O Christmas Tree

My flat is the perfect size for me, but with a tree it might get a little crowded.  Plus a tree would cost money to have and decorate and since i’m a poor student that wasn’t a good idea either.  My Mom suggested a great idea.  She suggested I paint a tree on the big window I have.  So that’s what I’ve done. 


I thought at the same time I would show you the steps I took to make it.  I used acrylic paint since it will come off easily when I want to remove it.  I’ll apologize now for some of the pictures.  They are blurry because it’s hard to take a picture of a window.


Step one:   I took green and mixed it with brown for the darker shades and a little white for the lighter shade.  Then I just painted a tree mimicking the branches.  For the trunk I used brown mixed with black, and then mixed with white for the lighter part.

Step Two: Add lights, just like you were decorating a real tree.

Step Three: Garland next.  I forgot to take a picture with just the garland added. 
Step Four: I outlined the ornaments using the top of a pop can as a stamp.  I also added some ornaments with the copper color.

Step Five:  I filled in the ornament balls with white since I was going to shade them in color.

 




Step Six: Filled in the ornaments with some color.
Step Seven: I added the reflections of the “lights” into the ornaments.
Step Eight: Add Star. (and yes, I made that too.)

Here’s my finished tree:
At Night.

 

During the day:

Merry Christmas Everyone!

How do Canadians Rock? Let me count the ways...

 

This is the main street by the school today.

In case you haven't seen the news, Edinburgh is currently experiencing "arctic conditions" and "extreme weather" conditions.  To us Canadians, it's a regular day in the winter, probably Jan type snow.  Not too cold, the "arctic conditions" is 0C to -7C so far.  We have about a foot of snow in my area and more or less in others.  It does have a few ice layers within it.

 (See the snowman village out there?)

For the last 3 days I listened and cringed at those in my apartment complex getting stuck on the hill (~10 degree slope).  When they get stuck they hold their gas pedal down and rev the engine.  Not only is this extremely ineffective it also makes the hill ice for everyone else.

Today I desperatly needed groceries.  So I went down to dig my car out of the foot of snow it was buried under.  Did I mention that they don't plow parking lots here?  Now it should have been a clue when I was out shopping just before "winter" had started and I saw ice scrapers everywhere by no snow brushes; it's apparent now.  So armed with my plastic dust pan (the closest thing to a shovel I have) I headed to my car. 

First thing that was obvious when I was outside was a guy just uphill of my car stuck and another guy helping to push him out.  I started digging out my car while watching them struggle.  He was also following the "i'm stuck, hold the gas down" ineffective strategy.  After getting tired of watching and listening to "rrrrRRRRR, rrrrRRRRR".  I walked over and told them that it might be better to try rocking the car.  After explaining I was from Canada and was use to the snow of course.  I was going to offer to push but after they completely disregarded any of my advice there was no way I was going to potentially hurt myself by helping them.  So I went back to my car.

Another 5 minutes or so went by and he was still stuck but I noticed that they were starting to rock the car.  (hhhmpft!)  They finally got the car back into the parking space and were giving up trying to get it free.  Then they started questioning why I was cleaning my car off.  I explained that I needed to go shopping.  The guy looked at me and said "you must be brave after seeing what I just went through".  I laughed and said this is nothing.  Both guys then disappeared.

I admit it did take a while to free my car and it involved a few times of getting stuck, cleaning out packed snow and moving forward and back a bit BUT I got it free.  And not only did I get it free I made it up the hill no problem and went on my way shopping.

Here's the parking lot at the mall.  Compared to Canada this is a disgrace!  Parking spots filled with snow and piles of snow.

I ran into a few chatty people in the store and the subject of the weather always came up and they were all astonished that I had not only gotten my car dug out but had DRIVEN it to the mall.

I finished my shopping and loaded up the car and headed home.  I pulled into my driveway; drove down the hill with no problem around the bottom of the building and BACKED UP the back hill so that I could pull into a parking spot with my nose pointed out all ready for future snow fall.

So how to Canadians Rock?
1. dug out own car by myself.
2. didn't give up!
3. got car unstuck
4. drove to mall
5. drove back from mall
6. parked
7. IN REVERSE!!

 

Yeah, Eh!

And then there were two...

So my home-made live mouse trap has still not caught my intruder.  I'm pretty convinced that it doesn't spend all of it's time here.  Once I catch sight of it and see it; for example when I pulled out the bottom drawer and found it in the drawer, I don't see it again for a few days.

Once again I was sitting at my computer when I saw the blur of grey by the bird cage.  Thinking I could catch this mouse by hand into a plastic container I went after it.  I know where it hides, the bottom drawer.  I yanked open the drawer...

Even though I'm not scared of mice, when I saw this:

I admit, I screamed like a little girl.  Now if someone had been recording what happened next I may have been able to win on America's Funniest Videos.  As I screamed and tried to get my mind functioning again, the two mice sprung out of the drawer.  One leapt contorting it's body as it did so, hit the floor running and disappeared around the corner of the door towards my living room.  The other leapt straight up, contorting it's body as well, hit the ground upside-down, then ran in the opposite direction with me following right behind.  It hit the wall under my radiator like a car hitting a wall.  Regained it's footing and ran under my bookshelves.  Now I'm ripping stuff away from the bottom of the bookshelves looking for it.

So now I know there are two mice in my flat (at least some of the time).  Now the chance of having more appear has increased considerably.  Now it's war.

I made a second live trap, it's much simpler than the first.  It's a toilet paper tube folded flat on one side which hangs off a ledge, with peanut butter on the hanging edge.  The idea is that the mouse enters the tube to get the bait and the weight of the mouse tips the mouse off the ledge into a waiting bucket.

I have also admitted partial defeat to this wise, intelligent Scottish mice.  I went and bought a live mouse trap as well.  All are set and I wait to see what's there when I get home tonight.

A Mouse in the House

I live in a 6 story complex, on the 5th floor (4th level if you are from here).  According to my Mom this means that I didn't see a mouse the other day.  But let me start from the beginning.

On Tues evening I was in the kitchen and out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of grey and a swish of a tail before it disappeared under my fridge.  I wasn't convinced at what I saw.  I should add that I didn't jump or startle, but that's from working at Wild at Heart in the beginning when we had a mouse problem.  I'll save that story for another day.

In case I wasn't just seeing things I decided to build a homemade live trap.  It's a fairly simple concept.  You get a deep bucket (or something similarly shaped), a piece of wire that is long enough to hang over the edges of the bucket, a pop can or bottle and something to build a ramp out of.

You poke the wire through the pop bottle lengthwise and lay that over the top of the bucket.  Then build a ramp up to the edge of the bucket.  To bait it you simply put peanut butter on the bottle; I'm told that this is the best mouse bait.  Here's my set up:

Everything I have read and been told has stated that peanut butter is the best attractor for mice; after 3 days of having the trap set I was not convinced.  Now I was starting to wonder if I had imagined seeing it.


Last night I was sitting at my desk labeling photos of animal skulls for my anatomy workbook.  I usually have a TV show or movie playing on my computer as background noise but I was currently between videos.  Kaitee (my senegal parrot) was half sleeping on her cage when I heard a very quiet crunch.  I thought - I know that noise, that's a rodent chewing!  I stared at the cage watching Kaitee to make sure that it wasn't her that made the noise.

I heard it again!

I went over to the cage and pulled everything out from underneath it, searched through the box of toys I have underneath it, and...nothing.  Hmmmpft.  Now I'm starting to question my sanity, maybe I didn't see a mouse, maybe it was Kaitee grinding her beak that I heard.

But then I heard it again.  So I pulled everything out from under the cage and emptied the toy box.  Still nothing.  Then I heard it again, this time since I was standing so close I was certain it wasn't Kaitee.  Kaitee who at this point was actively watching me very closely.

I pulled the small drawer unit that is beside the cage out and...

in the corner of the room was a little grey mouse.  Now in case it isn't obvious the picture above is not a picture of the actual mouse.  I saw it long enough to get a description but not long enough to catch it before it ran out of the room.  It was facing the corner happily chewing a seed, unaware that I had just removed the drawer unit it was hiding behind.  It must have sense the change because it glanced over it's shoulder threw the seed down and took off.

So my trap remains set.  I added the sunflower seeds since this mouse seems to prefer them and I wait.

Neither snow nor rain nor sleet nor dark of night

You should have recognized that as the postman's creed- 

"Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."

 Here they have added a bit nor sufficient postage.  Allow me to contrast the Canadian system as I know it to the Scottish system as I know it.

Canadian Post
If you don't put sufficient postage on an envelope it gets returned to the sender immediately.  As the sender you have defaulted the original postage as it's been "used".  You then put the correct postage on the envelope and mail it again.

Royal Mail
As explained to me by the guy at my local mail depot, so I can't guarantee this is completely accurate.  If you mail a letter here with insufficient postage it still gets sent.  The receiver gets a notice that they have a letter to pick up.  In order to pick up their letter they have to pay the difference between the postage already paid and the actual postage required.  As well there is a one pound administration fee added.  The mail depot holds the letter for 3 weeks and if it is not picked up it gets returned to the sender.  I'm not sure if then the sender would have to pay anything.  If there isn't a return address on the envelope it goes to a holding depot where they open it and attempt to find a return address that way.

I found this out when I was picking up a package from the depot and the gentleman ahead of me had to pay a 1.10 pounds for a birthday card. 

The Milking Experience

On Thursday our practical was milking at Langhill Farm.  The practical that I had been looking forward to since school started.  Everyone who had already done it had told me that it was messy and that they had to duck flying poo and swinging tails covered in poo.  Yet I was still anxious to do it.
Standard procedure once you get to either farm; Langhill (dairy cattle) or Easter Bush (sheep), you put on “waterproofs” and “wellies”.  (Translation: waterproof shirt and pants and rubber boots.)  Then we are broken down into smaller groups.  This week we were broken down into groups for milking, cattle handling, weighing and condition scoring and sheep handling. 
The milking parlour is a 28:28 Herringbone parlor.  It holds 28 cows at a time and milks them with it's 28 milking units.  In contrast there are parlours that hold 28 cows but only have 14 milking units.

First the layout of the parlor.

Aerial view.




Here's an example of a very clean, high tech milking parlour.  The keypads are the computerized milking units.

The cows are moved from the field or cow shed and into the collecting yard just behind the milking parlor.  Here they can become impatient and push at the milk gate trying to be the first in. 

Here's an example of the receiver (blue part) that they pass through before entering the parlour.  This identifies the cow for the milking machine and automatic concentrate feeder.

Each machine has it’s own milking cluster.

 

Now the process

The cows are herded into the collecting yard then let into the milking parlor 14 per side.  As they pass through the blue curtains they are identified.  The machines know by the identification number of the cow what their normal daily yield is and will alert you if you need to hold their milk from the bulk tank.  Reasons for not putting their milk into the bulk tank are if they have antibiotics in their system or they have just calved and you want the colostrum for the calves.
Once the cows are in the parlor you start with a dry wipe of the teats.  This is apparently the best way to prevent bacteria in the milk.




Then you attach the cluster which to reach the front teats requires that you lean right in. Sometimes the cows get antsy and kick their feet around a bit.  So you have to watch for that.





As the cows are being milked the feed troughs automatically feed the cow concentrate to supplement them for the amount of milk they are giving. It's a very fine line; they want to feed them enough for them to produce the milk but not too much that they gain weight.

At langhill the clusters are automatically removed.  They sense the decrease in milk flow past a set point and let air into the unit.  By doing this the suction is broken and the cluster falls off, at the same time there is a retractable cord that the machine winds up so that the cluster is pulled up behind the cow.  Some of the cows know that they are done and start to kick their back feet around.  At this point you can gently tug on the cluster to remove it if the cow hasn't done so already.

After the cluster comes off the teats are then sprayed with iodine to prevent infection.


In case you didn’t know, cows are indiscriminate poopers**.  They poop and pee whenever and wherever they feel like it, including during milking.  If you didn’t notice in the milking parlor picture you are standing 2 feet lower than the cows.  This puts their floor at mid-thigh to waist level.  This means that when they poop or pee it splatters and that means it splatters on YOU.  They are also really great at using their tail as a poop flinging device.  So at some point during the experience you will get poop on you.  Hopefully it hits the waterproofs and not your face.


Here is the reason Holstein-Friesian cows are black and white.



And where does condensed milk come from?

hehehehe.



**I’m borrowing this term from a friend.

A Thousand Words.

I was going to tell you about my awesome (early) Christmas present, but figure maybe I should actually use it before telling you about it.  So for now you have to wait.
Instead I shall share some pictures with you.  All are pictures that I took, so please no stealing! 

Sheep at Easter Bush

 































Heading out to the fields.

Cows!

Well the first two are calves…



I love the expression on this guy.


























Did you call?












 
Stopping on the way to the milking parlour to pose.












Everyone heading to the milking parlour.

Driving

 
One of the reasons it’s so confusing to drive here.  This is a street corner, notice the two signs pointing away from each other both say “Warriston Crematorium”.










Reason two: Notice the lights…showing green and red at the same time, plus multiple lights to pay attention to.

Shopping

You might have to click on this one to see it better.  There is a guy holding a sign that points to an checkout that is open or has less people waiting.  What a job!










I find this card hilarious.  In case you can’t read it:

“Leopards are easily spotted.  Just fill in the white circles with black ink.”

Sights

     
Edinburgh Castle.  The stands in front are for the Military Tattoo.











On the shores of Fife.  When my Mom and I first got to this spot the tide wasn’t in.  These waves are the result of the tide coming in and I managed to catch the wave breaking as well as the dogs reaction.

Scotland Weather

I shall end my picture showing with a picture that I feel shows the weather here perfectly.  I took this picture after a short shower from my balcony overlooking a park.  This is the complete image, no cropping, Photoshop or editing in any way has occurred.

Casting Sheep and Aging

It has nothing to do with broken bones.  You do it for foot trims, and shearing.
                                      *
Now I’ll try and describe the process of getting the sheep in this position.
First your eye down your sheep.  This involves picking out which sheep you want to catch out out the herd of sheep.
 
                       *
The main reason for picking the sheep you want to catch is to prevent you from randomly running around changing your focus as they start to scatter.


Once you have picked your sheep you need to approach it and try not to startle it.  Then you use one hand and lift up it’s chin, the other hand you put on the tail to stop it from backing up.  For better handling you can hold the sheep against a fence or gate.

*







At his point you can age the sheep by looking at its teeth.



**Picture removed**
These are milk teeth.  All the teeth are narrow and the same size.





 **Picture removed**
The first two adult teeth have ruptured.  They are a lot broader than the milk teeth.
This means the sheep is around 1 yr 3 months old.



**Picture removed**

The 2nd set of adult teeth have erupted.
1 yr 9 months.




**Picture removed** 
The 3rd set have erupted.  The tooth on the right is the last milk tooth and the tooth beside it is an adult tooth that has just erupted.



**Picture removed**
Another picture showing the 3rd set of adult teeth.
2 yrs 3 months.



**Picture removed**
All permanent adult teeth are in at 2 yrs 9 months.  The gums recede making the teeth look more spaced out.





Okay, lets move on to casting the sheep.  Once you have caught the sheep you want to turn the head inwards toward it’s hip.  If you wish to try to exhaust the sheep by holding it in this format and running around in a circle again and again, go ahead.  I did.  I’ll tell you though, it exhausts you and not the sheep. (AT ALL).



Then you put your hand just in front of the hip and while taking a step backwards slightly you lift up with the hand on the hip.  Did I mention that the sheep we were handling are Suffolk and Scottish Mule (both ~90kg).
*
If you do this part incorrectly you end up running around in a circle again.  If you do it correctly you end up with this:

















Once you have them like this they become very floppy and will willingly sit there.














They even get this relaxed:









*

Now you know how to do it.  It may sound easy.  Heck it might even look easy if you watch someone experienced do it.  Take it from me, IT’s NOT!  There is a definitely a trick to it and once you’ve got it, you’ve got it.

You say Tomato…

We are in the middle of our Embryology lectures now.  Learning about how an embryo develops into recognizable parts, but if only it was that easy.  We learn the 3 germ layers and from there, where each type of tissue in the body derives from.  It’s more complicated than that, but I won’t put you through that.

So that’s what I did today - “revised” my embryology.  That’s what they say here instead of "studying” 

You don’t give a cashier a “bill”, you give them a “note”.  Don’t go shopping for waterproof “pants”, look for waterproof “trousers”.  The term pants here refers to underwear.  You don’t trim your “bangs”, it’s your “fringe”.  You would call me on my “mobile”, give me directions to the “toilet” and put your “rubbish” in the “bin”.  A “jumper” isn’t an outfit for a baby, it’s a sweater.

I also learned that you “flip” a coin, but “cast” a sheep.  Stay tuned till tomorrow for those details!

So I have been slacking…

 

I’ll come right out and admit it.  I’ve been slacking.  I promised everyone that I would keep my blog updated, oops. 

I’m still working on getting into a good rhythm / schedule with school and studying and cleaning and all those things that you have to do but don’t really want to sometimes.  I’ve been spoiled working as a paramedic with my 5 days on, 2 days off, 5 days off, 2 days on schedule.  How have people managed to do this with only 2 days off?!?  That’s probably my biggest adjustment so far – not having long enough weekends.  Especially with only a washer/dryer combo, you can’t put a new load in the washer and move the first load into the dryer.  Instead you have to take the wet clothes out, hang them up, hand iron the wrinkles out, then put the next load in.  If you forgot to put softener into the wash, you end up with wrinkly stiff shirts…  Did I mention that the washer drum is about the size of 3 paint cans?

 

Meanwhile my old washer that I left behind was huge. 

Well…maybe not quite that big.  But it definitely fit more than my current one.  Putting 6 shirts in it is about the limit.  AND the drying thing is a whole number story.

I always thought a washer/dryer would be a great thing.  Put your dirty clothes in and then an hour or so later take out your clean fluffed dry clothes.  NOT EVEN CLOSE.

First off, if you over fill it you’re in trouble.  Second, because you are using the same drum to wash and dry it’s very wet inside when it starts to dry.  That means that it heats up all that water and steams your clothes.  If you take your clothes out before they are dry they are hot steaming soaking wet articles that you try and hang up without stretching.  So I bet you are thinking, “duh! why not leave them in until they are fully dry?”.  Well you have to guess how long to put the dryer on, because you can’t just open the door stick your hand in and check.  You have to stop the machine by turning the dial to off, then wait 2 minutes for the door to unlock.  Usually by that point I’ve gotten sidetracked and forgotten that I was doing the laundry…

Anyways, what was I saying?  Oh yeah, laundry.  So if you happen to guess longer than necessary to dry your clothes you end up with dry clothes in nice compact wrinkled balls. 

And a bottle of this

just isn’t going to cut it.

 

 

 

 

Till tomorrow when I’ll post again!