Monday
With olive picking at the Phillips's off the cards for the time being at least, thanks to poor Chris's black and blue ankle, on Monday it was 'business as usual' for us - whatever that means! What with Helen having been away in Prague, and then having had a string of guests, with our brief mini-holiday in between, followed by olive picking, it seems like it's been months since we had a 'business as usual' type of day!
While Helen booted up her computer up for the day I headed out to buy some materials that would enable me to continue to make progress with our new shed - which is slowly heading in the right direction after having spent the weekend working on it.
After making a quick stop at our local village farmacia to order another box of heart worm tablets for Reggie (here, all animal-related drugs are bought from the chemist, just as people medicines are), I headed to Montecatini for a change. Number one on my shopping list was a dozen hinges so that I could start making the shed doors, but I also wanted to get some electrical bits and pieces, switches etc, which are things that I know our local builder's merchant doesn't stock, so OBI it was.
The shopping in OBI took rather a long time - it seemed that Monday morning was the day all the staff went around the store on their cherry pickers, clogging up every aisle (or at least every aisle I needed). Unlike in the UK, they don't cordon off aisles when they need to use equipment like this, but instead just drive around you and shout at you to move if you're in their way - this meant that I could get the items I needed so long as I was quick on my feet!
After failing to find the hinges (it seems that 12 hinges of the same type is too much to expect from OBI's stock control system), but finally finding some replacement staples for my staple gun (which has been empty for a couple of months now) and getting all the sockets and switches I needed, I headed home making a pit stop at Frateschi's to see if Paolo could help me with the hinges... Fortunately, Paolo came up with the goods, so I was home in time for coffee with Helen just after 11am on the patio in the glorious autumn sunshine.
After coffee Helen went back to the office while I made a start on the shed doors. This proved to be slow work despite having been careful to make the framework of the structure as plumb and level as possible (it's not far out at all), but by lunchtime we had the first two of six doors hanging and swinging! I say "doors", but they are just empty timber rectangles - frames, if you like - that need boarding with tongue and groove to finish the job.
We sat on the patio to eat lunch in what was now the hot sun - hot enough for to me consider changing into shorts, although knowing that an hour after lunch I'd be in the shade behind the house, I decided against the wardrobe change.
We didn't take much time over lunch as we are both only too aware of the shortness of the days now that the clocks have changed and we wanted to get a bit more outdoor work done before the light faded. Helen changed into work clothes and donned the strimmer to make a start on the final cut of the terraces for the year now that all the wild flowers have gone over (which were supporting the honey bees until recently).
So while I continued to construct wooden doors, Helen strimmed her way down the terraces behind the house. We were both so absorbed in what we were doing that we missed our window to get out with Reggie for a walk today so, feeling guilty, we continued to work until the daylight disappeared, promising to take him out tomorrow.
Tuesday
Tuesday was a relatively uneventful affair - I spent the morning in Vellano working with David while Helen set herself to office work.
After lunch we gave Reggie his much needed walk along the river in Pescia before dashing home to grab our stuff for our Italian lesson back in Vellano.
With Sarah away this week, there were only the four of us (us, David and our teacher Johnny), so rather than continue working our way through the Italian grammar book (supposedly 'basic' - ha!) and leaving Sarah to catch up, we agreed to work at verb practice, something I think I could spend the rest of my days doing and still not getting it all!
After Dave had furnished us all with a good strong cup of coffee and a slice of his delicious banana and fig cake we got started with this week's 'esercizio' prepared by Johnny. He told us this was an 'easy' one, but we spent the next hour making it look anything but (although I think Helen struggled less than the boys did) - it very much seems as if one week can be a confidence booster, when you think you can feel it all 'clicking', and the very next week it feels as if you're starting from scratch again and nothing makes sense, to say it's frustrating is putting it mildly.
With the days all of a sudden shorter and our lesson being an hour later than usual, we left Vellano in the dark to go home and put the chickens to bed. Before we left for our lesson, the chickens had had no interest in going indoors, so we had no choice but to leave them out while were out. However, when I approached the shelter, or pollaio (apparently the correct term for what we have), it turned out that they had not only taken themselves indoors but all five of them were lined up on the top roost ready for sleep - only two weeks in and they are already much better behaved than the geese ever were!
Wednesday
Wednesday started out with a little bit of excitement in the shape of a small, but perfectly formed egg from one of our Livornese/Leghorn hens (we know it was from one of these because it was white)! Helen made the exciting discovery when doing her animal rounds before exercising and left it in the kitchen for me to find when I came down. It came as a huge surprise as I'd read that when hens are only just reaching maturity when the weather gets colder, egg laying can be delayed until the following spring, so I had pretty much expected not to see any eggs until after Christmas - this was definitely the happiest I've been to see a chicken egg!
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| Small. but perfectly formed. |
After the early excitement I spent the morning working in Vellano with David again before heading home for lunch before Samantha arrived for Helen's second Italian lesson of the week.
When I got home I learned that the Phillips' Panda had refused to start this morning, preventing Sue from visiting Helen for coffee, and they were in need of a tow to the garage later that day, so soon after Samantha arrived, Reggie and I headed for Vellano again, this time to meet David to find the mythical Obaca walk - a walk we've heard a lot about (the Obaca area being a rare flat piece of land in the Vellano area), but have not yet found for ourselves.
As the three of us walked onto the track we passed a couple of parked cars, one of which had a high viz jacket draped over the seat, hunters maybe? Hunters it was, and we soon came across a guy in cammo gear and a high viz jacket carrying a shotgun - he was below us and shouted something up to us but we could only grasp the word 'posto', so we assumed he meant that they were finished. As we stood trying to decide whether to carry on or not, a loud bang from a nearby gun rang around us, making our decision for us! We headed back to the road and decided to use a different track to take us back into the village before going back to the car, so the Obaca walk remains elusive but we plan to remedy that this weekend.
After a quick glass of wine in the Bistrot in the village, Reggie and I left David and headed home to find Helen who, having finished her lesson, was ready to jump into the car to head to the rescue of the Phillipses.
Helen and Sue stayed indoors and drank coffee while Chris and I hooked the Panda up to the back of our car with a tow rope and took the now familiar slow tow route down to the garage in Pescia to dump the Panda before they closed. The daylight was fast disappearing by the time we rolled into Pescia so we had to be extra careful not to trip up any pedestrians trying to cross the road in between us! We arrived safely, abandoned the Panda at the garage before heading back to the Phillips house where I swapped Chris for Helen and we returned to Pietrabuona to light the fire.
Thursday
Another day, another trip to Vellano! I headed up to the village to meet Dave at the Bistrot for an early morning coffee, but primarily to help the manager, Serena, with a phone call to the people who supply us with our satellite internet.
Connecting to the internet in our valley can be a hit-and-miss affair, and currently Serena uses a radio wireless service at the Bistrot, which is the only real alternative for most when the ADSL from Telecom Italia is too slow - we almost opted for the radio wireless service ourselves when our own satellite service stopped months back, just before we signed up with Europasat. However, it seems from Serena's rant the day before that the wireless service is prone to halting in bad weather - or even in not so bad weather - and it was during this rant that Dave told her that Helen and I use a satellite service.
I'd given Serena the details for Europasat, but it turned out when she called their local office in Lucca that the woman there only spoke English so communication had faltered very quickly and Serena had asked if I would make the call for her to get a quote for installation (what a turnaround in affairs - it's usually us needing help with making telephone calls for services!). Anyhow, by the time I arrived this morning it turned out that Serena had managed to speak to someone herself, so Dave and I just sat and drank cappucini.
After coffee I headed into Pescia to order my next batch of wood for the shed from the wood yard and then went to do the supermarket shopping (well done to those of you paying attention that this is happening on Thursday and not Saturday!). With Sarah away at the moment, we had invited David to come for dinner, as they had kindly done the same for me when Helen was away, and we had also invited Donatella and her Mum. So, with three shopping lists in hand, one for Lidl, and two for Esselunga (one for the ingredients for dinner and one for our own weekly supplies), I made a late morning dash around the stores before heading home for lunch.
The afternoon saw something of a role reversal: Helen, dressed in dirty work attire, went out to strim the terraces and split firewood while I stayed indoors to cook while wearing civvies.
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| Tidy terraces. |
As the light faded, dinner was under control, the house had been made ready to seat five (by moving the sofa and dining table into the office and replacing them with the larger garden patio table, covered with a table cloth), and Helen came indoors to shower while I lit the fire.
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| Ready for dinner for five! |
Our guests arrived around half seven, David having acted as taxi driver and collected Donatella and her Mum on his way down the hill. Reggie's mind was blown by having so many of his favourite people in the room all at the same time, and while he was wary around Donatella's Mum at first (not having met her before, he gave her a good barking at), he soon worked out that she was a soft touch and spent much of the evening seated at her feet waiting for table scraps. We all thoroughly enjoyed the evening together, managing a little Italian between us for the benefit of Donatella's Mum.
For those interested in the food elements of the evening (hi Carolyn!), we started with a very good bottle of Prosecco supplied by Donatella along with some fresh bread and a bowl of our own hand-picked fresh extra virgin olive oil (that is, 3% our own olives, 97% Phillips oil, but 100% our own sweat and effort). We accompanied this with some fett'unta (basically toast rubbed with garlic and drizzled with oil) and a pot of seasonal mushroom and chestnut paté. The oil was met with high praise from all, David confirming his order for 10 litres right there and then.
After that, we turned to red wine and chicken chiantigiana - chicken cooked in red wine with sultanas and pine nuts - along with boiled potatoes 'prezzemolata' (drizzled in more of the special oil, seasoned and with a large handful of parsley thrown in).
Finally, we despatched almost an entire Tunisian cake - a cake made with ground almonds, polenta and citrus zest, drizzled with a syrup made from the orange and lemon fruits and served a quenelle of Mascarpone.
I was pleased my afternoon's cooking had gone down well, and after finishing the evening with coffee and limoncello, our guests left sometime after eleven, leaving us to head to bed to sleep off the belly full of food.
Friday
Despite a relatively late night for us on Thursday (not having got to bed until midnight once all the washing up was done), on Friday I was awake with Helen and feeling ready for the day - more so than I had done in months. I'm not sure why this was the case, and I think that, if pushed, I could have rolled over and slept some more, but I didn't want to - what I wanted to do was get up early, walk Reggie and then collect the wood from the yard to make a start on covering the exterior of the shed before the rain that was forecast to arrive later on.
I decided a good walk was in order for Reggie, as he had missed out again the day before, so I drove a little way out of town to the quiet section of river we often use these days. This section of the river is almost always devoid of others, which means that Reggie can have a good run around, in fact I think this is his favourite walk of all.
We walked south away from Pescia as the sun tried its hardest to push through the cloud along a blissfully quiet riverside.
Along the way, Reggie couldn't help but run down from the high bank down to a building which, to all intents and purposes, looks abandoned except for the chicken coop attached to it (which is full of chickens). It's a long steep bank leading down to the house, something like 8 metres at a gradient steeper than 45 degrees - not a problem for a 17-month-old juvenile canine with four legs and boundless energy, but not something I'd want to tackle unless it was an emergency.
Fortunately there was no emergency, we've passed this place countless times now and Reggie likes to go to see the chickens, have a little bounce and growl around their fence, before joining us back on the path - all part of the walk and the chickens seem unfazed behind their secure fence so we don't feel we need to change the routine. Or we didn't.
When we approached the same house on the return leg of the walk, I saw Reggie look at the chickens, then look at me as if to ask 'can I?' I told him to stay where he was, which he did for a few seconds, but then the urge overcame him and he went down the bank to say hello again. I called him back and he came straight away with barely enough time to finish a growl. However, on his way back to me he passed a clump of bamboo that made a loud hissing sound - which shocked Reggie as much as it did me.
He stopped for a second and ran back to where the sound came from. I could now see a tabby cat sitting amongst the bamboo. Reggie found the cat and for a second there was a stand-off until the cat ran deeper into the bamboo. Reggie gave chase, running out of my sight and around the bamboo, presumably in the hope of finding the cat exiting the other side.
I did as I always do in these circumstances: I gave him his "come here" whistle and kept walking - he's very good at coming when whistled, and when he also realises you are leaving him behind he comes running very quickly.
It worked a treat and he came bounding up the bank - but something wasn't quite right and as he hurtled past me I realised he had a chicken in his mouth! He kept running until he got far enough away from me so as not to be disturbed or have his treasure taken from him prematurely. I couldn't quite believe what had just happened in the short few seconds between him running down to the house and him coming back.
As I stood there trying to make sense of it and waiting to see if anyone was going to give chase so that I could at least apologise and give them 10 euros for a new bird, Reggie disappeared down the bank towards the river.
After a while it was clear nobody was at the house (why would there be? It doesn't even have windows in some of the frames), so I continued walking to find Reggie, who appeared on the path as I approached with a white feather sticking out of his mouth, and down below in the river was the poor dead chicken.
I put a clearly very-pleased-with-himself Reggie into the car (surely now this was his favourite walk of all time), although he clearly doesn't yet realise that a chunk of this walk will have to be done with him on the lead from now on!
We headed to the wood yard to pick up the huge pile of tongue and groove (or perlinato as they call it here) I'd ordered. After loading only half of the wood onto the roof it was clear I'd need to do a second trip - 150 meters of wood is more than the roof of a Fiat Doblo can take!
It was late morning by the time we got home, and still dry, so while Helen continued to work in the office, I set straight to work on the shed until lunch, at which point I'd managed to cover one end wall. While I was working, I suddenly heard a flapping of wings above my head and was joined by the two white chickens (the Livornese). While it was one of them (we don't know which) that laid us our first egg - and has continued to lay an egg every morning since then - it also seems to be the white ones that are a bit of a handful and a bit too free range. This is now the third time one of them has escaped (the first time it's been both of them!). Given Reggie's little escapade this morning, they must have a death wish!
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| Spot the chickens. |
Thankfully, it wasn't difficult for me to usher them back into their enclosure, and they pottered back in through the gate quite happily.
After lunch, it was back to the shed for me while Helen donned her farm attire to go and start a bonfire on the terraces and burn bramble clippings.
The rain started around mid afternoon, albeit very pathetically, so we both worked on through with only a brief interruption when Sue came to deliver the 20 litres of oil that we had sold on their behalf.
Shortly after Sue left I went back to the wood yard to collect the remainder of the wood, bade the guys in the yard 'buon fine settimana' and headed home to unload the wood as the rain got heavier and the light faded, signalling an end to our week up on the hill.
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