The Flying Olives

I’ve been thinking of you as some of you plan to loll in the sun and head south to those lovely places where delicious olive oil originates from.  You’ll be basking in the warmth of the mediterranean blue skies as you dip your ciabatta or baguette into the oil, take a sip of white burgundy or a heavy rioja and think that life is starting to get ok again.

Whilst you’ve been doing that I’ve been down the road at the our local olive grove, picking olives.  Only about 160 trees; it’s small and no wonder the stuff is so darned expensive.  We spent 2 days picking and still we didn’t pick them all, which is a shame.

If you’ve ever wondered what those wide spaced combs are for in B & Q, as I did, well I can tell you.  With climate change B & Q are anticipating that olives are going to be the next mass crop in UK.  Strawberries are so passe.  

These big wide spaced combs which in other places or circumstances would be ideal for combing one's dreads, if indeed they ever get combed.  A massive tarpaulin kinda thing is laid on the ground and we go along combing the branches of their little black (and green) ‘nits’.  Any one who has kids with nits will know it is pretty effective.

For the out of reach olives there is a long doofer that would be good for massaging SO’s (significant other) back when social distancing is ruled as necessary.  If it is a female at your specialist local Thai massage parlour, boys, I’d suggest you say NO if you are asked if you want ‘special massage’.  It massages the branches with the vigour of a warthog jumping up and down on your back thinking it is the local Russian chiropractor, and olives coming flying off in every direction.  Geoffrey, the owner of the grove is ideally suited to the job of owning an olive grove; he is from Sheffield, the place where all the UKs best olives are grown.

 

80 trees a day with 6 pickers, which is 13.3333 trees each.  13 trees over 7 hours is 1.9 trees per hour and you know what …….. I don’t believe that.  Maths is rubbish when it doesn’t give you the answer you want, and I’m rubbish at maths.  What I will say is that it was good fun, social and whilst hard work it was not as hard as the vine yard, which almost killed me, necessitating 10 days in bed, death defying illness and the thought of hospital admission, By day 8 even Ali was getting worried and starting to beleive me. Olive picking was a lot more fun especially as I wasn’t ‘entertained’ by a racist git or paid $6 / hour less than the minimum wage.  Oh the vineyard owner, such a nice guy.

We picked a massive 600 kgs and have had 100 litres of oil squished out of them.

 

Whilst you are lolling under the sun in Rimini, think about that whilst dunking your dolcelatte cheese.  On this occasion it was me in the rain doing it.  In some places I bet the little kids scootle up to the top of the tree with the nit comb and then maybe fall off.  Child labour the world over is dispensable.

When you arrive here, don’t be surprised if you find a bucket of olives in brine in your room.  Under the shelf which is hosting the 8 rounds of brie are the olives.  They’ll be given to you on your sharing platter and some of them will be made into tamponade.  That always reminds me of my ILS course.  4 H’s and 4T’s where the Ts are toxins (allegedly olives can get botulism), Tension pneumothorax, Tapenade and Thrombosis (reduced risk from olive oil - apparently it lubricates the valves).

 

So there you go ….. Honestly, I still think about you good folks a lot, about all sorts of things.  Fun, olives, laughter and erudite conversations.  It’s all about relationships, and soon I’ll be publishing my self help guide on ‘Developing meaningful relationships the alpaca way’.  

What I want to know is why CalMacca is looking at me like that! She looks kinda curious.

I’m sure you all know that all good loving relationships take time to develop.  I know you can recall all those attempts to sidle up to SO (Significant Other), to stroke caringly, to look into SO’s eyes in a meaningful way all the while trying to avoid a, well, in my case - a spit of disdain.  I used to think it was a spit of endearment.  Cripes it smells.  I now only have to wear my full PPE occasionally.  My friendship with PACS (the collective noun for a group of 2 alpacas) is developing.  She’s always nice to me when I approach rattling dry pellets and hay, the PACS equivalent of chocolate and more chocolate.  Sometimes she does an excited little dance.  Slowly I’m getting a stroke of her soft oh so soft neck.  I’m getting there.  The other poor little girl , now called Albi Crusat, suffers domestic abuse, bullying and maybe even coercive control.  She doesn’t get a look in, especially when food is involved, which means I don’t either, but in my usual insistent style, I’ll persist.

 

 

The national annual ‘Enduro’ motorcycle event came to town.  It was about 3 km down the road and very exciting.  The bikes are released, 3 at a time at 1 minute intervals.  In a roar of spinning wheels, splattering mud and the familiar smell of trail bike fuel they zoom off to do ‘staged events’ over the next 70kms in remote farmers fields.  Gone and not to be seen for 2 hours.  Actually it wasn’t very exciting at all.  But it was great to go and meet a few of the ‘neighbours’ and to work out that we don’t need to go again.  In conclusion, not a great spectator sport.  It was held at the village hall, which may not be standing for much longer because …………. 

 

Can you please pay your subs!

New Zealand has a high incidence of aggression and violence so I wasn't surprised to see this road side sign whilst out on my latest bike ride.

And whilst out on that ride I was reminded that NZ has a small population for the land surface area, and so there is no need for big churches.

So life, like the tropical rain forest shower of time keeps flowing, the armpits of futility are there but the grey water of eternity flows away and we wake up to another day.  The alpacas, like the new born lamb of excitement leap into an affectionate run across the paddock but never quite makes it.  The eternal flow of tasks starts running endlessly through the day, like the clouds in the sky, sometimes causing unavoidable turbulence.  Soon we should take delivery of the solar pump to pump up 22 metres vertical distance and 180 metres horizontal distance into the 22000 litre tank so I can have more than a 33 second shower in the summer.  I’m convincing myself that 4 bits of e-coli are nothing much to worry about.  We had the water tested.  Then the shed to build and then the chicken house.

 

Finally, ahhhh look, what a beautie who sadly flew into our window and got dazed and concussion.  After mouth to beak resuss, ILS proved invaluable - you remember 4 Hs and 4 Ts, it shook its wings and flew off.

 

 

There was a shark in the sky the other day.

And finally I want to tell you why I struggle so much with the Kiwi accent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6c4Nupnup0

Ok, gotta go.  That’s fortunate for you.

I hope you are all well, keeping safe, having fun, laughing and I miss you more than you miss me.