Well, Barbs is back home in the rain and wind and misery-weather. We have 11 more feeds to do, and the horses are off our hands again. So is the stuff they convert expensive horse-food into. I must get some for the garden. Have a new raised bed (tank) to fill.
Other than that. We have a fire, we've just had our tea, solid stick to the ribs winter food, and the house is dry and not too chilly. Life could be much worse :-).
Hi Dave, speaking of the weather there, as we will be coming over for a couple of weeks this Friday I checked the long term rain forecast. The good news is that on 5 of the 16 days we will be there the chance of rain is 'medium, 50-75%'. You can probably guess the other 11 days...yep, 'high, >75%'.
ReplyDeleteMark, drop us a line if you'd like a bit of passing on of the my scanty supply of fishing/diving knowledge (or a bit of low-fat wallaby. How did the abalone come out?) I should have some free time then. Weather? It is winter, after all, and this is the wet season, but as we've found out, winter here can have really glorious days... and a short shower of rain, and the weather forecast says 'miserable'. The island is a spot over which weather systems pass (rather than stay -we do get a few resident highs, but mostly current weather here is a transient phenomenon. The big issue, seriously, is not the rain forecast, but the wind.) Saturday and Sunday are looking pretty good though. Carpe diem.
DeleteI am SO JEALOUS.
ReplyDeleteSeeing as Dave doesn't understand needs of friends on electrical lines as against five feet away, please take some photos of the property with Dave and Barbs and make him post them here.
Mr "Lazarus Long, South African Family Branch" hyper-compentent bush buzzard doesn't seem to understand we'd like a picture of the House, the Kitchen, the chookabago in its new environment, his animals today, his vehicles, the horse pooper scooper.
Fish, sunrises and sunsets are OK, but they are not the reality of life of the Freers, people whose tenacity so frequently amazes me.
Dave hasn't shown us the electric fence, solar powered. Something I'd love to see. He built a smokehouse in SA a couple of years before he left. Has he started his timber collection to replicate yet?
In many ways this site shows us so much more than was ever possible on Dr Monkey, in others he reveals so much less.
We who for some strange reason feel we are extensions of his family need just that little bit more.
Of course, Dave may fill my knowledge bucket, at last, before you arrive. Or he may say "no". That's up to Dave. I'm hoping his reticence is more to do with his personality than reality, and that he'll approve your taking photos and setting them up here.
Selfishness on my part I know, but even 59 year old fans wish to know more.
Regards to MarkB and Dr Monkey
Ian Clark
Gladstone QLD
:-) This is not big brother. And i am a mediocre photographer and my hands are full most of the time, with no space for a camera. Which hand do you think it ought to be in? the Pooper scooper hand or the shovel hand. I only have two. And it is best imagined really.
DeleteThe smoker is another to-do project. I will probably just cannibalise an old fridge. Last time I had access to lots of off-cut timber.
That's why I asked Mark B to take a bunch of photos that could be placed here. He can be your third hand.
DeleteAs regards the fridge/smoker. I've thought about it in the back of my mind all day, and I cannot work out how you could use an old fridge as a smokehouse.
The insulation in old fridges is generally an oil based plastic product mixed with asbestos. I'm a cigarette smoker and my risk of cancer is nil compared to applying heat to old refrigerator insulation.
Then there's old Aussie lumber. Even in the 1980's the hundred plus year old practice of painting lumber with creosote to reduce the risk of white ant infestation was still common. Creosote coatings have been banned for quite a while, as summer heat not only releases carcinogenic fumes, they are also hallucinogenic. No government likes their populace to have happy dreams. :-)
Eucalypt timber releases exceptionally flammable fumes. Ensure your smokerator is well ventilated at the top to enable diffusion of the fumes into the atmosphere, and assemble it at least 50 feet from your home. Else you may find you've constructed a fuel air device sufficient to make even Mad Mike smile, and your house frown as it falls down.
regards as always
:-(
Oops, Smiley face wrong way round. Should be
Delete:-)
What Ian sez. Wiv knobs on. In particular I want to have more details about the whole quad-key goat thing. Pictures of the evidence, the metal detector being wielded over the droppings etc.
ReplyDeleteCome to think of it I expect he could create a little ebook of the evidence and sell it....
I will get you a picture of the goat. And the goat poo.
DeletePerhaps a contribution to Terry Pratchetts new 'World of Poo"
ReplyDeleteget me into something with TP and I will provide pictures of me sieving it.
DeleteIan, you're confusing hot smoking (cooking in a smoky atmosphere) with cold smoking (smoke does not exceed 30 degrees, preferably cooler - a preserving process with drying, salt and smoke). In other words the temperature of the smoke is roughly that of the air in your home.) 'old' fridges are often quite new with a failed motor or gas problems. On the island, not worth fixing, a great metal box that seals quite well. I don't want either motor or gas piping. All I need is an enclosed space, with a restricted exit. A cardboard box, a 44 gallon drum, a dunnie house (without the dunnie) or an old trunk will all do. I've probably smoked more fish and meat (including on red gum - and I've used tons of it.) than anyone else who isn't a full-time professional, so I do know what I am doing.
ReplyDeleteThanks Dave.
ReplyDeleteWould you please, if it doesn't require you do more work, provide a link or a clue to where I should search. We live on the basis any meal cooked must be able to be two meals, so any new way to preserve that doesn't include vinegar is of interest.
I'm not really keen on my allergies, (vomiting is a nuisance to clean up later) so alternatives are always attractive.
regards as always
Ian
I should have opened with:
ReplyDeleteI have no idea what you are doing, but it reads as an attractive alternative for Susie and I.
Ian
It's not really of much help to you, as cold-smoked products (bar cheese and salmon) are normally cooked later. It's for preserving without refrigeration. You would know many cold smoked products - kippers, smoked salmon, bacon (these however are mostly produced in 'fake' modern processes, meaning the real thing is as different as 'Chinese' food served in America to Chinese food served in China. The process involves drying and salting (so 'real' bacon does not shrink in the pan) and so isn't to a lot of modern tastes.
DeleteThanks, Dave.
ReplyDeleteYeah, you're right. I don't want a tongue lashing from the doctor again about trying to suicide via salt. I keep telling him we don't have any in our home, he keeps looking at my blood tests and saying "Well, its in your bloodstream. Where'd it come from."
Dr Wilson just doesn't seem to understand that eating a balanced vegetable diet means one will get the salt naturally occurring in that food. No, I'm not a vege nor a vegan, but I follow the dietary plan and consume 5 vegetable foods along with my meaty protein each day.
Every doctor told me I'd be dead by 35. I'm 59 and healthier and fitter than I've been in years. Every year is a gift from our creator, whatever he, she, or it may be.
Happiness is an old fart who's lost half his hair (long time ago, aged 25) and half his teeth (makes my kid's joke about being "toothless terrors" when getting their adult teeth look sickly), my wife's kiss makes all that pale into insignificance.
Your lady love is home again, and as I've read this site, she brings you love as much as Susie brings me love.
Please, give her my approbation. I do hope Barbs will post here again one day. The wifely viewpoint was quite intriguing. :-)
Ian
or, more to the point, its clear you need her love and presence as much as I need Susan's. That is, totally.
ReplyDelete