Midnight The Sentry Box Mouser.

 Midnight seems to have adopted an old cupboard or press like they say in Ireland.

Even the airing cupboard is called the "hot press".   

Midnight sits in there and waits for a field mouse 🐁 to walk past and he pounces on the unsuspecting creature.  

He's not daft and all the animals are good at repurposing stuff, cupboards and cardboard boxes a speciality.  

Chip off the old block?  I've been repurposing stuff all my adult life.  Found anything good in a builders skip lately or at a carboot sale?  They never sell car boots do they?  

The Firewood Pile In The Old Stone Shed.

The ever dwindling firewood pile in the shed.

 You can never have enough sheds can you?  I keep this stone building with a corrugated sheet roof just for firewood.

Already it seems to be dwindling but I will use every bit until we buy some more firewood.  The old building keeps the firewood dry and it easily burns.  Damp firewood struggles to ignite and gives off very little heat.  

Do have a shed for firewood?  We still haven't turned the oil heating on yet and Ireland is a very wet climate but also very mild.  

Do you harvest your ow own trees for firewood or do you buy it? How much is a trailer of logs this year near you?  I have been known to buy logs or "blocks" even in 'manure'  or fertilizer bags even.  The cheapest I have paid is 2 .50 a bag.  I know someone who paid 6 Euros a bag  last week.  Think we are all starting to feel fuel poverty?

The Irish monsoon season is getting us a bit down at the moment.  We watched Paddington 2 on Netflix yesterday and he cheered us up.  Have you seen it?  

The Devon Village That Washed Away.

Regular readers know I love my Prog Rock.  These bands write albums with themes and the tracks can be over ten minutes long.

In August I was lucky to see Kaprekars' Constant at two festivals in Oxfordshire and in Kent.

Kaprekars Constant at A New Day Festival in Kent.

I had seen David Jackson who is in Kaprekars Constant at Loreley at The Night Of The Prog Festival in Germany in 2017.  He was playing in the David Cross Band and was a former member of Vander Graaf Generator.  Who formed at Manchester University.

Any way Kaprekars' Constant recorded a song called Hallsands.  It's about a Devon village washing away due to dredging.  It's four minutes long and well worth a listen.  I think it's a masterpiece.  Please give it a listen and let me know your thoughts about the song or the ill-fated village?  Thanks!

.Bunty Annual Award to me for saying it was a Cornish village when it was really in Devon!

Halloween For Our Canine Friends.

 It was time for the two dogs to try on their Halloween 🎃  costumes the other day.

We spotted them in our local German garden centre and beer 🍺 providers.

I like the bat costume the best but the skeleton one is OK. 

Night Time In The Countryside Next ToThe Sea.

 The nights are really drawing in now and the clocks change next weekend when it's a Bank Holiday weekend in Hibernia.

Feeding time at the zoo or even kitchen.  

Like children on Christmas Day.  Tiger Kitty loves a box to play with.  She says the cardboard box is better than the beer.  Oh for a pint of Doombar in a Wetherspoons.

The fire was lit at four yesterday.  We are only burning wood at the moment.  One thing about living in the countryside means you still keep warm with a real fire.  Do you live in a smokeless zone or do you have a stove like ours?

Black Cat Camouflage.

 No it's not the name for a Prog Rock band it's our Midnight the cat sitting on my arm chair in the front room.  

I think he blends in very well with the surroundings. Black Cat Camouflage would be a good name for a band wouldn't it?  I invented the name first so if you use it please remember me.😊

The Dignity Of Labour.

I was sat outside an "Oirish" pub in Portugal 🇵🇹 on Monday.  It was 28 degrees and the barstaff were Portuguese.

We ordered small full breakfasts and a couple of pints/ Canecas of Sagres lager.  Well it was ten o'clock in the morning after all.

We noticed a council refuse lady jumping over the walls and retrieving plastic and bottles and other detritus.

She noticed us watching her work and could tell we were impressed with her diligence and dedication to her work.

She looked up smiling and said: "Bom Dia".

My mental jukebox started to play a Deacon Blue song in my head:

Algarve Gardens, Flowers, Plants And Big Urns.

An apartment block walls softened with plants.  You can grow plants in a pot or in a big allotment or a paved back yard, anywhere even.

Growing at the side of a busy highway.

Ornamental grass growing through the stones/small bricks pavements.

Succulents seem to grow anywhere they choose.

Great big urns.  Would they have stored olives in them or maybe wine?
 

Two villas and their gardens.

I would love to go there for the Winter.  The rain and wind and orange warnings soon dampen the spirit.  Have you any plans to fly South soon?

"Isn't She Beautiful?"

28 degrees yesterday.  Unbelievable.

We spotted this beauty on Sunday walking back from Algarve Shopping Centre.  

I love her rusty sun tan patina.  Anyone know what she is?  I have a few ideas but I will leave it to ye!

Loule Gypsy Market And Town.

 

Homemade Peri Peri sauce and a photo of my big toe.  The sauce cost 6 Euros.  Hope it blasts our taste buds.  

Two bottles of Sagres bought from a camper van stall at the market.  Cold beer is nectar when it's 25 degrees in OCTOBER!

Buddhist statue outside a woman's clothes shop.

An old Art Deco style building for sale and ready to be converted into apartments.

Old church built in a Moorish style.

Again the soon to be converted (hopefully) 1940 building.

Loule Gypsy Market.  Lots of haggling and we managed to knock them down 15 Euros for a cardigan. Not a good photo at all.

The coach trip lasted a full half day and cost us 22 Euros each.   I wasn't that impressed but the wife likes shopping and we got some presents to take back to Hibernia.  I could have sorted them out with a five minutes dash around the airport Duty Free.😀

More Algarve Pics.

 It's back to the rain early next week.  The 🌞 has been cracking the flags so to speak.

Here's some more photos 📸:

Leo the Algarve cat.

Algarve by night.

A pretty lass on her scooter.  She will catch her death dressed like that.

Fish shaped litter bin.  Function yet sculptural.

Bottle of wine 🍷 for 1.89.

Indian Restaurant Menu.  

Below a sign for the Zoomarine.I will comment on the blogs I follow when I get back to rainy Hibernia next week. 

Away From The Rushes And Furze Bushes In Hibernia.

 

A picture of the Irish Riviera.  I wish!

No supping on site.

Not bad for October.

Everywhere you go there's  somewhere  to deposit any kind of rubbish.  Tory politicians a speciality.😄

Yorkshire By The Algarve.

 

This post is for my blog pal Yorkshire Pudding.  Who would want Yorkshire Puddings when the old currant bun is making us all reach for the Cerveja and Sangria?

Hope the Portuguese lass makes you smile YP?  Flipping heck! 

Two Pints Of Lager And 2 Ham And Cheese Sandwiches.

 How much do you reckon for 2 pints of Sagres and two ham and cheese 🥪?

Fly Away.

 Guess where we are going?  Cerveja, sunshine and Sangria and a certain Twinkle Toes plays for their international football team?

Just had a pint and a scone at the 🛫 airport.  Well it is 8.30 in the morning  after all.

DogsThat Scare Away Drones.

 This is the current Primeminister barking mad in another role.

They've removed two Premiers and now they are on to a General Election winner.  Well they are only 33 percent behind in the polls after all!

Time To Plant My Japanese Onions And Garlic.

 Ever since my allotment days back in England in the nineties I have planted Japanese over wintering onions and garlic sets. 

I like to plant them in compost filled plastic modules in the polytunnel.  This gives them a good start and they have a good root sock when I plant them out in the cold and probably very wet ground. 

The plastic polytunnel cover tore again the other day.  I will invest in a new cover next Spring when the Atlantic gales have abated.

Any one else grow Japanese onions or Garlic during the Winter?  It's great to see their green stalks growing through the snow.

New Stable Doors.

 

It was a very rough night the other night.  So we decided to house the livestock.

Number one son recently made these metal doors for the horse and donkeys.  The doors are made for them to stick their heads through and we give them treats of barley, 🥕 and 🍎  and vegetable peelings. 

They seem to like their animal hotel.  The only deposits they leave us go on the fym heap for the vegetable garden.😊

A Dutch Painting Found In A Charity Shop.

 No it's not a Van Clomp painting  but it's still a very nice find.

My brother gave it me yesterday because he knows I love paintings.  He paid 10 Euros for it.  On the back of the picture its written in pen Victor Coverley-Price (1901-1980)  Dutch Landscape = 1939.

I Googled the painter and he was English, born in Winchester and he showed his painting at the Art Competition at the1948 Olympics.  You never see Poetry or Art or Tiddlywinks anymore at the Olympics do you?

He was also a British Diplomat.  I Googled some of his paintings online and they have been sold from between sixty Pounds and over a thousand.  A nice find and I won't be selling it.

Does anyone know any more about this artist or perhaps you have one of his paintings?

When The Cat Weed On The Eggs.

 That's the new food waste bin full of eggs.  We are getting ten eggs a day at the moment.

Kitty Tiger must have peed on them because they stank of cat wee this morning in.  I am not going to waste them though and they will get a wash and the pigs will have an eggs peg tea.

Talking of chickens hope this makes you laugh?

A Horse In The House.

 Meet Kev.  He's a Falabella and his ancestors come from Argentina.  He says that his family were River Plate supporters and Messi is his hero.  I am more of a Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company fan and Ronaldo is my hero along with many others.

This is the photo they sent me on WhatsApp when I was in Blighty at the two music festivals and touring about a few weeks ago. He is also an avid Lidl leaflet reader.

I told him my white horse joke: A white horse walks into a pub.  The  barman says: Hey we have a whisky (White Horse) named after you." What Eric?" Says the horse.  

Kev found it amusing.  Know any horse jokes?

He's called Kev and his temperament is superb.  I have my own four hoof powered lawnmower.  He doesn't need petrol either.

He eats the grass and leaves a few deposits to fertilise the grass.

I just wish they didn't invite him in to our house.  Not that this is anything new.  Sheep, goats, ducks, pigs and dogs and cats have all spent an hour or so in our dwelling in the countryside next to the sea. Do you ever get four legged visitors in your house?