Everybody was Multi-tasking

What I've learned:

1. Everyone around here has more than one skill
2. Farmers' skills involve hitting things with a hammer

We've been having our bathroom refitted this week. It's been a long time coming. We started talking about it before Christmas then finally got round to ordering everything in March. Then lockdown happened. And shielding was extended. So, we've now got a beautiful, almost finished bathroom. 

Work in progress

We've been really lucky with the guy that's doing it for us. Technically, he's a joiner but he's done the plumbing, plastering, as well as the joinery work and fitting the new window. I know everyone knows everyone around here but it makes things so much easier because you're not just opening the Yellow Pages (yes, I'm showing my age) and choosing someone random that a) might turn up when they say they're going to and b) might do a good job. 

You're allowed to be excited about new windows when you're over 40

Along the way, I've learned that farmers are also mult-talented. I've mentioned before that I didn't really know what Ivie did all day. Aside from complicated mental arithmetic, Ivie spends his day problem-solving and fixing things. His days rarely finish up as planned due to any number of unforeseen circumstances involving the weather, temperamental machinery, animals escaping, animals dying, animals giving birth, or any combination thereof. In a lot of cases - animals notwithstanding - these circumstances are 'moulded' with the aid of a heavy object and a lot of force. 

Talking of multi-tasking, something I noticed when I first moved to Dumfries and Galloway is that a lot of people have more than one job. Their week might be made up of two or three part-time jobs or they might make money from their arts and crafts skills over and above the 9-5. In some circles, it would be called a 'portfolio career' but for normal people, it's just life. Before I lived here, I'd always worked full-time without questioning it and it was the norm amongst my friends. In fact, the people I knew who didn't work full-time outside the home generally had small children. 

As I've got older, I've really appreciated time over almost everything else and, aside from a six-month blip in a job that wasn't right for me, I've worked part-time since December 2013, often made up of two or more contracts. It was a great way to get to know more people, too. My first part-time contracts were with Spring Fling and Wigtown Book Festival, two of my favourite D&G cultural icons. I got to know a lot of people who are now close friends and I might have bumped into someone special at the 2017 book festival opening party...

Going back to the bathroom, I did get slightly confused by the multi-talented joiner earlier in the week. He mentioned that he would only be there the next morning as he had a funeral in the afternoon. I made my, "oh I'm sorry" face but didn't have time to say anything else as he had already moved on to telling me what else he still had to do. Later, as I watched the van leave down the farm road, I saw the tell-tale words on the back doors, "Ian Broll. Joiners and Funeral Directors". 

Add the Number You First Thought Of....

Things you should know:
1. Farmers don't always mean what they say or say what they mean.

2. They're all better at maths than Rachel Riley.

3. It's all voodoo.  

Before I started seeing Ivie, I hadn't really thought about what farmers do all day but it turns out the answer is mental arithmetic. 

I'd been thinking about writing this blog post for a while but have been procrastinating. Mainly because I knew I'd have to understand the ins and outs of it before I started writing. Today, I sat Ivie down with a coffee and interviewed him. Here's a brief summary...

When Ivie is going to spread fertiliser at another farm, the farmer will tell him how much (in hundredweight or cwt) he wants spread per acre. So far, so old school. 

BUT the machinery is modern and measures in kilos per hectare. 

A hectare is 2.47 acres and 1 cwt (112 lbs) is 50 kilos. Still with me?

So, 1cwt per acre is roughly the same as 125kg per hectare apparently.

Fertiliser comes in 600kg bags but used to come in 1cwt bags. So to complicate things even further, some farmers still talk in terms of 'bags' per acre when what they mean is 'one twelfth of a bag' per acre. And then you get into fractions of hundredweights but that's when my head starts to explode. Or implode. Or both.

At this point, Ivie started trying to explain units of nitrogen per acre but I had to stop him. That was plenty enough for one day.