January 2009
1st Started
the New Year with
a celebratory drink of non alcoholic wine. Afterwards Imelda went to
bed while Sorcha and I watched a film. Later that day, we
(including Pearl and Annie) went to Nicky & Jacinta for a New
Years lunch. Nickys cooking was excellent - as usual.
I am surprised he never became a Chef - its that good!
We had a natter afterwards and left about 5pm.
2-4th Frosty mornings. Took a few pictures. Shown on the right.
5-9th I attended a SAP course at NUI in Galway. I stayed at the Days Hotel. Very comfortable 4 star hotel with swimming pool. Very cold during this week with temperatures going to -4 in the night.
10th Sunny but cool day. Concreted some paths in both goat enclosues. Installed a felt roof on the new duck enclosure. One of the chickens died in the morning. I knew it wasn't well from the night before. It was an oldish chicken so probably died of old age. Sorcha and Lyle (her boyfriend) went to a friend's party at a hotel. Picked them up about 12.30 am via "Brent's taxi service".
11th My birthday. Cant believe I'm 48! Ok 49 again. Opened cards (thanks Laura & Nick - I know you visit this site often) and presents around 12.00. Got jumpers, trousers and tee shirts from Melly and Sorcha. Got a USB from Mum. Around 6.00pm we all ate a Chinese takeaway.
12th Back to Work! Aghhhhhhhh!
15th Lyle played at a Phil Lynott Concert. Ok I know he has been dead 20 years, but it was a concert to remember his music. Sorcha, Phil's aging mother and about another 150 people attended. Lyle and the other musicians apparently played well.
17th The day started off quite nice (7-10 am). I am usually up early to feed the animals, etc. Around 10.00am it started to change and storm strength winds blew in the afternoon - with gusts of 100 mph. The only damage apart from tree branches was that the rose trellis blew down. Later it kept trying to snow but never settled despite the temperature being 0 c. Sorcha and Lyle attended another friend's party in the evening. Brent's taxi service brought them home about 2.00am. Great life when your young!
20th Gave a presentation at the Dublin Institute of Technology on "Comparison of two ePortfolio platforms", for my MSc - it went well. Not kicked off the course yet!
The last week was very wet and cold and this week is promised the same. The hay is going down rapidily as it is too miserable to put out the goats in the remaining grass patches.
24th Another chicken died. It was a white Sussex, who had learnt to break the eggs and eat its content. Chickens aren't supposed to do that due to the shape and strength of the egg. So unfortunately for her, she got her beak clipped every couple of months.
26th One of the geese died. It appeared to be in good form the previous evening.
31st Woke up to rain at 6.00am. It continued for the next 32 hours non-stop, usually very heavy. Stopped at 4.00pm Sunday. Naturally, all the fields next to the lake flooded and we had a stream flowing down the road beside us. The next day most of the water had gone! How Ireland removes all this rain water is still a mystery to me!