Days of many goings-on

A couple weeks ago on our way to the farm, we were sitting at a train station bar drinking beer and waiting for a bus when a woman about our age walked into the bar. The bartender informed her that there were other English speakers in the place.

The woman was from Ireland. She had moved to Italy to be with her sheep farmer husband. We had known her for about two minutes when she asked if we wanted to get together on our day off.

We've hung out with her and her husband the last two Fridays. Here is her husband Robbie shearing a sheep.

He has about fifty sheep and makes cheese from the milk. I liked it but Rowan didn't like the smell.

We also went to look at a tower. It is part of the "Giro Delle 5 Torri," the "Tour of 5 Towers," which spans the area and links five local landmarks.The smaller holes in the building, not the large ones in the center, were where archers could position their arrows to defend the tower.

The weather was beautiful that day, and has been quite nice throughout our stay here.Following our day off, we had to go into the vineyard and dig holes to put new plants where some of the vines have died.The work was somewhat boring, and I didn't have my watch with me, so we listened intently whenever the church bells chimed so we knew what time it was.Rowan continues to be fascinated by every single bug we see.That evening, Mauro and Pia went out for Mauro's birthday, so we had to watch the little kid for a couple of hours.After dinner, Anna, the grandma, found a hedgehog in one of the dog's mouths, so she rescued it.The next day, we had to clean out a small pond. Mauro was going to suck all the water away, but Anna stopped him because she insisted on saving all of the little fish first. Rowan and she then spent hours scooping fish out of disgusting pond sludge.

Afterwards, we went to a lunch party at the house of some family friends. They had lots of animals.Dinner was served in several courses, but it started with a mind-bogglingly big loaf of bread (this man is cutting half the loaf).The rest of the meal included some wood-oven fired focaccia, a soup, then some soupy pasta (tortellini in broth, says the woman), then a beef roast, then some cow neck fat (which few people ate), then some barbecued meat, then spumante and dessert. They also pulled out some liquor, including homemade whiskey.We then went home and bypassed dinner. We had spent three-and-a-half hours eating that day.