The Chickens go to Jesus

As well as doing a great painting job, Jesus also provides us with no end of fun in the pun line. Today's relates to the fact that he has taken our chickens - with our permission of course! He already had a couple last year, and was happy to take these too. While I enjoyed having them, it was tempered by the fact they spend most of their time brooding and we couldn't let the dogs out the back in case they chased them. 

Jesus Saves...

...us from having to paint the living room.

He's done most of the work, but is returning later to touch up a few bits. This is our freshly white ceiling.

We obviously had to keep out of his way, so Kate was in the bedroom with Larry, when she wasn't giving classes, and I decamped to the workshop with the dogs and a selection of cats. Anubis is now looking in very good shape, apart from the wonky tail, and she and Pixie have taken to playing. Pixie playes Chew, while Anubis plays Punch. The games go on for quite a while and seem to end without any firm conclusion. Fortunately, they play the same rules when it comes to Lummoxing.

Jesus Everywhere

I've developed a nice system of helping the young ones who are yet to learn the English alphabet spell words. I use my own phonetic alphabet using words that they learn early on, so if I tell them how to write 'grape' I would say 'green-red-apple-pink-elephant' as these are all words they can write and learn in year 1. With the older ones who don't know the letters in English well, I will say E - elephant etc. This is a great system and works really well - until I found myself trying to remember the Spanish alphabet...

We've had a few visits from Jesus this week, or to be more precise, one has visited us and the other we visited. I went to Jesus the optician in Llerena for an eye test. Last time I went, which was three or so years ago, he didn't use the alphabet chart, so I hadn't brushed up on my Spanish alphabet, which is where my nearly daily clear annunciation of the English alphabet with my special phonetic add-ons comes in. I found I could not remember any of the Spanish alphabet, and had to stop myself from telling him clearly with BBC pronunciation that the line of letters was elephant, yellow, red, tiger... Happily, Ian was with me and was able to translate my mumbles into something that hopefully resembled the Spanish alphabet.

Jesus the painter has started work painting the side of the house. In his normal style, this entailed climbing onto the roof and dangling over the side of the house. He is also painting the outside wall of my workshop, which will entail repairing some of the plaster which was damaged by rain this year. This is so the house will look nice in photos.

Again, we were surprised how low cost it is to get something painted, it works out cheaper than us doing it ourselves. I guess this is because the painters buy in bulk and wholesale. They only buy white as they mix their own colours with dyes, so they can buy gallons of white paint at the start of the painting season (everyone gets their house painted during the summer).  When Ian painted the wall of the barn it seemed he was ever going to the paint stop to buy another tin, and we were horrified at how quickly the costs racked up.

We had an orange heat alert last week, but it didn't feel as hot as other days. Perhaps we are getting used to it...

Feeding Up Anubis

Our feeding up Anubis campaign is working well, although we could be creating a monster. We are trying to feed her on demand - and she has now decided to be quite demanding! However at least she is asking for food and she is eating well - very well. Although she was very thin and emaciated,  I don't think she was truly starving when she came to us (although she was probably close to it), so hopefully there won't be any long term effect. I don't think she would have lasted a lot longer on her own, however, and certainly wouldn't have survived a bout of bad weather.

We managed to find some proper kitten food, which hopefully will help to feed her up. She is still very thin, however nowhere near as thin as she was, and she now has a round little kitten-like tummy which she didn't have when she came. She is playing now too, and is learning that Roland and Pirata are a little different in their reactions (last night she was chasing Pirata's tale and didn't understand why he was ignoring her).

She has been amazingly easy to introduce into the house. Within a couple of days she was able to wander round the house, and she was housetrained almost immediately. I don't think anyone will be claiming her now, so she is very much part of the household.

Feeding Regime

Little Anubis hasn't been putting on weight so she is on a feeding regime now. We think she may have been struggling with the dried food, so we've got some canned cat food for her. We can't get kitten food, but hopefully the canned food plus some extra meat will give her the nutrients she needs.

Interestingly, she has started playing - which is something she hadn't done until the last day or so. I was thinking how nice it was not to have an annoying kitten, and at the moment the thought passed through my mind, she decided to try to climb up my leg. I think she probably just didn't have the energy to play. We also wormed her, as that might also stop her from putting on weight. We're not concerned, but concious that she's going to need a lot of feeding up.

She has to be fed on the work surface to stop her getting mugged by the other animals!

What a Difference a Week Makes

A week ago, Anubis was still living on the street, but she's adjusted rather well to life in a house. Last night was her first night out with the run of the whole house, though I think she slept under the sofa in my office for at least the latter part of the night. When we got back from our walk, she was ensconced in my chair.

None of the dogs phase her anymore and the other cats are also starting to get a little more used her.

No-one has called round this week to ask for their kitten back, so hopefully she is here to stay now.

Clown

Larry gives us hours of pleasure. Whether he is falling off his perch, trying to bite Rosie's nose, getting over excited by a new toilet roll in his cage, there is always something going on in his little parroty world.

We've thought he was odd - however it transpires that the whole breed is renowned for its oddness. I was trying to find out what one of his little dances means, and I found a parrot website which describes Patagonian Conures as being 'the clowns of the parrot breeds'. And I must admit, after watching him head butt his cone so it swings back and then watching him try and fail to dodge it, I can see what they mean.

Darker Mornings

aug_08, a photo by ian_pullen on Flickr.

We tend to leave the house at about 6.45 for our pre-breakfast walk in the country and we're now leaving the house in the dark. On the plus side, we do get to see the sun rising over the countryside. This was the sky this morning a few minutes before sun rise - if you look in the foreground, you may make out Pixie hurtling towards the camera.

All Hail the Great Explorer

 

Once more Extremadura, the Spanish region that spawned many of the greatest of the conquistadores, has produced a great explorer.

Anubis has built up the courage to get onto the floor and explore, despite the attentions of the other animals. The dogs have been pretty good, but Babbity Bumble has been growling a bit. She may regret that when Anubis is full grown as I don't think she'll be anywhere near as small as the Bumble.

Anubis in the Chair

Anubis has been spending more time around the rest of the animals for a couple of days and, while still nervous, is coping quite well. In a shocking turn of events, she appears to have taken a fancy to my chair. Having spent three months fighting Alfie for the chair, it now seems there's even more competition.

Wow, it's a big world out there

Kitten meets the rest of the house.

Anniversary!

We celebrated our anniversary by going to look at the area we are considering moving to. I normally have classes Saturday evening, so we were going to go tomorrow, however cancelled class and little kitten meant we decided to go today. It gave kitten a day of peace to settle in and a nice way for us to celebrate 11 years.  We took Pixie and Alfie, who both marked the day by vomiting in the car. Alfie started to get a bit hot, so Ian took revenge by drenching him in cold water in intervals to cool him down.  It is difficult to know with Alfie what is best for him - do we leave him at home where he may get stressed on his own (if we shut him away, else we worry about him getting trodden on by one of the big dogs) or take him where he may be unsettled int he car. However it wasn't unduly hot today, so his sickness is probably an indicator that he is just not a good traveller.

We went to a lake called Orellana, this is part of the series of lakes in Extremadura which are also called 'Franco's Waters' as they were part of a resevoir building program which he encouraged. This is a big lake, with three smallish towns on one side. The towns were nice and the lake was superb. We ended up a bit lost and traveled down a track only to end up at a roman bridge that crossed the lake. Obviously for the first nearly 2000 years of its life it was only crossing a river, however today it crosses a lake. The picture Ian took is of a tunnel that leads onto the bridge. We didn't cross the bridge - there was nothing to say that we couldn't, however we had nasty visions of getting stuck.

We were going to have a picnic, however hadn't allowed for supermarkets closing at 2, so we had to hang on until we got home.

We were looking for the sort of thing that we like and could afford. We want to buy as cheap as possible, as the aim of this next move is to get some money in the bank so we don't have to worry about unplanned expenses or the months when we don't have a lot of income. However, we want it to at least be habitable - with enough room for us all. We are considering a plot of land to build on or a house which is habitable with some land. The trouble with a plot of land and building is that we could soon find we blew the budget - which is why we've been looking at prefabs. We are considering buying a prefabricated house and having this installed, so we would know all the costs up front. When we first thought 'prefab' the old war time prefabs came to mind, however modern day prefabs are available in a wide range of styles and could offer a good relatively low cost option.

Hopefully we ought to be able  to find something quite nice which we'd be happy in -and still afford a pedalo to navigate the lake!!

Photos

Here are some new photos. Obviously not of the little kitten, who is currently snuggled under the settee in Ian's office. It's a friendly little thing so it's not hiding under there in a scared way, more because it is somewhere that all cats appear to like. They have all snuggled down under there at one time or another.

It's not met any of the other cats and dogs yet we'll break it in gently. Hopefully noone will claim it. It is an exceptionally pretty and friendly kitten, I don't think I've ever seen a kitten quite so pretty. It is obviously a siamese - or siamese type with creamy colored fur, darkening to chocolate color on its nose and feet. It's tail is odd, it is probably broken in two places, however it doesn't seem to worry it and I don't think it has been hit by a car. We've seen it pee and poo, which is good. It is eating well too.

At the moment the poor little thing is a bag of bones, however it should soon get fit. We'd been having a discussion about getting a new 'non-wonky' kitten to help us keep rodents and pigeons under control, and had even gone so far as to start to ask around, however it sat a little uncomfortably as we had set our hearts on helping special need cats. So perhaps this was fate lending a helping hand again.

Anyway, photos...

This is Javi, my youngest student, showing off his new glasses.

Here is Carlos - the first student who started with me. He and Paula are making a game in their classes and they were recording noises here.  This has been eminently successful. Their English is good enough now that they don't translate when they speak to me, so it is easy to use making a game as a framework for their classes as they can speak fluently and think about the game rather than their English - which is a great way to practice and develop their English. It is much more relevant and interesting practice than working through a text book or website.

This is Paula - Mum and AH will remember Paula and Carlos who had their photo taken with us a couple of years ago. They were little children then!

I made paper toys with the two 7 year olds. They are a tad less annoying now and are better at following instructions. This was a good exercise as they had to decide what color the hair was - whether the hair was curly or straight etc. The only thing I would change would be to use a thicker paper. These were made on printer paper, however while it went to mush for one who was a little heavy handed....

A Kitten Calls

There was a knock at the door shortly after one o´clock and several teenagers (at least one a student of Kate) were there with a kitten. They'd found it down by the health centre and hadn't been able to find anyone who knew where it belonged and so Kate sprang to mind. The kitten has probably been lost for at least the best part of a week as I saw it near the house several days ago and had mentioned it to Kate. I assumed it was from one of the houses on the street opposite.

It's got a bit of a wonky tail and is very thin right now, but hopefully nothing wrong with it that food won't sort out. It's being very friendly and has quite a purr on it, particularly when confronted with tuna. With luck no-one will come to claim it as it is rather sweet.

Alfie is still finding the heat a little too much. He learned this pose from watching Kate at siesta, though he's not quite got the tongue sticking out as far as it's meant to.

Car Washing Time of Year Again

It's that time of year again when the car gets washed so that it looks as well cared for as possible for the ITV centre staff. It's the equivalent of the MOT and was due this morning. Fortunately we checked the lights on Wednesday and found the reversing lights weren't working. After some exploration, it turned out that it was missing the switch by the gear stick, but the garage in Llerena ordered one which arrived yesterday. All went well with the test and apart from an initial eye roll from the fella doing the test, we seemed to understand each other.

It definitely was a better morning for me than a chap who came in while I was waiting for the result. There was some confusion over his appointment not being on the list, but he was adamant that he'd booked. Eventually it transpired that his appointment had been for the previous day. The shoulder shrugging from the staff while explaining he'd have to rebook would have made a Frenchman green with envy - such nonchalance.

This time next year it'll be time to break out the hosepipe again and, perhaps, head to a different test centre.