Cockerel's bad day.

Poor bugger.  Not his fault, but the management has been very poor and he's been rubbing his ladies up the wrong way, so:

RIP Sgt. Hakeswill!  The bowl's a foot across by the way.

He spent 24 hours in a wee (for him) cage, pacing up and down and trying to get back to his ladies, then I went to wring his neck.  Problem was, his neck's as thick as my arm and would not break, so I had to run to the axe block and lop his head off as he was not enjoying his morning at all.  Neither was I.  Poor sod.  Looked like a scene from Brain Dead.  Then I nearly put my back out trying to pull his leg tendons out (I was hanging off the table by his feet!), and was unable to draw him at all without cutting everything out in a gooey mess.  Not by the book, to say the least - which has been the case all along.  Bloody books...  Still, should make a decent coq au vin.

Sgt. Hakeswill "au vin":

Soak for 24 hours in wine and herbs, cook for 4 hours in a cast iron pot (important) in said wine with more herbs, wee onions and sich.  Eat with new spuds after a moments silence with the roughest Bourgogne you can find.

Plan B: rabbits for meat, which I have done before and are easy, and chooks for eggs only.  Might even make a hat.

Pretty piccies time to take yer mind off it all:

 The only use for a monkey puzzle tree: a big sunshade.

 Neat potager with lots of dire dried wee seedlings.

Yum.  Straw's and unpasteurised very yellow cream = a nap after lunch.