daytripping and emergencies

Alan managed the early start and the long bus ride with minimal grumbles, even though the bus could have been only defined as luxurious in the sixties, and the driver was well past retirement and seemed to have lacked confidence - using the breaks much too often. Anyway, Sümeg castle was impressive, a decent medieval fare with quite enjoyable anecdotes from our guide. Wasn't quite as frighteningly high up as I remembered from my school outing... Afterwards we stopped at Keszthely, first looked at the Festetics Palace with its beautiful carefully tailored gardens in the aristocratic fashion of the late 18th century. Incredible candelabras and decor to go with the furniture. The library impressed us most. Then we parked at the beach of lake Balaton and enjoyed an hour pleasure boating and a nice and simple meal at one of the beach cafes. It was a tad long day, but it was worth it, I think the village people enjoyed it, too, there were about 50 of us. While we were out having fun, Eric was working away looking after the place until bitten by some nasty thing - a wasp probably, and rang us up, that his hand was swollen and he wasn't feeling very well... we managed to organize Timi to give him a lift to emergency Siklós, where he was given injections - I presume calcium - and was kept for an hour or so for observation. by the time we arrived home at about 9:30, he was good as new; meanwhile Erzsi stayed in the house and looked after the guests we were expecting and who duly arrived. Talking about emergency - Alan's face come up to the usual zombi-look this week, inspite of the allergy tablets he's been taking diligently since May - but he took extra calcium tablets and by next day it started to get better, It was very hot, well over 30 for days and days. Cukkinis, kohlrabi, cucumber all started to produce - we will be busy, I mean even busier... Aha, paragraphs are working again, no need for bolding... photos show Alan in mildly zombi state but happy with his dinner, and the rest are Sümeg and Keszthely.

peas!

It was another incredibly speedy week and the Sunday (today) just have slipped away after I'd started this sentence earlier this afternoon. I was making experimental lecsó with the chopped, frozen spring onion things, while shelling peas and watching all the series on the Universal channel. Every day seem to be like this, too much to do but still guiltily doing easy escapist stuff. We have our new wwoofer Eric, who seems not a man of words but hard working. Alan is out with him; there is still an Újpetre football match with a few beers for sure. Donna spent a day and a half or so with us, giving us an excuse to see the now finished Zsolnai cultural quarter in Pécs - very well done - hope there will be enough people there to enjoy all the inventively furnished buildings, exhibitions and parks. We haven't seen it all - for example we haven't looked at the puppet theatre yet. Alan had a chance to visit Siklós castle again, with Donna, first after it was renovated again, now there is a full walk-around on the top. Black cherries were picked - our trees seem to have weathered better the frost than Nora's old ones, we collected about a bucket and a half, giving about 10 small bottles of jam and 3 kilos of frozen ones, for my new cake we got too much fond of. meanwhile there are tons of sporting events to keep up with, the European footmal, the lawn tennis in England, Alan's cricket... I know this is just that time of the year - but a tny bit too much is going on... so I don't bother downloading the photos, back to telly, lecsó and peas...

early june heat

yes, we had to go quickly to summer-mode, got the lighter quilt, left the roller-blinds down... we had 35C or more, and not a lot of rain. Ducklings moved into their outside quarters, Alan made a comfortable looking and safe house and a roomy run, with wiring against predators. They seem happy and make big noise if food or water are running short. Picture only shows the run, I'll try the whole thing next time, Messed up with elderberry this year - I was probably to mean with the sugar or the lemon or both - it is turning into pálinka... all that effort... Pali promised to take away the lot and help the process along to - something not too poisonous - with a mate of his. My sister was here, we had our trip to Boly, though was not brave enough to use 4x4 it was very muddy, it was a very stormy day. strawberries, raspberries pickable, peas nearly ready, the garden looks delicious, even with the continuous onslaught of weeds. Hyppo came back good and healhty, so Alan is taking me to my treatments next week, lunchtimes, when it is too hot to work anyway, so we can have lunch afterwards and maybe discover a few places where we haven't been. Lots of other things must have happened in the last two weeks as it's gone remarkably fast, but I can't remember... I felt particularly good last night and broke out in a spontanious indian jump/run and now my back is hurting dammit, one is not allowed to forget that one is old... Erzsi was given two tiny piglets - the runts - and we have been given her surplus goat's milk, hoping for being invited to the pig-killing in the winter... I made a picture of Alan and Dre wwofer/guest because of the nice coloured rose Gazsi gave me, there is a certain lack of wine on that table...