Category Archives: Amusing

Amusing, Farming

Hot and Dry!

Yes, this exactly how I feel. It has been hot and dry! So what has been happening. We have been stuck on the farm for the whole week because our truck is getting fixed up. The rear bumper is “rotten bad” and the side panels have been flapping out for a long time. We left our truck in Belmopan on Monday and took the chicken bus back to PG; it was a six hour journey which felt like it would never end! The music was on full blast for the entire time…luckily towards the end the music mellowed out into easy listening Spanish folk songs.

Anyway, we don’t mind being on the farm with no wheels. We like being here and there are lots of things to be done. I have taken a few pictures around the farm so you can see what is happening.

This patch is getting bigger:

Mother in Law’s Tongue.
Flowering Mother in Law’s Tongue.

Everything is flowering right now. This is the cinnamon:

Flowering Cinnamon.

The suriname cherries are looking very pretty with the white flowers:

Suriname Cherry

In my last post, I mentioned that we were starting our crepuscular routine which means being active during dawn and dusk so that we can work during the coolest parts of the day. I have noticed that the cat is following suit…as soon as it starts getting light in the morning at about 6.30am, he has found a cool spot to sleep until 5pm. However, I am not quite sure when he is actually active! At 5pm, he waits confidently by his dinner plate for food to be dished out to him and by 8pm he is looking for another sleep spot.

Gnome mentioned that the cat was getting fat.

This was my reply:

“…oh, he has big bones and most of it is fur!” (Ha-Ha!!)

Anyway, he does look very healthy:

Cat in a Box.

Oh to have the life of a cat…

Amusing, Belize, Farming

It’s Goosie Time!!

Hello Everyone!! Yes, it is indeed Goosie Time and they are pecking at our boots, beating our legs with their wings and generally causing mayhem and havoc on the farm. We found our first goosie egg on Chinese New Year and then our second one on Valentines’s Day. Luckily, we had saved up the first one so that we could eat one each. The eggs were huge and the yolks were a beautiful orange colour. Gnome cooked them as a Valentine’s treat Italian-style…slow-cooked in olive oil…this method involves spooning the oil over the egg to cook it. Ooooh…very tasty…each goose egg is equivalent to three chicken eggs.

Fried Goose Eggs.

This morning, we found one of our goosies in the grey water area which Gnome had caged off. He had feasted on all the forbidden peanuts!! He had systematically ripped up all the peanuts around the ditch looking for the nuts to eat. The dastardly goose!! I had to toss him out quite unceremoniously! Whilst I was doing this, other goosies crowded round trying to find the weak spot in the cage. I was soooo mad and I shook my fist at them shouting,

“…and to think that I was going to write a dedicated Blog post on how much I love my goosies!!”

These goosies are up to no good trying to find a way in…look at them..they are plotting. Will they figure it out? They have found the mound of earth…which one is clever enough to jump in!!

Goosies!!

Anyway, I have another goosie story which is a lot more heart-warming. A while ago, we swapped a male goosie (we had far too many and he was being bullied by other males) for some ducks. Well, today the guy who received the goosie hailed us down when we passed by his house. He was awfully excited and beckoned us to follow him,

“…come, come…I must show you something!”

He told us that his female goose had laid 2 eggs and set them successfully. Sure enough, we peered into his cage and there were two little-big goosies peeping up at us. Awwwwh!!!! The guy was so over-joyed and we were very pleased to see that our male goosie had done his job well. Apparently, he is guarding his female partner valiantly whilst she is setting again. He thanked us profusely for such a stud of a goose! When Gnome and I got back into the truck, we both said in unison:

“…we want more babies!!” (meaning of course, goosie babies!!)

Goosie Fever has started….

Amusing, Belize, Farming, Food

Early Jackfruit.

2 Comments

Hello, I am writing a bit more since we are both stuck at home. Gnome’s neck injury is getting better but as soon as he tries to do any type of lifting, the pain comes back again. I am giving him a full week and will re-assess for light activity on Wednesday. He is keeping his humour up and is reading up on silly things like Groundhog Day (which was yesterday) and asking me if I would eat a groundhog; my answer was “Yes…I am Chinese…the Chinese will eat everything!” Oh yeah, he was also looking at the protein content of millipedes to see if we could supplement our diet with it! He’s not kidding by the way…he’s also asked me to re-start the wormery as a protein source and asked me: “…how would you cook them?” and I cheekily replied with,”…Kung-po Worm! Sweet and Sour Worm, name any Chinese-Style and I will make it into a worm dish. I am of course not kidding too and will in the future post up worm dishes once I get enough of them to eat.

Talking of food…this year we have early jackfruit from a newly bearing tree. The tree is about 30 yards from the house in an area away from our normal walkways. We didn’t notice until this week when the geese stopped going to the pond in the morning. We scratched our heads and wondered what was the matter and then we saw the main goosie group camping under a jackfruit tree. Any other goose (not from their group) that happened to cross their path would get pecked and screeched at.

Goosies Camping Under Jackfruit Tree.

On closer inspection, we saw that a ripe jackfruit had fallen to the ground and head goosie was pecking at the fruit as if he was trying to get into the Guinness Book of Records for the “Fastest Time a jackfruit can be eaten by a goose in one sitting.” Then we stared up at the tree and saw four humongous jackfruit just ripe for the picking. Aha, the dastardly geese were waiting for the next one to fall down and feast upon! We managed to harvest just in time…look at these beauties:

We normally harvest jackfruit on our farm in July and August. February is very early but it is actually a better time because with the dry weather at this time of the year, they are less likely to rot and get damaged by torrential rain. Plus, this is an unusual time for fruit trees to produce so it is a welcome harvest on the farm.

Yesterday, I prepared one of the jackfruits and attempted to process it in a different way; Gnome’s mother had sent me a link where there was a very skilled person peeling the fruit in a spiral-like manner in a matter of minutes.

utube.com/Nila’s Kitchen

It was one of those videos that made it look so easy peasy! Well, I tried it and found that the jackfruit was too heavy (20lbs/ 10kgs) to manipulate in this way. I did however modify the method by cutting it into 3 inch rings and peeling the rings from the central core… then the fruit could be readily popped out like on the video. This took me less time compared to my old method…30 minutes instead of one hour so I will continue with the new improved approach. Once I am more skilled, I might be able to spiralise it and make a 2 minute video!!

Jackfruit:

Jackfruit.

Okay, I will write more since we can’t get out right now to do farm work!!

Amusing, Belize, Farming, Food, Plants

Catching Up With Pictures

It’s another grey and miserable day and we are feeling it…where is the sun? Wahhhhh!!

Miserable!!

I opened the front door this morning and from the veranda view, I spied my eggplant (aubergine) jiggling up and down on a raised bed. Plants don’t jiggle! There was a piece of zinc blocking my view so I stepped outside to see what was happening and it was My Goosie on my vegetable bed munching away! “My Goosie” was the very first baby goosie that I looked after last year; she came from a single egg that we found plop in the middle of the yard on New Year’s Day. While she was growing up, she would follow me around as I harvested vegetables from the raised beds. Learning from imitation, she got into the habit of nibbling on unusual things like aubergine leaves, rocket and mustard.

Goosie.

Well, My Goosie has had a sudden re-collection of childhood days and is eating all our vegetable plants. I have also lost my dandelions to her; fortunately she has not pulled up the roots so I will transplant them to a safer place today. I have tried talking to her but she refuses to listen…must be that adolescent time! 😉

My Goosie.

Anyway, goosie antics aside I wanted to catch up with farm news with a few pictures. By the way, talking of aubergines, this is the variety I am harvesting right now; they from Thailand. They are about an inch in size and are really nice cooked slowly in olive oil.

Thai Aubergines.

Gnome did a Christmas Eve planting of special Peruvian corn:

Planting Corn.

The ducks and geese like to walk round and round this enclosure hoping to find an entrance to these sweet tit-bits! This is the corn about 3 weeks later; doing very well and faring nicely in this rainy weather:

Corn Planting After 3 Weeks.

Oh and pigeon pea is in season again; I will write more about it soon since we are harvesting and eating this everyday:

Pigeon Pea.
Amusing, Belize, Farming

Adventures With M & G…

First of all, I have to tell you that it is freezing cold, grey and miserable right now! I think it is about 20C (68F) or less. Right now, we are wearing woolly hats, scarves and many layers including a t-shirt, jumper/long-sleeved shirt and a body warmer all zipped up to the collar. You would think that this is ideal cool weather for working outside but you can actually get sick because the sweat does not evaporate from your clothes and you are left feeling wet, cold and shivery. Hot water showers are a must right now. We are so used to 40C (104F) that it is difficult for our bodies to adapt quickly to the sudden drop in temperature. Having said all that, we still like this short winter time because we know that the dry season is coming soon and that is extreme in the opposite way.

Okay, I promised some pictures from Sunday; Sunday was a gloriously bright day and Gnome (the Adventurer!) had the notion that he wanted to drive the truck to the newly cleared area. Note that in all this time that we have been on the farm, we have always parked the truck in the driveway and never ventured forth into the unknown. There was no road so we had to weave in and out of coconut trees, dodge geese, stumps, bumps and little trees to boldly go where no Munchkin and Gnome had gone before. Weeeeee!!!

Bush Driving.

More Pictures; adventuring into the wilderness! This is the newly cleared area:

On the farm

Another picture from further away:

Adventuring further afield

One of the geese (Chinese goosie) poked his head out of the pond to see what all the fuss was about. I don’t think he felt as excited as us:

What’s Happening?
Amusing, Belize, Farming

Double Squeak!

The goosie noise level has quadrupled in the last week or so; there is shrieking, cackling, screaming and squawking every-day and throughout the night. Noise levels start increasing at about 4am in the morning right outside the house. Interestingly enough, the levels reach a crescendo at our waking time which is 6am and do not stop until they hear our bedroom door open. As soon as this happens, we see all four goosie groups scattering off in the direction of the pond. I swear…I am convinced that they have diabolical minds and are deliberately making our lives difficult!

Anyway, yesterday I wanted an extra hour in bed…just another extra hour! My sleep had been broken all night by the sound of Squeaky…there is one goose that squeaks (not squawks) but actually squeaks. The noise is very high pitched and occurs constantly every two seconds ; it felt like he was just standing right outside the house all night and had not moved an inch. Finally we could bare it no more and got up at 6.30am and I opened the front door to shake my fist at Squeaky and tell him what a terrible night I had…of course, it was really just for my own benefit…goosie would be totally un-fazed by my gestures of indignation.

Goosie!! Quiet!!

When, I opened the door, the squeaking was still constant and close but the goose was nowhere to be seen. Gnome looked out of the window and spied Squeaky about 50 yards away going off towards the pond. However, the constant high-pitched EEEEEEEEEEE noise was still outside our house…

Oh no…we both realised it at the same time…we have spawned a second Squeaky!!

There was indeed a Squeaky Junior standing proudly and all puffed up giving his best. The all-new Squeaky doesn’t look like his father…he is a Chinese goose. Here is a picture: the Chinese goose type is the one in front; normally these types make a quacking noise like a duck but we seem to have hybrid that squeaks.

Gnome says that in order to preserve our sanity (and our ears) we should try to breed the squeak out of our goosies. 😉 Ha-Ha…project #312 Breeding the Squeak out of the Geese!!

Goosies.

Anyway, that was just a little amusing story for a Sunday morning. The weather is bright and sunny today so I will go out and take new pictures to post up later on.

Amusing, Belize, Farming

Back To work!

We had a lovely two weeks holiday together; this generally consisted of switching off our phones (do you remember the good old times when we didn’t have mobile phones and people had to contact you at appropriate times on your land-line?) and switching off other communications including FaceBook. We did still have other forms of communication for family to get in touch if needed. I informed (mostly) everyone that we were off camping in the mountains and so we cut a trail off in to the mountains and carried food and goodies back and forth from the farm to the camp-site. It was nice to do something together and we ate very well. We did come back regularly to make sure that the goosies were behaving themselves.

Beyond the Boundaries.

So now that we have packed on the calories we are ready to start work on the farm again. Gnome said that eating lots of food over this festive period was the perfect way to store energy for the physical labour ahead of us…after all, this is the traditional way that farmers sustained themselves through the seasons and we feel that this is a more natural way for the body to gain and shed energy. I guess that it is important to point out that if you choose this lifestyle, you do have to increase food (caloric) intake in order for your body to remain fit and healthy. Incidentally, I also had to give Panda guidelines on increasing caloric intake with specific food preparation instructions since he is now upping his level of physical activity. I have worked out that Panda (and also Gnome) has to eat 3 whole chickens a week (or protein equivalent) plus the other food groups to sustain this type of lifestyle. Now, we can all eat bacon and eggs in the morning and not feel fat and guilty…Ha-Ha!! This life has its advantages…

Anyway, back on the farm we are trying to get back into the swing of things. Gnome started today by moving wheel-barrows of sand to our designated root/tuber beds…what a way to start! There is a reason why this has to be done quickly… it’s because the geese are having too much fun running up and then sliding back down the sand pile. ARRRRGGHHH!!! It’s ruining our lovely pile! We decided that the best course of action was to get rid of the sand as quickly as possible so that it doesn’t whittle down to nothing on the ground.

Sand Pile.

You should see the geese at feeding time…they are all on top of the sand pile giving their best to shriek and honk at me and when I do come out with their corn, they all slide down the hill in the midst of complete and utter chaos and mayhem. Yes, oh what fun!! Here are two goosies walking on flattened sand.

Goosies.

Wishing everyone a good start to 2019!!

Amusing, Belize, Farming, Food, Plants

Farm Plants.

Hello!  Still here on the farm and still hauling water up into the house.  It’s not a huge deal (with Munchkin’s well trained strong arms!); it is only an issue when we are trying to do a washing machine load.  The washing machine takes 40 gallons in total (=8 pigtail buckets) with the wash and rinse cycle so that’s the real pain.  But, of course we still have to do it and the clothes need to get washed!  Right now, we are still in the midst of the grey water drainage project #135 so the water tower preparations are not in the forefront yet.  The last few days, Gnome has been digging (I believe that’s what Gnomes do amongst many, many other things) our first drainage ditch which takes all the washing-up, clothes washing and bathing water out of the house area.

Digging First Drainage Pond.

The pond is actually bigger than this now and the final size will be 3 feet (90cm) by 30 feet (9metres).  We will be planting edible plants (taro, lotus, etc) in this first pond.  The overall plan is to have several of these connected ponds draining from one to another until they reach their final destination which is a great big banana and plantain grove.  That way, all the nutrients from our grey water can be used to water a whole bunch of food plants as it wends its way from food pond to food pond.  What a great way to water your own food!

Anyway, food is always in abundance on the farm and I am so pleased with our harvests.  This is the lifestyle for beings (like Munchkin and Gnome) who like to eat and cook good food.

Just got a sweet potato harvest today:

Sweet Potatoes.

Barbados Gooseberry is producing…

Barbados Gooseberry.

Oh and look at the flowers of the Barbados Gooseberry…

Barbados Gooseberry Flower.

And yes we are eating dandelion salad right now…

Dandelion Bed.

Some hot peppers; this is a funny story.  For quite some time, we have been trying to procure durian (Asian smelly fruit that all Asians adore and adulate).  We tried to buy from Ebay several times: “fresh seeds from China.”  If anyone knows about Durian, the seeds are the size of chestnuts but each time we received our seeds they would be pepper seeds!!  These Chinese…they really are something trying to pass off pepper seeds for durian seeds!!  So, these are our “Chinese Rip You Off Not-Durian Ha-Ha Pepper Seeds.”  I guess it is still something…

Chiney Pepper.

Oh this is a pretty edible: celosia; kinda like a spinach:

Celosia.

Okay, guys have a good night!!

Amusing, Belize, Construction

Home Decor With M & G…

Gnome Magic.

Hello!!  Yes, thought I would squeeze in another Blog post so that you don’t think that it is every 7 to 10 days only!!  You know what…time just flies by and before I know it, I haven’t written for ages.  Anyway, we are now in November-December time…the last leg of the year when it goes crazy-fast and you are left spinning in a whirlwind.  I really do think that from Thanksgiving time to Christmas/ New Year time, time accelerates and if you are not careful, projects come to a stand-still.  We are making a huge attempt to hold onto our sensibilities and keep on going!!  The veranda is getting its make-over.  Master Make-over Gnome has been plumbing and tiling.  The sink (love the sink!) and the bathtub are plumbed and working…oooh, look at that…

Sink and Bathtub.

We also re-located the washing machine-sans-case since the outer white cover was donated very generously by Gnome to the goosies as a nest:

Nesting Boxes.

Gnome Decor: attach the control panel to the wall and remove outer covering and lid.  Who needs frivolous washing machine accessories like that?  The washing machine, believe it or not, works absolutely fine.  On the plus side, stripped of its case, it is easier to move and takes up less space:

Gnome Washing Machine.

There you go…I now have all water stuff in one place…we will keep on going….

Here’s a tune for Gnome for doing everything that he does: “Gnome Does It Better.”

Amusing, Belize, Farming

A Few Things…

Hello, Good Morning to y’all! We have had a two days of showers and this morning kinda looks bright and sunny (cross my fingers).  We are sitting down with a cuppa getting ready for some farm work.  Some days, we have our Yorkshire tea and other days we have our own cinnamon leaves boiled for 10 minutes, steeped for 5 minutes and sweetened with honey.  It is a natural stimulant and sometimes we choose this over tea when we prefer a milder wake up!

Cinnamon Leaves.

Since it is generally drying up, Gnome has started a big mow again…the pond area was done first in preparation for our yearly bonfire for the the 5th of November (Remember, Remember…the 5th of November).   Ooooh, I wonder if Gnome will do a double bonfire again!!  It is an evening that we have friends around with bonfire(s), food cooked over coals and home-made wine.  We also undertake a little tradition every year that involves burning a
symbolic representation of an aspect of our life that we no longer
feel is necessary.   Hmmm…I am not sure if I am ready to burn the Pringles…it is one of my last links with consumerism!!  😉  This is the Guy from last year:

Guy.

What else…oooh, exciting stuff…sink is plumbed and we have a bath-tub/ trough for bathing…hee-hee.

Gnome asked me,“…it’s not exactly Martha Stewart…are you okay with it?”

Munchkin reply: “…who’s Martha Stewart anyway??  That is exactly why I love it!!”

I will have a better picture for you next time.  Fine decor with Munchkin and Gnome where Practicality is all that matters.  What do you think…can we market this lifestyle??!!  😉

Bath Tub.

Anyway, I will leave you with a picture of a morning gift from our Beloved Cat (he is like a son to us: lazy good-for-nothing-but-we-love-him and uses the place like a hotel).  Cat:

Cat.

A Gift from the Cat; he left this outside the front door and nonchalantly walked into the house to his eating area.  If he could talk, he would say: you guys can have the rat, I will have the gourmet liver that Munchkin serves up everyday, ta very much! 

Gift From the Cat.

This is what I said to Gnome: “…we could eat it…I have seen enough episodes of Alone to work out how to prepare the rat for food….”

Gnome: “…hmmm…don’t tell me you are starting to think you are an expert on survival skills from watching television!!”

Ha-Ha!!

(Alone is an American reality TV series where people are left to survive in the wilderness by themselves and expected to use their skills to hunt and forage to survive.  Many of the contestants have ended up catching rats to eat.