old age creeping gently this way…..

Growing strawberries is one thing but when you becoming Tiggy Winkles Animal Rescue French Division then it all becomes something else. I threw my large net back over the patch after  saving the ungrateful Hedgehog  two days ago and on my next visit to the allotment I found this little bird hopelessly tied in knots.  I picked him up, and I am not good at dead or injured animals, but I just knew that if I didn’t act fast I would loose this little sweetie. How brave was I, without gloves I picked him up and started to unravel the netting caught around his wings and head. I then had to ran for my scissors from the Poly Tunnel and cut him free. He bit me, scratched me and screeched to high heaven and was clearly not as committed as I was to free him before he had a heart attack and died. Well, you can see that I was a jolly little animal saver.  We let him go and saw him later in the cherry tree at which point I started to regret my actions as I have a bad feeling he will be the culprit who clears the tree before we have time or inclination to get the ladder up against the trunk to harvest our plump red cherries for ourselves.

The yellow serviette around my wrist is a very technical and essential part of living in France and serves as an aid memoir for whatever I am doing at any one time. Today it was there to remind me that I had the well pump turned on and not to forget to switch it off before the whole of the French water resources ends up on my garden. It can also mean that I have cakes in the oven, or dinner on the hob.  When Mike sees the Yellow serviette he asks…”and what are we not wanting to annihilate today?”… Well it is all well and good but I juggle many things at any one time and keeping the essentials like, water in the well and the cakes edible I find this system faultless.  I nearly failed yesterday however, when I was in the process of making rhubarb jam and from sad experiences I now know you have to cook the rhubarb until it no longer resembles rhubarb and then you can start the process of jam making.  I had completely forgotten that I had rhubarb ticking over on the hob and I had completely forgotten to wear my yellow serviette but Mike called through the kitchen on the way to another job and thought that it needed turning down and by the time I got back to the jam I was surprised to see that I was just in time and the jam was setting and ready to jar. Mike only mentioned later that he had come to my rescue and I promised myself not to forget the purpose of the yellow serviette and I have hung one just by the cooker to remind me to wear it, not sure if this is clever or just old age creeping gently this way…..