On Monday afternoon we did some strimming,
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by Tuesday evening both Ady and I had a series of itchy red marks on our necks and arms and assumed we’d been bitten by something, by last night they had started to blister and today they are still blistering and some have gone all weepy. It’s not dreadful, they are not sore or itchy any more and I think we have sufficiently few and sufficiently minor amounts to get away with them healing up and going away. But today when Ady went to do some more strimming Lisa said ‘oh be careful of this stuff, it’s hogweed and a previous WWOOFer had a nasty reaction to it, where the sap gets on your skin and makes it super sensitive to the sun so you get burns’. Ady remarked that that must be what I had then (his has not really blistered like mine has) and Lisa apologised for not warning us with the explanation that as she doesn’t ever do the strimming she had forgotten about it. I’m fairly cross about that really, I think it’s very irresponsible to know about a danger like that and subject someone to it without mentioning it. Googling has thrown up some real horror stories so I think we got off fairly lightly really.
So this morning was possibly the worst job you get at WWOOF hosts; cleaning out the animals. Here they only have chickens and ducks so it was scraping off the shit with a shovel, putting it in the compost heap and putting down fresh bedding in the duck house and the same in the chicken house. The chicken house also had the added delight of a load of stones the chickens had dug up with their scratching that needed to be used to fill some holes in the run. While Ady and I (mostly Ady in fairness ;)) did that Davies and Scarlett did some strawberry picking. Once we’d finished that Ady did some strimming (in long sleeves!) and I picked some peas and then did some feeding the tomatoes, pumpkins, peppers, peach and nectarine tree. Lisa was very cagily trying to ask me about whether previous hosts has used urine as a plant feed and what did I think about that idea. I said I was fine with it and she asked if I was up for some of that then, in the style of someone approaching me to join a cult. I did wonder if I was being invited to actually wee directly onto the beds myself so tenatively agreed and was shown the container full of wee (John’s) and the wee watering can, shown how to mix up a 10 to 1 dilution and feed the plants with it. I get all the best jobs, me 😉
I did wonder why I was set to work strimming killer weeds which resulted in blisters to my arms and neck with no prior asking but dealing with wee when I have had two children and therefore changed many hundreds of nappies might offend me…
Then it was lunch time 🙂
After lunch we did some weeding, planted out some squashes in the garden and in the polytunnel, broke up some cardboard boxes to mulch around some comfrey and then weeded a bed which was full of tomato plants which have self seeded from compost made from kitchen waste. Felt very odd and wrong to be pulling up tomatoes but Lisa could not be swayed by our suggestions of transplanting, selling them or even giving them away.
Then we sewed some swedes and some radishes and swapped over some protective netting for a lighter one with more growing space for the plants.
Dinner tonight was ‘Angelsey Eggs’ – a very nice hard boiled eggs base covered with mashed potatoes, leeks and cheese. Very delicious but not nearly enough. We had some interesting conversations over dinner about their experiences as WWOOF hosts and ours as WWOOFers though. Despite the lack of food and the whole hogweed incident I do like Lisa and John lots, they are interesting and have loads to teach us and seem to have fairly similar philosophies and ideas to us in many areas. This week has gone quick and I expect next week will do the same which is always the best sort of host really. We’ll definitely take away plenty of ideas from here.
Back at the static we had some cereal (kids) and Bombay mix (us) to tide us over 😉 The kids and Ady watched a film and I read a chapter of story to them before bed.
Are they super-skinny or do they just bring out the puddings and snacks when you’ve gone? I’m not sure how I’d feel diluting down someone else’s wee. I could handle mine or Sim’s, but I’m not sure about a random’s. Eek to the hogweed- hope it clears up quickly. What is this new Goddard breakfast?
Comment by Heather — 23 June 2011 @ 10:23 pm
pmsl at the Anglesey eggs – Chris loves this (not that I have heard it have that name before) and made us eat it once. Was a fairly disgusting mess. We have made it again since, in less messy fashion and it was nicer. He will be very pleased to hear that other people do actually eat it!
Comment by Alison — 24 June 2011 @ 10:03 am
Superskinny 🙂 Although one night we did head back for something and found them eating chocolate biscuits after dinner! 😆
I’d have the Anglesey eggs again but with bacon!
Comment by Nic — 24 June 2011 @ 6:39 pm