good home...

maybe someone fancies going on with ecohun? We have thoughts of moving on, maybe as suddenly had drawn on us that we might be getting old, like other people, or even a bit faster lately. And though we eat fairly healthily, move about - must be those bloody genes. Anyways, if a younger retired couple or working from home people could give home to our home, and supplementary income hostel,

we might consider selling it... say cca 60K pounds for the lot including all the antique village furniture... just a thought... meanwhile photos for the previous posting; the only sunflower giant still standing; walnuts picked so far very early this year; how large the fig trees got to; first hint of autumn colours; the pickling paprikas still to be picked and pickled; the path between our houses with the willows Alan planted for shading.

still here he says minus goats

yes, every day Alan feels stronger, now the job is stopping him overdoing things. As we speak he is walking to the end of the village, the sun came out, another beautiful late summer day. He has his mobile phone and he can stop at Tahar's for a cup of tea if he gets tired. We were lucky to find good homes for the goats for fairly decent money considering people don't like taking them this time of the year when need feeding through the winter. A nice Vokány goat and donkey fancier took them, with his son and the ancient Vokány shepherd who also attended to Moxie the sheep who as it turned out had a nasty jab (probably by bully Ermintrude) to her nether region. She had an injection and we got a cream for further treatment. We will miss the goats and the milk and the kőrözött and the cheese, but not the work. Now we can leave the care of the place with easy heart to Erzsi from the 28th October when we are prescribed to the famous Balatonfüred heart sanatorium for two weeks. Meanwhile from today we declined everyday help, and we are looking after the goat-less lot, it is not hard and doesn't take long. Weather still lovely with warm mostly sunny days and chilly nights. We slowly and comfortably doing stuff like red cabbages, more aubergines/marrow/paprikas, all into lecsó this year. Had the bean harvest, too. First time this year we had a good crop of hot paprikas, Tibi helped to grind them, so we have our own "erős Pista". Raspberries are still producing, but besides the couple a figs randomly, I think they started to grow too late this year and we won't have a lot more ripe ones. will get a few pictures soon...

ooops... heart attack!

So, the girls arrived, by which point Alan's annual allergy episode had struck, and he felt bad altogether, so we went to the Drava boat trip without him on Monday. It was lovely even though it was a bit rainy, that we had a great fish meal in Kémes that was suggested by the boat crew, we were at the coffee when Erzsi called that emergency helicopter arrived to get Alan to hospital... We were only about 20km from home, when we got there after stabilising him, they were ready for lift-off, Olga took me by car as the helicopter was not ready for me. After a night in the observance room, next morning 3 hours traumatic heart-cathetering showed serious event, and difficult maneuvers and re-starts to put in 3 stents in what is lovingly called "the widow-maker" artery and its neighbours. Anyway, the heart-centrum was a nice hospital, all the doctors/nurses were good. And he is home now, with the instruction of nothing to do but to watch tv till Tuesday, when he is taken for a conttrol and detailed operating instructions. We have DVD about the operating room maneuvers, as well as the helicopter lift-off, maybe put it here next time... I had lots of help, Erzsi, Tibi, the girls, Marta stayed on, Jutka came and Szonya is here now for a long weekend. The weather is beautiful, We still have raspberries, and the pears are the star, gorgeous. Erzsi chopped the roosters, szonya promised a coq-au-vin. Thanks everyone for the well-wishings - so far it worked!

cattoo

sorry, she died. had to tell eventually, happened just after that report of her fierce hunting times. On last terrible Wednesday. We went to Pécs as per usual at lunch time, and decided to stay on a bit as more stuff needed attended to such as tax office, bank etc. The previous night cattoo did behave strange, discovered her sleeping in an unusual place and unusual position in the bedroom floor. As windows had been open all the time the last few month, she often slept inside, but usually on Lois's sleeping place, a small sofa in the computer room. Anyway, she complained when I picked her up, Alan put her out, he said he hadn't noticed anything except some irritation for being moved. Anyway, on that Wednesday we had a call from wwoofer Casey that the cat is very ill. I called out the vet. He called me after examination, he thought she was run over, with broken leg and broken shoulder bone and probable internal injuries. In constant pain, and crying, of course. He offered to give pain killers and that's all, so I took the decision to ask him to put her down. What would have been the point in painkillers that wear off in a few hours? Also I think there was something wrong if after all these years she couldn't save herself on the street. Anyway, I don't go into details, the vet was crap at his job and at human relations, we won't ever do anything with him. The wwoofer was very upset as she had become very attached to Cattoo. And on the way home we had the most terrifying storm with cloudburst. On arrival home, crying wwoofer had rainwater dripping on her bed... could anything had gone worse?? Anyway, next day it turned out that the leak was a one-off, the storm blew from an odd direction under the slates and blew about 30 of them off, it was fixed in no time, and the insurance people transfered us a decent amount of money without bothering to send a damage observer or whatever they are called. Anyway, wwoofers left on Saturday, so we had a few days of just us, which seemed to be unusual. Erzsi insisted getting us kittens, but as we still expected a lot of comings and goings in the next few weeks, we declined. We had a group of ten Belgians just for one night but with evening meal and wine, which all went pleasantly, they left this morning - just imagine, they are doing a tour all on public transport! Good luck to them. The tour guide/organizer loved us, and said they would be back about 3 times a summer in the future! Today, as we have tons of food, all I have to do is to launder 10 lots of beddings and make beds and hopefully watch that last episode of the good wife that luckily I spotted to be on this afternoon. My school and good friends whom I travel with once a year are coming on Saturday for this annual being together, which will be here! So I'll be busy - first a lamb-bogrács on Saturday, then Pécs big market and Zsolnay on Sunday, and organized tour of the Duna-Drava national park on Monday and so on...