It wasn’t raining. Showers were forecast but fingers crossed. I had agreed to meet Emma at 9. I let her know to feed Rascal first if she was there before me. I also told her not to let the Peckys out until after he had been fed so he could eat in peace. She had just opened the door to Barry when I got there. Bluebell was out. Feral Beryl was on the edge but BR was inside. Emma went in for the eggs and all the Peckys went back in too. That didn’t work how we planned it 😂 I walked across the paddock a bit and the Peckys followed. She then ‘encouraged’ BR and Feral Beryl out. I shut the door. They were staying out until we got back after!
First stop for me was the barn to borrow a screwdriver. We went to the alpacas next. I got the food and Emma emptied the food buckets. She also carried the new poover hose. The weanlings and boys were fed and then the main lot of girls. I fed the far field last and once again began a fruitless attempt to see if I could see Ebony’s udder. No luck again 🤦♀️ We were now ready for the main job of poovering. I went for the quadling and Emma changed the poover hose. I drove in without incident, which is rare. The girls were having a post breakfast snooze, so didn’t bother making a break for the gate. We checked the poover was working and attached it to the quadling. Emma also accompanied me to the far field so that she could man the gate. Once I was in she went to pick poo in the weanling field. I started at the bottom of the field where there wasn’t so much poo. I went over to the furthest part and then through the middle. I picked up poo on my way but the largest piles were between the trough and the gate.
I went to the top corner where the hay feeder was. They need more so I’ll take that later. Then I worked my way down. It was all going great and time was flying by. If I had enough fuel in the poover, it was my intention to work my way back to the gate. I could see Emma coming through the field. She had obviously finished. She filmed some videos and I shouted over “Nearly finished!” Once the field was pretty much empty, Emma opened the gate and I drove out. The field is never clear of poo because they keep pooing where I’ve cleaned 🤦♀️ Emma shut the gate. I parked up in the poover bagging area and opened the back. It was pretty full. We emptied it all out and unhitched. I tried to start the quadling to take back out of the field but it wouldn’t start. The fuel was empty. I must have parked it up on fumes. It had been a busy morning but we’d got plenty done!
I was in a good mood so I decided to tackle those incompetents at HMRC with regard to the VAT. It didn’t go well. You have to answer multiple choice questions to get to the next level. I tried five times before I managed to join the queue. It’s so infuriating. I was in the queue nearly an hour before I got through. I didn’t get much further when the phone was answered either to be honest. The change of entity team were supposed to call me on Friday between 12 and 1pm. They didn’t. On the call today the call handler didn’t have a clue. I had to insist on another call back from the change of entity team. I then had to insist on a time slot. I asked what the reason was for the missing phonecall on Friday. There was nothing in the notes. No reason. They just hadn’t bothered! I also said that there was enough information for them to put things right but they insist we have a phone call yet they won’t flaming ring me! Seriously incompetent but there we are. I left feedback as well but they only allow you to put 1000 characters in the feedback box so they’re not really willing to listen to how useless they are. That’s nowhere near enough space! Anyway, I’m enjoying playing with them now its the only way to look at it. I wonder how Monday morning will go? And they owe Garth Hall thousands so someone is going to get a piece of my mind. Eventually 😂
I took some cat food supplies over to the barn for Rascal when I got to Garth Hall in the afternoon. Bluebell was out, Feral Beryl was on the edge again. Then I got a message to say Neil would be late. I needed him to sort the quadling fuel out. I went down to the alpacas, expecting him any minute. As I was walking down, it dawned on me that there might still be some left in the LST. I was in luck. There was some. I traipsed over to the field and filled it using the dregs. This got the quadling running. I went back to the LST to fill the small fuel tank. The tank needs a measured amount of 2 stroke in it too. There was about two thirds of the measure and the 2 stroke was empty. So then I was cross about that. I got a message to say “Cleaning woolly nose bums. Can’t stay long, got something to do” I was fuming. I’d asked him to do the fuel because I needed hay and alpaca mix. Now that he was doing stuff with the sheep, he wouldn’t answer his phone. I was beyond angry. And I shouldn’t be. He was doing something essential but he had agreed to help and he’d bloody forgotten. I decided to risk it and I went up on the quadling with the little red trailer.
As I was nearing the wellfield gate, he came out of the barn and shouted something. The wellfield gate was shut but I could see he had the silvernoses in so I assumed I could open the gate and leave it open. But, I couldn’t hear him. In the end I had to shut the quadling off. All he wanted to tell me was to leave the gate open. That put my temper up another notch but that was only the start. The quadling wouldn’t start back up so I walked to the barn, trying not to be cross. As I suspected he had completely forgotten that he had agreed to help. He started the quadling and told me it was still full. He also told me to keep it running. I loaded up with hay and went for the alpaca mix. Neil assured me the big fuel tank was down by the alpacas. I was a bit more cross again because he keeps moving it. He never puts it back! I unloaded the alpaca mix and went for the fuel tank. It was not where he had told me it was so unbelievably I got even more flaming cross. I gave up on that and went in with the hay. With that dropped off I bagged up 5 bags of poo. Neil turned up to tell me he was off. I hadn’t finished so off he went but I did tell him the fuel tank was still AWOL. “I must have taken it up to Cai.” FFS mun 🤦♀️
I filled up the final 6th bag and then walked up. I’d hoped to feed Rascal on the way but there were 3 Peckys and Bryn in the wellfield. I rounded them up, filled their water, fed them and put them to bed. I took the empty water container back over to the barn, fed Rascal and then half filled the water container. I was over enthusiastic with the filling and carrying it all the way back was hard work as it was just short of full 🤦♀️ I checked Cai on the way. No fuel tank in there either. What has he done with it?
Helen x
