The Witches of Eastwick

Written to The Ultimate Collection by B.B. King

Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them.
- Bill Vaughan

Clair spent most of the week constructing a brooding house for the egg-laying hens. The result is completely consistent with our previous hen house standards -simple and robust. As Borat would say, "Very Nice. Great Success." Rosana, who we have dubbed Dona do Galinheiro for her dominance of all things poultry, contributed to Clair's project by weaving six brooding nests out of bamboo. Polyface here we come.

While Clair was otherwise occupied, the witches of Alfheim finished stirring their cauldrons and began spraying their anti-ant pepper on the fields and orchard. We are all eagerly anticipating the results, though if it works I will have to remember to be extra nice to Lone...no telling what potion might be next. Kaoê participated in the voodoo. His comment, spot on for a seven-year-old boy: Tia, eu não sei se eu entendo muito bem como funciona (Auntie, his moniker for Lone, I am not entirely sure I understand well how this works). Comically, his lack of understanding did not stop him from absentmindedly tasting the pepper.

In parallel, the oxen crew completed plowing the first field. Beautiful work. Unfortunately, their boss and I simply could not agree on the grazing rotation, i.e. on which pasture the oxen would spend their nights, so they will not be coming back. It is truly a shame, but this was one of those cases where the gringo and the local did not manage to communicate. Sometimes you have to agree to disagree.

We will plant girasol or sunflower on the plowed field. As it turns out, girasol grows extremely well in our soil. We had little success with the soja perene, and the jury is still out on feijão-guandu, so it is nice to see that our thumbs may be green after all. At any rate the girasol has really taken off in the test field where we planted Lone's capim limão or lemon grass -and also mandioca or cassava, abacaxi or pineapple, peanuts and a cornucopia of squash. In fact, the girasol is doing so well that Lone is concerned it might block the sun from her capim limão. Most surprisingly, the abacaxi appears to be doing quite well. In fact, with the exception of the aforementioned soja perene and feijão-guandu, everything else is coming along nicely.

On Saturday, our good friend Beto from Paraibuna came for a work visit together with a mate. The purpose of his visit was to help us corral the Nelore so that we could examine them for parasites. Very impressive watching a verdadeiro cowboy work. Calm, systematic and skilled. Needless to say they were able to herd the Mad Hatters into the corral, though it still took some coaxing. I tried to imagine how this exercise might have gone without their help...not a pretty image. And best of all, they used our two new horses, Castanha or Chestnut and Alazão or Sorrel. After several hours of riding and herding, Beto concluded that 'o carvalho foi testado!'. In a chest-nutshell, he liked my horse. Sorrel will never be mistaken for either George Clooney or the Flash, but he is a solid workhouse. Hopefully Sorrel will approximate the fictional life of Bill the Pony, Samwise Gamgee's pony in The Lord of the Rings. I personally tested Sorrel late on Saturday afternoon, after he had spent the morning herding the Nelore, and he passed with flying colors, carrying me and a 50 kg sack of feed for several kilometers. Beto lent us a saddle, and our very good friend Márcio donated a first-class saddle to help start us on our life with horses. Where would we be without good friends!

On Sunday, after a long day of work, Lone and I went riding for a couple of hours...everything looks grander on horseback.