“Fog is made up of condensed water droplets which are the result of the air being cooled to the point (actually, the dewpoint) where it can no longer hold all of the water vapor it contains.”
Well, that is the scientific reason. The real reason is that we all need to rest our minds and have a wee think about what is to come.
I love the word: droplets. I have always been charmed by fog, it has a fat over-full wooly feeling to it. Like the world has exhaled a misty waterlogged breath. Then held it. Held it’s breath. NO blowing, or sighing, just stillness. And I quietly sit in the breath, in a huge pale mouth, buffered and contained, as insulated as Jonah, his whale moving softly around him, all sounds and movements entirely my own. And think. Thinking is vastly under-rated. The world’s breath glides in to match the temperature of my own breath. My own blood. Sounds drift about as though across long, dark water. Muffled, audible.
Kupa said “Thank you very much for locking me up but I am not sending YOU a Christmas card.” and on his release, stalked out of the Peacock Penthouse. He flew with his old determination and vigour straight down to the door and was gone. He is on a break from medicines for a month now. Though you and I will be watching carefully.
He moved so fast I could barely get him in focus.
Must be wintry enough to make Hot Chocolate. I make Ganache and store it in the fridge for just those evenings.
Pour one and half cups of hot cream over 12 oz of broken up good strong chocolate. Pause. Stir. Pour into jar and refrigerate. Add a spoon-full of the ganache (though it really is a diluted ganache) to a cup of hot milk for a hot drink on a cold night. If I have been very good sometimes I add a splash of Kahlua. I am often good.
Yesterday, I very slowly forked all the dry old straw out of the hospital wing pen and threw it to the Plonkers (who were deeply grateful). Mama is looking alarmingly wide already and as you know she always has quads so I have to get ahead of her. (We need to start thinking about lamb coats again soon but not quite yet.) When John got home I had him carry all the heavy things about. Tidying the areas of the barn that are un-used in the summer. Un-used areas become metal magnets for ‘stuff’. Now is the time to be getting them ready for a busy winter. I cannot ignore these chores. My animals depend on me and they care not for injuries and complaints. If I am not very prepared and attentive, animals may die in this environment. We almost lost Kupa because I was not up treading the boards.
I feel better having got this job done. Today is the hen-house. There is a fungus that may grow in dry bird droppings, a nasty one, it is better that this debris is on the field as fertiliser than in the chook house making my birds sick. Also, the droppings dry and are pounded into a fine dust that is very abrasive to a bird’s lungs. I always clean the chook house in the autumn and the spring. This job cannot be skipped. So I shall strap up my back and move as much out the door as I can and then get John to throw a few bales of fresh straw in there. We will load the srapings onto the back of the white truck them I am going to sweep it down onto the fields as John drives slowly around the hay makers paddock. I refuse to let it go to waste, so this will be done as well. One day I will get a manure spreader.
Actually I am hoping that for Christmas this year I get an ark for the layers, then the chooks will only come into the chook house in the winter.
I know you want to say rest rest. But this is not a choice. Animals will die if I don’t get the work done. And none of it takes very long. None of it is heavy. I can do it slowly. So no lectures my darling Fellowship. Miss C has got to get back to work.
I hope you all have a wonderful day. I certainly will.
Your friend
celi
ps. I was first introduced to ganache as a hot chocolate idea over at remedial eating. A beautiful blog.
The Kitchen's Garden 
77 responses to “the mantle of fog settles on the farmy”
I used to go into the deepest place in the fog and just ‘float’. I loved the seclusion as a child.
I’m so glad you are getting better and being ever so careful, Celi. Glad that Cupa is on the mend and that your chores are getting done too. Loved the three sheep in the fog!
It looks like a good day for sitting by the fire, but as you say, work has to be done on a farm. Take care 😉
Fog like sunsets paints it’s own picture. Lovely photos. And no lectures as like me you’d never forgive yourself if your animals suffered because you were sat inside. Just be careful.
That beginning was soulful…and here we have blinding blowing snow at top speed. Glad I don’t have to be on the roads today. But is dismal when you can’t see more than a few feet in front of you…so I understand the erieness of it all when moving about in it. Reminds me of The Hounds of the Baskervilles….do do do do….;)
Yes. That is one thing that people don’t realize…when you live on a farm you work no matter how bad you feel, unless you have field hands who can do it for you. Here on our farm…we are the field hands…just like Ceci. It is a tough life sometimes, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. When animals depend on you….you get up, get out, and do what you have to do and come back in and rest before you have to go out again. Just like when the kids were home. No rest for the weary!
God is looking after the farmer and his animals! 🙂
Kupa sounds so much better and happier! Yay! When is Mamma due? How exciting!!!
Wish we still had our manure spreader we sold it to a young farmer. Drat!
I had to laugh at your interesting request for Christmas! I am asking for gift cards to Petsmart! LOL
No….not diamonds or pearls…an$1800 puppy, high end dog food on automatic refill, vet bills and training classes!!! My Christmas gift for the next 30 years says Kevin! 😉 Fine with me!!!! 😀
Love you! Rest when you can…the worst is over and you are on the mend. Just carry that donut with you!!! I use wrist braces when I lift bales or buckets. It really helps!!! I am small boned and protect myself as best as I can. A weight lifting belt too! Those bales and feed sacks are heavy!!!
Love you! (((Celi)))
p.s. Making ganache today! Great idea! 🙂
Well, I was just about to say, “Naughty Celi,” but I won’t. I understand that the animals depend on you, quite literally, for their lives. So do what you must and rest in between. I will try that lovely ganache, for those nights when I feel I can splurge on the calories. If I worked as hard as you do, I wouldn’t have to worry about calories! This is a lovely post, too, both words and pictures; the fog does seem restful, like a favorite blanket comforts a child.
How is it I never thought of making hot chocolate from leftover ganache…brilliant idea! We had fog this morning, too, though not quite as thick. It is a peaceful blanket on one’s thoughts. Tell me who we see left to right in the three sheep shot…love the white looking ears in the middle…great shot!
You have the fog and I have the sunshine. Mind you, it is only a tease as our temps are due to sink overnight. I made the most of it with walk in the park and was chatted up by a flock of ducks!
I never, ever thought I’d feel nostalgic about the foggy days Up the Mountain (I call it Witch Mountain on those days) but you’ve made me think of it in a new light (or dark)! No lectures, but I’m still allowed to wish you well 🙂 Love the chocolate ganache/hot chocolate thing and I’m so glad you’re often good and get to have a splosh of Kahlua in it!
I swear, if I lived by you I would rush over and help you with your chores. Okay, I’d have to wear a face mask in that chock house which would be ever so attractive, but you would be so distracted with my hair looking like a chia pet in that fog that you would just let me go ahead while you went into the house and made me some hot chocolate from that ganache!
wouldn’t that be perfect, when John got home and helped he also wore a face mask! so you would not have been alone!
I love the fog! It makes everything look soft and fuzzy like taking off my glasses. Here we get the hoar frost which everybody calls ice fog. Yes, I know animals come first and must be taken care of. Just be sure to warm up those muscles and maybe a little stretching before you go outside. We are in the grips of that arctic blast today. Just a skiff of snow, but temp of 5 degrees does not make our chickens happy. The sheep love the cold, but not the wind. I see Kupa has some more beautiful feathers. So beautiful. Now I have to go to the store and get some cream. What brand of chocolate do you use?
I just grab a good cooking chocolate, not that Green and Blacks though as they lobbied against GM labelling.. c
Good to know. I boycott any company that is against GM labeling. That includes Nestles, too. Especially them.
Green & Blacks now owned by Mondelez aka Kraft 😦 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_&_Black's
ah, that would explain it.. c
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE foggy days on a dirt road. It is just…calm. 🙂
Can’t tell you how much I enjoyed your reflection on fog. The writing is lovely and perfect. My experience is similar. One of the things I enjoy about living high in the Andes is watching the sky, the clouds, and the fog–the cloud forest, especially at higher elevations. I wrote a piece a while back called “Evolution at the Tree Line” that described my encounters with clouds that overwhelm the landscape with gray.
Blogging from Ecuador,
Kathy
fog is wonderful in the mountains.. c
[…] by Celia at The Kitchen Gardens and PA […]
When I got up earlier this morning there was gentle barely rain, slightly more than fog and I thought the same thing, oh how peaceful. After 5 busy days away and back to work, I’ll enjoy it before I start the day proper. I love the pic of the sheep with the foggy background… it looks sort of iconic like something from James Harriet maybe…
You know how earlier on in your injury you said ice heat ice heat, or something like that, you’re on the mend and it’s evolved to rest work rest work… it’s good news though that you and the couch are less close than you were 🙂
I hate that couch now!..c