I am number one, I am number one, I am number one..(again). I would like to thank Mick Jagger and Stella McCartney for aiding me, (and others for getting kneecapped.) MWAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
fl] Sorry - I have been very busy recently + I still use non-digital technology. Will do what I can. Just to say that the Chickens are thriving, lots of eggs (gorgeous yellow yolks). flerdle made a bid for freedom recently in desperation as she attempted to get at her porridge. When the garden vegetables have stopped and I've dug the ground (late September) I will let the chickens have completely free-range. They will dine on slugs eggs, centipedes, leatherjackets and other destructive pests, fertilising the ground as they go. Continuing in the Good-Life tradition, I recently tried brewing Honey Beer to an C18 recipe (the chickens ate the mashed hops). It has a 2nd fermentation in the bottle and so every so often there is an explosion in the pantry as a cork pops out. This is no bad thing as I can have a little sip to see how it is progressing. My God it is strong. It is almost revolting, but oddly, once tasted it leaves you wanting more. Probably needs time. Has anyone got any recipes I can use it in if it turns out to be crap?
[BtD] I understand that once gone wrong, Honey Beer makes an excellent nappy soaker, paint stripper and fingerprint remover (that's removing fingerprints from your fingers, not from surfaces). I'd wear marigolds if I was you.
This is some really weird font here. Me no understand. Must sort out my CSS on the return. The school is going well but I need to return to listen to a guy from Sunderland explain density functional theory. More dispatches later. ttfn, rab.
[Btd] Our neighbour has decided to install some chickens, too. He was banging and sawing pretty much continuously last weekend (while we were unboxing all our gear) and now there are gentle warbly chicken noises coming from his garden. No rooster, fortunately.
[rab] See! See! Not just me [snorgle] You'll find it was Bob the dog who's Chicken Man. I currently live in what would be classed as "inner city" (20min walk to the middle of the CBD), but it's quite low density still - blocks of units, but many individual houses. We really only have one person-neighbour (going anticlockwise: church, multistorey carpark, cliff and shop, more shops, neighbour in large house). Some friends have kept chooks (complete with renovated gardens for same), and I did hear about someone with a sheep, up in the hill just a little over. They used to take it for walks, on a leash.
[snorgle] Not really - we were moving in while the chicken coop was being built, so I suspect the decision must have been made a good while before we could ever have met the neighbours concerned.