When Our John goes off to work in the morning at 5 am, he brings me a small strong hot freshly ground cup of coffee. Being the romantic soul that I am the first thing I say to him before he leaves for work and won’t be seen again for a good 12 hours, is “What’s the weather like?”
“We’re in for a bit of wind” he said “Gusting up to 50 mph. Warm though.”
“Gale force winds” I said, grateful I was not at sea. “Don’t blow away” and fell straight back to sleep. I never go back to sleep!
I woke an hour later to a branch flying into the side of the house and the wind screaming past the window. TonTon was looking at me through the French doors, his doggy hair blowing backwards, saying “Are you going to Do something? What are you Like? Are you sleeping in! Sleeping IN! The barn is blowing away, all the buckets are in the North 40, the chickens are walking sideways, you have missed your blog deadline and you are sleeping IN!!”
“Bugger.” I said and rolled out of bed. When John’s grandfather’s tenant cut an enormous hole in the front of the barn to fit his new combine harvester many, many years ago, he roughly hung those two enormous doors. They were and still are only fastened at the top, not the bottom. They must be, (Oh I don’t know,) about 16 feet tall. You have seen them. Nothing holding them down. You can imagine what happens when it blows. Usually I have them jammed into place with cement bricks and big hooks and lengths of timber. An ingenious Celi system. As I swung out of bed, pulling on whatever pants were handy and ‘my cleanest dirty shirt over my nightie’ I remembered that I had unhooked the doors and pushed everything open to let the spring in. Nothing was holding the doors down, I had a 50 knot sou’west and I had slept in. I could hear the banging of them from the house.
Those 16 foot doors were making like a kite and blowing right up and crashing down. And not a man in sight. Our John has been called back to work! Ah well. 
And so I pulled and pushed and swore like a fisherman as I dragged those flying doors across and jimmied and heaved until I could lock them down and haul all my bricks and rocks and barriers and railway sleepers back into place. Without any brute to force with, I used the lulls in the wind. As each door fell I rushed in with the heavy stuff and jammed it back into place. The wind screaming as I slowly beat it, I could hear nothing but wind.
By then I was in a moody, so I decided to reorganise all the stock into pregnant and not pregnant. Like everyone I am running right to the day on feed and the pregnant girls need extra, so no wasting that extra feed on fat rams with nothing better to do but chase the girls off. Or a steer that I will fatten on green pasture later.
Moaning Mia was determined to stay with her mother and so they are now in the central pen. Daisy and Hairy MacLairy have set up housekeeping again in the Cow Side. Hairy has the best fleece so I do try to keep him away from the cows and their messes but needs must. He cannot bully Daisy. And the calves, including Queenie Wineti who is bullied by just about everyone, are in the Black Hole of Calcutta – which by the way opens onto the yards with the best trees, so why they all moan and carry on, when I put them in there, I do not know.
Later in the day we went to visit the Old Codger. We talked about this and that, he likes the unit he is in, which I am very pleased about, he is well into his rehab and asked where TonTon was. So I spoke to the staff and they said is he potty trained? I said, well yes! They said, fine, bring him in then. As easy as that.
I told the old codger and it appears that he had already talked to the staff about His Dog. He said that the staff had told him that there was an old lady who lived there, who sat in a corner with her chin on her chest and did not move except to breathe for weeks on end. Someone had brought in a dog a while back and she had opened her eyes into slits (he mimed this bit) put her two little fingers to her mouth ( he mimed that too) and whistled a fantastic sheep dog whistle loud enough to wake the whole place. Scared everyone half to death including the dog – then she smiled, patted the trembling dog and went back to sleep. The Old Codger and I looked at each other. Both coveting her ability to do The Real Whistle.
All things being equal TonTon and I will be going to the Old Folks home on Friday. Remind me to take your eyes in the camera. We will see what we will see and you will see on Saturday.
Today is dawning cloudy but thankfully calm. No smashing doors and flying branches this morning. I am off to the barn to feed out, drag the hoses across and fill water tanks then finish my relocation stockwork. Then clear another garden.
Good morning!
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
88 responses to “Missed the deadline”
You two are such romantics. Great photos. Now I need coffee!
Morning Greg! c
It seems to me that you should have been better rewarded for having a lie in, but then again reading on, I was reminded that sometimes the work is the reward. At least you’ll be doing it in calmer weather today…
I do love my work and was appalled that i went back to sleep! It was very bad form, I slept through my writing time and then right into the farmy time.. terrible.. c
I’m sure you needed your sleep, if only to have the strength to wrestle those barn doors closed.
I still do not believe that that man cut the face off a perfectly good barn to fit a machine in there, he even cut the mezanine floor out, but we are slowly recovering it! c
“Bugger”. I like that!
NZ saying.. very eloquent! c
…and now I need to catch my breath!
Ronnie
I ran all day to try and catch up to myself! c
Morning C and all the farmy animals! Looking forward to seeing TonTon root the oldies from their chairs. He’ll have them all up, whistling and dancing within minutes, I bet. 🙂
As long as he does not pee on the floor in fright, he has been known to do that in the past, lets hope he has grown out of it! c
I too slept in this morning. Haven’t had nearly the exciting morning you have had though. Always, always, enjoy your stories. Good morning! 🙂
Good Morning!! I hope the weather is being kind to you this morning.. c
Snowing again…ha!
So this explains your absence yesterday. I worried.
Great descriptions of you wrestling those flying barn doors. Not that I would expect anything less from an exceptional storyteller.
Best part of this story, though, is the old lady who can sheep dog whistle. Think how happy you’re going to make her, the staff and your Old Codger when you show up with TonTon.
it was a funny thing describing a story as someone described it to me! I like this writing business! c
Whew! You slept in and you still accomplished all that before 7:30! Cecilia, you make the rest of us look like lazy slugs! Our barn doors are just like yours, about as tall and only anchored at the top. We keep them barred and barricaded with cinder blocks against the wind. There’s a matching set of doors at the other end of the barn, which makes things interesting in high winds…So glad they’re letting TonTon in to visit the Old Codger. Those nurses do know how important animals are for the healing process.
I was thrilled that they are making it so easy for me to take a dog in..he will be ok once he gets used to the new smells so we will go slow on the first day! .. c
Morning C, I was worrying about you. Glad you coped – I know what it’s like when there’s no brute in the force. You said to remind you: Take the camera tomorrow (Friday).
x ViV
Yes, i had better get busy, two trips off the farmy in ONE week! and yes Camera.. check c
Very funny and very moving – the stuff of good writing.
Morning Roger! c
We missed you – and there you were chasing your tail all day! Good news about TonTon, looking forward to seeing how he gets on with the Old Codger and his roomies!
Playing catch up is no fun, and am still doing it today! I will be extra fast today so that i can take the morning to try out the Therapy Dog! c
Oh, the barn won’t blow away, TonTon! Hee, hee. I can understand his concern. When I was a kid, I thought the store was going to close for the night while we were still inside.
(laughter) oh you poor wee thing and your mum was probably dawdling!! c
I was a bit worried yesterday when there was no post to read with my coffee. Glad — and relieved — to hear it wasn’t any worse than it was, Celi. Especially glad to hear that the Powers will allow TonTon to visit the Folks at the Center. You friend, the Old Codger, will definitely benefit as will a number of the others, too. Common sense prevailed!
Isn’t it wonderful when you get such a logical answer.. and The Old Codger will achieve a little notoriety from having a dog visit too, which will be nice as he is the new boy in class! c
What an evocative picture you paint of your battle with the barn doors. I’m imagining what a fisherman swears like now !
And lovely to hear Old Codger will be getting a visit from both you and TonTon
Morning Claire, you never want to hear a fisherman swearing, my father used to give them the glare, then nod at my presence to shut them up when we were kids! c