat which involved a trip to get the forms countersigned by the vet to enable us to get our DEFRA Accreditation. I did this last week on the way in to work, arranging to collect the forms on the way back home. The surgery closed at 6pm so I left work at 5, on a mission to get to said surgery which, ordinarily, would be quite doable were it not for the array of bottom-feeding fucktards whom I had the misfortune to encounter along the way. Regular or even sometime readers of this blog will know by now that I have an ongoing passion for hitherto undocumented laws of nature, and here is another one which I intend to christen "Rach's First Law of Restricted Motion". In essence, this Law governs the phenomenon which states that the more pressing the need to get from A to B in a fixed period of time, the higher the chances of encountering a mind-boggling collection of sump-dwelling motorised conards whose single purpose in life appears to be to keep you from your goal. Even the expeditory effects of Project FM radio were not sufficient to offset these irritations. However. There is more than one way to skin a cat and, rather than get into a 2 and 8 by ranting impotently as I may well have done in an earlier life, instead I rang the surgery and prevailed upon them to leave the forms outside, thus facilitating a nice relaxing Radio 4-enhanced sojourn at my leisure, contemplating this new Law.

Back to work

I'd like to hunt down that fundamental rule of physics which states that one hour of time spent in the office equates roughly to half a day spent at home during the hols. Everyone returns to work bemoaning this fact and therefore there must be a hitherto undiscovered (or at least, unexplained) branch of quantum physics to explain this curious and deeply irritating phenomenon. If any of you Brian Cox-alikes out there want to have a stab at it, please be my guest, and while you are about it you could also check out why it is so damn difficult to get a good night's sleep the night before going back to work. Kthx.

My return to work goes something like this:

Do lates on the yard a little earlier than normal the night before, giving time to (a) prep suit etc, and (b) have an early night in view of lurgy which has kindly surfaced to add that special touch to my last day of liberty :shakes fist at sky:. Feeling if not ahead of the game, at least fairly on track, I then go off to bed early and am making cute snuffly noises by 10pm, snug in the expetacation of a good night's sleep to help overcome said lurgy. Not wanting to give Sid said lurgy, I have repaired to the den on the second floor. Excellent. Only to then be awoken at 2:49am precisely to a wild rattling of what I suspect to be the attic door, located just outside the den, keeping step with the howling gale that is blowing about the homestead. Mentally refusing to contemplate getting up to investigate, I toss and turn, trying to get back to sleep to no avail at all and, eventually, giving in to small cries of distress issuing from the transitional cells that line my unfeasibly small bladder, I get up and make my way to the bathroom whilst the gale howls about the house and the attic door rattles alarmingly.

But wait! Is that the sound of a cat in distress? I loiter on the landing, listening with the straining ear of one who would not see any of her cats in distress under any circumstances but who really, really doesn't want to have to go all the way down the stairs at this ridiculous hour in the morning when there is a gale blowing around the house and I need to get up in two hours. Moments later I realise Sid has fallen asleep with the TV on so, suitably relieved, I crawl back up to the den, taking care not to loiter beneath the attic door (which is partly ajar).

I know, I think, I'll read for a bit, that should do it. But no. I cannot quieten my mind from going over and over all the things we have to do this week, this month, this year. Arses then, I tell myself, I'll try to stay awake for as long as possible. This normally works a treat in all but the most exceptional of circusmtances, so I'm confident that snuffly noises will soon be issuing forth from under the den door any moment now.

But no. By now I am being consumed by that cloak of irritation and increasing desperation of one who knows she must get up very soon, who really needs to sleep and yet cannot. Bollocks then, the only thing for it is to read some more. Finally fall asleep somewhere in the region of 4:45am, just in time for the alarm to go off at 5. Marvellous.

Nothing for it then but to haul my outraged frame out of its treacherous pit and begin morning doings, for tis Noodle's day off and am on morning duty. Downstairs, greet the smalls, let the dogs out and make myself a coffee. Tea just won't do it after a night like that. Don woolly hat and coatage sufficient to combat the howling gale and step out into the breach, noting as I go how rain is blowing horizontally across the yard and the wind is practically strong enough to whip my feet from under me. Thank dawg for the extra ballast I've accrued from lapsing my gym doings over the hols, or I might have been somewhere over Northern France before I knew what was occurring.

Pausing only to remark to myself how the yard is strewn about with brooms, skipping out buckets, haynets and other equipment which normally has the grace to sit quietly at its appropriate station, I feed the boys, top up haynets and stagger across the yard with a wheelbarrow full of haynets and breakfast for the mums and babies, fully expecting them to all be huddled in the shelter, as they usually are in the event of any inclemence, and indeed how they remained even during the last howling gale which tore sheets of onduline up from their pile and scattered them liberally about the place, including up against the fence next to the shelter.

Mommy Johnson mode swings into action and there's nothing for it but to venture out across the field, thinking about how there's nothing on earth I'd rather be doing at 5:15am on a disgusting Tuesday morning than tramping across a sodding field, practically being torn limb from limb by a capricious wind, looking anxiously for my herd. And there they were, huddled in the corner next to Q, as they always do in the event of anything untoward, the very picture of equine misery picked out in the glow of torchlight. With a bracing cry of "come on you buggers", I turned back for the shelter and they all trooped in after me.This was not a morning to divvy them up into mums and toddlers to make sure everyone got only their apportioned ration of grub; no. Just get on with it so we can all go about our business and you can get into the shelter and dry off. I pile in with the haynets, skip out, check them over by torchlight and repair back indoors having closed them in to their all weather area, only to find that one of the dogs had done a protest poo right in the middle of the kitchen. "You bastards!" I yell, by now near breaking point, and schlep off to take a very hot shower, but not before shaking said wadded poo in Franklin's face, knowing full well it was him wot done it.

Having congratulated myself on making it through the garden in my suit without getting too muddy, I drive out past the shelter, noting as I go how everyone is charging about after the fashion of very agitated horses in a high wind. Argh. What if they injure themselves charging about? Nobody will be up for hours. Argh! But I don't want to leave them outside in that if they're not going to use the shelter. And Argh! I'm now suited and booted and as such ill-equipped for an equine rescue mission after a night of heavy rain. Park the car outside the gates, switch it off and go and stand there for a few minutes to watch, in the howling gale with rain still blowing horizontally across the yard. Fortunately they settle almost immediately, and I am able to leave the homestead unmolested by further indecision.

Arrive at work at 7:30am, and go to a day's work, consoling myself with the fond notion that I could maybe leave at 3:30, what with only having had a half ration of sleep and being still lurgified. Ops meeting at 2: well that needn't be a biggie, it's bound to run on a bit but I'll schlep off after that. Except that just before the meeting, a call in from the Help Desk issuing further mewlings of distress based on the fact that they were being beseigned by students unable to login, further to a pre-Christmas AD rollout in our computer labs. Argh! Argh! So we formulate a plan to combat this and we all go into crisis mode, dealing with our allotted tasks according to our roles and skillsets. Finally managed to get off about 4:15, having checked that I could be of no furtther use to anyone, with one last hurrah in the form of a story of cheese making from the boss to finish me off. 

Get home to find that Sid has my lurgy after all and the dogs haven't been out as a result. Rather than risk a further protest poo, I decide to throw caution and most of my good sense to the wind, and take the bastards for a walk.

Sitting quietly on the sofa now trying to calibrate by how many extra degrees my throat is now throbbing, and marvelling that it could and probably should be a lot worse after all that. What ever else it may be, it is certainly never boring.

Catchup

I blame the lack of activity in this blog on a number of factors, mostly involving being busy at work and unparalleled levels of crapness. Also, we've had some ups and downs which hopefully are now put to bed at least for a while.

Tigre wasn't quite right for a couple of weeks in his right hind stifle, just as we were rocking along very nicely. He's back on form now and back in work; we've got some catching up to do but it's so nice to be riding him again.

Also, Gualter came in with a fat fetlock last Sunday evening, absolutely hopping lame. Quick call to the vet and we established with some flexions that it was not a fracture (argh the very thought) and could wait for Monday morning for callout. It's one of those fundamental rules of horse keeping that these things always happen at the weekend. Come Monday there was too much swelling for the vet to see what was what so she left us with a course of bute and vowed to return on Thursday. I'm so glad we put in that all weather rubber area because the stables are really too small for him and mum and he needed to be on restricted turnout, so it was ideal for that.

On Thursdsy the swelling was down but not as much as hoped, so he was given further course of bute and another week on restricted turnout, which meant everyone coming in and a really messy shelter to deal with every morning. However, the swelling was going down steadily and today he got the all clear to go out again, so the vet and I stood and watched as the four of them tore it up around the field to the theme tune of James Brown "I feel good". Hoping there will be no further problems from it - fingers crossed.

We're all set for winter now, with deliveries of haylage, bedding and feed over the last few days, and the corresponding drainage of the bank account. Still, record cheap vet fallout today - £36!

More on the lower field

So the updated to do list:

* installing a gate - DONE
* fencing the eastern boundary to get the neighbour's horses off it - DONE
* installing water to the two new paddocks DONE
* sorting out the drainage in the lower field :) DONE
* digging out the pond DONE
* removing all the dead wood from the pond - DONE
* harrowing (and harrowing and harrowing) - DONE
* clearing out the bottom ditch DONE
* fencing the remaining boundary, the pond and across the middle DONE
* digging out the field shelter DONE
* laying stone and rubber matting in said field shelter TO DO

All of this is good, except that the field now looks like an absolute bomb site.

Mostly concerning the lower field

It's been a while - am considering giving up blinking because three months seem to go by every time I do so.

Lots has been going on and I haven't wanted to blog about it until all the dotted lines were duly signed upon lest anything go wrong, but now that is done I can reveal the big news which is that we have after protracted machinations procured an additional five acres - hurrah! Really thrilled, as it takes the pressure off somewhat but also means that there is another whole raft of things to do:

* installing a gate - DONE
* fencing the eastern boundary to get the neighbour's horses off it - DONE
* installing water to the two new paddocks
* sorting out the drainage in the lower field :)
* digging out the pond
* removing all the dead wood from the pond - DONE
* harrowing (and harrowing and harrowing) - DONE
* clearing out the bottom ditch
* fencing the remaining boundary, the pond and across the middle
* digging out the field shelter
* laying stone and rubber matting in said field shelter

So as can be seen there's a lot to be done as the land has been overgrazed and neglected, so there's weeding to do as well as discing and re-seeding in the spring. We've been out there all day today (and what a beautiful day for it) armed with chain harrow, axe and chainsaw, and it already looks a lot better. We've taken out the old boundary fence, redone the electric fencing across the access gate, chopped down the old dead wood, piled up all the old shit that was left lying around (including numerous pallets and tractor tyres), harrowed (and harrowed), and planned the next stages of work with young Pheel and his Pitt-alike colleague Richard who I've mentioned before and who'll be here on the 24th to start all the digger work, of which there will be about a week's worth. Noodle will be thrilled :)

Meanwhile the horses are all well, getting their winter woollies and enjoying lolling about in the sun while we all toil away on their behalf.

Since my last update..

.. I have been mainly very busy, and lots of things have happened.

The Good
All the horses now have a secure area of rubber-covered all-weather turnout outside their stables/shelter. Whatever the weather, they'll be able to get outside and stretch their legs without being confined to barracks. There'll be no more hacking out a safe path along the driveway from the stables to the picadeiro to get the boys out for an hour in times of deepest snow and ice, no need to confine mares and babies to stables or worry about paddocks getting trashed when they get waterlogged. Better for them by far and also better for us in terms of husbandry during those rancid winter months when everything is such bloody hard work and even the most steadfast and dedicated of owners start to wonder WHY they put themselves through it.

All the stables and the shelter have been rubber matted so we can cut down a bit on bedding and mucking out will be easier.

The younglings are doing extremely well and are a delight to behold.

The mares have had their first appointment with the dentist and were extremely good. I always wonder what they must think when they have the gag fitted and someone grubbing around in their mouths with a giant rasp which, let's face it, must set up some impressive reverberations inside their heads, but they were model patients and we were delighted. Needless to say, some very sharp teeth were in evidence and now they are no more. Which is nice.

Little Nom has had his first farrier appointment and other than the bit where he opted to keep flinging himself on the floor rather than submit to standing for said farrier (during which I gave thanks for the freshly laid rubber floor), it went really well. He is a precocious little swine wrapped up in the world's cutest foal body and although unsettling for all concerned at the time I think he learned a powerful lesson that flinging oneself around in a pre-teen strop does no real good. Gualter stood like a pro for his second every trim, bless him.

Q continues to do well on his regime, which now involves having his muzzle on during the day and free access to his paddocks overnight. Unfortunately lessons with Mandy have been thin on the ground lately due to conflicting schedules but we did come 4th in the dressage at home series she did (E44) without the benefit of the third and final effort during which we were primed to correct all the things we learned during the process.

T is doing really well in his ridden work even if there isn't enough of it and we had our first canter under saddle last week, very lovely and soft.

We had another Bento clinic, where Q was much calmer second time out.

Knickers is doing well in her weekly work with the boys and it's a huge help to know that they have good sessions three times a week. This is a godsend generally and will be particularly so when it's no longer light by the time I get home.

The Bad
About three weeks ago the boys were both extremely unsettled on the Saturday afternoon, especially Q, who was pacing and completely sweated up in the evening. I brought him in at dusk as usual to his winter paddock and closed the gate, just as I had for the previous couple of weeks. Only this time he either didn't register or didn't care that the gate was in the way and tried to gallop through it. Result: one stallion-shaped dent in the 12' metal gate :O and a very bad nose bleed. I've never dealt with an equine nosebleed before and it was quite horrifying - blood was literally pissing out of his nose and within moments of bringing him in, the yard looked like a scene from a gorn movie. Arggh.
No sooner had we reassured ourselves that we had stemmed the flow than a giant ripping noise emanated from T's field and we found that he was charging around with his shredded rain sheet flapping around his legs. Took a while to get near him to get it off, by which time we were wondering what the bloody hell was going on and what in dawg's name might happen next. We took a walk down the neighbouring fields to check on their horses and see if we could see anything that might be causing the disturbance, tooled up with our pack of dogs and a number of implements for self-protection just in case, but there was nothing obvious other than what looked in the pitch black like a foal that was yelling its head off, in the nearby camp of our travelling friends across the way.
I discovered the following weekend that the "foal" was in fact a shetland pony stallion who'd been liberated by persons unknown from a field a few miles away and mysteriously ended up at said camp. Turns out he was such a handful that they ended up calling the owner to come and fetch him the next day. So the general conclusion is that it was the presence of a small but forceful new stallion presence in the environment that set our boys off and caused the ruckus. Luckily no major harm done and I was both shcoked and extremely relieved that Q suffered nothing worse than the nosebleed and a couple of scrapes on his legs.

Good news and bad

Two vet visits over the last 24 hours have given us both good and bad news.

THE BAD NEWS
neither of the girls are pregnant :(
After all the effort (not to mention expense) this is extremely frustrating and disappointing. We're now at the end of the season so there's little we can do and the vets can offer little in terms of why we didn't have more success. We've used the best stud in the area for the boys and the most recommended amongst Luso breeding friends for the AI work but alas it was not to be. There are a few possibilities that I can think of, having discussed it with a number of vets and colleagues:

1) There was possibly some low level uterine infection present which would have made conception difficult. Our vets do not routinely do endometrial swabs (they will certainly be instructed to do so next year) and the absence of fluid is no indicator of itself as to the presence or absence of infection. However, Newmarket vets swab every cycle - ok this is related to live cover considerations but interesting nevertheless.

2) There was some problem with the AI process. The practice in question has a 60% success rate over the season.

3) There are some mares who typically only conceive every other year, and these are likely to be the very maternal ones. As it happens both girls are extremely maternal 

4)  They weren't good candidates for frozen semen. They were AI'd last year but fresh semen was used.

For next year we are going to install a dummy at home, do an AI technician course and collect the semen ourselves. The only good thing we have got out of it all is that the boys have been trained to the dummy. It will also mean that we can offer chilled as well as frozen.

Interestingly with the girls, the first vet who did their scans had to sedate Xacra, but the second vet didn't find it necessary. It was the first time I've been able to be at home for the scans but Noodle said the first one was quite impatient, which might explain Xacra's reticence. The second vet however was excellent. He also said often he finds horses are less well behaved when the owners are present, which I have heard before from the stud vet. As an owner I'd be mortified if that were the case. Both girls were excellent throughout.

THE GOOD NEWS
Q is back to normal :)
The vet who saw him last week was back today and the difference was immediate when he was turned out in the arena - trotted over to the mares straight away and with a quick free school was markedly better and back to normal in his paces . He also had no reaction to the hoof testers.

He's also lost some weight as a result of the following regime: out with the muzzle during the day, allowed to graze for an hour without in the afternoon and in restricted paddock with the least grass overnight, with a week's course of bute. We'll continue this for another couple of weeks (sans bute) and blood test again after a month to see what the inflammation markers are like. He can be back in work now too.






The farrier is coming tomorrow and the chiro next week.

So, disappointing re the mares but extreme relief that Q is back on track. The vet was very complimentary about him in terms of stallion behaviour, which was lovely.

And Sod's Law being what it is, both boys are now back in work and I have a lurgy. Splendid.

Autumnal doings

I may have mentioned that Q was a bit of a slug when I rode on Sunday, but that's not unusual. On Monday we free schooled him and he looked a bit choppy in front. It does happen occasionally, usually when he's been doing star jumps in the field. We were due to box out for a lesson at a nearby yard on Tuesday but he still wasn't right so I cancelled and gave the vet a call, who came out on Wednesday. She found a slight reaction with the hoof testers so it's possible he's had a mild attack of laminitis :(

The problem is that we can't keep him in without him weaving incessantly so agreed to put him on restricted grazing and a course of bute. This was ok at first but this morning I found he had worn a path along the fence line :sigh: so in an effort to keep movement to a minimum I've got two options: 1) try Zylkene, a natural calmer and/or 2) put a grazing muzzle on him and let him wander at will. On balance I think he will be less stressed if he can move about to keep an eye on the mares as normal but not stuff himself with grass, so we'll try that.

We had a blood test done which showed a slight elevation in the markers which indicate some inflammation, so he's got a week's course of bute and we'll reassess with the vet next week. Argh - I hate it when there's something wrong with any of the creatures.


Meanwhile, I rode T this morning who was clearly full of vim and vigour. Not one iota of relaxation was to be had in the in hand warmup but I decided to ride him anyway since if we are going to move forward I can't just rely on only riding him when the planets are aligned. Besides which if I have faith in the new-found levels of trust building between us then it's as good a test as any. So he started piaffing as soon as I got on but settled (ish) to a rather animated walk and we put hoof prints all over the school with circles, serpentines etc followed with some lateral work. Up to trot and he was full of beans but listening, though I can't say he ever really relaxed through his back or stretched out to the contact as with previous rides; instead he was a bit sucked up throughout but the tempo was easily managed and he was good. It's quite a thing having all that energy to play with (!), strapped to half a ton of very animated stallion.

Knickers then appeared with the wheelbarrow and he decided it would be a good thing to show off to her (?) and immediately launched into a passage which we might still be doing even now if it were up to him, and I must confess I did enjoy it. Even a slight firming of the lower back gave a transition to piaffe - man he's sensitive! - but I couldn't let it go on even if I was rather enjoying it as he's not really that fit, so pushed him forward into trot. We had a couple of canters on the spot followed by the nearest approximation to a stretchy trot that we were going to get, and I left it there, pleased to have ridden the Rocket Man through it but not wishing to push it too much.

Otherwise, it's raining, and raining and raining. I brought the girls into their shelter so that the younglings could lie down in the dry, which of course has set Q off wanting to know where they are. It's a juggling act and sometimes you just can't win.

Meanwhile Xacra, who has been making good progress in the hind feet picking out stakes, nearly kicked my head off the other night. It's always that right hind and always when she fears losing her balance, so I am going to ask Tessa to look at her and see if there is any adjustment to do. I think a course of Zylkene will benefit her for this and the forthcoming farrier visit next week, as he couldn't get ner her hind feet last time and they really need a trim. I just need to determine that it's safe for nursing mares.

Final meanwhile: after a Super Noodle effort, all bar two stables are now rubber matted and the dog pen is finished. Once Pheel comes to do the work on the remaining two stables  we can finish them off and get the shelter done. Then all that remains is to get two more loads of hardcore in (9am tomorrow) so that the boys can come and finish off everyone's all weather turnout areas.

Never boring is it.