Sunday 3 March 2024

The Lambing Report

What I've been thinking about:
  1. FOMO
  2. Niche Googling

Lambing is in the fullest swing at The Spittal. The ewes seem to want to get on with it and enjoy the start of Spring with their lambs dawdling along behind on unsteady legs. 

Ivie is on the nightshift, which is made easier this year with the addition of a camera in the lambing sheds. It's great. He can keep an eye on things from the comfort of the sofa, only having to get all his gear on when he's actually needed. 

Pre-camera, there were times when it took longer to get his wellies and waterproofs on and off than to glance into the shed and see there was nothing happening. This makes for a happy Ivie. And a happier me, knowing that he can doze a bit more and be better rested when he gets up and drives big machines near heavy beasts in the morning. 



That's the theory anyway. You know how they say that dogs and their owners end up looking alike? Well, in Ivie and Rudi's case they share a personality trait instead: Fear of Missing Out. I've watched the dog fight sleep on many an occasion, worried that she'll miss the party of the century if she gives in. It turns out that Ivie is exactly the same. 

Definitely not tired.

I've always known that Ivie is a screaming extrovert (remember this blog?) but I didn't realise that would get in the way of him getting as much sleep as possible during lambing. Last night it was the World Athletics Indoor Championships on telly he didn't want to miss. He couldn't possibly snooze through the women's 3000m or the men's 60m hurdles. And the women's pole vault? Front row seats for Fisher! 

I have resigned myself to the fact that Ivie would rather drag himself around like a zombie during the day than miss out on anything. All I can do is be supportive and not expect too riveting a conversation (no change there, I hear you say 😉).

I am constantly torn between wanting to be more helpful during lambing and not wanting to get in the way. As a result, I've only had one night-time visit to the lambing shed so far this year. I moved newborn lambs into a pen and sprayed iodine on their navels. And I watched as Ivie lambed two other ewes in quick succession, healthy twins and triplets the end result. 

I'd forgotten my gloves so the next day woke up to a mahogany right hand and tarnished looking rings. Thankfully, I found a tin of Brasso under the sink before I had to Google 'removing iodine from silver'. 

[My curiosity has just got the better of me and I've Googled it now. There are all sorts of complicated instructions from American websites involving silver foil, salt water and ammonia. It makes me slightly worried / in awe about what's in Brasso that it took it off no bother.]

🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱

My hand still looks a bit like it belongs to Pinocchio, which could be an interesting talking point at the training course I'm going on this week. Which reminds me, I'll have to change my usual March topics of conversation. I'm not sure they'll be that interested in how many pets there are or receptive to me encouraging them to have a little nap. 

Friday 9 February 2024

A whiff of victory

What I've been thinking about this week:
  1. Smells
  2. Narrow margins 
One of the things I learned early on about living with Ivie is that if I want to carve out quality time with him, I have to encourage him to leave the farm. A snatched cup of coffee here and chat over breakfast is all well and good. But sometimes uninterrupted time to hang out and talk about more than what's for our next meal (much as I enjoy that as a hobby) does us good. 

In case we forget who we are mid-cuppa
(thanks to Mairi Secret Santa)

As we're now fully paid up members of middle age, last week we went to the same hotel we went to last year for our pre-lambing 24 hour getaway. We already knew that the joys of Hetland Hall are many and varied:
  • It's not far from home.
  • They have good dinner, bed and breakfast deals in January and February. 
  • We can both have a drink and not worry about getting home. 

Last Friday we added another plus to the list:
  • They sort out any problems very quickly. 
They do say that if you have bad customer service, you tell one person, and if you have good customer service, you tell ten... 

Upon checking in we noticed that our room smelled a bit funny. As you can imagine, we've got a pretty high tolerance for less than rosy aromas. We opened the window, gave it five minutes but it didn't fix the problem. A quick chat with reception and we were instantly upgraded to a HUGE room with a HUGE bed and lovely views. As Ivie said, we didn't care how that one smelled, we were staying. 

It seems we got away just in time as we came back the next day to two lambs that had been born that morning. A quick turnaround and we were off out again for an actual night out with other people. 


Lorna and Dolly got engaged and were having a wee get together to coincide with Wales-Scotland in the Six Nations. You've met them in a previous blog here. There were quite a few farmery boots at the bar with farmery aromas but, as we've established, I can cope with farmers and their unique bouquet. 

Emotions were high (due to rugby rather than engagements) and the one point victory left many of us broken men and women, despite the fact that we were on the winning side. I've written before about the heroic efforts of Scotland rugby fans but this was a whole new level of torture. Luckily, more delicious food reduced the stress levels and reinstated some hope for the next game against France. 

So, now we're into lambing and rugby season where Ivie takes turns to shout at:
  • endless sheep.
  • endless referees.
  • endless Gregor Townsend. 
While Ivie's blood pressure reaches dangerous levels, I'll be over here pretending I'm useful during lambing and daydreaming about king sized beds. 

Saturday 27 January 2024

Everybody Needs Good Neighbours

What I've been thinking about: 
  • Doors.

The other day, Ivie happened to mention that he'd been working next door. Past experience told me not to assume I knew what he meant by this. I ran through the possibilities in my head:

  • The farmhouse less than a minutes' walk from our front door. 
  • The house a few minutes' walk along the cycle track in the other direction. 
  • The 'next door' farm on the way into the village. 
It was none of these places. It was, in fact, the farm on the opposite side of the A75. Obviously. 

It's not the only confusing door in my life. The one that we use 99.99% of the time is our back door and the one that is the background to my online meetings is the front door. My brain has found this hard to grasp and regularly mixes them up. 

It made me think of other instances where what we say isn't quite what we mean. There's the definition of 'not long', for example (see this blog) or 'no dogs on the sofa'. 


Not spoiled at all....

At least I seem to understand more of the farmery conversations that take place around me than I did at the beginning. It was all a bit like being abroad and picking out the odd word of schoolday French in amongst incoherent babbling. I'd concentrate really hard but lose the will to listen when it got to sheep prices at the local mart or decisions around spread rates. 

La vache

Nowadays, I recognise a lot more names and places I didn't know before and I usually understand what Ivie has been up to when I ask him at lunchtime how the morning has gone. I'm still not massively interested in spread rates, to be fair, but I like to think of myself as a work in progress. 

It made me wonder whether Ivie had learned anything from me since we got together. "I know more about equality and stationery," he replied. Two very important topics, I'm sure you'd agree. 


I might not know where next door is or whether my back door is my front door but it's good to know there's still things to learn about the world and each other six years down the line. 

Sunday 12 November 2023

I'll be there for ewe

What I've been thinking about this week: 
  1. Education, education, education
  2. Crisps
This morning the cupboard was a bit bare. There was no bread and no cheese, which everyone knows does not equal a tasty lunch. 

Hunter Gatherer Fisher went on a quest to the village shop and came back with the lunch of champions: Heinz tomato soup, Simpsons morning rolls and Cheesy XL crisps.


As you'd imagine from the name they are very much up my fromagey street but they're not widely known beyond Dumfries & Galloway and Cumbria. I happened to mention to Ivie that I hadn't tasted them before I started going out with him. He nodded sagely in between bites  and said, "your education continues". 

It got me thinking about what else I've learned over the past six years. It's most apparent when it comes to farm matters. I'm no expert but I can follow more conversations about livestock than I used to and the other day I even actively sought out a video about sheep. 

Not any old sheep, mind you. This was Fiona - who in the past week has become hot property, appearing on everything from This Morning and Landward to Gogglebox and the Last Leg. 

Not a famous sheep but quite a cute one


She's put our corner of the world on the map, with lots of people hearing about Dumfries for the first time. And maybe a few more people are getting an insight into farming and animal welfare. But that's another story for someone more serious and knowledgeable than me. 

It's made me wonder who would win in a fight for most famous Scottish sheep. In the blue corner, Dolly, who now resides in a glass case in the National Museum of Scotland being ogled by people sniggering at how she got her name. And in the red, Fiona, who is very much alive at Dalscone Farm receiving 5-star treatment and visits from Dougie Vipond. 

Mary's little lamb doesn't even get a look in. 

Saturday 28 October 2023

Numbers Game

What I've been thinking about this week:
  1. Rocks
  2. Paper
  3. Scissors
Usually by October, things have quietened down on the farm and Ivie and I get to have more meals at the same time in the same place. We get into our autumn routine, eating breakfast together, stopping work for lunch and having tea at tea time. Obsessed with food, us? 

Ivie and I have been like ships that pass in the night this week, though. He's been doing a job along the road that involves shifting 10,000 tonnes of rock from one part of a farm to another. And I had a rare 5 day working week (yes, I'm a part-timer; no, I'm not ashamed). 

10,000 is a big number. I had it in my head that he'd said 10 tonnes but, on reflection, that doesn't make sense when bulls can weigh a tonne or more each. Although I'm pretty good with numbers, I'm not very good at picturing them out in the real world. 

Put together a three year budget for a charity? Easy peasy.
Visualise an acre, tonne or even a metre? Not a chance. 

How heavy are these? No idea. 


Anyway, my extra day of work wasn't exactly onerous. It involved a trip to Glasgow to take part in an art workshop for one of my work projects. I got to make part of a paper chain, take a line for a walk on a piece of paper and sit on the floor cutting words and phrases out of magazines. To be fair, getting back off the floor was the most onerous part. 

Thinking about it, though, I'm not sure that would have been Ivie's comfort zone. 

Drive a massive tractor and trailer along single track roads? No bother. 
Work on a giant collage with a group of strangers? No thank you. 

Doodle Priceless artwork

We have different skills and that's one of the things that makes us such a good team, along with laughing at each other's stupid jokes and being pretty laid back about the state of the house. 

Friday evening was the longest we'd spent together all week (naturally, spent shouting at a rugby match on TV). It made a change from Ivie rushing out the door as I got back from walking the dog in the morning and arriving home just after I'd walked the dog in the evening. Now I come to think of it, maybe it was 10 tonnes and he's just been hiding out in a layby till it's time to come home...

Friday 6 October 2023

We could be heroes

What I've been thinking about:
  • The Scunner Campbell
  • Scotland Rugby Fans
I know you'll find it hard to believe (because we're so young) but Ivie and I have a Great Nephew (as well as a great nephew, of course). Since he could sit on a lap and 'steer' he's taken great joy in anything with wheels. Luckily for him Great Uncle Ivie drives a tractor and last time he came to The Spittal he had a seat in the cab of a New Holland. I have it on good authority that when he's not visiting he talks about tractors non-stop and considers Ivie his hero. 

This got me thinking about heroes and their many guises. For Scots my age, there is only one superhero. 

Is there nothing that she cannae do? 

Some Scots (including Ivie) are hoping that Jamie Ritchie and the rest of the Scotland Rugby Squad will prove to be heroes tomorrow night. I admire their optimism. The thing is, it's not the team that are the real heroes. It's the poor bloody buggering fans that have spent a lifetime travelling near and far to have their hopes dashed time and time again. 

Ivie, Neil and Scrawn, Nice, 2023

Ivie is very proud of the fact that he's been to every Rugby World Cup since 1991. That's thousands of air miles, gallons of beer and lifelong friends made all over the world. I tend to take a less committed approach to it all, accompanying Ivie to World Cup destinations and sampling the other delights on offer. 

12-storey stationery store, Tokyo, 2019


Tarte au citron, Trevoux, 2023

I'd like to think that this time tomorrow, we'll be celebrating an historic win and Scotland's progress to the quarter finals. If not, we'll lick our wounds (again) and start making plans for Oz in 2027. Perhaps being a rugby fan isn't so bad after all. 

Saturday 2 September 2023

Celebrate Good Times

What I've been thinking about:
  1. Birth Days
  2. Gnocchi
This morning's Facebook memories tell me that six years ago I was visiting friends near Stockholm. Highlights included staying on a hostel that was a boat (or was it a boat that was a hostel?), spotting a gigantic elk from the bus (and no one else batting an eyelid) and time with some of my favourite people. 

Den Röda Båten
This time last year, Ivie and I were in Glasgow which meant that, in a break from the norm, we spent his birthday day together. I've long since accepted that red letter days at home are only marginally different from other days. We generally manage food related fun in the evening but bales still need stacked, machinery still needs tinkered with and stock still needs checked.  

Which brings me to yesterday. Ivie turned 45 (+VAT) and we had arranged dinner at The Pheasant Sorbie with Doug and Marie. We'd last seen Doug in Japan in 2019 and I'd never met Marie so we were really looking forward to it. 

Ivie was washed, shaved and about to put on clean clothes (exciting for me in itself) when it emerged that there was a cow calving. When Kerr and Drew weren't home. And the calf was coming backwards.

There was at least a tenner for the swear jar as Ivie put his working clothes back on. I got changed out of my glad rags to show moral support, secretly hoping that my offers of help would be turned down. It's not that I'm unwilling exactly but have you seen the size and temperament of cows? Especially pregnant ones with little hooves sticking out of them. 

I stood well back while Ivie persuaded her into the crush and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw Drew arrive. The swearing subsided as Ivie and Drew worked together calmly to try and get more than the hooves out. No further progress had been made when Kerr appeared and we were able to make a sharp exit to Sorbie. 

We had surprise main courses that Doug and Marie had ordered and Andrea had held off on cooking, and delicious desserts thanks to Morag. (Seriously, if you haven't been to The Pheasant, get yourselves down there.)

This morning, the wee calf (born via caesarean eventually) has its head up but hasn't got to its feet yet. I'm hoping that it rallies and ends up as mighty as this little CaesarLooks like an Italian restaurant was just the place to celebrate its birth...
EDIT: I can report that the calf is on its feet! 

Remember this little guy?