"Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?"

Okay, so evoking a Shakespearian tragedy might be a step too far, but blood has been shed and yours truly can't escape culpability.

It all started when Richard came to dismember a chicken. He casually asked me to choose one for him at which time I faced a dilemma that will be familiar to those who've read the first post on this blog. This time however, I decided not to turn a blind eye and confidently strode to the chicken coop to play judge, jury and perhaps even executioner. As it turned out, chickens aren't that keen to come near you at the best of times, so things were delayed while I got some feed and then returned to coax one unlucky walking roast dinner towards me.

This part was actually pretty easy but the calmness of the bird didn't make me feel any easier about what was ahead. Neither did assessing the suitability of the animal for eating. But it was too late to turn back now.

So here it is. The blood on my hands:

Can you spot it? There, on my finger. The red stuff! Oh, never mind.

Of course, I was never going to be able watch what was going to happen, however I did both listen to it and assist in what came afterwards. You know, plucking and stuff (shudder).

Despite Jo's reassuring words ("the other chickens are going to hate you for killing one of their family"), I slept a little uneasily that night, considered becoming a vegetarian and even continually washed my hands ala Lady Macbeth. And then a few nights later Richard invited us around for dinner. We had roast chicken.

"What Would I Write About If Nothing Went Wrong?"

You know, there was a moment earlier in the week when I had inspected my last cow pat (more on that later), that an interesting thought crossed my mind. It had to do with the content of this blog and just how I could keep it interesting if nothing of particular note happened. What would I write about if nothing went wrong, or we didn’t face any challenges? Of course, we don’t really want to face too many challenges, or have things go wrong, but we do want to keep things entertaining for all of you. But before I had time to really indulge my catch 22 quandary, fate, the dirty little minx that it is, rolled the dice. And as it turned out, I needn’t have worried.

But first; the cowpats. As previously reported, a pesky cow managed to munch up some string from a bale of hay last week and so we thought we’d better keep an eye out for an irregular looking pile of faecal matter. Not exactly something I saw in my future as a bright eyed child, but not everything goes to plan I guess.

I think this photo of Jo sums it all up really:

I didn't make her do it all of course:

In the end we didn't find anything out of the ordinary.

So we moved on to plan b, which was to do some surveillance:

I welcome your thoughts on what the caption for that photo could be.

Luckily for you (because I would have taken a photo of it), but unluckily for us, there were no bowel movements to speak of.

We decided that we were probably (or hopefully) overreacting a little bit because the cow is still eating and still doing what cows do. And something has to be making all of that mess.

So that was Monday. And it wasn't until Friday that things went particularly pear shaped.

All we wanted to do was go and check on the animals, making sure they had enough water and grass to keep them going for another couple of days and then go and have our lunch. Happy with how things looked, Jo and I stood around taking it all in and feeling particularly smug about what great farmers we were. Which was right about when Kupe took off after the lambs for no particular reason and scared them so much that they ran straight through the electric fence like it was, well, not an electric fence. When the commotion died down, there were lambs in three different paddocks, including one in with the sheep. That was not good. I'm not 100% sure why, but I just know that it's not. Cue the swearing. Lots and lots of swearing.

Our task was clear: separate one lamb from 12 sheep. And 3 HOURS AND ALMOST THE END OF A RELATIONSHIP LATER we succeeded in doing that. We're not so smug any more.

The weekend saw Jo go back to Christchurch for her nephew's christening and me babysit my one and a half year old cousin Samantha. I don't know why everyone thinks looking after children is so hard. I spent a whole 4 hours with her and had nary a problem. The trick? Give them something shiny and then go about your business. In Samantha's case it was a mobile phone and an ipod. Easy. What is not so easy is figuring out car seats. Three seat belts? Who's idea was that? I wasted 10 minutes just to go and get some McDonald's. I would have gotten something healthier, but I needed somewhere with a drive-through, lest I have to contend with the car seat again.

And that's the week that was really. Today I had to fix a water trough that was leaking, but that didn't turn out to be the nightmare it could have been. Mainly because Richard came and did the majority of the work. I did try to do it myself, but it seems that fixing water troughs is another life lesson that passed me by. I did manage to complete half the job, which is better than nothing. At least that's what I'm telling myself.

Now it's time to see what this week has in store for us.

"What's The Worst That Could Happen?"

That is a question that Jo and I have been asking ourselves quite a lot this week. And not in that jovial, shrug of the shoulders kind of way; but in that serious, "I actually need to know what the worst thing that could happen is" kind of way. Why? Well, it all comes down to something a little prosaic, but nonetheless unprecedented for both of us. Please allow me to illuminate...

Cows love hay. That's not much of a bombshell right? But it turns out that our cows love hay so much that as you ride along on the motorbike, they will follow you and have a munch before you have a chance to unhook and distribute it. Even given that fact, things were going fine as I rode out into the paddock and was mobbed by the herd. As I got between them and the hay I took it off the bike, cut the string holding it together and began throwing slices around to disperse the animals. In my eagerness to get them away from the bale, I ended up accidentally tossing out some hay with a bit of the string still attached. A cow and I both saw the piece of hay land. As if in slow motion I tried to react, but because of having twice as many legs as me, the cow made it to the hay first. Like a long piece of stray spaghetti, the bloody thing sucked that bit of string right up into it's mouth before I could get it out.

Now, I'm no veterinarian, but I'm pretty sure that a cow eating some string isn't a great thing. So this is where the panic ensued. I decided to put in a call to my cousin Richard and after leaving a message, paced about waiting to hear back. Jo was comforting, asking the titular question in the former way, while I wanted the answer in the latter way. A little while later Richard called back and the conversation went a little something like this:

Me: Hello?

Richard: I heard you killed a cow.

Silence

Richard: I'm only kidding.

Me (in my head): Oh thank [expletive].

Richard: How much string did you feed it?

Me: It ate one of the bits of strings that ties around the bale.

Richard: Oh, that much (laughing). That makes it even funnier.

From there, Richard just advised us to keep an eye on the cow and an eye out for some irregular looking, you know, cow pats.

Now, Rachael and Kevin, if you're reading this, I just want to assure you that everything is okay. The cows are fine and I am much, much more careful about throwing out the hay. Promise. I really hope you've gotten this far before booking flights home.

So that was a fairly interesting start to the week. Nothing quite so dramatic has happened since. Unless you count having to chase a rooster that got out of its enclosure. Apart from some incredibly impressive swearing on my part, the only other thing that was impressive was how much of a fool the rooster made me look as I was chasing it. 100 f-words later I had it cornered and managed to place it back with the rest of the roosters. Jo found it pretty funny. Thankfully she wasn't taking photos.

In case you were thinking we didn't, we did actually take some photos this week though. Firstly we went out and did a bit of sight-seeing. This is what we found:

We also went to the Franklin Country Market in Pokeno. We found some pretty interesting things there. For beginners, there was this guy:

While I was distracted by the hypnotic power of double denim, Jo was off getting her sugar fix sorted;

It was hard to decide how many scoops to get. There was so much choice:

I've decided that before we leave the farm, I will go back to this market and get a seven scoop icecream cone. After all, what's the worst that could happen?

Graduation

Yes, this week was graduation. I feel the same proud trepidation now as I felt leaving university all those years ago. The ceremony (read: dropping my Aunty and Uncle at airport) took place on Thursday and the reins to the farm were officially passed over. The weight of the keys in my hand seemed as heavy as the responsibility that came with them. For some reason I was instantly reminded of some wisdom from my childhood, and it's that advice that I'll keep with me during my time on the farm. Through every rain soaked delivery of hay; every electric shock I get after forgetting to turn the fence off; every time I wonder if I remembered to shut a gate; and especially every time the alarm goes off at 6am and it is still pitch black outside, I will not TRY to be a farmer, I WILL be a farmer.

To be honest, the changeover had begun for both Jo and I earlier in the week. First it manifested itself in an odd desire to pray for rain as opposed to willing the rain to stop. It seems being in a drought will do that to you. Other things were more tangible, such as our wardrobes. I've already mentioned what is inappropriate attire:

(I was attempting to jump over a fence at the time of the incident. The only plus side it that I looked pretty awesome doing it.)

So we thought we'd better get some proper gear. After all, we weren't going to be the apprentices any longer, we were going to be the masters.

BEHOLD:

Trackpants and Gumboots!!! The wonders will never cease.

Of course, Jo and I still had a few last minute lessons to learn before my Aunty and Uncle took off on their European sojourn. The first of these was shifting the lord of the manor (otherwise known as Andrew):

This is me thinking that it might be best to get out of his way:

It turns out I didn't actually need to worry that much as he's a pretty big softy:

Well, either that or he was distracted by the hay.

As for Jo, she was asked if she would mind planting some cabbages for the garden. She's the first to admit that it's not her favourite pastime. Especially when bloodthirsty predators sneak up on you from behind:

I've yet to tell her about the much worse hairy beasts that tend to inhabit hay sheds. Because of the lack of rain we've had to start feeding the cows hay. To them, we're pretty much meals on wheels.

And now here we are. In charge. As I mentioned last time, we have been into the big smoke a few times. According to Jo's friend Auckland is "road works and little else", which is certainly what we've been encountering. Although they do have an enormous Real Groovy record store and suburbs like Ponsonby, which is just cafe's and shops; something Jo is pretty pleased about.

I also mentioned last time about the clay bird shooting, and it is with those photos that I leave you with. Rest assured that these first few days have been good. While we may not be about to have a complete career change, the clean air and quiet countryside are doing us both good. And I personally think that the trackpants and gumboots are pretty fetching too.

Enjoy:

My cousin Richard in charge of the clay bird thrower thingy. You can tell I'm good with this kind of thing.

This is me missing. One of the many times.

My cousin Joshua collecting the clay birds he missed. Okay, that I missed.

And this is a photo of me moments before I actually hit one. With the weakest gun of the lot. I'm pretty sure that being a better shot with a less powerful gun means that I am actually a great shot. There's logic in there somewhere.

The Beginning

Two weeks ago, if you'd told me that there were farmers and then there was everyone else, I probably wouldn't have believed you. But such is the breadth of knowledge my inert brain has had to ingest over the last fortnight that I am now realising how wrong I was.

What kind of knowledge? Well, for starters: skinny black jeans do not appropriate farming attire make; and despite aiming directly at a neighbours house a few hundred metres away with a shotgun, the inhabitants of that house are not in danger because the pellets won't actually make it that far. Yes, it seems I am now enrolled in the University of (Farming) Life.

Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Here is some background as to why this blog has even come into existence. A couple of months ago, my Aunty and Uncle contacted me to ask if my partner Jo and I would be interested in looking after their 26 acre Highland Cattle farm in Pukekohe for four months while they were away on holiday in Europe. As we were both seeking work (or "employed by the government to actively job search" if you prefer) and were looking to move to Auckland anyway, we thought, "why not? How hard can it be? We've both visited farm's before, that's enough experience isn't it? And Pukekohe is closer to Auckland than Gisborne or Christchurch." Basically we were both optimistic.

By the time we'd said yes, there was no turning back. We'd bought the farm, so to speak. Or perhaps less morbidly, we were set for greener pastures.

We'd decided on a two week induction, giving us plenty of time to learn the ropes before being left to our own devices. This is us being chauffeured around our new domain:

We had our first encounter with the animals we'd be sharing our time with:

With names like Neil, Jock and Hamish, it helps to soften those otherwise sharp looking horns.

Of course, there are the farm dogs, Huntaway Kupe and Jack Russell Terrier Tera (whose photo will come later):

Things during these first few days have gone well, if I do say so myself. Aside from some fairly dodgy digging of ditches (it's been a while since a spade has been gripped by these hands) and a lack of rain making things tricky in regards to the level of water in the tank, only one thing has really challenged Jo and I during the week:

There'd been talk of killing a lamb for a few days and we both found ourselves doing some soul searching as to what our involvement would be in the process. Essentially as we both eat meat, it seemed a bit hypocritical to shy away from seeing the process of how the meat ends up in a delicious pile on our plates. As preparations were made and the event approached, we found ourselves facing the moment of truth. At which time I distinctly remember an urgent bit of business came to my attention and I had to go and do some work for the MTV website. No really, I did. Seriously! As for Jo, she probably would have been the more iron stomached of us both, but she didn't seem to mind when she was given the task of preparing vegetables for dinner instead.

And so, in a few days we will be in charge, with plenty of notes to refer to and plenty of people's contact numbers making up our emergency list. Next time I get around to writing this blog, there'll be reports of clay bird shooting, heading into the Big Smoke and hopefully not too much drama on the home front.

Until then, enjoy a couple of short videos featuring the aforementioned bulls and a whole lot of chickens.