all cont.

as the last post, same wwoofers (last this year maybe) guests variable, we had Elfie and Rens (Holland) returner optimum guests who insisted working and seemingly enjoyed digging the even bigger hole (they are nearly in oz) picking/processing food, chasing loose animals and some discussions on politics, culture and society... Which is also an entertainment (well, the chasing bit)to two little girls of the present lovely family of 5 from New Jersey. Lots of cooking happened as I felt obliged to feed the the working multitudes. Cattoo seems better, and in a very productive hunting phase, though the yucky specimen show no signs of being eaten, and she would only accept milk, wouldn't even touch paté. We have a small enclosure for our cockerels so that they won't runabout too much, to fatten, as we have evil plans. We have bottled some tomatoes, though won't be a big crop this year, and about 8 jars of the blue plum, somewhere between jam and "szilvalekvár", a very pleasant taste and consistency if I may say so. Oh, and I've been to Budapest for my control and all is well, got an appointment for the other eye (27th Oct) can hardly wait. Group of 10 expected from Belgium on Monday and my friends on the 7th September, for this years outing will be right here, with a tour of the National Park booked hopefully. photos show sombre wwofers and Alan, but the pattison dish looks happy straight out of the oven, there is a picure of it starring pre-cooked. With experimental apple cake, baked with non-sugar sugar and very healthy flour. Turned out rather nice regardless. Another still life of my early morning pickings and about the third batch of blue plums, the first year of good harvest of these, too, there is still another tree to pick.

op good, mid-fest

Yes, new lazy eye is better than old good eye; old brain has a lot of adjusting to do, can hardly wait for the old now not so good eye being done end of Sept or and of Oct, will get op appointment next week when back to Bp for one week post op control check-up. Meanwhile we have a good flow of guests and wwoofers, and the festival kicked up, the exhibition opened. Aunt Edit's drawings are a hit, and the photo show is very good indeed, all about masks and masked or otherwise decorated people around the world. Yesterday was the cake competition, I took part with the ringlo and walnut cake, if nothing else I beaten everybody by the sheer quantity. I hope, cause by the time wwofers turned up, only mine left... (example of positive thinking). Today was the bogrács cooking competition, just managed to arrive on time - 2pm - as we were on an excursion to Báta to buy new electric fence unit, as wwoofer (not named) left the wrong door open and cunning goats had chance to revenge their arch enemy. Bah, but now we got two stronger units, so there. Guests ( a lovely family from Germany, whose first born will start med school in Pécs and here to settle in that lad and to familiarize with the area.) and wwoofers looked at the cooking scene but had no patience to wait for free, plenty, fantastic food! Honestly! We tasted as much as we dared/could, I has chicken roasted in wine and sour creamed chicken - both just fab. Alan tasted two more fairly exotic dishes, we'll see how it goes. It was the best ever turn up for a village event, three long lines of tables full of people - basically eat as much as you like with free wine - our village ignores all that crisis and have a good time! I stayed home to catch on those eye-drops I keep forget to apply, some rest and here blog, Alan is taking part in Jenő's sound-ball massage demo. At night: open air retro disco, if we'll get the energy. Alan's gigantic earthworks progressed quite a bit as Caysee and Bryan are robust wwoofers. I hope he'll explain it all; it's terracing, comfy alternative steps up the hill and big ho;es for winter underground vegetable growing. We discovered that the tree we planted and did nothing so far is a green-plum (ringlo) tree, it's like a large greengage, but with easy stoning and better tasting. Jutka while here collected about a kilo raspberries - she is better at it than I am - and Alan made 6 bottles of raspberry jams - not possible when I am around (guess why) blue plums been pucked today - about 10kilos basket - we'll cooperate with Erzsi to do the very thick szilvalekvár that is fixing any problem innards. Giant lamb is in the freezer, had our first pörkölt of it and it was so good. Ok, at the beginning there were non-food topics, too... photos show Anita with Cattoo, who is not well again, refusing food. The weird marrows this year, Alan's new water warmer and his re-start of jewellery making, he stolen one of my old spoons for it, I am not happy, even if it looks good.

mid summer heat

very hot again, even I am getting prickly with some sort of skin redness just from the heat, even when in the shade, but even in the shade it is more than 35C this last week, and we have two more days of same before a bit of cool - down all the way to 30C... Lois's neck coolers are fully employed, I keep them in the fridge and get them out when getting the heat bad - about every hour. We had lots of last minute guests, including the 11 Polish people. Anita wwoofer overlapped with Ellen, all diligent and nice people, helping tons. Kifli cannot take the heat, if this blog is a bit weird, it's cause of that. Alan is showing Black cat white cat to Ellen and two more Danish guest girls, one of whom insisted digging the steps out for us, doing a real good job. They help with the animals, wash dishes - the perfect hostel guests. Tomatoes, aubergines are doing well at the moment, carrots, beetroots, kohlrabies and marrows been processed, raspberries and as from today, figs are doing a good show, and Curry is in the freezer. I am off to my cataract of on Saturday, wish me luck, back with sister and Aunt Edith pictures that will be exhibited on the following weekend, the Kiskassa 5 days Festival of light starts on the 16th. There will be besides the art exhibition loads of programs, including bogrács and cake competitions, and another table tennis tournament - as everybody wants to beat me (the reigning champ) it will be difficult to chicken out, though I suppose, thinking about it, the eye op is a good enough excuse. We'll have some photos later.