cold winds

The wind had a chill edge today.  The chickens gave up mid morning, and just went and sat in their house instead of their usual corner of the run.  I feel sorry for them.  It isn't very interesting being a chicken in bleak December, but there isn't much I can do about it.

I set out to make a homemade lard cake for the birds, done by melting a block of lard in the simmer oven, then pouring porridge oats into it until all the lard is soaked up.  Unfortunately the first time I checked the lard it hadn't finished melting, and then I forgot all about it, and the Systems Administrator shoved the soup for lunch into the oven without looking, and molten lard slopped over the edge of the basin and on to the oven shelf, transferred itself to the bottom of the soup saucepan and so the oven hob, and dripped to the base of the cool oven.  It turns out that the simmer oven shelf can be removed for cleaning.  I've managed to get by without knowing that for the past five years, not being especially keen on oven cleaning and not having spilt lard on it before.

The SA filled up the peanut feeder for the first time this winter, and within a very short space of time there were fifteen tits on it and clustering around it.  Even the long tailed tits came, and we haven't seen them near the bird table before all season.  It was amazing how quickly word got around that there was something good to eat in that red wire cage, and that it was safe to go in.  How do they know?  Especially the ones that hatched this year and may never have seen peanuts before.  Though birds can be cleverer than we expect.  I heard on Radio 4 that members of the crow family that hide food when other birds are observing them will return later and move their stash to a new hiding place, but don't bother if they don't think they were seen hiding the food the first time.  That puts their theory of mind ahead of the human nine and ten year old autistic children I heard about on Radio 4 this morning.

The heating oil arrived, and we now have a full tank, having been down to the last bar on the electronic gauge.  The SA ordered the delivery more than a week ago, and we were starting to get slightly twitchy.  The central heating hasn't been turned on yet, but we might now venture to run the radiator in the bedroom.  Probably just that one for now, and maybe the small one in the sitting room whose valve has broken, if the SA can't work out how to turn it off.  The Aga heats the kitchen and the study is heated by a log burner.  Indeed, so deeply ingrained is the habit of never running the radiator in the study that it has a bookshelf in front of it with the TV on top.  The oil delivery was 1925 litres and will last us a year or slightly longer.  I am dismayed that we use such a lot, but the SA tells me that compared to friends also living in detached country houses our consumption is about 40% of the norm.  We have put insulation into the loft space we have, all 15cm of it, and installed double glazing, and a super efficient condensing boiler, and there isn't anything else cost-effective we can do, short of deciding that cold showers are really bracing and healthy and improve your immune system.  The best thing to do with this house when we trundle off to the retirement home would be to demolish it and start again.  It is just a gigantic shed.  There are no cavities to insulate.

Addendum  One of the cats has been being sick.  I had to clear up a mess from the stairs this morning, and the SA had to clear up in the hall over the weekend.  This evening, just as I was browsing through the Guardian arts pages on-line, I heard cat sick noises from the hall, and found the grey tabby throwing up on the hall chair.  She managed to puke into my wellington boots which had been left (bad move) in front of the chair.  Sometimes my Franciscan love of animals almost deserts me.