Catch up

ADSL is back at last - we spent plenty of time on the phone chasing the PTT and the ISP and when I got up- this morning at about eight everything was working perfectly. My own suspicions confirmed I think - something was left disconnected or switched off when last OTE were at the exchange. That, I'm almost sure, is the case whenever we get cut off. The average technician doesn't know what the DSLAM or routers are for so they just unplug them, and to exacerbate the situation once the error has been reported the procedures are sloppy and full of holes that we all too often fall through. A string vest of a process!

We're getting a cold snap right now - temperatures (adjusted for wind chill - a northerly wind gusting up to 30 kph) around 4ºC. Not cold by Finnish standards but pretty chilly for these parts. We've been getting sleet and hailstones on and off for the past day or so but the girls have been enjoying it all immensely. Ears up, staring into the wind, and noses twitching on the merest hint of a scent wafting in on these ferocious gusts. Peering into oxalis and clover ground cover that could be hiding a shrew, or a hedgehog, or a cat, or anything else at all that could be interesting - could be dinner. In recent weeks they have caught and killed a bird and what was either a shrew or a mouse. They are on the tip-toe of anticipation most of their waking hours in these clean days.

The English lavender in Lav2 is all pruned now and coincidentally it was all finished on exactly the same day as it was completed last year despite the plants all being much bigger. Gill has worked assiduously and as often as the weather has allowed and then more ... The correct clothing helps - of course - but would mean naught were she not so determined and dedicated to her crop. This is truly a labour of love for her. Would you go out into the near freezing cold and drizzle in order to sit among clover wielding secatuers rather than sit inside in the warm? Would you? This is love. Just the English in Lav1 to finish up so that she might rest up for a little. The French is due for collection this weekend now that it has been dried, oil may be forthcoming soon thereafter. Fingers crossed.