Id of an English Woman

Saturday Evening Storms and a new Captain.

When planing a BBQ it is always wise to keep an eye on the weather forecast. Un-prepared for rain has a tendency to put out the charcoal very quickly.

Yesterday evening it was the end of season BBQ for Cloggys 'Old Farts" hockey team.
Yes .... the 'genius's had managed to plan it for the same weekend as Wimbledon Tennis Tournament AND Glastonbury Pop Festival so we were guaranteed rain and were not disappointed.

Fortunately the weather did not dampen the atmosphere and Cloggys team had made sure that there was an ample supply of beer to compensate for the crappy weather

The men skulked off at around 8pm to select a new captain for the upcoming season. This process took roughly an hour during which time there was a steady stream of mini' hockey Cloggys being sent backwards and forwards filling up the beer jugs.

Apparantly choosing a new captain can only be done properly with the aid of copious amounts of beer.

I wish the new Captain for the upcoming season much success. I wish his wife courage and strength!

Glastonbury link ; http://www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/
Wimbledon link; http://www.wimbledon.org/en_GB/index.html

Write comment - See the 0 comments

Seriously..... If I could make this s.h.1.t up I'd be a millionaire!

Cats, Bats, Chickens, Swallows, Dumb-arse dogs, Wasps, Squirrels, the Baby Cloggys Rats .... what more critters could be living in the Cloggy household?

A flippin' TOAD!

Here's what I found when I went to hoover up the dog hairs in the kitchen

Write comment - See the 0 comments

Cloggys Alarm Clock!

Every Bloody Morning at Day Break!
He's only a young Rooster and his voice hasn't broken yet but when it does .........

Write comment - See the 0 comments

Chicken name supplimental.

The forum for chicken names is still open. Please feel free to join in and add your suggestions.

Egg yield is pretty good bearing in mind we have only had them a week, 10 already! The ladies have been producing an egg each a day for the last few days.

Write comment - See the 0 comments

"Oh so THAT'S where all the nuts have gone ........."

No ..... I am not talking about the sad and untimely demise of Micheal Jackson, may he finally rest in peace. I am talking about the peanuts I put out daily on the bird table.

This has been going on for WEEKS!

I've been getting through sacks of the things, as fast as I could put them out they were disappearing and the pilfering culprit/s were nowhere to be found. It was like having a 'stealth nut thief' lurking in the undergrowth who only came out of his hiding place when he could see that the coast was clear.

It couldn't possibly of been birds polishing off the peanuts because the amount that were disappearing on a daily basis would have made it impossible for them to fly. No ..... another critter must be responsible.

Then today, as I was sat at the kitchen table writing up the weekly reports, I heard a munching sound. I grabbed my camera and crawled across the kitchen floor to the open window and slowly looked out. "

HA HA CAUGHT YA!"

Now I would like proudly introduce my nut thief.

We call him 'MP' (after the thieving Members of Parliament in the UK who have been in the news recently because of their shady expense accounting activities).

What with chickens, bats, cats, dumb-ass dogs, swallows, wasps and the kids pet rats I would not be surprised at this point if an elephant walked across the back yard.

........ but then again I probably would!

Write comment - See the 0 comments

FOR SALE - MIG 21 - One careful owner?

On the way home today I spotted this bit of 'TopGun' junk at a car dealership in
St. Isidorushoeve. (http://www.sint-isidorushoeve.nl/)
.After sitting in a 13km traffic jam on the A1 this morning I was sorely tempted to buy it!

Write comment - See the 0 comments

Bat Attack - A Wildlife SOS sucess story!

"MUMMMMMMMMMMMMMM THE CATS CAUGHT A BATTTTTTTTTTTTTT" woke me up at 6.15 this morning!
My first thought was "HUH? Dr. Suess nightmare". My second thought was "your kidding me its only 6"!

The youngest Baby Cloggy was not going to let me go back to sleep, oh no, she had wrestled the cat, amazingly managed to rescue the little bat intact and had now brought it into my bedroom for inspection.

"What are you going to do Mum"? she quizzed

HOW THE FECK SHOULD I KNOW ITS A BAT FOR GOD SAKES!

I told her I didn't know what to do with it but we should find a box

,shred up some bog roll and make it a nest until I had figured out a plan. Youngest Baby Cloggy came back with an empty cat food box, which I found a bit ironic, and a sock which she had placed the bat in. The little beast was beginning to look better already.

We called Cloggy, he was at work already, and asked what we should do ......... "Give it back to the cat" ........ was all he could come up with. Of course Cloggys approach to wildlife rehabilitation was rejected by his daughter.

In the end Baby Cloggy decided that we should phone up those "really nice people" from the Animal Planet Channel 'Wildlife SOS' who would surely know what to do with the bat. It was 6.40 by this time, which is still early in NL let alone the UK, so I promised to call them at 10. This plan was acceptable to Baby Cloggy and an hour later she peddaled off to school to tell her little cloggy mates all about her adventure.

10am came around and I dutifully called the people at 'Wildlife SOS'. (http://www.wildlifeaid.org.uk ) A friendly lady answered the phone and politely listened while I explained the situation. "We get lots of bats" she said.

"Check to see if his wings are torn" ...... They weren't
"Keep him warm" ..... Batty was snuggled into his sock.
"At dusk take him outside and let him go, don't throw him in the air just let him fly off of your hand" ......

Should I feed him? "We normally give them some meal worms" was the reply. I thanked her for advice and she wished me luck. What a great organisation, not only are they nice on the TV they are nice in real life as well!

I didn't have any meal worms so I fed Batty little bits of the steak that Cloggy was going to have for dinner. Serves him right for being so mean!

Dusk arrived so Baby Cloggy and I went outside to release Batty.

Many Thanks to the very nice lady at Wildlife Aid in the UK for her sound advice.

Write comment - See the 1 comments

The Veggie Stall

The concept of a weekly village market is becoming less and less in the UK. People rely on the big ol' supermarket chains that are open daily from daybreak to vampire hours and can sell you food at knock down prices because of industrial farming.

Here in Twente, and the rest of the Netherlands, there remains a thriving weekly farmers market environment and I love it to bits!
Not only is it a great place to buy groceries that are fresh off of the farm but its also a great place to entertain your house guests.

I can loose my Father and #4 for hours at the farmers market.

In Haaksbergen the weekly market is held on a Wednesday. Today I have had a chat with the biggest Veggie Stall owner in the market square.

When I first began frequenting the weekly market this stall was hands down the most busiest with people 3 deep waiting to be served. I was enormously curious as to why and his answer was very simple. "Good produce, sourced locally at reasonable prices".

Our veggie stall holder was a man of few words.

As it was such a nice day the youngest baby Cloggy and I had decided to bicycle into the village. This took a little longer than anticipated because we were distracted by a beautiful little foal on the way and by the time we got to the Markt everybody was packing up.

After a mooch around the village and an illicit visit to the icecream parlour (I'm sorry Sonja I slipped off of the diet wagon) we cycled home again getting distracted by the cute foal.

Next week I'll get there earlier and take some better photos.

Write comment - See the 0 comments

Cloudy Sunshine

Cloudy Sunshine cocktail recipe.

1 2/3 oz Gin
1 2/3 oz coconut rum
2 oz lemonade
5/6 oz lime juice

Build over ice in a highball glass. Too strong? Half the spirits and lime but still fill with lemonade.

Write comment - See the 2 comments

"Waspinator"

The Cloggy home has sprung a leak. A few days ago, during a downpour of biblical proportions, I was sat in the study with nothing but my umbrella for protection from the elements and 3 sauce-pans to catch the drips. It was wetter inside the house than it was outside.

I dutifully informed Cloggy that his roof had a few holes in it and asked if I should get a tradesman in to take a look? Shoulders were shrugged and comments were mumbled as he disappeared into his work shed. A few minutes later he emerged with his ladders. I left him to it and went off to pick up one of the Baby Cloggys from a play date. When I returned I was met by the following site.

Yes .... Cloggy had repaired the roof himself using my recyclable Albert Hein shopping bags and a roll of duct tape he had filched from the neighbour.
During his repairs he unfortunately found out that there were more critters living in our roof space than just the birds.

2 wasps nests had been discovered!

What to do??????? The previous Cloggy assault on a wasp nest had involved 5 litres of petrol, a cigarette lighter and a fireball which brought the neighbours running to see what had occurred. The wasp nest had been under a rock in the back garden.
Mercifully Cloggy decided that those tactic's were not applicable in this particular circumstance .....

A few vain attempts were made to empty a can of bug killer in the general vicinity of the nests but only resulted in the wasps, who were already mad, getting even madder and firing off few well aimed shots at Cloggy.

Now ... EVEN Cloggy can feel a wasps sting so he gave up the ghost and slouched off into the damp study in order to google "Waspinator".
He had admitted defeat and realised that in order to get the tiles back on the roof before the next downpour an expert in pest control must be engaged.

After a short while the aforementioned "Wasp Murderer" pulled his wagon of insect death into the drive way and

immediately proceeded to suit up. An hour later he had completed his task, drunk a cup of coffee, discussed the upcoming season for FC Twente, been paid for his services and gone home.

He was a very efficient and friendly chap, with reasonable rates, who I heartily recommend to all in Twente who have a problem with unwanted guests of the non-human variety, here's a link to his website; http://www.antisect.nl/diensten.htm.

That done .... all Cloggy had left to do was figure out how to put all of the tiles back on the roof.